The Hinge of Recovery Turns on the Experience of Doing

Many of my friends have been working the 12 Step Program for a good long time. Pick your poison; alcohol/drugs, tobacco, sugar and so on; the truth is that too many drink/drug too much, too many die of lung cancer and obesity is pandemic. My poison of choice is of the latter sort for my entire lifetime. In fact, it goes back way beyond me into the very genetic structure of my ancestry.

I have resigned myself to live with my imperfections, except that along the way I did discover Weight Watchers and over twenty years ago I became a lifetime member, having lost over 100 pounds.

But as with so many things, the weight jumped back on me over time. Various illnesses have creeped into my existence like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and most recently diabetes.

The primary factor in all this is the "weight management". Anyone who takes a quick look at me could have a quick chuckle about that one given the fact that I have so much extra weight to carry around. So many of us now share this "burden" that it has become a national concern.

The bout with prostate cancer sobered me up a bit and now I'm working at the recovery. I've got the sugar under control. I did buy a bike last year and do ride it, but not quite often enough.

A few moments ago, I came back from a visit with my nutritionist, and I must say, how wonderful it is to have such supports.

My bride and I are really pulling for each other now. She's doing well with the weight loss, I'm struggling with it. But I cheer myself with several good thoughts

1. I am quite a character with a fabulous sense of humor.

2. I am an indefatigable fighter for justice especially for the poor, the homeless, the outcast and marginalized and believe that the church I love should be a "House of Prayer for All People" just like Jesus said it should be, and that there should be NO outcasts. So that whatever race, ethnicity, class, gender or orientation we should be one in Christ, just as Paul said it should be. (Galatians 3:28)

3. I am an activist priest; race, class, gender, and orientation have been my rally cries and now I am calling for us all to mobilize ourselves for Labor Day. Wake up America, they want to take away our economic freedom and give it all to the rich.

4. But, like my namesake, Paul of Tarsus, I have this "thorn in the flesh" (2 Corinthians:12). I am a human being. Damn! So this I am learning; my recovery turns on the experience of doing. Eat right and exercise. That's it. Not rocket science!

So I stumbled across this phrase and it excited me. And now I have the rest of my life to look toward. A sea gull looks out over the sea, and I know what s/he's looking for. Man/woman does not live by bread alone but by every word that falls from the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4) and this is my word for today; "The hinge of recovery turns on the experience of doing".

Thanks for listening.

Fr. Paul