WHERE IS « MY » HOME?
I am writing this note as I am self-quarantined in “my” home. I am learning that it is not “my” home at all. I am living with the billions of people on this earth who are wondering when the spread of convid-19 will end. In my home are the many who are stricken with the virus and the too many who have died. I I am not alone because my family and friends are calling or emailing or texting me to make sure I am okay. Are you sure you are okay? Do you feel isolated? Do you have enough food? What is keeping your busy? My home is a home in which the whole of humanity is living with me. The virus started “out there” but now it is too close to home for comfort. We are all in this together. I have never felt so united to women and men I will never meet and never know. They are no longer strangers living in remote areas of Africa, or Asia, or Europe, or North America, or in disparate and separate Provinces in Canada or in cities strewn throughout our home and native land. Our national anthem is a reminder of great importance; true patriot love in all of us command, with glowing hearts we see thee rise, the true North strong and free, from far and wide O Canada we stand an guard for thee. God keep our land glorious and free. We are strong and glorious and, above all we are free. We are free and our freedom is being tested. Are we truly free when we do what we want to do and when we want to do it? That’s not freedom that it is slavery, that of a fearful and frightened person wanting everything for herself o himself. As people pick up their fifth or more package of twelve rolls of toilet paper, who are they thinking about? When overloaded grocery carts are being pushed to the car in the parking lot, who are they thinking about? I know judge not and you shall no not judged but if the shoe fits wear it! No one has the right to have the world rotate around their self-centeredness. No person is an island unto themselves. As human beings there is a streak in all of us to take care of “myself” first and foremost, but now is the time to transcend ourselves, to go beyond what we want to do and, do unto others as we would have them do unto us. In my home are also the homeless people on our streets, and those at Nazareth Community, who teach us the greatest lessons in these difficult and turbulent times: All our homes are only temporary. In the end we are all homeless and there is no such thing as “my” home. When my mother was ill and we were at the doctor’s office she asked the doctor if he was saying she would have to leave her home. He asked me and my mom to go to each room in her house, where my sister and I grew up, and think of the memories in all of those rooms. We did and when we returned to the doctor’s office we shared some of the memories with the doctor. Then he said, whenever the time comes for you to leave your home Mrs. Walsh, you will bring all those memories with you, you only leave the walls behind. What memories will we have of the time when we were offered incredible new ways of seeing and living our lives because of convid-19? What memoires will we leave to the next generation?
Father John Walsh