It has been about a month since the historic US election that resulted in Donald Trump being reelected to the presidency of the United States. For some of us, the election results are cause for celebration and hope; for others of us, shock or fear or sadness or despair. Whatever you may be feeling, it truly seems that we are at a moment in our nation’s history when we are having to figure out who we are, what we stand for, what we are willing to live and die for. It’s a soul-finding time for us and for our nation.  And it’s hard work.

About 15 years ago, my family experienced a house fire.  It was about this time of the year, and it was wicked cold outside. It was an electrical fire.  Apparently the fire started about 6pm and burned all night.  Despite the truly heroic efforts of the emergency workers, we lost pretty much everything.  But our family was safe and sound, and over the course of the next few months with the aid of so many kind people, we put our lives back together. 

As hard as those days were, when I look back on them, I feel that they were blessed; that we were blessed.  That house fire gave us the opportunity to start afresh; to jettison all the stuff that had glommed on to our lives and to start again.  And I’m not just talking about physical things.  We were given the gift of being able to look at our lives, who we were and what we were throwing our lives at, and to make some determinations about whether we wanted it to be like that moving forward or not.  It was a ton of work; but so worthwhile. As I look back, I think that it was during those months following the fire that our family rediscovered our soul.

Now, not everybody has the great good fortune of having a house fire to help you take a look at your life.  But the world kind of feels like it right now, doesn’t it?  Not just here in this country, but the whole world feels like it’s on fire right now.  And as awful as things may look and feel, I believe that there’s this glimmering treasure of our human soul that is waiting to be found way down deep. It may take awhile to burn through parts of who we have become to discover who we really are and who we truly want to be. Somewhere in that refiner’s fire, I find sparks of hope.  

Somewhere in that refiner’s fire lies the promise of finding our soul once again. The process is long and sometimes excruciatingly painful, but most assuredly in the end, there is pure gold, the stuff of life and love. The refiner’s fire is the Way of the Cross.  It is the Way of Jesus.  It is the Way of all those who follow in the steps of our Lord.

So, here we are, in this community that we call St. John in the Wilderness, day by day… doing justice, loving kindness, walking humbly, finding our soul.  

~Father Art