No, it wasn't a glorious fall day that brought out the best in everything. The dull sky loomed forlorn without brilliance and the chill nipped ever so that it might be best to remain content at home. Nonetheless the afternoon was calling me outdoors. And justified with some errands to run, I hopped on my bike and sprightly went on a 20 mile junket. I wanted to follow a route that Amy and I took a few years prior but somewhere along the way I veered off course. Still, fond memories flooded my mind as I recalled our day together talking of her reconnecting with Andy and eventually buying a large stash of windup toys for our mom. Even though unplanned, somehow I had found another way to get where I wanted to go.
On the return, although being more careful to maintain the preconceived path, I soon ventured a unique course. Again it mattered little, for which ever way I traveled there was something to marvel. Here was a group of roofers on their lunch break imbibing the sweet strains of Conjunto Norteno accordion. I pondered the coincidence when I came across a second just a few blocks away. In a park I spotted a father and son tossing a football in long, perfect spirals, and later, two girls gathering the last of the quickly fading snow to make a one ball snowman. When I rode past the house where Lorraine lived when I first met her, the smell of freshly baked bread and the ruckus of a truckstop jamboree ignited my senses. Each of these events formed part of a, now, glorious day.
Yet if there was only one of these recollections it still would have been a blessed afternoon. It's not the cumulative total, nor is it any one thing that creates the specialness, but the discreet attention to the individual. One is not better than the other for each was a gift of the divine. The best of everything awaits in anything. The way to love has no prescribed path because there's more than one way to get there.
The same is true with our relationship with our true self. There's more than one way to follow the inner light. In today's lesson from Matthew, Jesus preaches his first gospel message which sums up his spiritual convictions. He proclaims there are many roads to the golden heart: Be compassionate, sincere, humble, or merciful and you will arrive, he says. Seek justice, peace, or long to love and you meet the holy. Don't be attached to anything except finding yourself, and you will. The New Testament could end here and it would still get us where we need to go.
The Beatitudes offer us many ways to reach our destination and each one is filled with grace. We don't need to follow all of them to wind up at our spiritual home, but if we truly follow one, there's a good chance we'll reach them all. When we recognize the blessedness of life we won't be content with what's at home, we'll want to go out and fully experience the love that's everywhere to behold.
love, always,
pia
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