 Ann
and Jim Cavera

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the second half
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Quotes
"We cannot isolate our
spiritual life from the rest of our life, for it is in our
day-to-day situations that we experience our personal
transformation toward wholeness."
Joyce Rupp “May I have this
dance?” Ave Maria Press. 1992.
“Let nothing disturb you,
nothing dismay you. All things are passing, God never changes.
Patient endurance attains all things…God alone suffices." St.
Teresa of Avila
Robert Ellsberg from “All
Saints. “ Crossroad Publishing. 2002.
“We are all called to a way of
faith. At each step God asks us to trust him, to say yes to
him, to put our lives in his hands… We want certitude, but
instead God asks us to have faith.”
Fr. Richard Rohr and Joseph
Martos from “The Great Themes of Scripture.” 1988.
“The fruit of prayer is a
clean heart and a clean heart is free to love. The fruit of
love is Peace – Unity – Joy.”
Mother Teresa from “The Joy in
Loving” compiled by Jaya Chalika and Fr. Edward Le Joly.
Penguin Compass. Copyright 1996
“The farther we go on the
journey of faith, the more faith has to do with trust and
self-surrender. The Kingdom of God leaves none of us in our own
little kingdom where we decide what happens.”
Richard Rohr “Simplicity”
“Knowing God’s heart
means consistently, radically, and very concretely to announce
and reveal that God is love and only love, and that every time
fear, isolation, or despair begin to invade the human soul this
is not something that comes from God.”
Henri Nouwen “In
the Name of Jesus
“Thanks is the only thing we
can give [to God]. As a life-stance, gratitude moves us to
cherish everything as a gift to be cared for, nurtured, and
brought to fulfillment.”
Wilkie Au “The Enduring
Heart”
“Let me not expect more of
friends than they can give – but let me give them more than they
expect. Let me not expect too much of others who, like myself,
struggle under the burden of life, but rather let me be, as best
I can, a friend who does not fail.”
Fr. Benedict J. Groeschel,
C.F.R. Arise from Darkness Ignatius Press
copyright 1995
“In your own life, dark times
will come. If they are very dark and bitter, know that you have
plenty of company.”
Fr. Benedict J. Groeschel,
C.F.R. Arise from Darkness
“The first half of life is
consumed with exploring and developing our bodies, educating our
minds and cultivating our talents. Midlife is an ideal time to
venture into the unknown, the territory of your soul.”
Fr. Edward Hays Prayer
Notes to a Friend Forest of Peace copyright 2002
“As you deal with having to
make difficult decisions, realize that “I’ve changed my mind” is
a declaration of repentance, which Jesus said is essential to
entering the Kingdom of God.
Prayer Notes to a Friend
“We are not channels, we are
instruments. Channels give nothing of their own, they just let
water run through them. In our action, we are instruments in
God’s hand and He writes beautifully.” Mother Teresa of
Calcutta
The Joy in Loving
Compiled by Jaya Chalika and Edward Le Joly Penguin Compass
copyright 2000
“So I saw that God is our true
peace; and he is our safe protector when we ourselves are in
disquiet, and he constantly works to bring us into endless
peace.”
Julian of Norwich
Showings
“Anything can happen. What
the stories tell us is not that miracles will always happen, or
even often happen, but that some kind of life will triumph over
the many kinds of death. Nothing can separate us from Love.
Pat Livingston Let in
the Light Sorin Books copyright 2006
Web Picks
Center for Action and
Contemplation
Founded by Franciscan Fr. Richard Rohr in 1987, in Albuquerque,
New Mexico to “understand the constructive message of the Gospel
that crosses boundaries of religion, ethnicity, social class and
gender.”
www.sojo.net
Christian ministry based in Washington, DC seeks to proclaim and
practice the biblical call to integrate spiritual renewal and
social justice. Features the Sojourners magazine.
Boston College
The “Front
Row” lecture series includes 419 topics discussed by some of the
most thought-provoking speakers such as Michael Himes and
Cardinal Avery Dulles, S.J
www.webmd.com
Medical information and health tips are
presented in a easy to read format.
www.retreatsintl.org
Links to retreat houses listed by state
make it easy to find a place to rest and relax for a few days.
Also, one section makes it easy to contact a speakers and
presenters available for retreats.
Open Door Community
Our good friends Nelia and Calvin Kimbrough
live and work as partners in this well-established homeless
shelter in Atlanta.
www.FSJC.org
Excellent site for caregivers
www.familylifecenter.net
Steve Wood’s site is filled with help for
Catholic families |
Reflections – By Jim and Ann
Cavera
Devoted to faith, hope,
love & laughter
in the second half of life
Columns for
Spring 2008
Kairos Children
Ann
I am sitting at the kitchen
table and Cate and Rachel are sitting on either side of me.
Each has a bright blue and a bright yellow lump of Play-Doh.
Cate grabs her blue lump with two little fists. She clenches
her teeth and squeezes the air out of the lump. Then she
stretches this lump thin until holes appear. Holding up a
piece, she looks up at me through the hole and smiles.
Meanwhile, on the other side
Rachel separates little blue and yellow balls of Play-Doh into
separate color-coded piles. She pulls two of the empty
containers close and says “cup.” Then she begins dropping bits
of yellow clay into one cup and blue balls into the other until
the space in front of her is clean.
Not quite two years old,
neither of my granddaughters has any concept of time. We live
in a perpetual “now” without a past or future. For the next
five hours we are together without a clock, agenda or schedule.
As their companion, caretaker, friend and grandmother, my time
has become theirs.
Grandpa has put up a pup
tent for us in the sitting room. A large stuffed “Elmo” is in
the magazine crock and at some point we will unpack the box of
toys in the corner. Whenever the mood strikes, we play a CD of
Irish fiddle tunes and dance around together until Grandma
collapses and turns on an educational video about farm animals
or shapes and colors. Whatever we think of is what we do next
until one or all of us tires of it. The Greek word “kairos”
means dancing with God in the present moment. Truly, Cate and
Rachel bring kairos into my life.
St. Ignatius of Loyola said,
“There are very few people who realize what God would make of
them if they abandoned themselves into His hands, and let
themselves be formed by His grace.” I had almost forgotten what
it means to abandon my schedule for life without structure.
When my own children were young we played while I kept one eye
on the clock, and so I only half-entered their world. Now I
know how quickly kairos time can disappear into the structure of
pre-school, kindergarten and school. In the grown-up world only
little puddles of kairos slip into our hurried-up lives. A walk
beside the ocean at dawn, the birth of a baby, moments of
forgiveness and reconciliation, the visit of friends from
far-away; all bring time without borders into days that are
shortened by clutter. Jim says he thinks kairos is the way time
must be measured in heaven. Once we were too young and too busy
to enter kairos when it came upon us. As we sit at this table,
finding out what we can do with Play Doh, I know Cate and Rachel
are forming me too, helping me understand what it means to
abandon ourselves to the grace of God.
Is Anybody Listening?
Jim and Ann Cavera
On the web site “YouTube”
millions of clips have been downloaded from homemade videos.
Cyberspace must be clogged with “blogs” personal logs made
available to anyone anywhere to read. Everybody wants to talk.
People are curious in an impersonal way about what they are
saying. No one seems to care whether or not they are being
heard and no one seems to care much about what is being said.
Is anyone really listening? Everyone can hear. In fact, we
feel bombarded with too much in the name of communication. We
are more concerned about a different kind of listening that no
longer seems possible.
We remember from our
childhood being alongside our parents and able to see how adults
behaved and listening to what they talked about. One of Jim’s
favorite memories is going to a coffee shop before dawn with his
father to hang out with the other produce workers. Sitting on a
stool at the counter with the men, he listened and heard what
men out working for their families might talk about. I remember
helping the women in the kitchen at family gatherings. Shelling
peas or peeling potatoes provided an excuse to hear what grown
women thought about and talked about.
One of the women in our
church had a luncheon for a few women last week. We gathered at
her home at 11:30 and we left the luncheon table about 3:30
p.m. In between I learned more about family triumph and tragedy
in a small town than if I had spent weeks delving into local
genealogy. It was all there for the listening.
Real listening needs to be
done in the physical company of others. Listening involves both
the eyes as well as the ears. A raised eyebrow, frown, tremor
in a voice conveys far more than a text message on a cell
phone. Listeners have to let go of personal agendas and journey
into the joy and sorrow of someone else. To listen means to
value the person who needs to be heard. Perhaps our children
lack self-esteem because many of them have never felt the value
that comes from being listened to.
This week, we remember the
Israelites listening to Joshua as he spoke words that bound them
to their homeland and to their God. In this week’s gospel,
people heard Christ but missed his message. If we are no longer
able to listen to each other, how can we hear the voice of God?
King David, and his son Solomon, the prophets, Mary sitting at
Jesus feet while her sister worked in the kitchen, Paul on the
Road to Damascus, and Peter and the Apostles in the upper room
had no form of mass communication, and yet they heard the voice
of God. We can’t help but think God may still be speaking. We
are too distracted to listen.
It’s Only Temporary
Jim and Ann Cavera
It is so easy to reach for
temporary solutions to difficult problems. The trouble with
temporary solutions is that they have a way of becoming
comfortable, and permanent. The original problem gets covered
over and forgotten and the solution becomes accepted as normal.
Years ago when we moved into our home, we bought some
“temporary” furniture at a Goodwill store. When we moved out of
that same house 35 years later, some of the original Goodwill
stuff was still with us, still serving its “temporary” purpose.
On a larger scale,
especially in the area of politics, things often slide into our
culture as temporary solutions. How many taxes are we living
with today that began as temporary measures? It may be far
easier to mortgage our children’s future than it is to set
national priorities and create a sustainable budget. Even as
individuals and families many of us find it easier to charge
goods or borrow money than it is to take the financially tougher
road to live within our means.
Finding permanent solutions
to long-standing problems can be difficult because those
solutions often seem unattainable. In our parishes it is more
tempting to buy a quick-fix program that promises to turn us
into a vibrant parish community than it is to become disciples
willing to pour out our lives for the love of Christ.
Concerning marriage, in the second half of life it can be easier
to slide into the silent company of two individuals sharing a
house than it is to nourish a growing relationship.
This season of life offers
time to assess how we have lived our lives so far. If we have
spent too much time accumulating wealth (just until we have
enough) or too much time in self-centered pursuits (we have been
working so hard, we need to relax) or too much time following
“shoulds” and “oughts” instead of fulfilling our deepest inner
call, there is still time. Life can be found in change and
growth. Seeing almost everything as temporary and few things as
permanent can open new doors.
We are encouraged by
scripture to seek and hold onto the few things of permanence
that transcend life on earth. In speaking of God’s gift of
salvation the author of Hebrews 6:19 says: “We have this hope, a
sure and steadfast anchor of the soul…..” In Titus 1:9 St. Paul
encourages his disciple to keep a firm grasp on the eternal
message and to give up everything that does not lead to God.
(Titus 2:12)
In “Sabbatical Journey,” the
diary of his final year, Henry Nouwen wrote, “We are not talking
here about moral obligations or ethical imperatives. We are
talking about the mystical life. It is the intimate communion
with God that reveals to us how to live in the world and act in
God’s Name.”
We can become far too
comfortable living with temporary solutions to deeper
problems. It’s better to seek the few things we know are
permanent because now we more fully realize the life we keep
holding on to so dearly is only temporary.
In Plain Sight
Jim and Ann Cavera
How does this happen? I
reached in the hall closet to get my jacket and purse only to
discover both were missing. I double-checked the closet and
then looked through every room and closet in the house before
calling Jim to ask if he might have seen my missing purse and
jacket. His answer was that he thought he had seen them in the
hall closet just that morning. Even though I had already looked
in that closet twice, just to reassure him, I looked again.
Imagine my shock when the missing jacket and purse were right
there on the hangar just where they should have been. We are at
an age where important things that should be right in front of
us seem to vanish.
Important things in marriage
can sometimes seem invisible or appear to have disappeared,
too. Gary Chapman’s book “The Five Love Languages,” hit the
best seller list some years ago. Recently we reviewed his ideas
while we were preparing for a retreat. According to Chapman we
all crave love expressed primarily in one of five ways: Quality
Time, Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Gifts and Physical
Contact can each express love on a meaningful level. Couples
who are aware of each other’s primary love languages are able to
make emotional connections on the deepest levels. Too many
couples struggle with their marriage. One or both partners may
feel invisible because a spouse doesn’t express love in a way
that fulfills the other’s emotional needs. Chapman’s ideas are
well worth understanding and he has helped a host of couples
have better relationships.
Not everyone will seek to
understand Chapman’s ideas. Many people live alone, or they
have partners who believe their marriage is just fine and really
don’t want to be bothered with new ways of understanding.
Fortunately, God himself has a profound plan for fulfilling our
needs. The word for quality time with God is called prayer and
the practice of prayer leads to a life of love and peace, even
in the middle of chaos. Scripture is full of words of
affirmation meant to express God’s love for us in a personal
way. We are told God knows each of us so well even the hairs on
our head have been counted. For acts of service, Christ washed
his disciple’s feet and we are able to continue his example by
serving others. For love spoken through gifts, what gift could
compare with the gift of God’s only Son? The Eucharist provides
physical contact that is the “source and summit of our
relationship with God just as physical contact is an expression
of heart and soul in marriage.
We often keep God on a
hangar in a closet. When we need him, we can’t find him, even
though he is right there where we left him. Life can have a way
of making us feel invisible as we age and not everyone has
someone devoted to speaking love in his/her own language. When
that is the case, who better to turn to than the author of love
and the speaker of all languages? When we devote our lives to
speaking God’s language of love, we discover God’s own abundance
meets our deepest needs.
Second Sight
Jim
There is a familiar hymn
that we sing during communion time that asks us to look
beyond the bread we eat and see our Savior and our Lord. We
were thinking about this particular hymn because the gospel
stories during Easter focus on seeing the risen Christ. Those
pilgrims on the road to Emmaus were so preoccupied in their
conversation with one another that they did not recognize the
stranger who walked beside them. Only in the breaking of the
bread did they recognize the risen Christ in their presence.
Others couldn’t believe their eyes when Christ came and stood
before them. It just didn’t compute in their brains, in spite
of what they saw. Obviously there is more to “seeing” than
physical perception.
Have you ever known a blind
person who, in many ways, had the ability to see more than you
did? Austin was such a person for us. He was a regular lector
at his parish and he never missed his assigned Sunday to read.
After making his way unassisted to the ambo and adjusting the
microphone, he would unroll a cloth mat and lay his paper in the
center of it. With a clear voice he then proclaimed the
scripture as his fingers skimmed along the raised dots. Most
lectors occasionally let a word slip by as they pushed to finish
a certain passage. But Austin never missed a word and neither
did we, his listeners. He “saw” the words with his fingers
better than most of us read with our eyes.
In her book “Left to Tell”
Immaculee Ilibagiza describes the horror of the ethnic cleansing
in Rwandan holocaust. Along with seven other women, she spent
91 days hidden and starving in a small bathroom. During this
ordeal Immaculee gradually came to see life through the eyes of
faith in ways she had never seen before. She began to see those
who hunted her as children of God who were, like her, caught in
the grip of evil. Immaculee’s new vision eventually allowed her
to face and forgive the man who murdered her family and sought
to kill her.
All of the human family is
on the “road to Emmaus,” and every single heart holds the hope
of heaven as its final destination. Unfortunately, we have
chosen to surround ourselves with pollution, corruption and
destruction in every form. Lines down the center separating
friends from enemies become more clearly defined. Like Austin,
we need to keep the word in our heart and proclaim it with
boldness. Just as Immaculee did, we must use eyes of faith to
see beyond hatred and violence. When we are willing to break
bread, especially with those we have to come think of as
enemies, we will finally realize the presence of Christ among
us.
Catholic Baby Boomers | Catholic Spirituality | Aging With Grace and Spirit | Catholic Caregivers | Retired Catholics | Catholic Family Life | Catholic Spirituality for Seniors | Catholic Walk of Life
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Common Ground
Questions of aging explored in the light of
faith.
We must face difficult situations in the
second half of life. Often, these situations seem to be
questions without answers. To such questions, the only answer
is the kind of faith that has already seen us through so much in
life. From time to time we will consider one of these questions
in the light of faith.
If you have experienced a similar situation and your faith has
brought you to a different, stronger, better place in life than
you could have imagined, would you share your wisdom with us? We
may from time to time post selected responses to the
question. Last names of respondents and names of companies and
/or /other people will be omitted for protection of privacy.
Topic: We Are Not Who We Used to Be
When we look in the mirror, Jim and I both
realize we aren’t what we used to be, especially when it comes
to physical fitness and energy. How do we maintain ourselves
physically as we age? We know what to do, but finding the time
to do it is another story. One problem is that all of the
diets, exercise programs and energy building tips are so
complicated, we would have to drop everything else to make any
of them work. Simple must be better. We have a friend who has
a simple exercise routine and she gave up sugar some years ago.
While we can’t imagine a world without ice cream and cookies,
she does quite well without either. Physically, she appears
much younger than her 70+ years. What are some of the simple
things we can do to make the most of who we are physically at
this point in our lives?
Topic:
Mending Family Rifts
In his book “The Journey to Peace, Joseph Cardinal Bernardin
says “If you accept the Lord’s peace into your hearts, the
darkness will not be able to overwhelm you.” This afternoon a
friend, who happened to be passing by, saw us in the yard, and
she pulled into the driveway. She had just spent the afternoon
with some of her family at the funeral home because one of her
aunts had passed away.
Though the aunt had lived in a small town nearby, our friend had
not seen her in many years. There had been some trouble over
money in the family long ago and the aunt had not spoken to a
single one of her seven brothers and sisters for as long as our
friend could remember. She had come away from the funeral home
feeling sad that the rift in the family had never been mended.
Why is it that there is often a lack of peace in our families?
Unforgiveness grows in the darkness in our hearts, producing
mildew in the soul. It can’t grow in the presence of peace and
light. The older we become the more we realize how fragile
things are – how little holds our financial system together, how
fragile our health is, our quickly peace within our families can
be destroyed.
Many people talk about forgiveness, but often the people the
most difficult to forgive are the ones closest to us. Have you
mended a rift in your family? If so, how did you accomplish
this? Let us know and we will share ideas with others who may
be hoping to bring about peace in one small corner of the earth.
Topic: Family
Reunions
We look forward to our family reunion each
summer. It isn’t as large as it was in years past. Both Dad
and Mom have passed away. Younger generations have moved on or
moved away. Still we look forward to seeing those who come.
We have heard some creative solutions for
getting family together. One family rents a house in a
different part of the country each year so that the burden of
travel doesn’t always land on one part of the family.
Another couple always rents the same
condominium on the Gulf Coast of Florida for the month of
September each year. Children, grandchildren, aunts, uncles and
cousins come and go for a few days or longer as their schedules
permit.
While family reunions offer great
opportunities, they also hold pitfalls. What happens when some
family members can’t stand the sight of each other? What if
some family members have unattractive habits, drink too much, or
are inconsiderate of others?
It is becoming increasingly difficult to
hold our families together. If you have ideas, tips or
solutions on how family reunions can be richer, happier
experiences for all, please let us know.
E-mail responses may be sent to:
ann@catholicseniorspirit.com
jim@catholicseniorspirit.com
Common
Ground Archives |