I am here

I Am Here
5/19/2020
 
In Papua New Guinea one tribal group has not word for
“hello”
Instead, upon seeing someone, one simply says “You are
here”
To which the answer is, “Yes I am”
 
How hard it is to be here
Here in this sheltering place
Here in this divided and dysfunctional country
Here in this aged wrinkled skin
Here in this mind, this heart, this soul
 
Padrig O’ Tauma, in his book “In the Shelter”
suggests that ‘you are here’ and ‘yes I am’
might be as good a place as any to begin in prayer
 
it is not that we have a choice, really, to be anywhere
else than where we are
but in a way we are also in many other places in our
scattered minds
 
Padrig notes
“We are saying to ourselves ‘I should be somewhere else’
or ‘I should be someone else’, or ‘I am not where I say I am’.
 
I know that place un-place
that divine discontent, and sometimes shame, 
that feeling of wanting to hide unto the proverbial
bushel basket
or perhaps under my bed
 
but this is where I am
and this is who I am
even when the Sacred is looking
 
and it from here that I need to start
as I walk that bridge we call prayer to the One
who is in here, out there, everywhere
 
that reality that is as broad as all that is, infinite
and eternal
and as near as my breath, immanent, even intimate
 
here you are
yes I am
here I am 
yes you are
 
just here, in this place
sheltering, not sheltering 
a peace, suffering disease
hopeful, hopeless
saint and sinner
good and bad
 
I am here
and I am ready
for the Spirit to move
and do all that the Spirit does
 
I echo this day the words of the Palmist (139)
Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my
anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in
the way everlasting.
 
Welcome Lord to this place to this precious soul
To this tattered soul
 
I am here 
no hiding allowed
ready for Sacred to take me from where I really am
into Sacred newness
 
this day
and every day