Roman Catholic Canon

No two people are born with the same walk of salvation.

Each person will begin where they are on their own path,

But marriage depends on a common final goal.

Each spouse will sometimes follow and sometimes lead,

Each waiting and encouraging as may be necessary.

Only, in this manner, can a family remain whole.

Not only the two must continue focusing on the goal;

Those who came before them must also watch and wait.

How many of us get in a hurry to secure our own place,

And cut loose the others on our life's relay team?

Unless we stop and look back now and then,

We may get their first, but we still lose the race. 


"On completion of the seventh year, 

A minor is presumed to have the use of reason."

This is the teaching of the Roman Catholic canon.

And is the way parents put blame and shame

For their predecessor's and their own errors

Onto their young daughters and their sons.

What foolishness to think that any child

With so little knowledge and experience of life, 

A baby who hasn't even reached puberty,

Is able to take the full credit or blame,

For their own or any other's actions.

They're not ready for such responsibility.

But those who have been shackled

With adult fear and abuse from a young age,

Are always carrying an unfair burden.

They were tasked with undeserved shame

From their ancestors and authorities, too.

The weight becomes too much for them.
 

We were the children caught between

The Vengeful, Jealous God and His Son.

We had no hope of eternal peace or harmony.

The scriptures between which we were sandwiched

Left no room for human argument or error;

There was no path in which our spirits could fly free.

Some of my beloveds have given up,

And they have finally destroyed themselves,

Rather than continue the search for perfection.

Some have taken others to be with them, 

While they rejected all family values,

Rather than to risk their own rejection.


We now seek a scared place somewhere on earth,

Where we can find some place of rest and peace.

There is no further perfection in any part of creation,

Than the place where a group of us is made to be.

We must stop fighting to achieve our best selves alone;

This is not the purpose of any human being's station.


So gather to yourself those who join with joy 
In your walk back to your own innocence.
Allow yourself to be remade in the image of Divinity.
You were born perfect through the blood of your mother.
You deserved to be protected by the those who made you. 
You, and those who nurture you, are your community.

Fulfilling Friendships

What a difference a friend can make in our lives and our attitudes
A friend is one who can see your best underneath what's not so good.
They encourage you to laugh at your fears, and take their power away;
They will fight for you when you're too weak to fight your own prey.

They expect that you will, when able, pick up your spirit's sword again;
They do not delight in the vulnerability or dependence of their friend.
They take over only when necessary to keep your plan on course;
They never look back at the times they helped you, with remorse.

And when it is time for you to stand strong on your own,
They will always be available to you with their hearts and homes.
But they will back away should you continue to deny your strength,
Because they want you to achieve the life for which you were meant.

And they will always be waiting silently in the wings of your life,
Like the partners who are committed as husband and wife.
Because a true lifetime friend also has parts of your soul;
Without you they will continue to miss this piece that makes them whole.

When the World is a Scary Place

When the world is a scary place, where can we go for safety?

When even our parents and our church care only, from us, to be free?

How do we find our good selves, when we’re reflected in the eyes

Of even those who brought us into the earth to be, by them, despised?

How can we flourish as the images and likenesses of God?

Who is to delight in us, if our parents aren’t, of us, proud?

When those who created us turn their faces and walk away,

Who will protect and give us solace, when others, on us prey?

No child should be forced upon a parent who wants no part in her or him.

There are few resources that are freely shared without compensation,

The granting of children to an uncaring community is heartless,

But the right to be wanted is something we don’t want to address.

People seem to want children in their own image and likeness,

And of their god who insists that all mistakes be redressed.

If this is the image and likeness of their stated deity,

Maybe this is who they want themselves and their children to be.

Parenting without patience is not a way to create perfection,

And honest mistakes should not make one fear rejection.

To be treated as a pariah usually makes an animal mean,

The human animal can’t flourish and bond without self-esteem.

Self-esteem does not have to lead to pridefulness,

As long as we are mindful that, by our talents, we are blessed.

It is how we develop those talents that make the difference,

Celebrating by sharing them, not a life of doing penance.

But when we are discouraged from growing in grace,

Because our authorities can’t keep up with our pace,

We spend lives of shame and hiding our strengths,

Instead of pursuing the paths for which we were meant.

Wait with Me

How much of love is simply waiting
While our beloved runs life's race,
Though we may still have much to do?

Once we commit to one another,
The opportunities we miss,
May be more than just a few.

Becoming fully one with another,
In marriage and child rearing,
Is like running a three-legged race.

Our ambitions must be tempered,
Our desires put aside for a while.
Do we cut off the other for not keeping pace?

Do we leave our children by the roadside,
As we race through lives of personal pursuit,
Or do we slow our stride to carry them along?

Don Quixote's impossible, solitary quest
Glorified him dying bloodied and alone.
Do we want to live by the lyrics of a song?

Dreaming the impossible dream,
And fighting the unbeatable foe,
Bearing the unbearable sorrow alone?

Or is it better to be bonded in hopes
That we can both become better selves,
Through the making and tending of home?

Reminiscences from A Riverside Retreat

My friend curls up at her Riverside Retreat,

Caring enough to stay up late and talk.

She has the courage to speak her mind

But I think she needs to stop running and walk.

She continues to look for mountains to climb;

She seems to want to ford every stream.

I fear she’ll never find any lasting peace,

Pursuing, on this earth, an impossible dream.

Each of us is only given so much garden to tend;

We must seek and honor that garden’s boundaries.

None of us is meant to tend our gardens alone

This is why humans create families.

My friend has a husband who loves her and their child;

So much of him lives well in their daughter.

She may succeed in divorcing the man

But in their child, she’ll still deal with the father.

The question I'm not sure she has asked
Is, "Do I even want to be married?"
Marriage means sometimes we carry the other,
And allow ourselves to be sometimes carried.

I have given up the fantasy that all marriages

Fit into a convenient relationship mold.

Loving each other through loving others

Is not what the romantics foretold.

We were taught to love only each other and our church;

The children were a cross all lovers had to bear.

But I have seen even hate-filled relationships

Become healed by others who deeply care.

Rather than setting our children against themselves,

Many grievances should remain unspoken.

Blessed are the children who receive love,

Even though their parents are quite broken.

Our prejudices and sinful selves may be passed on,

But family honoring of ancestors is often overrated.

When we encourage our children to become their best selves,

Children can truly love some that their families hated.

While it is true that some things can’t exist simultaneously,

We can all learn tolerance if we are strong in our own values.

If we aren’t afraid of losing our own boundaries,

Loving those we disagree with is something we can choose.

Breaking and Beginning

We went to see some of our family,
Some for him, and one for me.
It took us twenty years for them to see
That we'll, forever, a couple be.

Even though this may sound strange,
I think his brother's death made this change.
Did the children need their dad's permission
To let another male family figure in?

Or was it Richard who was afraid
To open his heart and get waylaid?
Did his brother's death finally force him
To let the love of other family in?

Or was it that I finally gave up
Trying to fill his long-empty cup
With people who have been close to me,
With whom he feels little history?

I have often said that I'm afraid
Of the feelings he hasn't said.
Once a dam is broken above a town,
The too fast floods will cause people to drown.

There are many who love him, but he is frozen;
He doesn't know what they want from him.
It makes me sad that he offers so much,
But doesn't reach out to receive others touch.

His deep well of kindness and caring
Has always been here for the sharing.
Now that my family has broken our hearts,
In the fissures, will there be new starts?

Celebration of The Spirit of Life Within

How much easier it must be to follow a religion that has a physical mentor,
Not simply a preacher or a teacher, but one who has shown the way.
What we of the Abrahamic religions have is a long historical record
Where covenants and children are tracked from generation to generation.
Can the followers of Krishna, Buddha, Socrates, or Plato say the same?

It seems to me that for many years and many generations of people
We Abrahamics couldn't countenance sanctity without blood sacrifice.
The scriptures seemed to continue to tell the same tale of salvation:
We needed to move toward a way to see The Spirit in one another,
But they continued to fight for space and favor in earthly entities.

I believe that showing us the Spirit of Peace is the mission of The Christ.
I believe community cooperation and celebration is the path to peace
I believe The Spirit is available in our fellow humans, if we look for It,
And that all of creation is there to help us develop earthly harmony.
I wish that we could stop looking for blood or land to bind us.

I wish we'd all join in the celebration of The Spirit of Life within.