Rejoice and be glad

By Mia Pohlman

The first time my friend Claire and I returned to Father Bill's grave in Kirksville, we danced. The whip and nae nae, right there in the cemetery, by the road where people driving by could see us. It was the only response we could find, the only way we could express our gratitude, joy, grief, need, and deep, deep love for this man who had been a father, deepest friend and God to us.

He had often given us the penance in Confession to go home and dance while we brushed our teeth, to remember and participate in the joy with which God looks upon us. So there we were, in a cemetery singing and flailing our arms around. Commanding the world to watch us whip. And watch us nae nae.

When faced with our mortality, sometimes all we can do is dance.

Pope Francis titled his recent exhortation "Guadete et Exultate," or "Rejoice and Be Glad." It is, he writes, a repurposing of "the call to holiness in a practical way for our own time, with all its risks, challenges and opportunities." The title echoes Jesus' words to "those persecuted and humiliated for his sake:" "Rejoice and be glad."

The other week was a rough one for me; heavy news kept coming, one thing after another, and I was caught up in the mire of it. On the way to work while thinking deeply, I happened to glance over at the pick-up truck driving next to me. The person sitting on the passenger's side was wearing a straw hat and dancing goofily -- from the looks of it, to banjo music. He was really going for it, all out, picking that air banjo and having a blast, to his friend's chagrin.

I love to dance in my car and often wonder why all these serious people sitting at stoplights don't, and so to glance over and see this person giving it his all delighted me and was God's presence to me, reminding me of joy and lightness.

Then the truck made a right turn, into a cemetery.

I wasn't expecting that.

Perhaps they worked there, or perhaps they were going to honor a loved one. Either way, the sight of this joyful, goofy, dancing man traveling to a cemetery reminded me of something profound: death and anything associated with it -- sickness, misfortune, disappointment -- does not get the last word.

Our Savior has triumphed over it all, we are his and he loves us. We can dance driving towards a cemetery, in a cemetery and in all the places of our lives that feel like an end.

Jesus' words "rejoice and be glad" seem, to me, not a command to mask our feelings of hurt and sadness, but rather an invitation to authentically invite gladness in, to open our heaviness and darkness up even just a little and let light transform it.

This part of our lives is hard because it is the getting there, the traveling to who we were created for; when we travel, we can't always sleep in the comfort of our own beds. But we are journeying, and that is something to rejoice in.

We serve Love, and Love is the one who remains.