Green Pastures

I am sitting at my dining room table, drinking Tazo English breakfast tea (there's some kind of deal going on) and munching on leftover salad from last night. I have 135 unread blog posts in my feed, which sounds like a LOT, but most of them are pretty fluffy, so it's not too much to get through. That kind of pileup is what happens when you take a day off from the internet! But I'm glad I did it; gave myself time to read, reflect, and relax. It was very refreshing. Now I feel more organized and focused than ever. I might try to make a habit of abstaining from my keyboard for 24 hours, every month or perhaps weekly.

My book of the moment is A Celestial Omnibus: Short Fiction on Faith, which I am finding very valuable. One of the works I read yesterday was "A Father's Story" by Andre Dubus. This quote in particular stood out to me, and seemed to segue easily into what's been on my mind:

"I say the Lord's Prayer, trying not to recite it, and one morning it occurred to me that a prayer, whether recited or said with concentration, is always an act of faith."

First let me backtrack a little: I get hung up on belief, like we all do. I have made an uneasy settlement with myself, with my skeptic's mind, my inner scientific cynic. The world has plenty of mysteries, and why can't divinity be one of them?

My mother has always taught me that practice is more important than belief. She prefers Christian charity to the Nicene Creed. When I think of this, a sing-song voice pops into my ear: "Actions speak louder than words." Unfortunately, I've always been better at words than actions.

I am tempted to say "Faith is" and then make a grand statement, but I have learned that generalizations inevitably fall down. And exceptions don't prove anything about a rule, at least not anything good. But I can safely describe my own faith:

The way it feels to quietly enunciate the words of the Hail Mary. I always say "thee" and never "you", even though the spiritual head of my Catholic high school rejected the impersonal, archaic version. That always threw me off. I think he wanted the prayer to be more accessible to young people. Personally, I need traditions to have an aura of ancient precedence, so I can sink in and feel it.

My faith is a sensory belief rather than a cerebral one. How can I reject the cool hands that comfort my swelling heart? Why would I want to?

After all, "The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." That is an alluring prospect. At the depth of me, I am someone who wants to not want.