I’m sitting in a coffeehouse as I write this, and opposite me are others with eyes to screen or page. I give myself permission to snoop, to gaze on these faces, and I see incredible diversity among them. How does God do it? I note the eyebrows on the front of one very bald head. How very strange and beautiful this human accouterment is! I see a most gracious smile on the face of another who speaks (too loudly) into his cell phone. I see the furrowing on another face as if the person is trying to figure out the nature of the cosmos. A young adult male is also chatting on his cell, and suddenly--obviously exasperated--says his mom is on the other line and he needs to take it. He holds the phone in front of him, presses a button, takes a deep sigh, puts phone back to ear. In a voice that barely hides his annoyance, says “Hi mom, how’s it going?” He proceeds to tell her that he will not be coming home for the holiday weekend. By the litany of his subsequent excuses, it’s clear the parent on the other end is disappointed. Typical young man trying to pull away from a typical mom who doesn’t want her son to pull away. But the ‘typical’ of it all only magnifies for me the preciousness of it all! It’s a typical (and precious) Friday at the neighborhood coffeehouse.
The marriage of outer senses and inner eye and ear solicits our constant attention and practice. As long as our bodies are bonded to earth by gravity, then every single day requests of us to see into the heart of things. Every hour to look up and to practice sacred awareness. Every minute to be open to the grace to live sacrament.
