Love in Every Purpose Under Heaven

The power of love is unstoppable – it is the energy
behind the ripples of a miracle as they move beyond
the horizon of our sight to gently roll onto unknown shores.
-The Miracle Collectors

October brings a change in the air, color to the leaves, and a festive nod to celebrating the dead and the saints. A turnover of the seasons is underway and reflects, metaphorically speaking, the seasons of our lives as Katie writes about in this month’s blog. Enjoy a happy and treat-filled Halloween.

Collecting Miracle Moments One Story at a Time.

Joan and Katie

I think it is safe to say that one constant we can all count on is change: to the good, the better, the sorrowful, and back again. Rachel Goldberg Polin recently talked about co-existing with overwhelming and diametrically opposed feelings of sorrow and joy. Her son, Hersh, was
kidnapped and later murdered by Hamas, and she became a primary voice in bringing the hostages home. She was speaking to a crowd before the imminent release of the remaining living hostages earlier this month and harkened back to the biblical passage we are all familiar with from Ecclesiastes: “…To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven.” But she asked the question, “How do we do this?” – the weeping and the laughing, the sobbing and the dancing? Seasons were meant to precede and follow, not occur all at the same time.

At the end of her speech, she said, “No more pain, just love.” And maybe that’s the answer to her first question, “How do we do this?” When we love, we love. There is no going back, there is no lessening or conditions to love. It simply is. And we can hold our love for our deceased child at the same time we hold our love for someone else’s child being returned to them. Complex and impossible as it seems, love is the only hope.

Henri Nouwen, a renowned twentieth-century priest and author, wrote, “Gladness and sadness are never separate, joy and sorrow really belong together, mourning and dancing are part of the same movement.” He is speaking to any of us who think we can experience one without the other. For better or worse, we humans are in for all of it and in order to dance with the joy of abandon, we cannot escape or numb our way out of its opposite. But if we “just love” we can find a miracle antidote for the human condition. Love is at the root of our mourning and our reason for living; it is the ethereal energy that sustains us no matter the season. (Katie)