My Spiritual U-Turn

It began in earnest last fall. Here’s how I describe it in an essay I’m writing for the National Catholic Reporter:

Then on my 73^rd birthday last year—on All Saints Day, no less—I had myself a good old spiritual crisis. While wandering through a local nature preserve on that crisp November morning, I asked myself two pretty hard questions:

            What’s your life been about so far?

            What’s it going to be about from this point on?

As is my wont, I write to discover what’s at work in the stories I tell about my life. In this instance, why did those two questions feel as if they were, at their core, spiritual ones? I really wasn’t sure. And so I hoped that by writing about it for NCR readers, I’d figure it out.

Especially this part: how do I account for the fact that not long after that innocent stroll in the preserve, I, a “cradle” Catholic, have returned to the church after an absence of close to 50 years. I mean, can a person get more lapsed than that?

Now I know that one 800-word essay will not be enough to make sense of this for me—and likely for many of my friends, including those who profess no faith of their own.

But it’s a start. So I hope that after reading my submission NCR will decide to publish it. Who knows? Maybe there’s a growing market of lapsed Boomers & Beyonders--of any faith--who have started to ask themselves their own pretty hard questions.