Coram

I can’t remember where I read it, but someone wrote or said something like, “A fragmented life is disintegration. An integrated life is peace.” Life is so many things, we as human beings are so many things, and when there are parts of ourselves that we have to hide, it causes us to disintegrate. When our interior life is fragmented, it just makes living hard. “Coram,” for me, has been the journey toward integration. I learned it through my theological training in the phrase “coram deo”. It carries the notion that god is in all and through all, and to live coram deo is to live present to all that god is doing in the moment. It is a radical call to be present, and not a cheap idea of present where we don’t care about the past or future, but we carry it fully into the moment, and let the weight of the past and opportunity of the future fuel our being in the present. Starting in 2018, I began to experience all sorts of internal struggles, and developing practices that helped grounded me in the present really gave me life. They gave me the heart to never give in to hate and hopelessness, and the creative energy to begin looking at issues and putting myself into uncomfortable spaces and feeling at home there. This has been vague, I know, but life is often like that. “Coram,” for me, has been a journey of being at home in uncertainty, at home knowing that I can’t always know. We’re not wired for tons of uncertainty, but when we can get used to it, when we can face it, and still get up and love and be and do, well… that’s courage. And I think ultimately, that is what “coram” is for me… it’s courage.