This Flowing Toward Me

THIS FLOWING TOWARD ME is about finding God in strangers. Specifically in the kind of strangers Abraham found in the three angels passing by his tent and the stranger whom the Jew robbed on the road to Jericho found in the Good Samaritan. *** Marilyn Lacey is an American nun singled out for special honor by the Dalai Lama for her decades of work with refugees from Laos, Sudan and elsewhere. She tells their heartbreaking stories in a series of informal case studies designed to illustrate something deep and holy beyond their compelling personal tales. *** Sister Lacey defends the thesis that God, for reasons known only to Himself, likes either to present himself as a poor despised outsider or at least as likely to be found hanging out among such losers, by Divine preference. Looking for God? Then cast a glance about and see who is so dirty or poor or alcoholic that your hackles rise at the very thought of him or her touching you. Guess what? That's where God is. So open your heart to defenseless, mistreated, starving refugees and others of like ilk. *** In the autobiographic parts of THIS FLOWING TOWARD ME (a title taken from a poem by the Persian mystic RUMI), Marilyn Lacey makes it clear that she is a radical pacifist, with one exception: spiders. They scare the daylights out of her and she will kill them whenever they come near. She has only one request of God if and when she makes it to heaven: please don't turn out to have eight legs! *** An arresting image used over and over is that of a pilot light. God is not just "out there" among strangers. He is also within the souls of each of us, an inextinguishable pilot light, even in hell, if we ever need Him and call for Him. Curiously she prefers the expression Wake Flame to Pilot Light, saying that that that is what Europeans call the little contraption always burning, waiting for us to turn on our gas ovens, dryers and other appliances. My best guess is that "wake flame" is a translation into English of the Dutch "waakvlam." An instructive, helpful image. What is meant by pilot light is perfectly clear. I suggest, therefore, that in future editions she call that light of God (conscience?) simply pilot light, not the rather precious wake flame. *** The author is intelligent, well read, a student of religion and mysticism and a hands on practitioner of making refugees and other marginal men, women and children feel welcome to the extent possible. She writes clearly with little stylistic adornment. She consistently puts herself down (as a finicky eater of such things as termites, a scaredy cat regarding spiders, etc). She calls herself a very slow learner when it comes to figuring out God's plans for herself and the rest of us. But she grows on you. Yes, that she surely does. -OOO-