WLSU: What About Now

Anyway, that whole experience on the hillside 24 years ago was very Eat Pray Love of me. Of course, I didn’t go searching for meaning – not explicitly. Meaning just sort of smacked me upside the head. And I keep calling it conversion. My conversion.

Part of the reason I use that word is because it makes me uncomfortable. Part of the reason I use that word is I think it makes many of you uncomfortable. And part of the reason I keep saying conversion is that it’s true. Something happened to me that can’t unhappen to me, so I may as well be honest about that.

I’ve just returned from my sabbatical – a nearly four-month break from work that was facilitated by the amazing people, clergy, and staff of Church of the Redeemer, and graciously funded by the Lilly Foundation – who awarded Church of the Redeemer with a Clergy Renewal Grant which enabled me to travel both by myself and with my family. The primary purpose of this sabbatical was simply to rest, which I’m glad to say happened. When I wasn’t just resting, I was going places that connected me to conversion experiences and food – and the places where conversion and food meet.

So, what better place for me to take my family than Italy? It’s famous for its food, it’s rife with religious sites, and it was the location of my accidental conversion all those years ago. We spent a little less than a month in Italy, traveling all throughout the northern half of the country, and finishing our time there in Cinque Terre – the little patch of land on the hillside I keep talking about. I wanted to walk the trails of Cinque Terre again like I did all those years ago, and I wanted to take my family with me. I knew doing this would inevitably draw comparisons to the first time. How could it not?

And while I was quick to tell anyone listening that I had no expectations of another conversion experience, I could not help but wonder if just maybe I’d be knocked down and picked back up as thoroughly as I once had been.

Cinque Terre is a collection of five very small villages literally nestled into a coastal hillside, and aside from each town looking like a postcard, their main attraction is the set of hiking trails between them. We were there with another family with whom we are dear friends – five children and four adults all in. We were outnumbered. The forecast for the day of the hike included some periods of rain. But I had carted my family halfway across the world to walk this path, so I did that thing I do sometimes. I just said, “the weather will be fine!” and meant it. I suffer from the affliction of sometimes thinking my wanting something is enough to make it true.

It was not true.

At a little over 2 miles of steps and hills that are almost always ascending, the hike from the first village to the second is the longest and most challenging. About ten minutes in, the rain began. For most of the time, it wasn’t awful – just a constant mist punctuated with occasional genuine raindrops. My spirits would not be dampened. And only 2 of the five children were complaining. We would be fine. The walk kept going. It just kept going. And the rain picked up. And the number of happy people got smaller and smaller. I was still one of the happy people, but I was also feeling the weight of my own expectations, along with the realization that I had dragged 8 of my favorite people along with me and their misery was my doing. Well, me and God’s anyway.

The last 20 minutes was hard rain and big winds. We were just trying to get to the town and find a dry place to sit and eat. One of the kids grumbled, “Why are we even doing this?” I wheeled around and yelled, “Because it makes me happy, ok?” My award for Father of the Year is in the mail.

Soon we were all settled into a restaurant, drying off, getting fed, getting drinks, and getting our equilibrium. And of course, the rain stopped, and the sun came out. It was decided that one of the adults would accompany the kids on the train back to home base – that two-hour walk was a 5-minute train ride. The other two adults and I continued the next leg of the journey. It was sunny and quiet and calm and perfect. In fact, the weather was almost exactly the same as it had been 24 years ago. I missed the kids.

When the hike was over, my buddy Brian and I were sitting on the beach in paradise smoking cigars and drinking Aperol Spritzes and he said, “So? Did you see God?”

“The whole time,” I said. And I wasn’t exaggerating.

In fact, God did not knock me off my feet and pick me back up that day. I did not hear this clear loud voice. But it dawned on me when Brian asked me that I felt God the entire time – even when I was cranky and stuck in my own head with all its expectations and worries. God did not show up yelling “Here I am!” that day because I did not need them to. It’s been 24 years since that happened, but it hasn’t been 24 years of silence.

I think one of the reasons we resist talking about conversion is it feels phony. The idea that I used to be lost at sea and then one day God spoke and now my life is great, and I believe and know, and everything is clear – this is not my experience. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see? For me it was that I once was lost and still get lost quite a bit, was blind and still am very often. God did speak to me. I had that moment. And it did change my life. But I need to remember that that conversion was not an isolated moment. It was the beginning of a movement within my soul that is still happening, still working itself out. Call it sanctification if you’re Catholic, or discipleship if you’re Protestant, whatever you want. It’s messy. It’s ongoing. It’s conversion and it’s still happening right now.

I have to tell you the truth. That day on the trail was my favorite day of the whole trip. It was not the easiest. It was not the most relaxing or the most interesting. But I went to the place of my conversion and found out that I’m still being converted. God is speaking to me differently because of course they are. I am not who I was, nor am I who I will be. God will speak to me differently 24 years from now too. Maybe I’ll go to Cinque Terre in 2048.