Chances Are...

By Marie Laure

They say Life is a journey, but how many of us take the time to pay attention to the sites? Sometimes the best invitation to discover ones own path is to slip into the mystery of anothers. Marie Laures Chances Are . . . offers readers a window into the spiritual exploration of a soul moving through everyday life. On the way, one quickly realizes how intricately woven sacred moments are in the mundane, like riding the subway, sitting in class, and in getting lost. And one easily discovers connections and echoes from the page to ones own life. In that way, this story grows beyond a mere window into a compelling invitation.

Reverend Gregory Morisse
Senior Pastor, The Plymouth Church in Framingham, MA
The United Church of Christ


Marie Laures recognition of God -- whom she calls the Presence -- at an early age is prescient and powerful.Her description of continuing to love, even those whom we think we have lost, hits home for anyone who has suffered the death of a loved one or the indifference of intimates. Her story is a must read for anyone struggling to make meaning of an insufficient inherited religion and finding a new way forward in faith.

B.R. Bodengraven
Master of Theological Studies (M.T.S.)
Weston Jesuit School of Theology

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Dec 8, 2016
• ISBN: 9781504345552

Marie Laure

June 18, 2023, exactly three years since my pilgrimage to Julian of Norwich's anchorage in the UK, I will be reading from the book I wrote as a result of that experience. The pilgrimage to Norwich in June 2019, unbeknownst to me at the time, would be a final trip for three years. The shuttering of the world by the twenty-first century pandemic precluded further travel, until now! Serendipitously, the return to travel will take me right back to where I left off this time to read from my book Return from Exile a true story of a clarion call across the ocean to sit in the anchorage where Julian of Norwich told her story of Revelations of Divine Love 650 years ago. The book reading will be part of the commemorative celebrations. You are invited to come. Marie Laure has published her second book in her Serendipity Series. The first book was Chances Are . . .; her new book is Return from Exile Revelations from an Anchoress in St. Augustine. The story takes the reader to 14th century England to meet mystic and writer, Julian of Norwich, who lived in self-imposed exile from the age of fifty until her death. The author made a solo pilgrimage in 2019 to sit alone in the anchorage and hear what Julian's message might have been for us in the 21st century. The Black Death plague struck her village during her lifetime. The Coronavirus has plagued our global village for well past a year. The two women authors, Marie and Julian who was the first woman to have published a book in English, share their stories in this book about love, relationships, and exile.

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Chances Are…

Marie Laure

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Copyright © 2016 Marie Laure.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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ISBN: 978-1-5043-4554-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-4556-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-4555-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015919919

Balboa Press rev. date: 12/08/2016

Contents

Preface: Beholding

Fundamentally Changed

Summer at Six

Her Secret

Where Do Hearts Go?

You Do Not Have Faith!

Comings and Goings

By the Sea

What now?

The Quest Leads to Divinity School

Heart-Head Dichotomy at Divinity School

Two Steps Forward, Two Back

Disappearing

Surrendering

In the Darkness

Returning

Morocco Interlude

Turning Point

Angels

Frustration

The Quest Continues

Coming Home

Reunion

Epilogue: Black Magic

Acknowledgments

For my father and all the invisible beings in my life.

Preface

Beholding

This book was born in a young girl’s heart. In essence, it grew up with her. That the story has been written stands as testament to its otherwise intangible facts. At a very young age, I knew something that would not become consciously evident for thirty or forty years.

As a child, I spoke often to God as a figure to be confided in with secrets of my heart. I found solace in my loneliness by turning toward God. I believed what I was taught by well-meaning parents and nuns. By rote I knew answers that would allow red stars to be stamped into my Baltimore Catechism book: God – stamp; Love – stamp; Mystery – stamp. It all added up somehow to a neat and clean conclusion: There is a God. Everywhere.

Behold is a word often used when grace and beauty are about to be revealed. ("Behold: to perceive through sight or apprehension" – Merriam-Webster.) It’s a word that has been read aloud from pulpits and stages alike. Behold! as the angel appears; Behold! as the king appears. A simple word charged with a great task. Its meaning, however, is lost without the experience of beholding itself; words printed in a child’s catechism book don’t even come close.

As a young girl climbing trees, I came closer than I realized to beholding. There in One-ness with the tree, I felt God palpably present. I knew the that of God without words. Words are not meaningless, but they are often inadequate. Finding words, right words, any words, has become part of my challenge, my struggle, my quest.

In the five decades that have passed since I began to recite the catechism, I have realized that we learn creeds to try to make sense of the non-sensible, which is hidden from us, as by a curtain. Then, at times, the veil becomes translucent. Aha! we say, when we see that the that of God, the untouchable, unspeakable mystery, has presented itself. How this happens, we do not know. There is no telling when for a moment – and that’s exactly how long it feels – we will be allowed a glimpse of utter and total awe.

That glimpse is not enough, and at the same time more than enough, in fact too much, juxtaposed against the mundane of our ordinary lives. Yet, no single experience could ever be enough. It touches something so deep that the essence of life is never again the same. All else will be defined by that moment of knowing, which creates a yearning to see again, and again.

Years of debris left on the path of my life by relationships, jobs, children, and much moving about have kept me from heeding the call to tell this story. Much, very much, had to happen – some of it painful – before I would or could do so.

During the many years of writing, what became clear to me was a profound change in myself. The former, other self was of a particular time and place. Over time, as if hard-boiled and slowly peeled, a changed version of that self was slowly revealed.

By writing my story in the third person, I am trying to both acknowledge and embrace this personal and spiritual unfoldment. All the names herein have been changed including my own. In so doing, there is a sense of freedom to tell a universal story that gives voice to indescribable moments of awe that grab us when we least expect it. Moments that bring us to our knees or to our feet and leave us speechless. Capturing those moments in writing has been the driving force behind this book.

Fundamentally Changed

The first day of the year, Jessica is reflecting on the past. She’s sipping tea in a window seat overlooking Boston at sunset, but she’s also elsewhere, wandering through the years.

I am a fundamentally changed person, she says out loud over and over. For her, it’s been like changing from a caterpillar into a butterfly after being all wrapped up for a time in gauzy darkness.

For most of us, the beauty of a butterfly opening and closing its wings is a given, a gift we take for granted. We don’t think about what that