April  11, 2020

BOX

The box is filled – packed,

sealed, taped, addressed,

stamped at the post office.

It’s shipped in a van or truck.

Or it moves by plane – across –

space to space, from place

to place – till it reaches its

destination. It’s opened. Its

contents are checked out.

Then the call that it has arrived.

“Thanks!” Life.  Birth to death.

Nativity to Easter – with the

many quiet Saturdays – with

the many waits in between.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  11, 2020

Thought  for  Today 

“There are some people that if they don’t know, you can’t tell them.”

Louis Armstrong

April  10,   2020

Thought for Today

“What do we do when the foolishness of the cross actually makes more sense than the wisdom of the sword?”

Shane Claiborne,

The Irresistible Revolution:

Living as an Ordinary Radical

April   10,  2020 

UNDER  THE  CROSS

I stand under the cross wishing

I could hear Jesus’ words to Mary and John

addressed to me:

“Woman, this is your son!”

and “This is your mother.”

I stand under the cross wishing

I could say what the Centurion said,

“Truly this was the Son of God.”

I stand under the cross watching

the scene between the Good Thief

and the Bad, but their voices are about

saving oneself and being saved and

robbing paradise at the last minute,

aren’t my scene either.

I stand under the cross wishing

I could say, “I am thirsty” wishing

my faith was thirstier,  but it’s not.

I stand under the cross in the dark

seeing the spit and the blood on the ground,

wondering down deep if the echo of curses

in the air still being thrown at Jesus

are my inner sounds. I hope not. No Never.

I stand under the cross and hear,

“Father forgive them because they

don’t know what they are doing.”

I stand under the cross saying and praying,

“That’s me. You know me. Into your hands,

O God, I hand over my spirit. Amen.”

© Reflections, Andy Costello

SELF-RELIANCE

Somewhere along the line someone spotted a postcard - with our family name on it - along with our family coat of arms - along with our family motto.  They sent it to me.  

I wasn't in on the drafting of the shield, or the motto or the coat of arms.  I didn't even know we had a coat of arms.  My mom described where she came from in Ballynahown, Ireland, "Ireland has nothing." I saw the spot - on Galway Bay - as not that hot.

And my father used to say that he was within a rock's throw of where my mom was from. 

Asked to translating the Latin on the coat of arms, I said it means something like,  "Don't be searching for yourself, outside yourself." 

"Quaeseveris" is the only tricky word of the 4 words in the motto.  The quest, the seeking, the searching, the asking is at the heart of the motto.

"Quaeseveris" is the 2nd person perfect active subjunctive of the verb "quaero". It means questing,  as indicated, asking,  seeking, inquiring, requiring. 

I would like to translate it  as: "Be who you is, because if you  be who you're not, then you're not who you is."

Ralph Waldo Emerson calls this "Self-Reliance."

Here is Emerson's famous lecture on Self-Reliance. Just hit the triangle on the button.

April  9, 2020

COMPASS

Walking - early morning - in the woods –

coming to patches of light and darkness –

depending on the steep of the low hills -

then deeper and deeper into the trees ….

I come to a clearing - a palace place of light….

The light seems to be forming halos around

all the trees in the forest - lessening the

darkness everywhere - north, east, south, west.

It was as if I was standing in a compass of light,

and I stood there  wondering if God the Father

had the particularity he had about Mary for the

tree 2,000 years ago chosen to be the cross of Christ.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April 9, 2020

Thought for Today

“When I ask people for bread to feed the poor, they think I am a saint; when I ask them why the poor are hungry, they think I am a Communist.”  

Brazilian Bishop 

Dom Heldler Camara