This afternoon was a little strange, in a hand-of-God kind of way.
I had taken a day off from work, as we had a homeschool evaluation scheduled for our kids at 10 o'clock. I also had a call with a priest from the Avila Institute for spiritual direction at noon (which was scheduled back in January--a four month waiting list).
The conversation with the priest was rather ordinary and commonplace. I gave him some of my background, a bit about my prayer life (how I struggle with discipline and consistency), and mentioned my negative experiences in spiritual direction in the past. He was a good listener, measured in his speech, and simply stressed the importance of regular mental prayer (half an hour per day) where we pray in silence and meditation, and converse with God. He discussed a little about the dangers of pride as well, and how we have to be faithful to our vocations (in my situation, to my wife and children).
It was nothing I didn't already know, but that's actually what I found most fruitful about the half hour phone call/session--that the spiritual life for most of us is rather--well, uncomplicated and rather mundane. We may have particular struggles or issues during times of transition, but really the crux of his advice was "mental prayer at least a half hour per day," "be faithful to your vocation," and "be flexible" (meaning, have a plan B if your plan A for prayer is derailed). Most of us will never reach the precarious heights of spiritual perfection and ecstasy, and will struggle to advance beyond the first or second castle of the interior life (to use St. Theresa's terminology). But a lot of that largely is on our shoulders. Have I been doing a half hour of mental prayer a day? No. Am I surprised then that I have largely plateaued in my own spiritual life and advancement in virtue?
So, after our session I figured, "well, no better time to start than now," and asked my four year old if he wanted to go with me to visit Jesus at the Adoration chapel, since my wife was taking the other two to their theater auditions. We left the house around 12:45 and pulled up and entered the chapel right around one o'clock. I saw a woman from our parish who was leaving at the time I came in, who thanked me profusely for my letter to the bishop, which had been making the rounds. I was a little embarrassed with the people who did the same after Mass on Sunday. Maybe it stuck a chord, said what others were thinking. I don't know. In any case my point in writing it was to encourage our bishop and be true to what I would say I would do: pray and fast for him, his intentions, his office, and the particular situation he finds himself currently with all eyes on him as the bishop overseeing the diocese in which the President of the United States attends Mass and calls home.
Though I had every intention of spending a half hour of personal mental prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, this was somewhat derailed by a handful of retirees starting a vocal devotional. So, it was on to my "plan B" and I decided to just roll with it and join them, figuring there was a reason we arrived when we did. What's funny is that it was an hour long prayer session specifically for priests. Bishops are priests, right? Hm.
I decided to devote the next hour of prayer to our bishop, specifically. One of the retirees hands me a book, devoted to praying for priests. Odd. We end up praying the Divine Mercy chaplet, reading the message of Fatima and the paricular Marian locutions in this book, and other prayers of petition. But we begin with the rosary, praying the Sorrowful Mysteries. As I meditated on each mystery, I called to mind our Lord, but also our bishop and the priests in our diocese standing in persona christi. What would happen were our bishop be moved by prayer and conscience to take a similar stance to that of the Archbishop of San Francisco, on the cusp of a possible overturning of Roe V. Wade, and forbid communion to politicans who advocate for abortion (which includes our President)?
He would find himself in the Garden, feeling as if he would sweat blood for fear of the choice before him--to take up his cross in order to be faithful to Christ, his Bride the Chuch, and his priestly office. Why was he in this position? Why did God put him in this diocese, at this particularly volatile and acrimonious point in history? Was it to maintain the status quo in an objectionable luke-warmness like his predecessor? Or was he being called to follow Christ on the road to Calvary? Couldn't someone take this chalice of decision-making from him, spare him from this fate? Couldn't he just live out his vocation in comfortable anonymity, rather than in the spotlight of public condemnation? Why, Lord, why? He would think in agony. I don't want to do this. I don't want to be here. I don't want to make these decisions. When I followed you til now we enjoyed the palms being laid on the street, the mingling, the working miracles and helping people in service. But this? There is no one here. There is no one else here to make this choice. I am alone, and I am scared. I can feel the mob, the newspapers, the politicians, the angry people breathing down my neck. I can feel the eyes of the faithful on me; I want to be faithful, I want to follow you--but not to this. Please, take this chalice from me.
After rising, he would be turned over and led to the blood soaked pillar in the public square. His hands would shake uncontrollably as they were bound with chains and his clerical garb stripped from his torso. You want to play dirty, do you? the politicians in the box seats above think to themselves, Well, we'll show you who rules this house. With a waive of the executive finger, they signal to the brutes below to commence with the scourging. Tax-Exempt status? Stripped. How many people were depending on me to not rock the boat?, the bishop winces to himself as the lashes paint stripes on his back. Who do you think you are? the Most Powerful Man In The World asks him incredulously. Don't you know I have the power to grant you your freedom or nail you to a tree? I'm a good Catholic. Just who do you think you are? The man of God endures lash after lash, scourge after scourge, until he can hardly stand under his own weight. If it weren't for his hands chained to the pillar, he would have slumped over to the ground after the first few blows.
Every wound needs some salt, his executioners surmise. And so after his public lashing, the pain of humiliation begins. The press, the news outlets, start their digging. They're out for dirt. Who is this Bishop So-and-So. Didn't you ___ ten years ago? Isn't that a little hypocritical of you? Aren't you a Christian? The glaring flashes of the cameras, the microphones shoved in the face. Anything I say they will twist around, he thinks to himself, and recalls the scripture, "He opened not his mouth." They weave a mocking crown and press it firmly upon his bare head. The blood runs into his eyes, he grimaces while trying not to cry from the pain of humiliation and the piercing. I just want to do Confirmations and bless the CYO baseball games in my miter, he laments. But instead here I am, crowned with thorns of shame instead. And for what? For trying to be faithful to Christ. For being faithful to his office, his priestly calling, and the sheep in his care...including the one in office putting him through all this.
Next, he is paraded through the streets. He's not used to this. He spends much of his time in the chancery reading angry letters from parishioners who are upset at parish closures, and those requesting his presence at the KOC golf outing next weekend. Now the weight of the cross made custom for him is being laid on his shoulders and he is commanded: walk. He doesn't understand why this is happening. Hasn't he been faithful? Hasn't he been a good priest, a good (albiet, newly ordained) bishop in this new diocese? He puts one foot in front of the other, barely able to hold his head up. He hasn't had any water, his back is lacerated and he can hardly see from the blood from his head running into his eyes. From the jeering crowd a man steps out, proscripted by one of the agencies, to make sure he makes it to the final destination. Is he going to hit me too? the man of God thinks to himself. He recognized him though--one of his sheep. The man is embarrassed--embarrassed to be there, embarrassed to have to help this traitor to the state, this priest who thinks he is Christ incarnate. But in obedience to his conscriptors, he pushes a shoulder under the cross and takes the weight, if nothing else to get this thing over with. The man of God is relieved to avoid being crushed to death, and to not be alone in this ordeal. As they walk, the man from the crowd shakes his head incredulously, pierced by conscience. He had been a lukewarm Catholic all his life, and here is this priest, this bishop, literally living out the bible stories his mother had read to him as a child. He hadn't been to Mass in years; confession, decades. Step after plodding step, they say nothing, but as they make their way up the hill, his burning shame gives way to courage, to conviction, that what this man of God is enduring is worthy to be followed.
When they arrive at the end of the long, winding road, the man of God can hardly stand. His limp hands are forcefully yanked, his knuckles hit the wood of the cross and his fingers are spread. When he sees the size of the nails, he almost faints...but instead, he begins to pray. Father, Father... It dawns on him the words of scripture, "You do not have many fathers." How many times have his flock called on him: Father, Father. And now he is calling on the Eternal Father, the one who has given him this privelege to suffer as his son suffered. He looks around from above the ground, in agony, as he is raised up with ropes. There is nothing but vicious hatred towards him, towards his Church, that has all of a sudden decided to take a stand for something. He looks for his friends, and finds only his own mother and a few faithful sheep praying their rosaries silently, mouthing prayers on his behalf. He is too weak to speak, to hold his head up, to pray even. This is not what I signed up for, he thinks in a moment of weakness. Isn't it? the words come to him in a haze. Is this not what you were called to--to follow my son wherever he is led, to be His hands, His feet. And now your hands and feet are united with his. The man of God prays only to endure to the end; his fate is sealed in the world, but his soul is still in limbo. The one who has been roaming the earth for the past hundred years, given free reign, is vying for him. I can make all this go away, he whispers. Just give him the bread, and tell your priests to do the same. It would be easier, wouldn't it? the man of God agonizes. And who am I to judge anyway.
But in his final hour, he is filled with something, like a wind. He knows he only has a few breaths of life left in him. The wind speaks to him in silence; he is fortified. I come to do your will, he echoes the words he has read hundreds of times before, but now that will is costing him everything--his good name, his health, his retirement, his Church, and now his very life here on earth. He has made a mess of things, it seems. Father, he prays, please take my spirit. But when you do, let the spark of my life fall to the ground below and ignite your Church. Fill them with the fire of your love. Do not let my ecclesial death and my life as a priest be wasted.
All I ever wanted was to be faithful, the man of God thinks to himself. All I wanted to be was a good priest. And as he closes his eyes, he is carried off by the quiet words of repose,
Well done, good and faithful servant. You have fulfilled the vocation I have set out for you. Well done, good and faithful servant.
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