Presence of Power

Over the last few days, I have heard people talking about a very common word: power. Below are those references I've noticed lately as well as a link to a true story about a “powerful” soccer team from ESPN's Outside the Lines.

The first references comes from my good friend, Fr. Thomas Vigliotta. He has referred recently to power in terms of the abuse that it receives in many avenues of life (businesses, schools, families, churches, etc.). He was raising the concern that many if not all of the injustices in the world are a result of an abuse of power. His message did not attempt to condemn anyone, but it did invite us to ask ourselves when have we perhaps abused power given to us and likewise when have we fallen victim to others in their abuse of power. In answering those questions, we widen our perspective of what it means to be “powerful.”

Secondly, my yoga instructor the other day referred to power as a source of energy that allows us to function each day. She said that concentrating on our yoga practice was a great way to reconnect with a personal power that comes from within us. She said that in life our power can seep out of us as we share our power with others like water seeps out of a bucket with holes in it. However, in order to sustain our ability to share that power, we must recharge the source of that power whether through yoga, prayer, or other self-serving modes of nourishment.

Lastly, in my June 2012 Living with Christ daily guide to the mass, Rev. George M. Smiga wrote about how “God's power is universal.” What he meant by this is that the every single individual person in the world is able to convey God's power. He suggests that we access this power not so much through pride wealth, might, or extraordinary people or events, but rather, we find God's power more so in the humble, the poor, the weak, and the ordinary (as we'll see in the story of the mustard seed at mass in two weeks). He says, “[God's power] displays itself in common things: in faithful marriages, in honest friendships, in simple sacrifice.”

All three of these references to power share great insight into how the Spirit acts in our daily lives. If we can recognize ourselves as weak, poor, humble, and ordinary, then the power of God begins to fill us up. When the power of God fills up our spiritual water buckets, we begin to understand the need to refill ourselves with God's Spirit on a regular basis. And, if we refill ourselves with God's Spirit regularly, then we are much less likely to abuse that power which we received as a gift from God in the first place. 

I believe the below video is a great example the Spirit working within a group of men who decided to stand up to an abuse of power.  The video is twenty minutes long, but very much worth it.

Defiance-- The Story of FC Start

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.