changes

I'm starting to get over my jet lag, although I'm still finding it necessary to go to bed early! Three months of getting up in the wee hours of the morning has apparently changed my inner clock - or it just could be jetlag. We'll see.

I'm also starting to adjust to the changes in my life. Shifting from full time ministry back to full time Novitiate House Mode for one thing. We've also got a new community forming here at the Novitiate House. Some of the people that were here last year are gone, new people are here, and the two of us 2nd year Novices have returned from our ministry experience. So it's a time of navigating who is allergic to what foods (which I thought to ask yesterday after I'd cooked dinner but luckily it wasn't an issue!), how we want to organize our time and life together, etc... Really it's good experience, because in religious life - I'm discovering - you are often in transition. But it's a challenge.

We opened a time of discussion today with these words from Thomas Merton. We all experience transition in our lives, and I just love his perspective on it!

In a time of drastic change
one can be too preoccupied
with what is ending
or too obsessed with what seems
to be beginning.

In either case, one loses touch
with the present
and with its obscure
and dynamic possibilities.

What really matters is openness,
readiness,
attention
courage to face risks.

You do not need to know
precisely what is happening,
or exactly where it is all going.

What you need
is to recognize the possibilities
and challenges
offered by the present moment,
and to embrace them with courage,
faith,
and hope.

In such an event,
courage is the authentic form
taken by love.

We took turns reading this. There were a few chuckles (myself included) when it was my turn to read the lines "You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going." It's as if those lines were written for me!

But for now, I know I'm headed to bed.