Category: Scripture reflections

One of the popular methods in psychology at the time was called, “group therapy”—basically like-minded people working things out together with professional guidance.

Why didn’t y’all just go fishin’ and talk it out with God?

I guess because along the way we learned that some inner lies just don’t get unravelled in your life unless you “talk it out” with another human being who can challenge you and support you. (By the way, that’s really part of the genius of confession in our Catholic tradition.).

So one of the things we did in our group was to sit in front of another person and look into that person’s eyes for thirty seconds while repeating our own name over and over slowly without blinking or turning away. Then we changed places and let them do the same with us.

Afterwards we would come back together in the larger group and talk about what was going on during the eyeball-to-eyeball.

You can read the rest here.

So that September, feeling like a five-year-old going to school for the first time, I was on the lookout for teachers with a reputation for making learning come alive—hoping I might learn to do the same. One such was Sister Mary Eileen, who taught science.

In those days teachers did a little bit of everything, and one of Sister Mary Eileen’s other jobs was bookkeeping, a job she probably got because she had the gift for making every penny count.

Some of those “pennies” were being wasted by students who left lights burning in empty classrooms at the end of the day. So knowing she would never find out who had left them on, she devised a technique to help everyone learn the cost of electricity.

Whenever the lights were left on, Sister Eileen would go to that classroom. Then, in front of the whole class, she would take the class list, pull a long hatpin out of her sleeve, close her eyes, and take a stab at the list.

To read the rest, go here.