Pilgrimage

Living at this monastery I think of myself as trying to be on a pilgrimage.  I am not in Boulder where I have lived for many years, nor am I with my Paulist community in San Francisco.  I am away.  Part of pilgrimage is to go away from.  But what am I going toward?  This is the even harder part of the journey.  I am going to be here awhile, so I have the chance to go away from my ego plans, a surface life of just getting through the day, which can be formidable for us, but won't transform us.  So it is a Heart journey, going to the depth of the heart of Love for this God I believe to be Jesus.  What is my map? His life as found in the Bible, as well as the psalms I hear and read each day in choir, and the examples of other monks.  So far, I find that I get a bit lost, as I go off on tangents of self-interest, and self-centeredness.  But somehow, I am rather quickly reminded of why I am here.  Covid was the presenting reason, which appealed to my sense of fear.  I have spent many a summer here, but it was always with that sense of being away from somewhere else for the summer, which is not the same as leaving a place to go to another place.  So much for me.  What about you in this Covid time that changes your life without asking.  Can you make it something of a pilgrimage?  You leave something or have something taken away from you, but that may be opportunity if it can be looked at as a means to go toward something that will make you a better person.  The moving need not be physical to still be a moving away and going toward.