There must be a time of day when we who make plans forget our plans and act as if we had no plans at all. There must be a time of day that when we have to speak, we fall very silent ... and our mind forms no more propositions, and we ask: Did they have a meaning? There must be a time when we who pray go to our prayer as if it were the first time in our life that we had ever prayed; when we of resolutions put our resolutions aside as if they had all been broken, and we learn a different wisdom: distinguishing the sun from the moon, the stars from the darkness, the sea from the dry land, and the night sky from the shoulder of a hill.
More and more people are discovering that one of Jesus' greatest gifts is the sharing of his life with us through the bread and wine of each day ... and, one of the greatest gifts that we can give to each other is the sharing of our selves. Alice Howell, through her book THE DOVE IN THE STONE: FINDING THE SACRED IN THE COMMONPLACE, gifted me recently with a remembrance of my own Dove story, which I offer to you:
Alone at home one winter's evening, while sitting on the couch barely aware of the snowstorm beating at the window, I wept into the Silence. After a long time, the sobs abated and an anger welled up within from the depths of despair. For the second time in my life, I cried out loud to God, "You promised You would not give us more than we can bear -- this is my limit, so please do something!" Then I covered my face with my hands and the tears continued to flow -- yet, with no accompanying sobs. In less than two minutes, I heard a soft noise at the window and turned to look. There on the outside sill sat a most beautiful white dove. Even though I thought this "couldn't be", there she was just BE-ing for me. We meditated on one another for maybe three minutes. I closed my eyes in a prayer of gratitude for the peace and love which now enveloped me. When I opened them, though the visitation had ended, the dove's imprint continued to live in my heart!
And sometimes now, as I sit in the Silence, I smile in wonder at the infinite variety of ways God creates to knock at the door of our soul, to love and to comfort us in our sorrows, to surprise us with new Life.