Reflections on the Highway - Winter, 2026

“Solitude expresses the glory of being alone,

whereas loneliness expresses the pain of feeling alone.” -- Paul Tillich

“The God of gods, the Lord,

Has spoken and summoned the earth,

From the rising of the sun to its setting.

Out of Scion, the perfection of beauty,

God is shining forth”. -- Psalm 50:1,2

Laurie and I returned in late January from an 8-day solitude/silent retreat at the Jesuit retreat house, Eastern Point, on Cape Anne near Gloucester, MA. Up until the pandemic, I had made an annual retreat there for a decade. The last half of those years, Laurie joined in. As in the recent visit, the protocol is that we occupy separate quarters, maintain silence with each other and the other retreatants except for a daily meeting with a spiritual director and a 5:15pm Mass.

Solitude/silence is one of the foundational spiritual disciplines. Now, spiritually, physically, and emotionally, I cannot fully live without it. Like the Eucharist, it steadies me, fills me, restores me in a way that helps me be present to Christ's life in me, to family and friends I love, and to the broken-hearted who come for prayer.

I begin each year with a 3-day retreat at St. Francis Springs Prayer Center near Greensboro. I write out a narrative of the year past, take walks, and engage material God brings to my attention for devotional consideration. In bed, I close each day reading a novel or a biography, something that is entertaining and relaxing, and distracts my mind. At the Springs, I continued reading “Frank”, an enormous biography on Frank Sinatra. At Eastern Point about 10 days later, my nightly go-to was a Michael O'Brien novel, “The Sabbatical”, which jumped off the shelf given that my own sabbatical was underway. But as in other times like this, I knew the Lord was directing me to it, to that bookcase, to that shelf, to that book. Nighttime reading.

Moment-by-moment awareness is part of the “magic” of solitude, and it can grow, I have found, in the course of an ordinary day back home. This dynamic has become a reality to me as I learn to listen and to see. The discipline of solitude presents a deeper, a protected opportunity for a bombardment of revelations of the presence of the Lord. Such was Eastern Point. Because he was hearing how my days were filled with these revelations, my director toward the end asked me to list each encounter on a separate page in my journal. The list, line by line, takes up a page and a half, 40 in all. They came in different packages of interaction with the divine, arresting my attention and over and over prompting me to say out loud: “This is good. This is good.” Many were encounters with the beauty and variety of Creation, scenic beauty of rocky coastline with black rock jetties stretching out into deep blue waters; at low tide seals perching on exposed solitary rock formations, sunning themselves; staring at a fire burning in the large fireplace for an hour after dinner; encountering the very first spiritual director I had at Eastern Point years ago and embracing with heartfelt affection, then partnering in a Mass, he the officiant and I the lectern.

One more I will mention: it was as I was headed out for a walk. As I made my way down the drive leading away from the mansion, I turned left and noticed to my left in the curve of the road there was an embedded rock with a broken limb lying on the ground, touching it. I just stared at it, arrested. I named it “Broken No More,” the branch in the vine, the life touching the solid rock. The broken people who come for prayer and touch the wounds of Jesus, broken no more. I took a picture of it:

I have been experiencing and writing about these graces, these glimpses for some time now because they have altered how I receive life and live it, in awe of the moment-by-moment goodness of God being revealed and wonder taking over. The wonder of a child. The artists, the poets, the photographers, sculptors, painters get this and express it. So many have opened windows of this altered reality for me, but during this retreat, Gerard Manley Hopkins reemerged. Jesuit priest, Englishman, poet, unrecognized, unpublished until 30 years after his death, obscurely teaching in Ireland until his death at 44, he has profoundly opened the eyes of my heart to the reality of Christ in all things. And so again, in the retreat library, my eyes are directed to a book by Paul Mariani, “The Mystery of It All”. He is an author and a professor at Boston College, and a devotee of Hopkins. And another divine connection: He referred to Eastern Point in a writing that Laurie came across and handed to me. That is why I came here in the first place. Interwoven threads of direction.

Mariani calls these revelations the “scintillant” in the ordinary. Sacramental reality expressing itself. So it is, he says, “with what Catholic theology understands in the sacramental reality of things, looking further and deeper into the nature, the interconnectedness of things, with the belief, perhaps the understanding, that at what first seems random is, in fact, connected at some very deep, cosmological and spiritual level; that life is sacred and that things and events and people do matter, though we may not always understand how.”

 Then, he comments on the power of Hopkins vocation to express the reality of these deeper things, these epiphanies if you will: ... “when these designs are finally glimpsed and somehow understood through patience and prayer, when at last the larger picture begins to reveal itself, we are left with -- indeed surprised by -- a sense of wonder, awe and yes, Joy.” p.37.

He continues: “It is also something {Hopkins} gleaned from the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises; that beauty and wonder are not mere accidents caught in the glimmer of light and darkness, but something more, signs of God's presence, the Mystery in and through the great design that has always been there, but has to be instressed upon our minds and-more- upon our hearts. But what is this but the realization that there is a Creator who is also a Father who has loved us so much that he gave his only Son to bring us home again, so that this reality might become instressed at last upon us, to the point that we have no other choice finally than to greet him, love him and adore him in return, the way a child runs to embrace a mother, a father.” p.38.

Every morning, after my meeting with Father Michael, who by the way was a perfect match for me, I headed to the Mary Chapel for prayer. The Chapel has two sides in glass that connect in a corner. They expose magnificent views of grounds and coastlines. A life-size statue of Mary holding the Christ child stands in the joined corner. Each set of eyes are locked in a gaze with the other. When I am at Eastern Point, this is the place I come to pray. I sit with Jesus in a well-known interior place. I hold his hand. His brown eyes see me. I am always much younger than he, maybe 14 to 16. So much took place there that is too much to share, but I will share this: I began asking for a word from the Word that might summarize my time with him and the welcome of this place. A word that would also guide me in the days and years to come. It felt that big.

The morning of the day before we left, the word came with clarity. It was like it was suspended in the air before me as I listened in the Chapel: Generosity. I am hearing " live with generosity, Receive the generosity of God and bless it in its manifold forms." So much grace and affirmation. The next morning, before we leave, I am sitting in a chair facing the expansive windows, oceanside, of the dining hall. I “randomly” open the Jesuit booklet “Hearts on Fire,”  prayers, and guides I am using. On Page 35, I find the Prayers of Generosity. This is my send-off.

In closing, for those of you interested and patient enough to read this letter, I leave you with a favorite Hopkins poem, “The Lantern Out of Doors.” Friends and family who we encounter throughout life, lights of influence and love, “beauty bright”, “rich beams.” At some point, they are gone. They are beyond our care but not Christ's, “their...first, fast, last friend” and ours.

The Lantern Out of Doors

Sometimes a lantern moves along the night,

   That interests our eyes. And who goes there?

   I think; where from and bound, I wonder, where,

With all down darkness wide, his wading light?

Men go by me whom either beauty bright

  In mould or mind or what else makes rare:

  They rain against much-thick and marsh air

Rich beams, till death or distance buys them quite.

Death or distance soon consumes them: wind

   What most I may eye after, be in at the end

I cannot, and out of sight is out of mind.

Christ minds: Christ’s interest , what to avow or amend

    There eyes them, heart wants, care haunts, foot

             follows kind,

Their ransom, their rescue, and first, fast, last friend.

Blessings,

Trip and Laurie