pusilla animi

dear world,
i'm sorry for my cynicism. for how my anger at injustice, and the church, and politics makes me punch the car dashboard hard enough to bruise my knuckles. for how i always call everyone out, maybe not to your face but to myself, or to the people i spend the most time with. for the way i have an opinion about everything, and you're never right. 

i tell you that the reasons you earn money and the ways you spend money are a wasted life, i tell you that your car and your house and the food you prepare is abusing other peoples' rights. i tell you that your church is a people that wants comfortable and position and enablement for a better life. i tell you that your church doesn't know God and doesn't want to know God, that you want earth and not heaven. 

i tell you that your politics fill their time debating lives like issues, i tell you that your politics keep human lives at an ocean distance because this allows us our ignorance. i tell you that your politics are corrupt and heartless and they don't imagine if they were seeking asylum, i tell you that they destroy refuge. 

i tell you so many things, all the time. can i tell you this? my heart has gone so hard. i went to Cambodia and this rubbish strewn country is rubbish strewn with KTV Bars where dollars are traded for girls and for nights and dignity and soul-empty hearts. i went with this people, Destiny Rescue, and they make hope seen when they go into the dark places and they don't abuse the desperate and vulnerable, the at-the-end-of-their-rope people. they don't yell at the perpetrator and they don't shake their fist. they make another way, an opportunity, like salvation -- it's rescue and they redeem, they make a place for redemption. they make a place for girls to live and learn and earn and provide. injustice doesn't make their hearts hard -- it makes them soft. 

all of the things that i tell you, all the things i tell you are so wrong, all the things that make me so mad i want to break things and yell, all the things that mean my tummy is always tight. 

i tell you, i'm angry at myself. i'm angry because i don't care about you, world. i'm angry because i abuse you and use you for myself. i'm angry because i want to be comfortable on your earth and i'm angry because i don't know God and i maybe don't want to know God. i'm angry because i want earth, and not heaven. i'm angry because i procrastinate my life by debating and arguing and protesting and demanding and accusing you. i'm angry because i'm always distanced from you so that i can excuse my ignorance, because this way i can protect myself. i am corrupt, and heartless, and i destroy your refuge because my heart is a hard, guarded place and there is no room for you. 

St Francis who lived in Assisi, it's said that he possessed a soul called the magna animi. 

"The magna animi is the open soul that has space for the world to enter and find Jesus. 

There is another kind of soul. It's called the pusilla animi. It is the defended heart. It's a guarded and suspicious spirit that is closed to the world. It sees everything and everyone as a potential threat, an enemy waiting to attack. It shields itself from the world." [chasing francis: a pilgrim's tale, ian morgan cron]

The open soul that has space for the world to enter and find Jesus. 

i guess this is a confession to you, world.