Maria and I never met Kathleen Moore. This is one of her prayers in the Psalms to the Cloud collaboration, that lights my morning today:
God who thunders, who boasts in glorious hills,
who speaks in a still small voice,
Teach us to clamor only in your praise, or in defense of the afflicted –
Yet alert when a gentle word might move the afflicter.
Afflict us, not with hellfire but with biting gnats,
quick reminders to be still with our own praise,
Our vain promises we will forget, our begging to be enough.
If biting gnats will not quiet us,
speak loudly enough to tell us that we are enough,
Need not augment ourselves with what we buy, what we boast.
Teach us to speak as you speak, in a resounding chorus of creation,
With words so soft that we strain to hear.
Kathy’s pastor wrote this to us …“Kathy died so beautifully, and she had just become a Christian maybe three years ago. She was a lifelong radical feminist who thought organized religion was for idiots, mostly. Then she came to us “for community” she said, apologizing that she didn’t believe more. Then she got cancer. And was so clear-eyed and calm about dying! She taught all of us a lot…” Maria and I are grateful to Kathy’s daughters for sharing her words.
