While I find all of the charisms both interesting and beautiful, and the general theology of the Jesuits to be sound, it is this principle of “find God in all things” that I am most attracted to. This principle could easily serve as a five word summary of my own understanding of God and faith. I see God in my family and in my friends. I see God in smiling faces. In crying eyes. I see God in children, and hear him in laughter. I see God at the top of the chairlift at Butternut, or at the end of the jetty at Dune’s Beach. I see God in my students and in my roommates. I see God in strangers.
I can – at least most of the time – see God in all things. There is one place however, where I have trouble seeing God. I am able to see God in something, but I can’t seem to find God in the nothing. Most often I see God in people or in nature, but finding God in the spaces between is my challenge. I can hear Him in the birds chirping, or the children laughing, even the people fighting. I have trouble however, hearing him in the silence. I can see Him in the shiny new snow, or the bright fall leaves, or the faces of my students as they return to their pews after communion. I have trouble however, seeing Him in the stillness, in the emptiness.
My goal now? My goal as we enter a new month, a new season of Lent, a new semester? My goal is to see God in both the something and the nothing, to hear Him in both the noise and the silence. To find Him both somewhere and nowhere.
