lay down naked like fallen trees

leaf-bare and winter cleared

blanketed like moist grass beneath the snow

a beauteous shock of untouched flesh

dressed in the barren colors of chilling air

awaits the musical whisper of warmth

*Judas was an addict.  He was habituated to stealing but he gave up on himself.  Christ and the disciples knew he was addicted to thievery but they loved him by not kicking him out of the group.  They continued to trust him with the item which was his temptation.  It's not by denying what is or fleeing the issue that we face in our lives that will frees us. It's when we recognize that it is our own issue and own it but rise rise above our habit by sharing it with others who care for us that we can be in the midst of the temptation and say, "No!"  Judas never shared his addiction or owned up to it with those who loved him and cared for him and, consequently, was brought under by the addiction.  He tried bearing it by himself but it was too much to bear - alone.  So, instead of turning or re-turning to Jesus and the disciples for support, he gave into despair because all he recognized in himself was failure, a closed door, darkness.  He, himself, was the doorknob.  All he needed to do was ask assistance from those by his side.

Reflections of Frederick Buechner:

  -...what we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known in our full humanness, and yet that is often just what we fear more than anything else.

  -Maybe nothing is more important than that we keep track, you and I, of these stories of who we are and where we have come from and the people we have met along the way because it is precisely through these stories in all their particularity, as I have long believed and often said, that God makes himself  known to each of us most powerfully and personally.  If this is true, it means that to lose track of our stories is to be profoundly impoverished not only humanly but spiritually.