Praying with Postcards-1

   It began here. My spiritual journey. 

In 1969, I had liberated myself from the oppressive duty of church attendance. The priest at St. Clare's in Rosedale said we need to pray for such and such and I thought "when has that ever worked ?" The people I knew who were churched were not happy humans so what good was their faith doing?

 I walked my self home over the bridge that crosses the Belt Parkway in Queens and left that nonsense behind. Freedom!!!!

Our small family moved a bit and 1971 found us in California, Huntington Beach. Freedom and paradise! Then it happened: one morning I woke up with a chasm inside that felt as deep as the sea. Something huge was missing: that's the only way to describe it. I can see myself that day standing in our living room praying this pitiful prayer: "God, if you are there, help me." Nothing happened but I felt a tad of relief like I had done "something."

A week later I was shopping for a dear friend's birthday and found a small book of essays the name of which escapes me. As I read through, it was like the Spirit was holding a highlighter and  underlining each word. My eyes were being opened to what was true. I kept saying: "yes, yes and yes, I get it." Unbeknownst to me, I was  hungry for the words of faith that I was finding. The essays came from a book called "The Quantity of a Hazelnut" : it changed my life. I still have it.

I was also being tricked into faith. I recall taking a book out of the library in Huntington Beach soon after that .I thought it was a love story called "Late Have I Loved Thee' and how clever is the Spirit , it was the biography of St. Augustine. Everything was undermining my unbelief. That was August of 1971.

So I use this postcard of that place and I pray with it. I thank God for belief and all it has brought to my life. I pray for the high school friend who keeps that small book by her bedside for these past 50 years: for the author of the book, Fae Malania and for the people who came to a lonely couple's house for Easter. And for being redeemed, thank You.