An Autumn Tale of Beauty and Disaster

Tonight is Story Time With Adoro. Why? Because it's been awhile and my readers are bored.

I love Autumn. It's my favorite season. The vibrant colors of the trees capture me, the cooling temperatures soothe my heated brow, and the scent of leaves and bonfires sends me soaring.

So many see this season as a time to begin school or other things, and indeed, I see that, too. I await with dread all the things that "ramp up" and wish I could just escape into the beauty, rather than into the imprisoning chambers of work or school that prevent me from touching the majesty of God's creation.

This year it's been awful; a week ago when my street was supposed to bloom into full golden glory of color, it froze, it snowed, and then a wind blew. Less than twelve hours later all of the trees were bare and both the gold and the green leaves were plastered to the ground. Those leaves left on the trees were already turning pruny, and the next day were brown and dead. No glory this year. We went from pretty and lively to....dead and hopeless.

Not helpful, God, but I love you anyway. I'm sure there's a metaphor there somewhere, to be figured out when I get around to it.

But! Instead of lingering and moping about my street's lack of beauty, I have decided to remember what I love about this usually-beautiful season, and share with you one of my favorite memories of this time of year. It's one that unites the heights of joy and the depths of humiliation and agony.

Are you interested? Read on.....

The Red Maple

When I was a little girl, growing up in a little country neighborhood, I was enchanted by the Maple tree that graced our front yard. It was my favorite place. I could sit down and rest against it, I buried my dear guppies there with great ceremony (hilarious story I must tell one day), and that tree is where I first learned to contemplate...and to fly. Maybe even to trust.

Everyone knows that children are inventive. I grew up while video games existed, but were considered to be indulgent luxuries. We knew all the great cartoons, but spent most of our days playing in our country neighborhood, exploring the hills, talking walks, playing with other children, and...inventing new games and new adventures.

You can imagine, then, how my older brother saw the Maple tree not as something simply beautiful to behold, but as our own personal jungle gym. It seemed an obsession with him...every time we left the house, he would head directly to the tree in his quest to conquer it and rest among her branches.

His constant quest to climb higher constantly aggravated Mom, but intrigued me.

I wanted to do what he did. I wanted that courage. I wanted the vantage point he described. I wanted to rest in those branches, too!

It wasn't long before I went to the tree and, with heartfelt tears, complained I couldn't climb because I couldn't reach the lowest branch. Initially my brother teased me, but eventually good will overcame him and in a rare show of brotherly love, he pulled our picnic table to the tree and instructed me to stand on it, feeling I would be able to reach the branch and climb from that point.

I was still frightened, but my brother encouraged me, directed me and finally, I made it to the first branch. I don't recall whether he pulled me up or pushed me up where needed, but I do remember that I didn't make my first climb alone. It took several tries before I finally figured it out. He tried even to encourage me to venture out into his favorite branch, but I refused at first, needing to become accustomed to the lowest before ascending to what was higher.

The unfortunate part of this was that "my" branch was our JUMPING branch; it was...our exit from the Maple Tree.

Oh, yes...what goes up must come down. And if it's fun, it must come down REPEATEDLY and with much enthusiasm!

We had a new hobby!

My brother and I would rake up leaves beneath the lowest branch (which wasn't that low), and in a rare show of sibling support and love, we would get along in this great endeavor of survival. Where usually we argued, in the Maple Tree we had peace. It was an unwritten and unplanned sanctuary. It didn't matter what hatred we had for each other below...but while in those branches and leaping from them, we loved each other and willed each other's good.

That meant that we developed rules.

The first rule was that I had to learn to climb the tree by myself, but there was a grace period given to me for that, based on my height and ability. You see.,.my brother was a good teacher and a good brother, at heart, and knew I couldn't do anything on my own or without his wise direction. Or limits.

I hate to admit it, but he was right. I respected him and dang it...learned to climb that tree because of HIM and no one else!

Our second rule was far more serious, for we had the basic understanding that anything hitting the ground from any height tended to explode. If it worked with eggs, it worked with us.

Our exit custom involved raking the colorful leaves into a nice big pile under the designated exit branch, and after my brother had experimented with the softness of it, he finally convinced me to take this great leap, rather than having him assist me down via the picnic table.

Oh, what a terrifying leap it was! Oh how I stared at those terrible leaves, trying to imagine them as feathers, trying to trust the brother who so normally tortured me...but would never will my ultimate demise!

I still recall perching on that forked branch, there among the red-colored leaves, knowing my only way down was to let go....

And so it was....

I still remember the leap and the soft landing, the explosion of color, and the rapid ascent of us both as we sought to repeat the thrill of weightlessness and color.

Of course, it wasn't long before Mom came outside in terrified horror (or was it horrified terror?) to inspect our new game. She saw that, in fact, it was a good game, we had our own rules, and established in stone that we could ONLY leap from certain branches. She saw our rare cooperation and thought it a good thing, over and above the danger that we might be injured. She saw love before she saw anything else, and in the end, gave her approval.

Not all such games were good, though.

Stupidity and concupiscence always enters Eden

Our neighbor, a teen I greatly admired and even adored, didn't have a tree in her yard. She saw what we were doing and, because the leaves from the forest and her neighbors were plentiful, she had no problem raking them into a big pile in her own yard.

One day as I played alone, she invited me to join her which was a very big deal. Why would Annette ever want me to play with her? But I went, and we had a great time leaping from the top of a ladder she'd erected, landing in the leaves. From the ladder, maybe it was lower than the branch, but it was an easier climb which meant more chances to free-fall into the crunchy, colorful leaves

They were so soft that they led me to misunderstand physics.

So it was that I climbed the ladder, and, from the top, bent my knees hoping to land on them in the same way I landed on my springy feet. I didn't understand how the human body absorbed shock, I didn't understand that the leaves weren't really "springy"; my legs were. The leaves just helped a little.

I remember leaping, and in mid-air, hearing Annette scream at me in alarm, "DON'T DO THAT!"

She was older and understood physics in a way I did not. It wasn't scientific, but practical.

Annette couldn't do anything to save me from the disaster that awaited me.

I remember landing, my legs bent beneath me. I didn't "bounce" as expected, but rather, the concussion of the landing compressed my entire body, the landing a complete, abrupt shock.

I didn't "spring" or "bounce" or anything. Instead, I was driven into the ground as a whole and rolled to the side, stunned, unable to move my legs, unable to stand.

It was pain...but it wasn't. To this day, even KNOWING about spinal injuries, I can't describe the sensation. It was a pain I'd never felt, but which told me that this time, it was serious. I quite literally couldn't will my legs to move, I couldn't stand up although I tried.

Annette asked me if I was alright but all I could do was cry. I wasn't "alright" but was afraid Mom would find out what I did and punish me. I felt helpless and hated Annette's comments, telling me I was fine and telling me to "GET UP! You have to get up! Stop crying!"

I couldn't get up. I tried. Several times. I couldn't. My back and legs hurt so badly that I couldn't move, my legs actually wouldn't work at all, and I realized I had to do SOMETHING.

To her credit, Annette told me to just wait a minute. I wanted to go home. She didn't want to let me go home.

It was years before I realized Annette was terrified, too; just as terrified as I that I'd been seriously injured. From my perspective, I didn't want Mom to know. From her perspective...she was older and felt like she was at fault. I wish I'd listened to her and just laid there, waiting either for someone else to come, or just to feel better.

But I have never been one to wait when things are wrong, and, well...she let me go.

In tears, I went home. In tears, still unable to stand, barely able to move at all, I CRAWLED across her yard, across the street, and through our yard, hoping Mom wouldn't look out or think anything strange of my behavior. (Yeah, right...Adoro crawling across the street. Not strange at all...never mind the gravel...)

All I knew was that something was seriously wrong with me, I didn't want any attention, and hoped that if I just got home and ignored it...it would go away. I don't know how, but I managed to crawl all that distance (in excruciating pain), across the gravel road, into the house and to my room, pulling myself into bed. Hoping that maybe a nap would make it all better.

I remember thinking about Jesus, and how He fell when carrying His cross.

I remember Mom yelling at me from some other part of the house when she heard the door open, asking what I was doing. I just said I was tired and wanted to take a nap. Mom probably figured that was a blessed event, and never actually came out of the kitchen to see what I was doing. I was glad...I still couldn't stand up, and I was exhausted from all that crawling.

It didn't take me long to cry myself to sleep in terrified exhaustion. I never wanted to jump out of anything ever again.

I remember opening my eyes that afternoon and moving my legs. I remember carefully sitting up, carefully standing. There was no pain. It was all gone. I stood in my room and even JUMPED, waiting to collapse to the floor. It never happened.

I wondered if it was a dream, but no...my knees and my palms told another story, one told by gravel and dirt, and not all of it could be washed away.

Mom NEVER knew and STILL doesn't know of that event. I still puzzle it over, having had some medical training. I have a few theories but can't say I totally understand. Obviously, much of the pain was muscular, but when I consider the distance of my leap and the compression upon my spine, I am amazed I DIDN'T have a spinal injury, and have NEVER had back problems that didn't come from a different DIRECT injury (later in life - a result of an assault at work.)

As it was, I lived to walk another day, to run, and even to leap. I never again leapt from Annette's ladder, although I do recall she was overjoyed to see me walking later, and even teased me a little. Yet...she never brought it up again. My brother and I, we continued to leap out of the tree and a year later, used both the lower and higher branches to exit in to our respective piles of leaves. One branch became "His" and I would bring books up there so that, if he was gone, I could sit up there and read, or contemplate, or imagine. I "wrote" stories in my imagination, concealed myself in color and perhaps learned that the best place to be, ever, is in the present, especially when one is enclosed by colorful leaves and resting in the strong arms of a majestic maple tree somewhere in the Midwest.

Ah....to return to those days....

Why do any of us ever have to grow up?

*

Focus

One of the problems I find with studying Moral Theology is that it is so, so disheartening. In studying the Virtues, I realize how virtueless I truly am and how far I have to go. Yes, I am seeking holiness, but my failure become ever more clear.

This week in prayer I was pondering advice recently received in Confession, and heard that little voice of Jesus telling me quietly to stop being so overwhelmed by all of the knowledge I am gaining. What is really important, He said, is that I keep my eyes on Him. That little voice was entirely congruent with the advice received in Confession, and other advice from my Spiritual Director this week.

So I began to ponder that necessary gem; keeping my eyes on Christ. Him alone.

The Saints were experts in "living in the present moment." They sought to do God's will in all things, and how else could they have done so had they taken their eyes off of our Beloved Savior?

I realize how easy that sounds, but how hard it is to carry out. I've often awoken or renewed a promise during the day to "keep my eyes on Jesus" yet so quickly I am distracted and look away, falling from prayer, falling from tasks, all for whatever "shiny object" catches my attention. As if Jesus isn't enough, I have to go seeking other things!

And it is there I get lost. Falling away from prayer comes even before I take my eyes from Christ, I find, for without that anchor, I am set adrift to the whimsical winds of...whatever happens along.

It is disheartening to realize how often I choose sin over sanctity, but one of the important concepts in class revealed that this sense of being disheartened is a symptom of Pride. We are only dust; Jesus came because we do not have the ability to overcome our sin, so we should not be so surprised that we fall. Rather, the moment we realize we have slipped, we have to immediately look to Him to pick us up and set us back in place, there with Him.

This is not a denial of our own responsibility, but rather, a recognition of who we are and who God is, and an act of humility to know that we haven't the power to keep from sin...but God has the power to help us overcome it, if we but let him.

Yesterday we celebrated the Feast of St. Theresa of Avila, who wrote the famous words:

"Nada te turbe

Solo Dios basta."

"Let nothing disturb you.

God alone is enough."

Amen.

La Llorona

Ah, this is a tragic, tragic tale.

There are a few versions to La Llorona and I will let you search the web for them. I see that there is a movie that links her to the story of La Malinche, for, as we all know, legends take on a life of their own. As it is, I suggest you search out the term yourself and see what you find. I will try to piece it together here in a simplistic way:

Most legends of La Llorona (Weeping Woman) begin with the beauty of a young Mexican woman who catches the attention of a noble man, and in fact, men of both wealth and poverty. Predictably, she becomes the concubine of a wealthy man, possibly a Spaniard, and bears him two sons. Some stories suggest she already had her two sons when she met the nobleman with whom she fell in love.

In any case, the man is tempted either back to Spain or at least to live out a more "noble" calling by marrying a woman of higher privilege...maybe one without children. In some legends, he is a man whom, she believes, hates children and finds them an obstacle. In other legends, he has already fathered children by a noblewoman whom his family has convinced him to marry. In either case, La Llorona, as the scorned woman, is so distraught that she believes that if she is without children she will become the cherished bride she has always desired to be, and so she takes her infants and stabs them in the heart, dropping them into the river where she cries out in distress, "Mis Hijos!"

And still she is rejected by her lover, the death of her children was a vain sacrifice to the altar of convenience and selfishness.

"MIS HIJOS!"

There are other legends that tell a similar tale, but one more tame. In this other version, the sons of La Llorona played by the riverside in the evening while she cavorted with the men who so desired her beauty. And in her neglect, unsupervised, they found themselves without assistance in their boyhood games and, tragically, were drowned.

The final outcome of all the legends has the distraught mother weeping and wailing at the riverside for her lost children. Yet, she isn't crying through innocent loss, but her direct involvement in their deaths, whether through negligence or her own hand.

In the end, she took her own life, and to this day wanders the riverside, weeping and wailing for her lost children, seeking them eternally.

Mexican and American Southwestern folklore has La Llorona seeking her own children, a malevolent spirit wandering the riverbeds, digging in the mud but willing to swipe living children from the hands of other neglectful parents who allow their progeny to wander alone in dangerous areas, especially at twilight where the Xtabay also lingers seeking to devour lost souls.

Pondering La Llorona

I can't ever read this particular folklore without thinking of the reality she lives every day, in the women who so willingly slaughter their children...and in those who stand up and declare the morality of abortion.

When I hear or read the word "abortion", I see and hear La Llorona, weeping and wailing for her lost children.

I remember the laws recently passed in Mexico, and wonder how a culture that has La Llorona and Our Lady of Guadalupe so ingrained within it, which so IDENTIFIES it, can find the abomination of abortion to be compatible so as to be made LEGAL?

I don't understand how on one end so many in Mexico and America can give witness to the Legend of La Llorona and to the pregnant belly of Our Lady Of Guadalupe with the unborn infant Jesus, and how a culture so Matriarchal and so aware of the spectrum and battle for human life can, in the end, adopt the culture of Death.

I don't understand.

Can't the people, EVERYWHERE hear La Llorona crying in agony for her lost children?

Can't we hear the cries of ruptured infants, crying for their mothers, crying for their fathers who would ALLOW such destruction? Can we hear the cries of La Llorona's drowning children?

SHOULD we care for the cries of the selfish Llorona? Or should we leave her to Perdition?

In Jeremiah 31:15 we read:

Thus says the LORD: In Ramah is heard the sound of moaning, of bitter weeping! Rachel mourns her children, she refuses to be consoled because her children are no more.

The Legends of La Llorona reveal her as a woman with unbound hair, a woman of sin, weeping among the banks of Mexican rivers. When I drew my picture of La Llorona, though, I drew her in union with the Blessed Mother, who weeps for all her children.

When I ponder the story, of the woman in sin, I also hear the echoes of Sacred Scripture that point to Redemption.

In the Eighth Station of the Cross, (Luke 23) Jesus meets the weeping women.

"Weep not for Me," He tells them, as He bleeds upon their sandals, and their tears mingle with His blood, "But for your yourselves and for your children."

Our Blessed Mother wept for her Son, whom she gave up to the Cross on our behalf.

Our Lord bade the weeping women to weep NOT for Him, but...but for their own sins and those they inflicted upon their progeny, for if they could not first weep for what they lacked in themselves, how could they ever have children to mourn? Can life come out of death?

At the foot of the Cross, Jesus gave His Mother to us all, and so she weeps not for Him, who is our Savior and hers, but for all, especially those who do not weep for the right reasons. Our Lady wanders among us, crying her tears as she snatches us not to a watery grave, but to the eternal water that means life for eternity, to the ever-flowing blood of the Cross that warrants redemption, for the oil that is the Holy Spirit that empowers her children to bring life, not death, into the world.

My La Llorona shown above with a veil similar to Our Lady's, is also a tragic figure, but one who seeks out those who sacrifice their children on false altars, knowing what it is to allow true sacrifice for ultimate Redemption.

When I look at the La Llorona of folklore, I see the world as it is, a world that refuses Hope. But when I consider her under the mantle of Our Lady, I realize that even La Llorona does not weep in vain, for she is only one of those who meet Jesus as He carries His Cross, and in her weeping, helps to unite us all with our bloody Bridegroom.

Diagnosis

Today, finally, I met with my spiritual director. I will admit, I didn't want to go. Again, I found myself in the situation of not wanting to tell him what I had to say. Sure, I knew he'd be understanding, but it has to do with things that are hard for ME to talk about. Which, of course, means that they are exactly the things that need to be discussed.

He knew some of what was going on as I'd sent him a word document with my last appointment request, a reflection I'd written that pretty much stated, at the core, some of my position. But it didn't say everything...a few things were held in reserve. I couldn't even WRITE them, but knew I had to STATE them when the time came.

God's grace. Always, His grace.

Our discussion was fruitful and dredged up something that has long been a problem. It's not really the first time it has come up, but this time, he saw something in this that points to something else. Something lacking in my life.

Suddenly he asked me, "Can you get away, even for a day? Find a retreat? Just...get away?"

I had immediate excuses...work schedule, grad school...ie if I "get away" my books come with me, thus rendering the retreat not a retreat. He understood, of course.

In hearing his suggestion, initially I was thinking, "I just WENT on a few retreats! I haven't been back that long!" I confess, though, that I wish I could take another weekend away in the silence and solitude of the monastery. The cost might be a problem as this wouldn't be a discernment retreat anymore, but I was already shrugging his suggestion off, anyway.

Our discussion continued, and near the end of our time, he restated that I should find the time to just...get away. Not to discern, not to "do" something, but to just get away from "HERE", meaning everything in my life. Get a new perspective. Get away.

"You need something to look forward to," he said, glancing at me appraisingly. "Everyone needs something to look forward to."

He's right.

It took me awhile to see it, but in reflecting on our conversation, I remembered he was asking me what I see in my future, the things going on in my life. Essentially...What's going on in my life that has any real meaning? I cited work, which we discussed is just a job, not a calling or a career, I cited grad school, to end in May, graduation in June, God willing. But...then what? Sure I look forward to graduating, but it's not attached to anything but a piece of paper and a lot of debt. And I have this job that can't pay the loan....

I said it without explicitly stating it: I have nothing to look forward to.

I have nothing to work toward. I don't know my Vocation, I don't know what to do with the grad degree I'm working on and I'm stuck.

"Go visit your friends in Ohio!" my SD exclaimed. "Go! They'll be good for you!"

Dunce that I am, I still left his office thinking of the impossibility of "getting away" right now. Stretched ahead of me I see few free weekends, no time off, just work and school and family for Thanksgiving, and then the insanity of Christmas, then back for my last semester of school. Get "away?" I'd LOVE to! I LOVE my dear Ohio (and Indiana!) friends! I WANT to go back to Ohio!

But of course, as good spiritual direction goes, the important message eventually kicks in.

D'OH!

Of COURSE! Get away!

Sure, first he suggested a retreat, which would be nice, but there's no way I could go on a retreat and not turn it into discernment. I have this problem of needing to make everything "useful".

What my SD sees is that what I really need is what I'm COMPLETELY lacking in my life: fun.

There's no fun. Anywhere. Everything is compartmentalized. Everything is regimented, and my free time...is still dedicated to the "hum-ho" of life. It's not exactly "fun". Oh, sure there are the occasional weekend evenings with friends, but out of months at a time of intensity, what is a few hours of friendly escape? Just a drop in the bucket and that drop is too small to even create a ripple.

He's right. The reason I've been so danged depressed is that I have no goals, I have nothing to look forward to, nothing to plan and "romance".

It's so completely obvious I can't believe I didn't see it.

So...am looking at the calender. Am not sure how I'm going to pay for it with so much debt, but if God wills it, I am going to Ohio, I will figure out how to pay for it (seriously, the plane ticket is usually not THAT expensive), and I'm looking forward to seeing my friends again!

Of course, looking forward is much easier when the date is actually circled on the calender and the plane ticket is being located....

Oh, I need this......

The email has been sent to my friends.....oh, now planning the adventure is underway.....

Spiritual Gymnastics and The Force

I've always wanted to be a Jedi. Not because I had a crush on Luke Skywalker (which I did), but because he could do cool flips over fallen logs with green aliens on his back and he could do all sorts of cool things by just raising his hand! I have to admit that I think my love of gymnastics arose out of the swamp scenes in the Empire Strikes Back.

I don't advocate that a Catholic use "Star Wars" (the original trilogy) as spiritual fodder, but maybe God can use it anyway as a tool for a few of us wannabe Luke Skywalkers as we aspire to our Vocation, aka "Jedi".

Anyway...yup...I just called all of you who know and live your Vocation "Jedis". Congratulations. Don't let it go to your head. It's contrary to the virtue demanded of being a Jedi.

Tonight I watched "The Empire Strikes Back" for the what-hundreth time in my life, but I paid special attention to the scenes involving Yoda and Luke Skywalker.

In the beginning....

What does young Luke do? He lands in a dark place, cut off from communication, his ship is sunk, he's surrounded by darkness and rain and mud and awful things.

Then some annoying green swampy guy starts digging into his stuff, doing his utmost to try Luke's temper...and succeeds quite easily. Luke is rude, impatient, clearly trying to express himself, but failing miserably...so he thinks. And yet, Yoda understands him perfectly. Far more than Luke understands himself. (Sound like anyone you know? *ahem*)

But Yoda is patient, welcomes this strapping, prideful young man into his own home, feeds him even though Luke had refused to share his own dinner, and finally reveals that he is, in fact, the One Luke seeks to train him in the Jedi Arts.

Doesn't God do the same thing to us?

Indeed.

I know that's what happens to me. I try to seek holiness, and what does God do but try the virtues I don't possess, just so I realize I don't possess them. Yoda laments that Luke does not have patience. Um... yeah. Me, too.

Other than the first scene, we don't see Yoda acting crazy. Once Luke knows who he is, he behaves as a Jedi should, revealing that the first instance was a test of Luke's character.

The difference for we Christians to note is that God doesn't just test us in the "first scene". He continues to do this throughout our lives. Over and over again, lest we rest on our laurels. No virtues are ever truly "possessed". We tend to rest on our accomplishments, so if we are to grow in them, we must be constantly tested.

Back at the Jedi Training Swamp...

...After a period of training, Luke must enter into a cave. Yoda tells him he enters with only that which he takes with him, and admonishes him not to take his weapons. What does Luke do but glance at Yoda and strap his belt around his waist? Luke reveals that he is going in with all that HE has, relying on himself, not The Force.

What do any of us take into discernment but our usual weapons? Like Luke, we can't seem to lay them aside. What does Luke see when he goes underground? He sees Darth Vader, wins that battle, but what does he see defeated...but himself?

We as human beings tend to want to rely on what we have in the natural order, disdaining what is available to us in the supernatural order. Anyone who has studied moral theology can see this, for constantly we are tempted to rely on ourselves, and not on God. Yet, discernment calls us to rely ENTIRELY on God...and how difficult that is for us!

And How accurate that we disdain God (or "The Force")

In discernment, we must lay our own "weapons" aside. We take into it only what we have...what we are. If we are encumbered, we take sin with us and we face that sin, that anger, that lack of prudence. We face everything we are...and mostly what we are not.

It is a humiliating experience, as it should be, for none can approach God without humility.

If we take weapons with us into discernment, if we go with an attitude, we don't do anything but battle ourselves, and that, unfortunately, is where most of us start.

So many people don't understand the difficulty of this task, for we don't understand it ourselves. In order to know God, we MUST know ourselves, but in order to know ourselves, we MUST know God! We are called to trust, we are called to act, we are called to disdain all that we thought we knew in favor of what God desires us to know.

I won't say it is a journey of "self-discovery" for that does not go far enough; rather it is a journey to know oneself THROUGH God, for it is Our Lord and His Cross that defines us in every moment of our lives. We can't understand ourselves unless we can see ourselves in the light and the shadow and all the glory and folly of the Cross.

The difficult part of this is that we encounter ourselves as we really are...not as we'd like to be. We don't encounter our own holiness, but rather, what we lack. We see what we truly value, what we disdain to give up and we convince ourselves it's easier to flee than to accept the challenge of, say...raising the ship out of the swamp that devours it.

Maybe that's akin to raising our own souls out of the mud of sin that encumbers us. We try and we try, but we have no faith, and so as we try to rise, we are pulled back down.

Why? Because we do not trust. We do not love. We do not adore.

But it's fun to flip around and over things, isn't it? It's fun to run at obstacles and overcome them...unless they do not give. It is easy to take shots at targets...unless they send our own ammunition back in our direction.

Discernment is humiliating. It shows us who we really are, in complete, stark relief. Nothing is hidden. Everything is brought bubbling to the surface. Every single vice. Virtues are hidden if they were ever there at all.

Discernment is nothing but spiritual gymnastics, as we rise to meet obstacles, to crash in defeat, and rise again to meet a new challenge. We don't know what we must do, what we are called to do, or what feat we must accomplish to rise to any occasion.

All we know is that we have been called to a purpose, and anyone who takes the time to find that purpose must enter into this swamp, blindly, trusting in God alone, and we don't have the option to cut our "training" short for if we don't meet our own calling...other souls hang in the balance.

God does nothing by accident. But will we, in failing to discern...cause a fatality?

*

Imitation of Christ

We can only truly be formed into the image of Christ through suffering. Those who are called to trials and suffering should rejoice in that call, for it is an invitation to enter into a portion of His own suffering.

When we look at our world today, we see the ongoing persecution of the Church. The world hates us. It screeches at us, it wants to force us to conform to their ways, for the holiness of the Church is a standard the world cannot bear. The Church holds up a mirror to them and they see reflected there themselves. Rather than strive for holiness, they howl and cast stones at the mirror held up before them, which does nothing to shatter the Church, but only takes away from them the horrible visage of their own reflection.

It is far easier to cast stones than to turn one's gaze inward and listen to the voice of God who has imprinted the Law upon their hearts. Had He not done this, the experience of the mirror would not be so excruciatingly painful. These souls who experience this, tragically, have no where else to go. They are but the crowds who abandoned Christ, leaving only the remnant disciples with Him...and Jesus let them go.

He let them go so that He could send us out into the world, for thousands of years after His death and resurrection, to bring those souls back.

It is no wonder that so many strike against the Church. It is no wonder that the voice of the world seeks to silence us. It is no wonder that Christians all over the world are being slaughtered for simply following Christ. And it is no wonder that the Christians do not or cannot fight back against these enemies, for wasn't Jesus the lamb who went silently to slaughter?

What we suffer now is nothing more than the Passion of Christ as we walk the road to Calvary.

The Church, the Bride of Christ, is a holy, pure, reality. The fact that this Mystical Body is made up of sinners struggling for holiness is actually a greater sign of God's glory, for this struggle reveals that we are not called to conform to the world, but to Our Bridegroom, Our Savior who, as a wedding gift, gave His own blood so that we might have eternal life.

We, the Bride of Christ, the Church, must become like Christ if we are to carry out His mission, and that means we, too must walk in His bloody footsteps, we must also fall under the weight of the Cross so that He can lift us again and again, until finally, like Him, we the Church, will be lifted up and draw all men into this Mystical Body, in unity.

Jesus desired that all may be one, but that unity will come at a price, one each of us must pay through our own roles in the ongoing history of salvation.

The louder the world screams for our blood, the more glory there is for God and the more credibility the Church will have as we walk this triumphant road to Calvary to enter into the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.

Let us work then, to imitate Jesus, and not the world. Let their cries fall on deaf ears as we keep our eyes on the Cross and Resurrection. It is through this journey that we will, more and more, be conformed to Christ, both personally and in unity, as His Bride.

I Haven't Done Anything Either

So....where's MY prize?

And, when I get my Nobel Prize, can I have mine in Milka Milk Chocolate with their yummy cream center? (They make the BEST chocolate in the WORLD!)

Will I have to go to McDonald's and order a Happy Meal in order to get it, or should I just go to the store and get Cracker Jacks?

What I REALLY want to know, though, is how MUCH you don't have to do in order to be rewarded for not doing it?

The sad thing is that the bar is so low that even I'M too tall to reach it now. Never thought I'd say such a thing.... *sigh*

When even the underachievers can't match the underachievements of our Nobel Prize winners these days, well, what hope is there for the rest of us?

What Light Through Yonder Window Breaks?

Beloved, let us give thanks to God the Father, through his Son, in the Holy Spirit, because in his great love for us he took pity on us, and when we were dead in our sins he brought us to life with Christ, so that in him we might be a new creation. Let us throw off our old nature and all its ways and, as we have come to birth in Christ, let us renounce the works of the flesh.

Christian, remember your dignity, and now that you share in God’s own nature, do not return by sin to your former base condition. Bear in mind who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Do not forget that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom.

Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not drive away so great a guest by evil conduct and become again a slave to the devil, for your liberty was bought by the blood of Christ.

~ St. Leo the Great

If we fail to live in the light, we shall, to our condemnation and that of others, be veiling over and obscuring by our infidelity the light men so desperately need. As we know from Scripture, the man who received the talent should have made it produce a heavenly profit, but instead he preferred to hide it away rather than put it to work and was punished as he deserved.

Consequently, that brilliant lamp which was lit for the sake of our salvation should always shine in us. For we have the lamp of the heavenly commandment and spiritual grace, to which David referred: Your law is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Solomon also says this about it: For the command of the law is a lamp.

Therefore, we must not hide this lamp of law and faith. Rather, we must set it up in the Church, as on a lamp-stand, for the salvation of many, so that we may enjoy the light of truth itself and all believers may be enlightened.

~ St. Chromatius

We shall be blessed with clear vision if we keep our eyes fixed on Christ, for he, as Paul teaches, is our head, and there is in him no shadow of evil. Saint Paul himself and all who have reached the same heights of sanctity had their eyes fixed on Christ, and so have all who live and move and have their being in him.

As no darkness can be seen by anyone surrounded by light, so no trivialities can capture the attention of anyone who has his eyes on Christ. The man who keeps his eyes upon the head and origin of the whole universe has them on virtue in all its perfection; he has them on truth, on justice, on immortality and on everything else that is good, for Christ is goodness itself.

~St. Gregory of Nyssa

"I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness" ~ Jesus, John 8:12

One Hail Mary

Obviously I've been struggling a great deal lately, and really, I've been at the end of my rope. Tomorrow, I hope and pray, I'll make it to Confession (finally!) and get a fresh start. I have a lot of things to get off my soul, and today found myself nearly despairing.

Then I came across a post at Sancte Pater on the efficacy of one Hail Mary. Even though I pray my rosary en route to work every day, this post went right to the heart of something for me.

There, at my desk at work I put my hands over my face and prayed, slowly, a Hail Mary, nearly in tears.

There has been so much going on in my life, so much that is not publishable; I've been overwhelmed at work and with stuff for school (the latter partially as I simply haven't been able to focus very well.) It all adds up.

What I read today isn't new to me, but today, I really NEEDED to read it again, but more importantly, to experience it.

There truly is no such thing as a "bad rosary". If you are regularly praying it, even mouthing the words while your mind is elsewhere, is it very effective? Probably not. But it's better to be praying than not, isn't it? And grace can't be measured or quantified in any way. It is better, of course, to know what you are doing, and do it with intent.

Perhaps that is what I need to do; spend more time actually paying attention to the words, to the depth of the mystery of the Incarnation to be found in the words of the Angel's greeting to Mary, recognizing that there is our Redemption, at hand. In the hands of the Blessed Mother...who said yes.

We can pray to her with confidence in any troubles we face, for Jesus Himself made her our Mother as well, and she is ready, just waiting for us to ask her to help us come closer to Jesus.

Hail Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with Thee.

Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.

Amen.

Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum; benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Jesus.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae,

Amen.

Wanting to be Liked...and MORE!

Holiness isn't found in an instant. I'm constantly reminded it's found in the little moments, the small decisions we make every day. We don't seek holiness for accolades, but because we love God and want to be closer to Him.

The holier we are, the less we worry about what others think of us.

That's the problem, isn't it? We all want to be liked. We all want people to love us, and it really wounds us when someone we know expresses dislike in some way, or if we simply can't get along with them for some reason.

This is something I've often had to face since I began working in a parish.

Given that I came to this position with long experience in male-dominated fields, I'm pretty used to being the "bad guy". Given that I've worn a uniform a certain percentage of the world hates on sight, I can withstand the "evil eye" shot in my direction, especially considering that it's not personal.

I was surprised, then, in starting parish work, to find that the "evil eye" from a parishioner was devastating.

To be perfectly honest, never in my life have I ever hit such directed, personal hatred as I did when I began working in a Catholic parish and ran aground of the people who saw that I was disrupting the comfortable status quo.

Oh, yes, it was personal, and it was hatred. Let's call it what it is; the reality is that this happens across the spectrum of orthodoxy or lack therof. I see and lament it enough in the blogosphere, and I've even been a part of it.

Yes, I know I rant (on my blog), but I try to keep the rant general, not about the people, but the issues that we face. I may look at Sr. XYZ in her navy pantsuit and detest her eco-spirituality, but maybe I like her as a person and find her fun to talk to as long as the topic has nothing to do with theology. I've spoken with dissident priests, seeing in them something truly wonderful (one who had just absolved me after a very powerful confession), gritting my teeth against some of his expressed theology. Yet...in him I saw great compassion, understanding, and proper knowledge of Christ in the Sacraments. Something that in fact, led me closer to Jesus, lent to a greater ability to trust Him.

You see, I'm trying hard (still working on it) to separate the people from the issues. We are all sinful creatures in need of mercy.

It really hurts like hell when someone we know we are supposed to love directly targets us, takes aim, and fires.

That's what happened to me my first year. I didn't set out to alienate anyone, and actually tried to deliver Truth gently, making sure to incorporate myself and my own culpability in our Faith. I didn't do a very good job...some of my wording WAS too harsh. It wasn't all wording, though. The message itself is sometimes harsh, and if it's never been brought to the forefront, those it impacts the most repel it violently.

Some of the problem was that no matter how gently a message is delivered, there are those who won't accept it, and want to remain with the status quo, which in our day and age involves pluralism and relativism. Anyone who speaks truthfully of the Church, of Christ, is therefore going to offend anyone who rejects those teachings. The "offended" person, wearing the label belonging to the objective teachings, seeing that they don't actually match the label they claim, gets very defensive and lashes out.

They make the attack personal, in a way only an "offended" human can: viciously, with defamation of character and snarkiness. Never in person, though. In person, they are sweet as southern pecan pie. In any case, it's much easier to attack and silence the messenger than it is to go to the Cross and destroy Christ. Or, in someone open to the message, to actually take it in and experience conversion.

It's been some time now, and people at my work have gotten used to me and have gotten to know me as I've also gotten to know them. I recognize so many more faces these days, even if I don't know the names, and have to confess that in knowing them, I want to be liked by them as well. I want to be on their side, I want them on my side. Even though I am but an employee there, I am also a Catholic, therefore I see us as family.

I will their good, and so I teach/preach what I believe to be for their good, and I try to do it in such a way that all can handle the message...and desire more of it.

I guess that's the problem with being "family". Sometimes speaking the truth and doing my job means ruffling feathers. Sometimes it means having MY feathers ruffled. It means being challenged.

It means I have to be dependent upon God, for if I am not, I will be eaten alive.

I'm giving a few talks this week to a group of parents, something I have to do every year, and have to admit I don't think it's fun. I don't think I'm a very good speaker and wish I could just provide the information to someone else and have someone else deliver the message.

This afternoon I expressed this to my boss, saying that all the work was done; all someone would have to do is to step in and READ it!

Laughing she told me, "Adoro...just READ it!"

No! I meant SOMEONE ELSE!

OK, never mind...I'll go.

The core of my problem isn't any real phobia, or anything else. It's fear, of knowing I'm going to speak the Truth and some people are not going to like me because of it. The Truth is uncomfortable. I know it well...it still makes me uncomfortable, as it should.

But maybe the worst thing: I don't want to experience that because I want people to like me.

Oh, it's painful to admit that fact about myself.

Certainly, it's very necessary, in apologetics, in evangelization, to have a relationship with the other party. If I'm not friendly with Mr. Y or Mrs. M, why should they trust anything I say, or especially that it is coming from an eternal source, not just the Gospel according to Adoro?

In meeting big groups, I find it harder to deliver the message of the gospel, because I'm talking AT people. When I get to have these same discussions with small groups, or individually, they can ask questions as we go, which makes it more interpersonal. If I've been unclear in my presentation, they can ask for clarification. If I am in error, they can call me on it! (So far my biggest errors have actually been typoes, clerical stuff, not theology!)

But still, the key is in the relationship. I think it is easier now to speak to these groups because I know them, and consider many to be friends. I had to speak tonight and had among that crowd several parents I actually would have said didn't have to be present because they were last year or the year before. One said she wanted to be there for support, and after my talk, said she appreciated how the message was delivered.

I was glad to have her there. Her presence DID help, especially because I'd told her she didn't have to be there and I could just meet with her separately with any details.

There were others who didn't even ask, and I knew they were there not for the information, but to give support, to get anything new, to offer what they could. Wonderful people.

It's good to be liked. It's good to have friends. We can't survive without friends, or without their support.

But we can't depend on that or allow that to define us.

We can't fear delivering the message of the Gospel for fear someone won't like us anymore if we do. Or maybe that they'll outright hate us for simply professing our belief.

We live in challenging times, where it is "uncool" to be religious, unless we are "religious" in the pluralistic self-serving sense, that everything is truth, and truth is subjective, personally defined.

We who work in parishes have to wander through such muddy waters and help souls come out of it into the light that is Christ alone. It's tough work, we're going to take barbs, we're going to have fishhooks impale us, and we're going to bring up old boots when we go diving for lost souls.

But we can't give up. Whether we work for a parish or simply love Jesus and want to bring Him to others, we're going fishing in the muddy bottoms, and if we give up, it'll be too late. We're going in for rescue...not body recovery. When it gets to the latter, it's too late.

It's really no surprise that some we bring up through the muddy waters flail about and scream at us and express anger. It's no wonder they are defiant and combative. In emergency medicine, people who have been deprived of oxygen are often combative. It's a HUGE sign, and never one to take personally. They simply don't know what they are doing. Once they have breathed clean air for awhile, they come to their senses, they come to themselves....they come to Life.

Year for Priests

Before I worked in a church, I really didn't understand what priests deal with every day. I know that what I do is a privilege, for I speak with his authority, through the Bishop. If I give Church teaching...it needs to be Church teaching. Father trusts me to do that, the Bishop, by extension, trusts me to do that...on up to the Pope.

But there's more. People often look at priests without realizing the depth of what they do, who they are. Their parishes ARE their families, their parishioners...their children. I think they even have special concern for their employees (although I haven't much pondered this and need another viewpoint.) Myself, I see the priest I work for differently than I see my own Pastor; the relationship is definitely different, as it should be.

Still, though, it's not the same as secular employment. Faith changes EVERYTHING.

I know I am not called to parish work, although it's where I am now. It has changed me, it has given me a more mature perspective, something I needed, especially as a blogger. It has given me the chance to see people as they are, in all their needs, and the Church, in the depths of her true warfare.

Priests see this too, even MORE deeply. I know that if all I wrote in this post is true, it is even more deeply so for a Priest, who has charge of the parish. When I go home at night, my responsibility is done, but for my moral life. When a priest goes home at night...well...he never leaves. He IS home.

And because he is human, he wants to be liked, too. He wants to be loved. I know guys are not so emotional as we women, but foundationally we are all social and have this same need. I'm sure that it wounds Priests even more than it does me when they have to face the ire of their parishioners, for whom they have laid down their lives.

Pray for priests. Never let a day go by that you do not pray for your own Pastor, for his sanctity, for God to guide him in all the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and for his safety.

This is his prayer for you as well. Don't let that prayer be one-sided.

****

Vocation, Travail, and the Joyful Mysteries

For months and months now, I've been praying the Joyful Mysteries while pondering the gift and joy of Vocation, hoping to "get" it.

As I ponder this, I find I can't actually get through all the Mysteries, for they are not yet at any point of fruition in my life. As I pray, I try to see my own life, my own Call (whatever it is, whatever it means) in that of the life of Jesus and Mary.

Maybe one day I'll formally write a meditation on each Mystery, but for now, I'm only seeking to eke out the treasures, to understand my own relationship with Jesus through them, knowing they are relevant, but not always understanding how, or why. Each time I pray these particular Mysteries, I am trying to find the Joy, find the connection, and if I am stuck, well...I either complete the rosary as prescribed or stick with where I'm stuck, pondering what I can't understand.

The First Joyful Mystery: The Annunciation

The Angel Gabriel appeared to Mary, saying, "Hail, Full of Grace! The Lord is with Thee! Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!" (Luke 1:28, 2:42)

Mary was at first frightened, yet had an implicit understanding of what the Angel said, for she responded in complete Trust: "Let it be done unto me according to Thy word." (Luke, 38) In the Angelus prayer, we find the Gospel of John 1:14: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us."

All by Mary's fiat. She said yes. She said YES unconditionally. Not just then, but in every moment. When she gave her fiat, as they say, all of heaven and earth held their breath, awaiting her response. She made our salvation possible; she who had been chosen, purified, and prepared (through Grace) by God to receive the Word, gave her acquiescence to the Holy Spirit, who descended upon her as a pure vessel, like Mt. Sinai, Like the Ark of the Covenant, like the Holy of Holies; she was overshadowed by Kahvod, by the Untranslatable Kahvohd, conceiving of the Messiah out of her own flesh. A Virgin, pure, free from sin, Immaculate, for she had been created for this moment...and every moment forward.

She didn't just say "yes" in that moment, but to everything, and took action IMMEDIATELY.

Hail Mary, Full of Grace the Lord is with Thee. Blessed art Thou among women, and Blessed is the fruit of Thy Womb...Jesus.

The Second Joyful Mystery: The Visitation

Mary, having conceived of the Holy Spirit, got up and went to Elizabeth, her cousin. The Bible doesn't say much as to her reasons, but we can surmise that she was responding to the prompt of her Spouse, the Holy Spirit, and her human need to both comfort and be comforted. What we know from scripture is that she trusted in the promise of God, thus, before she arrived she knew Elizabeth in her age was with child.

To those who say Mary was "just a woman": Was that particular man-made Protestant doctrine created by MEN who have abandoned their wives and daughters? How could God call men and women to marriage and yet impregnate the Virgin Mary, abandoning her to the world? Isn't that idea a man-made, man-pleasing doctrine, suggesting sexual pleasure without responsibility? How convenient to men!

Isn't it more like the gentle, protective, creative Holy Spirit to be a gentleman, to live up to His promises and treat the Blessed Mother of Jesus as the spouse that she is and remains for eternity? Did He abandon her, or did He provide for her in every moment? Certainly He called her to suffer, but what Mother hasn't suffered?

But I digress, for this Visitation of Mary is relevant in every age, but in this Mystery, we must get to the core of the Mystery itself, which preceded the Paschal Mystery:

Mary arrived at the house of Zecheriah and upon her entrance, at the sound of her voice, the infant in St. Elizabeth's womb LEAPT at the presence of Mary when Elizabeth exclaimed to her, "Who am I that the Mother of My Lord would come to me?" (Luke 1:43)

Elizabeth recognized Mary for her sublime dignity, graced to her by God, recognizing her Vocation as Mother of us all, Mother of Jesus. St. John the Baptist, there at six month's gestation, LEAPT at Mary's and Jesus's presence (Luke 1:44); there, where Jesus would have been but a "lump of cells" in modern terms.

Was Mary just the Holy Spirit's little heifer? Was Jesus just a "mass of tissue"? Was the unborn St. John the Baptist just an overactive mass in his mother's barren womb?

If the humanity and divinity of Jesus, and the full prophetic humanity of St. John the Baptist were present in that moment, how can ANYONE claiming to be Christian and CATHOLIC claim that contraception and abortion are merely political issues?

If Jesus, a tiny tiny, scientifically unrecognizable embryo, at the point he met the fetus St. John the Baptist, were fully human beings at the time of that meeting....how can anyone who claims to be Christian continue to claim that contraception and abortion are not murder?

"Who am I that the Mother of My Lord would come to me?"

The Third Joyful Mystery: The Birth of Christ

Mary returned to Nazareth, three months later, full with child, where Joseph considered divorcing her quietly. He did not "know" her and had believed her to be pure; yet she returned clearly having conceived.

He did not want her to be stoned, and at his own word, such would be done for he was the betrayed betrothed. An Angel appeared to Joseph, revealing that indeed, his betrothed had remained pure, was chosen by God, and...so was he. Joseph the protector, Joseph the husband, Joseph the father.

The stares of the people, the scandal assumed, that Joseph had had relations with Mary before they were married! His very silence indicated both had been impure!

Both accepted the scorn without comment, letting others assume the worst, knowing God had chosen them for greater. Their humility lives on today...the scorn of their contemporaries has died in oblivion, without name, their gossip, unrecalled, their ashes...lost to the desert of Nazareth where they were buried.

Joseph and Mary, the couple scorned, have been elevated according to the glory God chose to bestow upon them; Mary conceived without sin, Theotokos, Joseph, adopted Father of God, whose adult life was lived in the shadow of the Mother of Jesus.

They traveled to Bethlehem, the place of Joseph's birth, for the census. What hardships they endured, physically and spiritually! How did the couple come to know each other in chastity and trust, knowing God had joined them, and their child would save all of humanity from their sins?

Travail

This is where I lose the thread of meditation. I know Mary is in travail, and after the conception of Christ, after the Visitation, after her journey, she gives birth.

The great Saints have said that her travail was not painful, for pain was/is penalty for sin, which she did not endure. Yet it is clear that Mary suffered far more than any woman on earth. I look to Revelation 12, where Mary (the Woman) flees to the desert and the Dragon makes war on her offspring. I know that is us; we are her offspring, for she is the Mother of all, even of Eve, whom she replaced.

I am stuck in "travail".

Even though I am single and know that I am called to marriage, I know that I am still called to motherhood in some sense. The Word has been conceived in me, and I gave my own fiat, believing it is true, accepting, foundationally, that there IS a Call from God.

I have said "Yes" to that Call, albeit imperfectly.

It has occurred to me, over the last year or so, and now, in my present darkness, that what I experience is akin to labor, although it is spiritual. A woman in travail, (labor) as her hour comes, experiences the ebb and flow of terrible, terrible contractions. She has nurtured the child in her womb for close to nine months, has sacrificed, has loved and awaits the coming of this wonderful child. She knows that what emerges is a result of love, a gift from God, and is life eternal.

As she comes closer and closer to giving birth, her pains become stronger, more intense, and longer in duration. She screams, she weeps, she writhes in pain, and no one can comfort her for there is no comfort to be found, until that tiny babe finally rests in her waiting arms, revealing her fulfillment.

It may be a moment, it may be minutes or hours, or even a few days.

Spiritually, it can be years.

I can't now write of the remaining two Mysteries; that of the Presentation of Jesus and of Finding Him in the Temple. I am still struggling to give birth to whatever I have conceived of the Lord.

For now, I must wait, accepting the intensity of the pain, trusting in God, knowing that this is not for nothing.

If I am a part of the Church, a Bride in the general sense that applies to all Christians, then it stands to reason that I must experience this travail, I must fight this war, and I must, even in this desert, know that God will open the earth to swallow what threatens.

Though my veil be torn and my countenance blemished, I can flee to my Savior, for by Him have I conceived this Faith and only through Him can I give it life and live it to the fullness.

And while they were there, the time came for her to be delivered, and she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

Dear God Why Today?

I nearly got up and left Mass during the first reading.

Of all days, of all time, why did it have to be THOSE readings?

If there weren't two people blocking my exit from my pew I would have picked up my stuff and left. I quite literally couldn't take it today. It's a good thing they were there.

I spent the entire Mass trying to hold back tears, often not very successfully.

So much for feeling better after Mass. Not that Mass is supposed to be fun. After all, Jesus wasn't exactly having "fun" when He hung on the Cross, dying, and what is Mass but the re-presentation of Calvary? When we are at Mass, we are quite literally at the foot of the Cross!

It's not supposed to be "fun".

Of course, during Mass the sacrifice of Calvary is made present as an unbloody sacrifice; for me today, though, it was quite bloody. Quite.

I'm still crying. And maybe that's proper.

*

Reevaluating the Single Vocation

Disclaimer: This is a "thinking out loud" post, otherwise known as...pondering ponderously, not looking for agreement or disagreement, not advancing a position, just...putting thoughts into words and seeing where it ends up. This will be a long post. Get yourself some coffee or maybe a nice cup of tea. Sleepytime Tea might be appropriate.

I used to write on this a lot, and my position was that being Single is a legitimate Vocation, although such goes against John Paul II's Theology of the Body. I changed my position on that after awhile, and have been holding to the standard that there are but three possible Vocations: Marriage, Priesthood, and Religious Life.

I eliminated Marriage; at a wedding a couple years ago, a truly beautiful wedding involving a Presentation to the Blessed Virgin Mary after the Vows, I was absolutely floored to realize I didn't WANT to get married! EVER! And it was one of the most freeing, refreshing moments of my life. It was not to say I did not love and support marriage, but just the realization God was not calling me to it. It was beautiful.

This revelation freed me to comfortably discern religious life, knowing the door to Marriage was closed.

Where does that leave the Single life?

It's a legitimate question. For myself, I'd stopped considering it. The Single life, as it is lived today, is simply unnatural. I know that what I'm living just isn't right somehow, although I can't really put it into words. We Singles, at least in America, tend to live alone, or maybe with one or two others who may or may not share our religious and moral beliefs (which SHOULD be one and the same, but just sayin'). Myself...I live in solitude, and as much as I love my solitude, I know that it is somehow disordered. It's not what is supposed to be. It hinders my ability to grow in holiness for there is no one to hold me accountable for my behavior, even in the little things.

Single life was not always so, nor is it so everywhere, although as the world as a whole becomes more secularized and less family-oriented, the disordered existence of the single life is becoming even more so. What do I mean by that?

Juxtapose the first paragraph of this section with other cultures: single women live with their families, maybe for life. They live to take care of their parents, to assist with nieces and nephews, remaining always a part of a community of sorts. When monasticism was more common, single women would enter what was then called "Third Orders", and live their single life in the community, with their family, but they weren't proper religious. They lived for the Church, they cared for the poor...but they lived a limbo that did not belong properly to marriage OR religious life.

A Brief and Incomplete Discussion on "Third Order" or "Tiertiary" statuses

The Third Orders have changed over time. Some Third Orders today are proper Religious who take vows and wear a habit, such as the Third Order Franciscans. (You would recognize them as such: Father, Brother or Sister John Mary, TOR)

I had my head bitten off by our local Vocations Director when I used the term "Third Order" in an email, because, confusingly, some Lay Orders still use the term "Third Order" and most do not, all due to the changing terms. Those orders that are proper religious get snarky when lay communities continue to use the term, and I'm quite sure Fr. Vocations Director has gotten an earful more than once himself. Which he passed on to me. Point taken.

Yet I have also come to learn that even using the term "Secular Order X" is in question, for some Secular Orders are actually religious, too...in a way. And I don't totally understand that. So I'm leaving it alone.

What we seem to have available to us, in terms that offend no one and don't crowd in on anyone's wanting to redefine terms that are constantly being couched or appended, for good or bad, is the phrase, "Lay".

We the laity, whether married, single, or even those who are Clergy (Priests, Deacons), can all enter into communion with a religious community as a "Lay Dominican" or "Lay Franciscan" or a "Lay Cistercian". Each Order seems to have a different term to apply to this particular status. The more left-wing Religious Communities call them "Consociates" or maybe "Affiliates". The more traditional (and I mean really traditional) will still use the term "Third Order." I don't think anyone uses the term "Tiertiary" anymore.

Why did I digress into all this? Because if I didn't, some commenter would jump in and define all this, and I have no doubt that will STILL happen because it's IMPOSSIBLE to be thorough in what is intended to be a brief blog post. (Which alone is clearly an impossible feat for me.)

Anyway, what does this all have to do with the Single life?

EVERYONE who reads my blog knows that I've really been struggling lately. I've been on edge, outright depressed, realizing that yes, God is calling me to something, but it's not Marriage, it's not Religious Life (which I thought it was, as my only other option), and my longer-term followers know that some time ago I was working with others on forming a chapter of Lay Dominicans. Which finally hit a wall and died. For ALL of us who were exploring the option. The Holy Spirit has spoken.

So here I am, still a single woman, still certain I am NOT called to marriage. So often I am in Adoration while weddings take place next to the chapel. I hear the music, watch the Bride and Groom process out with great joy, and still...it doesn't call me. I'm happy for them and pray for them and hope they realize that their Vows before God and the Church are for life. But I don't want to be there and be one of them.

I've written of how Religious Life isn't calling me, either. Maybe that was the source of my terrible terrible interior experience while I visited the Sisters this summer; it ISN'T calling me, although I so thought that it was...and SHOULD.

Because, as I said before....it was my only other option. Knowing that I wasn't called to Marriage, knowing the Single life isn't right and isn't a legitimate Vocation, well...religious life has to be IT!

And so many told me how the Hound of Heaven would come after me if I tried to flee my Vocation, how I won't attain the holiness God has in mind for me, how I won't find true happiness if I flee and just ignore the Call. Some have said they think I'm just not accepting the Gift of Vocation (implying in the context of our conversations that my Vocation is religious life), and the worst, the worst, the very worst...the implication that I should just "do it!" because I allegedly have nothing to lose.

I confess I have sometimes thought that if I won the lottery, I'd pay off my debt, get rid of my stuff, and enter religious life, if I was accepted. But that wouldn't be a true sacrifice, would it? And those AREN'T my circumstances. The reality is that YES I have something to lose, and maybe God isn't calling me to lose it. The fact that I don't currently happen to CARE about what I have to lose doesn't mean that God doesn't have something to say about it.

I can't make a decision on something so important as my Vocation just because maybe I have "nothing to lose". If I don't know what I truly have, if getting rid of my house, my debt, my crappy stuff isn't a loss to me, how is that a sacrifice? Isn't that just looking for escape?

No. I won't enter religious life on a whim that I have "nothing to lose". That's a fallacious argument from silence. I might in fact, be placing myself out of God's will to do such a thing. I truly don't care if I lose all that I own. The sad thing is...it all owns me. I CAN'T escape it. I have nowhere to go. My impediment to entering religious life...I am owned. By sin and by debt and it's all my own fault. If it was what God intended for me originally, in any case, I don't want it and the door is shut.

And that's what it comes down to; I don't want it and the door is shut. I shut it. Maybe God already did but I thought it open. I tried the knob, it hasn't opened, maybe it's just stuck, but I'll take a hint. NO ONE can say I didn't seriously attempt to open the door. No one who knows me.

Or maybe my depression of the last couple weeks is indicative of my interior struggle at refusing God's sincere Call. I'll be discussing that option with my SD and with no one else.

So I am back to being Single

Do you see why I've been so depressed?

The premise that I have sought so sincerely, and single heartedly has not been borne out.

I defined my options as Priesthood, Marriage, and Religious Life. I am a woman and God has said only men are called to be Priests, and I agree with God on that. Wholeheartedly! I have eliminated Marriage, and now, I have eliminated Religious Life.

I am bereft.

Single, alone...without a Vocation. God has left me abandoned. So it seems.

A friend a few years ago, before I began discerning anything, said to me, "It's clear you have been set aside."

At first I was insulted, but over time came to realize that "set aside" is the highest of compliments. Things that are holy are said to be "set aside". They are marked in a special way to be designated for God, to point to God, to be used by God for something amazing.

For the record, there is NOTHING amazing about me. I don't stand out in a crowd and never will (Ironic I used to want to be famous. How dumb.) If I could avoid standing in front of a crowd and speaking...I would. If I could hide under my desk at work all day and just push stuff out through a little window...I would.

Then, today, I had an amazing revelation as I did my Mariology reading. There was mention of St. Catherine of Siena, one of my favorite Saints.

Back to the Single Vocation

St. Catherine of Siena was SINGLE. She was not properly a religious. Yes, she wore a habit as a Tiertiary Dominican, but she lived at home, with her family. At the command of God, she was essentially cloistered in her own room for three years, communing with God. She was an Anchoress, receiving visitors at her window, providing spiritual direction. Her mother used to command her to "Come out and help with the housework!".

Finally God told her to be obedient to her mother and to do as she asked. This St. Catherine did, and also entered into the community to care for the sick. And not just the sick, but those most ailing. Those no one wanted to touch. (I'm quite certain St. Catherine of Siena was a great inspiration for Bl. Mother Teresa!)

St. Catherine's family tried to force her into marriage, but she "disgraced" herself by cutting her hair. God never called her to Marriage. He never called her to enter the Dominican Monastery and live as a contemplative religious.

In her time, yes, she wore a habit and fulfilled all, but her juridical status was as a single woman...and what great things she did! She lived and died for God! She had a mystical marriage to Him, suffered hidden stigmata (which appeared after her death), and as a Single woman...saved the Church.

St. Joan of Arc was also a single woman. God did not call her to enter a religious community, and did not call her into marriage. She lived for God and died for Him, a virgin martyr.

Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati, did all he did as a single man. I believe he discerned he was called to marriage, so an argument can be made there. However...he was never married, was he? In reality, he lived and died in God's will...as a Single man. He, too, for those who don't know, was a Third Order Dominican.

I have to say, then....was he REALLY called to Marriage? It seems not, for he did all of his great work in this life as a Single man, and died before Marriage. As that Married Vocation wasn't lived out, can it really be said he was called to Marriage? I don't think it can. God couldn't have called him to marriage if He had intended and known that dear Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati be called Home before such Vows could be expressed.

There are other Saints and Blesseds out there who make this point.

A Vocation isn't a Vocation until it is realized. Until then, it is all discernment.

Just as in law, the crime label upon someone isn't imposed until sentencing (which is often for a lesser charge), so it is in the spiritual life a Vocation isn't imposed until profession or ordination.

That is what is binding.

So perhaps, after all this, God is calling me to the Single Life. So be it. I will accept that. All it means is that once again I am thrust into discernment; for the Single life, properly lived, still means there is a mission and there must be some kind of consecration to God, whether ordinary or extraordinary.

As there is nothing extraordinary about me, I'll once again look into what is ordinary (i.e. Lay Dominicans, where I am most drawn) and hope to live out the simple holiness God has always intended for me. We are ALL called to Holiness, and no matter what, I will work on that foundational principle of the Christian life.

Single, apparently IS a Vocation...but not one without strings. So I'm off to find that string again, one I thought was gone but maybe is just waiting for me to come back to it.....

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St. Catherine of Siena, St. Joan of Arc, Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati.... PRAY FOR US!

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*********Please, for the love of God and for His Mercy, stop offering me advice. I'm not asking for any and don't need it. Thank you. ***

Idiocy

I'm nearing the end (I hope) of a very self-destructive week so I'm just going to keep going because at this point I have nothing to lose and don't really care:

This week a local newspaper ran an article about the planning sessions being held by the Archdiocese. I am not going to link to the article.

The article itself started off with a bad opening line, went into a basic summary of some issues faced by the local Catholic diocese, and then, if one desired, one could read the multitude of vile hatred spewed by asinine ignoramuses who aren't Catholic, who hate the Church without any factual reason for doing so, and who clearly hate anyone who professes the Catholic Faith.

As usual, several vile, ignorant, and hateful commenters trot out the abuse scandals, accuse the Vatican of withholding "wealth" and all sorts of other baseless charges leveled against the Church.

To my fellow Catholics:

The world hates us. But it hated Christ before us. Why should WE be any different?

But some of those vile, hatred-spewing idiots are unfortunately alleged "ex-Catholics", and instead of being part of the solution, they're advancing warfare against their own Mother.

We shouldn't be so surprised. People are fickle.

My fellow Catholics, if you have left the Church or are trying to leave the Church because of a few bad men, I hope you look deep into your own souls and realize you're just as evil and flawed. Who do you think you ARE, leaving the rest of the Mystical Body of Christ? What a yellow streak you have, you COWARDS! What happened to your Baptismal promises, to your Confirmation?

Or didn't you ever MEAN what you said? To you parents who had your children Baptized...didn't you MEAN it when you made those baptismal promises on behalf of your child? And now you're going to tear your children away from Jesus and take them into what, a garbage dump? Where else is there to go?

Isn't receiving OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity ENOUGH for you?

If you leave the Catholic Church because people are fallable, then you were NEVER Catholic to begin with! We aren't Catholic for our faith in Men, but for our Faith in God. And DAMMIT we are a FAMILY and you are a part of it! You do NOT get to leave your family, no matter how much your family sucks!

Blood binds, and you, Catholics, are bound by Blood, by Water, and by Oil. You don't get to leave. You can run and you think you can hide, but you'll be back because there is an indelible mark upon your soul. And you're only this angry because you feel so betrayed.

Do you think you're the only person in history who has ever been betrayed...by MAN? You haven't been betrayed by GOD, but by MAN, and MAN is fallible!

Get over yourself and focus on Our Lord who DIED for you and gave you the incredible privilege of calling you into the Catholic Church!

Our ancestors DIED for our Faith! When St. Ignatius of Antioch was eaten by lions, Catholics, average men, women, and children, who had been hiding in terror stood up and proclaimed their Christian Faith. They were all mercilessly slaughtered at the hands of pagan rulers and their henchmen. They didn't die for a lie.

And yet, you so-called "ex-Catholics" or "former-Catholics" are fleeing INTO the lies! And propagating them!

WHY are you persecuting Christ?

If our parishes close, it's YOUR own damn fault.

I'm first to admit I haven't done my part. I haven't supported my parish enough. Neither have YOU.

But there's one reason parishes are closing and I can't claim to be a part of that particular problem. Read on.....

The vile ignoramuses that comment all over secular news articles mentioning the Church keep crying that the Church is dying, the Catholic Church needs to "get with the program" or she will disappear. They say the Church is irrelevant to our age.

The vultures, clearly, are circling, but apparently they haven't read ahead; the Church will NEVER die.

The only death to be found is OUTSIDE the Church.

We see this in our modern society. Have you noticed the rate at which public schools are closing? In my county alone, my DISTRICT alone, I think, are 6 or 8 schools closing and merging.

I don't see anyone out there crying out that the American Government is dying. That's really interesting, because there are a HELL of a lot more public schools closing than there are Catholic parishes.

The reality is that both public schools and Catholic schools/parishes are actually closing for the same reason: low birth rates. Low birth rates is equal to fewer people growing up, getting jobs, paying taxes, and contributing to their parishes and other public services.

What causes low birth rates in a wealthy society such as ours?

Let's think about it..hmm.... Oh! Right! Contraception! Abortion! People, our population is IMPLODING! And NO ONE wants to acknowledge the elephant in the room. The biggest sex scandal of our time has NOTHING to do with a few perverted priests, but rather the perverted view of sex that makes people think children aren't the purpose and natural end of the sexual act!

The greatest perversion, the greatest scandal in our society is the slaughter of our unborn, and the very prevention of their lives through contraception!

But parishes are closing for more than THAT reason; greed and laziness are factors, too.

If your parish closes, it's because there aren't enough people to actually foot the bills. My guess is that there aren't enough people willing to volunteer their time to make things happen, either. I work in a parish that's doing ok, even in these times, although as it is for everyone everywhere, things are tight. Only a small percentage of the parish does ANYTHING to actually help. People arrive, they expect services they receive for free, they complain about any fees they are charged for things like religious education, never contribute to the Offertory at all, and then moan and complain that the Church isn't doing enough to help the poor, or themselves, or whatever their pet project happens to be.

HEL-LO! The Church's job is to DISTRIBUTE and ADMINISTRATE what YOU give to the poor! The POOR are YOUR problem! The people in the Church who actually keep those books take your donations and distribute them according to need and among the many different programs that require money to do things like purchase food for the poor!

And never mind the parish staff, who can't pay their own damn bills! You know why? Because YOU don't contribute enough for that, either!

What...you really think all a parish does is done for free? Maybe it could be if more of you would step up to the plate and offer your time, abilities, and expertise!

This isn't a Catholic problem.

I've spoken with people from MANY different religions, and they see the same problems, and the same causes. As it turns, out, shockingly, people are the same everywhere.

It seems to me, thought, that unfortunately, "Catholics" are the biggest whiners, especially those who actually don't know their faith at all and would rather spend time attacking it. The people who do the LEAST tend to complain the MOST when things don't go their way, and simply are at a loss when a parish they never contributed a DIME to suddenly closes. Suddenly it's someone else's fault. Let's blame it on the Vatican.

My fellow Catholics, the problems we face in the Church today are OURS. Let's take responsibility for our own failings, whether our failings belong to contraception, abortion, greediness (on our own personal part!), laziness, or anything else.

God did NOT send Christ into the world so that we could sit at His feet and whine about how no one is taking care of us and some of our spiritual leaders are sinners.

Last time I checked, Jesus died horribly for us each, individually. He called us EACH into His Body and expected we'd all contribute in some way. In fact, He sent the Holy Spirit to EMPOWER us to take Him into the world, but you know what? We suck at it, and it's because we're rejecting Him. We're sending the Holy Spirit away because we want to revel in comfort and let someone else do the heavy lifting.

Showing up for Sunday Mass once in awhile is not a "contribution". It's pathetic. Stop saying you're "contributing" or that you're "Catholic" if you haven't bothered to darken the door of a Catholic Church in decades. Stop claiming to be Catholic if your income doesn't do anything to help the Church because you refuse to offer it. Stop complaining there isn't anything in the Church for you if you're not willing to get off your fat, pampered lazy duff and offer your talents and ideas and abilities. Stop thinking that meeting the minimal premises of our Faith (which you probably can't even list) is enough.

We are not called to mediocrity, but to glory. And yes, that means YOU!

Catholics, remember who you are, who you were called to be, and in the words of St. Leo the Great, remember your dignity!

Even those of you who have fallen away...the Church needs YOU! Stop fighting so hard, suck it up, and just come back! What, you think you're the only one who has ever sinned?

Have you not read my blog? Sheesh!

I'm tired. I'm going to bed. I don't really care what the rest of you do, but the Church belongs to God. I'm in Sales and I suck at it. If you have a problem with anything I said here, take it up with Management. That would be God.

He can be reached by saying the following:

O God, Come to my Assistance. Lord, Make haste to help me.

Glory be to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, As it was in the beginning is now and will be forever, Amen.....

Hunting Season in Minnesota

I haven't gone deer hunting in several years, but I thought it would be fun to show you the only deer I ever had the opportunity to shoot. I'm proud to say I was quite successful in that endeavor:

Unfortunately that one had to stay in its natural habitat. Not fit for human consumption. What a pity. Under all that blaze orange, that one had nice flanks. And just LOOK at that rack!

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Disclaimer: Unfortunately, no deer were harmed in the production of this photograph. If a deer had actually been harmed, it would be displayed, hanging, with its innards removed and me standing next to it drenched in gore, grinning widely. That would have been followed by a photograph of me grilling the recently deceased in my special steak marinade.

But instead of that nice feast, all you get is this lousy picture.

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St. Therese of Lisieux

Like so many, I have long loved St. Therese of Lisieux, and at times in the past she has made her intercession known to me.

I specifically recall one evening, I'd gone to the church for Adoration and decided to go to Confession. I didn't have anything major to confess, although all the sins of my past were weighing on me heavily; I wasn't accepting of God's mercy, I was angry about several things (the new-revert syndrome, as I call it), and was quietly weeping in a corner of the chapel, near St. Therese's statue.

A woman I didn't know came up to me and handed me a little booklet as she whispered, "I came here today to give this to someone, but that person isn't here. I think I'm supposed to give it to you." I thanked her, and, wiping my eyes, stared down at this little home-made much-copied folded-paper booklet of prayers and devotions of St. Therese of Lisieux.

St. Therese and the Priesthood

If I recall correctly, St. Therese had a special love for the priesthood, a special devotion for this great gift Christ had left us, all so that we could be brought closer to Him through His chosen Ministers.

I have to wonder if maybe my own devotion to the priesthood began with my devotion to St. Therese of Lisieux? It is something to ponder, for the Saints never point to themselves; when we involve them in our prayer life, they direct us towards Our Lord, and to towards anything that will deepen our love for Him.

I don't recall what Saint said it, or if it was a private revelation to a saint, but I do remember reading the words, "The greatest way to honor Jesus is to honor the priesthood!" (Could it have been St. John Vianney?)

Ah, but so I've wandered in this post, as I usually do.

Flowers from Heaven

So many people say they have received roses from St. Therese. Fr. MacRae posted a particularly touching story yesterday on his blog, one I needed to read for I needed a reminder of the miraculous. Especially this week.

I've never received a rose from St. Therese. I don't think I've ever actually received roses from anyone, for that matter, although I used to pray for them all the time. While I've received signs of her intercession, it was apparently never God's will that I receive a physical rose, and maybe that's for the best.

After all...flowers wilt and die and God knows I can't keep green things alive.

But I rejoice that others do receive this sign, for even knowing their stories and witnessing their miracles, I take heart knowing that prayers are not spoken in vain and indeed, St. Therese is making good on her promise to shower roses from heaven upon the earth for those who most need such a sign of God's love.

I've been praying for a rose this week, though, admittedly not with much faith. If it be God's will, the Saint will send a rose. If not, my faith (or currently, lacking faith) will not be affected.

The one thing we always have to keep in mind is that our belief, our Faith, does not rest on miraculous signs, but rather, on the Cross and Resurrection. If we are not receiving signs, perhaps it is because we've been called to the Cross, and in the shadow of that, the greatest Sign in history, a rose simply has no beauty to compare to the redemptive sacrifice of Our Lord.

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