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At Mass yesterday, a priest I’d never seen before delivered the homily. He announced that our parish’s pastor had stepped down due to declining health. It was both a shock and not — our pastor has been sick for some time, and yet I was still throttled by his overnight withdrawal. The visiting priest, who turned out to be a longtime mentee and friend of our pastor, delivered the most gorgeous and vulnerable reflection on grace in times of change. His words have been nesting snugly with me since.
He talked first about how challenging it must have been for the priest to decide it was time to step down. I know many people struggle with retiring from a career that has more or less defined them, but — I can’t imagine the particular intensity of stepping away from parish life as a priest. This is not a job but a vocation. What might it feel like to be unable to do what you are good at, or what you’ve been called (by God!) to do in life? I am thinking also of Grant Achatz and his tongue cancer. I know you don’t stop “being a priest” (or “stop being cook”) because you’ve stepped away from your core duties, but I imagine it must feel like a splitting away, a vestigiality. Maybe that’s a miscast, though — maybe he instead feels chrysalid. In transformatio. Or perhaps he has the purity of trust that I often lack. Perhaps he sees that things are unfolding exactly as they should.
Still, to have the strength and wisdom to know when to step away is no small thing. Even in the more trivial avenues of my own life, I struggle with this. I was just talking with a girlfriend on the phone last week about how challenging it is to make a change in your 30s and 40s. We have been building up a massive weight of responsibility and contingency for years now. The fear of butterfly effects. And yet this particular friend recently moved not for career but for quality of life, and has also reinvented herself professionally multiple times — from attorney to travel agent to entrepreneur to stay-at-home mom. Just one of these changes takes incredible conviction to pull off; it is much easier to stay put. I told her that it has often felt like there are thousands of invisible hands keeping us in place. Do not move to Bethesda; do not hire an intern; do not part ways with your nanny; do not switch your child’s school. Each of these decisions are totally normal — routine, almost inevitable! — in the grand scheme of things, but it can feel as though you are the only person on the planet that has ever done them before when you are in the throes. (How can buying a home feel so complicated, even necromantic, and high stakes? Am I the only person who has ever had to figure out what to do with my child during that crescent of time between end of school and end of work? Etc.) Relatively recently, my Dad was trying to transfer ownership of an account from himself to me and it took multiple hour-long, in-person visits to accomplish it. During this process, it occasionally felt as though we were speaking a different language. (“You want to do what? For what purpose?”) My father was livid — how was it possible that he, the account owner, couldn’t simply transfer it? It’s as though we were the only people in the history of the world that had tried to make that change, which simply cannot be true. I think that most of the time, though, the world is designed for B-A-U (business as usual) and does not have the energy to contemplate fringe use cases, or end-of-use cases. Which, you know, makes sense in its own way. (Why would you dedicate even a fraction of time to rare situations? More impactful to rally resources toward maintaining status quo that serves most customers.) All of this to say that making even a small change can feel overwhelming to the point of debilitating. You are met with so many error messages, so many invisible hands keeping you where you are. I have had to rally a string of mantras around myself just to make my way into the change-making arena. Some of the mantras that have helped me get out from underneath those forces pinning me in place: you’re not making a decision yet, you’re just giving yourself options; be willing to change paths when you become the bottleneck; and listen to your instincts. I am sure that our pastor had powerful prayers he leant on as he came to his own decision. I wonder what they might have been? (What are yours?)
There is the other side of this conversation, too — how to accommodate changes other people have made. The priest on Sunday shared the most human account of his experience watching our pastor step down. He said that the first emotion he experienced was sadness. It had been difficult to see the pastor so unwell, so remote from his former responsibilities and the energy that he’d brought to them. He went on to explain that over the course of visiting the pastor several times in his new living arrangements, he gradually found happiness instead. He discovered he was happy that the pastor was comfortable and cared for; able to rest; and had had so much time doing what he was good at. There is so much to say about this chronicle of the heart during a time of change, but I admired the way he modeled emotional openness and resiliency. He let himself experience true sadness while also making space for that emotion to change over time, to melt into other things. No feeling is final, or inapt. I find myself leaning on this truth a lot as I age: “it only hurts this much right now.” Acute pain passes. And, if we are patient, can eventually give way to softness or warmth.
Sending good energy out there if you are making, or contemplating making, a change. Get out from underneath those invisible hands!
Post-Scripts.
+Thoughts coming from the other side of things: I don’t want anything to change.
Shopping Break.
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+Perfect everyday sweater.
+Bottega vibes on this J. McLaughlin crossbody.
+A great staple to wear in lieu of a white tee. 15% off with JEN-15.
+Loving La Ligne’s new arrivals — especially this cotton striped rollneck, this tweed mini (I’d style over a black turtleneck!), and their iconic striped mini marin in new colors. (10% off with code MAGPIE10.)
+Love this clutch.
+Two spring floral dresses I’m obsessing over: this and this. (Vibe for less with this $229 beauty! And this is a different color situation, but she’s SO gorgeous and flattering! I have this exact style in a winter tartan and I felt so cute in it.)
+How CUTE are these floral trim athletic shorts for girls? These lilac jeans are in my cart for my daughter, too.
+Chic packable raffia tote.
+Uniqlo has some seriously cute finds for little ones. Love these striped tees.
+Pottery Barn just released a collab with Rifle Paper featuring the sweetest Easter collection for kids — these melamine plates and bowls, these cork placemats, and this sweet cutlery!
+Sweetest short-sleeved knit. In general, really into short-sleeved knits! Also love this ice blue Banana and this butter yellow J. Crew.
What a beautiful reflection on the homily and the time of transition within your parish. I watched Conclave over the weekend (have you viewed? would be curious re: your thoughts!) and found echoes of your writing reverberating with the mid-film homily on certainty and doubt. I want to look up the text and bookmark the entire passage – I found it deeply moving, both as a Catholic and as someone in a time of intrafamily transition and living in the in-betweens and waiting periods.
Ooh, I’ve been begging Landon to watch but it’s always felt just a tad too heavy for what we’re looking for…maybe I’ll bump it up the list! Thank you for the generous compliments. I know how hard those transitional times and spaces are — sending you love!
I feel this sentiment so strongly. I am both in the throes of buying my first home and finding a new job which feel debilitating in different ways. On both sides of the equation I know these are good things but the deep uncertainty is weighing on me heavily. I have been frequently reminding myself of the Magpie phrase, “sometimes you have to move the dirt”. It’s been a useful reminder that this phase will pass (hopefully) and good things often come from times of stress and uncertainty. As you often say, onwards!
Emma! That is a lot to handle at once – I am sending you love. I’m so happy that phrase has come to mind — yes! Move the dirt til you get to the other side. “These are the days that must happen to you” (Whitman) — you’ll get to there but give yourself grace in the meantime.
xx