the sacramental life – Page 3

St. Thérèse of Liseiux

our meet-cute

By January of 2000, I was nearly 18, a senior in high school, and my trajectory towards the Catholic Church was pretty sure and straight. My exterior life—friends, school, the rapidly approaching future—was suspended in mid-air, like an alternate reality carrying on in a thought bubble, while interiorly I was going through an inexpressible alteration. I was sneaking to daily Mass either before school or in between classes. The weekday stillness of St. Joseph’s, St. James’s, and the Grotto were my sanctuaries in every sense of the word.

One morning as I was heading to daily Mass in my ’85 Honda Accord named Bogie (after Humphrey Bogart who, like my Honda, was old and raspy, but so cool), I turned into the parking lot to see more than the usual seven to ten cars. The lot was overflowing. I rolled down my window to ask a parking attendant what was going on.

“St. Thérèse’s relics are here,” he said. I nodded like I knew what he was talking about, but inside I was reeling from the words “saint” and “relics”, having visions of fingernail clippings and femurs.

Why did I go in to Mass that day, then? I do not know. But I did. And in my pinstripe overalls, no less. Why, when I saw the TV cameras and men in funny hats and sabers, did I not turn around and leave? I do not know. Though the sanctuary was over-full, I squeezed by the anxious families in the foyer, slipped through the glass doors, and took a tiny spot alongside the wall. In the front of the church, at the foot of the altar, was a wooden casement surrounded by what I could only assume was bullet-proof glass. It was all very strange. Compelling, but strange.

The Mass began and I was quickly lost, as this was slightly different from truncated daily Mass. After I fumbled through the Gloria and the Nicene Creed, an older, handsome gentleman in front of me with dark, thinning hair and glasses turned around and said, “You don’t know what you’re doing, do you?” I answered, “No.” With a gentle smile, he said, “My name is Conchi, short for Concepción.” He pulled out a missal, stood beside me, and tried to explain what he could in a whisper. The lady in front of us looked back with a mean glare to hush us at one point, but Conchi ignored her and faithfully coached me through the Mass.

People were starting to file towards the relics. He told me what to do—to kiss my fingers, touch the casement, then make the sign of the Cross. I eyed the TV cameras in the back, hoping I didn’t make it on the news in my pinstripe overalls, then my secret of going to Mass would be out—and not just going to Mass, but doing whatever I was about to do with those relics. I did what Conchi said, mechanically, feeling like an imposter.

It came time for Communion and Conchi asked me if I wanted to go up for a blessing. In all my attendances of daily Mass, I had never gone up for a blessing, but had remained kneeling until it was finished. He told me to cross my arms over my chest, so I did.

I was starting to worry about the time at this point, concerned I’d be late for class since daily Mass usually didn’t take this long. As soon as it was over, I turned to thank Conchi, but he was gone. As I maneuvered my way through the crowd and out of the church, I kept an eye out for him, but I never saw him again.

As I walked by the St. Joseph statue outside, a strange awareness caught me by surprise: I had a sense that there was something over me, like a thin veil covering my face, a substance that I could see through, but that was protecting me somehow, hiding me. I wondered at the time if this was what “grace” felt like, that thing I had read a little about, that thing the early Church Fathers talked about with the Sacraments. Not the vague—though wonderful—grace I had learned about as a Protestant, the over-arching power that Jesus imparts to reach out to us and save us. This was different; it was an actual, tangible something.

The rest of the day passed in a fog; again I felt like I was going through the motions of my daily life: school, friends, play rehearsal, family, while this great secret tectonic shift was happening in the depths of my being.

When I got home late that night, I remembered a little green, musty book I had bought at a garage sale a couple years before, Wisdom of the Saints. I leafed through it and found the last chapter about St. Thérèse of Lisieux, which included an excerpt from Story of A Soul. As I read through this tiny piece of her writing, I was shocked by the amount of Scripture she quoted from memory, as though it flowed out of her heart as purely and freely as her own words. I cannot say what struck me most about St. Thérèse; I don’t remember feeling an immediate kinship with her. I was, however, struck by how she was called to the religious life so young, yet had confidence in God’s loving plan for her.

What I didn’t know at the time was how this little saint would become a companion through my life, a novice-mistress of sorts for my own spiritual life.

An Ordination

“with his whole body in God’s service”

My husband was welcomed into the Catholic Church the year news broke in our own Portland Archdioceses of sexual abuse from local priests, during the Easter Triduum in 2002. I know he was asked by more than one person—“Why now?” It was, of course, disturbing, rattling, and heart-breaking. Yet the holiness or lack of holiness of priests was never what attracted my husband to the Church, but rather that She was founded by Christ, sustained with Truth, and guided by the Holy Spirit. The priest that shepherded him into the Church was, thanks be to God, a good and holy man. But it was undoubtedly a difficult time for the archdioceses, having to face the heinous sins of some of her priestly sons, and intercede for healing among the victimized. Even so, my husband saw the beauty in obeying God’s call to become Catholic even when life within the Church looked bleak—He was trusting in Christ to heal and lead, who is the foundation and source of life in the Catholic Church.

The same question—“Why now?”—hung in the air this weekend in Portland’s cathedral, St. Mary’s, at the ordination Mass of two new priests, one of whom is a good friend. We were introduced to the now-Father Kenyon while he was in seminary. A convert as well, our family and he shared many great, late conversations about church history, theology, spiritual life, saints, literature, and the challenges facing the Church at present. Archbishop Sample aptly addressed the question in his homily from his bishop’s chair, calling out the obvious “elephant in the room”—why become a priest now, when priests are looked upon suspiciously, cautiously, with disdain (in few cases, rightly so), while some face persecution, false accusations, and hate-crimes from enraged Catholics and non-Catholics alike?

Archbishop Sample said to the two young men, “You are not a part of the problem. But I am counting on you to be part of the solution.” From the congregation, it was clear these two men knew it, too, that they were going out into a perilous sea to cast their nets into the deep—not with fear, but with hope and courage.

The Gospel reading from the Ordination Mass was taken from John, chapter 12, when Jesus says, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me…” Even to the cross, as is evident when the candidates lay face-down on the ground, their arms outstretched to signify the offering of their whole bodies to God’s service.

This past weekend was also the weekend of Father’s Day, and how fitting to celebrate fatherhood in both its forms. How sorely we need not just strong fathers that are willing to lay their life down for their families, but priestly fathers who will do the same—these two different vocations do not differ in their high demands and great reward.

It was moving to watch these two men be presented to the bishop, to lie on the cold hard floor of the cathedral to offer their lives to Christ and His Church, to vest in their priestly garb for the first time. One of the most powerful pieces of this Mass was the college of priests that processed into the Church, then lined the sanctuary behind the altar in a half-circle. They all lifted their hands at the consecration, all intoned together the beautiful “through Him, with Him, and in Him”, and all blessed and congratulated their new brother-priests.

I had told my children that it was similar to a wedding, that the priest in a sense married the Church, vowed his life to Hers, vowed his body to Her body. As always happens when I search for the words to explain something of importance to my children, I too learn something. As I watched the ordination, I remembered a quote from the 20^th century spiritual writer, Adrienne von Speyr, about St. Joseph and the nature of his celibacy:

His virginity has nothing to do with the lackluster impotence that most pictures seem to give him. If he will have to make a renunciation, then his whole manhood will achieve it and will thereby be strengthened in its very masculinity… He will not stand languishing next to Mary; instead he will stand beside her as a man who knows his strength but has sacrificed it in simplicity and generosity.”
Handmaid of the Lord

“Next to Mary”, in the case of these two young men, could also include “next to the Church”. Within the misunderstood freedom of our culture, we are taught to believe that sexual freedom and self-gratification are as necessary to the body as food and water, and the recent exposure of the crimes committed by clergyman appear to strengthen this position. Society says, See how these men languished at the side of the Church, and then abused the vulnerable and innocent in their sexual hunger. This approach completely ignores the increased occurrence of sexual abuse of children and women in our society as a whole. The perpetrators have, yes, been priests (which is especially despicable, to be sure, as they are representatives of Christ), but in even greater percentages children are being abused at the hands of teachers, volunteers, foster care families, uncles, brothers, fathers, etc. What a malady that now, in this time of great sexual, biological confusion within our culture, the one place that has the liberating, beautiful truth about the nature of the human body, its origins, purpose, and design has been undermined by the sins of her own leaders.

How will the Church repair herself? How will the Church be a light when her own members have worked so hard to snuff it out? On Saturday, at the ordination Mass, unfolded a piece of that puzzle. These two newly ordained priests—who undoubtedly have much to wrestle with in the life ahead, many struggles both interior and exterior, but so much opportunity for grace and divine strength—will lead the Church by their example of self-sacrifice and love.

And it’s not just these two new priests, but all their brother priests, too. I looked at the group of men, knowing they are also just men, knowing they all have difficulties in their vocation, maybe even doubts, but the joy of their priestly calling was palpable. That joy and grace overflowed to us, the congregation, and the other part of the solution to the problems facing the Church today.

There are no priests without people. We, the families that sat in the pews sweating with our scrambling toddlers, subtly eyeing our teenagers to see if and how they might be stirred in their hearts, were strengthened and encouraged by the outpouring of grace to live an authentic, honest Catholic life—one that does not deny the struggles and difficulty of the Church’s teachings, but carries the cross joyfully as an example to our children and the world around us.

He is no eunuch; he stands with his whole body in God’s service… It will be hard but never bitter; it will instead bring an openness towards the mysteries of God.
Adrienne von Speyr, Handmaid of the Lord

totus tuus: knowledge of Mary

knowledge through suffering

Our move to the opposite coast was a feast in many ways: we lived in a wealthy area just north of Boston only a half-mile walk from the beach. We lived near many beautiful Catholic churches, historical landmarks, cultural hubs, and natural beauty. We had few friends, but they were amazing people. I assumed we would stay there—in the area, at least, maybe further south in Rhode Island where it was a little more our pace. The house and job north of Boston was supposed to be temporary; God would open a door somewhere else.

My husband and I also refer to this 3-year period as The Years of NO. The doors just wouldn’t open, try as we might, pray as we did. We needed to change our situation, but kept getting no’s from job possibilities and alternate housing. We felt like we were living under a cloud of confusion. What did God want us to do? At times I was angry—I felt like we’d been faithful, made sacrifices—where was the pay-off? I was starting to worry that our entire married life would be this: uncertainty, jumping from one job to another, uprooting our family every few years, barely scraping by. The first several years of it were an adventure. But it was growing tiresome.

In December of 2013, my kids had the stomach flu. In a moment of reprieve from nursing and laundry, I decided I would take a break from sitcoms and watch The Song of Bernadette. It was surprisingly fruitful: I realized I didn’t understand the implications of the Immaculate Conception. I also began to think about the real poverty of Bernadette’s family, and how Our Lady had told St. Bernadette, “I cannot promise to make you happy in this life, but in the next.” What right did I have to expect the right job, the right house, the right conditions—to feel obligated to have a comfortable life, as though that were the goal? I realized one of my biggest hang-ups was my perspective: I was so focused on what we didn’t have and hadn’t succeeded at, that I was lacking basic gratitude, which was the real cause for the loss of my joy. I felt pretty rotten, and resolved to change.

Lucky me, I came down with the stomach flu the next day, and in that moment over the toilet bowl I knew I needed to draw closer to Mary if I really wanted to understand joy in suffering.

In January of 2014, I started the five first Saturdays devotion to learn more from Mary’s Immaculate heart (read more about that here). A lot happened in those five months: I found out I was pregnant with our fifth child; my grandmother came to visit and I had, what would be, my last conversations with her; my cousin and her two babies died tragically in a fire; then my grandmother passed away on Mother’s day. Over this five-month period, while growing new life inside of me and grappling with death in my family, things became clearer. The knot in our lives had more to do with our own pride over what we would have willed for our family, not what God willed. We needed to be completely open to any possibility, not look for answers within the limits of our own understanding. And, man, were we lucky to just be alive and have each other.

Slowly over time, it became clear to my husband and I that if, for three years, the doors on the east coast kept closing (and in strange ways), then maybe we should move back to the west coast where we had more connections and more of a support structure. But it sounded impossible—where would we live? Where would we work? Oh, and I was very pregnant?? And yet, we needed to move somewhere, our time was running out.

In the end, my grandmother paid our way home, posthumously. It was a beautiful final gift. So at 7 ½ months pregnant—I had to get a permission letter from my midwife—I boarded a plane with my incredible mother (who had helped me pack boxes, insisting I elevate my tree-trunk ankles) and four other children while my husband drove a moving truck from one side of the country to the other.

My in-laws graciously lent us their basement. In we piled, the kids crammed into one room (which they actually loved), cement floors, a woodstove, a sink, a griddle, a microwave, and mini-frig. My husband did not yet have a job, though he was frantically re-connecting with former colleagues and friends. There were times I was really stressed out—I mean, how long were we going to be living in a basement? And every time I lamented about having to bring my newborn baby home to a drafty basement, I thought of the Holy Family in the stable and had to shut myself up. If the God of the universe could be laid in a manger, my baby would be fine in a fully plumbed basement. And I tried to keep up the practice of counting our blessings instead of our losses.

Our fifth child, a little girl whom I call Blossom here, was born on September 8, Our Lady’s birthday. I knew she was Mary’s baby, not just because of her birthday, but because of all that had quietly transpired between Mary and I during that nine-month period.

We spent the fall in the basement, learning patience and trust, embracing temporary poverty, learning compassion for those stuck in poverty, and why hope is a virtue. One of the gifts of my husband’s temporary unemployment was how much time we all spent together. And our kids reminisce about that time as though it was a great adventure: “Remember when the basement flooded? That was so cool!” (Um, guys, no it wasn’t.)

My husband started his new job the following February, on the feast of the Presentation, a little reminder that everything is a gift and good in God’s time. THAT was cool.

{I also want to recommend two books which were very helpful during this time: Perseverance in Trials: Reflections on Job by Carlo Maria Martini, and Happy Are You Poor: The Simple Life and Spiritual Freedom by Thomas Dubay.}

totus tuus: day 6

the Beatitudes

Nerds that we are, whenever my husband or I are reading a good book, we will excitedly punch the other one in the shoulder and say, “Listen to this!” or “Can I read you something?” Several months ago, my husband was reading Life of Christ by Ven. Fulton Sheen and, with tears in his eyes, read out loud a passage from the chapter on the Beatitudes:

But let any man put these Beatitudes into practice in his own life, and he too will draw down upon himself the wrath of the world. The Sermon on the Mount cannot be separated from His Crucifixion, any more than day can be separated from night. The day our Lord taught the Beatitudes, He signed His own death warrant.

My husband was so visibly moved by the passage, I didn’t want to betray my confusion. How could that be so? I thought. The Beatitudes are so beautiful. In my head I imagined a hippie-like Christ sitting on a hill talking about blessed this and blessed that— idyllic, and nothing like the crucifixion. I knew I was missing something, but after a “hmmm” and a nod, I went back to reading my own book.

Fast-forward to now, Day 6 of the Consecration to Jesus through Mary, a day to ponder the Beatitudes. I read the familiar Scripture passage from Matthew 5, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, and so on. Yes, lovely; sure, powerful. But the next piece for reflection was from St. John Paul II’s homily from the Mount of Beatitudes in Israel in 2000. He said, “Jesus did not merely speak the beatitudes. He lives the Beatitudes. He is the Beatitudes.” I went back to the Scripture passage and began to read it differently: Jesus is poor in spirit… Jesus mourns… Jesus is meek… Jesus hungers and thirsts for righteousness… Jesus is merciful… Jesus is pure of heart… Jesus is a peacemaker… Jesus is persecuted…

The passage suddenly turned into an arrow that pierced my heart and I had to ask myself: Am I poor in spirit? Am I willing to mourn? Am I meek? Do I hunger and thirst for righteousness? Am I merciful? Am I pure of heart? Am I a peacemaker? How do I react to persecution?

I realized I had grazed over the Beatitudes most of my Christian life like the eunuch who meets Philip and says, “How can I read with no one to teach me?” I remembered Fulton Sheen’s words about the Beatitudes and immediately went looking on the bookshelf for Life of Christ. In just ten pages, he illuminates those twelve verses with piercing clarity: “Our divine Lord takes those eight flimsy catch-words of the world- ‘Security’, ‘Revenge’, ‘Laughter’, ‘Popularity’, ‘Getting Even’, ‘Sex’, ‘Armed Might’, and ‘Comfort’- and turns them upside down.” Sheen goes through each, discussing the opposition to each Beatitude. He finishes how he began:

Crucifixion cannot be far away when a Teacher says ‘woe’ to the rich, the satiated… the popular. Truth is not the Sermon on the Mount alone; it is in the One Who lived out the Sermon on the Mount on Golgotha… On the Mount of the Beatitudes, He bade men hurl themselves on the cross of self-denial; on the Mount of Calvary, He embraced that very cross.

John Paul II, at the close of his Beatitude homily, says, “[Christ] does not simply say, ‘Do as I say.’ He says, ‘Come follow me’.” When I read the Beatitudes as traits of Christ, I can see how saints like Mother Theresa or Damien of Molokai were willing to answer God’s call to serve the poorest of the poor, for in them they saw the face of their beloved Savior. Or in a more ordinary sort of way, Thérèse of Liseiux could react with charity to hurtful sisters and Chiara Badano could accept suffering and death at the hand of cancer because they followed Christ in the Beatitudes—knowing they were blessed in mourning, in persecution, in their meekness— not because they relished suffering, but because they loved Jesus and followed him to the mount.

my meet-cute with the Divine Mercy

In October of 2013, my husband and I were living north of Boston, and on a whim one Saturday morning we decided to drive with our four kids across the state of Massachusetts to Stockbridge to visit the National Shrine of Divine Mercy. It wasn’t entirely random; I’d been really wanting to go—St. Faustina was the first saint I loved and had taken as patroness at my baptism and confirmation (along with St. Thérèse of Lisieux). It was also the 75th anniversary of her death, so there would be an especially large gathering at the Shrine.

It was a beautiful drive, just as one would expect in New England in the fall; the trees that lined the turnpike were red and golden-hued, the air was crisp, the sky was clear. My heart was full as our little family prayed the chaplet on the lawn. As I looked around at all the people gathered there, humbled by the multiple priests hearing Confessions and the lines that trailed behind them, I was moved, but also amused by God’s leading in my life. I first encountered St. Faustina right at the dawn of my awakening to Catholicism, and she walked quietly alongside me up to my baptism a few years later. At that time, I had no idea of the impact the message of Divine Mercy had made on the world, only what an impact it had made on my own life.

I first heard of St. Faustina in the basement of my boyfriend’s house when I was around 16 years old. At the time I would often walk to his house after school. We’d do some homework, then “watch a movie” in his basement (code for “make-out”). On that particular day, his mom had borrowed a movie from their church library and was very excited about it. I don’t know why I was willing to watch this obviously religious video; maybe because I was trying to be nice, acquiescing to her earnest recommendation of this B-quality documentary. Or maybe she knew our code language (it wasn’t altogether clever). But I actually did watch this movie. It was about a simple, Polish nun named Sister Maria Faustina who had received a message from Our Lord, a message of mercy for the whole world at a time when the evils that preceded World War II had already been unleashed, unbeknownst to her. Normally a skeptic of anything Catholic, I was moved by her life, by her suffering and humility, by her solitude and contemplation, by how much Jesus clearly loved her. I wanted that. And that image of Jesus… He is touching his heart, from which two streams flow: one red, one white— blood and water— just as it was at the crucifixion when his side was pierced. Underneath this gentle and heroic Christ is written the words: Jesus, I trust in You.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the Divine Mercy. Like the image of the Sacred Heart, it had found a foothold in my entire being. I typed “Divine Mercy chaplet” into the search engine on our computer at home. It was an accessible prayer—an appeal to God’s mercy by the suffering of His son, for the salvation of the world. There was also something about the recalling of His “sorrowful Passion” and the meditation on His suffering that appealed to me. I prayed the chaplet in secret every so often, and increasingly more as I grew closer to Our Lord and the Church.

At the time, I really needed not just the message of Divine Mercy, but the image too. Home life had become increasingly stressful as addiction reared its ugly head and demanded the full attention of us all. I needed to see that look of tenderness from Our Lord, and to remember that He poured Himself out for love of me. I needed to call out for mercy as an intercession for my family, but also for myself in the midst of what seemed hopeless; I needed that mantra of Jesus, I trust in You, when there was no clear path forward.

The Divine Mercy message, chaplet, image, and the holy example of St. Faustina herself would become a staple in my spiritual life: in my struggles with anxiety and scrupulosity, in prayer for loved ones struggling with addiction and other over-powering difficulties, and in just remembering Christ’s mercy for me in my own continual struggle with sin. God knows I wasn’t looking for it, and certainly not where I encountered it, but how sorely I needed it.

At the National Shrine of Divine Mercy, there are life-size sculptures for each station in the Stations of the Cross.

To learn more about St. Faustina and the Divine Mercy message, visit here. For more information about the National Shrine, visit here.

how much farther?

Walking through dew-lit grass in the early hours of late summer mornings conjures a specific memory for me, and I’m surprised what a hold it still has on my senses. It’s a mix of nerves, dread, and nausea. I played soccer for my formative years, from the ages of five to sixteen, and in the later years of competitive play, training began in August (though unofficially all year). I was never a good or happy runner. There was this one particular run in pre-season training where the last mile was uphill (and was aptly named “suicide hill”). It was through a thickly forested area, which provided some refreshing shade from the August sun. Even so, this part of the run was the worst, the most difficult, the most tiring, the most painful—and it was also when I had no clear idea of where I was in my run—I knew I was towards the end, but how close? And that thought—how much farther?—nearly drove me mad. Other girls were passing me, seemingly energized by the thought that they were almost done, while I felt more discouraged than ever. Their breathless, motivational exclamations as they passed did the opposite of motivate—I wanted to be maliciously clever, but I mercifully didn’t have the energy even to spit.

Then I’d crown the hill, and just like that I was in suburbia, the dark forest behind me, running down the paved road towards the soccer field where most of my team waited (yes, I was usually last), bent over, guzzling water, or lying on the ground in a sweaty mess.

I can honestly say that, while I don’t willingly subject myself to running as an adult, I am grateful for that experience—for the discipline, the drive, and just to know that I could do it and not die. But that moment on “suicide hill”, those aching minutes where I was haunted with the thought of how much farther has come to my mind repeatedly in so many other instances—in labor, in difficult relationships, exhausting days, Job-like years of life—and even annually in Lent. How much farther?

This Lent hasn’t been particularly trying for me, in fact it’s been sprinkled with graces. But the past week has been like trudging through mud. The daily grind of life was grinding me down and I really wanted to hit up my old stand-bys for comfort and sustenance, the very things that I’d given up for Lent (or that I’d given up for life). I’d failed, tripped up under the cross, and felt like an embarrassed child at the foot of Our Lord, half hiding my face, half ignoring Him. To indulge the metaphor, I was stuck on “suicide hill”, only thinking about how hard it was, how much I hurt, and not looking up and ahead towards the finish line.

Yesterday, my family and I trekked an hour and a half north to visit a monastic-community-in-formation. The Maronite monks of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph are in the process of building a monastery in Castle Rock, Washington. Their enthusiasm and love for the faith, vocation, Our Lord and thus His people, is infectious and inspiring. Even though I was dreading the drive through a mud-puddled highway and spatially-challenged vehicle, it was well worth every minute of car bickering and the penitential porta-potty.

Aside from the beautiful divine liturgy (which was food for my soul!), the homily, augmented after Mass in Abouna’s announcements, was all about answering, “How much farther?” In short, we’re at Passiontide, only two weeks away from Easter. But the real answer is eucharistia, a word that’s chock-full of meaning. In Greek, it means thanksgiving; for Catholics our Eucharistic feast is an offering of thanksgiving as we receive our Lord’s Body and Blood. As I listened to both priests, I thought of quotes I have on my frig (that I apparently need to be looking at more often) that read, “Gratitude is the root of joy,” and, “Gratitude is the beginning of trust.” As I took the Body of Christ that had been dipped in the Precious Blood, I was reminded to not only make an act of thanksgiving for this Eucharist, but that this was the true sustenance that would help me get through to the end.

Another message of these holy priests that was echoed in today’s readings and a rich homily from our own parish priest, was that as we continue on to the end, not to look back. “Go and sin no more,” Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery. It reminds me of how often Jesus said to paralytics, “Pick up your mat and walk,” as though to say, your half-lived existence is over—go and live fully, sin no more, take your light into the darkness, baptize nations, preach the good news, etc. Lent is the time to renew repentance, and renew the Christian life. Only with eucharistia—with gratitude and the Eucharist—can I accept what has been and have the strength to move on.

Thinking back to “suicide hill” and that run of all runs, I got lost in what I had run to that point. I was overcome by how far I had run, and was sure I couldn’t finish the race. My teammates who passed me were thinking about the finish line, not about the space between.

The answer is not to look behind where lie our failures or even past glory, but to look up and ahead where Christ is raised up on the cross. I have been thinking a lot about two “secular” songs this Lent—“Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails (Johnny Cash’s cover) and “I Can Change” by Lake Street Dive. These songs echo the self-loathing that either precedes repentance and new life, or despair and death. In any perpetuating sin or addiction, it is our past failures that take our eyes off of what’s ahead and concentrate instead on sin. It’s not a lack of knowledge of our shortcoming, but a deafening awareness of it that drowns out hope and chokes our joy. It takes strength and humility to call out to God who is all too eager to wipe out our offenses and give us new life. But if we allow Him to do that, we need to think on it no longer, to keep no record of our failings once they’re offered up in the sacrament of reconciliation, but to be content to “go, and sin no more”, over and over again, until the final race is run.

I for my part do not consider myself to have taken possession. Just one thing: forgetting what lies behind but straining forward to what lies ahead, I continue my pursuit toward the goal, the prize of God’s upward calling, in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:13-14

finding Jesus in the Temple

What St. John of the Cross describes as “the dark night of the soul” is, as far as I understand it from saints’ writings, a true loss of all consolation, or a sustaining sense of having been abandoned by God. The presence of God, however strong or faint, which had sustained such souls in their vocations, no longer calms their spirit or is their source of strength; they feel quite alone. Most recently, the world was shocked—even scandalized among some groups—to learn of the darkness and silence that had pervaded the spiritual life of the great Mother Teresa, who served God faithfully to the end. The response of holy men and women is not to despair, but to have faith in the darkest time.

Yet one can experience God’s stillness or silence without a dark night of the soul, and it can be unsettling. Though there may not be a temptation to despair, there is a temptation to panic, to act impulsively, or to find consolation elsewhere. Just as Jesus’ time in the desert gives us insight into the trial of temptation, and Jesus on the Cross illuminates the forsakenness of the “dark night of the soul”, an earlier event in His life offers some clarity on that more gentle, but aggravating sense of a loss of His presence.

It’s appropriately labeled a mystery- “Finding Jesus in the Temple”—and the Gospel account can be found in Luke, chapter two . Joseph and Mary head to Jerusalem in a caravan for Passover, and Jesus accompanies them as a boy of twelve. After everything is done according to the law—and undoubtedly beautiful, fruitful moments have passed between Jesus and His parents as they speak of Jerusalem, God’s covenants, and the Mosaic Law—the Holy Family departs. But it turns out Jesus is not with them, and Joseph and Mary are, for three days, left with unimaginable imaginings about their son as they scour Jerusalem for him.

They must have thought they saw him several times, only for their hearts to drop when they realized it wasn’t him. Of course, we know they found him, and in the Temple no less, amazing the scribes with His wisdom. (Some of those scholars must have remembered Jesus when he returned twenty years later.) Both a peace and anxiety must have come over those holy parents—a peace to see Jesus already understanding and fulfilling His mission, and an anxiety that it has begun. What Mary and Joseph felt, thought, and did after that is speculation, or contemplation; we only know what is written in the Gospel account.

Twentieth-century Catholic writers Caryll Houselander and Adrienne von Speyr do just that—they speculate and contemplate what this event meant to the Holy Family. Both writers discuss the trial of trust that Mary and Joseph underwent in those three agonizing days. Von Speyr calls it “the school of noncomprehension”, the act of learning how to surrender one’s intellect in God’s intimate workings. She writes:

No Christian is spared the collision with God’s ever-greater reality or the blind obedience from man that is included in it and required by it. Christ’s parents, too, must already come to know in their Son the hidden presence of fathomless divine mysteries.

And when His parents confront Him in the temple, Christ still offers no explanation. He only asks, almost rhetorically, “Did you not know I must be about my Father’s business?” This is not a rude retort, but Him pointing the way, the way of not needing to comprehend, but to follow. This is not the first time Mary and Joseph have been asked to obey without comprehension. And they will be asked to do this again, particularly Mary during Christ’s ministry and death, and so preparing all Christians to do the same: obey without comprehension. Through Mary and Joseph’s example, we see it’s not an occasion to grow angry or despair, but is cause for a “greater opening-up of [the] soul to God and, therefore, a new fruitfulness.”

Houselander writes that this story from the Gospel is revealed to us because Mary and Joseph “experienced the loss of the Child because it is an experience which we all have to go through, that our love may be sifted and purified.” Houselander calls this sense of loss “the most universal and most purifying.” She goes on to describe the different ways and circumstances we might experience this sense of loss. She even writes of people who may suffer daily emotional ups and downs, who feel keenly what they perceive to be the loss of Christ’s presence through scruples and irrational guilt—this disposition can walk with Mary and Joseph through Jerusalem.

If it is true that, as Von Speyr writes, “one does not approach the Cross with the understanding but only with the renouncing surrender of comprehension”, then periods of thirsting and seeking—whether from spiritual dryness, doubt, emotional instability, silence in prayer—promise to prepare us for the Cross that unites us to Jesus.

Handmaid of the Lord, Adrienne von Speyr
Reed of God, Caryl Houselander

St. Joseph, give me your silence

St. Joseph is a quiet saint. For my first several years as a Catholic, his March 19 feast day passed by without my acknowledgment. This wasn’t fair or just on my part because he’d definitely been around in my life. But, like Mary, his brief appearance in Scripture and near-silence left more to the imagination than I was ready to spend on him. Other male saints—like St. John the Apostle, St. Thomas More, St. Isaac Jogues—captured my attention with their accolades and heroism. St. Joseph was just too quiet to notice.

Yet, like Mary, Joseph’s silence in Scripture, coupled with His faithful obedience to God, offer rich food for meditation. As I grow more deeply in my own vocation—where I will not live a life of big heroics like John, Thomas, or Isaac, love them as I do—my attention has turned more and more towards the Holy Family to find the heart of this interior life that spends itself physically in the home, mostly unseen.

Of St. Joseph’s silence, Pope Benedict XVI wrote it is “a silence woven of constant prayer, a prayer of blessing of the Lord, of the adoration of his holy will and of unreserved entrustment to his providence.” In one homily I heard years ago at a local parish, the priest pointed out that Joseph was so prayerful, he could listen to God in his sleep. Pope Benedict XVI also wrote, “Let us allow ourselves to be ‘filled’ with St Joseph’s silence! In a world that is often too noisy, that encourages neither recollection nor listening to God’s voice, we are in such deep need of it.”

It’s so difficult to find actual, physical silence anywhere, particularly in a home. When I had my first baby, there was so much silence that it made me uncomfortable. Whenever she was asleep, I enjoyed the first several minutes of quiet, but wasn’t sure what to do with myself after that; I was so unaccustomed to silence that it made me agitated. Now, with so much to do and so much activity in the house, I would know exactly what to do with that hour of silence.

But there is a silence of the heart that I am praying for the grace to develop, that stillness spoken of in the psalms, the stillness that Jesus asked of the disciples on the stormy sea. Ideally, one would start the day with prayer or Mass, and I used to have such high expectations—a Rosary! Liturgy of the Hours! Wake-up at 4:00 and pray on my knees! Yeah, that never happened. I have settled for a brief morning offering. It orients my heart and mind towards God in a simple, straightforward moment. Evening prayer has gone the same way: I’ve settled for a brief examination, a brief list of gratitude—and honestly, sometimes it’s just a “Glory Be” beside my bed before collapsing.

It’s the middle of the day that needs so much work. When life doesn’t happen the way I want it to, even simple daily tasks, I get agitated and that stillness is disrupted: if I don’t eat breakfast soon enough, if I have to clean up spilt milky cereal, if my little ones won’t occupy themselves long enough for me to help another child with division, if my toddler is screaming for food while I’m making dinner… the list is generous. If I fail to pray throughout the day—and these are little prayers, little cries and thank-you’s to God—then I grow more and more disgruntled and agitated, and instead of silence, I have a litany of complaints turning over in my head.

The Holy Family couldn’t have been without those daily annoyances. As a carpenter, Joseph must have dealt with the messy business of getting paid, jobs taking longer than anticipated, dissatisfied customers. And like every family, I’m sure they dealt with not having enough food on the table, illness, the circulating village gossip. But they weren’t somber puritans either—they were friendly, generous neighbors who partook in the feasts and festivals of the year. I’m certain they danced. Yet, in all this, they maintained peace and a still readiness before God. I hunger and pray for that.

Lenten Traditions: Food

Over the years, our family has developed Lenten traditions. Some of those have to do with food, which may sound strange since it’s Lent, but even fasting should have an element of beauty and joy to it. I’m not an adventurous cook, so I won’t make a habit of talking about me in a kitchen, but these are worth sharing:

The Redwall Cookbook

A few of our kids (and my husband) love the Redwall series by Brian Jaques, stories about rodent-monks in a medieval setting. And, lucky for us, there is a Redwall cookbook, and it’s all vegetarian. “Stones Inna Swamp” sounds a lot more delectable to kids than vegetable soup with dumplings. It always cracks me up to see them get excited about food they would otherwise roll their eyes at. There are little stories to accompany some of the recipes, and the illustrations are very well done, reminiscent of Beatrix Potter.

Red Lentil Soup

For the first several years of marriage, meals during Lenten fasting days consisted primarily of variations on bread and cheese. The first time I tried making soup, for some reason I thought I could wing it, but it was pretty bad (let’s just say I put the “lent” back into lentil soup). I went hunting for recipes and found one that has officially become a tradition: Red Lentil Soup, with manchego cheese on the side (a creamy sheep cheese from Spain, sooo goooood). For a small meal on a day of fasting, it’s satisfying.

Lenten Scones

Several years ago, when I had three children under four, I had just quit teaching and was a full-time at-home parent. I easily grew listless at home; I had no at-home hobbies, and sometimes the hours seemed to creep on by. My saving grace was a handful of friends I had in the area who, I’m fairly certain, felt similarly. We all came together for company and friendship for both ourselves and our children.

I remember one particular day in March when I needed it more than usual. March is often a difficult month in the Pacific Northwest—lots of gray skies and rain. It’s easy to get stir-crazy. Plus, it’s Lent, so you’re often left without those stand-by pick-me-ups like coffee or chocolate. A friend of mine called me up and invited me over. I remember sitting down at her table, and taking a deep breath, relieved to have my kids occupied with her kids. She set down a steaming cup of tea and a scone in front of me.

There was a story behind this scone, which she called a “Lenten scone” (and it looked very Lenten—lumpy with oats and raisins). She had received the recipe from a family friend in her hometown. Whenever she made these scones—and only during Lent—it reminded her of her home 2,000 miles away and the family whose company she sacrificed for the sake of her new family.

Perhaps the reason I like making these scones is that it reminds me of my friend—and not just that particular friend, who is still dear to me, but for that group of young women who were friends at just such a time. It reminds me of those days of early motherhood that felt Lenten in their sacrifices and self-surrender as I struggled to navigate a life that was no longer about me. I’m still figuring that out, of course, still struggling with it, but those early days were more difficult in their newness.

I make these scones for Ash Wednesday, then for every Friday during Lent. They’re definitely Lenten, but also delicious and weighty. With a side of cheese and carrot sticks, I count them as a small Lenten meal on a fasting day. If you try them out, share them with a friend to keep up the tradition! (And my family is gluten-free, so I just use 1-to-1 gluten-free flour substitution, as well as gluten-free oats. And I’ve substituted buttermilk for cashew milk which works pretty well.)

Ingredients

2-3 tbs. sugar (quantity of tbs. sugar = how Lenten do you want to get?)
1 1/4 cup. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
dash of salt
1 cup oats
1/3 cup raisins or currants
4 tbs. butter
1/3 cup buttermilk

Directions

Combine: 2-3 tbs. sugar, 1 ¼ cup flour, 1 tsp. baking powder, ½ tsp. baking soda, dash of salt
Stir in 1 cup oats and 1/3 cup raisins or currants
Cut in 4 tbs. butter
Work in with a fork 1/3 cup buttermilk
Press onto a cutting board or counter and cut into squares, or form into a circle and cut into triangles.
Bake on a greased cookie sheet at 350 degrees for 20 minutes

Christ must increase, and I must decrease… in body fat…

The other day I went to the local coffee shop to buy hot chocolates for my kids; it’d been a rough week at home, the cold weather had limited our activities, and with Lent around the corner I figured a little mini-mardi-gras pick-me-up was in order. As I stood waiting for six hot chocolates, the barista struck up a conversation. Ordering six of anything usually leads to a conversation. She wanted to know what the occasion was, and I explained that since Lent was coming soon, this was our last hot-chocolate-hurrah of the season. She seemed familiar with the idea of Lent and asked about what we do.

“Individually we all give up or do certain things,” I replied, “but as a family we give up dessert.” (And if you know our family, dessert is a major sacrifice. One eats dinner in order to have dessert.)

The barista’s face lit up. “What a great idea! Lose all that Christmas weight!”

I laughed awkwardly, and didn’t say much more. I figured a crowded coffee shop wasn’t the best place to go into the true purpose of Lent. But her response is not altogether unreasonable. In our culture, we give up food to lose weight. When I found out I was gluten-intolerant, I was surprised at how many people were interested in my gluten-free diet, said they were “trying it out”, like it was another diet fad. Besides the fact that a lot of gluten-free bread is made of starch and has very little fiber, it generally doesn’t taste good—why would someone willfully subject themselves to that? I had to explain that I was gluten-free, not by choice, but because gluten made me physically ill. Fasting, without the primary goal of losing weight, is non-comprehensible to many people.

This non-comprehension is something I’m definitely familiar with, and it’s related to why I don’t fast. I fast according to what the Church instructs, the small meals on meatless Fridays, and I find that doing this as a family increases its meaning as we all ponder our gratitude, or lack thereof, for having more than enough. But for the first several years I was Catholic, I tried to fast on top of that, fairly ambitious with new-convert zeal and enthusiasm, but I failed miserably. I got to the point where I dreaded Lent, associating it with failure and discouragement, with old wounds re-opened.

When I was a teenager, like many teenage girls, I struggled with self-image and a borderline eating disorder. When I started to pursue a career in acting, it only heightened. I remember a fellow actor during a lunch break look at my food and laugh, “Rabbit food again?” I’m from a line of sturdy-built farm women, so I had to nearly starve myself and exercise like a crazy person to achieve a slimmer side of curvy, but it was never slim enough. This lifestyle of mine, which had its roots in other issues, was wholly unhealthy not just for my body, but for my mind and spirit as well. That was a long time ago now, yet I still have a hard time disassociating those unhealthy dieting habits from fasting.

It took me a long time to learn that food is not the only thing one can fast from. It seemed like the most ascetic choice, maybe in my mind that meant holier. But if the point is to grow spiritually, I would have to choose a form of self-denial that would truly bear fruit.

In an interview about the Missionaries of Charity, Mother Teresa spoke about how difficult it can be for young postulants to adjust to their new life in the order. Some, she said, have “more” to give up than others. For example, one postulant had been used to ice cream every night after dinner, and later admitted to Mother Teresa that it had been very difficult to give it up, even to suffer the memory of it. In my own lack of charity, I imagine that Mother Teresa, who was daily face-to-face with poverty, hunger, and death, would have heard that and scoffed. But no, Mother Teresa, in her great charity, understood the degree of sacrifice the young woman had made, instead of focusing on the thing she sacrificed.

I’ve borne many frustrating Lents, at the end of which I feel discouraged and not at all prayerful. Maybe someday I’ll be mature enough to fast prayerfully. But for us modern Americans with shame-faced first-world problems, there are lots of fruit-bearing forms of self-denial: abstaining from television, Facebook, and frivolous googl’ing; waking up early, praying the Liturgy of the Hours, daily reading the Bible; picking up after people without complaint, bearing toddler tantrums with patience, you get the idea—these are difficult (embarrassing as that is). Lent is about self-denial, but the kind of self-denial that will bear fruit; self-denial that will allow us to decrease so that Christ may increase.