Grilled Cheese Vocation

While lying in my bed reading Anne Lamott's new book, Plan B, this morning, I ran into the reason I want to be a priest. Anne was talking about a friend of hers speaking on a trip to a prison. This friend reached the prisoners with the story she told. They stood and applauded her. Anne says the reason for this is that she said to them, "I'm human. You're human. Let me greet you in your humanness. Let's get together and be people for awhile". Hot tears wet my cheeks because that is just it. I have not been able to tell people when they ask why I want to be a priest. I could not tell them, "I want to lead God's people" or "It is all I have ever wanted to do" not even "I think I'm right for the job". I have felt like a fraud some days, not having a concrete answer for what I'm doing here. But Lamott is exactly right.
I want to be a person with people. That realization freed me from my own little prison, where I was knocking my head against the wall, saying What the fuck does God want with me? I am thinking now that it might be that I was really making an attempt to live in this world just like I am, to hug my humanness. That is what Jesus was talking about in those two greatest commandments. He said something like, "Come here and let me love you." It is a message of radical acceptance of God's beautiful, flawed creation. Not "let me change you" or "let me choose the prettiest of you". Jesus sat down on the couch and said to the whole world, "Here. Want half of my sandwich?" Perhaps this is it, the heart of God. So, that's why I want to become a priest. Neato.