Bloom Where You Are Planted

I received this wonderful reminder in the mail and have been thinking about it. Sometimes we are planted-by life and circumstances or Providence. Sometimes we make choices and plant ourselves. Sometimes we are replanted and replanted-yet we survive and can bloom. We can choose to do and be all we can be wherever we are, or we can choose to shutdown and hide our blooming, hoping to bloom behind our walls or to be replanted again. This little reminder suggests that we “bloom with grace” wherever we are. That we make choices to bring beauty and grace to the worlds in which we find ourselves-and perhaps that we look for the beauty in everyone around us. I believe that grace is a gift from God to bring out the best in us and let it shine-no matter who is looking or not! And I believe that as we all bloom the world is a beautiful place of amazing diversity and surprising delightful life.

Mother and the Weeds

My Mother was a special person who could see beauty in everything and everyone. She dressed and she painted, mostly large oil paintings of flowers,with a bright artistic flair. When the residents of her Senior building in Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York were invited to adopt a plot in a nearby lot and plant whatever they liked she was delighted. Some planted vegetables and fruits. Most planted beautiful flowers. My mother looked for and planted weeds. They were as beautiful as any flowers and she thought they needed a showcase. They were all around but unnoticed and unappreciated. She was criticized for this but, in her way, paid it no heed, she knew they were beautiful and that if people could get by what they thought they were, the name they were given-“weed” to what they really were-God given creations-they too could be loved and enjoyed. She never worried about conformity and above all people I knew- she truly bloomed where she was planted. She had to battle mental health and financial issues at a time when medications did little to help. And, I realized, often not soon enough, that her views of the world were a vision to be embraced and emulated. She always saw the good others overlooked. I always hope that I have learned this from her and that by God’s grace, I too can be myself and shine just as I am.

Above Mother is with me at my graduation from Junior High School. She was always at my side through all of my later advanced degree graduations and through thick and thin. Below we are in front of her Senior Building and she will show me her garden plot across the street.

Below is one of her paintings.

In the picture below one of Mom’s paintings is on the left and her picture, painted by my cousin Jack’s wife Arline McGarry on the right. Mother was beautiful and she created beauty wherever she was.

Below are a few so-called weeds on my front lawn. I very carefully make sure they can grow just where they are. In my life I have tried to do the same with the people in my life. Some of the most beautiful children I knew were the middle school kids at the Alternative Learning Center where I worked as a Counselor for a few years here in Fort Myers after a second retiring from my University “Professor of Social Work” Career. Serious behavioral and emotional problems had landed them there but one by one and in small groups they could truly grow and shine. I remember one fellow, Sonny, whose name I spelled Sunny with him to give him credit for the positive joy he could express frequently. Each one had a special shining that could be revealed with care and attention to both the pain and happy places in their lives.

I loved the practice aspects of my long Social Work career as much as the teaching of “how to do it” in my Academic career. And after leaving formal teaching and going into practice again and then Pastoral study and pastoral work I loved, and still love, the opportunity to get to know people in their strengths and struggles, hopes and fears, and to seek the grace of God for their blooming with them.

I hope that today you will join me in finding the beauty and goodness in life where you are even when it is not ideal. I hope that you will find it past the labels given and truly appreciate things and people for what and who they are despite and beyond their “labels”. I hope you will see the beauty in the so-called weeds. I hope that you will join me in blooming where you are planted!

Blessings,

Pastor Judy Lee, RCWP

Rev. Dr. Judith AB Lee, Good Shepherd Ministries, Fort Myers, Florida

8/15/2023

“IN THE CHURCH THERE IS ROOM FOR EVERYONE”-POPE FRANCIS-WORLD YOUTH DAY 8/6/2023

DIOS NOS AMA- GOD LOVES US

In his address to a huge welcoming crowd of 1.5 million youth and others gathered for the 2023 Catholic World Youth day in Portugal today Pope Francis emphasized God’s LOVE and the INCLUSIVITY of the church. He said ” In the Church everyone is welcome” and he organized a resounding chant of “todos, todos, todos”-everyone, everyone, everyone!

He said “God loves you and accepts you just as you are, not as society wants you to be.” What a message to those of us of difference- of all colors, cultures, socioeconomic classes,genders, sexual orientations and -who are , for example, members of the LGBTQ community! Fr. James Martin, always supportive of our community, tweeted “And this does mean the LBGTQ Community” just in case anyone was still wondering. Pope Francis also said “follow the example of Jesus and be sensitive to the situations all around us, to other cultures, to the pleas of the poor and vulnerable, and the cry of the wounded and mistreated earth”(ncronline.org). He spoke clearly of loving everyone, noting that love dirties the hands-it is not an antiseptic act from afar. He said not to be afraid of loving, it is a risk, but worth it. He mentioned a huge wave on a nearby beach and suggested that we catch, ride and surf the wave of young people and all people interested in following Jesus now. He concluded by telling the youth “not to fear” and it was announced that the next World Youth Day would be in Seoul Korea in 2027.

Let us hear and enjoy the Good News spoken by Pope Francis today.

ALL are loved and cherished by God. ALL are to be included in the Church, and the church everywhere. God’s priorities are with the poor and vulnerable and our love is to be active and reaching out. God also cares for our precious environment and wants us to take good care of her. Exploitation of the labor of the poor and the gifts of the environment are concerns of the Pontiff and of everyone who says they love God- to love God is to love what and whom God loves-EVERYONE and all of Creation.

Let us then continue to love one another and God’s precious world as we go forward into this new week,

Love and blessings,

Pastor Judy Lee, RCWP

Good Shepherd Ministries of SW Florida-8/6/2023

Jesus said “I CALL YOU MY FRIENDS” (John 15:15b)

One of the greatest gifts we can receive is friendship. Throughout Creation beings of all sorts have a need and desire for like creatures to share life with. Above are Socks and Velvet, two of my kitties who have been friends for over nine years as they lived out their lives with me and our family. Socks is the beautiful Maine Coon type kitty on the left. He was as sweet as he was beautiful. He and Velly loved to cuddle and just be together. Socks went home to our loving God last week after an illness with me and Velly at his side and other kitties near. Velly has been lost without him. So have I. Our beloved pets can also be our closest friends. I am so thankful for their time with us.

I have been thinking about friendship lately, probably because it becomes more precious as life goes on and we have fewer friends surviving and fewer opportunities to make new friendships. Friends move away, to return to their home States or to be closer to family; and friends, like our pets, get sick and go home to God, their Creator. I have lost many friends and each one takes a piece of my heart. In the past two years two more close and special friends have gone home to God, one from my childhood, Jean Tracy Forman whom I lost and found again, and one from my young adult years, Jean Cornella Bauer who has remained near and close over the decades despite geography intervening. I can still hear their voices and sometimes forget that they are gone. I so want them to still be here so I can call them up and laugh and cry with them and feel close again.

Friendship has been an important theme in popular culture and in the Holy Scriptures. Proverbs 18:24 says that “there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother”. Friendship is celebrated in song and in poetry and we are so blessed to have it in any measure. And when our best friends are also our loves we have the most special blessing. I am so thankful for this joy in my life especially as losses are par for the older years- and for all of us.

Songwriters Simon and Garfunkel sang of “Old friends, old friends, sit on the park bench like book ends….memory brushes the same years, silently sharing the same fears….” As Simon and Garfunkel did not get along very well I wonder if they came to know in older years what they wrote about as young men. I hope they did. There is a closeness that needs no words, just proximity. And it is that proximity that I miss most now with loved ones far away yet close in heart.

Bill Withers sang “Lean On Me” – “Lean on me when you’re not strong, I’ll take your side, I’ll help you carry on….” That “leaning on” quality of friendship is very important and often a life saver. Carole King wrote that when you’re down and troubled and need a helping hand, “You’ve Got A Friend”. How reassuring that is. Stevie Wonder and also Dionne Warwick sang that when there are troubles “That’s What Friends are For”. How true that is. Cole Porter wrote “Friendship”-“If you’re ever in a jam, here I am…It’s friendship, friendship, just a perfect blendship…” And indeed it is.

Take a moment and reflect on your friends here. Friends from long ago, friends from your job or your school or church or place of worship, or your neighborhood. Old friends and new friends. They are very special, indeed! Friends who are loyal and present and friends you may have lost over time one way or the other. Friends who are lovers and lovers who are friends. Friends who are also family members, and friends who have become family. Friends who are near and far, and friends who have gone home to God. I am doing that now and saying thank you to each one. I hope they hear me. And if you want, reach out to a friend and share this with them, telling them how important they are to you. You don’t have to lose friends out of life’s busyness or benign neglect, you can be the one to reach out, and with the Golden Girls theme song say: “Thank you for being a friend!”

What A Friend We Have in Jesus

The above heading is also the title of an old hymn-an old hymn that simply writes the profound truth of our lives. “Are we weak and heavy laden? Cumbered with a load of care? Precious Savior still our refuge….In His arms he’ll take and shield us…We will find a solace there”…”take it to the Lord in prayer”. And that is what I want you to know- you are never alone although life can get pretty lonely. Jesus has called us friends as we seek to follow him in his Way of Love. He has promised us his Spirit to stay with us forever.

It is amazing to me that Jesus calls us friends. Some see the loving marital relationship as a paradigm of our relationship to God- but others, including myself see loving friendship as that paradigm. Jesus, in John 15, much of the chapter but particularly verses 9-17 talks about seeing us as beloved friends who share the work of the kin-dom of God with him.

“There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends….” (John 15:13)

“And you are my friends…I no longer speak of you as subordinates, because a subordinate doesn’t know a superior’s business, instead I call you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have learned from Abba God….” *John 15:15 (TIB) (Abba is akin to “Daddy”.)

We do not have a distant God, we have a God who shares with us, who loves us and who gave everything for us. We have a God who wants to communicate with us, to be near us, and to share the work with us.

I am so thankful for having a Divine Friend who is here when no one else is, who is always near, and who loves me and calls me friend! This amazes me and gives me both hope and comfort.

Bless you, my friends,

Pastor Judy Lee, RCWP,

Good Shepherd Ministries, Fort Myers, Florida

8/4/2023