I think of you every day. Much love.

First, if you are reading this, let me apologize for the gap in posts. I was beginning to doubt whether or not anyone was reading the blog, and so I left it unattended for awhile. In any case, here is a new posting:

“I think of you every day. Much Luv”

There were the words above…”I think of you every day. Much luv” staring up at me. I had just gotten on the train I call the “tunnel of death”, that is, the subway. The reason for this is the autophobia and bit of claustrobia I have. Ok, perhaps there is more claustrophobia then I will admit. I am not sure at this point. However, I will just bet “dollars to donuts”, as grandmother used to say, that not many people will not double knot their shoelaces for fear of feeling trapped in their own shoes. There. I said it.

But I digress.

I take the subway to work. I sat down, and there written on the top edge of the seat in front of me where those words… “I think of you every day. Much luv.” The average person might not have even given it a second thought. But, dear reader, I am far from being the average person.

In a series of books called “True Life in God” God says that there are no co-incidences to Him. Now we can debate endlessly the legitimacy, or not, of the books. We can debate endlessly what about when bad things happen to good people (in fact there is even a book written with that very title). But let me pose a question. What if God doesn’t always speak to us through pillars of fire in a deep voice that sounds suspiciously like Charlton Heston? Perhaps this is not just a coincidence? Does this seem reasonable? Shingon Buddhist believe in the “voiceless voice” of God. At Medjugorgie Mother Mary tells us of God speaking to us in silence. St. Teresa of Avila and the Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta speak of the same thing. So what if God speaks to us in other ways?

What gives me pause to consider this, on this day is not just the words above, but the context in which I viewed them.

Human beings are often creatures of guilt. We have all heard of people being given a “guilt trip” whether the person giving the guilt trip is a family member or a friend. When human being sin, we later come to God with a guilty conscience. We feel guilty. The fact of the matter is most people don’t have to wait for someone like satan to come along and make us feel guilty – we do just fine on our own.

Yes. I know. There are sometimes when there may be a reason to feel guilty.

But there are other times when it is merely a matter of not being able to forgive ourselves for being human. There are other times when we don’t even understand the concept of righteous anger.

“Righteous anger?”

You bet. Even Christ Himself threw the money lenders out of the temple – His Father’s House – and overturned their tables. He had every right to do so. Not just because of who he was, but because of what was going on. There are some things that just aren’t done. Disrespecting God is one of them. Do you think Jesus felt guilty for throwing out the money lenders? I can’t tell you. One day, if we are all lucky, we will get to ask Him.

Yes, the other side of the coin is that there are times when it is a darn good thing that we can feel guilty.

Consider Mother Mary – Christ’s mother.

Now at this point, if you are not Christian, just bear with me. If you are Christian you at least understand that Mary was Jesus’ mother. If you believe that Jesus was also God, as I do, you have an understanding of Mary as Mother of God. OK? Lets just leave it at that.

In the news we see people like Mel Gibson throwing around racial epithets aimed at Jews. He is far from being the only one. It is easy for people to forget, for those out there who may be anti-semitic, that Christ was a Jew. Mary was a Jew.

There is a game called “the dozens” For those of you who may not know it, it is a game where two people start insulting one another’s mother until the other one has no come back. Now – I told you that to tell you this –

Think about the above paragraph. How many times have you heard someone talk about “those damn jews” Not often out in the open any more. Bigotry isn’t as accepted, happily, as it once was. But it is still there my friends, it has just gone underground. It circulates through society like a nasty undercurrent, and one that, if it where anthropomorphically embodied would be just as mean as a snake. That is why we have people like Mel Gibson insulting Jews and people like Michael Richards (Cosmo Kramer of “Seinfeld” fame) insulting African Americans in night clubs. Bigotry is still alive and well.

But the thing is this – remember – Christ is a Jew. His mother is a Jew. The apostles were all Jews. I don’t know about you my friends but playing “the dozens” with God’s mother seems a very, very dangerous thing to me.

Some things just aren’t done. That is one of them.

I told you that – to tell you this. This is one case where it is a darn good thing that there is such a thing as guilt

So whether we are guilty because we have something to feel guilty about, or we feel guilty just because human beings seem to enjoy feeling guilty think about this:

If you deserve to feel guilty, say a little prayer to God, whatever your concept. Also remember the words “I am sorry” go along way. Then forget about it. Don’t relive the guilt. If the other party can’t forgive you, at that point their hard heart is theirs to live with and that is their own lookout.

If you feel guilty because of righteous anger – such as the leader of your country killing people in another country because “God told Him to do it” Well in that case, the person upon which you have heap your anger for that issue had it coming. Offer a little prayer to God, to get it to stop. Then forget about it. Leave it in God’s hands.

If you are guilty just because you seem to enjoy feeling guilty. (see the above paragraph about asking for forgiveness). Well, first off – cut it the heck out. Do you enjoy feeling guilty? Do you “dig” on it? Is it “your thing?” No? Well allow yourself to be human. Once you have done one of the above FORGET ABOUT IT.

As human beings one of the saddest things is that, even if we ask God for forgiveness we seem to have a hard time forgiving ourselves. This is where God speaking to us in silence comes in.

We may be going through our day. We may feel like we have disappointed God (after all feeling guilty about something can be very, very contagious to those around you). Then we sit down on a train. And there, in our field of vision are the words from God.

“I think about you every day. Much luv. – God”