An Awakening
My husband and I have often talked about what our mission looks like. He has his men's Bible study, he is chaplain to a college football team, and various other outreach opportunities. I am often a part of the college football team experience, and I enjoy that immensely, but we have room, together, for more.
Denver has a desperate and burgeoning homeless population. We have discussed helping. But how? The community and the local and state governments continue to throw money at this crisis. Is that working? Is there something else we could do, on a one on one basis, to reach this population and provide a path to a life that is less desperate?
The "awakening" for me happened while listening to Father Gregory Boyle read his audiobook Tattoos on the Heart to us on a long drive to southern Illinois over Christmas 2019. My husband, William, two of our children W, 22 and M, 24, and I were headed to a small town in Southern Illinois to spend Christmas with my dear mother-in-law. I asked for recommendations for a book we could listen to and W suggested Tattoos on the Heart. We immediately queued it up and...wow.
The "beans" of love is my malapropism of Father Boyle's recitation of the line from poet William Blake's The Little Black Boy:
And we are put on earth a little space
That we might bear the beams of love
you see, my hearing is a tad impaired due to tinnitus, and I heard "beans" and thought it was a beautiful, inspiring, eloquent phrase. Of course, the correct phrase is all of that, but the "beans of love" stuck with me. It moved my heart. It made me think of bearing something tangible. Sustenance. God.
Father Boyle often mentions "the slow work of God" in his book. Our hope is that we are on a new path observing the slow work of God by bearing the "beans" of love.
Welcome to our humble journey.
Denver has a desperate and burgeoning homeless population. We have discussed helping. But how? The community and the local and state governments continue to throw money at this crisis. Is that working? Is there something else we could do, on a one on one basis, to reach this population and provide a path to a life that is less desperate?
The "awakening" for me happened while listening to Father Gregory Boyle read his audiobook Tattoos on the Heart to us on a long drive to southern Illinois over Christmas 2019. My husband, William, two of our children W, 22 and M, 24, and I were headed to a small town in Southern Illinois to spend Christmas with my dear mother-in-law. I asked for recommendations for a book we could listen to and W suggested Tattoos on the Heart. We immediately queued it up and...wow.
The "beans" of love is my malapropism of Father Boyle's recitation of the line from poet William Blake's The Little Black Boy:
And we are put on earth a little space
That we might bear the beams of love
you see, my hearing is a tad impaired due to tinnitus, and I heard "beans" and thought it was a beautiful, inspiring, eloquent phrase. Of course, the correct phrase is all of that, but the "beans of love" stuck with me. It moved my heart. It made me think of bearing something tangible. Sustenance. God.
Father Boyle often mentions "the slow work of God" in his book. Our hope is that we are on a new path observing the slow work of God by bearing the "beans" of love.
Welcome to our humble journey.
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