Oh those pesky nuns

Mark 12:10-11

Have you not read this scripture:“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes”?’

     I have no allusions that if Jesus were here today I could be a doubting Thomas or a dismissive Danny ( my creation ).  I give everything the critical eye and I scrutinize everything. I might reject that stone meant to be my salvation, the cornerstone.

     That is what Jesus was, the cornerstone rejected by the leaders of the very religion to which he belonged. A rather intimate relationship I'd say. From all accounts, Jesus was a Rabbi's Rabbi. He was gifted in preaching, compassionate and loving. He is the answer to all of our questions.

      I our search for happiness, holiness and wholeness I can't help but think how much I might have missed by some of my flippant rejections. We all do it. Perhaps in not respecting ourselves we wind up disrespecting and rejecting others. It is said that you cannot love others until you love yourself.

      Someone noted recently on a FB page of my grammar school how they had been tortured by 'the nuns' for umteen years and at the age of 71 felt that they had finally broken free from those bonds.   I noted my religious back ground of 20 plus  full years with nuns and they had successfully graced me with the support and knowledge that I am thoroughly and utterly loved.  That came in handy when the hierarchy determined by their tribunals or witches council such as it is, that I was to be laicized and was intrinsically disordered. ( the Roman term for gay people ). I could easily have dismissed so much of those 20 years, many do based on their experience of scarred and imperfect nuns. But aren't we all scarred and imperfect in one way or another? In our rejections sometimes we throw out the baby with the bathwater so to speak. 

      I wonder if we should be rejecting anything. All of God's creation, animate and inanimate have revelations to offer about the creator. Any religion I can think of, while not offering perhaps the entirety of truth have a portion of knowledge and truth  to offer. No one person, religion or fact contains all knowledge except God herself.

      At the ending of this Lenten season when we may or may not ( probably not ) been fully successful in our journey for wholeness, I think the most important thing to remember at this point is to respect and love yourself as God does. Do not dismiss or reject yourself as less than loved, less than perfect. In a few days you will be intimately reminded of just how much God does love you.