The Gratitude Committee

My mother is a big greeting card person; it's unthinkable for her to let any nationally recognized occasion pass without sending every major relative a card.  Growing up, I didn't mind this so much; all I was required to do was sign my name.  What I hated though, was thank you notes.  My mother forced the writing of thank you notes upon me like she forced me to eat overcooked broccoli.

Like many things that have been ruined for us in childhood, though, I took a good long break from thank you notes (and broccoli), and then eventually rediscovered them in my own way.  (I learned to like broccoli when I learned the fine art of briefly steaming, rather than boiling it for a half hour).

It took involvement with non-profits as a fundraiser, grantwriter, and event organizer for me to finally see the value of thank you notes.  They went from being something I was merely obligated to do to an enjoyable exercise in actual gratitude.  I began to take pleasure in choosing the words and the card, imagining how the recipient might feel upon receiving it.  And there was an unmistakable sense of satisfaction when I deposited the sealed envelopes into a mailbox.  Like that was one thing out of my ambiguous, ambivalent day that I could honestly say was The Right Thing To Do, and I had done it.  I could cross it off my list and feel complete.

While participating as a board member for one non-profit, my good friend Rob and I became The Gratitude Committee.  Since we're both ridiculously philosophical, perfectionists when it comes to writing, and long-winded, the Gratitude Committee often spent many hours composing a simple thank you note.  But it was fun.  There was an exciting element in the collaborative nature of our projects.  Sometimes we'd work on a note for a while and get stuck on one line.  Maybe this seems silly to you, but there is definitely a tricky place in thanking a donor who you want to be able to ask for money again at some point.  You want to let them know you're grateful, while also subtly preparing them to open their wallets again.

So we'd get stuck on this one line, and finally decide to leave it alone for a while, let it simmer in our subconscious minds.  Then, the next day or whatever, one of us would have a breakthrough and elatedly call the other as though we were announcing having found the cure for the common cold.

I am no longer a member of the Gratitude Committee, and I tend to forget to write thank you notes, or I put it off for so long that it seems more insulting to send it at such a late date than to have never sent it at all.

But lately, I've been putting together a list of people I want to spend some time creatively thanking.  So many people have done wonderful things for me lately, and it's very easy to just say "thanks" at the time then let these little miracles fade away.  But when I really look at how people have sometimes saved my ass, or made my life easier or more pleasant in some way, I am stunned at myself that I could ever let such things go by without a concrete expression of gratitude.

There are many lessons in life that keep coming back to me because I'm such a slow learner.  I forget so fast.  One of those lessons is that gratitude is the right mode for just about any activity.  It's the answer to many questions, and the antidote to much negativity.  I tend to feel guilty when people give me things - gratitude is the alternative to that.  Expressing gratitude means a cosmic balance has been struck and catapults me into a far more joyful and enlightened realm.

Writer Elisabeth Eliot says, "It is always possible to be thankful for what has been given instead of complaining about what hasn't been given.  One or the other will become a habit of life."  God knows I've too often fallen into the habit of complaining instead of being thankful.  


I came across a vegan's blog today.  She's recently become vegan because she has major problems with the global food market.  I do too, but I don't think being vegan is the answer, at least not for me.  Mulling over her blog this evening, I started drifting into my usual ambivalence about the efficacy of political solutions.  The sense of futility inherent in awareness of being a member of a flagrantly corrupt system.  You gotta eat.  And unless you're producing all your own food yourself, someone somewhere - human or animal - probably suffered for your dinner.

So what do I do?  Starve myself out of guilt?  No.  I offer gratitude to whatever life I'm consuming.  Which is all life.  Just life.  And in this way I see that gratitude is the flipside of compassion, because if I can be grateful for another's sacrifice, the inevitable next step is to see that sacrifice is also asked of me.  And I can be grateful for that too.

A Full Moon for Francis

The Prayer of St. Francis 

Lord make me a channel of thy peace;

that where there is hatred, I may bring love; 

that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness ; 

that where there is discord, I may bring harmony ; 

that where there is error, I may bring truth; 

that where there is doubt, I may bring faith; 

that where there is despair, I may bring hope; 

that where there are shadows, I may bring light; 

that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted; 

to understand, than to be understood ; 

to love, than to be loved.

For it is by self-forgetting that one finds. 

It is by forgiving that one is forgiven. 

It is by dying that one awakens to Eternal Life.  

Amen. 

Today is October 4, the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi.  Last night, Sister Moon put on quite a show for him.  As I sat on my porch and gazed at her glorious fullness, I heard bells from the San Francisco de Asis church.  They rang for a long long time.  I suppose there was a mass celebrating St. Francis, and I'm sure they're doing it today too.

This blog will have to serve as my little tribute to Francis.  I just adore him.  Such a rabble-rouser, such a poet, so much compassion.  A great combination of qualities, if you ask me.

Nowadays, he's considered patron saint of the environment, because of his great love for all of creation.  I think the feast of St. Francis should be widely celebrated as a second annual Earth Day.  The rate things are going in this world, we could use at least two.

When I was in San Francisco for the first time, I had a major blonde moment (and I'm not even blonde).  I wandered into one of the cathedrals (don't remember which one) and was surprised that there was so much stuff in the gift shop about St. Francis, until I (DUH) put it together:  San Francisco = St. Francis.  (Believe it or not, I actually have a master's degree.)

Anyway, I bought this poster.  I'm pretty picky about art that I like enough to look at every day, but I love this and have it up in my bedroom:

Il Transito di san Francesco alla Porziuncola

(St. Francis Dying at Porziuncola)

by Gerardo Dottori

I never get tired of looking at it.  It' so vivid and meditative at the same time.

At the San Francisco de Asis church here, in addition to the statue of St. Francis that I mentioned in my previous post, there's also this little alcove about two feet high, built into the western well surrounding the church. 

 

I love that Francis is holding a dove here, since there are actual doves that live in the bell towers of the church.  I even managed to capture this photo of a dove and a pigeon hanging out:

I think it's pretty neat that there's so much animal and plant life at a church dedicated to St. Francis of Assisi.  It's like they know they're welcome there.  The Canticle of the Creatures is perpetually whispered on the breeze.

What is truly glorious about the Canticle (also known as the Canticle of the Sun) is that he wrote it on his deathbed.  Apparently, he was lying there, tempted to feel sorry for himself, questioning the fairness of his pain and infirmities.  But in that darkness he chose gratitude - for the opportunity to soon leave the world and move on to the next, but also for the world itself, and all he had loved in it.

I think this is very similar to the way the book of Job ends.  I've always thought that God's speech to Job is about loving the creation as the answer to suffering.  It's like God is saying the way to deal with suffering is to be amazed, to realize how little we actually know and understand, but then go out into the creation and see and know and love the creatures, and by extension, the Creator.

Francis, I think, knew this best of all.

The Canticle of the Creatures

Most High, all-powerful, all-good Lord,
All praise is Yours, all glory, honor and blessings.
To you alone, Most High, do they belong;
 no mortal lips are worthy to pronounce Your Name.

 We praise You, Lord, for all Your creatures,
especially for Brother Sun,
who is the day through whom You give us light.
And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendor,
of You Most High, he bears your likeness.

We praise You, Lord, for Sister Moon and the stars,
in the heavens you have made them bright, precious and fair.

We praise You, Lord, for Brothers Wind and Air,
 fair and stormy, all weather's moods,
by which You cherish all that You have made.

We praise You, Lord, for Sister Water,
so useful, humble, precious and pure.

We praise You, Lord, for Brother Fire,
through whom You light the night.
 He is beautiful, playful, robust, and strong.

We praise You, Lord, for Sister Earth,
 who sustains us
with her fruits, colored flowers, and herbs.

We praise You, Lord, for those who pardon,
for love of You bear sickness and trial.
Blessed are those who endure in peace,
by You Most High, they will be crowned.

We praise You, Lord, for Sister Death,
from whom no-one living can escape.
Woe to those who die in their sins!
Blessed are those that She finds doing Your Will.
No second death can do them harm.  

We praise and bless You, Lord, and give You thanks,
and serve You in all humility.

 

The Little Flowers of St. Clare

I've always been a big fan of St. Francis of Assisi.  Anyone who would strip naked in the town square as a statement against superficiality and rampant materialism is ok in my book.

But it's only recently that I've come to appreciate his cohort, St. Clare.  My previous sense of her was that she was sort of a twelfth century religious groupie, but since I've been walking to the San Francisco de Asis church, I've found myself irresistibly drawn to her, because of the beguiling and enigmatic statue of her that's in the courtyard.

As you can see, she's surrounded by flowers.  I first started my walks, my little pilgrimages, in early August, when her garden was in full bloom.  In fact, the day of my second walk, I came home and looked her up on the computer, and discovered that her feast day was in two days, on August 11.

The most impressive thing about Clare that I discovered is that she was the first woman to write a monastic rule.  She started the order of nuns known today as the Poor Clares, and the set of rules and guidelines that she wrote to govern this order was approved by the Pope on August 9, 1253, two days before she died.  I just happened to find this out on the exact anniversary of that day.

I also found out that she's the patron saint of laundry workers, which, since I'm planning to open a laundromat, really just gave me chills.

It's true that she was inspired by and devoted to Francis, as he was to her.  In the courtyard, their statues are catty corner to each other, facing each other; hers in the east and his in the west.  When I go there at twilight, the setting sun behind Francis lights Clare up.  And I think this is how it was in life.  They were rarely together physically, but always in spirit, always looking toward each other, illuminating each other.

 

I've never been one to venerate statues.  I'm not Catholic, Buddhist, or Hindu.  But visiting the statue of St. Clare has an odd effect on me.  Every time I go, I end up sitting in front of her garden.  There is what I can only call a substance of spirit about her statue, a sense of presence.  No, no.  I don't think her statue is alive, or that her spirit is trapped in it or something.  Don't commit me to the loony bin just yet.  But just look at this, and tell me there isn't power in it:

There is something mysterious and real there.  Made all the more keen by the profusion of life in that spot, and the life infused into the church building she stands by. 

In case you didn't know, the San Francisco de Asis church is a real adobe structure, meaning that it is made of mud and straw.  Each year, the parishioners get together to re-mud the building's exterior.  So the church is literally anointed by the life of all those hands, all that devotion over two hundred years.  This is my view from where I sit in front of Clare.  You can just make out Francis to the left.

This place is a symphony, and the adobe walls are the bassline.   Throw in Clare and Francis, the chortling doves that roost in the bell towers, the hummingbirds and bees and the multitude of hawk moths, the fragrance of the flowers, the movement of clouds and the echo of magpies and ravens over that huge round sky - and the symphony is complete and exalted, the senses and spirit exult.