Monkey Grass Wins

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My wife is a gardener, and this morning she enlisted me to uproot a patch of monkey grass. Its roots are tenacious, intertwined, mutually nourishing. Even a small section remaining below sight, deep in the earth, will in time regenerate itself.

In any kind of resistance, especially one on behalf of a tradition, the singular virtue is patience, the strategy roots. They go deep by solidarity, the passing on of teaching, forbearance. These depend on its members themselves, by God’s grace, and not on others’ decisions or on historical twists and turns. Learn from the root systems in your front yard - its lesson is simpler and more challenging than we like to admit.

Peace,

+ GRS

Posted by The Rt. Rev. George Sumner with

Complete the Race (II Timothy 4:17)

At the end of our vacation we find ourselves in Chicago for its Marathon weekend (the fastest, I have read this morning, perhaps because it is cool and relatively level). Marathons offer many good things. You can see world-class athletes from places like Ethiopia and Kenya. There is a feel of fiesta with signs by family members, getups by some for-fun runners, and food for sale.

But as I looked out my hotel window at 7:30 a.m., I watched the race of competitors who have lost legs or their use. Wheeling vehicles by arm for 26 miles means serious fitness and determination.

Those competitors were to me, this morning, a symbol of the Church too. For each is wounded. The larger family cheers them on. Each by grace has risen up to run the race. Ahead is the goal, the prize, the welcome home. We find the companionship of Jesus the Lord, there, and along the route too.

Amen.

GRS

 

   

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