Rev. Barry Bloom's October Reflections

Fall is, indeed, coming.  I woke up this morning feeling cold.  It felt uncomfortable and invigorating at the same instant.  As I woke fully I thought of the coming cold, my cold season long runny nose, and the slow arrival of the dark.  The winds of autumn, the dropping of the beautiful leaves, the dry edge of cold soon to be an everyday experience.  And for a minute I grieved the loss of the warm high activity months (for us non skiers at least) especially the loss of all that light.  Time is coming to go bravely inside, literally and figuratively. Embracing the dark.  So we begin this new cycle of our church year poised between the two, the dark and the light. The theme for our services in October is courage.  Whenever I hear that word, I think of the scene from the Puccini opera “La Boehme” (the Bohemians).  In the last act the heroine, Mimi, is dying.  Her lover Rudolpho is bereft.  Their old friend, Colline, described as a philosopher approaches Rodolpho, having seen that Mimi has little time left, and quietly says, “corragio”, courage.  The music then swells as Mimi breathes her last accompanied by Rodolpho’s screams of loss and grief.  The curtain drops. Those are the moments when we most need courage in our everyday lives aren’t they?  Accepting loss and pushing our way through our lives on the other side.  Whether the death of a loved one, or the reality of a devastating diagnosis, these are the “borders of our lives.”  And as we continue to explore, one of the primary reasons we find safe places, spiritual communities, to be a part of.  To be reminded we are not alone. To be loved through the frightening, empty time to come.  It takes corragio!
 
Rev Barry Bloom