Many had warned me that after my conversion I would feel a dip, a kind of spiritual low and perhaps it was naive of me to think that it wouldn’t happen. Not to me anyway. Besides, I’m not them, right? But in the process of striving to live out this Catholic life, I can’t help but notice more flaws in me that are being brought to the light. Things I wish I could change, habits I wish I could let go of...emotions I wish I just didn’t feel. I turn to the crucifix hanging in my room wondering how many of my bad habits I have tried to nail to the cross throughout this liturgical period. Some habits I wish I could nail there and have die, never to return into my heart again.
Throughout this Lent, I felt like something was missing and I lacked the drive to change. It was so strange to feel that within such a vast and loving community such as Challenge, I could feel so alone. Hoping to find a bit more strength to hold strong to my Lenten sacrifices and to keep persevering, I turned to an author whose reflections are what helped guide me to the Church in the first place. As I opened Home Tonight: Further Reflections on the Parable of the Return of the Prodigal Son by Henri Nouwen, the following paragraphs caught my attention:
It is paradoxical but real. The more I find intimacy with the Creator of my life, the more loneliness I experience. And at the very same time this loneliness offers me a new sense of belonging to the family of a Divine Love that is much greater and more intimate than any belonging that the world can offer...The greatest loneliness and the greatest solidarity with the Divine Lover and with the human condition are coming together. Once I accept this passage as a call to be deeply, deeply connected with the Unconditional Love, with my own fragile humanity, and with brothers and sisters everywhere, something shifts within. Allowing God’s love to be the primary for me changes the way I live my existential loneliness, mainly because I am more rooted in the truth, and thus more able to live my suffering while standing as a full, human person.
After reading this my heart seemed to be a little more at peace with my loneliness, my struggle to find love, give love and love myself. Maybe walking alone with Jesus is just His way of reminding me that regardless of the unmet needs that continue to scream within me, looking for healing from others, that my confidence and trust should always be in Him...that He is enough. As I look to the cross as a source of strength, I am reminded of the beauty that the cross brings to our salvation. I am reminded of the confidence and trust our Lord had in the Father. I’m reminded of His free, total, faithful and unconditional love for each and every one of us. I’m reminded that my brokenness and my wounds are what are staring me back in the face, and as I close my eyes and imagine myself at the foot of the cross, I picture, as vividly as I can, His fragile, broken body. These wounds were suffered for my wounds...This pain was suffered for my pain...And this body and this death is given up for me, out of love and in order to give rise to a new life.
As we prepare ourselves for the final stretch of Lent, to enter into the journey of the Lord’s passion with Him, I encourage you all to, in prayer, express your desire to walk with Him, persevere with Him, trust in the Father with Him, and in the end give yourself up for Him for the glory to rise with Him once again.
Wishing you all happy reading of the below articles as well as the grace to persevere in the last weeks of Lent with the words of wisdom my best friend once told me...a little Hope, a little Faith, and a little Trust,
Liz V.
On Behalf of the Newsletter Editors