The LIGHT of God's Presence

Photo: Karen Streveler, OSB

Recently I read a commentary on how we can find God in our ordinary places. It made me think a bit about how often I see God among some of the persons I connect with every day. Many of us have been delighted to discover God in familiar or unexpected persons and places. It got me starting to think of what I might be invited to consider as a Lenten change of heart. I started going through the litany of Lenten possibilities: patience, listening quietly to criticism without retaliating or losing my temper, choosing time for kindness over being so task-oriented that I’m really am not available for a small gesture that might make a world of difference for one lonely person.

I realize that I’m more than a bit hesitant to honestly name one specific attitude or behavior which is “less than how I want it to be.” If I’m willing to do it, it likely needs more specificity about what the opposite behaviors/attitudes would concretely look like. That’s where the persons around me that possess those transformed behaviors/attitudes might give me a small road map for guiding my desire to change. I can keep watching for it in persons around me. After I’ve I see it, how much courage would it take to stop them soon after I’ve witnessed it to make a simple comment to them about what I saw and why that made a difference for me? Maybe each time I name that behavior/attitude in another, it will become more embodied in me. Then both me and the other person may have received more “LIGHT for the path” forward.

Mary Rachel Kuebelbeck, OSB