The Tranquil Life
The passage from the reading of St. Paul to the Thessalonians today struck a cord in me:
“Nevertheless we urge you, brothers and sisters, to progress even more, and to aspire to live a tranquil life, to mind your own affairs, and to work with your own hands as we instructed you.”
That is my goal; a tranquil life.
It isn’t lost on me that this reading resonates as COVID ravages half our country, as a CAT 4 heads for New Orleans, as fires, floods and earthquakes devastate millions and as we once again see the Afghani people suffer in unthinkable ways. It makes me wonder what right I have to a tranquil life. And yet, here is the reading resonating in me and asking me to reflect on what God is trying to open up in me. How God is calling me to “Progress even more” and to “mind my own affairs?”
That is the challenge. Right there. How? And I hear, as I always hear, “Trust.” “Hope.” “Endure.”
Well, that is easy for me to say, I am not in the thick of all of the devastation, and I am grateful for it. I know that I am right where I need to be. I am right where God has called me to be; tending my family, tending my garden, tending my job. I have had to make it all emotionally manageable during this time. I have had to discern what I was suppose to put my energy toward and what I just couldn’t afford to. I have had to recognize that my actions could have consequences in the lives of others and so I have made my world more manageable. I thanked God for the day I got vaccinated. I thanked God for the day that my extended family and I were reunited. So many good things have happened and I am so grateful and so it is just a little easier for me to trust, hope and endure.
Each morning a cardinal or two greet me. My sister used to see these as a sign that “everything is going to be okay” and I hear her as I say good morning to them. Everything is going to be okay, eventually because God is ahead of it. It may sound Pollyannaish, but it is true. As we continue to experience the consequences of all of us exercising our free will, (different than “rights”) it’s important to remember the value of living a tranquil life. My tranquility in the midst of the chaos and the madness can help turn down the volume and maybe by turning down the volume we can better hear each other. Maybe by better hearing each other, we can better understand each other. Maybe by better understanding each other we can better love each other. Maybe by better loving each other we can better serve each other. Maybe that is when we can finally bring about the kingdom. Peacefully.
