Letting Go

Why is it so darn hard to let go?

My baby boy, Benjamin, who turns sixteen this September, got his first job last week at a nearby restaurant. Bedraggled and exhausted after eight straight hours on his feet bussing tables, he told me he’d barely had time to scarf down food or take a break. His feet hurt. My heart hurt. Am I crazy to cry a bucket of tears because my baby’s growing up?

He’s the child we call “well loved;” the one who was treasured and coddled endlessly by his dad and me, and all of his older siblings. He was the apple of a whole family’s eye, and we relished his happy disposition and the white, curly locks that set him apart among the rest of our children, whose looks are predominantly Latin.

I’d had it in my head we would get this one “right.” We were mature parents (for the most part) by the time Ben was born, and Bernie and I felt sure we could spare him the mistakes we’d inflicted inadvertently on our first four. We just wouldn’t do the same stupid things we'd done in the past. Besides, we were too tired to offer anything but smiles and kisses. Forget discipline. Thanks be to God Ben rarely needed it. It was all going to be love, happiness and blessings for him. Right?

Then came the big bump in the road—the unforeseen tragedy, when life, as we knew it, turned on a dime. Bernie died, and our household changed in one fell swoop from a bustling center of activity for seven busy people, to the dreadfully quiet dwelling of a single mother and frightened, fatherless nine-year-old child. Kara, Alex, Gaby and Christian left one by one—goodbye after goodbye came. Everything was different, even as I tried my best to provide some sense of safety and normalcy in our home. It didn’t always go so well.

I vividly recall the night Ben and I sat at our large, family table to have dinner alone for the first time. He had begged me to cook pork chops, a family favorite, and I had happily complied. By the time the pork chops were served, the silence in the house was pounding in my ears, proving to be more than I could take. I escaped the table to have a major fall apart in the bedroom closet, leaving the television as Ben’s only supper company—a first, since I had always been a stickler about keeping the T.V. off while we ate.

I couldn’t shield my child from the trauma and sadness of life, and it literally broke my heart. I want to shelter him now as he goes off to work, knowing he has sore feet, tired legs and a belly full of butterflies. He’s nervous about doing a good job at the restaurant; he’d rather be riding his bike and swimming with friends, caught in the painful transition between boyhood and manhood—held, too, in the crossfire of a mother’s heart that wants to keep him tucked in.

Yet I know I can’t.

The moment has arrived to let go a little, offer him up to God, nudge him toward the edge of the nest so he can learn to fly. These are the birth pangs of the push forward, and birth pangs, like delivery, hurt.

The question every mother must face is upon me: will I let go, let God and trust? Do I trust that Ben will find his own ground, and the ground of God’s heart, even if his feet hurt now? I do trust. Even in the midst of labor pains, even in the midst of knowing that manhood is coming all too fast, even as I am aware that before I blink, thirty-three years of caring for kids at home will come to a close. Breathe. Push. Just like giving birth.

Do Catholics Believe In Near Death Experiences?

With the immense popularity of “Heaven Is For Real” and other books about experiences in the afterlife,  the topic of Near-Death Experiences (NDEs) has taken front and center stage. Though the Catholic Church has no formal teaching on NDEs, plenty of people claim to have had one, including my late husband Bernie. The descriptions of these experiences often take on a tone of either Protestant Fundamentalism or the New Age. But Bernie’s experience was--would I dare to say--amazingly, authentically Catholic!

As a Catholic theologian who has taught the faith for fifteen years, I have never publicly addressed the topic of NDEs before. Those experiences fall into the category of what the Church calls “private” revelation—a topic I tend to stay away from when teaching Catholic doctrine. * However, Bernie’s life-changing NDE, chronicled in detail in my book Miracle Man, compelled me to share his incredible story with others. Why? Because Bernie’s “come to Jesus,” which he shared with me after miraculously waking up from a six week coma that was induced by a massive heart attack and multiple organ failure, highlighted some important truths of the Catholic faith that could use re-stating today. These include:

• We don’t get a “free pass” to heaven because we’re convinced we’re “a good person.”
• We are judged by God on the good or evil we have done in this life (Rom. 2:5-10).
• God, who loves each of us personally and infinitely, has gone and will go to great lengths to save us and bring us home to heaven.
• In the end, life and eternal life are about LOVE--and life on this earth is meant to teach us to love and be loved.

Bernie learned all of those lessons first hand during his NDE after suffering “the widow maker” in December 2008, which he inexplicably survived. Within a week of his heart attack, Bernie’s heart, liver, kidneys and lungs failed, leaving him comatose and on life support as doctors tried to save him—uncertain if he had any brain function left. Astoundingly, Bernie did an about face and began to recover, surprising his doctors and earning him the name “Miracle Man” among the hospital’s medical staff. He eventually woke up, was weaned off the ventilator and regained his ability to speak. Though still in the Intensive Care Unit, Bernie asked me one day if I wanted to hear about his Near-Death Experience.

I responded, of course, with a resounding “Yes!” Given the fact that I had prayed for his conversion for 24 long years and that I was at his bedside the night a nurse shocked his heart three times to keep him alive, I had a hunch he may have met God. But I never expected to hear what he said next.

“I died and I clearly remember it,” Bernie began.   “I saw my soul leave my body and was looking down on my body from above.” After describing in detail how he saw the condition of his soul, as well as the things he had done in his life that were pleasing and unpleasing to God, Bernie shared this zinger: “Judy, I followed the light all of the way to heaven. And when I got there, I wasn’t permitted to enter.” That from a man who steadfastly maintained that he was sure he was going to heaven because he was a “good person.”

Bernie was then sent back by God to make amends for his life, but not before meeting terrifying creatures that beat him brutally as they screamed in his ears repeatedly, “We’re here to help you!!!”  You’ll have to read the book to find out how the story ends (it’s nothing short of amazing), but suffice it for now to say that Bernie was a changed man after his NDE. So much so that he spent the last six weeks of his life telling me, “You have no idea how much God loves you…You have absolutely no idea how much God loves you!”

Because in spite of seeing his own inner darkness and his need for conversion and purification, Bernie’s overarching experience of his encounter with God was one of unfathomable love. Love that died on the Cross for his sins. Love that chased him down to beckon him into a relationship with Himself. And Love that waited to embrace him and welcome him home with the words, “You are my beloved son. In you I am well pleased.”

In the end, what matters most about “private” revelations like NDEs is the fruit they produce. In other words, they can be considered authentic insofar as they help us to “live more fully” by “Christ’s definitive revelation” (CCC par. 67). Christ revealed that God is love, and that Love holds us accountable for our lives and for our actions. Though those two statements seem contradictory in today’s world, they nonetheless contain the age-old truth of Christianity. That’s the truth Bernie discovered when he met God. And it’s the truth that would ultimately transform him and lead him to eternal life.

*(See the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  Par. 67 for the Church’s teaching on “private” revelation.)

A Catholic Girl's Litany of Humility

This was too good not to share!  Enjoy this guest blog by my daughter, Kara Klein.  Happy Easter!

Oh, to be female, single and Catholic! A state of great ambivalence (or may we say, distress!) for all too many in today’s world. With the feminine desire to make a gift of herself through marriage in a society where people flee commitment, and with deep longings to bring forth life amidst a culture of death, the future for the devout Catholic female can sometimes look a little grim. While the problem of prolonged singlehood is deep, multi-faceted, and cannot be blamed on (nor solved with) one sex, race, or generation, what do we single Catholic women do while we wait for the desire of our hearts?

Like Mary, we say “yes” with a whole heart to Jesus Christ, who is Love itself, hope with joyful expectation, and learn to love right where we are.

We long for love, but sometimes we’re more focused on being the recipients. We want to be pursued, romanced, courted and carried off into the sunset—which is only natural, as it’s how God made us. But as women, we are called not only to receive love, but also to give it freely. Even now as we wait.

Perhaps this time of waiting for so many is a time of purification, as God refashions our hearts to seek to love rather than seeking to be loved by those around us. We need women today in our world who are willing to love sacrificially without counting the cost—for the sake of the other, and not for what that person gives them.

Can we young singles lay down the desire to be on pedestal for the desire to serve? Can we dare to put others before us? Dare to put Christ first? Dare to be content right where we are, to embrace our lives with gratitude as they are today, trusting that we are in God’s will? Can we dare to be humble?

My roommates and I recently wondered what a Catholic single girl’s Litany of Humility would look like. We came up with this:

From the desire of being stared at…

From the desire of being called, messaged, emailed, tweeted, Facebook stalked or Instagramed…

From the desire of being told I’m gorgeous…

From the desire of hearing there isn’t, never was, and never will be anyone else quite like me…

From the desire of a four-carat diamond ring…

Deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being alone…

From the fear forever being a bridesmaid…

From the fear of gaining 5 more pounds…

From the fear of my ticking biological clock…

From the fear of the single life being my permanent vocation…

Deliver me, Jesus.

That others be pursued more than I…

That others get asked out more than I…

That others get married before I do…

That others have children even when I don’t…

That others be happier than I, provided that I become as happy I should…

Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

Jesus, meek and humble of heart, unafraid to be single till the day you died, hear us.

It hurts to stop looking for the love we long to have, to stop demanding love, and instead, search every day for ways we can offer it to the world around us. But as a priest once told me, “In becoming a woman, you must be the one to love, to serve, to give, and you will find the joy you are looking for.”

Requiescat In Pace

I feel called to share this excerpt from Miracle Man on the sixth anniversary of Bernie's death.  I wrote this final "Bernie Update" to our family and friends days after his funeral on the Feast of St. Joseph.  The Miracle Man taught me all about persevering love, and our journey together infused my being with Holy Hope… the hope that is borne of suffering and birthed through love.    Bernard Joseph Klein, rest in peace.

March 22, 2009,  Final Update

Dear Friends:

Bernard Joseph Klein was buried on the Feast of St. Joseph on Thursday, March 19, 2009. When we awoke, a dense fog covered the area, but by the time we arrived at Our Lady of the Lake Church, the sun had broken through, ushering in a glorious sunny day. It is difficult to share what is in my heart, but I would like to give you a glimpse of the day in Bernie's honor.

The funeral liturgy was absolutely beautiful, as we were graced with the angelic voices of Kitty Cleveland and the St. Scholastica Academy Choir under the direction of a most gifted pianist and friend, Sharon Scharmer.  Fr. John Talamo, Fr. Beau Charbonnet and Fr. Robert Cavalier honored us by presiding over the liturgy, and their presence on the altar in gold robes made present to us Christ's priestly presence in heaven—sacred, redemptive, all-powerful. I have never been so happy to be Catholic as I was on Thursday. I stood in awe and wonder as I watched the rich symbolism of the funeral Mass unfold, reminding us of Bernie's baptismal vows, his presence at the heavenly banquet of the Lamb of God, his marriage to the Eternal Bridegroom. As sad a day as it was, it was equally joy filled thanks to the consolation of the hope of heaven, and the love of our family and friends—all tangible and very real to me as I stood in the church with the symbols of heaven before my eyes surrounded by people who love me, Bernie and our family.

When the funeral Mass ended, we processed to the cemetery of St. Joseph Abbey, where many of the monks and priests of our archdiocese are laid to rest. It is holy ground, full of silence, prayer and majestic oaks. As we drove up to Bernie's gravesite following the hearse, seven Marines stood at full attention waiting for his arrival. It took my breath away to see them standing there and to remember how proud Bernie was of serving in the Marine Corps—the place where he found his personal gifts and his identity as a man. A twenty-one-gun salute and "Taps" followed our prayers, along with the folding of the American flag accompanied by Kitty's gorgeous voice singing "Amazing Grace." It was a moment none of us will soon forget.

 After the services concluded, we made our way to the home of our dear friends, Angele and Gary Darling. Gary is an incredible chef and he laid out a delicious banquet for us, including his famous Jamaican Jerk Chicken Salad and Mediterranean Hummus. We ate, laughed and cried as we remembered Bernie and his unique personality. A gentle wind blew through the French doors that were open throughout the house, and the Holy Spirit was very present as we shared a meal and fellowship in remembrance of Bernie. I returned home that evening with my heart full, feeling as though I had been to a wedding reception instead of a funeral. It was a happy ending to a day I had dreaded and prayed against for months —the funeral of my spouse.

 As I write these words, my heart is full of gratitude for Bernie's love and life. I am grateful for his illness and for three months spent in a hospital room filled with tender moments of love and grace. I am grateful for the outpouring of support, love and prayer that came forth in the midst of such a profound personal tragedy. And I am grateful to God for his faithfulness, and for the reality that he continually seeks after us, wooing us with opportunities to know and embrace his Fatherly love. In the end, that was what this journey was all about—for Bernie and for me.

Thank you for your love and for carrying Bernie on the wings of prayer into the arms of Our Lord. I am eternally grateful, and I know he is too.

With love and thanksgiving.

Judy

Finding The Ultimate Pleasure Park

Sign up for my Virtual Book Tour on my Home page and watch my exclusive new interview with broadcast journalist Mary Lou McCall, which will be available on my website next week!

We live in a world where pleasure-seeking has become a highly prized ritual. And we keep upping the ante on what constitutes “pleasure.” Sado-masochism is being normalized, evidenced by the immense popularity of “Fifty Shades of Grey.” Addiction is rampant, and kids are smoking more than “plain old pot.” They are, instead, indulging themselves in cheap, synthetic marijuana, guaranteed to give both an outrageous high and a psychotic break.

The stakes are going up, and so are the consequences. I’ve gotten five phone calls in the last few weeks from desperate mothers trying to figure out what to do about their drug-abusing children. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that our societal disorder is escalating. So, what in the world is the answer?

I was praying about our collective cultural quandary the other day, and quite frankly, my heart was heavy. I decided to meditate on where it all began—the place where sin, chaos and disorder first entered the world. I began reading Genesis and glanced down at the footnote for Genesis 2:8, where the Garden of Eden, paradise, is first mentioned. I was stunned to learn that “Eden,” translated literally from the Greek, means “pleasure park.” Well, I thought, that explains everything!

Human beings first resided in a pleasure park, and it was positively delightful. Teeming with love, life and light, God’s blessing rested everywhere. Banished from paradise due to original sin, we’ve been trying to recreate Eden ever since. We seek endless pseudo-pleasures to fill the void, yet we avoid the one thing that can bring us real fulfillment.

Because here’s the thing: the bliss of paradise consisted in being in God’s presence, and in enjoying an intimate love relationship with Him. Paradise cannot be found outside of the Divine Presence—no matter how wildly we seek it elsewhere. St. Augustine, who discovered this personally, said it this way: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”

It’s not surprising that the less time we make for the pleasure of God’s presence, the more frantic and chaotic we become in trying to fill the God-void. Busyness is epidemic today, as we chase after endless activities, trying to do it all. On occasion, when we’re “still,” we plug ourselves into any number of gadgets that consume our attention.  The endless noise makes it impossible to find interior silence, the place where Presence dwells and the sacred space into which God speaks.

How do we get back to Eden? Where do we find again God’s life, love and light? We must cultivate the garden of our soul, and we must be intentional about doing it.

There is no substitute for spending time alone with the Lord daily, where we speak to Him, become still and listen for His voice.   God asks each of us, every day: “Where are you?” and He wants us to honestly tell Him. He yearns to uncover, possess and penetrate our hearts, and He wants us, in turn, to unveil ourselves, remove our fig leaves and let Him come in.

The secret to finding paradise is simple, yet it comes with a cost. If we “waste” time in God’s presence, and seek Him for His own sake, the place of delight will unfold from within like a beautiful garden. And the pleasure park it contains will surprise and satisfy us with its sweet, healing fruit.

The Woman Of My Dreams

by Kara Klein

What a joy and delight to hear the amazing testimony of my daughter, Kara Klein,  at the Magnificat Breakfast this week.  Truly, the Lord has done great things for her, and holy is His name. Enjoy her guest blog!  

Recently at the national Focus conference I heard gifted speaker Sara Swafford tell a group of single young women: “Become the woman of your dreams and you’ll attract the man of your dreams.” This struck a deep chord in me.

As we enter into a new year, and resolutions fill conversations and various forms of media, I’ve been asking myself:

“What do I want for this new year? Not merely, what do I want to do, but who do I want to become? Who is the woman of my dreams?”

Initially, what comes to my mind is: perfection. I want to be perfect, of course. Virtuous and valiant, strong yet sweet, to always do the right thing, say the right thing, know the right thing, to be successful in all I attempt, to love without faltering.

Yet I once heard the very wise Fr. Jacques Philippe say: “More than God wants our perfection, more than he wants our success, He just wants our trust.”

What kind of woman would I be if I didn’t so much grasp after being perfect as much as I trusted in God with my whole heart? If my whole presence exuded the reality: “All is well. We have a Father. He is real, and He is good. We can trust Him with our entire being, abandon ourselves to Him without reserve. And no matter what happens—though the mountains crumble around us and the earth melt like wax before us—we are in His loving hands, and He is working all things for our good.”

Probably I would be less like Eve, and more like Mary. Less like the one who took matters into her own hands out of fear that her Maker was holding out on her, and more like the one who said, “the Lord has done great things for me and holy is His name!”

I think we Christians complicate our lives more than we realize. We think we have to do so much, be so much, achieve so much, discover so much; when all we really have to do is say “yes.” A simple “Let it be done unto me according to your will. Today.

Yes to loving the person that is right in front of us; yes to accepting with peace life as it unfolds before us; yes to trusting radically like a little child. Simple, but not easy.

To be a woman whose trust and joy are not based upon the ever-changing circumstances around her, but solely in a God who loves her. That is a woman of faith. And that is the woman of my dreams.

The Secret to Scaling the Summit

Today's blog is dedicated to my precious daughter, Alexandra, with love and thanksgiving for your tender beauty, grace and strength.  Happy birthday, DeeDee Bop A Loula!  I love you!!!!

The summer my late husband Bernie died, I figured that the best way to survive what I knew would be a long, hot, lonely summer at home was to get out of town for a while. My daughter, Alex, who was twenty-one at the time, agreed to accompany her nine-year-old brother, Benjamin, and me as we set out on our first “vacation” after Bernie’s death—an event which any widow can tell you is emotionally daunting. Providentially, we visited three beautiful mountain towns that summer: Jackson Hole, WY, Crested Butte, CO and Caesar’s Head, SC. And as God is wont to do, He used both the sweet company of my daughter and the stunning mountain landscapes not only to provide consolation, but to remind my still fragile heart of some of life’s most precious secrets.

When we arrived in Jackson Hole, I told Alex that I wanted to take a hike. I had in mind a nice, leisurely walk beside a clear, running stream. She took me instead for trek straight up a mountain trail, a trudge that is more than a bit challenging for someone like me, given that I’m not athletic, am scared of heights and am unaccustomed to high altitudes.

Alex, who a year later would run a half-marathon on those very same mountains, insisted that we push our way up the peaks anyway. She knew from experience that the reward of climbing the mountain—the breathtaking, invigorating vistas—could only be seen from on high.

“Come on, Mom, you can do it. Drink lots of water,” she said repeatedly as I panted for breath. Because as any experienced climber can tell you, the number one trick for making it up the mountain is drinking plenty of water.

As I stopped repeatedly to quench my thirst and catch my breath, I thought about how important water is to both our natural and spiritual lives—especially in times of drought. Living water, water that will never run dry, comes to us through a relationship Jesus, who is the fountain of life (John 4:14). He slakes our thirst continually as we give ourselves over to Him and drench ourselves in His love. His love sustains us in times of sorrow and suffering, especially if we have let it soak deep into our souls over time.

My mountain trek also reminded me of how indispensable food is for the journey. “Stop and eat a snack,” Alex insisted after an arduous period of climbing when I was feeling weak and disoriented, convinced that I couldn’t go on. I remember the long, painful days in the ICU, when the only thing that kept me going was the Holy Eucharist—the superabundant Bread of Life—mercifully delivered to the hospital by a Eucharistic minister. I do not believe I’d have survived the suffering we endured that year without the Eucharist. Just as I know that I would have been unable to continue climbing upward with Alex without natural sustenance.

With Alex by my side, I also learned that if you’re going to climb a mountain, don’t try to do it alone. If you get injured, lost or can’t go forward, you need someone there to help. In fact, you may even need someone who loves you to carry you to safety.

One day in Crested Butte, we hiked a mile up a mountain to see an exquisite waterfall at the top. Young Benjamin started out with a bang, running ahead of us for the first half-mile. Twenty minutes later, his little legs collapsed and he couldn’t go any further. Though he weighed sixty some-odd pounds at the time, he simply needed to be carried. Strong, loving Alex carried him on her back most of the way to the top, reminding me of how she had demonstrated the same strength for her dad and me as Bernie’s life came to a close. She bravely sat beside us, holding our hands. Her faithful presence was a tremendous gift as we scaled a painful, frightening summit, and she stood steady with us to the very end.

God and the mountains teach their lessons, and so do those whom we love. It’s not necessarily what they say out loud that communicates who and what they are, but their strong, abiding presence that tells us everything.

What the World Needs Now

In honor of the nearly sixty million babies who have been aborted  in America since Roe vs. Wade legalized abortion in 1973, I feel compelled to repost this blog.  Mary, Mother of Life and Mother of the Unborn, pray for us.

“I didn’t know it would be so hard!” That was the second time in a week I’d heard those words from a mother’s lips, this time before morning Mass from a teary-eyed mother asking for prayers for her teenage son. As I saw the searing pain in this beautiful mother’s eyes, I thought of the sword that pierced Our Lady’s heart, and of all of the varied swords that have pierced the hearts of mothers throughout the ages.

After spending a week recently with my daughter Gaby and her three young sons, ages 6, 3 and 19 months (with a fourth baby due in April), I am reminded of just how sacrificial and self-giving motherhood calls a woman to be. Motherhood continually demands the pouring of oneself out in love for the good of others.

“There’s no rest for the weary,” I joked with Gaby amid the whirlwind of non-stop activity with three very busy little boys. But she pressed forward, stretching herself to be patient, to speak kindly, and to use the last bit of the day’s energy to sing lullabies and pray with her boys before they went to sleep.

“Women will be saved through motherhood, provided they persevere in faith and love and holiness, with self-control” (1 Timothy 2:15). This is God’s promise; but it is a promise with a provision: faith, love, holiness and self-control are required for “saving” motherhood. I dare say those virtues are what the world needs most right now.

One of my favorite feast days is the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, under which title I have a great devotion to Our Lady. Mt. Carmel is the location in northern Israel where hermits dedicated to Our Lady gathered to live and pray in the 12th century. It was on this same mountain that the prophet Elijah won a showdown with the infamous queen Jezebel, who had led Israel into idolatry through perverse pagan practices, including offering human sacrifices and sexual rituals to the fertility gods. Jezebel’s legacy is one of grasping for power, using manipulation, domination and control to get her way. Her life eventually went to the dogs, by which she was eaten. She is the antithesis of Our Lady, whose legacy is one of total self-surrender to God in faith, love and holiness. She is the woman who birthed the God-man, and whose life ended by being received bodily into heaven to be crowned as Queen of the Universe.

Jezebel or Mary? Each generation of women faces the perennial question of which way we will go. It is an ever-present temptation to take matters into our own hands, and to reject the demands of love that press in from every side—especially the ones that engage our hearts and bodies in a posture of expansive, self-giving love. The choice of which way to go seems to play out most poignantly on the sacred ground of our fertility and in how we welcome new human life into the world.

The Catholic Church’s age-old teaching concerning human life is profoundly counter-cultural, and it is becoming more so daily. At this moment in history, it takes heroic virtue to practice the teaching of the Church, that is, to be open to life and to receive each child as a gift from God. This entails rejecting the notion of “controlling” one’s fertility through contraception and abortion, along with surrendering one’s body to God in “faith, love and holiness, with self-control” (1 Tim. 2:15). Such an act of faith can be daunting when one has embraced a contraceptive or abortive mentality for many years. I know it was for me.

Thankfully, I am encountering more than a few young women today who are going the way of the Church. They are going the way of Mary by saying “yes” to life, even in the face of great cultural odds. “Yes” when they don’t have the whole thing figured out. “Yes” when they may be subject to persecution. And “yes” when it means that they will have to truly stretch themselves to be conduits of love in a cultural climate that frowns upon more than 1.8 children per family. Their stance takes bravery and selflessness, along with radical trust in God.

What the world needs now are many more women like them who incarnate faith, love, and holiness for us. And above all, self-control. These young women bear the piercing sword of this age—the rejection of life as a gift from God, meant to be received in His way, on His terms, in His time. They are a sign of contradiction for a world longing for real love and longing for the way of Christ, who is the way of Mary.

As we sadly remember the legalization of abortion in America, may we entrust ourselves to Mary, the Mother of God, the archetype of maternity and the willing bearer of True Life.

The Lord Sings Joyfully Because of ME?

I had an epiphany in the Adoration Chapel on Tuesday morning, on the real Feast of the Epiphany.

After the past few weeks of Christmas craziness and sporadic, half-baked prayer time, my husband Mark and I happily settled back on Monday into our morning routine of “wasting” lavish time with the Lord in the chapel before Mass. Yay! But I showed up at the chapel that day agitated and distracted, unable to concentrate or pray. I was preoccupied with my sins and myself, and proceeded to present my list of leftover holiday “junk” to the Lord.

“Ok, Lord,” I started. “I did it again this Christmas. I prayed too little, spent too much, ate too much, drank too much and gossiped too much…So much for my intention of having a holy, prayerful Christmas.”

I was disconcerted throughout the hour, certain that God was as disgusted with me as I was with myself. After heading home, I spent the rest of the day wasting lavish time on Facebook and other Internet excursions, ending the day with a stiff neck, more irritated with myself than when the day began.

Back in the chapel Tuesday morning, on the real Feast of the Epiphany, I opened to the morning readings:

The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a mighty savior. He will rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in his love. He will sing joyfully because of you.   Zephaniah 3:17

Those words rang at me. “You will sing joyfully because of me, Lord?” I asked. “You rejoice over me?”

I sat there with my eyes shut tight in our sunny little chapel, trying to picture God singing joyfully over me. It was pretty hard to imagine. I then tried to recall the times in my own life when I had sung joyfully over others, and two vivid images came to mind.

First, I remembered the many times I had nursed my children at my breast while singing to them, along with the surge of joy I had experienced as I beheld a beautiful baby in my arms. I remembered the happy surprise of falling madly in love with each child, experiencing a depth of love I'd never even dreamed was possible. I had sung over my children and rejoiced.

He will sing joyfully because of you.

As I further pondered those words, a second, more recent memory came to mind, which occurred when I married my husband, Mark. For months, I walked around the house constantly singing a song I’d made up to the tune of “Emmanuel.” My silly song went like this: “Markisimo...Gelisimo...your name is called...Markisimo.” (No, Kara did not get her songwriting skills from me:)

“I’ve never had anyone sing my name before,” Mark responded to my singing, delighted that I sang joyfully out of love for him.

“Judy, that’s just an inkling of the way that I love you,” I heard the Lord gently whisper as I smiled. “There is nothing you or anyone else can do to make me love you more or less. I love you infinitely. I am love.” With that, my heart filled with joy.

Moments later, I opened the book I had brought to the chapel to read, and amazingly, found my apparently all-too-common dilemma on the page before my eyes:

"The sadness of not being perfect is a feeling that is much too human, it can even border on idolatry,” I read St. Francis of Assisi's words to his friend, Brother Leo, who was depressed and defeated by his sins. “Focus your vision outside of yourself, on the beauty, graciousness and compassion of Jesus Christ,” St. Francis advised. “Accept being shipwrecked. See only the compassion, the infinite patience and the tender love of Christ. Jesus is Lord. That suffices.”

I am learning that God does not relish in my getting it right, doing it right, or being right. Instead, He delights when I let go of my futile attempts at performance and let Him love me. Our God is a merciful Father who sings over His children, a Father who tenderly picks us up when we fall and who rejoices over us with gladness simply because He loves us. May this epiphany hold me fast throughout the coming year.

Held

Overcome with emotion as I watched my dear friend, Melanie, walk through the front door of the tiny chapel last Friday evening, the tears were flowing freely.   Tears of happiness that my fellow widow was getting married again, mixed with tears of remembrance of all of the times we had wept together after our husbands died.

Those were some raw, painful days. But this was a new day. We were celebrating a resurrection.

Mel glowed radiantly as she walked up the aisle of the rustic 18^th Century Baton Rouge church, where her fiancé, Bob, and her two sons—both Protestant pastors—waited in front to celebrate nuptial vows. The moment could not have been more beautiful, with eight little ivory clad granddaughters preceding the bride, and a harpist throwing ethereal sounds through open windows that welcomed the encroaching dusk. Quite the contrast to the many evenings Mel and I had spent at my home sharing stories of shattered dreams and weeping together, even as we reminded each other that we were still safe in the embrace of God, maybe being held closer than ever before.

Her story included the agonizing disappointment of failed marriage, followed by the all too brief elation of meeting and marrying a best friend, a devout Christian man with whom she was happily prepared to spend the rest of her life. They'd been married just twenty eight months when Don was struck dead late one September afternoon, hit head-on by a crystal meth-crazed driver as he toured a country road on the motorcycle he loved. The wreckage was immense on every level. I met Mel shortly thereafter, and I watched her scrape herself out of bed day after day to tend to the needs of her eleven-year-old son and meet with clients in her counseling practice. I marveled that she was able to get out of bed at all, to put one foot in front of the other and continue to walk forward—and that she trusted that God had not abandoned her. Natalie Grant’s song “Held” became her anthem, and she played it all day long to remember that God was holding her, even in the midst of her pain and darkness:

This is what it means to be held, how it feels, when the sacred is torn from your life

And you survive. This is what it is to be loved, and to know that the promise was that when everything fell, we'd be held.

We huddled together and held on, and we were held. And now, on another September day, a new holding was taking place. I pondered the mystery of life’s seasons as we beheld this resurrection:

Do you take this woman… to have and to hold, from this day forward…until death do you part?

Melanie was getting married, and God and Bob would hold her now.

God-incidentally, Mel’s wedding happened to be the same weekend that I was celebrating the second anniversary of marriage to my precious husband, Mark. Mark and I met two years after my late husband, Bernie, died of a massive heart attack. Having just returned from working abroad for twenty-seven years as a Catholic missionary, Mark was spending several hours a day praying in the Adoration Chapel, discerning what God had in store for him next. It was there that we met.

We struck up a friendship, centered on our faith in God and on our mutual love of Catholic theology. Walks on the lakefront discussing theology and philosophy turned into discussions about our life journeys. The reality of jarring and unexpected changes, the death of lifelong dreams and the prospect of futures uncertain all became fodder for conversation. Mark and I became closest friends over the months, and a year after we met we were engaged.

On September 29, 2012, the Feast of the Archangels, we pronounced our wedding vows at Sacred Heart Catholic Church amidst the pouring rain. Many nights since then Mark has held me close, catching tears of gratitude for my new life with him, as well as tears of still fresh grief from life’s unanticipated wounds.

All of that came rushing in as I watched a dear friend with whom I’ve shared so much walk up the aisle, her feet and face light with happiness. It would have been enough for us to be held by God, and that’s all we were hoping for, really. But to be held again in the arms of marital love was an unexpected rebirth for both of us. I give heartfelt thanks to God for the gift of new embrace, for Melanie and for me.