I write, speak, invest, network, and question to stimulate fruitful conversation. Let's talk about human flourishing! It begins with freedom. Holy leisure is the key to human being, freedom and generativity. Please join me in the adventure of realizing Christ!
This is the post that led to the talk, Women on the Way to Healing: She had a strong faith, a good Catholic husband, ten children, a beautiful home, good looks, a bright and well-educated mind, a healthy lifestyle, and a depression that just wouldn’t quit. She was my friend, and she’s dead.
I feel sad, and tired, and wounded, and frustrated. We have people all around us who are so fractured they can barely appropriate the riches they are immersed in. We talk about discipleship as though it’s a matter of getting faith into the faithless, when perhaps we should think more about getting faith fully absorbed by the faith-full. It’s about the content, but also about the integrity of the vessel.
My friend plunged back and forth from the ‘on’ mode (homemaking, new baby joy, meal plans, ideas for the future) to the ‘off’ (drowning in anger and self-loathing, unable to pray, hiding this ‘other self’ from the gaze of anyone who might guess how far the dis-integration had progressed). Too much of her time was spent covering over the growing dark reality with a surface tension of activity and normalcy. Avoidance of the dissonance within herself, fear of giving ‘it’ power by paying too much attention, and complete inability to reconcile the poles of opposition in her own thoughts and behavior all tore at the fabric of being. That fabric – woven of a blend of true faith, real nobility and substance, and good intentions – became increasingly easy to tear as despair eroded hope that escape from depression’s grip was even possible.
Ironically, the very strength of character that made it possible for her to bear these tensions so long, helped make it seem to others all really might be well for her in time. It was too easy to depend on one so gifted to find a way past the condemnation and brokenness of her own being, for the sake of the family she loved. Who takes charge when The Mom is impotent to help herself? Where does anyone look for help when the same woman who is all-providing, all-organizing, all-capable is powerless to help herself? Who could have believed that one so blessed, so creative, so loving could be bearing in her depths such unhealed wounds, such unexpressed need?
I don’t have fill-in-the-blank answers. I’m just hurting – for her, for her family, for all the women out there who have their act ‘so together’ no one realizes how desperately they need help, for all who labor under the illusion they can hold the tension of their own wounded souls together well enough to make it seem God is doing a great job. God forbid He get blamed for what is wrong in me, or that the Church take flak for my imperfections, or that my flaws undermine someone else’s faith in His power to heal, or that anyone use my weakness to call into question the idea of living a Christian life.
If anyone out there is maintaining an illusion of being a poster child for all that is good and holy, but violating yourself to do it, I beg you to step back and seek the help you need. Even if your honesty shakes someone else’s faith, your healing will ultimately do more for those around you!
What God asks of us as women, wives, mothers, is impossible. We cannot ‘do Christian life’ in our own strength. The demands are meant to bring us to our knees in supplication for the grace and help we need. God’s strength is made perfect through our weakness. Oh God, that the tragedy of this woman’s life bring others to You offering weakness, poverty, need, flaws, imperfection and emptiness as a vessel for you to fill!
I recommend Fr. Longenecker’s book, Praying the Rosary for Inner Healing; consecration to Mary (see Fr. Gaitley’s book, 33 Days to Morning Glory); Catholic psychological help (see links, below); and the friendship of strong women to whom you can say, “HELP!” when you need it.
This is my most-requested audio – about how we can educate our children well, despite our own inadequacies. The Problem – We must get kids from where they are, to where they need to be; from ‘uneducated’ to ‘educated’. Given the poverty of our own education, we feel asked to do the impossible: build a […]
Some audiences want to cut right to the chase: “Give us practical applications of all your ideas about Sabbath-keeping.” OK – here you go: In this talk I do just that – give concrete, practical ways to dip into the kind of leisure that brings interior equanimity and leaves you more whole, more human, more […]
I prepared this talk for the Heart of a Woman group, in Kansas City, shortly after the suicide of a Catholic mother of ten. It was a shock to me, but not entirely unexpected, as I had known her during the years she struggled with depression and disintegration, despite her devotion to the Church, Christ, […]
For an Apostles of the Interior Life Women’s Retreat, where the theme was “The King Desires Your Beauty,” I prepared this truly interesting talk. Will you believe me when I say that this is another of my favorites?!?! I know, I’ve said that about a lot of these talks, but revisiting them to give a […]
I once asked a friend who calls herself a Jewish-Catholic if it had been hard for her to accept Mary’s role in Salvation History. She laughed and said, “Heck no! Every Sabbath was begun by a Jewish mama’s prayers! I’d have been suspicious if Lord Sabbaoth hadn’t come through a woman.” Jewish women welcomed Sabbath […]
Differences between the original myth of Cupid and Psyche, and C.S. Lewis’ retelling of the myth in Till We Have Faces have the effect of revealing new dimensionality in the Christian understanding of both myth and of the human person. The pre-Christian myth, like the pre-Christian person, is veiled in a darkness that constitutes a […]
In “Stour Valley and Dedham Church” Constable has painted the Vale of Dedham – a familiar and beloved area of his native England.
“The Merry Drinker,” by Frans Hals This is a portrait of an unnamed man, called in the title only ‘a merry drinker’.
Giotto’s painting, The Wedding Feast at Cana, portrays the literal and spiritual senses of this story.
Berlinghieri’s St. Francis appears behind the altar of San Francesco in Pescia, Italy. It is an excellent example of art ordered to divine worship.
A mom is the caretaker of a huge, wonderful, potentially beautiful, critically important place! She, herself, this actual, unique person, is the single most important ‘environment’ in the lives of her children. Like Mary, like the Church, she is an atmosphere. She is an atmosphere of affection. This is not just warm, fuzzy feelings, but […]
Benedictine College hosted a Symposium for Advancing the New Evangelization in 2014. The theme was Transcendentals as Preambles to Faith, and I got to propose my take on that as a paper. Anyone who knows me could probably have bet good money I’d do something ‘three dimensional’ with that, and they’d have won those bets. […]
I once got a chance to do an all-day retreat with one of the sister Apostles of the Interior Life. Naturally, I wanted to discuss the role of leisure in the formation of persons! As usual, I prayed about the upcoming event, and God brought together several threads of my contemplation to weave this talk. […]
Did you know YOU are a poem? Check out Ephesians 2:10, where the Greek ‘poema’ is usually translated ‘workmanship’. I like ‘poema’ better, as it implies beauty and artistry, but ‘workmanship’ is nice. I’ve discussed the importance of poetry, poetic education, poetic imagination and poetic reading in many different venues (many of the talk topics […]
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