After the keynote speaker on ‘Art and Practice of Forgiveness’ for Mission week at Marquette, a few friends went on to the stage with a banner of our Breaking the Silence message: Marquette Teaches Killing followed by banner saying Forgive Us. As they held up the sign people were talking, filing out and ignoring the message. I left the hall and went to reception outside the hall and felt out of place as people hurried to get in line for autographed books from the speaker or in line for refreshments. I felt lost in a sea of busyness.
This is not the first time I had this ‘out of place’ feeling. After hearing the inspiration story of this woman from Rwanda, the banner reminding me of how young men and women are put in a position “to kill or be killed” at Marquette University I felt alone and a strange person in a strange territory.
The feeling continues on to today as I had a hard time getting myself out of bed. I am a fairly good self-motivator but had a hard time getting going today. My advocacy to end Teaching war and killing at Marquette or my advocacy for less racism and segregation in the Catholic Church in Milwaukee did not seem very meaningful today. I wandered thru the day with a sense of hopelessness. But I made it and after cooking a nice meal for wife and myself tonight I felt better.
Doing is tough when you feel meaningless and out of place but faith keeps you going on, knowing that you are acting according to your conscience and being out of place is just part of the package.
Comments
Please send any comments on this post to . Let us know which day’s post your comments pertain to. If the comments are appropriate we will post them here for you.