12:47 a.m. - Friday, Apr. 23, 2004
Thirty.
It is almost one o'clock in the morning, and it is technically my birthday.
I am 30 years old today.
Thirty. I'm living in a strange town in a strange part of the world. I'm not acting. I'm not doing comedy on stage or on television. I'm not making movies. I'm not drawing comic books. The thing I'm doing is completely unlike any of the things I imagined myself doing when I was 12 or 16 or 21 or, heck, 28.
Thirty. I am thirty, and I believe I am more myself now than I have ever been before. It's a strange thing. The more that is stripped from me, the more myself I become. I'm not struggling to be an actor or a writer or whatever. Those things were taken from me so that I might find who I am without them.
I've pretended to be an artist. I've pretended to be an actor and a comedian. I've even pretended to be a missionary. But beneath all of these things was the man I was meant to be. The true me. And after 30 years of pretending, I think I have finally found who I really am. I am a heart that daily experiences the unfailing and unfathomable Love of God. I am a beating heart.
When I am completely myself, when I am completely that heart, I am completely free to love anyone God brings into my path. The rich man, the poor man, the addict, the Christian brother, the alcoholic, the whore, the impoverished child. The heart that I truly am beats in time with the heart of Jesus, and I am free to give His love as quickly as I receive it. That is what I want to do with every single day that I have left upon this earth.
I am thirty years old, and I finally know who I am.
I am a beating heart.
I am a priest of God.
