Faith is Where Your Ass Is

Warning: random thoughts ahead:

Faith is not where your head is. Faith is not where your heart is.  Faith is where your ass is.   You have to show up. I haven't done a very good job of showing up lately. Even if my heart isn't there, I need to show up.

Sometimes, you don't know what to believe in.  Our head tells us what we think is wise to do. Our heart tells us what we'd like to do.  Another part - our soul, our gut, our conscience - that tells you what you have to do.

Why do we stay when we don't want to, or leave when we don't want to - because it's right.  Sometimes we make decisions because long range, this will bring us life.

If someone comes up to you and asks, "Are you happy in your life?"  It's not a good question.  It's a question to torture yourself.  Are you happy in your relationship?  Are you happy in your career?  It's hard to answer yes because it's the wrong question, it asks a different question than the one we need to answer.  The "good" question is, "Is there meaning in your life?"  Is there meaning in raising children?  Is there meaning in going to church?  Is there meaning in making the right choice when you want to make the wrong one?  Is there meaning in your career?

Imagine Jesus on the cross - and if someone came up to him and asked, "Are you happy up there?" Then most likely the answer would be "no."  But if someone asked if there was meaning in him being up there, then yes, there was more meaning than we can perceive or understand.

 If we go back to the "Dark Night of the Soul," that I talked about with Mother Theresa...then we see that sometimes her heart wasn't in it, her head wasn't in it, but SHE was in it.

There is a place where we don't think, we don't feel, we just KNOW.  Father Rolheiser calls our moral center. How do we get in touch with that place when we've lost it. Show up. Pray.