The Most Ordinary Things

There was this thing floating around social media a while back, this little inspirational insight geared towards women and their spirituality. It went something like this:

GOD COMES TO THE WOMEN

Have you ever noticed how in the scriptures men are always going up into the mountains to commune with the Lord?

Yet in the scriptures we hardly ever

hear of women going to the mountains,

and we know why — right?

Because the women were too busy

keeping life going;

they couldn’t abandon babies,

meals,

homes,

fires,

gardens,

and a thousand responsibilities to make the climb into the mountains!

I was talking to a friend the other day,

saying that as modern woman

I feel like I’m never “free” enough

from my responsibilities,

never in a quiet enough,

or holy enough spot

to have the type of communion

I want with God.

Her response floored me,

“That is why God comes to women.

Men have to climb the mountain to meet God, but God comes to women where ever they are.”

I have been pondering on her words for weeks and have searched my scriptures

to see that what she said is true.

God does in deed come to women

where they are,

when they are doing their ordinary,

everyday work.

He meets them at the wells

where they draw water for their families,

in their homes,

in their kitchens,

in their gardens.

He comes to them

as they sit beside sickbeds,

as they give birth,

care for the elderly,

and perform necessary mourning and burial rites.

Even at the empty tomb,

Mary was the first to witness Christ’s resurrection,

She was there because she was doing the womanly chore of properly preparing Christ’s body for burial.

In these seemingly mundane

and ordinary tasks,

these women of the scriptures found themselves face to face with divinity.

So if — like me — you ever start to bemoan the fact that you don’t have as much time to spend in the mountains with God as you would like. Remember, God comes to women. He knows where we are and the burdens we carry. He sees us, and if we open our eyes and our hearts we will see Him, even in the most ordinary places and in the most ordinary things.

It irked me then, and it irks me now. And I've been trying to figure out why. 

I mean, I get the point. It speaks to the busy Marthas who "find God in the dishes & diapers." Most moms can't go to the bathroom for thirty seconds in peace without a toddler jiggling the lock on the door, let alone find time to themselves the way men do. It's sometimes thrown in our faces as a kind of "double standard" (usually when our wives are tired and frustrated and running on empty).  

Our Lord makes this clear in the ordering of the Commandments--Love God (first), then you will be able to love neighbor as yourself. He makes it clear that Mary has "chosen the better part" in her otherwise useless adoring at Jesus' feet while her sister runs herself ragged with the deets. 

When I was in discernment with the Benedictines, ora et labora was everything. This included an attentiveness to the work at hand so that it was not done slovenly or carelessly. And yet, it was clear that the actual, primary work (in the monastery) was prayer (ie, "the work of God"). 

Cue the eye rolling. "Well, this is a home, not a monastery. And you are not a monk. And while you are at it, do some dishes!"

All true. But back to the mom-post at hand.

What exactly is being conveyed here? I think what it comes down to is that I am not a woman. I think what irks me about it is this subtle inversion that the domestic work is, in fact, the "real work," and that men "going up the mountain to commune with God" is somehow the secondary. It lists out and numerates all the domestic duties--babies, meals, homes, fires. SAHM: 16. Husband: 1. Not to mention the messaging obviously meant to convey a sense of solidarity: Women stay put; men run off. Men have to climb the mountain to meet God, but God comes to women where ever they are.” 

On one level, I can't relate to their domestic work anymore than I expect my wife to be out mowing the lawn and sweating in ninety degree heat every ten days, or taking the car in for inspection and oil changes, or taking out the trash. This is stuff I do, and I'm fine with it. But it's not my primary preoccupation. It doesn't define my identity or where I find my "tribe," and it's in addition to putting 40+ hours in outside the home. It's just stuff that has to get done.

My primary vocation, however, is to head my family--spiritually, financially, and corporally. And yes, that sometimes does necessitate "going up the mountain to commune with God." This isn't something to be scoffed at or dismissed as pie-in-the-sky spiritual idealism, pitting women's work against men's work. If I'm not doing that (and believe me, it's not as often as I would like), I'm not following the Lord's model as a man, Jesus "who often withdrew to lonely places and prayed" (Lk 5:16); who was tested (Mk 1:12); who "very early in the morning, while it was still dark, left the house and went to a solitary place where he prayed" (Mk 1:35).

I have no issues with women finding solidarity with one another in their domesticity, which often can be their own kind of "lonely place" where they feel isolated and disconnected. There can be a tendency to enshrine the home as their kind of domestic palace where they rule as Queen. And God bless them for it. Let's face it--most men don't know how to do this stuff with the same touch that women do. A monastery, maybe. But without our wives, we'd have a house, but not a home. We benefit from it, and we shouldn't forget it.

But women, for their part, shouldn't forget that it's that very "communing with God" which is what spiritually fortifies the home and makes it a sanctuary from the outside world. If we traded those early morning hours, or those times away "up the mountain," we trade away our spiritual fortitude and protection which comes from hearing the word of God in prayer and carrying it out in our vocation as husbands and fathers. Otherwise we don't grow, but stagnate in the here and now.  

My wife has plenty of opportunities to get up early and pray the Psalms, or meditate on the scriptures, or drive to the Adoration chapel. So do I, for that matter. We just trade these golden opportunities for inferior things--scrolling on our phones, lounging around, shuttling from here to there. We both de-prioritize what should be our top priority--God--we just do it in different ways. 

I think where the difference lies is that men need to carve out this time intentionally and seperated from others, whereas women, in my experience, enter into those culiminated little moments of divine encounter throughout their day, organically, and often in communion with other women. It is natural for me to get up early and "go to a lonely place" to pray with a degree of asceticism, whereas for my wife this may not be necessary. For my part, if all I did was wash dishes and change diapers and make lunches or whatever all day, and didn't work (see Fred The Fireman and the SAHD Dillema), I think I would want to kill myself. For my wife, she jokes that as hard as it is some days on the SAHM front, she's "living the dream." And she means it.

Men's spirituality and women's spirituality doesn't have to be pitted or scored against one another. We are different for a reason--"male and female He created them"--and find and serve God in different ways. Though I have many women saints I admire, my calling is to be a man, and be the best man God has made me to be. That means prayer and work--ora et labora--appropriate to my state in life. Not "my work is my prayer." Prayer AND work. And if I have to go up a mountain for a few days to live that out, then so be it.

We find God when we embrace what He has called us each to live out and who he has made us to be, as men and as women respectively. Mountain or no mountain.