An Instrument of Peace

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” Mother Teresa

A few weeks ago, at a holiday mass at my kids’ sweet little school, I was overcome with the most affirming sense of rightness. Goodness. That all was right and good in the world, my world, as I sat in that full gym and took in all the loveable children, the warmth, the coziness, the goodness as I looked around me. Devoted teachers, caring parents, an authentic community centered on compassion, self-discipline, and social justice. There was an exquisite loveliness to that morning, that moment, as my mom sat next to me at her grandchildren’s school, as we listened to the mass and the children’s beautiful, imperfect voices raised in song.

And then, an alarm went off. A muffled alarm, but persistent and beckoning, near us and quiet enough that only those in the immediate vicinity could hear. But still. I turn and see two large bags – gear bags or like bags you might see unattended at the airport – about ten feet away.  It seems the sound is coming from one of them.

Typically not one to jump to conclusions, I am aware of the December 14th anniversary of Sandy Hook and those families and dear children weigh heavily on my mind. Because we never THINK anything bad will happen at safe places like our kids’ schools. The fact that this is no longer a certainty is troublesome, to say the least. And because of this awful fact, and my recent prayers for the Sandy Hook families, my mind goes THERE. Just briefly. But still. It goes there. What if that alarm is something bad? What if, while I’m sitting here absorbing all this loveliness, something BAD happens? Is this how it goes? Ends? Sitting, soaking up the good that is my kids’ world, and having it all blown to bits by some bag honking – AHNT – AHNT – AHNT – AHNT - 10 feet away from me?

A school administrator walks back, looking curiously and calmly for the sounding alarm’s source. She bends over the bag, as if to move it, and said bag’s owner – the school photographer – swoops in and rescues his bag, silences the troublesome alarm. Silences my runaway brain. At least momentarily. But my peace is rattled, my Zen cover blown.

I’m disheartened that this is what our world has come to. That we are inundated with news of bad things that happen to good people, in what we expect to be good, safe places, ALL THE TIME. That we can’t sit peacefully, prayerfully, in our sweet kids’ precious school during mass, where we send our beloved children to learn and to grow, and NOT be reminded that it could all turn on a dime . . . well, that’s no good. That an unfamiliar, untimely alarm can sound and cause us to jump (if only on the inside so as not to startle the children – many of whom I personally know already have more and deeper shudders at bumps in the night than we could have ever fathomed . . .).

It’s a hard world to live in, to make sense of, to not be overwhelmed by.

And we wonder why our kids are scared. Why we are scared. Anxious. High-strung. Always on the look out, watching for the next bad thing: war, Ebola, Ferguson, Sharia Law, sexual slavery, global warming . . . It’s too much. What our kids are learning in this brave, new world is that we always have to be a little distrustful, a little wary. And that SO goes against the grain of anything I believe in or am about that in my very, most centered space, I am UNWILLING TO ACCEPT IT.

You heard me. Call me stupid. Naïve. Blind. Tell me I’m putting my head in the sand. Whatever. Here is what I know. What I believe. Where I’m willing to put my time and energy. In good thoughts. In loving acts. In kindness and compassion toward others. In reaching out. In helping those that are scared or hurt or healing. What I know and believe is that energy in, equals energy out. What we give, we receive. What we put out, we get back. Where we focus our energy, is what we see in our lives.
Karma is real.

Like when I was writing this essay and out of one of my notebooks fell a poem by St. Francis of Assisi, in my dad’s distinct, handwriting, tucked in the front cover, a reminder to me about who I can always choose to be in this one big world and life of mine:

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love; for it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Amen.

Any who knew my dad would know that he eschewed organized religion. Yet he was a deeply contemplative and spiritual man. Drawn to universal messages of love, connection, and illumination by many spiritual teachers (Rumi, Kabir, Buddha, and Chief Seattle to name a few), the apples have clearly not fallen far from the tree. My brother Chris wrote his own version of a peace prayer and though my dad never saw this, he would be proud to see how clearly he is represented in the many life lessons my brother and I embody.