Bittersweet

I've had moments of such great joy lately, but they are tinged with sorrow.

Yesterday, my youngest daughter graduated from college. Besides the inevitable inconveniences -- interminable processions of graduates, uncomfortable heat -- it was a wonderful time of celebrating accomplishment and being a family. We certainly know how to laugh together, my children and I, and the dinner after the ceremony was the best Mother's Day present I could have received. But, we all knew that that one who would have been most delighted was Julia's father. And he wasn't there.

My older daughter told me about a recent incident when she was riding home in the backseat with my son and his best friend. One will be studying for the ministry, one is in seminary preparing for the priesthood. A lively and charitable discussion about the meaning of the sacrament of Communion in each denomination was going on in the front seat, and at one red light, they both whipped out their Bibles to clarify what concepts they were referring to. I'm sure you understand the deep happiness, almost a silent chortle, that overtakes a mother when hearing a story like this about a child whose final attainment of adult maturity and well-being was not always forseeable during adolescence. Yet something is missing. I'm sure that if it is for Dave's good, God is allowing him to witness and even participate in these good things. But I have no one here who shared the uncertainty and so with whom I can share the depth of joy and gratification that I know now.

Bittersweet. Joy and sorrow, neither overtaken by the other but comingled.

I understand Mary the mother of God a little better now.

The Litany of Shortfalls

Lord,

There was some parenting I didn't receive
- You are my Father
There was some romancing I shouldn't have trusted
- You are the Lover of my Soul
There are some things I want, but can't find
- You are the Source of all good things
There are some evils I have gotten used to having around
- Your Passion and Death has saved me
There are some lies I tell well
- You are the Truth
There are goals for which the cost to me seems too high
- You tell me only to ask and it will be given to me
These things are big: I cannot see how I can change them
- You make all things new.
Lord, I believe. Help Thou my unbelief.

Amen. Good Night.

Even British TV is redeemable

I can't describe this story in a way that does it justice. Click here to read.

Insult added to ultimate injury

Judge Greer honored by his professional peers.

From the article:

"In addition to Greer's award, the Law Week celebration offers events that allow the community to get a closer look at what the West Pasco Bar Association and the law profession are about, Hook said.

"'It's not just about battles; law is a way of life.'"

You don't say.

Dieting with the Lord

I started going to Weight Watchers last week. It's worked well for me before and I plan to succeed at it again, for the last time. Because I have a new plan.

I'm not going to turn this blog into a weight-loss journal. What I hope for instead is to elicit your thoughts, and clarify my own, about losing weight, or conquering any appetite that has the upper hand, not by "working a program" alone, but turning it over to the Lord.

Gluttony is defined by the Catholic Encyclopedia as a vice and a moral deformity. Wow. (Read the link; it'll make you think about your next meal...) It is a sin against the moral order by eating prae-propere, laute, nimis, ardenter, studiose: too soon, too expensively, too much, too eagerly, too daintily. Double-chinned wow.

This is a lifelong struggle for me, and I used to blame it on my upbringing, on unmet needs, blah blah blah. Or I blamed it all on myself; my moral weakness, my lack of "will-power," my general awfulness.

A little while ago, I started to understand in the light of a closer walk with Christ, that maybe both were true, maybe not. That wasn't important any more; forgive and forget. What was important is that no matter how I got this way, any continuance was a sin, greater or less. I was offending God by mistreating a perfectly healthy appetite, which He gave me to nourish myself, and have pleasure while doing it (does this sound familiar? Remind you of any other popular sin?).

I started giving particular attention to any Scripture mentioning eating and food. Recently, the Scriptures that bounced off my flab the most resoundingly were these two:

Psalm 81:10:
I am the LORD your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.

Note that He doesn't say with what. We should be open to receive what we need.

Luke 1:46-55:
My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name.
And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in their conceit.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent away empty.
He has come to the help of His servant Israel,
for He has remembered His mercy;
the promise He made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children forever.

Mary's happy words to Elizabeth. He has filled the hungry with good things. No food mentioned again. I even checked the King James Bible to see what the "fancier" language had: "He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away." Just a couple of haths.

Other parts of Scripture go to considerable lengths to talk about wine, juicy food, honey, milk. Not these two particular sections, and others.

Can we open our mouths in trust and wait for the Lord to fill them? How? I know the old Irish saying "A man must wait for a long, long time for a cooked pheasant to fly through the window." I still have to cook, and add up FlexPoints (the cost of cottage cheese! The cost of a cookie!), and write it all down. But can I be obedient to the Weight Watchers plan without making it my Master?

This should be interesting. There are great graces, and some too-tight spring clothes hanging in the closet, and new clothes and health on the horizon, waiting for me.