12/13/14

This morning I climbed a mountain strewn with huge rocks and bounders and as I reached the top, a friend reached down to help pull me up the rest of the way. I stood with the other like minded souls as we called out to people to join us there on the mountain. I called a few children to stand with us while angels came to join us from the future and monks and priests filled our ranks until we covered the mountain top with our spiritual presence. As one, we called on God to fill us with energy, each in their own way.

I felt God enter my soul in drops like golden rain falling upon parched ground. I felt in great need of a lifting up of spirit this morning. I watched the children smile with their new strength and power and laughed as I reminded them that the energy they felt was hug power not punch power. One of the boys was shadow boxing the air. The children had left by the time we descended the mountain.

As I walked down the mountain I asked Jesus to help me find and go to the people I felt most concerned with this morning, the many desperate mothers here in America. I went to one mother who sat at her kitchen table who seemed filled with despair from worry. She and her children were in need of so much and she was desperate to find a job. I talked to her and hugged her and asked Jesus and the angels to find work for her.

“Keep looking for work,” I whispered to her. “You will find a job soon.”

I went to another mother in the same predicament. She lashed out one of the children in anger and then felt contrite and ashamed. I hugged her and held her hands in mine as I told her not to give up. “Keep putting in applications.” She cried that no one was taking applications. “They will soon. The angels will help you. I promise.”

Jesus nodded that the angels would help her. They do such good work, forever unseen and constantly unrewarded they go about soothing our woes. We should be so grateful for all the angels who follow Jesus and work for our benefit. I am glad that during the Christmas season we remember there are such beings as angels, even if we do fill their images with glitz and glitter. Still, the season reminds us of many important things we tend to put aside the rest of the year.

I worry so much about some mothers who seem on the edge of falling off the cliff, dropping down to street level, and taking their children with them. Their situation seems extra sad at this time of year. One women told me her children didn’t get a Thanksgiving and, without some kind of help, they wouldn’t have a Christmas either. I was able to send her to a church where I hope she will get something for her children. I like to think there are other family members who a mother can go to for temporary support. This is what families are for, to give care and concern to one another, unless they too have been plowed under with joblessness. We seem to be growing a permanent underclass here in America. When I take calls for St. Vincent de Paul there always seem one or two people who I deeply empathize with and feel sorrow for in their dire circumstance. I often wish the churches in Detroit had more to give but sometimes even they are struggling.

Yet many businesses donate food, beds and other things especially at Christmas time. Eastern Market will give out Christmas baskets again this year at Sacred Heart Church, but I am afraid that the need may be greater than what will be available. It seems like so many are looking for work, or if working, not making enough to keep the bills paid.

It is wonderful that certain business hire and try to hold on to workers even during hard times. If the economy is growing as they say, it is taking a long time to reach ground level. I have talked to some mothers with young children who have went past the cut off date for welfare and so receive nothing but food stamps, yet they try to keep going. Jobs were more plentiful when those welfare laws were passed. Now, any job will do if a mother can just get enough work to keep heat and a roof over the children’s heads.

Where did all the jobs go? No one ever thinks about it but the flip side of joblessness is an end to crime. Who ever heard of a person working full time and then going out to steal copper wire or a car. Imagine if every one in Detroit who wanted a job could get one. If every able bodied person went to work every day who would be left to commit most of the crime? Only the drug abusers, and such. Oh, well. Maybe if the economy keeps growing jobs will become more plentiful. For now, I applaud those few companies who are willing to cut into their profit in order to keep a person employed or to give someone new a job.

12/14/14

Jesus told me during mass this morning that “It is accomplished.”

He was referring to the chore he set out for me to do. My writing on the web has achieved what Jesus intended. This means that I won’t be writing as often as before, although I may still write comments on our social woes and put photos of my paintings on the web. Certainly, I will continue to meditate and meet with others upon the mountain once or twice a week, and I will still write about any strange lands we might visit. I intend to spend more time improving my writing and artistic skills. I need to complete my last novel, have fun writing more short stories, and keep painting. Maybe I can begin selling some of the paintings in a few years.    

Father Thomas asked all of us during his sermon this morning to think about why we come to church. An answer came to my mind quickly—Isaiah. The reading today was a good example of how Isaiah can reaffirm our love for God. Chapter 61: “The spirit of the Lord is upon me,…” His poetic lines sink in deeper and say more than any factual statement ever could. I wish I could do as well.

Also, during the mass for Mary the other evening, when Father Thomas combined Jesus birth and death in the same sentence, my mind suddenly clicked with understanding for my own strange, Christmas tradition. Every Christmas I feel the need to sit in front of my decorated tree with a glass of wine while listening to Mozart’s Requiem Mass. A odd choice for Christmas. Yet, while I listen I am reminded once again that maybe it takes the tragedy and woes of this earth to produce such a genius as Mozart who’s music is so soul touching it will stay with us forever.

Displaced in America

12/26/14

I don’t have much to say this morning, just notes about different subjects. I think I just wanted an excuse to put my latest painting here on the web. Every once in a while I paint a now-future prediction and this is one of them. It is called “Displaced in America,” It is happening more and more lately as the weather gets more destructive and less predictable. After painting these few pictures, I feel done with the subject so can move on to other types of paintings.

I truly enjoyed Christmas this year. I kept thinking of how pleasant and happy many people are at this time of year with the music, and hustle and shopping and food. I love the concentration on Jesus, angels and giving and wish it was like this all year through. I notice that even people who are not religious give from their hearts at this time of year and isn’t love the basis for all religion? As Jesus once tried to tell us, Love is the whole of the law. If you’ve found how to love, you have found God.

I was going to write about the man who’s gas and electric is off and could be turned on for a small amount that he can’t seem to get from any source. Thaw won’t help unless your bill is at least $250.00 over due. I’d like to know the reasoning behind this because DTE turns the gas off even a person owes less then a hundred dollars. But there is not much sense in writing about what we all know, that there are many desperate people are here in America and around the globe.

What I truly wish for most is less charity and more employment and education. I have found that charity, though wonderful and giving, leaves too many empty holes, holes hollow like a dried out sponge. It seems that the truly desperate aren’t as aggressive in reaching out or lack the transportation or know how to search or pick up what is freely given.

I have noticed that much of the charity goes to those who are able to take the brash step of reaching for it, while others get passed by. More jobs and freer education would solve this problem. As much as I dislike politics, I might get deeper into it if it meant furthering people’s means to employment, a necessary ingredient for a true democracy.

12/25/14

As I sat in church this morning, I thought about how tarnished life had made me, mostly during my young adult years, but also how polished I feel now that I have been with Jesus for these many years. I realized once again how our many flaws and wrinkles just need time to be worked and smoothed out. God intended we be this way, to be different, to very, to move in various directions, else we would all be from the same cut-outs, perfect clones instead of the growing people that we truly are as we change for the better. Yes, all is well on God’s world as we work through our pains and joys on the way to becoming.   

12/29/14

I have been thinking of what Jesus said, “It is accomplished.” It is typical of Jesus to evade saying exactly what it was he accomplished. He leaves it to us to figure it out. Some ideas are obvious such as meeting on the mountain in spirit form and traveling in spirit, but I suspect there are a number of nuanced and subtle ideas that I didn’t pick up on, as though Jesus threw out a net to catch more than fish, more than I could understand, even perhaps an underlying message to the enemy. This is just my idea but I think it is justified. No matter. Jesus still walks the earth along with his angels so who knows what other wisdoms he may give us to explore.

12/29/14

As usual, I sent out a number of Christmas and birthday prayer cards along with donations to various priests and monasteries. I thought about these during meditation this morning and asked myself how much meaning they have because the priests probably pray over a few thousand names in a basket. First, the person who receives the card knows I cared enough to send a prayer. Certainly Jesus and the angels knows each and every name. Also, I include each person I send a card to in my rosary prayers. So I believe that every card feeds the soul and also spreads thoughts of love and kindness, if only for a moment.