My parents (and grandparents, when my family lived with them between moves) said these words to me through and beyond my growing up years. No matter what happened during the day – good, bad, or indifferent – I had been sent out from and would return to a family that loved me. It’s the everyday miracle of offering and accepting love each morning, and the assurance that a warm welcome awaited at each day’s end. Did my parents realized how important it was for me to hear this daily benediction? Did I?

It’s such a powerful gift and a difficult revelation to say I love you, even to someone who already knows it and has said the same to us. The words don’t come easy. It’s even more difficult to say I love you while looking in the eyes of a beloved other. To be seen and loved, to see and love another – that’s nothing short of holy. To know that returning home at the end of the day brings the same blessing of seeing/being seen and loving/being loved – that’s a reminder that holiness embraces and infuses each day from beginning to end.

I love you! See you after school! Maybe life itself is God’s version of these words, spoken in air, light, flesh and blood. I love you! My love goes with you into this life and I will see you when your life’s adventures bring you back home to me.