We got to Berkeley on Thursday, after a 5 day orientation at a retreat camp on Aptos, CA. It was right on the Pacific Ocean and the beach, so needless to say it was incredible. It was even better by the fact that I left my vacation down the shore in Jersey on Friday, and then was on the opposite coast's beach on Saturday. Overall, orientation was alright, plently of meeting the 70-80 Jesuit Volunteers (JVs) who are working in the Southwest region (Arizona and California). The days seemed long, as the anticipation of getting to our house and getting started with our new lives was palpable. After talks about boundaries, relationships, spirituality, and community, and after having a week of delicious (mostly vegetarian) food, we finally got to leave and go to our house. We (when I refer to 'we' I most likely mean my house: Casa Thea Bowman...look her up) were driven in a van by a supervisor at one of our JV placements, and we were accompanied by 4 other JVs that are living in the Oakland house (Casa Dorothy Day...again, look her up). While you can tell that our house has been occupied by JVs for many years in the past, the house is great and we were surprised with a plethora of food items that the old house left for us.
I start work on Monday, although half of our house had orientations on Friday. Needless to say, I am excited and anxious to start work and actually know what I am doing. Overall, I want to get into some sort of routine for this year, which, for me, will make life much more comfortable.
I know that I'm not the best "blogger", so I apologize for lack of order, but from time to time I'll probably be writing about things relating to my spiritual and religious life, most of which will probably have a Jesuit bias towards them. One of my favorite quotes is from the Jesuit priest Gerard Manley Hopkins who wrote: "The world is charged with the grandeur of God." (It is the first line of a short poem he wrote). I had two examples of this at orientation.
The first came during a time of silence. I was on the beach praying the rosary when I saw a mass of black moving across the ocean; it was a whole array of birds flying across the ocean. Now I'm not great with the English language, so it will be hard to relate what I actually saw and make a good visual for you, but there were THOUSANDS of birds flying. They flew a short way and then stopped over the ocean and were flying around in a large circle; some birds were on the water while others were flying low but over the ocean. Each time I would look behind me, I would see about 5 or 6 more flying towards the group. I don't know what they were doing (I would guess feeding), but it was a humbling sight. They remained in the one area for a long time, and eventually flew further out over the ocean, remaining in a large group. It was utterly astounding, I had never seen that many birds in one place at one time, it was something I would expect to see on Planet Earth or a similar Discovery Channel show. I just took it all in: the birds were in nature and were uninterrupted by anything I was doing. I apologize, because I know I am not doing this scene justice, but all I could think about was God and how the sand beneath my feet was from God and because of God, and it filled me with a sense of being that humbled me and reminded me that it's not just me in this world, nor just people in this world; and it was just beautiful.
I am not going to explain the second example, but just give you 2 pictures, both taken on the last night of Orientation after our Missioning Mass. Think of the quote while viewing these pictures; I believe there's nothing more to be said or could be said about them:
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