Another day, another conversation with the illustrious Joan!

Today, she quotes Exodus first:

“God is gracious and merciful… slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” –Exodus 34:6

A lovely sentiment, to be sure, but it’s a bit cherry picked, don’t you think? I wouldn’t exactly characterize Old Testament God as “slow to anger” and I’m mid-way through Exodus right now. For the second time– four books into the real version I had to switch to a plain language version of the bible and it’s going much better this time. Cover to cover! An interesting read… although songs from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat were stuck in my head for all of Genesis. Anyway…

Here’s what Joan had to say:

“Who is this God, really? Who is this God whom we have fashioned out of the light of our needs and the hopes of our hearts? When we are vengeful, we tell tall tales of an angry God. When we are sick with our own sin, we find ourselves a God of mercy. When we are pressed down, face in the sand, we know what a God of justice is all about. Is this God? Or is God the measure of how deep our smallness goes, how great our parching thirst for love? Surely God is all of this. And more. The more we cannot in our smallness and our thirst even begin to imagine.” –Joan Chittister

Love. Incomprehensible. All of the above.

Weaver of the tapestry.

The threads made of light and hope. The threads of vengeance and anger. Threads of justice and love. God, the universe, the creator, I AM (as it says in Exodus… I’m basically a biblical scholar at this point, guys) is all of those threads and more. So much more.

At least that’s how I feel.

On Ash Wednesday, Call To Action posted this sentiment on Twitter:

The more to me is just that: love– what we come from, to where we will return. Love, love, love.

Love doesn’t judge. Love cares. Love forgives and heals and on and on and on. Love is friends. Loves is family. Love is steady, it’s there whether you believe in it or not. It is. I AM.