Unless A Grain of Wheat

For a couple weeks, actually, I have been pondering the Gospel for last week, the 5th Sunday of Lent.

Jn 12:24-27

"The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
Amen, amen, I say to you,
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,
and where I am, there also will my servant be.

This spring has come early, and even though our Association has redone the landscaping, I am determined to grow Sunflowers this year. In spite of the un-neighborly ducks and deer and bunnies, I am going to have Sunflowers following the sunshine and eventually providing a wonderful feeding roost for finches and any other birds that happen along.

This year, because I can't beat the Association, (and plant stuff in the actual ground), I was THRILLED to find a "Sunflower kit" from a local store. It was a bucket filled with dirt, a pack of sunflower seeds, and a plastic "greenhouse" lid. Although it's been very warm here, the moment my sunflowers germinated, a cool front was ushered in, such that I cannot transplant them into a far larger pot to be placed outside quite yet. And I am further concerned because it's now been so cloudy and my house has so little direct sunlight that, well...my sunflowers are wilting.

But it doesn't matter. Not really.

The fact that I can't yet take them outside brings the Gospel message home to me ever more deeply, for because life takes place before my eyes, I have been able to witness exactly what Our Lord is trying to convey. As my seeds germinated, I saw what had attracted the ducks a few years ago: the shells of the sunflower seeds. In fact, they are still hanging on even though now they are nearly 6 inches high or more. I see how new life does violence to the "grain" that was planted, and that the incredible beauty that is to come must first be broken into pieces. No matter how hard those pieces try to hang on, they will be forced away so that the leaves can unfurl to receive the life-giving rays of sunshine and both give shade to and allow the roots below to send water to make them grow.

Growth of any kind is violent; there is nothing delicate about it. I watch my little plant orient itself towards the sun, and I watch it wilt when the sun is not forthcoming. I am watching my little plant struggle to survive and because I know it must thrust away, for itself, the seed casings that were once it's own womb, I do not intervene other than to try to provide as much light and heat as possible in our erratic spring, but also the right amount of water And I am always getting it wrong.

Still, this flower is a living metaphor and I cannot help but look upon it while pondering the Gospel of John and why we must all be willing to fall to the ground like the "grain" and be broken apart for the sake of eternal life. That is what holiness is all about. It is what it means to embrace the Cross, and in fact, it is what we must suffer, all of us, in the end, to enter eternal life. We are all that little seed and in spiritually dying or physically dying, it is all the same; it is what allows us to enter into holiness and eternity.

Finding Happiness in the Cross

It is HARD to be holy, and working on the habits that increase virtues is sometimes a very harsh labor – yet it’s one lightened by love. The penances and chosen deprivations of Lent help us to take stock of our spiritual lives, our sinful habits, our willful disorder, and in so doing, help us to know ourselves more clearly in the face of God. Yes, it’s difficult, but it is the difficulty that bears fruit, for we must all pass through the Cross in order to have eternal life. During Lent, more than any other time of the year, we know the weight of the shadow that falls over us and we walk with Christ towards Calvary, joining our own bloody footprints to His.

It is easy to become frustrated with the world in which we live; the world that hates Our Lord and anyone who sincerely seeks to follow Him. It is easy to become angry with those who claim to be Christian and then legislate things completely contrary to Christianity. It is easy to give in to despair when we look around at the multiple disasters, both natural and man-made, that plague our globalized society, and it is easy to let slip vitriolic condemnations.

We are fallen creatures and even when we’re trying to grow in holiness, we fail miserably. Constantly. Because of this, it’s easy to want to give up.

Some mornings I don’t even want to get out of bed for it seems that I awake only to the anticipations of the sufferings of that day. Then I gaze upon the Crucifix and ponder…if things are so bad now, how much worse would they be if Jesus had not come? How much worse off would we be if Jesus had not sanctified the world with His Incarnation and restored our relationship with the Father through His Passion, Death, and Resurrection?

It is the Cross that gives us Hope, that beckons us onward, calling us to Faith, demanding that we follow this life-giving paradox of sacrificial Charity.

Today I went into the chapel to pray. As always, I was flooded with a sense of relief. When I arrive, Jesus already knows what I’ve done and what I haven’t done. He knows the state of my soul perfectly, and still, He allows me into His Holy presence. When I kneel and enter into conversation with Him, nothing else is important. Entering the church, entering the chapel is entering Eternity; a place where time does not exist, where the problems of the world melt away, and I can collapse at the feet of my beloved Savior.

He is the one who makes life worth living. It is for Him I arise each morning, and for Him I work each day. It is Jesus I seek when I have no happiness, for real happiness can only be found in Him. It is Jesus who gives me the strength to go on, and continues to pull me forward and upward when I’m ready to give up. Through this long winter, this long season of Lent, through this desert of spiritual aridity punctuated by the thorns of sin, I continue forward because I know, ultimately, how this will end. I may not be very holy now, and I may fall constantly, but as long as Our Lord is there, I will always have a reason to get up again and continue pressing on.

Thank you, Jesus for our crosses. Every single one. And especially yours.

Neither Ashes Nor Cross

Usually I look forward to Lent, but...not this year.

This year, I'm not ready, and the fact that it is late is a great mercy to me, for as we count down the final hours, still I am not ready. This year, I don't want Lent to come.

It is not that I haven't prepared, or that I haven't chosen my penance. Rather, it is that I am not ready to repent and I dread both repentance and the penance I owe, even knowing the depths of God's mercy and the fact that my penance can never match the depths of my sin and the ends to which I am drawn should I continue on my present course:  Hell.


This year, I shudder at the sound of Lent,  and I want to flee, but I cannot flee, for as Psalm 139 says, even if I fly to the ends of the earth He is there, to the depths of the sea and to the skies above...He corrals me like an untamed mustang.

I can do nothing but surrender.

For the last several weeks, I have been working my way through LOST and tonight, I finished it, right on schedule. For weeks, between LOST and four seasons of DEXTER I have been pondering human frailty and the reality of life without Faith.

As it turns out, in my real life I have also been struggling with my own Faith. 

For a couple weeks now, although I know I need to go to Confession, I have not gone. I desire to go, but because I am dealing with some questions and issues of unbelief, I have chosen, directly, not to go.

Why?

Because in spite of my deep queries, I believe in the Sacrament and the Authority of Christ.

And because I have not gone to Confession (and need to), I have not received Our Lord in Holy Communion  for a few weeks now.

I am grateful for the graces of Spiritual Communion, but for now, I cannot approach and receive Jesus from the altar; I am not either objectively or implicitly disposed.

Yes, it IS hard to stand aside to let others leave the pew while they glance at me in askance, but I will not go forward even for a blessing, for, quite honestly,  this is the wrong time for a Blessing stolen only to deflect my Pride in the face of the unasked questions of strangers regarding the state of my soul.

We all fall short. We all sin. We are all LOST.

I've watched the entire series now, in only a few weeks, hoping to be done by the start of Lent. While I enjoyed it and didn't "get" some of the stuff imposed upon it or supposed from it, I will say this: there is one line that broke through my own heart, and it's something I take with me into Lent, and hopefully beyond.

In the final season of LOST, Jacob says that he chose them not for who they were, but for who they were not. (Not his exact words).  He chose them because they were all flawed. They were alone, they were already lost, and they were already broken. He chose them in order to give them something for which to live...and for which to die.

I admit I was brought to tears by this for I, too, am flawed, alone, lost, and broken. 

I can't pray the prayer of Queen Esther without tears, for whenever I give voice to it I am desperate, even though it speaks to my constant condition: "Help me, Lord,l for I am all alone, and I have no one but Thee."

Esther cast herself upon the Mercy of God, who chose her not for her status, but for her lowliness. He heard her prayer even before she prayed it.

That struck me in the script for LOST: even though it wasn't a religious  show by any means:  the reality is that God does indeed choose us for our humility, but never for our Pride.

We may be chosen for the purpose of purification but in the end, we learn to choose Him through sacrificial love. Not love of ourselves, but love of others, for their good.

That is true charity.

This year, I enter into Lent unwillingly, but still with the intention to observe the penances and sacrifices. This year it will be harder than ever, for I also enter without Faith. I enter Lent, this year, with nothing to offer, and truly, neither am I open to receive.

I enter this Lenten Season as Judas for even as I profess to follow Jesus, I cannot claim to be one of  His Own. 

My kiss, right now, to Jesus is one of betrayal. I know He chose me out of my solitude and brokenness and reached out to me because I am lost. Yet all I have to offer is a kiss of betrayal.

My only prayer, this Lent, is that by the Triduum I will come to Him with absolute trust in His Mercy.

For now, I have a long ways to go.

I am grateful for these 40 days to give me a chance to take back my kiss, to take back my stolen 30 pieces of silver and to instead, embrace the shadow of the Cross that falls over me.

Judas was lost because he appealed for mercy to the wrong authority. It wasn't because he wasn't repentant, but because he refused to speak to the One whom he had offended.

Tomorrow, I will receive Ashes, and with the watered-down admonition to "Repent, turn from sin and believe in the Gospel".  This is all well and good, and I might have to actually, through my work, impose those words upon another, should Father (my boss) tell me to do so. I will be obedient to that should he conscript me into that service.

What I prefer and want to hear, though,  and want to impose upon others is this, the harshest of introductions into Lent and that which helped me grow up:

"Repent, man, for you are dust and to dust you shall return." 

If we lose sight of our final ends, that of eternity, Lent has no meaning whatsoever.

No one around me, priest or layperson has, in recent months reminded me of my final end. To do so is politically incorrect.

If Lent doesn't do it...then I have no reason to repent. If Ashes have no meaning for me, neither does the Cross.

If neither Ashes or Cross have meaning

...why should I repent?

Unworthy Servant

More and more, I've been struggling not to become disheartened by the state of the Church. Or, rather, by the state of souls that make up the Church.

Those who form their image of the Catholic Church only from their online activities see a great deal of hope, and indeed, there is! However, the active, joyful, and even sometimes contentious drama of the online "St. Blog's Parish" doesn't even come CLOSE to comparing to the dynamics of the average real-life Catholic Church right down the road from you.

I say this with a very heavy heart. So often, for example, I will ask groups of people, or individuals about this or that very popular and well-known Catholic devotion. I receive in return, blank stares. Parents come up to me to complain that they pay for the Church to raise their children in the Faith and become very offended at being informed that the Church has always held that parents are the primary educators of their children and the Church, or rather, those hired (and hopefully qualified) to teach are there to AID them, not take over and turn their children into little Stepford Catholics.

Faith is learned in the home; it is reinforced and elevated through Mass and through religious education so that it may be better lived out every moment of every day. 

When I first began in parish work, I was quite the little idealist.

Well, I think it's time to admit that my last shred of idealism has been completely demolished. Quite honestly, I'm surprised it lasted this long.

I used to love public speaking and when I began in my parish job, I went to work with enthusiasm, anticipating (quite idiotically and naively, actually) that those members of the parish who came to mandatory meetings might actually want to be there and look forward to learning more about their faith. (HA!)

Certainly, there are some who do fit that description, but there are far more who are there but don't really care, and others who are quite openly hostile and disrespectful, not just of the presenter, but of others who are also present.

I now dread each and every time I have to get up in front of a group of adults and teach. It doesn't get easier to deal with hostility and juvenile behavior of adults. Quite honestly, I would rather present to a group of angry, hormone-unbalanced middle schoolers than a group of adults with even one of  whom has taken on the persona of her own hostile teenage self. (And you know, it's never the guys who are openly hostile in a parish: it's the women.)

I was really praying about this yesterday, and after a speaking engagement, afterwards as well. I returned home from work last night so disheartened and frustrated I sincerely considered turning in my resignation and casting it all to the wind.

Thankfully, although I do sometimes consider such crazy things, I don't tend to act upon them knowing that, quite honestly, it is pondering out of emotion and not out of reason, and certainly not making a decision from prayer!

To prayer I went, and, there, I was immediately chastised back to my senses. 

In the Adoration chapel, when considering my change of heart with regard to the joy I no longer find in teaching adults, I  once again had to consider the nature of what I am doing. When I taught RCIA, I was teaching a group of people who wanted to be there. Even if they weren't sure about wanting to become Catholic, they had a sincere interest in learning. Their entire outlook was one of good will, and even on points of disagreement, they asked questions and looked for clarification.

Then, upon working in a parish, I learned very quickly that although there are many people of good will and a charitable outlook, there are all too many who simply don't care. They are not open to receiving the message of the Gospel, they don't know or care to know why the Sacraments are important, and the response they send, loud and clear is, "This is not my affair; I'm paying others to do this, don't bother me by talking about Jesus."

And there, in that contemplation of reality, is where Jesus "spoke" to me, reminding me of His own experience of speaking to the crowds. How many times have I read, or heard proclaimed from the pulpit, the fact that crowds tried to stone Jesus, that they rejected Him, heckled Him, walked away, and returned only to beat Him to a pulp and crucify Him?

"Why should YOU be any different?"  He asked me.

Why, indeed.

Have I not professed to love Jesus with all my heart and soul, and profess to desire to follow Him?  Have I not written on this very blog, over and over again, that following Him is a sacrifice and in order to do so, we must join our own bloody footprints with His? Are we not called to unite our sufferings with His....especially when we are participating in His work on earth?

Before I went to bed last night I read more of "The Imitation of Mary", and it was as if these chapters were exactly meant for me as I passed through that darkness of near-despair last night.

"If you carry your cross impatiently, you only make it heavier, and add evil to evil. 

The way of the cross is the way to heaven....unhappy are those Christians who turn to their own ruin what is intended for their salvation! They are like the thief at Christ's side on Calvary who blasphemed.

We often implore heaven to free us of our crosses, but we do not know what we are asking (cf. Mt20,22), for these crosses are a copious source of merit for us.

Where will you find greater fruits of holiness and surpassing virtue than in the shadow of the cross on Calvary?

Oh, yes, that was meant for me to read last night. But there was more:

What a joy to be judged worthy of sharing Jesus' sufferings in a special degree!

A disciple is perfect when he becomes like his teacher (cf. Lk6,40). Jesus, our teacher, whose perfections we must try to imitate, endured the greatest tribulations.

There are few perfect souls that have not been through some hard test.

In practicing the virtues which involve suffering we show God a more generous love than we do in the active virtues. 

My God, great wrongs, imprisonments, or long cruel illnesses need not always be the lot of Your saints, but You have at least prepared other crosses for them which may not seem so terrible but which serve to make them die to themselves.

I wish I could reproduce these pages for you, for each and every word struck me like a sword to the core of my soul, chastising me for my unfaithfulness, reminding me of the cross I had willingly accepted, and yet, desiring to cast away upon deciding a bit arbitrarily it was just too heavy these days.

What I realized most profoundly, though, was this:  Jesus went to the Cross for each and every soul, personally. We all go to Him for mercy and forgiveness, we all sin, doing violence to Him in choosing to rupture our relationship with Him in favor of some shiny bauble here on earth, or even worse, out of our own self-love.

In my rebellion last night, essentially what I did when I complained to Our Lord, was to tell him, "These souls aren't worth it. They are not worth my discomfort. I am not willing to bleed for them."

And that's when, interiorly, I looked upon the Cross, and understood what I was doing. By turning away from those I have been called to serve at this time in my life, I am turning away from Christ Himself, I am rejecting all the mercy I have received from Him, and I am refusing to show His own mercy and Divine Charity to others.

I am ashamed. Deeply, deeply ashamed.

So it is that this unworthy servant will return to work, carry this cross, and remember that all I suffer, all we who work in parishes suffer, is a direct participation in the Sacrifice at Calvary.

Thank you, Jesus.

Exaltation of the Holy Cross

Psalm 57:1

Have mercy on me, God have mercy, for in you my soul has taken refuge. 

In the shadow of your wings I take refuge till the storms of destruction pass by.

In the Shadow of Your Wings

Reposted from March 12, 2009:

Have mercy on me, God, have mercy

for in you my soul has taken refuge.

In the shadow of your wings I take refuge

till the storms of destruction pass by.

~ Psalm 57

This morning I could not take my eyes off of these words from Psalm 57. Even when I tried, I was drawn back, especially to the phrase, "shadow of your wings". What did that really MEAN?

It wasn't long before the connection was made, for as I knelt in adoration of our Lord, my eyes were also drawn to the cross, where Christ was stretched upon it, His hands and feet nailed to the wood. His arms stretched out like...wings.

And there it was; under the shadow of His wings, I will take refuge. The only refuge in the storms of destruction that wail around us all is the folly of the Cross, in which we find the Glory of God in the redeeming sacrifice of His Son.

The shadow of the Cross and the shadow of His wings are one and the same. If we are truly seeking God, we would do well not to flee from the Cross, but rather to run towards it and embrace it with all our might, seeking to remain in its shadow for life.

You have kept an account of my wanderings;

you have kept a record of my tears;

are they not written in your book?

Then my foes will be put to flight

on the day that I call to you.

~ Psalm 56

The children of this world look upon the Cross now just as they did then, pointing and jeering, still seeing only folly. Even as they reject the suffering of Our Lord as "violent", they turn to their own infants and inflict the most terrible violence as they rend them to bits in the womb, or determine the aged or infirm no longer have a need or right to live. The children of this world cry out against the sacrificial violence that bears sin away, as they themselves gnash their teeth and riot in demonic anger at the Christians who have fled to the Cross and live peacefully beneath it, embracing life, bearing the storms that MUST come to anyone who truly seeks to be united to Christ.

In taking refuge at the foot of the Cross, we do not flee the world, but see it as it truly is, and see, in Christ who was lifted up and drawn us to Him, the glory of eternal life. The folly of the Cross is the redemption of sinners, and the Glory of God through the obedience of His Son.

My heart is ready, O God,

my heart is ready.

~Psalm 57

When the temptations encroach upon us, let us take refuge, then, in the shadow of the Cross and allow Jesus to fight the battles we cannot face on our own. Let us flee into the shadow of His wings and allow the Precious Blood of our Redeemer to cascade upon us in a flood of salvific love.

Psalm-prayer
Lord, send your mercy and your truth to rescue us from the snares of the devil, and we will praise you among the peoples and proclaim you to the nations, happy to be known as companions of your Son.



(all Psalms and prayer taken from March 12 2009 Liturgy of the Hours, Daytime prayer)

Embrace

It's been a long rough road, and the burden has been anything but light.

A year ago I had a "revelation" that I might be called to be a Passionist Nun. I went to my spiritual director, wrote to the Passionists in Kentucky for info. They responded via email, I responded in turn, then heard nothing more.Several weeks passed, and at the time I was having some technical problems with my email, so I re-sent my response and apologized if duplicate, explaining the email situation.Still nothing.

I realized it was a slammed door, and that slammed door was a bit devastating to me.Things worked out, though, and I went on other visits to other communities who invited me to visit even without my request.It was a good experience, if a hard one, and I returned home with much to ponder.

Then last fall, I entered a pretty deep "depression", so conflicted within myself, so confused as to what God was asking, certain He was calling me to religious life...but I didn't want to go. It was horrible; I wasn't certain of anything, but all I knew was that I was rejecting God, and I didn't know why. I was bitter, I was angry (bitter and angry are my default settings, as it seems), and couldn't seem to climb out of the pit from Hell I'd fallen into.

Slowly, though, the clouds cleared, I came back out by God's grace and went back into "I want to do God's will no matter how much I think it sucks" mode, which, in that case meant remaining single...or religious life. Whatever. Two sides of the same awful coin.  (And yes, I saw all my options as awful. I still do.)

Over Christmas break when I finally had time to read and pray for"fun", the contemplative life again tugged at my heart and soul. I couldn't ignore it. I've since written to a couple contemplative communities, one of them being the Passionists in St. Louis Missouri.

To my surprise, I received a wonderful, welcoming and joyful letter in return. Enthused by their response I wrote my own long letter...and couldn't seem to actually send it. I went back and edited, printed it, stuff  it in an envelope, addressed it...and it still sits on my kitchen table. Two months later.

I feel rude. Very rude. But...I can't pop a stamp on that thing and send it. I CAN'T.

Their reaction was so blessedly different than the canned response I got from Kentucky followed by a non-response, and here I am, NOW the one giving the non-response.

Eventually I need to respond and explain my delay, and I know they will understand. After all, they're in the business of discernment and don't want anyone there who doesn't belong there. And really...I don't belong there.

Today I was at a morning retreat and spent an hour praying a Passionist devotion; a Chaplet of the Wounds of Christ. Over and over again. It was in that repetition that I came to realize that, well...God wants me to embrace the Cross, but not in that particular way. It's time to close the door on my end and make it stop swinging this time.  I'm letting go of this particular idea. I am not called to be a Passionist Nun, so that particular romance is over.  That does not mean I don't love meditating on the Passion and the Cross. It means only that I am not called to reside in that terrible and joyful shadow.

Wounded Bride

In June, God willing, I'll be awarded my Master's degree, finally, if I can actually make it through or over this brutal wall of the last few months. As it is, every time I open one of my books I go cross-eyed and my brain goes into some kind of a coma. I am assured this is normal for last-semester graduate students at any level and in any degree field.

Still, the closer we get to our end date, the more I ponder why I am receiving this degree. I don't know what it's for. I don't know how I'm going to pay the loans, especially given that no one will hire me but the Church...and the Church isn't interested in paying my graduate school, or my undergrad loans, for that matter. In fact, the Church isn't interested in paying my mortgage or my electric bill or anything else.

So why have I spent three years elevating my debt?  Why? It sure doesn't help me enter religious life if that's what I'm called to.  I laugh to think of all the times people have queried either to me or to others, or just randomly about the idea in general, "Is this just an escape from real life?"

HA!

I've never seen religious life as an "escape" as much as the secularists love to offer that idea. Having explored religious life, it is ANYTHING but an "escape"!  Rather, it is life lived with far more intensity and  purity than anyone can find in the so-called "real world."

Even as I sense an attraction to the contemplative life, I am surrounded by the open wounds of the Mystical Body of Christ, and I find myself doing "damage control" here and there. I recall my training as an EMT and remember the chapter on Triage. Some days, I think that's all I'm doing.

Being Catholic is like an eternal September 11 (which as you may recall, I remember quite poignantly due to my Job at the time.)  Or maybe it's like being an army medic on the battlefield of a war with no end, in every time in history, all at once. The only thing the Faithful can do is to respond to the horrific wounds resulting to people who are victims of society and culture, even as so-called "friendly fire" continues to shell the city, and buildings continue to fall, and looters continue to take what isn't theirs until a building finally lands on them...and we are called to address their crushed limbs as well.

A friend of mine (CK) once advanced the question of how we would react if the wounds of the souls around us were visible as physical wounds; how would that change our reaction to them?

I go a step further...how would that change our understanding of the intent of Vatican II?

It's the difference between putting leeches on a man who is in hypovolemic shock and bleeding out (hello United Nations One World Government) or offering our own veins to be sapped of our blood to give to the wounded through IV's and personal treatment according to need...and Salvation.  And bringing them home to care for them ourselves. Bringing them into OUR Family...the Church.

There isn't anything in between.

Missionary

The Church is nothing if she does not live up to our Mission to the world.  This is the responsibility of all of us.

So often, this Missionary focus of Vatican II is interpreted solely as a response to physical need, but in our culture, in our politics, in our health care, the real need isn't physical; it's spiritual.

America isn't imploding and falling apart at the seams because of poverty; we are imploding because of a spiritual need that is not being fulfilled.

We have to remember that the works of mercy are both physical and spiritual, and right now, we have an overabundance of people wreaking havoc trying address physical needs of the world while they themselves are impoverished in their own spiritual deprivation.  Even as they seek to help the poor, they are limited and they are failing because they cannot give what they do not have:  spiritual health.

While praying today, I begged God to tell me what He wants me to do. Why am I getting this degree? To go into a cloister?

As I read the letter from the Passionists again, one of the things that unsettled me the most, I think, was Sister's comment about my education; great fruit for contemplation, but maybe a source of frustration for those who do not actually care about theological education.

I can't see God educating me to send me to a dead end where it will not be used (as dear Sister seemed to hint;  they aren't interested in theological studies in that particular monastery.) God MUST want this degree to go to some use, to build up His kingdom. Otherwise I'm nothing more than a welfare kid holding an expensive piece of paper with no actual value to anyone but me...and if it's just for me, it's of no value whatsoever.

We never really possess anything, and nothing has any value if it is not shared with another.
We can't give what we don't have, and we don't have anything until we can give it away.

I no longer have any passion at all. Not for religious life, not for anything.

I am at an impasse; I know I am called to respond to the spiritual deprivation in our society. I know that the best and most noble response is the contemplative life. I know I am not called to the physical missionary fields, yet, I am missionary for as a Catholic my mission is to all who are lost...and the lost are EVERYWHERE. Not thousands of miles away.

More and more, I think that maybe I am called to visit another monastery, but only so it can be put aside; I think God calls me to maintain a presence in the world, using what I've learned in practical ways, for there is a lot to be done, and few hands willing to do it.

I stand this Lent, at the foot of the Cross, in my arrogance telling Jesus what I will and what I will not do and He bears me in patience while He bleeds and gasps for air.

Yet my own hands still hold rocks and sand and gravel as I say to Jesus, "I can't do any more than this. I have to hold on to this stuff."

Then Jesus Crucified opens His own hands with great effort, in excruciating pain, struggling against the muscle spasms, and tells me, "If I can do this...you can drop what you hold...and embrace the same cross and the same nails I release right now."

No....I don't have any passion for anything at all.  Instead, Jesus has brought me into His own....and He will direct the outcome.

Thank you, Jesus.

How Long, O Lord?

Suffering is important and we can't escape it.  I know that I have often written of the need, and the call, to unite our sufferings to those of Christ, but the truth is that I seek to escape just as much as everyone else.

One of the things I have prayed for this Lent is to really SEE how many times I have caused Our Lord to weep over me as He did for Jerusalem.  I know I am in need of a very deep conversion, as I have allowed sin to rule my life in place of Jesus.

Truly, in order to grow in virtue, to eradicate sin, we have to recognize it, we have to renounce it, and we have to keep our eyes on Jesus. It is here that we suffer the most, for we recognize the damage done to our souls, maybe even our bodies, and our relationships because of our sin. Perhaps our suffering is at first self-centered, but in keeping our eyes on Jesus and on the Cross, that suffering is transformed to a recognition of something far greater, something that transcends even the most horrific temptations.  When we realize how far we can fall, and look upon the Cross to see Our Lord, who condescended to become one of us, to become one WITH us, what we find is that our love for Him begins to grow far stronger than the love for our favorite sins.

More and more, we desire to embrace Christ and live only for Him.  It is folly, then to try to run away from suffering, to be "positive" and deny the need to suffer during Lent, for it is only through embracing the Cross that we can EVER embrace Jesus.

How long, O Lord, have you wept over me as you wept over Jerusalem?  How long have I fled from you, how long have I denied you, how long have I been the cause of your suffering? 

Help me, Jesus, to embrace the Cross and die to myself so that I may one day become the cause of your joy.  

Amen

Entitled

I went to a Catholic College where, as at any college or university, there was a mix of students from several states, regions, and economic statuses.  As I recall, several of us used to comment on the sometimes shocking behavior or attitudes of those students that came from the wealthier suburbs of Chicago or other cities. We often snarked that they were always being bailed out by "Mommy and Daddy", and so never held to account for anything.

Truly there were some students who seemed to have no sense of the real world, so sheltered had they been by their parents' wealth.  One famous example from my class year came from a sociology class. A somewhat heated debate was raging with regard to male and female roles in the home, and there were passions on all sides. Finally one particular girl raised her hand and when given the opportunity, stated in honest astonishment, "I don't understand what the problem is! Why don't they just have the maid do it?"

The entire class fell silent in stunned disbelief. Was she SERIOUS?

Indeed, she was.  I do believe she learned a great deal during college and while completing her required internships, etc., about the plight of the everyday life of men and women everywhere, and that most people don't have maids. Anywhere.

I am ashamed to say, however, that even as I laugh at the incident now and even somewhat nostagically recall discussions with my friends on the "spoiled brats" at my college and everywhere...well, my house is made of glass, too.

Maybe it finally shattered today. At the very least, it cracked all over and will have to be replaced.

Sure, I grew up poor and "maid" was the word Mom used when establishing her role as Mother and not servant of we messy children. And sure, I had to work my butt off to pay for college (a debt that STILL has about $5,000 left to be paid off, but let's not discuss the grad school loans that will come due in 6 months on top of that...), but even so, I have just as big a sense of entitlement as those students did.

Oh, yes, my sense of entitlement is HUGE. I don't know where it came from, but have to admit it was in place even when I went to college.  I got financial aid and loans because I EXPECTED it and decided I DESERVED it. I decided I DESERVED to go to college, then DESERVED to get a good job with my degree...and on down the line.  Losing my "dream job" early on, the one I worked so hard for, was actually as devastating as it was because of my overdeveloped sense of entitlement.

The Human Plague of Hidden Hubris

If we all truly look at ourselves, we will recognize this same hubris. Maybe the rich kids in school had their entitlement influenced by their family's money or importance or other factor. But we poor kids, well, our likewise overdeveloped sense of entitlement (and the obvious superiority I described above) arose from knowing there was money for us because of our poverty, and the mistaken sense that we were "better" because we'd learned "values" and a "work ethic" from our working-class/ impoverished families.

Just last night, and a little today, some co-workers and I were speaking of this sense of entitlement we all have, how our pride gets in the way of all the different things we think we need to control. Not just out of a proper perspective of turning out a good product, doing good work, etc., but how the outcome reflects upon US in the eyes of OTHERS.

It's very easy to fall into the trap of doing some kind of good work or advancing some kind of program not for the good of the parish or the city or the school or other group, but out of a sense of misguided Pride in ourselves.  Although we may start out with the proper intent and ends in mind, it is very easy to lose focus and continually die to ourselves.  What may have started out as a meritorious thing can quickly descend into an occasion for Pride, in which we are seeking our own glory, instead of God's.

All of us seem to think we're actually entitled to a good reputation, respect and esteem of others! 

The last time I checked, though, holiness has NOTHING to do with how we appear in the eyes of others or what they think of us.  It has nothing to do with whether we have college degrees or a big house or even whether we live in an abandoned van down by the river with seven homeless cats and a wounded bird.

Perhaps one of the first things we need to really evaluate in ourselves is our sense of entitlement, and how ingrained it is in everything we think, how we live, what we do...in every moment.  Why do we get impatient when sitting in traffic?  Entitlement. Why do we get impatient when waiting for someone to call us back?  Entitlement. Why do we become put out when someone stops by our office without an appointment when the time might be inconvenient to us?  Entitlement.  Why do we become upset when someone else wants to use the computer or the phone or the TV?   Entitlement.

The Truth is this:  we have a lot more importance in our own eyes than we do in another person's estimation of us as they evaluate priorities in the circumstances of their own lives.  The unfortunate reality of human nature is that we ALL suffer from this plague of entitlement, and we feel put-out or put-upon when someone else's own sense of entitlement happens to collide with ours, literally or figuratively.  In our own tendency to be wrapped up in our own affairs and hubris, we actually forget the virtues of justice, mercy, and humility, all bound together by charity...which reminds us that true holiness is deferring to others and remembering we are called to serve, not to BE served.

NECESSARY ASIDE: 

Fr. S. at Clerical Reform has an INCREDIBLE post on this particular facet of Pride today.  Go read it!  I have to admit I  found his post to be timely given my ponderings and realizations of the last few days, am grateful for his commentary, and would love to sit down with a cup of coffee and discuss the theological implications of this very large topic with him.  Ah, the limitations of the internet:  often human interaction is limited. But then again, who ever said we were even entitled to the internet?  More on this in a moment....

Pride in Discernment 

As I wrote this post, another point hit me pretty hard, and because I know I am not alone in facing the difficulty of vocational discernment, I have decided to bring it up as well.

I've written before of the GIFT of Vocation, that it is something unmerited, and it's something I often forget to consider as I continually seek God's will for me.  I often complain about how hard it is, how exhausting, and how much I wish I could just put it aside and just "move on" with my life.  Never mind the fact that I can't "move on" if I don't know where I'm going!

Thus, in my prayers and thoughts this afternoon, I queried, "Why do some of us struggle so much with discovering our Vocation?"

The Answer:   Entitlement.

Ouch. Oh....ouch. Ow. Bleeding profusely now, and deservedly so.

When, exactly, did I get a sense of entitlement about such a great gift as a Vocation?  And when did I lose sight of the fact that the very SEARCH for it is a HUGE grace from God?

I've been realizing, more and more, how BIG my sense of entitlement is, and it's a painful process to evaluate everything in my life, taking a look in that mirror of my own estimation in my eyes, and recognizing I've been staring at my image in a distorted circus mirror for a very long time. 

The Remedy

Everything is Grace. Everything is a personal Gift from God.

There's nothing new here, nothing I haven't seen or read or heard, and it's nothing new to you, either. 

Maybe the problem is that even though it's not new, I've become so fascinated with the circus mirror that I  never put it aside long enough to actually embrace the reality of my own lack of importance in the face of God. Now that my perspective (again, by Grace) has been changed a little, now I can internalize, maybe, the Truth.

Yes, Jesus died for me, and my struggle with accepting that comes from the same pride that makes me depend too much on myself for everything. It's that sense of entitlement, that, at its core, is whispering, "You don't NEED a Savior...you're ENTITLED to one!"

Oh, it's painful to realize this, but necessary.

If we don't put this terrible, soul-killing, disordered sense of entitlement aside, we can't ever learn to depend on God. The loving God who knows our pride and our lack of humility, but STILL chose to die on the Cross especially in the face of our hostile lack of gratitude.

I'm going to continue pondering this, for as long as it takes. It will take YEARS to root out all the tendrils of entitlement that have taken over my life, but I'd rather spend the time NOW than have it burned away from me in the purifying fires of Purgatory. Which, by the way, is yet another Mercy of God's Justice that I don't deserve and to which I am not entitled.

Everything is a gift. Every moment. Every "inconvenience", every blessing.

Thank you, Jesus.  

Amen. 

What If? Arbor Vitae....Redemptionis

Some time ago I wrote a post about the fact that fiction safely asks the question, "What if?"

It asks us to suspend belief, to enter a different dimension and accept the parameters of the fictional life being given. This crosses all the genres; historical, future, science fiction, mystery, and the obvious fantasy. Even anecdotal accounts have a certain amount of "literary license" or "poetic license" in the telling of tales.

There is beauty in this, though, for often these fictional worlds force us to consider things that transcend us. Not all of those things are good; not all have at their heart Truth or Beauty or Goodness. Not all of them INTEND to have those things at their source, not because they want to challenge us, but only to present something totally oppositional to what we live, which, in the end, forces us to realize those things that ARE true and good and beautiful.

Of course, there is fictional writing out there worth even less than the "Piss Madonna" or whatever that waste of urine is called. Oh, and not just the "artist" but his blasphemous work, too.

But I digress.

This evening I had a conversation with a friend and we discussed a few things that have come to mind during the last few years of my theological studies and some recent talks I have given.

The conversation made me muse a bit more, realizing that questions are important and it's possible to ask them in a way that doesn't offend Truth, but perhaps maybe reveals it more clearly. I don't know. All I know is that I am pondering some theological questions, hope to do so faithfully and no matter where I tread, I hope to remain a loyal daughter of the Church.

Of what, you ask, do I muse tonight?

It goes back to Genesis and Original Sin.

Fascinating stuff, of course. We know what happened but I'm going to recap anyhow:

Eve was hanging out in the Garden one day, minding her own business when the Serpent slithered up the Tree of Life under whose branches Eve was innocently contemplating God's Glory.

The Serpent, a real snake of action, never known to be appreciative of contemplation himself, rudely interrupted her reverie and asked her randomly,

"Did God say you shouldn't eat of ANY tree in the garden?"

His deception was simple and subtle and he licked his lips while he waited for Eve to process what he'd asked. But she was actually more astute than he'd realized.

Eve, rising from her prayerful contemplation, corrected the Serpent, and said, "That's not what God said and you know it. He said we can eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but if we eat from a particular tree in the center, we can't touch it lest we die. THAT tree, not "any" tree. Be proper in your use of language; language can be really misleading. You should know better."

The serpent, realizing that God had gifted humanity with a real intellect and not just tree sap for brains, saw that he had to be even more sublime in his tactics. But he also saw an opening.

Rather than engage in the semantics of the argument, he started a new one, to see if he could keep Eve guessing. This was fun!

"WHAT?!" The Serpent exclaimed. "He said WHAT?!"

He noted with satisfaction Eve's expression, alarmed both at the blasphemy (for which she didn't have a word) and the seeming intelligence of the Serpent.

Eve felt a shadow creep into her intellect and will. She deliberated and thought maybe she should listen to the Serpent for a moment, even though every fibre of her being told her she should run away screaming.

The Serpent, seeing in her eyes the doubt creeping in, continued in his most enticing of voices, speaking in a conciliatory manner so as not to offend her sensibilities, "You will not die. God knows that when you eat of this fruit your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

He waited, licking his lips, resting on a branch in a bit of sunlight that had made its way through the leaves. He moved a bit so that the light wouldn't fall directly on him, for he hated when his scales reflected the sunlight. He found a satisfying spot in the crotch of the tree and rested there, burrowing deeply in satisfaction, sighing in preparation for a nice nap after his present work was done.

Eve pondered the Serpent's subtle words. "Eyes opened?"

Did that mean her eyes weren't opened? She reached up and wiped her eyes for a moment, looking around her at the beauty of creation, the sun, the dappled spots on the ground, and the animals crowded around her feet. They all seemed oblivious to this conversation, but only went about gnawing on leaves or resting in the shade cast by the Hosta plants under the Tree of Life. Eve wiped her eyes again, wondering if perhaps it was possible there was something she WASN'T seeing? Could the Father have held something back from them? The Serpent seemed to think so. Why would he use that phrase if she already knew everything she was supposed to know? Was she supposed to know MORE?

And what of this "good and evil"?

What did that mean?

Eve looked around her, and saw that everything was good. She had intimate union with God, she was physically comfortable all the time, she had enough to eat, just the right amount, and life was perfect. Most importantly, she reveled in the love of God and perfect union with Him while enjoying His Creation.

What was "evil"?

This made her curious. What would the deprivation of good be like? Was there another side to things? Wouldn't it be interesting to see what it was like where God was not present?

The Serpent rested, watching Eve's deliberation, watching her eyes taking in everything around her and finally alighting on the Tree of Life.

Her eyes, focusing on the Arbor Vitae lit up in a different way. She saw that the Tree was good, too, and the fruit...quite inviting. It was colorful and emitted a tantalizing fragrance, perhaps even more so because it was forbidden.

She'd noticed it before but in purity of intention considered it nothing more than an inedible flower in a different form. But now, wondering if God perhaps hadn't told them EVERYTHING she felt her mouth watering and reached out to the tree, almost against her will...but not quite.

Once it was in her hand, she hesitated no longer and quickly brought it to her mouth. The taste was sweeter than anything she'd ever experienced or imagined, and this solidifed the doubt introduced to her by the Serpent. Yet she could not understand the sudden bitterness that caused her to spit out the seeds, gagging but unable to eject the pulp she'd ingested so willingly.

The sense of nausea and bitterness faded quickly, and overcome again by the inviting fragrance and salivating taste buds, Eve bit again into the flesh of the fruit, then offered it to Adam, who finally appeared out of the dappled shadows of the garden.

He did not hesitate to eat of the fruit offered to him from his beloved spouse, although she offered him no explanation. It was enough to him that the fruit was in her hand. The fragrance of it called to him and even if he'd been able to resist the sensation, her trusted hand, he thought, would never lead him astray. In his love of Eve, he ignored the echo of the voice of God speaking deep within him cautioning him against eating of the Tree of Life. Eve...her hand...her fruit...was Life ITSELF!

He bit deeply of the fruit, wallowing in it, reveling in it, not even noticing the Serpent gazing from the crotch of the Tree, his forked tongue betraying his excitement.

Then Adam and Eve locked eyes and were ashamed, for they realized neither were covered, and they stood immodestly. They both dove to either side of the Tree and then, carefully made their way to the foliage on either side, both pulling Hosta leaves and fig leaves as they went, trying to cover their shame.

Neither understood the sudden desire they had for the other, a desire that focused not on their ends, but on their parts; not what the other would attain in sanctity, but what they could experience physically in that moment.

Then God walked through the Garden as was His custom and called out to Adam and Eve who were suspiciously absent from their typical joyful greetings.

"Where are you?"

God knew where they hid, but knew they had a choice: to accept or reject His loving question. He knew their shame and was saddened, but instead of condemning, He asked them first to come to Him in love and humility.

They did not come. In their shame, they continued to hide, and gather more leaves to cover themselves.

Adam, the first to speak, blamed Eve, and in so doing accused God, blaming HIM for putting "that woman" with him.

Eve, incensed, spoke up from the next thicket, claiming that it was all the fault of the Serpent. But she did not come out from hiding, for she was busy weaving clothing from the foliage that surrounded her.

We know the rest...we're living it every day. We know that Christ died because of this very event and the effects that followed.

But WHAT IF....

What if, when God walked through the Garden, Adam and Eve had come to Him as He called?

What if Adam had gone to God on his knees with the remainder of the fruit of the Tree of Life? What if he had taken personal responsibility for his actions, and instead of blaming Eve, had admitted that he firstly had neglected to protect her and secondly, had directly disobeyed God both out of his own will and out of his disordered love for Eve over God?

What if Eve had knelt in humility before God and admitted she engaged the Serpent instead of walking away, instead of calling God, and, worst of all...for doubting Him in favor of the word of a creature she could crush under her own heel if she but tried?

What would our theology be like, what would our world be like if Adam and Eve had, in effect, gone to Confession?

Yes, their sin would be erased...to a degree. But original sin, in some sense, would remain. Temporal punishment would still be a reality, for the wound would still be present. The propensity to sin would still have been introduced.

It would make sense for them to be ejected from the Garden, and for the same reason we recognize today; if they continued to have access to the Tree of Life, having already tasted its sweetness they would not be able to withstand it without eating of it, and, of course, if they continued to eat of it they would not be able to be healed of their disobedience and doubt. Ejecting them from the Garden was an act of Mercy which pointed, from the beginning, to the coming Redemption.

But, in the case of Adam and Eve's repentance, would the effects of original sin be lessened? Would the world be more like the Garden but without the Tree of Life? Would there still be pain in childbirth? Would food be brought forth through thorn-infested land or would it grow more easily with minimal efforts to harvest it? Would the preternatural gifts of the original pair be part of humanity now? And would death have entered the world?

I have all these questions, and more.

As my friend pointed out this evening, this is what happens when one gets a little theology. We ask the deeper questions, the "what-if" questions. Not seeking to change reality, but rather, hoping to better understand the reality that we live every single day.

My own pondering will continue, and as I understand it, this is of the type that has kept theologians awake for centuries. "What if?"

It's the "what if" that brings us into contact with God and forces us to pursue Truth. True questions don't lead us OUT of the Church, but INTO it.

On a personal note...

I look at the story of Genesis, and realize I'm a part of it. I live it every day. I give in to the Serpent's suggestions, I enter into dialogue, I deliberate and I eat of what is forbidden. And knowing my influence, I offer it to others, those who should know better.

We all live Genesis every day.

I am reminded of the Exultet sung at the Easter Vigil:

"O Felix Culpa!" O Happy Fault! O Happy Sin of Adam that has won us so great a Redemption!

Oh, yes, I've experienced the greatness of God's mercy. I fell hard, and I fell long but when I came back, God's mercy was far greater than my sin, for the Redemption is ALWAYS more powerful than the Fall.

I guess "what if" doesn't matter. When I look at the story of our Redemption, I do not see the the Fall, even though I live it. Rather, I am drawn into the Wounds of the Savior who reaches for me from the Cross, which has taken the place of the Tree of Life, for Jesus is life itself and feeds us directly from His own Body and Blood, while the Serpent lays crushed dead beneath the weight of the Cross and the heel of the Mother of God who kneels with all her children, pointing to her Son, pointing to Love Incarnate.

The Cross, the Crucifixion...there is the Tree of Life, the Arbor Vitae, the Redemptionis Sacramentum. There is Life Itself, raised up, drawing us to Him, just as He promised.

God always keeps His promises.

Participation in the Cross

Our Divine Savior has deposited His richest graces in the cross and He will impart them to us only through our particular participation in His cross and suffering. When Jesus desire to enter our souls and unite us to Himself, he accomplishes it only through the Cross. He permits exterior sufferings to come upon us to detach us from the world, from our conveniences and pleasure, and from all affection for creatures. He visits us with interior trials, to purify our desires and inclinations, to destroy self-love and so complete our unconditional surrender to God. The greater the favors which the Lord wills to confer upon souls, the greater the love with which He prepares them for these favors.

O my Savior, give me a love of the cross that all my sufferings may tend to more intimate union with thee.

~ Taken from Jesus, the Model of Religious Life

Friday 6th week after Pentecost

Everyone's an Expert

Disclaimer: I'm about to be brutally honest but there's an apology at the end.And my own advice for you, for which as you see, I'm entitled. I'm still sorry. Please forgive me.

Cornering the Professional

It's a plague in our society, and one we ALL face, if from different perspectives.

Imagine this: you go to a summer barbecue and while you're catching up with a friend you haven't seen in awhile, you overhear a conversation a few feet away. Out of the corner of your eye you see the person being accosted is looking around desperately for a way to make a quick exit. And you notice this because you yourself have worn that same mask of polite listening while your mind has been working overtime to both listen so as to respond with gentility and yet somehow find a way to be "busy" immediately.

What's going on?

Well, the interlocutor has just found out the deer-in-the-headlights guy is a doctor and she wants some advice on a growth on the back of her neck, or maybe about her husband's club foot or her daughter's "womanly problems" (and said daughter is on the far side of the nearby picnic table wearing an expression of horror as she realizes her mother is divulging very sensitive and private information to someone with whom she now must socialize).

In fact, when she meets that doctor, to whom her mother is going to learn is single and available, she knows that doctor is going to be thinking, “Honey, you’re nice but I know WAY too much about your vagina and don’t want to live my life hearing about it from your mother!”

But he’ll shake your hand politely as you blush because you BOTH know what’s really going on and you BOTH forgive each other if not your mother in that moment. And maybe you end up getting married and raising a family together in spite of all that improper personal information.

Oh, yes. We've all seen it happen, if not with the Disney ending, and we've all been on the wrong end of that scenario, (maybe not exactly, I hope!) Perhaps we've even been the offending party. (And really, I HOPE NOT and sorry guys, but that is REALLY what some mothers will do!)

Now, in that particular scenario, it is legitimate experts who are being questioned and asked to give free advice. If you're a doctor, a lawyer, a police officer, an insurance broker or agent, insurance claims adjuster, or nurse (among other careers!) you're reading this and nodding along, because YOU'VE been the one trying to flee the conversation more times than you can count! In your personal life, you hear more intimate permissionless details about more people and their problems than you do in a single day at the office! Continue nodding....I know this is true. If you're NOT nodding, then you were hired only yesterday. Read this post again in a week.

In our society, expertise is highly valued, as it should be, and to be fair, most people DO respect the fact that these professionals are entitled to time off. They do NOT need to be accosted at church events, random barbecues, cotillions, quinceaneros, picnics, or while waiting in line at the grocery store. They knew, going into their fields, that their area of expertise was going to subject them to people without boundaries, but they are still human and even the greatest of experts among us need some time off before they burn out and people die because they are so stressed from never having time to be a human being that they start making bad decisions and amputate the head instead of the appendix. Or in court, maybe they'll defend a divorce instead of a murder (although there's not much difference.)

Armchair Quarterbacks

The funny thing is, though, that with all this advice-asking going around, there are also a lot of people who are sudden "experts" in any given category that simply has their interest. If Mr. Offensive Interlocultor actually got an answer from a lawyer on a complicated legal issue when accosting the poor guy at a social event, he suddenly becomes a legal expert and will pass on his incomplete advice to someone with any kind of a related issue. And thus, his unprofessional "advice" is actually quite distorted for even HE didn't get a complete answer and in fact, selectively ignored the very REAL advice of the attorney trying to get away from him, to hire his own counsel so that the case could be evaluated accurately and resolved appropriately.

Oh, yes, we all know people who fit into this category as well.

When it comes to people who are in very serious need, though, amazingly the default of most people is to limit their OWN advice and to direct that person to a competent authority for their problem. They might have names of people with whom they've had good experiences, proper professional offices or organizations and the like. They realize, even if they are usually from the advice-giver category that some things are still too big for them and in their sincere good will, they know someone else is better qualified. I find it very interesting that in these cases, those people take a step back and become champion supporters and for once, hold their tongues and ask, "what does your doctor say?" or "what does your lawyer say?" before they hop into presumption-of-personal-expert mode and start advising away.

(Flannery O'Connor might disagree with the above paragraph, but I'm trying to assume the best of people.)

I think if I were to study sociology, I'd do a dissertation on this particular social behavior encompassed in this post.

Of course, as you might expect, I have another point to make.

Vocational Experts Without a License

All of the above goes out the window or is entirely reversed in the case of vocational discernment.

If a man or woman reveals that they are discerning a religious vocation, or priesthood, even if they've done a great deal of research, have a spiritual director, a discernment group, etc., suddenly everyone OUTSIDE of those groups becomes a self-appointed expert.

Suddenly, the person or people who know the MOST about the topic are relegated to the intellectual and spiritual equivalent of an infant. People who know NOTHING about what the discerner has been through or what OFFICIAL advice they have been given and which they are faithfully following take them "under their wings" and immediately start firing off completely unneeded or even illogical advice about what they should do, where they should go, what they should be doing, the pitfalls, and even try to DICTATE specific communities or seminaries to them!

This type of advice also assumes the person's spiritual advisor or group must be fully incompetent or the person in question would already be a priest, professed religious, or 20 years married.

My dear readers, I know this for two reasons: I've experienced it repeatedly and because I blog about it, I've gotten emails and Facebook messages from other people experiencing the SAME DANG THING!

It's a PLAGUE I tell you! A plague!

What's really annoying is that many of the advice-givers will impart their lack of wisdom while pointing out smugly that "God speaks through people who know and love you!" so as to shut down any possibility that we can turn down their “obviously-perfect” expertise about something they've never actually discerned for themselves.

We who are discerning are also aware that most of our self-appointed prophets aren't actually privy to the Divine Processions, and if they were, they wouldn't all be giving advice that directly conflicts with that of everyone else and that of our own Spiritual Directors or those of similar privileged status.

I really find this to be fascinating, and really can't explain it without more study, and maybe something scientific (as opposed to pure experience/observation).

Why IS it, exactly, that, outside of the discernment of vocation, people are ASKING advice, but when it comes to this topic, they are ALL experts?

Why IS it that when a woman says she is considering religious life everyone has a favorite CARMELITE monastery?

Why is it that when she says she likes the Dominicans everyone assumes she's never heard of the Nashville Dominicans (Dominican Sisters of St. Cecelia) or their offshoot, the Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist? Where do you think she got her first interest in the Dominicans (given this culture)? And why can’t they understand that the fact she knows about them, she is not discerning them any longer for specific reasons?

Or of course, when she says she's discerned some Order or Congregation, the unsolicited "expert", without batting an eye, immediately begins to discuss how she should prepare to enter the local Carmelite monastery and she herself would be willing to accompany her and will arrange the entrance Mass?

Why is it that even when the discerner says God is leading her to visit a particular convent, everyone STILL suggests she check out 10 other of their favorite communities, and the first on their list is a Carmelite cloister, perhaps the one in India?

Seriously. I wish I was kidding.

 The second to the favorite Carmelites are the Franciscan communities, which often, people who recommend them don't even know whether they wear habits or not, or what their apostolate is or whether or not they are faithful to the Magisterium of have their own brand of "Catholicism".

These "experts" usually don't know the first thing about what they're recommending.

I'm sorry, but it's true. I’ve experienced nearly ALL of the above. What I haven’t, other discerners who have contacted me HAVE.

We’re not angry!!!! Please note and read on! 

We’re just exhausted from the battle to stay true to the course we’re on while fending off the improper course and timeline YOU think we’re supposed to be following.

The reality is, we suspect, is that unsolicited "experts" actually are taking an opportunity to give their own view, perhaps because they never properly discerned their OWN vocation and are trying to live vicariously through those who are. Maybe they just want to feel needed. Maybe giving advice is something they do every minute of every day and they aren't aware they're doing it.

The one thing I do find to be constant is that those who give advice DO HONESTLY CARE and unfortunately, they're also very sensitive sorts who take it personally when someone doesn't seem to want or need their advice. They will feel very hurt for a very long time if their advice isn't followed or accepted without question.

And actually, that's what makes these recent blog posts so hard. Because I KNOW that in outright refusing and even condemning unsolicited advice, I am unintentionally offending people I have no desire to offend.

But I'm not a rug and am tired of feeling like one. If that offends some people, so be it.

Discernment is hard enough without having to go around feeling like we have to defend and justify our actions, lack of actions, feelings or lack of feelings, decisions or lack of decisions at every single turn.

I feel I have to speak up on behalf of myself and EVERYONE in discernment because we're tired of being offended ourselves by people who don't seem to think that we can possibly interpret God's will for us without them. And yes, often unsolicited advice is outright offensive. And no, we don't tell you this because we love you, too, and know that your intentions are good and that you don't mean any offense either!

Again...if you've been strong enough to read this far, please know, we love you, we respect you, we thank you for your prayers and support. But please, please, please, stop telling us inane things like "stop trying so hard!" or "go to this monastery" or "give up your dog now so you don't have to find someone later" or "My niece entered X abbey, and she's happy so you would be too". And dear God, if I hear one more time of the rumor that I am delaying because I'm looking for "the prettiest habit" I think I might puke. Really; I don't care about fashion NOW, what makes you think I care about religious fashions? (Except for the habit thing; I do desire to wear a habit for I have discerned it is important. That has no bearing on what others discern...only me.)

We have certain people to whom we are listening. We have certain people who know more details, respect us enough to know we're trying as hard as we need to, and who have assured us that our agony isn't a type that needs comfort, for it is a purifying agony that a vacation with our dog or cat or a ski trip out West won't cure (especially in July when Aspen is devoid of useful snow). *sigh...my dust-gathering skis...*

One more point: the people I know who are legitimate experts in things RARELY offer their advice without being asked, and if they do so, they do so cautiously and with a disclaimer. There are a few people in my life who are not in my designated set of advisors and to whom I will listen because they are "experts" who cautiously advance their advice, and are humble enough to realize I might ignore them (and that it's not personal!). In their advice, they encourage me to go to my SD, they encourage me to ignore them if their advice conflicts with anything "official", etc.

Please be gentle with people who are discerning their Vocations. If you are privileged enough to hear them express to you, through a blog or personally, that they have been or are going through a rough time, please do not minimize the experience, don’t “poo-poo” it, don’t try to “fix” it in any way.

They know where to go.

Especially in the case of “blog revelation”, know that unless you know this person directly, you probably don’t have the right to offer any advice at all. And if you DO know them personally and they haven't asked you directly for advice...well...then you're not one of the few. Sorry. Again: nothing personal. They love you. Be assured of that. 

To my friend-readers who know me personally, know that I love you and thank you with every fibre of my being and if it weren't for your PRAYERS or physical support (watching my dog, my house, driving me to the airport and picking me up, paying my mortgage for 2 months, taking my Adoration hour on the Saturdays I'm gone, etc), I wouldn't be able to focus so much on God's voice that HAS to come out of the fray.

This post is not personal. It’s not directed at anyone. And in fact, it was written on behalf of all souls, everywhere, who are discerning Vocations and have been the hapless recipients of well intentioned people who would be horrified if they knew the angst they were causing with their own “advice”.

I apologize to all my readers and my friends, whether you read this now or will find out about it in the future. I hope my honesty isn’t hurtful for anyone.

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May the peace of Christ be with you, always. And please continue to support Vocations to the priesthood and religious life! Remember advice is cheap...it is only hard labor that really expresses love.

Jesus made that VERY plain to us all when He suffered His Passion and died on the Cross for us. If that's not hard labor, I don't know what is!

As I recall, Jesus didn't give advice from the Cross...he was too busy living it as an example to the rest of us.

Now...go overwhelm your parish Vocations Committee  with offers to drive people to the airport, watch pets, pay debts, etc etc etc that applies to legitimate need. Prayers and ACTION make Vocations happen. Not advice.

God bless you all, and again...thank you.

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Kissing the Cross

A funny thing happened to me on the way to the convent; I got laryngitis. Actually, it hit me in the parlor while meeting with one of the Mothers just after my arrival. I'd been sick before I left and thought I was over it, but no, apparently not. And oddly enough, I didn't have a sore throat, I felt fine, just had a cough which wasn't even, at least initially, that bad!

Yes, yes, break out the jokes about how it was God's way of telling me to "shut up and listen", which really was an unnecessary message as I LOVED all the silences and sought them out whenever I could. As it was, though, that was the joke of the week with the Sisters and I was in on propagating it!

I think though, that God used it to impart to me a very different message. Not the harsh "shut up" but rather, a lesson in the Cross, in surrender, and embracing suffering.

Relics

The Novitiate at the convent had in their refrectory a relic of the True Cross, which I was invited to kiss while Mother K. was giving me the tour. At the time although my laryngitis hadn't fully manifested, I knew it was there and wasn't looking good. So my initial prayer as I kissed the Cross was that Our Lord, in His Mercy, would stave off this particular illness. I knew that the Sisters would be asking me questions, that I would have questions, and of course, I was mortified by the idea that upon my arrival in the convent I was sick! This was one of my nightmares!

I later learned there was another relic of the True Cross in a little shrine near the chapel, this one in a more ornate reliquary with a lit candle near it, and I often visited both relics and kissed them during my time there.

Yet it was on that first day and the following that, because of my unexpected and seeminly illogical illness, coupled with the grace of being able to kiss the Cross that made me meditate on that action, Our Lord's suffering...and what it meant.

A Kiss

What is a kiss but a sign of sincere love? It is intimate, it is intentional, it is physical, a motion that begins interiorly and is expressed exteriorly.

In kissing the relic of the True Cross, upon which Jesus hung in His act of Redemption, my kiss was intended to be an act of true love and devotion for Him, and in that, a recognition of His own love for me. I did not intend to be a Judas, offering a kiss in exchange for the blood money already held.

Later, in the chapel while I had some time to really meditate, I first spent some time praying that I wouldn't lose my voice, that God would remove this particular cross so that my week of discernment would be done in health and not this very inconvenient illness. And of course, my prayer was interrupted with a coughing jag. And even then I lamented my condition and begged even harder to be delivered from my suffering.

That's when it hit me; I had just kissed the Cross.

In contrition for my presumption, I gazed upon the crucifix that adorned the altar and took in our Savior twisted and contorted in torment, realizing that this is what He calls me to do as well. It is impossible to be united with Jesus without also being subject to suffering.

To kiss the Cross means that we love the Cross and we love Our Lord who died for us. To kiss the Cross is to love suffering. It is to love humility and mortification. The greatest act of love is imitation, therefore if we truly love Jesus, we must be willing to imitate Him...even unto His suffering and death.

My prayer then, was both arrogant and a betrayal. I kissed the Cross and asked for comfort. I made an act of love and then denied it by refusing to be conformed to the One I profess to love. Who am I to question the will of God, who cannot be taken by surprise and who KNEW I would suffer this illness through my retreat? I knew I should see it as a gift helping me to be more united to Him, and not an irritation that separated us.

It is my own actions, my own unwillingness to surrender to God's will that separates me from Him. Not a mere illness.

In fact, it was that illness that brought me face-to-face with Him and reminded me of the value and necessity of the Cross and the real meaning of love.

Upon this realization, I bowed my head, knowing God was with me, and said to Him, "Thy will be done. Not mine. Yours." In that moment, I embraced my suffering, which, as I've written, was not limited to the physical but became a spiritual struggle that never abated for a single moment.

From then on, each time I kissed the relics of the Cross, I made an act of surrender, resolving in my love of Jesus to also love the Cross and everything that comes with it. To embrace my sufferings if not in joy, then at least in acceptance and docility.

We are not given Crosses in order to chase us away from God, but rather to conform us more perfectly to Him, for we cannot find Him unless we are willing to be subject to His Passion.

We have to ask ourselves, each time we make the Sign of the Cross...do we mean what we pray? Do we understand what we are doing and how it must change us? Are we willing to imitate Christ only if it is comfortable to do so?

When we kiss the Cross, is our action a betrayal or a true act of devotion and love for Jesus?

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