life stories: always remembering.

there are times when we break bread together, sharing our stories, hopes, and hurts. there are times when we drink together, doing the same and also adding laughter and love.

i've been thinking a bit about confession & communion through deitrich bonhoeffer's life together as i've prepared a creative worship service for VA ministers attending an overnight retreat.

i think about how we hold ourselves back from others, whether in protection, fear, or routine. i think about how we carry hurts and wounds far longer than we ought. i think about the places for healing that shape us in our lives of caring for others. healing that takes place through tree branches, light, and color. my mind wanders over the landscape of memory to recall those i have hurt, held myself arm's length of, those i've misunderstood.

changing the vantage point, the space where i view the road traveled, i am given hope. we are all becoming. in the spaces of living, of being present, we are blooming into being. we are given the chance to become new again and again.

each day i awake to possibility. when i listen to inner wisdom, when i am present to myself, when i am fully attentive to the present moment, when i am seeking, when i am centering, when i am becoming mindful of those around me, i am living fully. there will always be difficult moments. there will be argumentative folks, negative folks, disagreeing folks. there will always be the other choice, the other road, the other response. breathe in, breathe out. move on.

again and again we return to breaking the bread, sharing the meal together with stories, hopes, and hurts. we share the cup and add laughter and love. we offer ourselves to one another and we are fully present to this moment, this body, this space. we can become for ourselves and one another the healing that we each need.

my theology always returns to a theology of presence. who are you present to in this moment?

draw in a deep breath, breathing in love for yourself. draw in a deep breath, exhaling the love from within sharing it to those that surround you.