Justice or Mercy?

This afternoon I was too angry to be angry. Ever had that feeling? Knowing that it is better to say nothing because what you will say will be so awful that it will take forever to make up for it? Yeah, that kind of afternoon. (Let alone that we still do not know Nikolina's surgical status -- all that is still pending. So today was not the best day for bad news.)

Nonetheless, bad news forced itself into my happy little day. And it all happened so innocently. I had taken time off work to be available to help Shane with any family needs before, during, and after Nikolina's surgery and decided to use some of my found time to balance my checking account. I opened the online version, figuring it would only take a few minutes since I was pretty much caught up, having balanced everything last week, which was pay day. And then a thunderstorm overtook my sunny day. To my horror, I saw that a $1500 payment to the IRS that I had put into my list of checks-by-mail account as a temporary place holder had not been removed when I sent the paper check on pay day to the IRS (my bad) and the bank had gone merrily on its little way and already mailed it, with an arrival date of today. Needless to say, I do not live in that echelon of society that can swallow an extra $1500. Trying to get the $$ back from either the bank or the IRS will take weeks; that much is for certain. The first payment already cleared, and now the second payment, unless something happens, will bounce (or all my other pay-bills-by-mail will bounce and cost a fortune in bounced check fees and quite a bit of embarrassment and paperwork with the companies that are expecting paper, not rubber, checks.) Putting a stop-payment on an IRS check was a nervous-making thought. So, the only reasonable approach seemed to be to find the extra money somewhere -- and I knew where. I could take out an advance on one of my credit cards that would cover half of it, and the rest could be taken from savings for now. We had put that amount of money into a savings account six months ago for an expense we had anticipated (and still anticipate); that could be borrowed temporarily. So, off I went to ask Donnie to go take it out of the bank while I worked on getting the credit card advance.

And then that little bubble of perpetual happiness that seems to bounce up and down around me wherever I go got a leak. Donnie became very quiet. He had that little-boy-caught-with-his-hand-in-the-cookie-jar look on his face. Finally, he admitted that (1) he had never put the full amount into the savings account and (2) over the past six months he had been removing the money bit by bit to buy himself comfort things (like foods that I don't buy because they are bad for his diabetes and little gadgets that I don't quite understand the need for). Now, there is nearly nothing in the account. My happiness bubble was leaking pretty fast, and I decided I had better do something to get out of the house -- uh, I could pick up the mail -- before I totally lost it and said those forever-type things.

On the way to the mail, all kinds of things went through my head, most of which centered around divorcing the "freeloader" (Donnie has not been able to find a full-time job since we returned to the USA from Jordan three years ago and brings in small amounts of money through freelance graphics, which he typically keeps for his own use unless there is an unexpected urgency), divorcing the "thief" (Donnie has emptied one or another account in the past without telling me -- the only joint account left is the savings), or putting the "child" on a short leash (making him turn over his checks to me and then giving him an allowance). Clemency was not among any of my thoughts.

Of course, divorce won't solve the current problem. However, the leash might take care of things in the long run! And then there is the real situation. We have been married 40 years, definitely have a quiet but deep bond of love (when I am not angry), survived all kinds of trauma and drama (more than a dozen families together would be expected to survive), parented a bunch of kids, serve actively and happily as grandparents to Nathaniel and Nikolina, and stability is needed now more than ever for Shane and his wife Lemony, given the situation with their children, for Doah who will need to have a united front to solve his addictive-medicine dilemma on Monday and beyond, for Lizzie and Blaine who have just moved to South Carolina on a shoestring and both about to start new jobs who will need a little financial support for a short while, and for Noelle who herself is trying to provide emotional support to her significant other who will likely be in a care facility for the rest of his life due to total renal failure. Shura has returned to Russia to be with his natural parents, has had Julie for support anyway, and has not needed us for a while. Ksenya is busy becoming famous in Hollywood and has her natural mother here now. Nonetheless, at least a half-dozen members of the successive generations do not need to have their parents losing their cool at this moment in their history. Still, the thought of total freedom, just walking away into the sunset, enticed me, well, at least for 5-10 seconds.

In real life, away from my thought-life, I guess it boils down to the one thing I did not consider on the way to the post office: clemency. (Not that the post office trip helped much: there in my post office box lay a demand for payment for $650 for a bill that we have sent evidence twice that we have paid in full! Argh! Is anyone in the billing office capable of reading?) Sigh! Clemency...That is not the choice I feel like making right now. It was not even the choice that came out in the two daily mass readings that I heard this morning. One was the post-battle sacrifice of the king's daughter and the other was the binding and ejection of the guest who came improperly attired to the banquet. Sheesh!

I am going to go walk around the mission grounds in just a little bit and talk to God. I am pretty sure God will hand me back my happiness bubble and teach me more about mercy, my initial reaction always being oriented toward justice rather than mercy. And then life will go on - because it has to and because God always makes my boo-boos stop hurting.

Oh, the money? I sort of forgot about that, didn't I? Nothing to worry about - I already asked God for help, so I have indeed forgotten about that problem other than being ready to follow any guidance that comes along. Actually, after today's thunderstorm, I am looking forward to tomorrow's rainbow, just one of those many gifts from God!

The Extra Manager at Today's Meeting

We are reading 1 Samuel in our Bible Studies class through an interdenominational scripture class published by SEEK. Tonight, we discussed chapter 23, in which David twice seeks the counsel of the Lord. One of the personalizing questions posed in the SEEK study materials is "When was the last occasion that you went before the Lord with a decision that needed to be made? Did you have a sense that God did lead and guide you?" (For me, that would be, ah, like, every day, given the life complications that I routinely run up against.)

The question immediately brought to mind the first meeting I had had this morning. Without revealing confidential information, I can share that two senior managers and I, their supervisor, had been called by our Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) office to a pre-mediation discussion with our organization's attorney and Human Resource director about an age discrimination complaint that had been filed by an employee from one of our branch offices who had been fired for absenteeism and poor performance by his first-line supervisor, Shirley. Prior to this meeting, I had, as usual with such meetings, asked God for guidance. (I don't like to play with people's lives without that kind of assistance.)

Once assembled, we introduced ourselves and our roles since our organization is quite large and not everyone knew everyone. The role of most of the members of the assembled group was clear. Roger was Shirley's supervisor, and I was Roger's supervisor. However, why Marvin had been called in was a puzzle to everyone, including to the EEO specialist who had set up the meeting and sent out the meeting invitations. Marvin, like Roger, was a senior manager, but he was not in Shirley's chain of command. We all agreed that it looked like an accident that Marvin was there, but he might as well stay because he had ridden there with Roger and me and would be stranded until we were ready to leave, anyway.

It appeared that Shirley had done an adequate enough job of counseling the employee and had some documentation to back up the firing. Curiously, the employee had only asked for reinstatement for six months as a redress for discrimination. I moved the discussion away from whether or not we could give a non-discriminatory reason for the firing (we could) and whether or not we could back that up with documentation (we could) to why the employee would only ask for a 6-month reinstatement. Well, it turned out that this was the amount of time he needs to be in the organization in order to qualify for retirement -- and, having started with us pretty late in life, he is already of retirement age. Based on this information, I ventured that we not look at this complaint as one in which we could justify whether we had done things right (all the correct documentation, following the rule book) but rather as one in which we could justify whether we had done the right thing (the humane approach to a person's life). Doing the right thing rather than always doing things right, a leadership concept introduced by Warren Bennis in his book, On Becoming a Leader, is an approach that I vigorously advocate for all the supervisors within my division.

Now, the problem with doing the right thing -- retaining the employee long enough for him to be able to retire (Where else, at an advanced age, would he be able to start the whole process all over again so that he would enough time to earn a pension?) -- is that continuing to work for his current first-line supervisor would be very problematic and probably impossible for a number of reasons that I cannot share. Hmm...Just as it started to seem that there would be no choice except to support the first-line supervisor's decision to cut the cord in advance of retirement and the lawyer and HR officer began moving in that direction, I looked at Marvin and got a "scathingly brilliant idea" as Hayley Mills in the lead role of Mary in the movie, The Trouble with Angels, was wont to say. Marvin is the senior manager of our Internet products, one for which the employee could work from his current branch office location on a flexi-place, short-term basis. Marvin acknowledged that he could probably find six months of work on a special project for the employee and stated that he would be willing to take him on. Voila! A chance to the right thing!

"Now I think we all know why you were called to this meeting!" I told Marvin.

Oh, yes, to answer the question from tonight's Bible Study class, I did indeed get a sense that God did lead and guide me today!

Monday Morning Meditation #111: God's Love and Compassion Are Meant for All

I cannot believe that I did not put this up in the morning. It was not a matter of time; I had seemingly plenty of it since I had the day off. Yippee! However, one thing after another came along -- Mass and post-Mass tea with a friend, editing an article for a young professional in Turkey (not sure how she found me; she popped up on my Facebook page a few months ago, asking me to friend her although I did not know her -- I sometimes do that with young professionals in my field), vet, home business requirements, taxes (yeah, gotta think about those now; I try to get them done early, but I don't always succeed), prayer group movie night (at my house -- so that requires scurrying around, making sure everything in the house sparkles, especially the bathrooms and picking up munchies at the store), laundry, and likely a lot more that I have already forgotten. Oh, and, of course, the tumble I took that laid me flat out on my back and temporarily knocked the wind out of me. Nothing broken or damaged, thank God. I did not forget the MMM, however, and so, assuming that the saying "better late than never" holds in this case, here it is.

The reading this week comes from the last chapter of Jonah, chapter 4. Jonah is, indeed, a short book, but for me, it is a powerful book. My life seems to have some parallels with Jonah, and I can certainly empathize with some of his feelings. Chapter 4 tells of Jonah's anger at God's compassion on the Ninevites, whose destruction he had been sent to preach, only to learn that God would not destroy them because they repented.

Reading: Jonah 4

Meditation: Last week, I commented about how my job situation had taken a path along the lines of Jonah's task to preach to the Ninevites. I have long been aware of that parallelism. However, I had not thought much about the conclusion to Jonah's story until I read it today. I really do understand Jonah's anger (or, at least, frustration). All that work -- and embarrassment -- for nothing!

Earlier the end of the story struck me as Jonah going off the deep end and being a selfish person. However, now that I have had so much contrary experience with the task of dealing with Adrian (as I pseudonymized the real person in my book, A Believer-in-Waiting's First Encounters with God), or Goliath, as I referred to him in earlier posts on 100th Lamb and Modern Mysticism. I seemed to be tasked with combatting the sense of evil that seemed always to surround Adrian, then was told to "love him," and the later he seemed to get off scot-free. (Sort of like when I was told my abusive mother "lives in grace.") Just like Jonah, I have had to come to terms with the reality that God gets to make the judgments, not I. (But, oh, how I would like to be the one to make them!)

Contemplation: That is far as I can go with you this Monday morning. I now retire to private prayer to praise God for love that goes beyond anything I can imagine. I will ask forgiveness for my petty reactions when I see such love being given to my nemeses and will give thanks for being gently guided into more proper thinking, as was Jonah. I will also ask God to readjust my attitude whenever a readjustment is needed. Then I will move on to contemplation, my favorite part of the day, letting God take over the direction in which my relationship with Him moves.

I will leave you now to your prayer and contemplation. First, though, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I think you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation posts. (During the week, he also posts great homilies and other thoughtful discussions. I enjoy reading those, too, as do readers of this blog who have taken the stroll over to his blog.)




For additional inspiration throughout the week, I would point out two sets of blogs: (1) the list of devotional blogs on my sidebar and (2) my blogroll, where I am following a number of inspirational priests and writers about spiritual matters. I learn so very much from all these people. I highly recommend them to you.