Saturday, March 28, 2015

Hi, Friends,

  Here I am posting another letter so soon after I posted one last evening.  It came to me this morning during my meditation that something connected with what I talked about in yesterday's letter did not get said.  It will not be easy to do this, but I feel I need to try because only in that way will what I wanted to say in yesterday's posting get said.

   I will start with a question.  Have you had the experience of being so affected by the goodness and truth and beauty of another person that you take the time to be completely, totally focused on them and you look at them deeply but respectfully, allowing the gift of that person to fill you?  We can be so taken up with our busy life or taken up with the gifts this other person brings us but never really connect with them at the level of their person, at that level where they are uniquely themselves, with who they are in their depths.  All of us carry this mystery within us.  Everyone of us is this deep and yes, holy.  But we can easily miss being alert to this mystery and gift of the mystery of ourselves.  We carry the divine in our depths. We are never alone.  From our depths come glimpses of beauty and goodness that make our life have an entirely different meaning and hope.

  So if you have had something of the experience I am referring to, if you have noticed this depth in just one person in your life, then I think you can follow me in what I will try to say below.

  I have learned over the years that when I engage in my 45 minute meditation/contemplation each morning, I am moved to be very quiet, to just focus on God, not to start thinking of anything about God nor saying anything to God, nor imagining anything about God but to just be quiet and attentive.  What comes up at times are distractions.  My mind does want to get involved.  My imagination does jump around.  Sometime I feel the urge to say something and then I realize what I am doing comes from a nervous, childlike level of my wanting action.  So I have to gently cease doing that.  My deeper instinct is to come back to that quiet space where He is present--where there is no image, no concept or thought, just an amazing, beautiful presence and to be attentively quiet there.  To settle down and just BE.  Sometimes it is much easier than at other times.  Sometimes my spirit is jumpy because of what happened the day before or all the things I know I have to deal with in the coming day. So a fair mount of the "work" of contemplating/meditating is to keep coming back to this Center, this quiet place and to let go, to just BE.  And then there are by the grace of God some easier times when something really powerful wells up from my depths and I get overwhelmed with the awareness that I really do KNOW Him and the love that comes out of me is so overpowering.  It is a love for Him first and then a love for the entire human race . . . with the desire that everyone know this peace and joy, this Presence and Love, this most amazing Person.  This is what filled me in various ways last Tuesday, on the anniversary of Romero's assassination, and then on the next morning when I went to surgery.   What I felt I needed to share with what I posted yesterday is this movement of the human spirit to be drawn like a magnet to this One who is the essence of goodness, truth and beauty.  It is so overwhelming and so real, so powerful that it overcomes all fear, moving one beyond even the instinct of self-preservation to offer yourself for a Love that is greater than what you ever experienced before but is worth everything, EVERYTHING!!  You lose your fear of death, so powerfully can this grip one. Your deepest interest is not just to serve this Love but to give yourself entirely and be totally One with it.  You lose all fear, all self-concern and worry.  You are completely taken up into this sacred Reality and when you come back down you look at the world with boundless hope and the assurance that this Presence, this Love is too powerful for any and all evil.  It will in its time overcome all obstacles, all that threatens the deepest hopes of the human race.  It is the most persistent power around.  It never pushes people, never forces.  It is usually quite gentle, although for some personalities this Presence can intervene and "seize" you and really "capture" you. But it is always respectful and open to the possibility of our saying 'no'.  True love cannot be any other way!

  So again, this experience came to me strongly on Tuesday as I pondered what this sacred Presence did to Romero and even more so the next morning as I lay on a stretcher in the pre-op room, so very alert and feeling amazingly ready and alive while waiting for the anesthesiologist and surgeon.  Sometimes I am speechless with the reality of God, how close and really powerful God is.  Above everything is the goodness and loveableness of this God.  Finding such a Friend is surely the greatest discovery of a human being's life and once that happens there is the unfolding from your depths of wanting to serve this Reality, to give everything you are and have to this One.  This is surely the Pearl of Great Price which prompts you to go and sell everything you have in order to buy it (See Matthew 13:44-46)  You become a "fool" out of love, so captivating is this Reality, so alive to this Sacred One do you become.  Romero experienced such, I am sure, and so did the human Jesus when on a daily basis.  He got up before sunrise to go off to a quiet place to be alone with God, His Father.  We need to follow His example!

  So, that is it.  I am done.  I have written what I felt compelled to say but needed a good night's sleep and this morning's contemplation to realize that I had more to say than what I was able to say last evening.  Again, a blessed Holy Week and Easter season to you all.

Bernie Owens

Friday, March 27, 2015

Dear Friends,

   I am home and out of the hospital. I was there for 31 hours.    Many signs point to a quick recovery (i.e. no blood in my urine this afternoon nor at dinner time.)  But constipation is a problem.  Ugh!  I am drinking a lot, especially warmed juices like prune juice. I had a quality sleep last night, a harbinger of good things to come and a sign that this operation was worth the trouble.  I still have a catheter in me; that won't come out till Monday morning.  Sometimes it is quite irritating!  It could easily be an effective tool for torture!  (Sorry for being so graphic!)

  Where were my thoughts this last week?  In two places:  first, on the 35th anniversary last Tuesday, the 24th, of the murder of Archbishop Oscar Romero.  His story has gripped my attention for many years.  I had the opportunity in 1998 to travel with a group of 12 other Americans to El Salvador and spend a week there.  I got to see what it was that changed that man in the last four years of his life from a quiet seminary professor to an outspoken bishop.  It was the murder of his Jesuit friend, Rutilio Grande, that lit a fire under him and made him take a stand for the many, many poor, abused farmers of that nation.  The financially powerful families and military feared/hated him and eventually murdered him.  That happened when he was saying mass for the mother of a murdered priest. He had just finished his homily and began the prayers for the preparation of the gifts of bread and wine.  At that point, from the back of the chapel, an assassin fired a single rifle shot through the upper part of Romero's heart.  He fell dead immediately.  In 1998 I had the opportunity to stand on the spot Romero stood on when he was shot, and I stood right on the spot or close to it where the assassin fired the bullet.  The chapel is not that big.  It might hold 200 people at most.   Later, we were taken to Romero's bedroom--a simple guest room at a hospital for terminally ill cancer patients--and I saw up close the alb or white undergarment Romero was wearing; all priests wear this when celebrating mass.  All down the white garment on the heart side (left side) was dried blood.  The single bullet hole was quite visible.  What an amazing thing to see with my eyes!  I was so taken by how real and brutal is the death of a martyr.  But there was also a deep admiration for this man and a secret desire to imitate his courage and be as public as he was in defending the oppressed, to speak out for those who are considered disposable by those in power.  HIs story of being transformed by his role as chief shepherd for the church there is what makes his story so remarkable in how God can make a saintout of somebody, and then in such a short time.  He wasbishop less thanfour years and all of his spiritual depth came to the fore in those last four years.  God can move quite quickly in our lives.  It begins with God planting deep desires in our soul and then calling us forwardto live with depth, with great generosity, selflessly.  (something is making the type here unerasible unlessI erase whole sentences.  I will notdo that!)  So Romero and his life mean very much to me.  He is a great saint but I find it more remarkable in how God "seized" him and led Him to such greatness under tremendous pressure and danger.  This fills me with great hope.  The "burden" is not with us but with
God!  Just say 'yes' to whatever God asks and go with it.  We aren't to make plans.  God has a better plan, better than anything we could ever come up with.  Just go with God,  Let God accomplish in us whatever God wants to do.

  The second set of thoughts very much on my mind and heart were on the following day, in the morning in fact and as I lay on the bed waiting to be put under for my surgery.  I was so aware that it was the feast day of the Incarnation, perhaps the greatest moment in all of human history.  How can I say such a thing?  Because that feastmarks the crossing over of God to humanity, of God becoming human in Jesus.  Everything changed in that initiative of God, everything!  Without that all would be lost.  With it, all is assured.  I have thought abut this before but rarely has it hit me as strongly as it did last Wednesday as I lay waiting for the anesthesiologistand surgeon to start the surgery.  I was so alert that morning, even though I was up at 4 AM and had slept maybe 6 hours that night.  I felt the overwhelming love of God for all humanity,whether people believed in Christ or not.  This love was there and is still there  I don't know how to communicate more than I have the depth of that gesture.and it is something like what struck me about Bishop Romero,that as admirable is his life, what I find far greater is this same theme:  how God makes us who we can become, if we are willing to trust and go with the gifts that are offered. The initiative is with God, not with us.  It was so true in Romero's case and gives me all the more motivation to offer myself to God however God wants to use me, take me, ask me to do X or Y.  I find the  respectful gesture of God, inviting us, notpushing us, but inviting us,to be so beautiful, so moving.How meaingful it has been for me to be surprised with the invitation to Kenya, to trust it, to go with it and to be so blessed by what I have found in that part of the world.  I so hope I can relate to God in the same way for the rest of my life and not miss a thing in my friendship with Him.  It is too wonderful to miss out on or fail to accept.

  It is time for bed here.  Tomorrow is the 500th birthday of St. Teresa of Avila.  What a great,great lady and what amazinginsights about human life and growthin her writings.  Anyway, I had to mention her as I say 'goodnight.

A very blessed Holy Week and Easter season to you all.  May you experience something of the consolations that are there when pondering the love of God for everyone of us expressed in that fateful week almost 2000 years ago.

Bernie Owens

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

HI, Friends,

  I learned just this afternoon I will have surgery a week from today, Wednesday morning, the 25th.  I will not stay in the hospital overnight but come home that afternoon.  Also, I will be catherized for about 4-5 days and sore for about two weeks.  Holy Week will not be pleasant for me, so it seems.  Anyway, I am very glad it is going to get done.  I want it over with so that I can get on with a number of projects I have facing me in the remaining two and a half months left before my return to Kenya.

  A happy Easter to you all!

Bernie Owens

Saturday, March 14, 2015

Hi, Friends.

    Here I am back in the USA.  I arrived in the Detroit area, at Manresa retreat house, my old stomping grounds, last Sunday afternoon, March 8.  It took 25 hours to go from my front door in Nairobi to Manresa's front door.  Two flights, each 8.5 hours long, separated by a 3.5 hour wait in Amsterdam, Holland took up most of my time.  Really tiring.  Still, a smooth flight except for one moment over Europe when the plane, a 747-400 shook quite a bit while going through some kind of air turbulence.  I slept for 11 hours the first night.  This has made my transition to this time zone quite easy.  

   While in Amsterdam I visited the airport's "Meditation Chapel" to pray morning prayers and a rosary.  While there 10-12 Muslim men, all between 25 and 40 years of age, came in to pray, so too one Asian woman who wrapped herself in pink, including her head.  She was Muslim as well.  Some rolled out their prayer rug and knelt, bowed, and chanted some prayers in Arabic.  Each stayed maybe for 15 minutes.  I was there for about 35-40 minutes and so witnessed this expression of Muslim reverence from a number of fairly young people, all but one of them being a male. Really, I find their reverence to be beautiful.  I hope their reverence for God carries over to their peaceful respect for their neighbor, Muslim as well as non-Muslim!!

  The weather change to this place has been rather dramatic.  I left temperatures up to 90 in the mid-afternoon and got hit with temperatures around mid-40s.  I brought appropriate clothing.  I knew what to pack!   The snow here is melting fast.  Almost everyday since I arrived has been blessed with clear, sunny skies.  

  I had intended to come back here for about 5-6 weeks beginning in early May.  But what developed recently is the need for some surgery on my prostate gland.  It would cost $4000 dollars in Kenya while in the States insurance would cover most of the cost.  So I decided to come back to the States much soon and to get this need addressed.  As I write, I still do not know the date for my surgery.  My doctor wants me first to get a full physical exam.  That exam is scheduled for next Monday morning, the 16th.  I am now guessing my surgery date will be sometime during the following week, March 23-27.  

  In the meantime, I have spread the word about the two-week pilgrimage I will lead in Italy next November 7-21.  I have been sending out electronically copies of the itinerary and all the other information needed for the trip.  If you who are reading this want a copy, send me your email address and I will gladly forward to you as an attachment a copy of all the pertinent information.  

   Do I feel excited or jubilant about being back in the USA?  No.  I enjoy being with special friends again.  I will get to see a real spring again. I will join with two special events in my family.  For all of that I am very thankful.   But the work I have been given in Nairobi makes that place special, and for now that is where I truly enjoy being.  So when I board the plane on June 19 to return to Kenya, it will be with a certain eagerness.  I am returning to the States for a three month visit again next year, May to August.  But I don't feel so wedded to a particular place.  What matters is creating with God, being part of the work through which God does awesome things in people's depths.  For me there is nothing more meaningful than that.  

  Also, God is doing something special through my daily prayer.  In the mornings, after shaving, showering, and dressing, I sit quietly, wordless for 45 minutes, just paying attention to Him in my depths.  No images, no thinking, just paying attention to Him. (I know the One in whom I have believed!)  And at times a lot of love wells up from inside me.  I feel this as my love for Him but sometimes I am left wondering whether it is more His love for me.    The two of us are really one in this.   Many times it is quite quiet and ordinary, but underneath the quiet is this  immense love, this unending attraction, an inexpressible closeness and precious friendship.  There are times I am struck dumb, unable to respond adequately, and then I ask the Spirit of God in my depths to pray what I cannot say but what God so deserves. 

   I am going to bid you 'goodbye' for now.  After I know more about when I will have surgery, maybe after I have it, I will write again.  A blessed Lent to you all.  

Bernie Owens

 

Monday, March 2, 2015

Dear Friends,

  Well, I am gathering things to pack and on Saturday evening I leave Kenya to come to Detroit and stay in the Detroit area till June 19.  (Someone, please melt that white stuff and raise the temperatures about 50 degrees!!  We are into hot summer here, 90 degrees each afternoon.  The direct sun is truly hot but, thank God, the humidity is low!!)) I come to get some anticipated surgery, probably in the third week of March, to take time to heal up, and then begin a serious search for financial help for our retreat center and its need for two new buildings.  In addition I will be promoting my book due out soon after Easter and also promote a pilgrimage to Italy starting in Venice and ending in Rome, November 7-21.  So, there are a number of things "on my plate!"

  I have been getting better sleep than before.  I also had two dear American friends visit me before they began a two-week safari in the Serengeti bush country of northern Tanzania, and then when they returned here  but before they returned to the States (Spokane, WA) another day and a half.  Wonderful conversations with them and the Jesuit community with the nuns who are staff members at this retreat center had the joy of celebrating with them their 27th wedding anniversary with a mass and special meal. What a beautiful event it all was.  And then the pictures they sent back of the animals they saw and natives (Masai herders/bush people) they met while on their safari were magnificent!  They witnessed first hand a large pride of lions and also a lion hunt of a wildebeest.  Guess what, the wildebeest lost the chase and became food for the pride, the left overs were left for the hyenas and vultures!!  Life and death are so close there in the bush country of this part of the world!!

  I will be staying at Manresa in Bloomfield Hills, my former home for 19 years, till June 19.  I continue to meet here people on retreat who are just amazing.  The world and the human race God is creating is far richer than what many of us realize.  There are truly striking similarities in us all, even though we seem so different and, sadly, often get stuck at the level of those differences.  I could talk at length about this, this deeper, more invisible world, but I simply don't have the time right now.  Lots of things from students yet to read, a class to teach on Wednesday morning, a big community meeting Thursday evening, and answer a lot of email before I actually pack and leave here.  It is all doable but I can't dawdle or I will have a mess on my hands and high blood pressure!!

  May your Lent continue to be rich in new life with God and lead to a wonderful Easter.  I suppose this will be my last post until I get to Detroit and have something there to write about.

God bless!

Bernie Owens