little old people

Where did that boy go

who with the crew cut and goofy glasses

looked out on the world so long ago?

 

where did that person go

who dreamed big dreams

and thought he could be anything he wanted

 

and that life would be easy

 

who thought that the good people won

and that evil was defeated

always

 

where did that one go who

so easily accepted the version of God

so blithely presented by his church?

 

how did it all get so complicated

and tortured?

 

it has not been a bad life

it has not been an easy life either (although to some it may look to be so)

I have my issues, my flaws

 

at times it feels as if my weaknesses cancel out my strengths

my mistakes invalidate my accomplishments

 

I am not who I thought I was

looking out so long ago

the world is not what I thought it was

God is not who I thought God was

 

and it is OK

 

I was thinking about the church year

Advent and Christmas, and those high holy days

of white

 

baby Jesus, the manger, magicians and stars

 

of Lent with is purple solemnity,

and Eastertide

with those huge pivotal moments

Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday

the vigil

Easter (white again)

 

And of Pentecost

our bright day of fiery red

 

those moments capture the imagination

and fire up our hearts

but now we are in “ordinary” time

almost half a year of unrelenting green

with no moments of high celebration

 

just the ordinary

the plodding along

tending the garden, pulling weeds

doing the mundane

ordinary

 

and I realize this is where life is

in the ordinary

this is where faith lives

in the ordinary

this is where Sacred dwells

in the ordinary

 

in the flawed and cracked adult

who no longer bright visage

and with eyes no longer quite as bright

who plods through each day

 

living out the Imago Dei

as best he can

knowing that even in this

messy, ordinary, daily existence

 

God is

 

and that there is a reason

even if I do not know what it is

for getting up in the morning

and welcoming another day

another week

 

it does no good to look back

at the good or the bad

 

no one who puts his or her hand to the plow

and looks back get anywhere

 

and so this morning

it is time to be again

that young soul

looking expectantly at the world

eager for what life will bring

 

Jesus once said, the kingdom belongs to the children

I suspect God wants us to be like children

those in whom the image has not been dulled

 

God want us to be eternal children

twisted, battered, grey, aching young ones

perhaps those with a long road behind

and a short road ahead

 

but still children

in whom, when God looks at them

God can still recognize God’s self in them

 

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Alleluia, Alleluia!  Open, all of you little old people!

It is I your God, eternal, risen from the dead, coming to

Bring back to life the child in you.

                     Michel Quoist (Prayers)