Church Bells

As I write this - at 10:19am - the church bells are ringing in the distance.  I'm sitting inside a coffee shop, and the reason I can even hear the bells is because the doors of the place are open: the barristo burnt my breakfast panini.  The smell of burnt bread permeates the place.

The point of today's post is that one of the things I love about Moose Jaw is that while not being any more nor less religious than other Canadian cities, there seems to be a residual appreciation for tradition here.  One example of this is that older brick buildings from a bygone era are not only intact, but well taken care of, looking great.  None of this tearing them down stuff and building something "new and improved" that's so evident in Vancouver.

Another example is the ringing of church bells on Sunday mornings.  I noticed it first on Easter Sunday in April, when on the way to church I heard beautiful Easter music streaming from the tower of a large church nearby.  Five minutes and 5 blocks later, as I approached my church, the sound of the hymns faded in the distance, and the sound of church bells intensified.  At that time I thought "This is great!  Easter in Moose Jaw!"

But since then I've been pleasantly surprised by - and indeed, have become accustomed to - the ringing of church bells on a weekly basis by local churches.

The priest at my parish recently also began ringing the bells on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursday mornings and afternoons, to mark the beginning of Morning and Evening prayer.  He said to me that the purpose of ringing these bells is to "remind those who cannot attend the appointed prayer times at church that they can still pray in whatever context they find themselves in, in the quietness of their own hearts."  

How cool is that: the church bells remind us that whether we're working or grocery shopping, banking, sipping a coffee, or walking to/from work (that's usually the case with me, and the bells always remind me that I'm a bit late for work!), we can approach God in praise, thanksgiving, and supplication at any time.

I asked him if he ever gets phone calls to complain about the bell-ringing.  He responds "No, actually, I've had a few phone calls where people call and say that they appreciate the sound of the bells; and interestingly, some of the people that call are not even people of faith."

So, I'm not certain why traditions such as bell-ringing continue here, whereas in bigger cities they fall by the wayside, but whatever the case may be, I find it refreshing.  Ring on...

Hiking Moose Mountain

Today we drove 200+ kms southwest of Regina to Moose Mountain Provincial Park.  Gorgeous Fall colours were on display.

17km hike.

Sunny.

Chilly at first, warm throughout the day.

Good company.

Dinner at the pub afterwards.

Grocery shopping in Regina.

Back in Moose Jaw by 9pm.

Camino: Day 7 Revisited

This is what I had for breakfast a year ago.  Biscocho y cafe con leche.  Unbeatable, in my humble opinion.

I paid for the first biscocho.  Miguel gave me one "for the road".  I finished it well before the halfway mark.

Here's what I thought about a year ago during the walk.

In reflecting on my walk over the past few days, I'm coming to the conclusion that I have a deep discomfort, even dislike, with who I am.  In the eyes of the world I must be a nobody: no career, no family, no property, no car.  Nothing.  What do I have to show for my 42 years of living?  Seemingly nothing.

I know that God is not looking for any accomplishments.  In his eyes I'm a deeply valued person, created in his image, but I still feel massively disappointed with who I am.  I don't meet my own standards (nevermind the world's).  I feel like a failure quite often.

I guess this is what walking alone for long periods of time can do: it's like facing a mirror for a long time.  As you keep looking at it, you begin to see yourself without a mask on, as you really are.  You see the warts, the freckles, the imperfections, signs of age, etc...  I'm not as bad as I make it out to be here, but I'm certainly not as good and happy as I pretend to be.

I'm not sure if the way I feel about myself has changed significantly in the past year.  I keep thinking "if only this happened...." or "if only I could......" or "if only that issue was resolved..."

Maybe others are more satisfied with their lives than I am, but I doubt it.

I have a massive hunger to do another Camino.  But this time the purpose would be much less about discernment, and much more about the search for and enjoyment of community.

Camino: Day 6 Revisited

Here were my notes last year after the 20km journey from San Juan Villapañada - Salas.

* early start, again, around 8am

* breakfast in Cornellana (8km)

* Monasterio del Salvador a nice site for pics; in ruins

* feet are killing me; left foot especially, 3-4 blisteres; right foot ok, but developing blister on big toe

* 20kms [a day] ok, but still "too much"

* staying @ Miguel's Albergue La Campa; restaurant [attached to albergue] has fantastic food, home-made; biscocho was excellent

* best meal in Spain, so far

* lentejas soup

* cold, maybe 8C @ night; little heating

* Casa cultura: free internet

Cornellana:

Sigue la flecha (follow the arrow)

Albergue La Campa

Camino: Day 4 Revisited

Here are the personal notes I took exactly a year ago, after 4 days of  walking the Camino del Norte.  The distance covered on this day was 30kms, connecting Deba with Zenarruza (via Markina-Xemein).

* hardest day yet!  but my God, what beautiful places I saw!

* walked alone most of the day, but I took a lunch break about 12ks in with Jacob, Arman, and "the French girl"

* in Markina I had a beer with Markus, Angelo, and a few Spaniards [addition: Markus here managed to weird us all out by ordering, simultaneously, a beer and a coffee; the Spaniards were especially amused by this combination of beverages]

* walked Markina to Zenarruza with Markus; we had a nice conversation: "What is sin?"  "Is ignorance sin"?  Markus said no, I said yes; not sure...

* monastery in Zenarruza welcomed me

* glad to take a break now, even though I met a great bunch of people

A few pictures.  Leaving Deba:

Rancher in the mountains:

Way Marker:

Fall Colours

Today I went hiking around Wascana Lake with the hiking group.  Afterwards, we had a bbq.

As the pictures below show, Fall's in full "bloom".

Right now the leaves are yellow.  Three or four weeks from now they'll probbaly be orange.  Six weeks from now they will be no more.

The Camino: Answered Prayers

A year ago yesterday I began my pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago.  How time flies...

It may seem strange, but since walking the Camino, not a day has gone by that I didn't think about that amazing experience.  For one, I think it quite possibly may be the most significant accomplishment of my life, and so it makes sense that it's still on the forefront of my mind.  

But on another level, there are at least two events in my life that occurred as a direct result of the pilgrimage, and because of this connection, I often think back to the long walk that I took to Santiago de Compostela, and how it changed my life.  These two events are: vocational and relational changes.

The sobering thing about the changes in working and loving, is that I prayed for direction and discernment on both.  I prayed that God would lead me in my search for meaningful work, and I prayed that God would guide me in my search for a life partner.  And astonishingly, God answered both, radically.  The first prayer item was answered within 4 months of my walk.  And the second, well, it was maybe answered a long time ago already, but I only recognized the answer upon my return from Spain.

Vocation.  Last year at this time I was working in Spiritual Care, the general area that I've sensed God directing me towards over the past 4 years.  But the format was part-time, on-call, and in a secular institution that I felt little connection to.

Today, I am working in Spiritual Care, but in a capacity that enables me to contribute in a significant way not only to the lives of residents, but to the life of the institution itself.  It helps too that the facility is faith-based, and highly regarded in the community.

Relationships.  In a sense, nothing has changed here: I'm still a bachelor!  But on another level, there's been a seismic shift.  My best friend of 4 years is virtually absent from my life.  Desolation.  And other friendships too, are radically altered.  I now spend a lot of time alone, much more than I'm comfortable with.  And while I have made new friends in my new city, it just doesn't feel quite like home yet.  Yet.

Prayer is dangerous.  God hears our prayers.  Worse yet, He answers them.  Be careful what you pray for.

A year ago I'd never have imagined such drastic changes.  Leaving the mountains for the prairies.  Exchanging dark and wet days for clear and cold days.  Good bye city.  Hello farmland.  Geography.  That's all that changed, really.  A new postal code.  And yet, it wasn't just a move.  It was a Call.  A call that demanded a response.  Obedience.

God's ways are excruciatingly frustrating.  But then, perhaps in my more sober or lucid moments, not to mention less narcissistic moments, I'm reminded of God's words to the prophet Isaiah: "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:8-9).

Indeed.

Rarely are my thoughts lofty enough to leave even the earthly atmosphere, never mind reach the heights of heaven.

I prayed.  God answered.  But in a way that I neither expected nor hoped for.

Still, I am thankful for His answers, His ways.  At least I'm beginning to be.  I must be.  What else is there?

Change is hard.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have Mercy on me, a Sinner.

Salsa!

Another first: salsa!

20 pounds of tomatoes, 8 onions, 7 cloves of garlic, 5 big green peppers, 4 cans of hot jalapeño peppers, and a plethora of other juices and spices.

The result, as the last picture below shows: 26 jars of salsa!

It took 4 of us 3 hours to make the concoction.  Each of us gets 6 jars.  One jar goes to the instructor, and one for the coordinator of the community garden.

Bring on the chips...!

A First: Zucchini Bread

Given the large quantity of zucchinis I've harvested over the past month, I've decided to expand my baking horizons, and tracked down a zucchini bread recipe online.
 

I'm a believer: this bread is tasty!

The amazing thing is how little of the vegetable is needed in order to make the "loaf".  The bread pictured above only contains 2 cups of shredded zucchini.

More zucchini bread coming up...

Thought-Life

I met with my spiritual director this evening, and something that struck me deeply in our conversation was the whole issue of who or what we choose to pay attention to in our thought-life.  What are the thoughts in our lives that are life-giving, and do we focus our energies on those thoughts?  Which thoughts make us feel sad and depressed?  And most importantly: can we choose to direct our thought-life?

My experience this past year has been that when I'm in extreme psycho-spiritual pain, I find it next to impossible to think about anything other than that pain.  My whole outlook is clouded by an overwhelming sadness, so that lofty thoughts about God, for example, become next to impossible.  Instead, I find myself mulling over scenarios that are not resolvable: Why did it happen to me?  What did I do wrong?  What could I have done differently?

The more I think about these questions, the more I get upset and obsessed, because these are questions that I don't have the answer for and never will.  My mind eventually gets stuck in a destructive cycle, and the worst of it is that I seem unable to choose otherwise.

In my conversation with my director tonight, I likened this destructive fixation to the pain that we feel when we hurt physically: when someone hits my finger with a hammer, the most natural response is fixation on that pain.  Our sole attention becomes the pain, and searching for ways to lessen it.  My body at that point overrides any "life-giving" thoughts such as sipping a piña colada at a beach in Cuba.  All I want is a painkiller.

Is it not the same with psycho-spiriutal pain?  Can we think about the finer things in life - faith, hope, and charity - when we're grieving the loss of a loved one?  My experience has been that I want to focus on anything but those things.  Intellectually, perhaps, I could tell myself that "all will be well" as Julian of Norwich said, but that hardly lessens the pain.  Indeed, in some ways it intensifies the pain, because I have to deal with the torture of knowing that things could be better, but aren't.

Fairy Tales

One of the writers of the 20th century that really intrigues me is J. R. R. Tolkien.  I so appreciate his worldview, a worldview that doesn't minimize the role of fables, fairy tales, legends, myths, and traditions, but sees in them the common threads of truth and joy.

In a world that narrowly defines fact as including only scientifically verifiable knowledge, the likes of Tolkien, G. K. Chesterton, and C. S. Lewis speak against the grain with a tremendously fresh (yet aged) and hopeful voice.

Below, for example, is what Tolkien says about the universal appeal of fairy tales:

Fairytales move us in a way that realistic fiction does not (and can not). Because fairy tales speak to us of several deep human longings that we are almost afraid to admit and that we can never discard. We long to survey the depths of time and space. We long to get outside of time altogether and escape death. We long to hold communion with other living things, like angels. We long to find a love which perfectly heals and from which we can never depart. And we long to triumph over evil finally and totally. When you are in the middle of a great fairy tale, the fairy tale lets you live even briefly with the dream that love without parting, escape from death, triumph over evil are real and realizable. That’s why the stories stir us so deeply. And why we will go on reading and writing them no matter what the critics may say.

Brilliantly, Tolkien then continues, weighing in the gospel's place in the conversation about fairy tales:

... the gospel’s message is that, through Jesus Christ, every single one of these things that the fairy tales talk about is true and will come to pass. We will hang out with angels. We will have loves from which we are never parted. We will see an absolute triumph over evil. There is a beauty who will kiss you in all your beastliness and transform you. There is a prince who will save us, forever.

Changes At Work

Today was my first day back at work after a week's vacation.

A number of my coworkers returned from their vacation too.

But most notably, today was our new CEO's first day of work.

He's very intense and perceptive.  He smelled conflict within the organization walls before he'd even spent a full day at work!

I'm hopeful about the future.

Back To The Prairies

For the third time in the last 6 months I've visited BC, for the third time, I've departed back to the prairies from Abbotsford rather than Vancouver, and for the third time, I've departed on a Monday.  So a tradition of sorts is developing on my day of departure.

I wake up around 8am, and go sit with mom and dad, who are drinking their morning mate.

Then at around 9, mom gets out the waffle iron and starts making a scrumptious waffle breakfast.  Simultaneously, the French Press comes out, and a delicious carafe of coffee is made.

After breakfast, I spend a bit more time talking to mom and dad, usually by this time engaging in "wrap-up" conversations: what my plans are for the next few months; if I have any special needs they can assist me with; can they come visit; etc...

Then I either go for a walk, or do laundry, or pack my suitcase.

Around noon we eat a small lunch (almost always leftovers from Sunday lunch), followed by a short nap.

At 3pm, Ralph comes over, and together we all go to the airport.

By 4:30 I'm on the plane, and by 5 I'm in the air.

Below, Ralph and I at mom and dad's place.

The Chapel On Main St.

It's going to be close to 4 months before I step foot again in this city that I simultaneously both love and hate, so as I woke up this morning I felt an acute sense of heaviness on my soul, realizing that today was the day of departure.

Somehow, it seems to me a landmark day.

A closed door on a friendship and relationship gone awry.

Other friendships - especially those from my soccer community - seemingly nearing the end of their cycle.

Yet more friendships, from previous years, now distant both in time and closeness.  Friends get married.  They have children.  They move.  They change jobs, interests, schedules.  Hurtful thoughts and words - spoken or unspoken.  Some friends even changed their faith.  Each of these factors was like a tiny wedge separating us.  I wonder if it had to happen like this or if there is something I could have done to keep relations alive.

But there have been other changes.

Profound spiritual and social alienation from my faith community and denomination.

Vocational disappointments and letdowns.

Rain.  Dark clouds.

And cultural alienation, too.

So when I left this city this morning, a strong sense of finality was in the air.  Next time I come west, is there even a reason to come to Vancouver?  Should I just stay with family in Abbotsford?  Why bother coming to a place that has turned its back on me?

As I began driving to Abbotsford, I was on 12th Street, when just west of Main, I was reminded of the beautiful chapel that I used to go to semi-frequently.  When things were rough - 2001-2, 2006, and the 6 months before my move to the prairies in 2013 - I came here often, sometimes daily, to pray, to sit in silence, to lament and weep, to read the Bible, to just gaze at the cross.

My whole being jumped for joy at the prospect of stopping here again today.  So I did.  To mark the end of an era, perhaps.

I sat.  Silent.  Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.

The cross.  The quietly burning flame.  The Presence.

I sat nearly motionless for close to 30 minutes.  Tears.

And then I got up, bowed before my Lord, did the sign of the cross, and left.

In a city where much is transient, this little chapel is the constant.  In a city where I often felt alone, the Saviour always met me here, clasping his scarred hands around me, and around the world.

Fish Shack

Around 9am this morning I met up with Alfonso, and together we drove to Grouse Mountain for a hike.  I went yesterday afternoon too, and surprisingly, I felt better today than yesterday.  Maybe it was Alfonso "pushing" me (he beat me to the top by 5 minutes), but over the years I've also noticed that I often hike better when I hike 2 or 3 days in succession.

Afterwards, we picked up Anoush on the way downtown for brunch.  We ended up at a place called The Fish Shack, and my goodness, what a surprise!  The food was so good!  

I ordered the Corn Bread Hash, and as the picture below shows, it comes in a frying pan.  A LARGE frying pan.  Like, the pan's big enough to feed a family!  Needless to say, I did not finish it all, I took with me enough for a full breakfast tomorrow.

It's hard to take a picture of me completely happy.  I always - for whatever reason - hold back.  I almost never let myself go.

But below is a picture of me, free, unhindered, satisfied.  Thanks to the Fish Shack, I'm a bit more self-realized today than I was yesterday.

The second picture reveals the fabulous company that was along for the ride: Alfonso, Anoush, Sanjit, Juan, Juan's friend Ted, and Mark, who's visiting from Edmonton.