I greet the day as it is and I bring myself as I come.  I come before the loading dock ready to be refitted for the living of this day.

In the silence, I empty all the unresolved conflicts, weighed imperfections, and simmering resentments from my weary arms.  I stretch my arms loose until I settle into a new posture, limber in the excessive freedom of one spoiled by a God boundless in love and grace.

Then I hold my arms out to receive what I need for the day.  It comes – not knowledge or certainty but simply an abundance of forgiveness and patience.  Too large of gifts to fit neatly in my arms, it all splashes its excess over my own skin as I clumsily prepare to share with others.

Overburdened with good news, I am now ready to emerge for the day at hand.

Inspired by Padraig O Tuama, quoted on OnBeing 

“Neither I nor the poets I love found the keys to the kingdom of prayer and we cannot force God to stumble over us where we sit. But I know that it’s a good idea to sit anyway. So every morning I sit, I kneel, waiting, making friends with the habit of listening, hoping that I’m being listened to. There, I greet God in my own disorder. I say hello to my chaos, my unmade decisions, my unmade bed, my desire and my trouble. I say hello to distraction and privilege, I greet the day and I greet my beloved and bewildering Jesus. I recognise and greet my burdens, my luck, my controlled and uncontrollable story. I greet my untold stories, my unfolding story, my unloved body, my own love, my own body. I greet the things I think will happen and I say hello to everything I do not know about the day. I greet my own small world and I hope that I can meet the bigger world that day. I greet my story and hope that I can forget my story during the day, and hope that I can hear some stories, and greet some surprising stories during the long day ahead. I greet God, and I greet the God who is more God than the God I greet.

Hello to you all, I say, as the sun rises above the chimneys of North Belfast.

Hello.”