The Healing of Yuck

The visiting priest had been brought in to give a Lenten Retreat. His talk had centered on compassion and how God is merciful, understanding, loving, and desirous of our communion with Him. He spoke of how nothing – NOTHING – can separate us from the love of God other than our own cold-hearted rejection. Somewhere in his talk he mentioned that we should even offer God our junk, our anger, our disappointments.

After the presentation had ended and the Q&A; was done, a woman approached, who had sat in the back.

Many of the parish regulars were surprised to see her; they thought she’d left the church long ago. They knew she’d had some family problems. Murmurs ran quietly through the crowd as she approached the visiting priest.

She walked right up to him and asked, “Did I hear you correctly? You said it was alright to offer God our anger?”

The priest stared at her for a moment trying to gather some hint as to where she was going with this. Her face was tight as stone.

He said, “Yes … yes, of course.”

It was at that moment that the murmurings found memory and folks recalled, in that instant, that this woman had lost a son – a mere teenager – all those many years ago.

She stared at the priest for a moment, then turned and walked away …

As others gathered in to greet him and ask their own questions, he watched her. His eyes followed her … all the way back to the corner of the room where there was an icon corner …

And he saw the woman lift her fists up in the air in front of the icon of Christ and say …

(and I paraphrase) …

The Orthodixie Podcast on Ancient Faith Radio.

P.S. — I shall be away from blog/comment moderation until the Feast of the Annunciation, March 25th.