Apostolic Authority and Baptism…

Given some of the discussions between Protestants and Catholics on the forum I frequent, I found the Mass readings for tomorrow (heard at Vigil this evening) to be very interesting. So often the Catholics are told that the sacrament of baptism is only symbolic and imparts no grace, does not forgive sin, etc.  We are also criticized for saying that baptism only in the name of Jesus is not enough, but must be done with water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy  Spirit. Not only that, but apostolic authority is always an issue in such discussions… and even that is supported in this reading.  So much in such a small reading.

The first reading from Cycle A, the 6th Sunday of Easter, April 27, 2008.

Acts 8:5-8, 14-17

5 Thus Philip went down to (the) city of Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah to them.

6 With one accord, the crowds paid attention to what was said by Philip when they heard it and saw the signs he was doing.

7 For unclean spirits, crying out in a loud voice, came out of many possessed people, and many paralyzed and crippled people were cured.

8 There was great joy in that city.

14 Now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent them Peter and John,

15 who went down and prayed for them, that they might receive the holy Spirit,

16 for it had not yet fallen upon any of them; they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. ⁵

17 Then they laid hands on them and they received the holy Spirit.

Scripture continues to live and breathe since my conversion to Catholicism.  It makes so much sense.  I find that instead of my scripture readings leaving me with more questions than answers, I’m finding that connections leap off the page and I walk away with more illumination, understanding, and meaning from much smaller portions than I had ever seen before.  Awesome.

 

The Third Hour of Prayer…

 So I was quite willing when said friend turned to me (as we left the Adoration Chapel at 4 am) and asked if I was up for ‘the third hour’ of prayer as her husband calls it.  You. Betcha.  During a recent natural disaster, a local church refused to accept supplies from my friend’s Catholic parish simply because they were from Catholics.  Since it can be difficult to fall asleep after Adoration anyway, my friend has taken to spending an hour in prayer for this Church.  We piled into the car, swung through Whataburger for a breakfast sandwich to eat on the way, and headed for the third hour.

In the quiet of the car, we took out our rosaries and began to pray the Luminous mysteries.  The rosary is a meditation on the life of Christ, luminous mysteries being specifically the major events in our Lord’s ministry.

So these were a particularly appropriate meditation to pray for unity in service to our Lord with these, our brothers and sisters in Christ. As the street lights formed pools of clarity in the early morning darkness, our voices rose into the silence with the rhythm of prayer.  I meditated upon each event in the life of Our Lord, praying the words of the Angelic Salutation and asking God to accept her fiat as mine, that intimate communion with God returning.  The prayerful chorus of our voices invited our Lord into our midst and He came, and listened, and taught…

My memories are imperfect… and incomplete… some insight is not given for us… to be scribbled on the back of stray bits of paper, meditated on and shared, but to assist us in prayer… as our Lord participates and guides our prayer, bringing it into line with His will.  This was that sort but I wanted to save what I do remember as everything He gives is precious.

Luminous Mysteries

1. The Baptism of the Lord

As I meditated upon the Baptism, I realized yet again what being ‘Christ-like’ means.  It means that God came and LIVED as our example. He showed us HOW to respond by HIS response. He was baptised not because He needed to be cleansed of sin, but to fulfill all righteousness… and that is an example to us.  We need to respond in such a way as to fulfill all righteousness…   He humbled Himself and walked among those who were weak, needy, sinful… an imperfect reflection of Himself.  How can we refuse to do likewise?

2. The Wedding of Cana

In the Wedding at Cana, a need was brought to Jesus attention by His mother.  The wine was gone and the wedding feast far from over.  He asked what she would have Him to do… it was not yet His time.  She turned and gave instructions, her very entrusting of the servants to Him an act of faith, belief, and persistence.  What did He tell them? I told her no? He honored the request of His mother. He was humble. He saw the need and met it, even though the timing was not the best.  How often to I let convenience determine my willingness to serve?

3. The Proclamation of the Kingdom

4. The Transfiguration

5. The Institution of the Eucharist.

Bread. Wine. Simple food. Brought by sinful men, held in imperfect hands, shared even by a traitorous friend.  What did our Lord do? He took it, blessed it, broke it, perfected it, shared it… and in doing  so, gave Life. The bread and wine, like the prefiguring loaves and fishes, was useful to our Lord… not because of the perfect hearts and right belief of those who brought it, not because it was an adequate offering… the apostles themselves thought it insignificant and unworthy… but because of the perfect heart and holiness of He to whom it was given by faith. Our Lord repeatedly took imperfect gifts and sanctified them, made them holy, multiplying them, and using them to bless… to give Life.  Who then are we to refuse the gift of another made in our Lords name and to our Lords sheep, no matter how blemished, imperfect, unclean the heart of the giver in our eyes? Is it not a lack of faith on our part? Just as the apostles lacked faith that God could do anything worthwhile with a few simple loaves and fish?

As the temple became a car once again and the harmony of our voices died away, I realized a few things… First, that voices risen in prayer, glorifying our Lord, was something precious… it was as though I’d been given a very veiled glimpse of what it must be like to raise one’s voice in the throne room continuously in the Holy, Holy, Holy… never tiring, just being renewed and filled with joy and never ending love… not boring as it always sounded to me as a child… and that it would be a wondrous thing to be able to do that one day in heaven.  Secondly, that I was praying not only for that church, but for all Christians… for myself… knowing myself guilty and praying that I would be given grace to not be found lacking in faith, doubting God’s ability  to transform even the simplest things given by the most corrupt appearing heart, incapable of judging rightly the heart of another before our Lord… but trusting that God can use even the Samaritans of our acquaintance… to do His work.

Arriving back at the house, I climbed the stairs with a silly grin on my face to climb back in bed … a third hour… who knew… I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Not Enough Time…

As I mentioned in my last post, I am visiting my best friend and had the opportunity to spend several hours in prayer with her during her usual weekly 2-4 am Adoration slot. She’s the one who introduced me to Adoration in the first place and it had become a very precious part of my prayer life by the time I moved to a new state and new parish with no real Adoration to speak of.  Anytime I come to visit that coincides with Adoration, I am able to join her and it was particularly precious this visit as it has been more than six months since I had such an opportunity for Adoration, much less one with her.

I have not slept well these last months and was particularly tired last night due to little sleep the night before.  So I slept through both the cell phone alarms I set and had to be woken by my friend asking if I was sure I wanted to go. One might think that going to pray for two hours on such little sleep in the quiet of a private chapel would be difficult.  There was a time when I could not pray for five minutes together without serious boredom and attention loss.  I frankly was a bit concerned that, despite previous experiences in Adoration, I might be tempted to join the apostles in their example of ‘midnight prayer’.

Silly me.  Time had passed for me, but not for God.  My location had changed, but His remained the same.  He was there waiting for me.  I had so much to pray for, petition and thanksgiving, so much I wanted to meditate on… so I got right to it.  After praying the dedication of the hours, I paused to switch out my Magnificat’s in their little cover as the month was changing that night and I wanted to go ahead and do Morning Prayer before I hit the more intense, specific prayer. There is usually an editorial, some articles and prayers before the daily stuff starts and I began with those once morning prayer was over.  As my previous post suggests, I got seriously sidetracked there with all kinds of intense illumination going on. 

 As I mentioned to my friend, as a Protestant I dutifully showed up for services with my Bible and a notepad, studiously listening for the ‘points’ in the sermon to make notes.  As a Catholic, I show up with so much to pray and meditate on in Adoration that it never occurs to me to bring paper… and repeatedly I’ve found myself learning so much, so inspired by repeated somethings that click as I meditate, that I’m scrabbling for pen and paper… holding my hand up to heaven saying ‘WAIT! Hold that thought! You’re going too fast!  I have to write this down so I won’t forget it!’

 This was true this time as well.  In fact, something unusual happened last night. Normally, our Adorations are a blessed, pregnant silence. Ours being the type of friendship where no words are necessary and hours of silent prayer spent together  in our Lord’s Presence with rarely a spoken word are an easy and familiar thing.  This time, it was happening to us both, though reading and meditating on different things but being given some really interesting illumination that spoke to the same or similar topics.  We kept interrupting each other to share as they struck us… sometimes one writing furiously, trying to capture the latest insight while the other was enthusing over something as well… both in close, intense communion with the Holy Spirit… but with each other at the same time… as the insights given complemented and shone light upon the others.

At last, we both leaned back in our chairs, silently absorbing the wonder of the moment.  After some moments had passed, my friend asked what time it was… I reached for my cell phone to check the time, thinking it could only have been about 20 minutes and why was she, of all people, so time conscious all of a sudden… (stupid anne)… Imagine my astonishment to find that it was 3:48 in the morning, a mere 12 minutes remained in our two hours and I was nowhere near ‘done’.  Yet again I found myself packing up my Adoration materials and reaching for my shoes feeling both profound joy and somewhat bemused disappointment as I realized that not even TWO hours is enough dedicated time for prayer…

What is Belief?

On the forums I frequent, the issue of what belief is came up on a thread about the Perpetual Virginity of Mary.  What exactly is required of a Catholic when we are asked to ‘believe’. 

 One of the other Catholic posters quoted a good definition:

Belief: (be and lyian, to hold dear). That state of the mind by which it assents to propositions, not by reason of their intrinsic evidence, but because of authority.

 I am fortunate enough to be spending a few days with my best friend who lives several states away from me.  She has a two hour Adoration slot from 2-4 am at her parish each Monday night… or is it Tuesday morning?  I digress… Anyway, I am able to go with her when I visit and as my current parish has no real Adoration to speak of, it is a great blessing.  As I spent time in meditation and prayer, I came across an article which really addressed this line of dscussion and the Holy Spirit brought to mind some recent things which all tied together neatly with her definition.  I shared that on the forum and wanted to ’store’ it here for future reference.

There is a fabulous editorial at the beginning of the April 2008 Magnificat, written by Peter John Cameron, O.P., that speaks to what it is to believe (his words and clips are in green so as to differentiate them from my own thoughts). 

Cameron discusses belief not only as faith in God, but rather reminds the reader of the tie between that ‘mature’ or ‘advanced’ belief in God etc and the smaller ones we engage in every day without recognizing them for what they are.  Such examples include “a husband [waking]  up in the morning believing that his wife still loves him; the food that a waiter puts in front of us we eat believing it not to be poison; we believe that the 7:19 train scheduled for Baltimore will actually take us there and not to Sheboygan.” 

Cameron goes on to say “Without “belief” our life would be an endless process of interrogating, examining, second-guessing, and proofing.  Saint Thomas Aquinas in a Lenten sermon once said, “How would anyone be able to live unless they put belief in someone?  How would they even believe who their own father might be?  And therefore it is necessary that human beings believe someone about those things which they cannot know perfectly by themselves.”  Believing launches our humanity and enables us to go forward in life.”  

The Catechism says believing “is an authentically human act” (CCC 154).  We ‘believe’ because we are human – it is our nature.  To refuse to believe is to refuse to be human – to refuse to hope and to wonder – to refuse to be teachable and malleable.  To refuse to believe hardens our heart because in doing so we deny a part of ourselves – the very heart/essence of who and what we are.  

Cameron quotes Benedict, “The act of saying “I believe” is “an act in which the will and the understanding, the teaching and the guidance I have been given, are all cooperatively involved.  This act transcends my own limits.” (Pope Benedict XVI)” 

To refuse to believe anything but what we ‘know’ by our own ability, exclusive of any other human being, is to refuse knowledge entirely. It is to refuse to engage in the communal process of human thought.  Even scientists ‘believe’ in what has been studied and learned before.  They did not find it out themselves, but trusted in the ‘belief’ and work of those who came before… even if they were able to ‘prove’ by their own experimentation the ‘truth’ of previous minds, they are standing on the shoulders of such men… on the ‘foundation’ that those scientists ‘belief’ which existed even BEFORE they could ‘prove’ what they intuited to be ‘true’ has given. 

Indeed, it is often the way that science, beginning with a hypothesis, BELIEVES before it can PROVE… many times continuing to believe in the face of great opposition.  Pope Benedict XVI said that “for the believing Christian the words ‘I believe’ articulate a kind of certainty that is in many respects a higher degree of certainty than that of science… We live faith, not as a hypothesis, but as the certainty on which our life is based.” 

Cameron continues “To say “I believe” means that I refuse to live by my own ideas, my constructs, my preconceptions, my self-imposed measure.  In the words of Pope Benedict, “To believe means that we become like angels. We can fly, because we no longer weigh so heavily in our own estimation.  To become a believer means to escape our own gravity… Someone who believes has found in the truth the pearl for which he is ready to give everything, even himself.” 

To refuse to believe is to CHOOSE to limit ourselves and to CHOOSE to limit God.  It is to say “No – The mental construct I have of You is big enough for me – wondrous enough – I don’t want a God I can’t understand and comprehend.”   To refuse to believe is to become a black hole (RNW dropped that idea in conversation and I’ve taken it and run wild) and, overwhelmed by our own gravity, consume not only ourselves but all that is good and light within our grasp.  In the end that becomes too much for us and instead of the apparent destroying of all that which we have consumed, we are destroyed.  (Hawking radiation analogy here, though I realize that all analogies break down in the end – some in more stellar fashion than others… pun intended…) We become not larger, but smaller, until at last, overwhelmed by our efforts to deny and annihilate all that is light and good, we cease to exist entirely. 

Cameron again… “Belief in God changes us. Faith is a way of knowing….  As St. Augustine expressed it, “I believe, in order to understand; and I understand, the better to believe” (see CCC 158).” The Catechism says that “what moves us to believe is not the fact that revealed truths appear as true and intelligible in the light of our natural reason: we believe ‘because of the authority of God himself who reveals them’” (CCC 156, citing Dei Filius 3) just as our reason for believing our husband, the waiter, and the train schedule come from the authority of those in a position to know who reveal them to us.  

My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis

Such a small book… I’ve had it for over a year… and yet I have not been able to complete it even once.  I keep reading a bit and then having to put it down so that I can meditate on the contents of those few pages.  The next evening, I pick it up again and find that I need to reread those passages and feel I can not go on until I have internalized the message and made better headway in  its practice.  So much wisdom, so much Truth… I need to get copies of this little book for my children.

A few excerpts…

Chapter 1

What doth it avail thee to discourse profoundly of the Trinity if thou be void of humility, and consequently, displeasing to the Trinity?

In truth sublime words make not a man holy and just: but a virtuous life maketh him dear to God.

I would rather feel compunction than know its definition.

These sentences particularly resonated… (but then you’ll find so much of this little book does with me) and especially that last line.  As much as I have studied to learn the faith, doing so still, I would rather experience it than know it intellectually. I would rather BE penitent than know its definition.  Not that the two are mutually exclusive by any means… just that so often we err in thinking that knowing is equivalent to doing. 

If thou didst know the whole Bible by heart, and the sayings of all the philosophers, what would it all profit thee without the love of God and His grace?

 (from a long list of vanities) 

… It is vanity to follow the lusts of the flesh and to desire that for which thou must afterwards be grievously punished…

Study, therefore to withdraw thy heart from the love of visible things, and to turn thyself to things invisible.  For they that follow their sensuality defile their conscience and lose the grace of God.

Chapter 2

The more and better thou knowest the more heavy will be thy judgement unless thy life be also more holy.

Be not, therefore puffed up with any art or science: but rather fear because of the knowledge which is given thee.

If it seem to thee that thou knowest many things and understandest them well enough, know at the same time that there are many more things of which thou art ignorant.

Be not high-minded, but rather acknowledge thy ignorance.  Why wouldst thou prefer thyself to any one, since there are so many more learned and skillful in the law than thyself?

If thou wouldst know and learn anything to the purpose, love to be unknown and esteemed as nothing.

This is the highest science and most profitable lesson, truly to know and despise ourselves.

To have no opinion of ourselves and to think always well and commendably of others, is great wisdom and high perfection.

This rings so true.  It is so common for people to think well of themselves… all we hear about is ’self-esteem’ anymore, even from Christians… whatever happened to being like Christ? LIKE Christ?  Did Christ consider himself above others? Did he send those who came to him off to study the law or did he send them out to sin no more? 

It isn’t easy by any means… but just the attempt to consider others better than myself, to see where I am sinful and despise that in myself as our Lord does has been a worth while exercise to say the least.  Still, it has been amazing to me how many of my other sins and failings, that list that could be xerox’d from confession to confession with a set of blank lines for the changeable things, have been curtailed or made better in the attempt.  Anger, impatience, and other such sins that come from pride and selfishness… all rooted in valuing myself above those around me whether I realize it and intend to do so or not.

Chapter 3

He to whom the eternal Word speaketh is set at liberty from  multitude of opinions.

From one word are all things, and this one all things speak; and this is the beginning which also speaketh to us.

Without this word no one understands or judges rightly.

…

Learning is not to be blamed nor the mere knowledge of anything which is good in itself and ordained by God; but a good conscience and a virtuous life are always to be preferred before it.

But because many make it more their study to know than to live well, therefore are they often deceived, and bring forth none, or very little fruit.

Oh, if men would use as much diligence in rooting out vices and planting virtues as they do in proposing questions there would not be so great evils committed, nor scandals among the people, nor so much relaxation in monasteries.

Verily when the day of judgment comes, we shall not be asked what we have read, but what we have done; nor how learnedly we have spoken, but how religiously we have lived.

Tell me where are now all those great doctors with whom thou wast well acquainted whilst they were living and flourished in learning?

Now others fill their places, and I know not whether they ever think of them.

In their lifetime they seemed to be something and now they are not spoken of.

Convicting indeed. I do not spend nearly enough time in rooting out vices and planting virtues as I should… I am just as guilty of reading more and acting less.

Chapter 3 cont’d

How many perish in the world through vain learning, who little care for the service of God!

And because they chose rather to be great than to be humble, therefore they are lost in their own imaginations.

He is truly great who is great in charity.

He is truly great who is little in his own eyes and holdeth as naught the pinnacle of honor.

He is truly prudent who looks upon all earthly things as nothing that he main gain Christ. Phil 3:8

And he is very learned indeed who does the will of God and renounces his own will.

Amen.  I have much work to do… it is work, after all, cooperating with God’s will and allowing Him to do the necessary bits.  I am hardly a willing sacrifice and rather wish He’d just lash me to the altar instead of having to hang onto it myself. I keep praying a ‘trump’ prayer… Lord, no matter what I say later, I want Your will in my life and to be transformed into Your likeness, regardless of what it takes… and then try not to whine too much when He takes me up on it.

Notice of Amended Post…

I would like to notify readers of an amended post.  It has been brought to my attention this evening that someone has taken issue with a post on this blog made in February of 2007 entitled Speak It, Live It… or Not… .  In the interest of fairness, I have included the exact wording of the main post that inspired such conclusions so that the reader may correct their understanding as they see fit.

A Family Rosary…

Tonight we began to pray a rosary daily as a family.  It was something my husband had mentioned wanting to do to the children. They mentioned it to me, not knowing that I had  also been wanting to begin doing this, and so it began. 

We used Scriptural Rosary books, the same ones we used in our old parish to pray the communal rosary every Wednesday.  At the end, my husband told me that wasn’t a traditional rosary.  Ha. I told him that if by ‘traditional’ he meant not ‘just a mantra of Our Father’s and Hail Mary’s without even mentioning the mysteries’ (and he admitted that is what he meant) then no, it wasn’t. It was better. He did like it though, so it’s ok. 

 One of the girls wanted to pray another set of mysteries, and I’m glad that she enjoyed it that much, but we told her it would wait until tomorrow.  I want them to keep enjoying it and overdoing it the first night won’t help.  Still, it was a good start. 

There is something special about praying together in community.  There is also something special about praying together as a family.  The chorus of our daughters young voices raised with the deep tones of their father in prayer is a precious thing.  These are precious days together.

Mourning the Loss/Embracing the New

You know it’s bad when you have been attending  your new parish for three months and as you arrive at the stop sign at the end of the road leaving the Church, your youngest says ‘Every week at this stop sign, we say how much we miss our old Parish.’ Yeah. That’s bad.  It isn’t so much that the new parish isn’t a good one, as that the old one was so wonderful.  We can’t help but compare the two and while we are doing our best to embrace the current parish, we do mourn for what we’ve lost… and it is substantial.

Tonight we attended our first Adoration in the new parish.  They have a Holy Hour once per month on Wednesday nights, during which they also have what they call a ‘penance service’.  What that really translates to is that Father is available in the Reconciliation Room during the Holy Hour for confessions.  I am very grateful for any Adoration time at ALL.  I can’t imagine NOT having it. There were about 20 adults there, made up of several couples and one other family with younger children than ours.  Not bad for such a small parish.  However, the conversation at the stop sign tonight still turned to the old parish where we had 24 hours of Adoration once per month. Dh and I regularly had one of the wee hours all to ourselves.  A very different experience I must say.  All regret aside, it was wonderful to spend time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament once again.

An Awful Christian…

The forum… it often starts there.  A friend stated in passing that they were an ‘awful Christian’.  Someone seemed not to understand that and began a new thread.  The discussion was rather… interesting… with one calling those who use such terms ‘dramatic’ and asserting that instead it would be better to give sordid details such as…

“I’m struggling with not yelling at my children” or “Bible study makes me fall asleep.” or “P*rn is a huge issue for me” or “I had an affair.”

I took issue with that suggestion and disagreed and was called, albeit indirectly, ‘overly dramatic’ as opposed to honest as I suggested such comments were intended.  Many others rebutted the entire assertion saying that  there are no ‘bad’ Christians, that it was a misnomer.  These also brought out the doctrine of  ’all sin being created equal’, that we are all ‘covered’ (the blood of Jesus you know) and so on. 

A friend on the forum posted after some encouragement some strong thoughts on the matter that really resonated with me.  I requested permission to share the post here so as to comment on it, which was granted provided it was done so anonymously.  No attribution is given in honor of that request. 

A friend speaks…

“Church-speak” is a perfect term for it.

The egomania and narcissism are phenomenal: when we say that all sin is equally significant we mean that all sins are equally insignificant until we encounter one we dislike. That one is serious.

We set ourselves up as arbiters of what matters and what doesn’t matter in the place of Christ. We assure ourselves and one another that we are all sinners, yanking scripture out of its context and far from its intentions to prove our point. We tell ourselves we are being loving and humane by doing this, as though it didn’t give us a pass for doing things that Christ says fit us for hell.

And so we comfort ourselves by twisting scripture until “it isn’t our righteousness but his” that matters, by which we mean now not only are we absolved from the discipline of disciples but we are excused from the guilt.

We posit a judgment in the future, in which we will be covered by saving blood, and in which we will have only the very flimsy excuse that we didn’t judge others for offenses we ourselves were prone to commit, like murderers who protest to the judge that they never condemned any other murderers.

But we break command after command after command: we hate our enemies; we call a brother fool; we commit adultery in a zillion ways; we manipulate each other; we use one another in more ways than any of us could count for our own satisfaction; we refuse to serve the least of these; on this very board we PM one another like catty little children to mock those we think are in the dark; we would pull out every irony and flippancy and scripture in the book to defend our self-importance rather than count another person the greater brother or sister; we excuse ourselves from going the extra mile; we admit that the meek will inherit the earth, but we mean to keep it in trust for them until they do; we cram our heads full of self-righteous tripe about the sins of others and fixate on it until we go blind; we demand our just desserts; we protect our sloth with every device known to modern psychology, science, and consumerism; our gluttony comes in every kind; we neglect the poor; we turn aside from the hungry; our prayers and fasting are quietly self-congratulatory, and we find the subtlest ways to make sure they become known without actually telling anyone; we abandon the widow and the orphan… I could go on like this for quite a while, and I’m only in Matthew 9.

And when I look at my life and the death and destruction I’ve sown, when I consider the mistakes I’ve made and the sins I’ve committed, and I am shown the consequences of my actions, and I look at the bleeding corpses of love all around me that are dying by my hand (and no, this isn’t drama, this is real), and I hear the twaddle about none of us being perfect, and all of us being redeemed by blood, I want to tear this building down.

I want to say, do you have no fear of God? Do you have no self-knowledge at all? Have you got the tiniest conception of what you’re saying? Have you looked in the eyes of the child you’ve wounded, the spouse you’ve abused with your petty stupid game-playing, the trust you’ve shattered, and the lives you’ve ruined, and then looked in the eyes of Jesus?

Because if you have, you would never be able to say “There’s no such thing as a bad Christian. You would be ashamed to open your mouth on the topic. You’d sit quietly until the topic changed, and you would wonder why death wouldn’t come more quickly for you so you wouldn’t have to keep crushing the things you touch.

Ugh!  It all resonates. It all convicts. It’s excellent and I am guilty as charged on so many levels… but then I KNEW THAT and that is why I agreed when said friend made the ‘awful Christian’ statement in the first place.  So often I look at myself and agree with the apostle when he said that he does that which he hates, and does not do that which he should love…  I agree with Chesterton…

The London Times once asked a number prominent people to write essays on the topic, What’s Wrong with the World. G. K. Chesterton reply is the shortest and most to the point in history: Dear Sirs: I am. Sincerely, G. K. CHESTERTON

… and I mourn being a bad Christian, resolving yet again to be better than I am, to die more fully to self… only to yell at my kids one more time (though I think the provocation great at the time… what homeschooling mom wouldn’t after having a 9 yr old walk up to them on day one of a new school year, point at the x between two numbers and say stupidly ‘what is that’ as if they hadn’t been proficient at multiplication just two months before) and have my failure arrest me mid-rant as though a third cock had crowed. 

I want to be so much more for Christ each day than I am. I see my failures clearly before me. I resolve repeatedly to conquer these besetting sins and yet they persist… an appalling lack of charity (to borrow a friend’s phrase), an appalling lack of humility, an appalling lack of mercy, an appalling lack of wisdom, an appalling lack of self discipline, an appalling excess of self… I could go on but I’m sure you get the idea. So many faults I am struggling to conquer under His direction and with His help….

Many seem to think that such a harsh assessment of myself (and I might add inadequate as I’m sure I am sugar coating this substantially and ignorant of most of my sins) would deny any understanding of God’s mercy and love, especially as directed towards myself.  They could not be more wrong.  It is in drawing closer to our beloved Lord, in experiencing His mercy, His love, His grace, more completely that I begin to see myself more clearly in the reflected Light of His Glory. It is as a result of His illumination of my faults in order that I might cooperate in their removal, or at least, their remediation.  It is a GIFT! How on earth could I ever be willing to have Him remove faults of which I am unaware? How willing could I be if I did not see them as repulsive as He does?

Yet, this gift can be a difficult one to unwrap at times… and at such times when yet another ‘layer’ of the ‘gift’ is revealed in all its filth and decay I can’t help but despair of His ever being finished with me and I have to ‘gird my loins’ yet again and launch once more into the fray… racing, walking, stumbling, crawling, clawing my way toward a finish that ends successfully only with my lips on His feet.  At such times, I cling to the thought that it is those children He loves that He chastises, even the bad ones… and I am thankful….

Almost My Last Service…

Once RNW, my friend at Postscripts From the Catholic Spitfire Grill, shared her thoughts on being an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion in a post called Channels of Grace: We Become What We Do.  Her thoughts really resonated with me as my experience has been very similar. A few quotes to illustrate what I’m referring to specifically…

…I have the privilege of being an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion. I assist the priests and the deacons in distributing Holy Communion at Mass and to those who are unable to attend Mass during the week. I have noticed that Our Lord has taken this thing that I do and used it to change what I am…

Just as Our Lord has allowed me to distribute His Body and Blood in the Eucharist, He has blessed that ministry and multiplied it like the loaves and the fishes to every part of my life. I bring Jesus in the Eucharist with me in other ways all of the time as I talk to people about the joy of being Catholic. The physical actions of what I do as a Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion has somehow been imprinted on my soul and I have become what I do.  

 I have shared before on this blog a few of my experiences in being an Extraordinary Minister and the profound effect they have had on me.  What I have not shared, perhaps because I did not realize fully the source or the completeness of the gift, was the depth of love I have been given for this parish family, these parishioners individually.

 

 Tonight was, unless I am assigned next week and don’t know it, my last time to serve as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion at my parish before we move.  I knew that before I went to Mass but somehow it slipped my mind until I had taken my place with the Cup in hand and as the first person, an older gentleman in our parish who I know well, came to receive it hit me again. It hit me more fully, and I began to cry. (Despite the mention of such times on this blog, this is not normal for me. I’m not a ‘crier’.  It is the very irregularity of it that makes it blog worthy in the first place.)

 

Each face was familiar. I knew each one, some by name, some only by sight. That first one, the older gentleman, is Italian like my husband.  He too married a woman substantially younger than himself. Their family was similar to ours in some ways.  He never thought he would end up outliving her. Devout, he attends daily Mass and often has another widowed older gentleman friend with him. He has always seemed to have a soft spot in his heart for us, and we for him. 

 

That one would pause briefly with clasped hands before the raised Cup and proclaim brusquely, “My Lord and My God” before moving on.  Her devotion none the less for her short manner; her eyes never leave the Precious Blood.

The next a sweet woman with such a love for her husband who had an accident and severed a few of his fingers last year. Also regulars at daily Mass. He battles malaria contracted during military service… a man with such a gentle heart.

 

One after another, on and on they came, and with them the tears welling and causing the entire nave to sparkle at the edges of my vision. Each person so precious, some of them friends to whom I speak often and some I know only from previous moments just like this one, yet the love I have for them is indescribable and it is all the same intensity.  To think that I am to leave this parish family, these people for whom God has shared His love with me… to think that this was the last time I would be able to serve them by offering them the Body and Blood of our Lord… brought great pain and mourning.  How I long to continue to be His Hands to them.  Not only in this Extraordinary service, but also in other less visible ways… cooking, serving in the church kitchen, working the bazaar, teaching children and grandchildren in various capacities, visiting them when sick or injured, praying with them… just loving them and being with them.

 

As I stood in the Sanctuary waiting with the other EM’s for Father to replace the extra Hosts in the Tabernacle, Charmaine, our pastoral associate, having finished as well took her place beside me and took my hand. I held on for all I was worth and loved her for being there. She was there with me in the beginning when I first received, knowing what it meant to me. She taught me how to serve and was there when I served the first time and knew what it meant to me. Now she was with me again at the end, and again, knew. I fought the emotion all the way back to my seat beside my husband, but from his reaction - and that of my youngest daughter, I didn’t do a very good job of hiding it.

 

The tears continue as I type. The sorrow of leaving this parish family so dear to all of us remains and I’d imagine we will all mourn the loss for some time to come.  With the perspective blogging provides, I am reminded that there is a way I may serve them, regardless of where or how far away this road takes us… I can still pray.  They are on my permanent prayer list and will remain there. It seems so little to give in return for all they’ve given me, all they’ve taught me, the example of godliness and faith they’ve been. It seems so inadequate compared to actually living among them, serving God side by side in a temporal way… and yet, when we drive away for the last time, this will not be good-bye but only Vaya Con Dios and Until We Meet Again… in the High Country.