A Remembrance:R.I.P John O’Donohue

Two Cups of Tea at Hope’s Cafe

In 2007 Terry and I were in Washington D.C. to attend The Evolution of Psychotherapy Conference.  Whatever I may have learned in those few days is overshadowed by my experience of a program the conference directors had arranged for the night before the conference opened. The speaker was John O’Donohue, an Irish Catholic who had left the priesthood for a different path.  A poet, author, and speaker, he is perhaps best known for popularizing Celtic spirituality. 

In this era of extreme polarization and in the wake of a divisive election, I thought of John O’Donohue.  In the jam-packed room where he spoke that night in D. C., there was not so much as a cough or a whisper.  We sat mesmerized, his lilting Irish brogue enhancing the depth of his words, both comforting and challenging. I wished this week I could feel that same sense of peace and comfort I felt that night.

I share with you two quotes of his that seemed especially pertinent this week.

“Keep something beautiful in your soul to survive difficult times and enjoy good times.”

And:

“Part of understanding the notion of Justice is to recognize the disproportions among which we live…it takes an awful lot of living with the powerless to really understand what it is like to be powerless, to have your voice, thoughts, ideas and concerns count for very little. We, who have been given much, whose voices can be heard, have a great duty and responsibility to make our voices heard with absolute integrity for those who are powerless.”

This would seem to indicate two priorities:  self-care amid difficult times and the ongoing and persistent call to the care of others for whom self-care would be an impossible luxury.  And a lesson we need to heed:  the second priority can be the most effective by adhering to the first.  I encourage us all to take care of ourselves, to immerse ourselves in the gratitude that grounds us, and to experience the challenge of care for others as an invitation to increase community, a partnership which unites us. 

I offer this blessing first invoked by O’Donohue: May you experience each day as a sacred gift woven around the heart of wonder.

Thank you, John O’Donohue.  May you rest in peace.    January 1, 1956 –  January 4 ,2008

The invitation is open to share “two cups of tea” anytime at Hope’s Café, or anywhere you share companionship and conversation.

May we be bearers of hope, the “wait staff” of Hope’s Café for each other and all those we encounter.  Shalom, Kate