This Journey of Hope continues with Module 2, and something is beginning to shift. I am starting to recognize the presence of a weight that I have been carrying, a weight that has become a part of me, a weight that I didn’t even realize was with me, for I have been carrying it for so long. And this weight is slipping. It is still heavy upon me, but it feels different, maybe even a bit lighter. In the same way, this urgency that I have felt to help my church move from the comfort of power and control to the vulnerability of community is also shifting, slipping, changing.

During this Journey of Hope gathering, Canon Sarah Snyder talked about the journey from conflict to reconciliation, and she told of the ways in which conflict can burden faith leaders. She shared from Conflict and Reconciliation in Churches by Sandra Cobbins about a group of clergy who were severely impacted by conflict within their congregations, and that while these clergy thought that they just needed to be more organized, the reality was that “they also needed to be equipped to deal differently with the destructive and unhealthy behaviors in the parish,” for those were the things that were draining them of energy and their personal time. These faith leaders needed to care for themselves and address their own wounds in order to be better equipped to lead their congregations. Canon Sarah Snyder reminded us that “our ability to love others is deeply connected to our ability to love ourselves.” Is this what is happening with me? In my effort to try to help move my own congregation with love, am I neglecting to love myself?

Father Adam Bucko then spoke on the importance of monastic spirituality and contemplation, and that it is through the inner transformation that we will be able to show up as a healing and reconciling presence in our own communities. Again, have I been working so hard on trying to help move and guide my church that I have failed to care for myself? And how can I be a part of the reconciliation in my own church if I am holding on so tightly to something that, ultimately, I even don’t have the ability to control? I love my church. I have been at my church for almost my entire life. But I am holding on so tightly that it hurts. So, I start to loosen my grip, and when I do, I feel that weight shifting. I sense the beginning of a release of control, the beginning of reconciliation. I sense peace.

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