I wrote my last column about “Taking the Next Step” which was a weekly reflection on the gospel, faith, and the struggles and joys of being Catholic.  This was my final piece which was sent out earlier this week.

For about a year, I have been writing these small reflections on how to “take the next step” in faith.  As I write my last piece this week, I began wondering if and how writing these reflections has deepened my faith.  But how does one go about measuring such a large, expansive, and mysterious concept?  And what does it mean to be “deeper” in faith?

I looked back at where I was a year ago, remembered my struggles, recalled my anxieties, joys, questions, and thoughts and it soon became evident: Yes. I have grown.  The journey didn’t bear significant markers or milestones, but a rhythm emerged out of establishing a regular practice of asking, “What is God saying to me this week?”  and not just thinking about it, but actually articulating it in words, offering it to others.  It turns out that giving food to others is the only true way to feed yourself.

Where were you a year ago?  That question is usually reserved for New Year’s Eve, but for so many of us, August is just as equally a time of transition.  The change of seasons is drawing near, academic calendars begin anew, and the sounds of summer are beginning to fade.  What were you praying for a year ago, what occupied your heart last August?  Has it changed?

Some of my favorite theologians have said that life is not a linear process, nor is our relationship with God.  Meaning, our relationship with God is not like our earthly relationships with one another where we experience and distinguish relationships by periods of closeness, then distance, and everything in between.  Our God is a hopeless one; hopelessly in love in all that we do.  God is the immoveable love rock.  That has not changed from last year.  What should be different is our response to God’s repeated callings to engage with Him.

Take the next step this week and create a “compare and contrast” list, asking yourself this question: What are you doing more deeply or differently since last year in your life of faith?

For me, the regular practice of writing what my spiritual eye saw softened me to regard the world as God does – with more gentleness, patience, and humor.  When I first started doing it a year ago, I stumbled and didn’t know what to write, but it got easier as the weeks went on which led me to conclude that, perhaps, taking the first step will always be the most difficult but after a little while, taking the next step becomes the most natural thing to do.

I did it.  I threw out lotion and perfume bottles.

It’s something I’ve never done before.  I could never bring myself to waste, and in that incapability to throw away, I had more than I ever needed.  Today was the day.  I opened a trash bag and went to town on my bedroom.  Magazines, lotions, clothes. I’m in a purge fest.

I’m cleansing, saying goodbye, getting rid of excess.

It feels almost like an urgency to only carry the essentials.

Since I was a little girl, the car window was like a magical lens for me.  While my siblings played random traveling games, I’d stare out the window and watch the rolling hills, the purple sunsets, the hitch hikers dragging feet, the black smoke from the big wheel trucks.

When I’m the passenger, my thoughts scatter.  My brain empties itself and it absorbs the images and fleeting nothingness.  Sometimes, my mind wanders to unresolved things that I haven’t figured out.  A political article that confounded me.  The latest piece of news I heard from a friend.  A hiccup at work that I didn’t smooth over yet.

Like magic, the road can be a place of vision.  Perhaps it’s the movement.  The silent way everyone’s concentrating on the road and their bright little GPS gadget telling them how much further until they reach their destination.  Travel, for me, can sometimes be a meditation all on its own.  In quiet drives, I can hear myself think and epiphanies, random resolutions, declare themselves in the small space of my car.

Epiphany: as there is no right way to mother, there is no right way to father.  Nick doesn’t do things my way because he’s not me.  And I’m not him.  Why do we expect fathers to do things our way?  If we are to truly work toward egalitarian parenting styles, parents must model this in their own homes.   Parenting is about loving, not about correcting.

Epiphany: In about two generations, families will be more integrated.  There will be a movement back toward village living. This whole isolated/parents working like crazy for limited family leave/doing it on your own model of US parenting we have going on right now is DYING.  Families are meant to be built in community. And having good company around you is NOT the same thing as intentional community.  Play dates are not the same as building a community together and helping one another raise our families.  This includes both children and our aging parents.

Epiphany: I don’t need much, but I do need space.  This morning, I sat on a carpeted floor (luxury in my world) with my back propped against a bathroom door while everyone else in my friends’ house was sleeping.  I was entirely comfortable and content.  Fancy work desks and “a room of one’s own” are not prerequisites for time to write.

Epiphany: Love, still, can stop my heart in wonder.  This morning, I saw Nick sleeping on his stomach, head below (nearly under) the pillow, right knee bent at a slight angle, left knee face down and leg stretched out and over the mattress.  Glancing to my right, my heart stopped when I saw Isaiah in the complete same position.  Angles matching identically.  His abbreviated body had even moved OFF the roll out mattress and his head was barely on the mattress, being used as a pillow.  The image, eerily identical, was startling.  Father/son. Symbiotic in sleep.  I reached quietly for my camera to grab the moment, but Nick flipped over and the moment was gone.  My heart was so full of stunned love, I took a mental photo.

More scrapbook epiphanies to come.

I’m giving myself permission write whatever, whenever. Sometimes I think expectations slow me down. Worrying too much what is and isn’t good enough, perfect, right. Those are high expectations in writing, particularly when the process of writing itself is built upon the premise of it being a process. Not everything is gold. Not everything is genius.

First drafts are works in progress. The final product is after much toil and labor. The good work entails flushing out the not so good work. The flushing needs to happen more often.

I’m home. I’m back at work. My head is cloudy, still, from the deep south. Swimming in memories and humidity of nothing to do, far away from life.

But I’m back. Physically I’m back. But I left my head in New Orleans.

A small glimpse into the wonder world of Voices of Our Nation Arts Foundation (VONA) which I had the privilege of attending last week. In summary: it changed my life.

VONA Love Letter from Lisa Factora-Borchers on Vimeo.

I was recently challenged to come up with a working definition of what makes an activist.  And since my brain is far from rested or even working, I have just an abbreviated response.  This is to be continued.  This is not finished.  It is not inclusive of all my thoughts on this topic.  It’s huge, compelling, and much larger than a blog post.

What Is An Activist?

• a living person who decides to put action to their conscience (a dog marching in the Pride parade, or barking up a storm at an organization’s funding rally is not an activist because there is – to my knowledge – no conscious choice an animal makes to participate in these actions)
• engages in some sort of action, collaborates with a group or event whose mission is to disrupt, transform, heighten awareness of, or unlearn a practice, pedagogy, or agenda that seeks to oppress a marginalized group
• puts into practice new or newly founded ways of practicing love, relationship, community, and interdependence
• understands that liberation of all persons can not be and never will be on the backs of or forsake another person’s liberation
• organizes
• has a working and evolving understanding of the relationship of economics to discrimination/oppression and works to disrupt the destructive patterns