come closer to me

"Come closer to me," he told his brothers.
When they had done so, he said:
"I am your brother Joseph, whom you once sold into Egypt.
But now do not be distressed,
and do not reproach yourselves for having sold me here.
It was really for the sake of saving lives that God
sent me here ahead of you."

This is from today's first reading (Genesis 45). I've always hated it when well-intentioned people, trying to find something to say when faced with tragedy in someone else's life, say things like "God has a plan" or "God never gives us more than we can handle" or "Things happen for a reason." I mean, how more annoying could you be? But you know what, sometimes it's true. As Joseph learned. And it's also freeing, to give up the pain and anger you feel due to the tragedy and accepting the gift that comes from that.

There's an older woman who just finished her term on my parish council. Whenever it was her turn to open or close one of our meetings with a prayer, she'd always end the prayer "Thank you for all you have given us. Thank you for all you have taken away from us." This used to bother me, in large part I think because I was dealing with the taking away of my beloved mother which I would not thank God for - no way no how. It irked me just like the "God has a plan" comments.

But at our last meeting, when she closed our prayer this way, it hit me deeply in my gut in a GOOD way. Sometimes I realized, God DOES take things away from us that we can't handle and that IS a gift. My application process for the groovy sisters, especially the autobiography, has had me doing some deep thinking about my life. I've realized the gift God gave me by getting my ass into therapy years ago where, after much struggle, I was able to let go of a lot of pain. The gift was not only the taking away of that pain, but the love and light from Christ that took its place. And although I refuse to accept that my mother had to suffer for ANY reason, there have been a lot of blessings in my life through that experience and since. For one thing, it's much more complicated and personal than I want to go into here on this blog, but what I went through during those 3 years is a big part of how I find myself on this journey.

Some Thursday evening thoughts ….. My stat counter says I'm over 3,000 visits by the way. Crazy …