Defining word: held

A word of the year for the anxious ones

1. Hold (verb): to carry or support with one’s hands.

2. We’re standing at the bottom of the steps—James and I—when he reaches up and says “picka me up” in his tiny chipmunk voice. Bending down, I lift him onto my hip, squeeze him tight to me and press my lips to his peanut butter scented pillow soft cheeks as we make our way upstairs for bedtime. “I wuv you mama” he says, and I feel my heart split wide with the love I feel for this precious, wild, tender boy.

3. It’s 6:00 AM and I stumble to the coffee pot after another night of tossing and turning my way through nightmares. They change every night, but in every one of them I am lost and helpless in a dream world distorted by fear and confusion. The anxiety that plagues me during the day has been finding me in sleep for weeks and I am breaking under the weight of it. Coffee in hand, wrapped in my favorite blanket, I reach my arms up like a toddler. Come get me, Jesus I pray. Picka me up. Tears slide down my cheeks as a peace I can’t explain covers me in warmth and light. The image in my mind is so vivid I can feel it. I’m a child, safe and loved, asleep in my Father’s arms.

4. Sister Joan, my spiritual director, asks if I’m familiar with the word “hesed” (I am not). An ancient Hebrew word, it means loyal, steadfast, faithful love. Hesed, she says, is a tender love that bends to the beloved, squeeze her tight, and kisses her tear-stained cheeks.

Quotes

“Christ's insistence on the power of children is very striking. Almost more than anything else in the Gospel it proves that in God's eyes being something comes before doing something. He sets a little child among his apostles as an example of what He loves. He says that heaven is full of children. Indeed, the Architect of Love has built the door into heaven so low that no one but a small child can pass through it, unless, to get down to a child's little height, he goes in on his knees.” - Caryll Houselander

“We're a child in the car asleep
In the driveway at night
Our mother's gonna slowly sneak
Our body inside
We can rest in the arms of trust
There's no way that we can say
We've earned our way into light
All we have to do to is stay” - Needtobreathe, Mercy’s Shore

“it has not been to great or powerful people that the Spirit has come but to the little or the frightened, and we have seen them made new, and known that the subsequent flowering of their lives was nothing else but Christ given to them by that sweet impact. It is always a love story…” - Caryll Houselander, The Reed of God

Patron Saints

Art by Gracie Morbitzer

St. Therese of Lisieux - “Expect everything from God as a little child expects everything from her father; it is to be disquieted about nothing, and not to be set on making our [own] living“ - St. Therese of Lisieux

Madonna and Child with Cherubs, ca. 1650 Giovanni Battista Salvi

Mary, Mother of God - “A baby with a perfect, loving mother cannot find a better place to grow in love and life than in the womb. And so Mary, our perfect Mother, nurtures and protects us until we are ready to be born into eternal life.” - Father Boniface Hicks

St. Martin de Porres - Martin spent most of his life serving the Brothers of the Dominican order in Peru and the surrounding community. Patron of social workers, he’s depicted here bending to tend to a sick brother, patiently holding a bowl soup to his lips. The story of Martin and the Mice in the book Saintly Creatures is a fan favorite around here as is Love God, Love Me, Love You.

Meet me in the comments!

Do you have a word or phrase that guides your year?