On Transitions

Summertime is often full of transitions. Children complete a school year and announce with pride they are now in the next grade. Others graduate from high school or college and face new adventures — moving, a new job, a new school. Transitions are filled with tension. Even good transitions bring up anxieties. Saying yes to something new and wonderful usually means saying goodbye to things, people and routines that are familiar. It can be a mixture of joy and anxiety, looking forward to new possibilities and reflecting on the things that have been. As a priest I've moved 12 times since I entered the Seminary in 1970. From home to the Seminary, then back home, then to New York, then for a sabbatical with the Cistercian monks of Spencer, Massachusetts, then to Oregon, back to Malta and finally to my present location at Naxxar in a Retirement Home, without being retired ! The physical transition of moving belongings is also a big hassle. Getting boxes to store things, and finding a way to move them from one place to another usually by car. Once I had to do it by shipment, and even by mail, close to 18 boxes filled with my belongings, mostly files, CDs, clothes and some nick-knacks. When I returned back to Malta, I said goodbye to long-time friends without knowing if I would see them again. I kept in touch with most of them through email. Some respond, other not, but I never give up, and keep trying to get any answer from them. The young children I left behind are now teenagers. And the teenagers are now out of college and possibly married already.

Jesus showed us how to live in a way that allows us to follow God without being held back by other things. He said once "foxes have dens … but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head" (Matthew 8:20,) and so we know that even Jesus experienced transitions frequently. But God works in us through transitions. Moving from one place to another gives me a chance to pause and consider how attached I am to material things and to remember what's most important to me. It's not the clothing or the books, my CDs, my flute, my watercolors and my photos, but the relationships, the love and the ability to use the generous gifts and talents God has given me for the good of the world around me. As Jesus reminds his disciples, he also reminds us that "there is no one who has given up house or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God who will not receive back an overabundant return in this present age and eternal life in the age to come" (Luke 18 29-30.) So when we are facing major or minor transitions or just the ordinary change of seasons, may we be able to relax our anxieties and allow ourselves to rest in God's generous care.