My Intentional Camino: Upward and On

It is an hour before sunrise, but I wanted to let you know....

God has called me upward and onward and out of here, from Huntington Beach State Park back to my home.

"But you have been there at the beach only two and a half weeks, and you were going to stay four!"

Well, I know it is time to go for lots of reasons.

One is this scripture which was given to me on Monday's retreat and which I pondered yesterday:

"Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we shall go into such and such a town, spend a year there doing business, and make a profit'--you have no idea what your life will be like tomorrow.  You are a puff of smoke that appears briefly and then disappears.  Instead you should say, 'If the Lord wills it, we shall live to do this or that.'  But now you are boasting in your arrogance.  All such boasting is evil.  So for one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, it is a sin." (James 4:13-17.)

I'll never forget the time I managed Adoration at our church, and it was my duty to contact people to get them to commit to spending an hour sitting before the Blessed Sacrament.  And we would have someone praying in front of the monstrance holding the consecrated Host for each hour of the day.  One particular woman said each time I called that she would come at her assigned hour, "if the Lord wills it."

I was incredulous!

"What do you mean?  Will you be there for your assigned hour, or won't you?!"

And now I see the scripture verse that she was living by.

Another reason that I know that it is time to go is because I have been praying for God to show me the way, and after the lovely Day of Prayer I attended with the community at Precious Blood, I have felt that my work is done and it is time to move on.

"That's it?  That's all you have to go on and you're walking in that?!"

Well, there is another thing still, and it is not the approaching days of rain or wind or colder weather.

No, it is because my mother and I have plans to visit her brother in Texas at the end of February.  We are planning to leave two days after I return home from my Camino at the Beach.  But her brother's health has declined in recent days and my mother feels an urgency to be with her brother at this time and so do I.

So, through the miracle of cellphone and internet connections on a sandy campsite by the edge of the ocean, we made our new airline reservations last night.  And when the sun comes up I will pack up my little poutstinia and pull it back home.

Now this Psalm song is in my heart:

On Eagle's Wings

Michael Joncas

You who dwell in the shelter of the Lord,

Who abide in His shadow for life,

Say to the Lord, "My Refuge,

My Rock in Whom I trust."

And He will raise you up on eagle's wings,

Bear you on the breath of dawn,

Make you to shine like the sun,

And hold you in the palm of His Hand.

The snare of the fowler will never capture you,

And famine will bring you no fear;

Under His Wings your refuge,

His faithfulness your shield.

And He will raise you up on eagle's wings,

Bear you on the breath of dawn,

Make you to shine like the sun,

And hold you in the palm of His Hand.

You need not fear the terror of the night,

Nor the arrow that flies by day,

Though thousands fall about you,

Near you it shall not come.

And He will raise you up on eagle's wings,

Bear you on the breath of dawn,

Make you to shine like the sun,

And hold you in the palm of His Hand.

For to His angels He's given a command,

To guard you in all of your ways,

Upon their hands they will bear you up,

Lest you dash your foot against a stone.

And He will raise you up on eagle's wings,

Bear you on the breath of dawn,

Make you to shine like the sun,

And hold you in the palm of His Hand.

And hold you in the palm of His Hand.