On Saturday, April 7th, during the Easter Vigil, our son's fiancee' Adrain, followed the new Paschal Candle through the doors of St. Theresa's Catholic Church. After a year of discussion and studying and inquisition and reading and discernment, she followed a physical sign representing the Light of the World, through the doors of a Catholic church, into the faith of our family.
Because of her answer to this call, our grandchildren, before they are even called into being, have been given a gift: the gift of a two parents sharing a faith, the gift of parents who know that for a marriage to have any chance of surviving it must be built on faith and dependance on God.
Several family and friends have asked me what led to her decision to join the Catholic church.
We live in a world of curiosity. We are constantly wanting to know what is going on in other people's lives, in other people backyards, in other people's business. I do not object to the questions at all. If I am truthful, I've pondered them myself.
Faith, afterall, is not something to be taken lightly. Certainly there is great discernment done before answering a call to change one's religion.
The girl I've come to know and love would not mind them at all either and would answer in her own quiet, giving way. For her there is
no secret, no great revelation, no mystery. She loves our son and wishes to make a home, a family, a life with him. Part of that encompasses the church they shall attend and the faith they shall practice.
But, for the mothers among us, life becomes a deeper mystery when we first hold that babe in our arms, stare into his eyes, and wonder (pray) over what the future has in store for him. We are always trying to get inside our children's hearts. From there, everything becomes a mystery. Love is a crazy thing and it does that.
I have not spoken to Adrain at length about her decision to join the faith of our family. Part of me doesn't feel the need to know. I've heard others ask her and some who went to R.C.I.A. classes with them have shared bits but, overall, we have simply welcomed her decision with a quiet faith that God's hands are at work in the life of our family.
That is enough for us.
This particular blessing has taught me more than ever that nothing my husband and I ever did in raising our children is worthy of this grace. We did nothing at all.
It is a grace freely given and, thus, should be freely received.
Sometimes questions place a burden upon our shoulders that God never intended us to shoulder.
I tend to see the failings in my past parenting all too quickly. I'm a mess at wanting to turn back the clock and do it all over again...corectly this time.
I sigh in resignation and know that I have no choice...none whatsoever...than to give it all back to God and ask Him to make it whole again, good again...
...worthy...of something! anything!
He has intervened on this young couple and blessed them abundantly. Not that they deserve it. Not that our family deserves it. We deserve nothing. In a world that lives an entitlement mentality this is a foreign notion and, often, a scary idea. Yet we come into this world naked and we leave naked. The very first breath of air we breathe, and each breath thereafter, is a gift. Everything given is a gift. We deserve nothing.
That our whole family is blessed because of one girl's personal decision, that our family lineage is blessed because of a choice made, is a Paschal bonus, part of the Paschal Mystery. Some mysteries cannot be solved no matter how hard we analyze them, inspect them, and turn them over and over in our heads, hands, and heart.
Sometimes, in order to fully appreciate a gift, we have to let go of the mystery, place it back in God's hands and ...
Be Still!
For me, this has been a part of God's business and I am hesitant to question His business.
Afterall, gifts should leave our hearts full of thanksgiving, not questions.
{courtesy of Richard Paul Evans}
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