"For God so loved the world

you know how that one ends...

that he gave His only son." John 3:16


to love the world
what a thought eh
have you ever really thought about that kind of existential abounding endless unconditional kind of love?
As I have recently begun to dig, to really dig deep in my world, I have come to some rather quaint assumptions on my own.
They involve new little loves like creating little spaces that remind me of all my little loves around the world.
I began to create spaces like the one pictured above in an attempt to heal.
special shoutout to an amazing organization, FMTM.


I think we all have some healing to do.
For some it may seem heavier and for some lighter, or maybe it hasn't really surfaced yet.
it's easy to push something aside and say "I'll deal with that later" like not washing the bowl of cereal you just ate from knowing when you get home from a long day at work and all you wanna do is plop down on your bed and maybe eat another bowl of cereal....you immediately wish you'd washed that bowl earlier. or maybe it's the answer you give to the question, "how are you?" whether its terribly unfinished or tragically false, you didn't empty your cup and fill it back up again. The thing within you wanting to be said never even gets touched. and your heart, your heart gets harder.
 Maybe you never knew you needed healing?  Everybody hurts (thanks R.E.M. circa 1992)


a need for healing.
how could God have trusted the entire world his one and only son?
I think he saw our need to heal. a very human need at that.
do we give ourselves the time needed to heal though?
are we intentional with the way we spend our quiet time?
do we trust others with our world?
just because our world is easily tuned out or quickly misunderstood, doesn't mean it shouldn't be put out there. be fearless.
It's hard to trust.
es dificil confiar.
dejalo ir.
let it go.
no significa olvidar.
it doesn't mean forget.
 it is a slow work.


instead form that memory, that beauty into something greater, something better, let it define you, everything you do. GROW.


with healing comes fruition


a new blossoming, a growing where you're planted kinda attitude.
He SO loved the world
that He GAVE his only son.
can you imagine giving away your most prized possession?
saying goodbye to something or someone you love the most?
I can
and
it HURTS.
but by His wounds we are healed.


say yes to sharing.
say yes to trusting.
say yes to the humanness of hurting.
but more importantly say yes to healing.
wherever you are.
in whatever state you may be in.
confia. trust.
He loved the world THAT much.
trust him with your world.




con corazón.

To Resurrect: Resucitar

Resucito, Resucito, Resucito! 🎶
Dios resucito al tercia dia
todos lo sabemos
pero todos lo entendemos?
In a tradition that happens every year since Jesus' resurrection (Semana Santa, Holy Week)
it's easy to get wrapped up in this concept of a "break," the Easter food and festivities etc.
What a wonderful world we live in to be able to give that time, to be able to take Good Friday off those who do not have it off already.
I remember a good friend asking me about 2 years ago while I was in Peru
what have you resurrected to?
WHAT A QUESTION
I still can't answer it.
But I am constantly searching for answers
as I sit here and write this blog post before completing my homework and other "pendientes"
What's on my heart weighs heavier than what's in front of me sometimes
let it out yall.
LET IT OUT.
As one of my high school religion teachers used to say "I digress"
A ver....
Back to the question
What have you resurrected to?
Have you kept your Lenten promise?
Have you met a goal recently?
any small goal merits a small triumph!
Next week, I embark on a small journey to Chicago for a From Mission to Mission retreat.
Its been a goal of mine for a while now.
I finally did it, I booked that flight, I am GOING. what awaits my heart is unknown. but I must trust.
In the midst of the biggest semester of graduate school as I finalize my thesis "para sustentar" to present it..
It is probably the farthest from the PERFECT time to give up 3 days to "retreat"
But it is never going to be the PERFECT time.
As I am asked to gather up some pictures to bring to share my story and as I am told, it's great that you are coming, most people cry if they come their first year back...
here I am still crying simply at the thought of the opportunity to start sharing. HA!
Thats who I am though. I cry. I process. cry. repeat. cry. repeat.
Though my journey seems different sometimes, everyone's journey is. everyone's journey is wrapped in uniqueness, in a difference that only God made uniquely yours. No one can taint it or take that away. it is yours. YOURS and God's of course. ;)
there is a certain beauty surrounding that.
I lose sight of it sometimes.
and I question, I doubt, I even forget to love.
so I'd like to resurrect to love.
to a love that Jesus showed us all on that cross, the ultimate sacrifice. 
As I step forward out of Lent and into Easter, the journey to love continues.
Different vocations.
Different paths.
Different lights are shown to us.
Different blessings are brought to each of us.
So I ask you this..
what blessing is in front of you right now?
maybe its an iced caramel espresso latte and graduate work like me.
maybe its a loved one
maybes it a snack
maybe its a cat
maybe its food.
maybe its just YOU

rise.

&

resurrect.


remember how loved you are.

Happy Easter. FELICES PASCUAS.

An Afterword: On Being

I feel as if I could go on and on and on and on about    "being."
It is beauty. It is grace. It is love. It is God.
God is the greatest of all "beings"
The one being who loves us far more than we could fathom.
Maybe its why being in its simplicity is so, well, not simple.

The above photo is taken in one of my favorite places in the town I grew up in on my 25th birthday, my first birthday stateside post JVC,  my brothers would roll their eyes at the sound of the restaurant's name, my dad would kindly suggest other options and my mom would say her infamous line "I go with the flow" but, in the end, we'd always end up in the same mexican restaurant whose waiters have seen me essentially grow up.  Frequented on my birthday after mozzarella sticks at Applebees were long forgotten (though I must go back) it also became frequented by everyone else in the extended family (side note: no one on his or her birthday was obligated to choose Casablanca)
 I like to think it sort of always just... happened.

Maybe that's what being is all about, the whole come what may attitude. Go with the flow. Ride the waves. as they come.
The question these months that sometimes have felt like years to me remains the same: How is it that after all of this, I am struggling "being"???
It's funny how life brings you back to certain places sometimes.
Back to certain glimpses.
For me it's standing on the corner of el mercado grau waiting for the 35 or the 5 bus to take me home where the infamous red velvet couch in Tacbloc awaited my heavy heart, drooping eyes and all of Miss Christie in whatever state I was in.  But the moment before that, standing on that corner my first months riding the waves of 1st year JV life, I longed to crawl out of my skin.
There are days I feel like a foreigner.
a traveler on the way home.
remembering the tears that sometimes streamed down my face on that long bus ride, from being a witness to the injustices of our world or simply from reveling in the abounding love I received daily that sometimes resulted in me being tackled on the floor by a bunch of 1st graders.

and I long for the relief that red velvet couch offered me.
But the truth is, I will always be a traveler, I will always be a foreigner and maybe even always long to crawl out of my skin because my home, my true home is somewhere I can't imagine, somewhere I can't grasp, somewhere I can only believe in.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am ruined for life.
I am ruined.
r-u-i-n-e-d
R-U-I-N-E-D
I have heard it over and over again from countless missioners, young and old.
but I have never really fully understood it.
I pretended I knew what they were talking about and honestly thought I did because I felt a tiny ounce of the unsettled..
the brokenness...
you may be questioning yourself too...what on earth is she talking about?
Because to be ruined means "to reduce to a state of decay, collapse, disintegration, to cause great and usually irreparable damage or harm to, to have a disastrous effect on, reduce to a state of poverty, to fall headlong or with a crash" in Latin it was the "collapse of a building"
But, what have I collapsed to?
Have I collapsed to who I was in 2014? Have I collapsed to who I was when I boarded that plane on January 20th, 2017?
That's where faith happens.
where trust comes into play.
I am ruined because I will never be the same again. I am damaged because I have been broken. I have been broken into pieces. I have been stretched and I remained stretched, I didn't go back to the way I was, I can't go back. It's irreversible.
There is a desire in my heart many days to find a bandage that puts me back together, to find the answer, a solution, to encounter the settling.
but I can't
because
I am
ruined.
it is irreparable and can feel disastrous.
BEING ruined.
so its only human to cling to what I know, to what I long for, to what I love, to the glimpses of settling..
I read the following recently,
  "Part of the complexity and pain of the missioner's life is knowing, on some deep level, that one has become a permanent "stranger in a strange land," whether in the host culture to which one has been sent, where one is a 'guest,' or in the 'home' culture from which one has come" 
Once a missioner, always a missioner 
("At Home in The Journey: Theological Reflection for Missioners in Transition" Jo Ann McCaffrey, 2005, p. 24)

and I don't think I believed it.
I said, what?! what do you mean I will never feel that way again? or find that something that brings me so much joy? Dios mio no puede ser!
but I know that when I set foot again in that desert my heart will be smiling so big, I'll remember why being ruined was THE greatest lesson in patience. in love. in faith.
and its one of the most beautiful, to know that what I long for isn't even earthly. It never was. As each day passes, I arrive closer to that realization and to Him who is inviting me to walk in the ruins, in the brokenness, the unsettling.

camina conmigo
walk with me.

let us remember that the mission is GREATER.
la mision es mas grande.

 like snow in the south, beyond what can be imagined.

a special thank you to all those who have supported the journey and continue to do so.