Pause+Pray

When the stress level and busyness in my life are high, I don’t always take time to thank God for the daily gifts he gives me.

In writing about a South African Women’s March for Freedom during the era of apartheid, poet June Jordan concludes a poem with the affirmation, “We are the ones we have been waiting for.”

Jesus came to the well on a hot day, tired from his long journey. He encountered a Samaritan woman and began to tell her personal, private details about her life no one else knew.

Think about the words of Mechthild of Magdeburg: “The Holy Spirit is our harpist/And all strings/Which are touched in Love/Must sound.”

While I am often goal-directed, I try to do something each day that neither toils nor spins, that doesn’t accomplish anything, that is simply joyful and fun. I believe God wants us to enjoy.

St. Augustine got a few things right, others spectacularly wrong. But his mother, St. Monica, never gave up on him.