My Prayer

Dear God,

In the wake of so much conflict and sadness in the world, I find myself slipping into a dark place.  Please help me to find my way back to the light.  Please help me not to judge those who are making me angry with their views, though they differ from my own.  Please help me to accept that we are all doing the best we can.  Please help me to do my best.

Everytime I hear another person say that we shouldn't allow the Syrian refugees to come into Canada, I want to cry.  I want to rail at them for what seems to be their heartlessness and mean-spiritedness.  In my heart of hearts, I know mostly they are just afraid.  Please God, help them not to be afraid. 

Please help us to embrace one another.  Help us to find the things that bind us as humans.  Help us to understand that it is not skin colour or religion or place of birth that separates us, but rather fear, greed and hatred. Remind us that you did not draw the lines around the countries on the map but created the world for all of us to share.  Help us to find our better instincts. 

Help us to accept what is inevitably coming our way and let it bring out the best in us, rather than the worst.  Help us to be helpers, to provide comfort and refuge to all your children who need it.  Help us to remember that we are all your children.

Please forgive us when we fail.  Help us to pick ourselves up each time we fall, learn from our mistakes and try again. 

Thank you for the many blessings you have bestowed upon me.  For being born in a safe and free country.  For access to education, employment, health care, potable water, shelter, transit and food.  Thank you for family and friends.  I will try to be worthy of these gifts.

Love
Jackie

Heartsick

 "If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men." - St. Francis of Assisi

 

The older I get, the less and less I seem to understand the world.  The events of last night in Paris are so far outside my sphere of understanding that I'm not even trying.  My visceral reaction to the news was to feel sick.  Sick to my stomach.  Sick to my core.

Before the Paris attacks, I tried hard to bury my horror over the attacks in Beirut. Our part of the world paid little attention to those terrorist attacks.  But another attack on Paris would get our attention. The loss of European lives would hit close to home.  I tried hard through a long wakeful night after the news came from Paris, to convince myself that Canadians wouldn't go where I feared they would go but it was only a few hours into the day when I saw my worst fears realized.  

Yesterday, the annual Fall Fair was held at my mom's nursing home.  As we have done for the last eleven years, my sisters and I ran the jewellery department at the fair. Other than at the fair, I seldom see the group of women who volunteer at the nursing home.  My mom doesn't attend the activities anymore.  They are a lovely group of women, most twenty years my senior.  One of the loveliest women, Anna, took a few moments out of our very hectic preparation time to chat with me and get caught up on the happenings of the last year.  In addition to her volunteer work at the nursing home, Anna has been working at her church on their project to sponsor six families of Syrian refugees.  They should arrive in Canada before the end of this year.  After the attacks in Paris on Friday night, Anna is having second thoughts. She's thinking that maybe we shouldn't let them in.  What if they are terrorists?  I felt the knot in my stomach growing.

Earlier this year I reconnected with an old friend.  When I posted on my Facebook page a few weeks ago that I have created a new line of jewellery that I am selling for Syrian refugee relief, she was one of the first people to message me with an order.  Today, she posted a petition on her Facebook page, imploring the Canadian government to ban the entry of Syrian refugees.  It felt like a gut punch.  

In less than six weeks, it will be Christmas.  We live in a huge and prosperous country.  Are we really prepared to tell these refugees that there is no room at the inn?  Are we prepared to let terrorists define who we are?  We are Canadians.  We have more than we need.  Let's build a longer table not a higher fence.

Ten Years of Profound Gratitude

"Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed.  Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude." - Denis Waitley

Ten years ago today, I spent a long, sleepless night praying for time.  In the early morning hours of November 9, I would head to Princess Margaret for surgery.  It was step one in my breast cancer journey.  I was scared, to be sure.  I didn't want the pain, but I've had enough experience with pain during my life to know I could handle it.  I didn't want the disfigurement but I have enough scars to know I would eventually stop seeing it.  What worried me most was that I might not wake up from surgery and that anguish is what filled my thoughts that night.  I asked God over and over, for the time to raise my son.  Jacob was only fourteen.

My prayers were answered.  Jacob is grown now and I have had ten years of joy watching him become an extraordinary man. I got exactly what I asked for.  A couple of nights ago, I found myself praying again.  I am profoundly grateful for the gift of these ten years but I want more time.  A lot more time.  I want to dance at Jacob's wedding.  I want to hold my grandchildren.  I want to revel in retirement.  I want to see Paris, Sydney and Tokyo.  I want to finish the book I've been working on in dribs and drabs for the past five years.  I want to grow old.

Every morning for these past ten years, I have awoken with gratitude.  Every morning I have started my day with whispered thanks for the time.  I am so lucky.  I am so thankful.  I am so blessed.