[caption id="attachment_1933" align="alignright" width="200"] Blog by Sr. Pat Thomas, OP[/caption]
Anybody reading this who is familiar with train travel on the East coast will recognize this phrase. When the commuter trains come to station stops, there is always a gap between the train car and the platform, and the disembodied voice is heard “Mind the Gap” or “Watch the Gap” so no one will put a foot down the wrong way. It has happened, and often with dire consequences. No matter how many times you ride the trains, the voice will be heard until you want to say “OK. OK. I get it”, but it is relentless. Yet, no matter how many times it is said, people have still tripped or put a foot down too soon. Not good.
We have lots of gaps in our world. There is the wage gap, the gender gap, the age gap, the achievement gap, and even the gap analysis. We can look all of these up online, google or whatever to try to understand them better.
But how are we mindful of the gaps in our lives? Maybe they are gaps in communications with a friend or loved one. We need to call someone and know it will be a difficult conversation and that gap grows wider the longer we put it off. Can we ever bridge it? What is holding us back?
Is there a gap between us and God for some reason? We may say we want to get closer to God, to know God better, and what do we do about that? Most of the time, we fill that gap with words piled on words piled on words. We go to adoration with our rosaries, devotional books, wonderful prayers that we have said since we were children; that is all good, we know it. But, how do we get to know someone better if we are filling the conversation with our words? How many times have we just sat down in a quiet place at home, in a church, in a park, on the shore, in the forest, and just it let it be us and God? Sometimes that little knocking we hear inside is God trying to fill the gap. Be mindful.
Blog by Sr. Pat Thomas, OP[/caption]
Anybody reading this who is familiar with train travel on the East coast will recognize this phrase. When the commuter trains come to station stops, there is always a gap between the train car and the platform, and the disembodied voice is heard “Mind the Gap” or “Watch the Gap” so no one will put a foot down the wrong way. It has happened, and often with dire consequences. No matter how many times you ride the trains, the voice will be heard until you want to say “OK. OK. I get it”, but it is relentless. Yet, no matter how many times it is said, people have still tripped or put a foot down too soon. Not good.
We have lots of gaps in our world. There is the wage gap, the gender gap, the age gap, the achievement gap, and even the gap analysis. We can look all of these up online, google or whatever to try to understand them better.
But how are we mindful of the gaps in our lives? Maybe they are gaps in communications with a friend or loved one. We need to call someone and know it will be a difficult conversation and that gap grows wider the longer we put it off. Can we ever bridge it? What is holding us back?
Is there a gap between us and God for some reason? We may say we want to get closer to God, to know God better, and what do we do about that? Most of the time, we fill that gap with words piled on words piled on words. We go to adoration with our rosaries, devotional books, wonderful prayers that we have said since we were children; that is all good, we know it. But, how do we get to know someone better if we are filling the conversation with our words? How many times have we just sat down in a quiet place at home, in a church, in a park, on the shore, in the forest, and just it let it be us and God? Sometimes that little knocking we hear inside is God trying to fill the gap. Be mindful. 