Definitions...

What defines you?

I've been wrestling with that question a bit for the past several weeks. What defines me? Is it how successful I am? Is it my sense of humor? My ability to sit with somebody in crisis? Maybe my ability to just hang out and have a good time? What is it that defines me? What is it that I allow to define me? Do I allow the world to define me? Do I allow my perfectionism... or the voice that speaks out of my perfectionism to define me? Who or what defines me?

I struggle with this question because at different times I have different answers. Hanging in my office is a towel that says, "Remember who you are." It's a towel because I am to remember that I am claimed by Christ, I am defined by Christ, in the waters of baptism. I know that... I know that I am Kate, a child of God. But in my weaker moments, in my times of doubt, I find myself trying to depend on me... to depend on what I can and cannot do. I define myself by the world... by the level of success or the level of failure. Or perhaps I should say that sometimes I define myself by the crazy expectations I set for myself which never seem good enough.

Advent and Christmas always seem to be a time of spiritual renewal for me... a reminder of who I am, of who defines me. It is not the world, rather a baby laying in a manger, that defines me. But how do we, how do I, carry this notion through the rest of the year? How do I constantly remember what defines me?

This is something that I ponder. Not only for myself but for my ministry. How do we as the Church remind the people what defines them? What defines us?

I continue to ponder...

Kate