Starfish Coffee House – Our Community

Community is something we are likely all aching for these days. Several weeks into quarantine life and the isolation is debilitating. It makes sense that it would affect us to such an extent, as we are human beings, created in the image and likeness of God to be in communion. God literally formed us for union with others and with Himself and thus, these stay-at-home orders are muddling both. Not only are we required to be away from friends, extended family, co-workers but also from the Sacraments, our Church, the Eucharist. It is mind-boggling when we really start to examine it. I recently heard (virtually) Archbishop Dolan speak about the tactile nature of our Sacraments to anoint the Sick, to bless in the imposition of hands, to make new in the washing at Baptism. The Church allows us to feel with our senses through these Sacraments; we are united to the divine through our human nature. 

As we wait for the Church to be restored in the full, visible Sacramental nature that we all know and love, let us not grow dark, tired, or numb. We may not be able to receive as we are accustomed but that doesn’t not mean we are not able to receive at all! The Church is alive, possibly in a greater vibrancy than before. More and more people are in communion online by viewing the Mass, praying the Rosary, participating in the Stations of the Cross. These are moments of great faith among us! We who are temporarily separated from our Church and all Her beautiful Sacraments still believe in Her power beyond any distance. 

Our little Coffee House community continues to gather in prayer regularly, we laugh and joke and enjoy the friendships God has formed. The movement of faith that is enveloping our greater neighborhood may not always be seen or even felt, but there is a rising up of the Church in the Holy Spirit and we are on that ride. Though we are apart, we are undeniably in communion with God, as Saint Paul taught us: “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present not things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”