The Whisper

Today I ran near 10-miles. The temperature reached near 65 degrees and the sun appeared. Yesterday I ran as well, but the conditions were not as worthy. I ran on a muddy path yesterday and today's path was paved and full of human riff-raff.

I felt the love as I ran, and I embraced the Chaos in my life. I considered the things, people and areas in my life around which I draw lines while asking God not to disturb them....My prayer has been instead, "God, fix me, but here is how I want for you to do that."

The pain in my hip was constant today. By the end of my run, my hip brought me near to tears. I was so very tempted to lay myself down, face onto the ground, with outstretched arms, and to beg God not to take away my running from me. The thought was so real for me that I began to think about what the human riff-raff down yonder on the path might think about me as I laid myself down and prayed to God not to take away my running from me. I wanted to draw a huge line around my running and beg if necessary that God fix me without touching that part of my life.

The more the thought possessed me, the more my hip ached.

Prostration on the paved running path was a near possibility. I was so close to laying myself down, but self control prevented me from begging God in such a pitiful manner.

Yesterday after my run I spent time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, and a Silent Priest whom I barely know, came and knelt beside me. As I silently prayed my infantile, "help me, help me, help me," he must have sensed my desperation.

There was another woman in the Chapel. I call her Professional Prayer Woman. She had the routine down. She said some prayers aloud and she had her rosary and she knew when to get on her knees and when to sit up. I knelt on my little chair and hunched over and rocked back and forth and thought only the Prayer of Eternal Help Me.

Professional Prayer Woman made her glorious exit. In came Silent Priest, who knelt beside me and prayed his silent but seemingly equally desperate prayer.

This went on for 15-minutes. Mass was to begin in 15-more minutes. I wanted to prostrate myself right there, but I thought that Silent Priest might think I was trying to upstage Professional Prayer Woman.

Silent Priest and I remained in the chapel until life called us out.

My mother, a very gifted singer, sang a song throughout my childhood which now plays like a rewinding tape in my head:

Hear, oh Lord, the sound of my call.
Hear, oh Lord, and have mercy.
My soul is longing for the glory of you.
Oh, hear oh Lord, and answer me.

I guess the point it is simple.

Silent Priest told me that God never left me, and I asked Silent Priest why, then do I not feel God, or know God? Silent Priest told me that God has never left me, and I asked Silent Priest why God is not present and why God is absent? Silent Priest repeated again that God has not left me, and I asked Silent Priest, how can I hear God?

Silent Priest told me that God is in the Whisper, and that I must Be Still, And Know that God is God. I asked Silent Priest why God is in the Whisper, and Silent Priest said that God has never left me and that I must Be Still and Listen for the Whisper.

I asked Silent Priest why if God is near, do I feel so much pain, from my hip to my soul, and Silent Priest said that God has never left me. I asked Silent Priest if God has never left me, then why can't God fix my pain, and Silent Priest told me that God is with me.

Silent Priest told me to be gentle with myself so that I can hear the Whisper when it arrives.

The words of Silent Priest kept me from prostrating myself on the path of my longest run today. It would have been an obscenely self-indulgent prayer posture.

I will instead prostrate myself in my private corridors, where I will pray to hear the Whisper. I will examine how to erase the lines I have placed around the things, people and areas in my life which block out the sounds of the Whisper.

It is open season on the soul and if I cannot run through this season, I will walk or I will crawl.