There is this interesting thing with cell phones called “face time” where you can actually see the person you are calling. I am a child of the days of Dick Tracy and the “two way wrist radio”. Who thought that it would ever really be possible. Of course, there is a bit of privacy lost with face time since the caller can see you now. If I call, please have clothes on!
Seriously though, face time does matter. Email and texts are very impersonal and people cannot really express emotion and you cannot see the look on their face when they say it. I often really mess up texts, leave out a punctuation or something and it gives the wrong message. I have learned how to apologize and use that skill often. But, face to face interaction makes a big difference so maybe this whole face time thing is a plus.
This got me to thinking about something I read from Richard Rohr, that Jesus came to earth to show us God’s face, to make it easier to love God. Think about that, Jesus came as our “face time” with God. He said, “if you have seen me, you have seen the Father”. That was always plan A, for us to have a face we could learn to love.
I can hear this now, “hold on, we never got to see Jesus, so what is your point?” And, honestly, that is just not true. At the Abbey, all visitors at the gate are welcomed in because St. Benedict taught that it is the face of the living Christ you are seeing. Mother Theresa said much the same about her work among the poor and sick of India. You see, every day we get to see the face of the Living God if we will just bother to look.
Why don’t we look? It can be terrifying is why. When we take a close look at others, we see ourselves and that image is rarely the Beloved that we are. It is, instead, that face we know that even God has a hard time loving. It is hard to see ourselves as God sees us, which is as his Beloved child. So, prayer, in any version you or I offer up, that is our face time with the Creator of the Universe.
Today is the day for us to have face time with God. Not just in prayer, but in living in a world where we look at each face as the face of God. I wonder what our world would be like if we actually did this? I am thinking, this old social worker might just be out of a job!
TMM