Next stop Canada 🇨🇦 🍁

‘Everything, every day, is in the Hands of God’. (Fr. Richard Ho Lung)

No room for sadness even though we would love just one more day. How could we possibly grumble? What started out as four weeks together, turned into seven, thanks to uninvited guest, COVID. 

God really does turn all manner of things to good, all the time. Thank you God for EVERYTHING. You will never be outdone in generosity.🙏🏻

Divine appointment.🌸

I offered him my prayer. He happily accepted. He talked about his son who committed suicide. I spoke about my husband who died far too young as a result of demon drink.

Walking towards his car, he turned around one last time, uttering with deep conviction: ‘It is great to talk one’s mind out’. Simple statement and yet so profound. 

Divine appointment for us both.

‘Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer everyone’. (Colossians 4:6)

Encounters extraordinaire.🙏🏻🎆

Wonderful visitation with Mary this morning. We walked and talked in the crisp fresh air. I love her company, we are best friends ever since I worked in the High Support Hostel where she resided for a time. I always take my leave of Mary with an uplifted ‘light as a feather’ heart, sunshine walks beside her. 

Later on, a friend informed me that Mary’s long time friend, Jim, was poorly and would I pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy at his bedside in his place of residence. I jumped at the chance. As I sat in prayer, I knew in my deepest spirit there was no ceiling in this Sacred sacrosanct space and Heaven had no floor. In the hour of death, Our Lady draws closer, Saint Joseph, James’ Guardian Angel too. 

Jim’s room was packed with Angels and Saints in the presence of Almighty God who is a loving Father like no father has ever been on earth. Heavenly Love and Light shining brightly all around.

Jim slept soundly, his beautiful face relaxed like never before. Quite remarkable, utterly angelic.

Mary will be sad when she hears the news about Jim. They both resided in the High Support Hostel. They both knew suffering and rejection. Because of Jim and Mary, I know who God is.

For me, two encounters from God, far more superior than my paltry words could ever convey, all in a January day in 2022.

‘Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also’.     (Matthew6:19-21)

 Magestic sunset at the close of a magnificent day. ☀️

Geokaun Mountain.

‘We love because God first loved us’. (1John:4:19)

‘The best and sweetest things in life are things you cannot buy: the music of the birds at dawn, the rainbow in the sky. The dazzling magic of the stars, the miracle of light. The precious gifts of health and strength, of hearing, speech and sight’. (Patience Strong)

Idyllic Rossbeigh beach.☀️

‘Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made’. (John 1:3)

                                     ‘The voice of the Lord is over the waters’. (Psalm 29:3)

Something old - Something New.☀️

Never too old to start something new. Today, my first exercise class in a gym for forty years. Therapy extraordinaire.

Back then, I had the privilege of running a Crèche attached to Fitness Club. Scant training, my one and only qualification ‘loving kindness’. Every child in my care meant the world to me, myriad wonderful memories and stories from that time.

While the yummy mummies worked out, I babysat. Story-telling, singing, dancing, colouring, Lego and oftentimes just good old-fashioned chitter-chatter. No plan of action, sweet simplicity. When the last child would be taken home from my crèche, I would dash to the gym for the remaining scraps, always hanging on, never really taking part.

Today, my class serious and at the same time ton of fun. Gym Master knows his stuff, adept trainer but more than that, his sense of humour and quick wit rendered the whole experience uplifting and truly therapeutic. All anxiety and ruminating suspended for sixty delightful minutes. Upbeat music too, impossible to stand still for one second. Just right for us  ‘Over 60’s’ folk.

Thankyou Killian for nudging me on. Thank you Derm for my gym attire, when you gifted them to me, I had no plan to be wearing them to an actual gym, but God knew all the time. What a Mighty God we serve. Forty years melting away in the twinkling of an eye.

‘And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time’.   (T.S. Eliot)

Simple abundance.💎

My Covid Retreat has come to a close, liberation is landed. This morning loyal Antigen declaring merrily; ‘All clear!! You are free to go’. 

My two whole weeks of serene solitude, as opposed to lingering loneliness, over. I emerge, bright eyed and bushy tailed, oodles of gratitude in my heart to God for the simple abundance of this uncomplicated life I am exceedingly privileged to be living. Before this time of enforced rest and renewal, in the rough and tumble that is daily living, myriad gems had escaped my attention.

Praying Holy Rosary in my garden every day definitely a highlight📿. Raucous crows, tranquil doves and many more colourful little birds besides, blending in seamlessly as our prayers, like incense, wafted their way up to God in highest Heaven. Going forward, I can not imagine one day without Holy Rosary in our cosmic temple.

‘Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them’. (Matthew 6:26)

Sound of my wellies on wet grass evoking memories of days long gone, pottering on the farm with my dear Dad. Wellies and my childhood days, inextricably linked in my deepest heart, I had forgotten how much I love my wellies. Moon in the evening peering through bare naked trees. No foliage to hide them, no pretence. Much like myself, nothing to hide me now too, all activities and distractions silenced. 

For sure, I am happy to be free, thrilled to be able to attend Holy Mass and receive Holy Eucharist again but without one scintilla of a doubt, I am immensely grateful to God for the brief respite that was my ‘Covid Retreat’.

‘Never less lonely than when completely alone’. (Cicero)

‘By habitually thinking of the presence of God, we succeed in praying twenty-four hours a day’.                  (St. Paul of the Cross)

Thank you Dear Jesus for coming to me. ❤️

This morning, dear friend Mary brought me Jesus in the most Holy Eucharist, O happiest of days. Many times in the past, sublime privilege of taking Holy Eucharist to others in the above pyx was mine. Today, me the grateful humble recipient. Beautiful Jesus walked through the open window of my little cottage of isolation. I am over the moon, walking on air, bursting at the seams with gratitude extraordinaire. One whole week since I last received Holy Eucharist. 

Later on, Micheal, my kindly nephew, dropped delicious lasagne on the same window sill. Shortly thereafter, lovely Emily dropped off a scrumptious shepherds pie. Smashing young folk with big beautiful hearts.

Sustenance for soul and body. For now, there is nowhere I have to be, no important thing I have to do. No schedule, no timetable. Healing time of peace and prayer. 

Everything that happens to us is either foreseen, ordained or permitted by God. In due course, all will be revealed.

‘All things are the works of the Lord, for they are very good, and whatever He commands will be done in His time’. (Sirach 39:16)

‘If you have eyes to see, every hour of the day holds its splendour. It comes from Me, from a fragment of me. I vary my spectacles every morning to rejuvenate your hearts’.                                                        (Jesus to Gabrielle Bossis/He and I)

 

COVID.🛏

‘That my word may dwell in your heart’ ; whispered in my deepest spirit as I awoke at 3AM this morning. I scribbled it down on the notebook near my bed lest it disappear into the ether of the night. ‘God’s word dwelling in my heart’, made me smile, filling me with much needed peace.

Feeling poorly, sleep fragmented, positive antigen test later confirming my lingering fears. Two ominous lines shouting out apologetically; ‘So sorry - you have COVID’. Always, for me, not knowing is definitely worse than knowing the worst. Acceptance is peace.

Lightbulb moment.💡 Positive number 2! My son had been cooped up in his room since he tested positive four days before and now there was nothing to stop us both occupying the whole house. As G.K. Chesterton wrote; ‘We are all in the same boat and we are all seasick’. 

The world will not stop spinning. My Sacred Church privileges/duties (munus) will all get done. These COVID days will be spent in prayer - for you dear reader and everyone else too.

‘This is one of the consequences of prayer: the safety, the freedom, because essentially we have nothing to fear’. (Sr. Wendy)

                                        Today is the sublime Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus. 

 ‘But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint’. (Isaiah 40:31)