Back in the golden days of Hollywood - the 1930's - Greta Garbo supposedly said, "I want to be alone." Later in life she tried to set the record straight: "I never said, 'I want to be alone.' I only said, 'I want to be left alone.' There is all the difference."

Greta went to odd lengths to be left alone. She summarized it like this: "The story of my life is about back entrances, side doors, secret elevators, and other ways of getting in and out of places so that people won't bother me."

Is that a good goal in life, keeping people from bothering us?

A pillar of our faith has to do with God's bothering us - Abraham and Sarah, Moses, David, Isaiah, Joseph and Mary, the apostles, St Paul ... the list goes on.

God bothers us; God does so through other people.

It stands to reason that we would need to gather together once in a while for God's "bothering" to happen. Some of the times have to do with worship.

It might even be a good idea to invite and welcome those most likely to be bothersome.