Being Connected

I tend to face life’s challenges and situations looking for the correct answer – Lord, what is the right thing to do? Lord, show me the right way to go!

I was doing that yesterday in mass, seeking how to follow God’s will “correctly” – job stuff, grad school, the elections, friends and relationships were all on my heart. In the silence before mass started, a quote came to mind that I read several months ago, a quote from Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM:

It is not about being correct; it is about being connected.

Not about being correct? My mind relaxed, my soul unfolded a bit, and I laid down my concerns – and then, only then, I sensed being connected. Connected! Connected in an inner way to the Spirit that is in me, and in you, and in every human being.

This moment of connection is where grace meets us, where creativity and understanding are born, and where our vision is expanded (if only a little bit) beyond our own ego.

Fr Rohr’s quote came from a meditation on seeking God’s will in silence – we won’t always get it right, so to speak, but if we seek to stay connected, God will make good out of what we do – and that’s the whole point (See the full meditation here).

I’d like to take the liberty to apply it a step further. Connection doesn’t end with us and God – it is meant to spill over onto every person we encounter. When we are connected to God in an inner way we can open that same door of connection to others. And there, being present to the other and open to connecting with them, the magic happens  – which of course, isn’t magic, but grace.

This seeking connection with the real people around us is, I think, what opens the door to our best creative energy – it allows us to figure a way out of paradoxes, to cross chasms between opposing ideologies, to understand the other and value them regardless of disagreement.

Through this connection and relationship grace is born once again. Through this connection, person by person, the Holy Spirit moves through the world — and that is the only thing that ever changes us, and the only thing that ever changes the world.