Love everyone...as SHE loved her Son.

After my second son was born, my husband and I decided he needed a playmate.  I became pregnant easily this time; however, when I went for my ultrasound at eight weeks there was no heartbeat.  Of course I didn't know this right away because the tech hid the screen from my view, but I knew something was wrong.  I left upset but with no real answers.  My doctor contacted me and said it might just be too early and that I should repeat the ultrasound in a week.  My repeat ultrasound would fall on Good Friday of that year.  I went in with high hopes, but a horrible pit in my stomach.  I had prayed for a miracle the entire week leading up to Good Friday.   I went in for the ultrasound, and this time, the tech let me know that she still could not see a heartbeat.  I was devastated.  How could this be happening on Good Friday of all days?  I sat up and cried many tears inside that examining room.  When I turned to leave the room, I looked up over the door and there was a figurine of Jesus - not on a crucifix - but with his arms extended looking down on me.  I was instantly comforted.  I knew Jesus was there with me that day - that He would never leave me.  Easter Sunday was coming and I had hope for the future.

Two months later, I became pregnant again and I was optimistically cautious throughout the entire pregnancy.   This baby's hormones were on high though and I couldn't ever NOT be aware of the amazing life growing inside of me.  This baby definitely wanted me to know that he was here for good!  I was sick as a dog, and once I got over that, I had an appetite like a linebacker!

During that pregnancy, I was still having a lot of problems with my family (as mentioned in a previous posting) and I did a lot of crying, as well as a lot of soul searching.  I had not only been unjustly attacked, but then abandoned.  I prayed a lot during that time.  I kept asking God for a sign - something that told me everything would be okay.  When I was about four months pregnant, I had a dream that I could not explain when I woke up.  In my dream, I was standing before a very large grotto in a foreign country.  Inside the grotto was a large painting of Mary.  It was very specific and I recognized the image as familiar.  However, in the dream all I could keep saying in my head was, "She's so beautiful."  I couldn't take my eyes off of her even though there were many people passing in front of me to get a quick glimpse.  It was dark and there were candles lit at the bottom of the grotto.  I was frozen - just staring at Mary's face...filled with mercy, love, such beauty.  All of a sudden, a wind came over my right shoulder and in that wind I heard a very distinct man's voice say to me "Love everyone...as SHE loved her Son."  As soon as I heard the voice, it was like I was being pulled away from the image - out of the grotto - and then I woke up.

I thought, "What did that voice mean?"  Was this the sign I had been waiting for in regards to my parents and sister?  I did love them.  I never stopped loving them.  Perhaps, I was still angry with them.  I didn't know what it all meant, but I jumped out of bed and did a google search for the exact image of Mary I had seen.  I immediately recognized the image as Our Lady of Guadalupe.  Okay, now this is where my mind began racing in many different directions.  I still didn't understand.  She is the patron saint of Mexico. What did Mexico have to do with me???  My husband and I had lived in New Mexico for one year as newlyweds and it was an extremely happy time.  I thought perhaps Mary was coming to me in an image that would make me happy - bring back happy memories.  I put it on the back burner because I couldn't figure it out.  I never forgot the words or the sound of the man's voice - so clear, so distinct, or the feeling of the wind - so forceful yet comforting.  I figured God would reveal the meaning of this message when the time was right.

A couple weeks later, I was reading a Catholic blog on the internet, and it was talking about Our Lady of Guadalupe as the patroness of the unborn.  I just about fell out of my chair.

"Love everyone...as SHE loved her Son."

Was Mary not a scared and unwed pregnant teen?  She answered God's call to be a mother with a resounding "YES!"  Mary said yes to life and look what happened to humanity.  What if she had said no?  The message I heard was a message of love.  And in the end, isn't that what Jesus calls us to do?  The dream finally made perfect sense.  

It wasn't specifically about my family - although it was in a roundabout way.  This was a message about God calling me to do His work.  When I vowed to be a soldier for Christ during my second pregnancy, I did not know how He would use me.  I had been waiting.  Actually, I had been waiting since my first year in teaching many many years prior, but I had been too scared to enter the pro life movement then.  This was the answer I had been looking for.  I told my husband I needed to get involved in the Respect Life Ministry.  Only, I didn't know how or what I could do at that point.  I was eight months pregnant, very swollen, and had two other children.  So, on the backburner it went once again.  Surely God would wait for me.  Surely He would let me know, just as He always had, how and when I could become involved.  I gave birth to a healthy baby boy...our third son.  We named him after Pope John Paul II, who was relentless in his fight for the unborn.

Walk Was a Success!

Great news! The walk was a huge success.  We had over 300 people in attendance, and we raised over $11,000!   There were people there of all ages and from many parishes, but most importantly, a third of them were students.

The pro life message has to begin in our homes and with our youth.  If they know the facts of fetal development, the methods and horrors of abortion, and the fact that chastity has never stopped being an option, then the hearts of this country will change so that being pro-choice will not be seen as a choice anymore.  In fact, the "pro choice" groups make it their mission to bombard women with the message that an abortion is a safe and viable alternative to pregnancy and bringing forth life.  In reality, when a woman makes a decision to abort her baby, she feels she has no choice.  Women abort their babies in desperation, often under duress of family members.

I was overwhelmed with not only our local walk but with the national March for Life in Washington DC.  I have heard reports there were half a million people there.  I watched the rally and walk live on EWTN - and it was certainly a sight to behold.  So many people...braving that cold...to stand before our nation's capitol to declare every human being has a right to life.  The amount of youth that was present at the march was fantastic.  There were many youth groups and colleges represented there.  I know our Archdiocese brought high schoolers to DC and am looking forward to hearing about their experiences.  Franciscan University in Steubenville, OH brought over 800 students, faculty, and staff.  Christendom College in VA completely shut their campus down on Monday so that every student would have the opportunity to attend the march.  Those are awesome signs for our future as a nation.

Become informed and teach your children.  You will never regret telling them the truth rather than following societal norms.  You only have one chance to be a parent and before you know it, your children will be grown, living away from your home, and making their own life decisions.  The night before our walk, all of my supplies and materials were all over the dining room table.  I turned to my fourteen year old son and said, "You must think your mom has lost her mind."  He said to me, "No mom, I think you found it."

Praying before our display of 40 crosses - representing the number of babies
who lose their lives every day in our county alone.

One of the first signs along the walking route.

Surrendering

These 40 Crosses represent the number
of babies in our county who lose their lives
every day to abortion.  Each cross bears an
epitaph - a memorial given by a parent,
grandparent, or sibling to the baby who
lost its life.  They are on display at our parish
for this Walk for Life 2011.

When you make a commitment to do God's work, and you sign up for Christ's army, you don't exactly get to call all the shots.  As a former teacher, I can tell you, I would love the title of "General".  I'd settle for "Commanding Officer".  It just doesn't work like that.  This is a promise with the Big Kahuna - The Creator - the Maker of Heaven and Earth.  I think He's the General!

Back in September, I agreed to become my parish's Respect Life Coordinator not even knowing what my duties would be.  I felt called, and there was just too much overwhelming evidence to support that calling (which I'll go into in a forthcoming post).  I couldn't deny it anymore.  I couldn't run from what God wanted me to do.  I accepted - actually gleefully - even though I was five months pregnant and I was told that our parish would be hosting a Walk for Life for half the county the end of January.  My due date was February 4th.

Well, since the calling was too strong to ignore, I saddled up and took off.  It is now the eve of the Walk - the eve of the anniversary of Roe v. Wade.  All my t's have been crossed and my i's have been dotted.  I'm thrilled beyond belief that God has carried out His mission through me.  This has been a glorious journey to get to this point - through hills and valleys - always knowing that the outcome would be whatever God wanted it to be.  I was just enlisted.  I was given the tools to carry out this awesome task.  I hope the weather is great, many people show up, and that things run smoothly, but I won't lose sleep over those details tonight.  I always knew I wasn't in charge.  

p.s.  I will post the outcome of our parish's Walk for Life, as well as a picture or two in my next blog.

Signing up in Christ's Army

A year and a half after my second son was born, I found myself sitting in an Easter penance service.  Probably because I'm a convert, confession doesn't come easily or natural for me.  I am learning, however, that it is one of the greatest and most underused sacraments.  Our parish offers a penance service each Easter and Christmas so that you can come, listen to readings, write down your confessions, stand in line to present them to a priest (they also offer private confessions), and after you receive your penance, you can go outside to a small bonfire and burn your paper.  It is a beautiful service, and there is something to watching your sins literally burn before your eyes.

It had now been almost twelve years since my conversion, and even though I had felt I was being led, and even pulled at times, I had a strong sense I wasn't doing enough.  It went deeper than that though.  For some reason, I still had an issue with Christ.  I didn't feel close to Him as my savior.  I believed in his life, death, and resurrection.  I believed his mother Mary was leading me to Him.  But was I praying to Him?  After seeing the Passion of the Christ, I realized I had done nothing in comparison to what He had done for me.

So, I sat in this service and felt like a coward.  I've never thought of myself as a coward in my personal life.  I kind of like to take the bull by the horns, as the saying goes.  But when it came to Jesus, I was timid.  What could I do?  What was I doing?  And what was I capable of doing for Him?  I realized, sitting before the crucifix, that I didn't really have to figure that out.  I didn't have to know exactly where God wanted me.  So I made a promise that night.  I wrote on my paper a few confessions and at the bottom I wrote, "I promise I will be a soldier for Christ, no matter the cost."

Three days later, a firestorm erupted within my family.  I was accused of all sorts of things I never said or did.  No one was willing to listen to any explanation I could give.  I felt persecuted and I didn't know why this was happening.  As I've mentioned in a previous blog - My Conversion to the Catholic Faith - my parents have really been Godless for a long time.  The occult consumed them, and I watched evil seep into their souls and ooze back out to touch those around them.  The first attack came in the form of a phone call from my mother, and I normally would cower to her or my father just to get along.  That day, I spoke my peace in a calm rational manner.  It was like I was someone else.  She didn't listen, but screamed, ranted, and swore at me.  I never lost my temper and tried to give explanations to her accusations.

As soon as I hung up with her, I began shaking and crying and I realized then it had been the Holy Spirit with me on that phone - giving me the words to say.  I could have never come up with the words on my own.  Christ even said to his apostles upon their commissioning that they need not worry about words; that they would come as the Spirit of the Father.  I have since not worried very much about speaking the truth.  I have learned that the truth really will set you free.  It is in seeking truth that we find God and His plan for each of us.  After two years of repeated attacks through emails, phone messages, and letter, I ultimately lost my family - parents, sister, grandfather, aunt, cousins, etc. - but I gained a new family.  I began to feel, for the first time in my life, that I had a place in Christ's family and I was willing to fight for it.

I began to pray to St. Michael the Archangel to give me strength if I were to be in this army.  This was an army that was "persecuted for righteousness sake".  I was scared because I knew this would not be easy.  I was willing to take on this awesome responsibility anyway. I did not know exactly where God would use me, but as I promised that night at the penance service, I would fight for Him.  I would fight for the Son.  I would be a soldier for Christ!


"You will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear testimony before them and the Gentiles.  When they deliver you up, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour; for it is not you who speak , but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you."      Mt  10:18-20

Open to Life on Whose Terms?

So what does "being open to life" really mean?  Does it mean someone's open to having a baby...really?  We all seem to think we're going to get the perfect baby, the gender we want, the personality we want, the perfect birthing experience (whatever that is for each person),  and all on our time...when we want.

After staying home with my first son for the first four years, I found myself back in the classroom due to financial constraints.  I taught middle school three more years, but this time I got to teach my first love - which was math.  The most ironic thing about that first year back, was the inordinate amount of similarity between this class and my very first class. I was thankful I didn't teach them most of the subjects like my first job...this time it was only math.  I did, however, see this as a second chance.  The cast of characters was so similar, but I was older, a little wiser now from being a mother, and I knew God was presenting this situation to me a second time for a reason.

I loved my students and I loved what I was teaching, but I was longing for a second child of my own.  In January of my third year there, I suffered a miscarriage.  I was devastated and blamed it on the stress of the job.  In March, I put in my resignation and had no intentions of ever going back.  I took off the entire next year just to be home with my son and to try to get pregnant.  I couldn't get pregnant.  Not only did I feel like a failure, but I felt like God had abandoned me.  Why was it that I had such a strong notion that God had more children for me, but that He was holding out?  Why wouldn't He send me the rest of my children???  I was angry, and I felt desperate.  The end of the school year was approaching,  I had no pregnancy to show for it, and I wondered if the baby I had lost would be the last baby I would ever carry in my womb.

My doctor advised fertility pills.  I remember feeling excited that medicine was coming to the rescue.  Surely fertility pills would do the trick.  Why wouldn't they?  I had been pregnant before.  My husband wasn't so keen on the idea; he felt it should be in God's hands - not ours.  That sounded like a cop out to me.  Why wouldn't I try if medicine was telling me I could?  I begged him to let us try.  We tried for three months and the only thing the pills got me was a major mood enhancer in the wrong direction - my hormones were on overdrive and I let just about everybody "have it".  Difficult would be a major understatement to describe me during those three months!

It didn't work.  I was trying very hard to accept God's plan for us as parents of an only child.  I had always wanted a large family...this didn't make sense to me and I was sad to my core.  I decided to go back to teaching to get my mind off of it.  We continued to try with no luck.  I wondered if there was something in me or my relationship with my husband that was holding us back.  I had always wanted a girl, but could my feelings of specifying the gender and not simply allowing God's plan to unfold be the cause of my apparent infertility.  What if the timing just wasn't right?  Did God really need me in that teaching position and I would just have to wait?  Or would that day never come?

One night, while laying in bed, I began praying...but praying like I never had before.  I was exhausted.  I didn't want to think about babies anymore.  I was brought to my knees and I completely gave up.  I told God that whatever his plan was for me, I was okay with that - even if it meant I would be the mother of one child.  I had gone through so much, and had hit the bottom, and I really was okay with God's plan for us as a family.  I was relieved.  I felt like I had been finally freed.  Maybe there was something to what my husband had told me before I tried the fertility pills.  Maybe there was more wisdom than I knew in the Catholic teachings.

A couple weeks later my son awoke in the middle of the night from an apparent nightmare.  Only it wasn't a nightmare that scared him, but something he saw in his dream.  He dreamed an angel came down through the ceiling of our house and brought with him four children.  He said he was so happy finally playing with other children in his own house and they all got along.  He said they all liked the "same stuff".  What scared him was that at the end of the dream, the angel turned to leave and take the children with him, and he could see the wings in his back.  He said they were large and it scared him.   I assured him that night that an angel would never want to scare him.  He fell back asleep happy, and I wondered...did it mean something?

Little did I know, I was one week pregnant with my second son.

Mary and Her Miraculous Medal

Not long after my conversion, I became pregnant with my first son.  The Carmelite Sisters, who were running the school where I was teaching, put his name in their perpetual book of prayer when he was born.  They also gave me a pretty little light blue pendant.  It had a pretty image of Mary on the front.  I immediately put that medal on a silver chain around my neck and never took it off.

Two years later, I strapped my son in his car seat as I had now done a thousand times, and we set off one morning to return a blanket that was a hideous color of green.  I was only one block from our house when a car traveling approximately 50 mph hit my driver's side door at full speed.  I don't think either one of us ever saw the other.  His little red car was hidden behind a lawn truck pulling a trailer.  It happened so quickly, yet at the point of impact, every motion slowed down to a crawl, and I really did see my entire life flash before my eyes.  I remember the other driver's car bouncing away from my car in slow motion - which ended up landing about fifty feet away.  I remember my head jerking side to side and hitting the driver's side window while the glass shattered all over me.  I remember feeling a sting in my right leg.

While this was happening, I heard my son scream from the back seat, but everything went black.  I struggled to see out the front window, but I couldn't.  Everything was black, yet I saw my life.  In an instant, I was four and then twelve and then nineteen and then giving birth and everything in between.  I remember in that instant, I cried out to God to please let me live.  I remember saying I had too much to live for and begged for my life.  The next memory I have was of looking up and seeing six police cars, two ambulances, and a fire truck.  There were two paramedics crawling in the passenger side door telling me I would be okay.  I turned my head to look at them and they were smiling like the faces of angels.  The steering wheel had cracked in two, a piece of the gear shift was stuck in my leg (thus the sting), every window in the car was shattered, and they were pulling me out of the passenger side door backwards.

The first thing I said was, "Where is my son?!"  The female paramedic helped me to stand up and assured me that they had removed him from the car before me and taken him immediately to the ambulance still strapped in his car seat to keep him immobilized and safe.  She began asking me if I was okay.  The endorphins running through me led me to believe that I was.  I felt nothing - completely numb!  She began to dust me off as I was covered head to toe in glass.  Once I came to my senses, I began to feel a burning sensation throughout my body and my head was really hurting.  She convinced me to lie down on a stretcher and be taken to the hospital for further examination.  As they were strapping me down, she told me I would get to be right next to my son in the ambulance and that we would not be separated.  It was the next thing she told me that I will never forget.

She said she had something very important to tell me and that I needed to pay attention.  I told her I was.  She began with, "You know how I had to dust you off when you got out of the car because of all the glass?"  I said, "yes."  She said that she has to do that for everyone at every accident where a window has broken.  Then she said, "When I pulled your son out of the car, I immediately went to dust him off because I didn't want any glass to fall into his eyes.  Only, there wasn't any glass on him...not one piece...not one piece of glass dust.  I kept checking him over and over because I couldn't believe it.  There was, however, a silhouette of glass around his body.  It was like he had been covered in saran wrap at the point of impact."

Covered in saran wrap?  When they placed me into the ambulance next to my son, it was a feeling of relief I had never felt before.  Just to know my baby was okay and I could reach out and grab his hand.  I could touch him.  He seemed fine - the paramedics had been keeping him happy.

How could that have happened?  Why was I covered head to toe in glass, yet he didn't even have glass dust on him.  The paramedic's words will forever stay in my mind.  I will never forget the look on her face as she told me.  She also happened to mention, "I've been doing this job for twelve years now, and I have never seen this happen."  I told her his guardian angel must have shielded him from the impact.  She smiled and said, "I think so."

When the Carmelites gave me the pendant, I didn't even know what it was.  Again, I was a recent convert and I still don't know all the images of Mary.  It looked pretty and it was a gift from them so I wore it.  It was a miraculous medal.  A miraculous medal depicts Mary as she was seen one evening by a nun.  Mary said to her, "Have a medal struck upon this model.  Those who wear it will receive great graces, especially if they wear it around their neck."  I believe my son and I were protected that day.  I had begun a devotion to Mary back when I was teaching, and she certainly sent her graces to us in our time of trouble.

The Meaning of the Miraculous Medal

Children are an inconvenience, right?

Before I write about exactly how I got into the pro-life movement, I feel I must address a certain ad that is running currently on tv.  There is a commercial out right now advertising for the use of an IUD (intra-uterine device) by a known maker.  It is a long commercial and one that I'm sure many women stop and listen to.

The images and message are so disturbing that I feel I must address it.  The commercial shows a couple doting on one young child, as well as showing that child's messes throughout the day.  Each time the child "gets into something", the mother says something to the effect of "yeah, I can wait a little longer to have another child."  She says it so often and with a look of distress on her face. The child is looking innocently at her as all young curious children do, while she looks down disappointingly.

Our society has moved so far away from a family centered mindset, that many young couples today plan not to have children or they plan to have just one...maybe two.  They also think they can plan exactly when they will have this child.  Many couples wait well into their thirties because they are building their bank accounts.  It is this mindset that has caused so many couples distress at their apparent infertility once they "decide" to begin their families - as if it's their decision anyway.

This ad is a very sad statement on how we perceive our children.  Let's face it, they are a bother, right?  Boy, if I don't have any kids then I'll get to continue my lifestyle forever...or, when this baby gets a little bigger, I'll be able to return to my lifestyle.  And babies are so much work.  Who would want to put themselves through that more than once?  Guess what?  Babies and children ARE a lot of work.  They do not come with an operating manual.  They are messy and dirty and slobbery.  When they are toddlers, they say things like, "I don't like you!"  Young children are needy.  They need to be carried - a LOT!  If they get sick, you are their only hope for ever getting better.  You'll lose a lot of sleep.  You'll get wrinkles.  They even color on your walls sometimes and look at you with the utmost pride in their artwork.

The truth is babies and children are the greatest gift God can ever give someone.  They love you unconditionally.  You are the center of their universe.  They love to kiss and hug you with all their might.  They love to please you.  They want to be held because they love you so much, they can't stand to be away from you.  They need you because that is the way God intended it to be.  The parents and child do this dance of give and take.  It takes through the toddler time period for parents and child to really get to know each other.  So they dance...round and round...through the crescendos and the diminuendos.  It is a beautiful dance and one to be savored at every note.  Being a parent is not about trying to get out of your responsibilities.  It is about owning up to the ever most awesome responsibility of raising healthy children and sending them forth into society to make a better world for you and me.  We need to stop trying to plan our lives so much and begin accepting God's plan for mankind..to make beautiful loving families grounded in faith!

My Journey to Catholicism Part 5 - I'm finally confirmed!

The time between that Christmas and Easter was pretty uneventful except for a certain guest speaker who came to the school.  She was a young mother from the Respect Life Office who came to speak to the seventh and eighth graders about fetal development...and abortion.

Up until this point, I had always considered myself a worldly young woman who was pro-feminism.  I believed Planned Parenthood when they said they were only there for the underprivileged - to provide basic female medical care.  I believed in oral contraception because why would anyone want to have a baby when they weren't ready?  The pill saved women from enslavement, right?  Well, that's what we were told as young girls fresh off the advent of the legalization of oral contraception and the legalization of abortion.  And as horrible as I thought abortion was, I wouldn't take that right away from another woman.  What if she was raped?  What if it was a baby from incest?  What if she was too poor to take care of the child?  What if she herself was just a child.  What kind of monster would make a young teen go through pregnancy and delivery and raising a child when she was just a baby herself?

That Respect Life representative had about a half hour before her presentation and I was on break.  I decided to talk to her.  She began giving me statistics and details about the methods of abortion.  I thought there was only one method - a sort of vacuuming of a clump of cells early in the first trimester.  It wasn't even a baby yet!  And no one did abortions in the second and third trimesters.  I didn't even think they were legal.  After learning that the clump of cells was really a tiny baby...and that abortion was legal all nine months of pregnancy...and how abortions were really performed, I wanted to cry.  I was devastated.  How could so many young women be bamboozled into thinking abortion was a safe alternative to pregnancy?  Killing babies was being pro-feminism? And oral contraceptions could induce miscarriages without the woman even knowing?  It didn't make sense.  At the heart of every woman's inherent feminism is a desire to carry a child, not kill one.

I thought that if every woman in America knew what I had just learned, abortions would end tomorrow.  Only, what about rape, incest, and the teen pregnancy?  I still wasn't sure.  That day, I came home and told my husband everything I had learned.  I told him, "I know my future in the Church will be in the Respect Life office... but not now.  I'm not ready.  I'm not quite there.  Quite frankly, it scares me.  It's not an easy ministry, but I feel my calling is there somehow."  I knew that God would call me when the time was right.

That Easter, I was confirmed a Catholic.  My journey was not over, but only beginning.  I didn't know where the Church would lead me, but as I knew back when I was a teenager, the truth was lying inside this Catholic Church.  It had always been there, and I was finally on the inside!  I was in the loop! I was so happy to finally put to rest my inner struggles of staying protestant or becoming one with the Church...the one Church that Jesus Christ himself established two thousand years before with Peter as its first Pope - the same Peter whose very first church in Antioch I had visited just three years prior.

The Carmelites helped to shape my theological background.  I learned so much from them...not only in their teachings, but in their ways.  They were love.  When I saw them, I saw love.  There was only one thing radiating from their eyes, and that was their love for Jesus, his mother Mary, and all of humanity. I would only teach there one more year before becoming pregnant with my first son, and it was a bittersweet ending to my short-lived teaching career - or so I thought.  I walked away from teaching to become a mother for the first time.  I prayed a decade of the rosary every day in thanksgiving for this life that was growing in my womb.  I felt very close with Mary during that time.  I knew she knew what I was feeling.  She was the ultimate mother.  She understood.

My Journey to Catholicism Part 4

So FORTY?  That's a mighty symbolic number in the Bible. I tried to run from it, and it found me.  I did have to "put in my time" as it were, at that first job.  I had forty sixth graders in a portable behind the school.  I had quite a range of issues in that first class, ADHD, ADD, emotionally handicapped children (with anger/violent issues), a child whose father had just been sent to the state penitentiary for selling drugs, and a physically handicapped child who had a chip on the shoulder about the handicap.  I realized my very first day with them that if I was not the face of Jesus to these children, I would lose them.  They needed love and structure.  I taught them all of the language arts, history, and religion for them and the seventh graders.  Ha!  Yes, you read that right...religion! I wasn't even Catholic!  I requested a meeting with Sister (our principal) and told her how concerned I was about my Biblical/theological knowledge and perhaps giving the children misinformation.  She just smiled and calmly said, "Just because I know you're here and it's on the forefront of your mind, I know you'll be fine.  I know you'll be conscientious.  I have faith in you...and if you ever have questions come to me and ask."

These nuns were very special.  They were the Carmelite Sisters from Los Angeles.  At the time, they were one of the last orders to wear the full habits, and they were very strict about their theological teachings.  I just loved being in their presence.  They showed me their love for Mary, the Mother of God, and the special relationship between Her and Jesus.  I felt She was always there with me holding my hand every step of the way.  The Carmelites were leading me to a relationship with Her...who would lead me to a deeper relationship with Him.

Upon receiving this teaching position that summer before the school year began, I immediately went to my local parish and asked to be a Catholic.  I couldn't deny it anymore.  The signs - the way I was led to this job and away from the Episcopal Church - were too strong to ignore or explain away.  The pastor met with me and instructed me to sign up for RCIA, the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults.  I was thrilled to be taking this step.  It felt right.  I knew it was right.  Once I began my teaching job, the pastor of that school met with me and asked me to transfer over to his parish.  I said I would, so I finished my RCIA classes at my new parish/school.

At Christmas of that first year in teaching, my husband and I would celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary.  I told my pastor, and he told me in a very matter-of-fact way that we were not married.  Ummm, excuse me?  What?  He explained that since we had only been married by a justice of the peace back in Phoenix five years earlier, our marriage was not recognized by the Church.  He suggested that we have a small ceremony on our anniversary - which would be a sort of renewal of our original vows but would be sacramental and recognized by the Church.  I thank God for his wisdom and guidance during that period every day.  It was no mistake I had been led to this school.

Our Wedding in the Church
Fifth Wedding Anniversary
December 18, 1994

I thought it was a wonderful idea.  It was a beautiful evening.  We had a small private ceremony in the chapel with few family members and friends, and when we came out of the chapel, my entire 6th grade class was there waiting for us.  They had come to surprise us!  They knew we would be attending Saturday night mass immediately following our wedding ceremony and they had arranged to perform a song and dance during mass just for us.  I could not believe these sixth grade students had been meeting for weeks behind my back, and without me knowing, to practice a song and dance just to celebrate our wedding in the Church.  Their song and dance took the place of our pastor's homily that evening, and I received my first Holy Communion as a Catholic that night as well.  It was an overwhelming night...so filled with joy and one I will remember forever!  I was on my way to becoming Catholic...I just had to wait until Easter to become confirmed.  It was a day I was anxiously awaiting!

Carmelite Sisters of the Most Sacred Heart of Los Angeles

My Journey to Catholicism Part 3

I think garnering one's first real job out of college is a challenge and one that only comes through due diligence, patience, networking, and even some praying.  Because I knew the way the county public schools operated, I opted to look into teaching in the private school realm.  There was a fantastic Episcopal school and a fantastic Catholic school very near to my home.  I began subbing in the Episcopal school my last year in college...thinking this would for sure lead to a job offer.  It was a beautiful quaint Episcopal school in an upscale neighborhood.  The children were happy and the best part of the school was its size.  There were only fourteen children in a class and only two classes per grade.  I thought, "Boy, I could get so much done with a class like that!"

I did, however, visit for a day the Catholic school, and although the principal (a sister) and the vice-principal were very accommodating and nice, I wasn't too keen on the size of the school.  Each class had forty children in a classroom - forty!  As a young teacher, I can tell you that really intimidated me.  I never thought I could have control over forty children at one time.  So, I put all my eggs in the Episcopalian basket - even after all the experiences I had with the Catholic faith.  I was still running from it, it seemed.

At the end of my last semester in college, the principal and vice-principal of the Episcopal school asked to have a meeting with me.  They said a second grade teacher was leaving and they wanted me to fill her spot.  They went over salary and benefits with me and then said they would call me again in about a week.  I was ecstatic.  It was my dream job and it was all coming to fruition.  I waited...and waited...and waited.  I never received a phone call.  I was confused as they had spoken so positively with me just the week before.  It didn't make sense.  I waited a few more days and then I called them.  I got the run-around.  I was devastated because I hadn't done any networking anywhere else.  This had always seemed like a "done deal".  Finally, the vice-principal called and told me they just weren't hiring and that was that.

I began praying because I had really wasted time with one school and now I was behind the ball.  Very few other schools even knew who I was.  Out of the blue (and one week later I might add) I received a phone call from a sister who was the principal at a Catholic school I hadn't even heard of.  She said she had been given my name by that nice sister at the other Catholic school close to my house.  She said that principal spoke very highly of me and that I had done "field work" there for her.  Well, that wasn't exactly true.  I had only just visited that school for a day, but who was I to argue?  I needed a job and if that principal's recommendation to this sister landed me an interview, then so be it.  Once again, I was being led - hand held almost - into the Catholic Church...and away from my Episcopalian roots.  I wasn't happy about it.  I still longed for that coveted teaching position in that posh Episcopal school.

I went through the interview process and and was told that the positions were competitive - that they had many applicants.  I finally made it to the last round, which was the interview with the pastor.  He made me an offer on the spot.  The kicker was that he said he only had two positions available:  kindergarten or sixth grade.  I told him I was only certified in grades one through six, and he said, "So sixth it is!"  I began sweating bullets because I never wanted to teach children older than third grade.  The bigger kids were a little scary.  How would I control them?  Sixth grade was ...MIDDLE SCHOOL!  I calmly told him not to worry, that I could handle it.  Then the pastor proceeded to tell me that the sixth grade class was the worst class he's seen at that school in years and that I would have FORTY of them.  Forty?  Wasn't that the number I was running from previously?  Yes, forty sixth graders would be my fate...and here's the best part.  Since the school was going through a renovation, I would be with those forty sixth graders most of the day in one portable in the back of the main school building.  I was happy to have a job, but I just kept thinking, "I'm here for a reason."

My Journey to Catholicism Part 2

Christmas of 1990, my husband and I packed up the little we owned and threw it in the back of a U-Haul truck.  We attached our Honda to a trailer in back, sat our yellow lab puppy in the front between us, and we drove away from Albuquerque with our destination as Miami, FL.  We left Albuquerque with temperatures in the 20's and snow on the ground and arrived to Miami with temperatures in the 90's!

After some time at the local community college, I figured I'd shoot for the best Miami had to offer...or so I thought.  I dug in my heels and set my sights on the University of Miami.  UM was making things a little difficult for me though - having to change my major a bit, costing a lot more money, not promising any financial aid other than loans, and having to take longer than I thought to graduate.  I dug in my heels though and fought even looking at another lesser known university called Barry University.  It was a private Catholic university.  I wasn't sure I wanted to be Catholic yet, and I wanted to make sure I made that decision on my own - not from outside pressures.  I decided, however, to meet with an advisor from Barry about seeking an education degree from them.   They made it so easy for me...of course!  Not only was the tuition less, but I would graduate sooner, I would graduate with the appropriate degree, and they would give me grant money and loans to make my life even easier.  How could I say no?  God was calling.

Because it was a Catholic institution, I was very excited about the requisite religion courses because I could kind of take up what I left behind at UNM...and Barry was forcing me to take them, so the big decisions were which ones do I take?  I had loved my Reformation class at UNM, but where would I go from there?  I believe Barry required me to take two religion courses and one ethics course.  Why would I sign up for the average freshman theology class when there was a whole theological world out there waiting for me?  I signed up for "Old Testament" first.  I felt like this was out of my comfort zone since most Christians - especially Protestant Christians - don't grow up knowing a lot from the Old Testament.  I knew pretty much nothing, and boy did I learn!

After my first year there, my husband and I were invited to visit my in-laws who were then living in Turkey.  How could we pass up such an invite?  We knew we didn't want to fly from Miami to Istanbul without staying over somewhere, but where?  Europe's a big place!  Ah yes, something was calling us to visit Italy...namely, Pope John Paul and the Vatican!  In May of 1993, we flew from Miami to Rome and stayed in Italy a week before flying on to Turkey.  If I were to say that visiting the Vatican was just an amazing experience, I would be understating it by a mile.  It was life-altering.  It was the first time in my life that Jesus' life, crucifixion, and resurrection made sense.  All the stories from the New Testament came to life and they were living there at St. Peter's Basilica.  We sat in mass with Pope John Paul, stood in awe of the Sistine Chapel, and took a bus out the famous Appian Way to a lesser known catacombs (early Christian burial place underground now manned by a Japanese priest who spoke eleven languages and was our personal tour guide).  Those experiences brought those early Christians right into my life...like they were still alive!

After a week in Italy, we landed in Istanbul...or Constantinople as it once was called.  We were only there one day, so we decided to see the famous Hagia Sofia, once a great Catholic Church that was now a Muslim mosque.  The icons and artwork showed so much detail of how the early Christians viewed Christ and his mother, Mary.  Sadly, the faces were mostly scratched and the icons made from mosaic tiles were crumbling apart.  That also brought to light the attitudes of the Turkish muslims towards their early Christian roots.  We traveled throughout Turkey for a month and one could look at where we went and think we were on a pilgrimage.  The truth is that Turkey is so rich with Christian history that it's difficult to go anywhere and not see early Christianity staring you in the face.

We drove to Ephesus and saw John the Apostle's church, to a hilltop above Ephesus that Mary made as her home immediately following Jesus' crucifixion, to Tarsus (Paul's birthplace), to Cappadoccia - a city carved into the mountains that housed early Christians fleeing from persecution, and finally to Antioch to see Peter's first church - a cave carved into the mountainside with a giant stone altar and an escape route on either side.   It was easy to see the danger these early Christians were faced with on a day to day basis.

Upon returning to Miami, I had to sign up for an ethics class.  I didn't sign up for Ethics 101, I decided to sign up for a junior level ethics class entitled "Biomedical Ethics".  My husband thought I was nuts and warned me against the class and I'm sure he thought it would be the class to destroy my gpa.  I can tell you I was the only non pre-med or nursing student in the class.  So, I made sure I sat in the front row and took notes like crazy.  Why biomedical ethics? Who knows! Again, it just sounded interesting.  What did we talk about?  Um, hospital rights - namely Catholic hospital rights - patients' rights, physicians' rights and obligations, abortion, euthanasia, etc.  Man, I had no idea how that course would set the stage for what I'm doing now!

My last semester, I had one more religion course to take, so I signed up for a senior level theology class entitled "Sacraments and Liturgy".  First of all, any well-versed Catholic knows that those two topics are our faith.  They are what the Church was founded on and what it stands on today.  Well, unbeknownst to me, I was the only person to sign up for that class other than a senior whose major was theology.  The course would be taught by a deacon, and he called me to his office to meet with me and find out why I signed up for the class.  He was extremely skeptical of my intentions.  He told me that if the class was too difficult for me and I decided to drop it, the entire class would have to be dropped and I'd basically be messing up this other girls' coursework.  I assured him I could handle it and of my purest intentions...to learn as much as I could about the Church before I graduated.  He accepted!  I graduated from Barry University summa cum laude with a 4.0 gpa in elementary education.  The hunt was on to find my first teaching job!