When I was in the car today, I found myself listening to Dog Named David’s “Circus” over and over. It talks about how love makes us do crazy things.

I ran away with the circus,
Since I fell in love with you, since I fell in love with you.

I feel like this describes my life since I first started LifeTeen. I realized how in love with God I was, and I decided to “run away with the circus.” I went to lifenights, attended Noon Mass each week, and went on retreats. Some of my friends didn’t get what had changed in me – but I knew. I had fallen in love with God, and I had given up my past in order to run away with the circus, in order to live my life for God and to show my love for him through LifeTeen.

I’m just a clown in your circus
Ever since you caught my eye, ever since you caught my eye.

Since high school I have moved on to the next verse of the song. Not only have I “run away with the circus”, but I’m now a “clown in the circus” – I have joined Core Team.  I’m no longer just a bystander, but I’m now part of the main act. It’s up to me, and my fellow “clowns” to keep the teens interested in the circus, to keep them so in love with God that they want to come back week after week.

It’s not always easy. It often requires me to step out of my comfort zone. But each week I remember why I’m doing this. I’m doing this because I’m in love with God, and I’m doing this so that hopefully the teens will also want to run away with the circus and join me in experiencing God’s love.

What’s keeping you from joining the circus?

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While avoiding doing my homework earlier, I ran across this article in which a young man** wrote thirty things he believed.

I believe life is good.

I believe God is in everything.

I believe we’re all equal.

I believe we can help people.

I believe everyone is weird in their own way.

I believe hate is a cause for love.

I believe that when I meditate I feel peaceful.

I believe we should be generous.

I believe brothers and sisters should be kind to each other.

I believe kids should respect their parents.

I believe I should not whine.

I believe people should wake up early.

I believe people should go outside more.

I believe in nature.

I believe people should use less trees.

I believe we should help the Arctic and rainforest animals.

I believe people shouldn’t throw litter on the ground.

I believe people should not smoke.

I believe God is in good and bad.

I believe in magic.

I believe people should not give up.

I believe love is everywhere.

I believe that God helps us to have a good time.

I believe we live best in a community.

I believe we can protect people in danger.

I believe we should help the poor.

I believe it’s OK to die but not to kill.

I believe war should not have started.

I believe war should stop.

I believe we can make peace.

**This “young man” is seven years old.

Story and Audio

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As I stepped outside my apartment building Monday morning, I was greeted with a snow shower that I wasn’t expecting (because, once again, I hadn’t checked the weather before getting ready for class.)  Now I realize that it had already snowed on Sunday so the presence of snow wasn’t really what made this morning special, but rather the peacefulness that the snow brought.  For the first time this semester, I wasn’t instantly overwhelmed by the sound of cars honking or tires screeching or people yelling or sirens going off.  Instead there was this sense of calm that spread over the whole campus.  From somewhere inside, I heard “Be still, and know that I am God.”  Now don’t get me wrong… I’m not the type of girl who normally thinks in Bible quotes, so this was new to me, but it was exactly what I needed to hear.

“Be still, and know that I am God.”

Sunday marked the beginning of the season of Advent: a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the birth of Christ.  Our society sees these four weeks in a different light: a time of expectant waiting and preparation for Christmas, not for Christ.  We worry about buying presents, baking cookies, decorating the tree – all of these things that we want to be finished by the time Christmas comes.  But in reality, those things don’t matter to God.  I think he would much rather see us spending our time preparing our hearts and our minds for the birth of Christ.  The real challenge is in finding a way to do that.

“Be still, and know that I am God.”

My time of preparation this year will be focused on what I heard today: “Be still.”  This is going to be tough because I seem to thrive on my busy schedule and trying to “be still” isn’t exactly how I had intended to get ready for Christmas this year, but I think in the long run it will be the best way for me to prepare.  God wants us to be open to him everyday so that he can fill us with his love, and if quiet, reflective, stillness is what I am in need of for that to happen, then that is what I will be doing.  Hopefully this will be a successful Advent for me.

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Tonight I attended the Jon McLaughlin concert. You may not have heard of him, but he is one of my favorite musical artists. His voice and the lyrics to his songs were amazing, as expected, but the part I enjoyed most was watching him play the piano, and looking a bit ridiculous while doing it. He didn’t just sit on the stool, but he was jumping up and down, kicking his leg out, and looking almost as if he needed to use the restroom. I found this amazing because, as ridiculous as he looked, he didn’t care at all. He was so completely lost in the song – lost in doing something that he loved.

I want to be lost.

There is a quote that says “A woman’s heart should be so lost in God that a man needs to seek Him in order to find her.” The more I thought about that, the more I realized that the first half of that, the “a woman’s heart should be so lost in God,” is exactly what I want. I want to be so lost in God that I don’t think twice about doing ridiculous things just to show how much I love him. Right now I occasionally catch a glimpse of this “lost” feeling – the feeling that I just can’t sing loud enough in church to express my thoughts… or the feeling that an hour of adoration is just WAY too short. I love those times, but I want them to go from “glimpses” to being a “constant.”

I like the second part of the quote, too, and would love for that to happen someday, but I feel that the opposite is just as important. I would love to be so lost in God that those who know me will come to know God better through me. I want his immense love for others to be seen through me, through my actions, through my words. I want others to see how happy I am being “lost,” and strive to also become lost in God.

The easy part is knowing what I want… the tricky part is getting there. I don’t think there is a map on how to be “lost in God,” but the glimpses that I have had give me hope that I must be doing something right. Maybe next time I post I will have found the answers, but until then, I am looking for suggestions. Let me know what it is that causes you to be “lost in God.”

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I’ll be the first to admit that sometimes during the homily I find myself not paying attention. I’m normally good for the first couple minutes, but then my mind starts to wander, and by the time I realize it is happening, Father is heading back to his chair. It doesn’t matter what church I am at, or who the priest is, this is just something that is bound to happen. After I realized this occurred quite often, I secured myself a “second chance” homily, one that Fr. Jeff sends out weekly. Not only is it great to get multiple points of view on the weekly readings, but I am also able to choose a time and place where I will not be distracted. Since I started this, I have had great success in getting something out of at least one of the homilies I hear each week. 

This week, however, I walked away from both mass on Sunday and my computer on Monday feeling like I had taken something away from the homilies. Fr. Benz taught me about Jell-O, knives, and cutting boards. Sorry for those of you who did not hear the homily and are now confused, but take my word – it was good – but I am not going to go into any more details… Fr. Jeff, on the other hand, took a different approach.

Throughout his homily he talked about how maybe we are not the seeds, or the dirt that the seeds are growing in, but rather the sower – planting the seeds – and God is in charge of harvesting. Fr. Jeff talks about sowing seeds of God’s Word, and of compassion, generosity, fairness… of forgiveness, integrity and joy. If we are able to plant these seeds, we can rely on God to take care of the rest.

Near the end of the homily, he said “100% of the seeds we do plant will not bear fruit; but 100% of the seeds we do not plant will not bear fruit” and this line really struck me. I know I’ve heard things similar to it before, but it wasn’t until now that I began to understand it. I believe that both parts of the statement are equally important. On one hand, we must realize that as hard as we try to succeed, and as perfect of a situation there may be, sometimes we still fail. It is not through fault of our own. It is not that we didn’t try hard enough. It is simply just that we are humans and we are not perfect. But even though we may be scared of that failure, we must realize that we can’t let that fear control us. We must continue to plant seeds, continue to try things that didn’t work the first time, continue to get back up after being knocked down.

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