Two Lesbians, One Dream: Community and Gay Catholics

I grew up in a home where visits were usually restricted to members of our extended family, the Swiss Chalet delivery person, and the Avon lady. We were an exceedingly shy bunch (an admission that would surprise most of those whom we’ve met in our professional lives, as well as many of those whom we’ve known socially). For all of us in my immediate family, socializing, especially with new people, was often very painful. Even as a fully-fledged adult working in a people-centred ‘helping’ profession, the discomfort of ‘meeting the other’ is an introversion side-effect and psychological heirloom with which I continue to struggle on a regular basis.

But this past year, I’ve learned so much about how to be in community. My wife and I both share a dream of building community; of helping to build bridges that honour, celebrate, and unite all people. For me, living our dream of community has meant learning how to welcome more than just the Avon lady into our home. It has meant facing fears about my own shortcomings, and taking risks way.into.the.Unknown. It has meant being vulnerable in ways that are really new to me. The beautiful, and surprising, result of this year’s ‘stretching’ is that for the first time in a long time, I feel like I’m part of an organic, human ‘something’ that’s way bigger than myself. I even look forward to meeting complete strangers, and to welcoming groups of new friends into our home. I’m astounded at how much more connected and integrated I feel, as we continue to open ourselves to our dream of community.

In a mini-blog-series, called Two Lesbians, One Dream: Community and Gay Catholics, I’ll share some of our experiences and discoveries that have resulted from being in new forms of community this past year. The key posts/learnings/themes will be:

• “Love one another as I have loved you.”
• Clinging is for Saran Wrap, not people
• Wanna take a walk?: Companions (not helpers!) lost in the dark together
• Go guilt-free: possibilities may be endless, but human time is not
• Human beings, not human doings

I’ll post on this topic every Friday of the series, beginning in June.

Thanks for joining me here in the cosmic e-ether; it’s so good to be with you.

 Peace and blessings.

*Credit to Sonia King, mosaic artist, for a lovely mosaic image.

Our Petition in Support of All Youth (Bill 13, The Accepting Schools Act)

Our Petition in Support of All Youth

(Bill 13, The Accepting Schools Act)

My wife drafted a petition, Catholics for Bill 13, after meeting a very special high school student earlier this week. The young lady, who identifies as LGBT, was heartbroken when someone within her church community put out a petition opposing Bill 13 (a proposed anti-bullying law named The Accepting Schools Act) during mass. The bill, which is in its second reading at the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, has raised concerns amongst some Catholics because – among many other inclusive, affirming, and protective measures – it will require all publicly-funded schools to allow students to form Gay-Straight Alliances (to be called by another name in Ontario’s Catholic schools), should they wish to do so. The bill deals with all forms of bullying, and seeks to protect all students in Ontario, regardless of who they are, from violence.

After discussing the meeting with this young lady, my wife and I decided that we really wanted to stand up for this LGBT girl, and for all other young people in Ontario, by creating a petition that would support the Bill 13. We had never written a petition before, and were a bit nervous about doing so; but we felt that this young lady, and other young people like her, were well worth our apprehension! The petition can be found at: http://www.change.org/petitions/the-legislative-assembly-of-ontario-support-bill-13.

Always an inspiring source of courage, my wife then went out on a limb, and shared this issue, and our petition, with Francis DeBernardo, Executive Director of New Ways Ministry and writer of Bondings 2.0, the New Ways Ministry blog. This morning, we were overwhelmed with surprise, and profound gratitude, when we received an update from Bondings 2.0, and found that Francis had written about Bill 13 on the New Ways Ministry blog, in a post called “Catholic Support for Gay-Straight Alliances: ‘It’s what our faith calls us to do.’

Thanks to people like Francis, to those who have signed, and to all those who stand with people like this high school student, a real, and affirming, difference is being made in the lives of young people around the world.

Peace, blessings, and gratitude.

Cat

*Credit to Gail Skroback Hennessey for the beautiful anti-bullying image used here.

The Joy of the Desert Experience

I love the desert experience of Lent. For me, this spiritual journey marks a time of hope and joy, when we can strip away (or be open to having stripped away) what is not essential to the Self. It is a time of openess and vulnerability, key ingredients to Transformation. While in this figurative space, I also inevitably encounter fear and self-doubt; I question my own inherent worth and whether I can make it through the isolation of this desolate ‘place.’ I admit that these parts of the desert experience are far from enjoyable for me; in fact, every time I walk this part of the desert journey, I am deeply afraid, as though it is the first time I have been ‘here’; and as though I am doomed to remain here forever… But then, in the deepest spot of this darkness, I let go. And rays of light break through the darkness, and emerge with new hope and new insights. Transformation is evident – transformation *is* - and I find myself wondering how I ever could have doubted the beauty of Life’s process and journey, the beauty of Life’s Way(s).

As I prepare for the second week of Lent, I am reminded that while we humans are always alone to some degree, we also dwell in this darkness together. We can’t see each other yet, but we are all here in the desert, together with one another, as is the Wisdom, the Mercy, the Love, the Source of All Things Good.

Mindfulness and Eating

Global Light Mind’s Daily Inspiration Message for February 23rd really got me to thinking about trust, especially trust in one’s Self and in one’s innate ability to choose, and to be, Wholeness and Oneness:

~ If you want to understand any faith of philosophy, live it. You must not follow the letter of the word but the spirit of the word. You must live the knowledge to understand it and experience it first hand. You may believe you are one thing, yet at the end of the day, your actions may speak differently. You must become the journey. You are the journey. Reflect your beliefs by your actions. ~ Brother Jangbu ~

Brother Jangbu’s words about living by the spirit of the word bring to mind, for me, mindful eating, a beautiful process I’m exploring after a lifetime of emotional eating. When it comes to embracing the spirit of eating regimens, rather than the law, I think it means trusting our body to tell us what it needs, how, and when; I think it also means trusting our Self to recognize, and respond healthfully, to our body’s and our heart’s messages. In the present moment, as we ‘be’ in the gap, we listen to our body, our heart, or other conduits of the Divine, and make decisions that bring joy and peace. Ironically, it is in giving up the letter of the law, and replacing it with the spirit of presence, that I am finding freedom and joy in food and in eating.

(Special thanks to Peter Morgan of Free Mindfulness for sharing the gift of his gallery photos with the world.)

Making A Difference - Rochester Roots

Reblogged from Our Tiny Earth:

Rochester, NY is a cold and dark city for much of the year, but there are organizations who have gone above and beyond in bringing light to the community. I would like to thank them for their years of service by bringing agriculture, sustainability, and community to the youth of Rochester.

Follow Rochester Roots on Facebook!

Jesus: A Pharisee About Pharisees?

I had a rebel of a spiritual director a few years ago, an elderly, but vibrant, left-leaning nun who loathed the Church and who openly questioned whether or not Jesus thought himself the long-awaited Messiah. She had an ever-present twinkle in her eye, a passion that flowed from her deepest Self, and a voice that could melt chocolate. “She kind of reminds me of Anne Murray,” a friend said when she first recommended Sister Anne to me for spiritual direction. “And she’s really funny,” she added. She was so right.

Sister Anne seemed to delight in all kinds of people from all walks of life. She was a witness to the God of mercy, compassion, and love. In our year together, Anne and I talked a lot about relationships, religious life, mysticism, and about being present to the Divine. Although I didn’t see us as spiritual carbon copies of one another (She was more irreverent than I at that stage in my life), I noted that we did seem to see eye-to-eye on most things. Mysticism. Social justice. Gospel Values. The God/Creator/Source of Mercy and Compassion. Eventually, spiritual honeymoon still in full swing, I realized that where Anne and I did differ was in our view of Jesus’ (internal) relationship to the authorities of his day. Anne saw Jesus’ oft-described anger toward the Pharisees, the fundamentalists of his day, as real and justified. I was kind of stunned. I didn’t think Jesus was like that at all. Jesus was cool with everyone, right? Even if he didn’t like their behaviour. I mean, he saw through them to their soul, the good part that’s in all of us. My Anne Murray sound-alike had deflated her disciple’s balloon.

 

“But what I don’t get,” I argued, “is how Jesus, being the embodiment of Compassion and Love, and all that good stuff, could be so angry with the Pharisees. I mean, if he could see the really big picture, really understand human brokenness, why wouldn’t he have more compassion for them, understanding that their judgement was coming from a place of ego, not the soul?” I just didn’t understand why he would address the ego, or brokenness, instead of the soul, of the other. I seem to recall Anne exclaiming, and with great passion, as per usual, “JESUS SHOULD HAVE BEEN ANGRY!!!!!!” Anne argued that Jesus, being Jesus, *ought* to have taken a position of anger against those in authority.

This issue – the question of Jesus’ interior relationship to the authorities of his day – had (and still has, to this day) serious implications for the way I choose to live my life. In my research and teaching, for instance, do I seek justice for the oppressed by raging against the ‘machine,’ painting gatekeepers and upholders of our imperfect, human systems and institutions with the same brush? Whatever my adopted approach to dealing with injustice, do I engage with the system, et into it, so that I can help to transform it from within… or do I disengage, shifting my focus away from systemic transformation and toward the smaller moments in, and ways of, life? Maybe there is another road, a middle road that I do not yet recognize…

Anne and I never got to revisit our discussion about Jesus and the authorities. During a summer break from spiritual direction, Anne was diagnosed with cancer, and she died within the year. But the unfinished discussion, the not-yet-closed question aobut Jesus’ relationship to the Pharisees — especially his purported anger, disapproval, and disdain — has left me unsettled since Anne and I shared our questions and ideas in her tiny basement office that day.

I do not have answers to my wonderings, but I suppose the burning questions are an essential part of the journey; the years of questions, the years of answers, as dear poet, Rilke, points out. This is a year of many questions.

A New Year

Hello, Dear Reader and Friend,

I bid you my best wishes for a year filled with peace and joy. I hope you are happy and well, and that the holiday season has been good to your soul.

It’s been awhile since I’ve spent time hanging around this corner of the universe. I’ve missed being here.

Peace and all things good to you as you journey through 2012. Looking forward to reading your thoughts.

Cat

Poem(a,b-ish): Trans(c)ience

Title 1a: Identity
Title 1b: Communism Left Behind
Nested Titles: Identity(Communism Left Behind)

Poem(a,b-ish):

Where are your feet
If you do not live there?

 

Poem(too): Universal Pleasures

Rabbits’ ears

    Perk up

With the sound

        of

        Egyptian singing

                     and clapping

          And it is so

           Even in the absence

                      of t.v.

Poem(ish): Bird with a Tiny Beak

Guitar Strumming
                                                                                   alone
with dissonance
unfettered Bravado
behind
this translucent /wall/,
You are not.
Coming (.) Home
I Am
Reminded of
allofthispeacefulwhisperingsomehowswirling
silence
and your [-presence]
of uness
by
this
solo
guitar
crying out
to be
|cradled|
like a small-beaked bird
.