Dear All,
At this time of year if we are about in a town of any size really, we are likely to see a homeless person in the street, often looking cold and weary, often with a dog. Our attachments today have a focus on ‘home’. There is something on homelessness as well as on home and also on hope – so needed by those on our streets. We don’t usually know why they are there – sometimes it may be a life-style choice but more often it seems to be just circumstances that have led to it – maybe family rejection, maybe substance-abuse, maybe ……… But I do remember hearing a homeless person saying that the worst thing about it wasn’t cold, hunger, wet clothes, but the fact that most people pass by without even giving a look, a smile, let alone a word. Often from my own experience I think that is from embarrassment – I wasn’t going to give the person anything so I didn’t want to meet the person’s eyes.
So the reflection on hope is hugely important.
We have an Irish blessing from Sacred Weave today. Hope you enjoy it and have a good week!
With love
God is Our Home
Henri Nouwen
This image of God inviting us to his home is used throughout scripture. The Lord is my house. The Lord is my hiding place. The Lord is my awning. The Lord is my refuge. The Lord is my tent. The Lord is my temple. The Lord is my dwelling place. The Lord is my home. The Lord is the place where I want to dwell all the days of my life. God wants to be our room, our house. He wants to be anything that makes us feel at home. She is like a bird hugging us under her wings. She is like a woman holding us in her womb. She is Infinite Mother, Loving Host, Caring Father, the Good Provider who invites us to join him.
Homecoming
Joyce Rupp
O God of exiles and strangers,
find the homeless parts of me.
Guide them towards yourself
for you are my promised land.
Take the stranger inside of me
and find familiar soil for it.
Keep me mindful of the Emmanuel,
whose sojourn brought me a glimpse of home
I Never Knew his Name
Carol Dixon
I never knew his name;
but each day I walked past
on my way from work;
he was there, in the doorway,
huddled with his old dog.
Sometimes I gave him my apple
left over from lunch,
and felt good because I had given up
a tiny morsel of a meal
when I had so much.
And if I did, he smiled up at me
through the scruffy growth of his beard,
and the dog tried to wag its tired tail
as it chewed on scraps thrown out
by benevolent butchers.
One day he wasn’t there and I heard
he’d been found dead that morning
after a particularly cold night.
The dog was taken into a shelter.
On a string round its neck,
he’d hung its name, Fido – ‘Faithful’.
And his name?
From a paper in his pocket
it seems his name was Josh,
short for Joshua –
another name for Jesus.
The Sun is Still Rising and I am Still Growing – Hope!
Morgan Harper Nichols
The sun is still rising
the wind is still blowing
and no matter the landscape I am growing.
You are still growing. Even when your mind is anxious and you feel lost indoors ,
trying to make sense of a place you have been before,
I hope you can trust that the sun is still rising, even if you don’t watch it rise each day.
You have not missed out on what was meant for you,
even when it seems that way.
You have not missed out
on what was meant for you
you have not missed out
on what was meant for you:
a life where even through brokenness
morning mercy
morning Light
shines through.
Things will change.
Yes, things will change.
Hour by hour,
and day by day.
You will grieve
what could have been
and what is no longer
the same,
and you will shine, on anyway.
You will shine on, anyway.
So here’s new beginnings
sunrise into sunrise:
you have not seen everything yet,
through it all, you are still alive.