September 15, 2008
Dear Friends,
It was a busy summer for me here in Omaha. I visited my parents in Des Moines three times, attended three weddings, enjoyed Sonic's slushie happy hour twice, moved once, met four new neighbors, spotted (and named) three neighborhood cats, and tended one garden.
In the busyness of moving and the stress of life, I have to keep reminding myself: don't take yourself so seriously. One day this summer Mandy, Jara and I decided to attend contemplative prayer at our office. We began by running/racing to the area where we have prayer because there are only two really comfy chairs and three of us. As Mandy tried to figure out the timer on the computer Jara and I were giggling and talking about what would happen if I fell asleep during prayer and knocked down the enormous picture on the wall behind me with my head during our time of silence. Would you interrupt your prayer? Get up and ask if the person was okay? The three of us decided we would not be able to keep focus: we would laugh.
About 3 minutes into the silence something went wrong with the computer and it made a pretty loud noise. Mandy got up to correct it. I opened one eye to see what was going on. Jara was shaking and trying to keep her eyes shut. Mandy sat back down and caught the laugh. I started shaking, too. We all made eye contact and laughed a little-as quietly as we could. Then went back to the more contemplative kind of prayer.
Jean Vanier writes in his book Community and Growth: "And there is something funny about humanity. Little as we are, poor as we are, with all our 'animal' needs, we are called to become more than angels; brothers and sisters of God, the Word made flesh. It seems so ludicrous and wonderful, so crazy and yet so ecstatic. And the most rejected are called to be at the heart of the Kingdom. Everything is upside down. No wonder some people at sacred moments have the giggles."
I like to think of that. The Kingdom that is coming is the Upside Down Kingdom. With everything all shaken up like that of course we must laugh, even if it is only from the disorientation of it all. Even with all my shortcomings, God calls me to be a sister of God. The children that sleep on the streets of Lima, boys who were coerced into being soldiers in Freetown, women forced to sell their bodies in Kolkata, and sweet grandmas in Kathmandu have received their calling from God to be at the heart of the Kingdom. And it brings me so much joy.
All my love,
Marcia May
P.S. Email me for my new address! marcia.ghali@wordmadeflesh.com