While they were looking intently at the sky as he was going, suddenly two men dressed in white garments stood beside them. They said, \u201cMen of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven.\u201d
\n~ Acts of the Apostles 1:10-11<\/i><\/p>\n
This morning, as I was leaving to run an errand or two before Mass, I met Jesus. And as he did with the Samaritan woman at the well, or with any of us, he \u201cshowed me everything I\u2019ve ever done.\u201d<\/p>\n
I was already in a weepy place, waking up. Yesterday, someone I love very much told me she thought we might not be able to be friends anymore, because I am so judgmental. She\u2019s going through a tough time, and wanted to talk about it with me. But I didn\u2019t stop at listening. I told her I thought part of the problem might be hers. And I didn\u2019t sugarcoat it. \u201cI trusted you,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I feel judged and found wanting.\u201d<\/p>\n
I would like to be able to say that this kind of behavior is an exception on my part, but it\u2019s not. I would like to be able to claim Asperger\u2019s or some other autism spectrum disorder as the explanation for my scrupulous obsession with rules and my tin ear for social cues, but in fact it is just that I am a staggeringly bad friend. I would like to say it\u2019s just being a Libra that compels me to play the devil\u2019s advocate and always take the other side, but the fault is not in my stars but in myself: I am always too busy working out a theoretical argument to notice the hand that simply needs holding.<\/p>\n
So I required church, badly, this morning. Got in the car, turned the key, and a horrific clattering, shrieking, no-good-will-come-of-this noise emerged. The Check Engine light\u2013the automotive equivalent of the Seventh Seal\u2013began flashing wildly. The car (Bernadette Subaru) jitterbugged in place maniacally. I turned off the ignition and looked intently at the sky.<\/p>\n
Suddenly, two men were standing beside me. They were not dressed in white garments, unless you count the grubby undershirts that topped the sweatpants. They were not, in my experience, angels. They were, in fact, two of the guys who live across the street from me in a halfway house for former offenders run by a notorious neighborhood slumlord.<\/p>\n
They were precisely the two guys with whom I\u2019d had a World War III level run-in two Sundays ago, when my request that they turn down the arena-level ACDC they were pumping out to accompany their front-porch beer binge was met with, well, some comments about my age, size, and the kind of sexual practice I should feel free to indulge in with myself. I responded by citing city noise laws. The resulting shoutfest ended up involving the inhabitants of 5 houses on the block, my landlady, and the police. A negotiated ceasefire resulted in the lowering of the music level from them, and an admission from me that Yes, I do come across as a stuck-up, cranky old rhymes-with-witch.<\/p>\n
Come across, nothing. I am<\/i>.<\/p>\n
So this morning, I was in full judgment mode, afraid they were going to give me trouble. Instead, they\u2013Webb and Donnie, now that we\u2019ve finally exchanged names\u2013got under the hood, diagnosed the problem as one I already knew I had (\u201cAin\u2019t no woman in the world remembers to keep the oil level up,\u201d Webb said. \u201cMeaning no insult, ma\u2019am\u201d), and offered to drive me to the gas station to buy oil. I clambered into the truck with Donnie (they were right about my age and my size), and he chatted away about his job as a landscaper and his brother-in-law\u2019s cancer.<\/p>\n
We got the oil, and on the way back, Donnie asked what I do. I told him I wrote about religion and helped raise money for nonprofits. \u201cHuh,\u201d he said thoughtfully, looking straight ahead. \u201cThen you do some good in the world.\u201d He paused, and grinned. \u201cWho\u2019d have thought it? Guess it just goes to show you shouldn\u2019t judge.\u201d<\/p>\n
They got the car running and extracted a promise from me to Go, and avoid a tune-up no more. They weren\u2019t angels. They were the best of Samaritans, stopping to help not some anonymous robbery victim but the very priest-and-Levite who would have passed them by if the case were reversed, probably quoting every jot and tittle of the noise ordinances as she did so. And they were more. Not judgmental, but just: the kind of just men Gerard Manley Hopkins says reveal the unexpected face of the Risen Lord:<\/p>\n
. . . the just man justices;
\nK\u00e9eps gr\u00e1ce: th\u00e1t keeps all his goings graces;
\nActs in God\u2019s eye what in God\u2019s eye he is\u2014
\nChr\u00edst\u2014for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
\nLovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
\nTo the Father through the features of men\u2019s faces.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nOn this Ascension morning, I had been judged, and found wanting. I was looking at the sky, when I should have been looking next door.<\/p>\n
As I left for Mass (which I made on time), I shook Donnie\u2019s hand, and went to shake Webb\u2019s. \u201cUh-uh,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re at hug level now.\u201d So I gave him a hug, and as deeply felt an apology as I know how. I pray my friend will let me do the same.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
While they were looking intently at the sky as he was going, suddenly two men dressed in white garments stood beside them. They said, \u201cMen of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1086,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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