On Winged Words...: Where Fear and Faith Collide

This year was my first Thanksgiving away from home. An ocean away from the turkey-loving country I call home and in a country that is becoming more and more a second home despite the fact that it doesn’t spend the fourth Thursday of November giving thanks and stuffing themselves with turkey and all the fixings (though we are fortunate enough to work in the only school in all of Greece that acknowledges this special day with kids wearing hand-colored turkey headbands and pilgrim hats singing Thanksgiving songs and serving turkey for lunch in the cafeteria J), I needed to find a way to celebrate and spend the three-day, holiday weekend we found ourselves with. So if you’re not going to spend the holiday weekend with family stuffing yourselves with turkey, why not do the next best thing and spend the weekend with friends stuffing yourselves with gelato and pasta in Rome? J
So that’s what we did. Back in early October, with a decently-priced flight to seal the deal, a couple of friends and I booked our tickets to Rome for that weekend and dreamt about the tastes and the sights that would be our exciting, if unconventional, way of celebrating a Thanksgiving abroad. And that was that. Easy-peasy.

Until it wasn’t anymore.

Two weeks before we were set to fly to Rome, the attacks in Paris happened. And terrorism became much more real for my family. Travel was no longer “easy” (or as relatively easy as it had seemed before). And this longing for safety, which is the same longing that drives us all—from the refugees fleeing the terror that has been inflicted on them in a horrific daily barrage, to the mom holding the hand of her young child as she looks left, right, then left again before crossing the street, to the group of Fulbrighters who had planned a Thanksgiving trip to Rome...

How can we go about our daily lives and adventures safely?

How can we protect the loved ones whose hands we hold? And what about those who are too far away and can only be reached via the internet waves that connect? How can we ease the worries and fears of those you love, who you just want to hug but who are too far away for now?

How can we find peace?

It was supposed to be an easy, exciting trip to just look forward to and plan for. But then fear was introduced into the mix. And fear has a tendency to taint whatever it touches: a dark, inky blot drips into the crystal clear, purest of waters and spreads, making it murky, stained, dark.

Fear makes things not so easy. Fear makes things tricky. Fear makes things darker. Fear makes things stressful. Fear makes things scary.

So where does faith fit in? How do you find a balance between avoiding danger and unnecessary risks, and living life to the fullest and doing the things you love, the things you’ve planned? How do you decide to take those steps or not?

Cross the street, it’s a risk. Drive across town, it’s a risk. Fly across the sea, it’s a risk.

And in the world we live in, that fear is almost enough enough to send you scurrying back under your covers. But that’s not what you really want. And that’s not really how we were meant to live.

So what do you do now? Well, I’m sure it’s different for every person how to approach a risky situation/decision. All I can tell you is what I did, what I thought in those weeks leading up to Rome.

I thought and I prayed about it. A lot. And I talked to people about it. A lot. And I thought about it some more. And I wished desperately (hoped against hope, knowing it doesn’t work like this but wishing so much that it did!)—I wished that I would make up in the morning and things would be better, clearer. Easier.

They weren’t.

But when have you ever learned anything, gained anything worthwhile and it was easy? The paths to the most breathtaking views are rarely lined with elevators and escalators. The classes I’ve taken and loved and learned the most from were also some of the hardest and most demanding. The best friendships don’t come with easy small talk, but rather they happen and grow when you take the chance and step outside your comfort zone and make yourself vulnerable and open yourself up (and that is not at all an easy thing).

Fear doesn’t have the final say. Just have a little faith.

So it wasn’t going to be easy. I realized that, and I was on my way to accepting that (or at least, accepting it as much as I could). And I was becoming more and more aware of the fact that peace is not the same thing as ease, and that peace, within yourself and also in the world around us, is not necessarily easy, either. But we strive for it anyway. We must.

In talking with a family friend we’ve known for a long time and whom I truly admire and whose words/advice I respect and trust, I came to a new understanding of fear, faith, and freedom, and how it all works in life right now, and even more specifically, in the situation I was faced with at the time (and am still facing to a certain degree).

We have the freedom to choose what we do with our lives. And sometimes that freedom can be quite scary. Sometimes I want to return it and just have someone else tell me what the “right” decision is. Why can’t I just have my parents tell me what to do (much as I resisted that when I was younger, a tiny piece of me longs for it now)? Why can’t I have a burning bush like Moses? Why can’t the path be clear? Right or left? Why can’t it be easy?

Sometimes we let the chaos of life and the uncertainties that surround us bog us down, and we let this freedom to choose stress us out. I know I’m guilty of it. Time and time again. But if we look past our nose that’s tucked down to our chest as we hug our knees and try to hide from life, we might see that this freedom isn’t actually such a terrible thing. We don’t have to walk across the tightrope alone. If there’s not a clear right or wrong answer, a sure prompting either way, then that means not only do we have the freedom to choose, but that there’s a safety net in choosing either way. We can decide and we can trust that it will work out either way.

Another thing this wise friend reminded me of is that we are not given a spirit of fear. And, moreover, we were meant to have life and have it abundantly. And that includes all aspects of life: faith, love, joy, peace, adventure, and so, so much more. We were meant to live. And if you were made with a spirit for and a drive for adventure (or whatever your calling might be), that’s no accident, and it is okay to follow where it leads.

So where does that lead us? Where does that leave us?

I’m not saying to go out and live recklessly. And I’m not saying we should avoid any and every risk. It’s a delicate balance we seek, a fine tight rope we walk. But we still walk it. And we walk it knowing there’s a safety net either way, just in case. We walk it with faith. We fight fear with faith.

Remember that dark, inky pool that resulted from fear? When I was in high school I saw a video that illustrated the cleansing power of faith and Jesus in the face of sin. It’s kind of cool actually. If you have a glass of water and you add iodine to it, the whole glass becomes dark. But if you add bleach mixed with water to the murkiness, the whole glass clears. The image stuck, and the message resonates once more as I sit here reflecting on this trip and the days leading up to it.

So in the rocky, murky path leading to the decision of whether or not to go to Rome last weekend I clung to faith; and then (having made the decision to go, with a certain measure of peace in that decision, though not without its share of residual caution), in every step through the beautiful, cobblestoned streets of Rome I kept clinging to that faith.

And I had an amazing weekend in a lovely city with wonderful friends.

I'm glad I went.

A fun-filled, food-filled, sightseeing-filled weekend—literally, quite possibly the fullest of weekends I think I’ve ever had the fortune to spend. The sights, the history, the beauty—another statue or old building (or both!) around every corner. A city quite lovely and so rich in history (and history so well preserved).

We really did so much in only three days. Definitely made the most of our time there. Saw everything we wanted to see and even some things we didn't know we wanted to see. Ate everything we wanted to eat, and sometimes on two or three different occasions/restaurants! Took a bunch of pictures. Saw a lot of things. Learned a lot—about Rome, about traveling, about myself, about faith.

It was a great weekend. A different way to celebrate Thanksgiving to be sure, but an enjoyable one, nonetheless, and it was still full of good food and good company and abounding in more reasons for/in which to be thankful.

But it wouldn’t have happened if I had given in to fear. And I couldn’t have stood up to that fear without a little faith.

So we press on and we give thanks (and not just on Thanksgiving!) and we live and we learn and we try to make the most of our life and live it to the fullest. And we keep seeking that balance between fear and faith. And we put one foot in front of the other and we walk step by step.

And we walk in faith.

~*~

Now, perhaps you’d like to take a walk with me down the streets of Rome. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other…

Our first steps down the streets of Rome:

The national monument (our first "touristy" stop for the day):

Oh, look! Ruins! :)

From the balcony of the national monument/museum, an overlooking view of this beautiful city:

No trip to Rome would be complete without a trip to Trevi Fountain (and a tossed coin over your right shoulder wishing for another such trip in the future!)

The Spanish Steps (under construction so we couldn't walk them):

One of the famous piazzas (squares). I can't remember the name. It has a cool DaVinci museum tucked around one of the corners, though! An interesting and informative find.

Street views:

Random, old fountains around every other bend:

A view of St. Peter's at night:

Now a view of the former fortress of the Pope (at night!):

Day 2: a trip to the Vatican--starting with a tour through the museum:

A statue of Hercules--the model for Michaelangelo's figures painted in the Sistine chapel:

And, it's autographed! And in Greek! (which I can read now!! J)

Even the floors are pretty:

Originally, all those ancient statues were painted and had glass eyes in them (like this one does). Eerie but cool...

While the Greeks liked to sculpt the ideal image of the body, Roman sculptors tended to try and capture the reality of the human body (every beautiful, ugly curve and wrinkle of it!):

Tapestries that revealed 3-d images with thread:

The steps leading back up to the Sistine Chapel (no pictures allowed in there but being in that place, seeing those paintings, imagining being there half a century ago when it was first built...incredible. Beyond what any picture or words could ever express...):

First glimpse of St. Peter's Square:

The door to St. Peter's Basilica, only opened every 25 years for the holy year for pilgrims to trek through. But it will be opened again tomorrow (December 8th) for pilgrims because the Pope has declared this year (2015) a holy year!

St. Peter's Square. The columns curving out reach around as if to emulate the church's embrace.

Looking up at the balcony where the new popes are announced and from which they give their first blessing:

Trimming the tree (with a crane! not pictured):

Imagine walking in to St. Peter's half a century ago and this being what you see. No less incredible or breathtaking now...

THE most beautiful piece of stained glass my eyes have ever beheld (made all the more striking because it is the only piece of stained glass in the church):

Above the tomb of St. Peter. The bronze balcony was made by melting down all the bronze Greek statues in the museum's collection except for one that still remains there: