CowPi Journal

I took the kids to see two domes yesterday. The first was a round barn in Arcadia, Oklahoma on old Route 66. It was originally built 1898 by William Odor, but was restored in the 1990’s. There are hundreds of round barns around the United States with a few still standing in Europe.

The other dome was the new Oklahoma state capitol dome. It was added to the existing capitol building and was finally inaugurated last November.

There are many wonderful paintings and murals within the capitol building. I managed to get two decent shots of the murals over the state senate and house of representative wings. Both of them represent images significant in Oklahoma history, oil and agriculture.

I have a friend who says that there is no such things as coincidences. Everything happens for a reason. The mathematician inside of me is skeptical with images of probability calculations and statistical charts. I am resistant to ascribe a higher meaning to why I ran into a former student yesterday, but it feels at times that certain coincidences seem to be too good to be just chance.

Interruptions fall into the same area as coincidences because of a sense of lack of control. Interruptions infer that I am doing something that I want to, need to, or have to do, and something else, usually another person, diverts my attention and energy. My first honest reaction is a silent minor protest, but then I deal with it. By their nature, interruptions tend to have a negative connotation.

But Henri J. M. Nouwen in Reaching Out asks:

But what if our interruptions are in fact our opportunities, if they are challenges to an inner response by which growth takes place and through which we come to the fullness of being? What if the events of our [personal] history are molding us as a sculptor molds his clay, and if it is only in a careful obedience to these molding hands that we can discover our real vocation and become mature people? What if all the unexpected interruptions are in fact invitations to give up old-fashioned and out-moded styles of living and are opening up new unexplored areas of experience? And finally: What if our [personal] history does not prove to a blind impersonal sequence of events over which we have no control, but rather reveals to us a guiding hand pointing to a personal encounter in which all our hopes and aspirations will reach their fulfillment?

Interruptions are opportunities. It is through our interruptions that we have an opportunity to step out of ourselves, an opportunity to serve others and the Lord.

Nouwen also recounts a story by a college professor that illustrates my point, “…my whole life I have been complaining that my work was constantly interrupted, until I discovered that my interruptions were my work.”

As I have written before, one way to show your love for God is to love your neighbor, and one way to show love for your neighbor is through service to others. Interruptions are a signal to service. I wonder how often I fail to notice?

Sunday’s gospel reading from Mark 6:30-34 describes such an interruption:

The apostles gathered together with Jesus
and reported all they had done and taught.
He said to them, “Come away by yourselves
to a deserted place and rest a while.”
People were coming and going in great numbers,
and they had no opportunity even to eat.
So they went off in the boat by themselves
to a deserted place.
People saw them leaving and many came to know about it.
They hastened there on foot from all the towns
and arrived at the place before them.

When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd,
his heart was moved with pity for them,
for they were like sheep without a shepherd;
and he began to teach them many things.

Update: This post has been superseded by newer, built-in trackback systems in most blogging applications. Links to this site no longer work.

Inspired by Adam Kalsey’s SimpleTrack, I wrote my own PHP script called Manual Trackback. (To be honest, I was chicken to ask Mr. Kalsey for a copy of his script.) This script allows an author of a weblog that does not support trackback to manually trackback to my weblog. All this weblog author needs to supply is the title of his or her weblog, the title or date of his or her weblog entry, the entry’s URL, and an excerpt. That’s it. Then their trackback will be listed among the comments and other trackbacks for my entry with a link pointing back to his or her weblog.

The Manual Trackback script is completely customizable to your weblog if you know a little CSS and HTML). It should work for other weblog systems besides Movable Type as long as they stick with the trackback specifications.

There is one PHP include required for this script to run. It is an open-source PHP class called Snoopy. You can download a copy of Snoopy from SourceForge.net. (Thanks to Mr. Kalsey for the hint.)

See the Manual Trackback script. Documentation is included within the script.

What is trackback? It is a system used “to enhance cross-site conversations and build community.” You can learn more about trackbacks at A Beginner’s Guide to TrackBack.

See also Trackbacks & Comments.

The JB posted this prayer by St. Ignatius of Loyola last month:

O Lord, teach me to serve you as you deserve,
To give and not to count the cost,
To fight and not to heed the wounds,
To toil and not to seek for rest,
To Labor and not to ask for any reward,
Save knowing that I do your will. Amen.

JB went on to comment:

The biggest enemy is complacency, and the “not to” phrases above are all about complacency. Counting the cost, heeding the wounds, taking a rest: they all ask the same question. “Haven’t I done enough for now, Lord? Don’t I deserve a little break here?” Can’t I just be pleased with what I have done, instead of considering what I haven’t?

I agree completely, except the fourth line of the prayer haunts me. I know how I am. I can go pretty strong on a task and my commitment will not falter. But I also know that I need a break every now and then. Without a break, my motivation and determination tends to dull. The fire in my belly begins to smolder. I need a rest in order to rekindle the fire, to stoke up my motivation and press on with renewed vigor. But that fourth line makes me feel inadequate, as if I am not trying hard enough.

And then there is the first part of today’s gospel reading from Mark 6:30-31:

The apostles gathered together with Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.”

Aha! Jesus knew that the apostles needed some time to rest. I don’t feel so inadequate now.

BUT WAIT, as Father Ken discussed in his homily last night, there is more to the story. In last week’s reading, Mark 6:7-13, Jesus had commissioned the apostles to go out and preach repentance; “The Twelve drove out many demons,
and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them”. This week’s reading is about their return. Imagine how excited they were to report all the miraculous things they had done. Each of them in turn would say “I did this” or I did that”. Each of their reports would begin with “I”. But did they really do all those miraculous things? Jesus knew that they needed some down time to rest, to pray, to meditate and reflect on recent events—a kind of mini attitude adjustment.

This type of rest is not an opportunity to sit back and ask as JB says, “Haven’t I done enough for now, Lord? Don’t I deserve a little break here?” No, this type of rest is what I seek at times, the time to pray, to meditate, and to recharge the batteries. Everybody needs a little attitude adjustment every now and then.

(But the fourth line in St. Ignatius’s prayer still bothers me a little…)