Mtr Mary Trainor

We all are one in mission, we all are one in call, our varied gifts united by Christ, the Lord of all…*

Dear one,

A friend relates a dream: Tom is seated in a pizza parlor booth, of all inglorious places. He is awaiting his food order, when out of the corner of his eye he detects movement, and turns toward it. It is his good friend Ann, slipping into the booth.

What makes this dream so special is that Ann, in the real world, has recently died.

They talk, Tom blurting out questions, barely waiting for answers. At some point he asks, “Have you seen your parents yet? Oh, my God, have you seen mine?” Ann pauses, then says, “Not yet. That’s next. First, I am being made whole.”

A single, great commission compels us from above to plan and work together that all may know Christ's love.

It’s just a dream, you say, yet for me it points to a Godly truth I find revealed also in today’s Daily Office reading from John’s Gospel. Within the larger passage, we stand with others at the cross of Jesus. He is not yet dead.

Soldiers divvy up his possessions among themselves, until they come to his single-piece tunic. To share it, they would have to destroy it. They leave it whole, perhaps because it is only of value if it is whole.

Jesus was often concerned with wholeness, putting people back together, mending body and spirit, promoting connection, unity, community.

We see it again when he speaks from the cross to unite his mother with John the disciple. They are made whole, a unit, a new family, bonded forever in the shadow of the cross.

The Church, the Christ community, is the very model of unity, the followers of Jesus coming together regularly across time to be one with another as the Body of Christ. Together, this Body--his Body--works to make the world whole.

We all are called for service to witness in God's name.
Now let us be a vessel for God's redeeming Word.

I run into my friend once in a while, more by phone or text once I moved to Arizona. We almost always reminisce about Ann, a devoted friend we shared.

Occasionally, Tom tells the story of the dream again, with the same clear detail as the first time.

He breaks the silence that follows: “Yeah...only a dream.”

Mtr Mary

*We are all one in mission, Number 778, Wonder, Love and Praise, A Supplement to The Hymnal 1982