Let Your Life Speak
Lynne Elwinger, O.C.D.
Nature’s wheel of seasons has come once again to Autumn, with its liturgy of falling leaves, seeds, and ripe fruit and grain. Overhead, geese are practicing their formations for serious long-distance flights southward. Frost’s cold breath will soon close the growing time, bringing the remains of summer’s exuberant growth back to brown earth.
As unadorned tree branches and bare earth emerge from their summer hiding places, I am pondering a short sentence on a scrap of green paper that emerged from a pile on my desk. “Let your life speak,” it reads in my own handwriting. What does it mean for my own life, I wonder, and I feel an instant intuition that what is going on in Nature reflects some important information about this little admonition, and vice versa. In this season of the disappearance of the temporary and the reappearance of the enduring, there seems to be encouragement to look beneath the outer forms to what supports them and becomes visible through them. As leaves speak of trees, flowers of plants, and both of the sustaining earth, so the ways in which we live our daily lives speak of their own source and foundation.
Immediately our October saints, St. Teresa of Avila and St. Therese of Lisieux, come to mind. Their lives spoke so eloquently in their own times and still speak today. Though separated by centuries, and differing in culture, age, and life experiences, there is, underlying all those outer characteristics, a bedrock value system and spiritual relationship with God, common and yet unique to each of them, speaking clearly through all that they do. There is a type of strength, integrity and consistency that shines forth from them that attracts people, even at a distance. I think this same possibility exists for us too, and such an influence is very much needed in our time if we hope to carry forth the mission of Jesus in our wounded world. We, too, broadcast messages with our lives, though perhaps not ones so well-defined and easy to read.
The stronger our inner connections to that divine ground in our heart and spirit, the clearer and more readable are the messages that reflect outward. There is a certain power of presence that flows from people who are Spirit-connected, without their saying a word or doing anything out of the ordinary. All of us know or have known people like this. When we are in the presence of their energy, our own inner connections are renewed and realigned, like iron filings in the field of a magnet. We feel empowered and inspired just being around these people. I believe we are called to become like them.
Our generous God, mysteriously dwelling within us, always stands by, hoping for a time with us, hoping to gift us with all that we need to grow in the ways of discipleship. It is not about being worthy, deserving, or even capable. What is needed is for us to be available, to make time to go within, to quietly listen, and to experience the peace and calm of our inner holy ground. To be effective givers, we need to first learn to be good receivers. Then, our lives will speak to others, in whatever circumstances we meet them, and for some, it may be the only Gospel they hear. Our lives always speak, whether we are aware of it or not. What they speak is up to us. My prayer is that my life will speak of God’s compassionate love for all people. How does your life speak the Good News?
Every time you pray, you add to the light and harmony of creation. John O’Donohue
Sr. Lynne Thérèse Elwinger of the Resurrection O.C.D.