Ave Crux, Spes Unica!

I hesitate to describe my penchant for noting anniversary dates of my life as compulsive, but perhaps ingrained is fair. It is part of my liturgical sense, I think. Repeating annual observances gives space for reflecting on what has changed and how I've grown over the years. The one constant in my life is change. That is certain. 

Thirty-two years ago today was my first day in Japan. The first of 924 days when Japan was my address (although I did spend about a month each in the Philippines and Stateside during that stretch). It is also the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, and yes I did choose this date to be my arrival date, just like I chose the Annunciation to be the day I left. 

This year has given me a fresh perspective on today's feast day. And that is the lamest possible way I could make that statement. Let me try to get a running start into unpacking this.

This morning at Mass, with all this date and feast day business humming quietly in the background, I had a strong related memory surface, one that I have turned over and over in my mind over the last three decades. It took me a moment to realize how it is this year's connecting piece. And here it is: when I lived in Japan, I was connected to an order of Sisters as a volunteer. The Sisters lived in two small convents in the immediate area. One of these was connected directly to the school where I taught, and occasionally I stopped by to visit their kitchen, especially in the early days. The one Sister who spoke English fluently lived there. One day when I was there, I noticed she had written on their pen board four words, which I felt were a direct message to me (because they were in English): God lives in Reality. 

If you've ever moved thousands of miles away from home to a place where you know no one, cannot communicate with anyone, and feel completely vulnerable and helpless, you might appreciate how words in your native language can pierce your heart and stay with you forever, like those did that day. And if you haven't, trust me on this. They did.

When human beings experience discomfort, conflict, pain, confusion, demoralization, scandal, injustice, etc, we tend to cope through some type of escape or retaliation. Or both. Escape says this reality is painful, and I want out. Retaliation says this reality needs to be fixed, and I'm going to create my own battleground to fix it. These are understandable human reactions. I think you could say that escape is often its own form of retaliation. These are not indicative of human flourishing, though: this is about survival. 

Human flourishing comes in Christ. Christ comes through His cross. His cross is our only hope (Ave cruz, spes unica!). And here we have the truth: God lives in Reality.

The reality of our lives is full of discomfort, conflict, pain, confusion, etc. The Christian revelation is that God is not sitting in a cloud somewhere, demanding our obesiance, handing down rules, or generally accepting everything that happens and tut-tutting it away, and throwing us candy to make us feel better. The Christian revelation is that God enters our pain. He does not remove it; he comes close to us in it. He conquers it, but appearances show that it conquers Him. His embracing of the ultimate in discomfort, conflict, pain, confusion, demoralization, scandal, injustice, etc, is what swallows death, conquers death, and reveals life and immortality. He calls people to faith in this. He calls people to receive this power and live in it. He calls people to live in reality -- all of it -- by the power of grace, which is His life in us. 

Sin is avoidance. Sin is turning a blind eye to suffering -- that of others, or our own. Sin is refusing God. Sin is turning away from Him and choosing not-God. Unreality. 

Here's the thing: this is the lot we are born into. We have an inclination to this sin. The grace of baptism frees us from being chained into it, but we have to be formed in such a way that we learn to choose good. We need to learn that we are loved by a self-giving God to such an extent that we love Him in return, follow Him, and learn from Him to lay down our lives (that is, enter discomfort et al.) for our brothers. 

Here's another thing: there's a point at which every person is formed by pain and not by love, and we carry our desire to escape reality forward with us. Sometimes we carry it forward in highly complex and sophisticated ways that shape our relationships, our work, and our very sense of self so that, even as Christians, we make a fine art out of avoiding reality. 

I feel like the entire focus of my life comes down to this point of learning for myself, and to help others, to look upon the Pierced One, the Man on the cross, and to embrace -- in the drops that are bearable, as God measures out -- the reality of His love meeting our pain. I'd like to say that in that moment in looking upon the Crucified, our pain is undone. I do believe God lifts certain things from us, granting immediate relief. But often that meeting entails being met in great grief the pain we have tried to silence and stuff down. It is not neat, easy, or quick, but it does heal. The resurrection power of God is real. But God does not do magic. He redeems and restores, and it is a process. It takes our cooperation, our trust, our perseverence, and we need community support through it, so we don't cut and run.  

God lives in reality. If we find reality too much to face, it means we need Mercy. Mercy is God's love meeting us in our pain. It is infinite. The ocean of mercy opened up for the whole world through the crucifixion of Christ, and if we call out for mercy, God will draw us to this whole process of healing. When we cry out for mercy, we must come with open hands, clutching nothing, or at least willing to let go of the things we clutch, trusting that God brings life and not death. Or at least willing to trust. Willing to receive life. Willing to believe that there is more to life than death. God will meet you wherever you are at and will gently guide you forward. His great desire is to give us Himself. 

He can make sense out of everything.

Every Ending is a Beginning

My heart is full. Today was the major ending of my Spiritual Direction Formation Program. There are a few more minor endings; two more things to hand in, two more meetings. Then finalizing of grades in September and the graduation pilgrimage in October. But today was the last time for meeting as the large group online. The last formation sessions. The first goodbyes.

And one theme of the day was how every ending is a beginning. 

And like the program has been, consistently, there was the structured theme and the theme that bubbled up during the discussions. So much gratitude. So many reports of how the course has absolutely transformed lives and has ran parallel to huge life upheavals.

During these two years (26 months, if you count from the time of my initial interview for joining), I've experienced a lot of endings and beginnings, none of which I saw coming. As I've been saying to my cohort for the last few months, there has been the formation course, and then there's been the Lord's formation work. Today I heard that this was a common experience for many. In May of 2024 I would not have believed that my journey would have taken the path that it has. But for both the sorrows and joys of it, I am extremely grateful. The Lord looked at my life and smiled and set about a process of transformation that I could not have dreamed up, even though I see all of my dreams reflected in it. For me it has been proof that He knows me, that He is good, that He is all powerful, and that He sees the burdens I have struggled to carry without yielding to His help for way, way, way too long. 

One thing stated today that more or less cinched up everything for me was this statement about what Carmelite spiritual direction is: It isn't about helping someone figure out which path to take. It is about unveiling the One who leads. Once you see the One who leads, you don't need the map. You trust the One who is leading. 

And that is where I am. Spatially, on the map of my life, to be honest, there's plenty I don't see about exactly where I am going. But I know Who is leading the way. And my job is to sing along with the Sister Act choir -- I Will Follow Him. No matter where He goes. No matter what it asks of me. No matter what anyone else thinks of it. I Will Follow Him. That is true freedom. And that is the only way to accompany people, because that frees me to walk with anyone the Lord brings to me in whatever way He is leading them. 

To journey with people from all over the world, under the leadership of an incredibly faith-filled group of Carmelite friars has been a particular gift. I love my adopted hometown of Steubenville, but it has been a real growth opportunity to have imput from outside of this Catholic bubble. It is wonderful to know that for as long as I've lived in my neighborhood, most of my neighbors have been Catholic and would pray for me in any need. But it is also a joy and a deep, cleansing breath to know that the Holy Spirit is so much bigger than the Us Four and No More feeling a local community can become over the course of years. It has reminded me that the presence of God is not dependent on only certain people or relationships. 

It is easy for me to grieve endings rather than see them as beginnings of a new stage. Life has taught me that. But God has taught me that hope is a theological virtue -- a supernatural gift of God oriented towards what He has in store. A vulnerable stance before new life, in new vistas. "Now to him who is able to accomplish far more than we can ask or imagine, by the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen." (Eph. 3:20-21) 

In Which I Relate What I have in common with St. Therese

I'm in my very final term of my Spiritual Direction Formation Program. It started with a prophetic bang back in September of 2024. There was a moment on the last full day of our in-person intensive, during a group spiritual direction session, where one part of one line of one reading impacted me so profoundly that I wept for the 20 minutes of meditation we had, and then I wept some more as I shared about it with my small group. The line was this: At the heart of the Carmelite rule, there is a call for us to commit ourselves to Jesus.... That wasn't even the whole sentence. But it struck me profoundly and memorably that the Lord Jesus was impressing upon me that up until that time, I had a concept of what it meant to follow Him. And He was calling me to an entirely new level. The tears were not exactly tears of joy, nor were they anxious tears. I suppose I could say they were sobering tears. What came to mind during the group sharing was the image of Aslan, how he is not tame, but he is good. I think I wrote a post about this at the time. Ah yes, here it is. I am reminded that I realized that I do not control in this relationship with the Lord. 

In 2025 I experienced a couple of totally unforseen developments in my life which picked up my identity, and really my practical day-to-day life, and shook them all about. In the midst of this, I came face to face with some of the highlights of traumatic things from my past and began dealing and healing with professional help, new personal habits, skills, and lots and lots of emotional support.

Then we had our fourth intensive in March, in Chicago. On the last day of that intensive, it became clear that I was losing that lots and lots of emotional support, instantly. Yeah, ok, forgive my coded writing, but let's just say that I have now been moving from the highlights to the deep depths of traumatic things from my past. Same Lord. Same call. Same formation. And now I am grappling with that commit ourselves to Jesus part from two years ago.

And this is where St. Therese comes in. I've read about her Christmas Eve conversion dozens of times, but it is speaking to me in a brand new way right now. Therese knew about loss and pain and trauma, having been ill as an infant, sent away from her family to a wet nurse, bonded there, then removed from there, sent back home with some degree of anxiety, possibly soaked in from her mother's anxiety. Then her mother died. Then she attached to her sister Pauline as her mother, and then Pauline abruptly left home to enter Carmel. So by the time she was 10, Therese had a "mystery illness" which was something of a psychotic breakdown. Even after she recovered, she recounts that she had the horrible fault of being extremely touchy and crying at the slightest provocation. (For the record, all of this is what I can relate with the best in her life.)

The Christmas Eve grace seems so simple and silly, but it was transformational for her and understanding it is powerful to me. Coming home late in the evening from Mass, 14-year-old Therese was on her way upstairs to put away her coat when she overheard her tired father make a comment about the custom of Therese opening the little gifts which were waiting in her slippers, that at least this would be the last year they'd have to do that. Her sister heard it too, and caught her glance, knowing that this was prime fodder for Therese to break into an emotional mess. But Jesus delivered to her a grace that changed her. She writes, "Forcing back my tears, I descended the stairs rapidly; controlling the poundings of  my heart, I took my slippers and placed them in front of Papa, and withdrew all of the objects joyfully." She says at that moment, she left her childhood, and found the strength of soul that had left her when her mother died. She was able to choose to navigate her emotions, rather than to allow her traumatized emotions to ride roughshod all over her. She was not surpressing; she was choosing. She was choosing to stand in the strength she had received rather than in the hurt she had known. And from then on, the choice to love God and neighbor was rock solid in her. Even in her final illness, when she struggled in feeling a sense of faith in heaven at all, she says she was still able to love. 

This is really foundational to her famous Little Way, which boils down to abandoning oneself to the merciful love of God, with gratitude. 

Let me tell you, studying this with a real-time experience of having so much childhood trauma triggered in me 24/7 has been ... a ... [squinting] ... grace... I guess I have to say. And it is a call. I'm not at the point where I've received the grace and I'm bounding down the stairs to be joyful in the face of the beloved one who just innocently had filled my eyes with tears a moment before. I'm meeting these old pains and hugging them tight because apparently I don't yet have the trust to hand them over. But I think right there is the commit ourselves to Jesus moment. It's so much deeper than thought or real time action. This is deep, deep trust in ways I've never accessed before. 

But I know and believe that God does not play with us. I signed up for formation, and formation I am receiving. I remember that during my application interview, I blithely said that I'm often saying yes to the Lord in things where I don't really realize what I'm getting myself into. This has definitely been another case of the same. 

Some sobering things are now on my plate. When I have a moment of dipping out of the 24/7, I'm looking at the sobering things. I'm in a very serious place of there's no way out but through. Please pray for me. On Thanksgiving Day I visited the relics of St. Therese in Virginia, and we had a chat about what I have felt as a call to trauma-informed spiritual direction. My dear Therese is informing me, that's for sure. So, yes. Please pray for me. 

Aaron's Lesson for Christian Middle Management

This morning I read Exodus 32, as found in the Office of Readings. A small detail stood out to me that I don't remember noticing before.

This is the account of the Israelites in the wilderness who start to get anxious when Moses has gone up the mountain to worship and commune with God. He's been gone roughly a month, and they apparently were given no timeline about when to expect him back. As far as they know, he's never coming back. They are feeling insecure and scared for their future. 

They complain to Aaron. If I can imagine what's going on for Aaron, he probably trusted at first that Moses' trek was in God's hands, but he also is being pressed by the insecurity of the crowd. The people need a leader, and their complaints start to hit him like demands for performance. "Make it better, Aaron. Do something, Aaron." 

They don't ask him to pray and ask God for direction, and this doesn't seem to occur to Aaron, either. He looks at their need as a crisis and tries to blend his own wisdom and experience with this demands he is now feeling personally. He is not so much concerned with helping the people connect with God as he is with alleviating his own sense of unease. Moses is gone, after all. Instead of looking at the people's need with the humility that puts him in touch with his own need, he comes up with a plan.

And here's the detail. The people say, "Make us a god" and he's now taking their direction. His means? He tells the people: "Have your wives, your sons, and your daughters take off their golden earrings...." He doesn't ask "the people" to personally sacrifice anything. He asks them to make other people sacrifice. Aaron seems to not understand that true spiritual seeking comes at cost to oneself, and that the vulnerable waiting is part and parcel of God's design. Aaron doesn't dig into his own growing sense of uncertainty with Moses gone, and he doesn't ask the men to dig into their growing sense of uncertainty with trust in the Lord. Instead he comes up with this idea to present God as a thing that can be easily grasped. And like he later tells Moses, "I threw the gold in the fire, and out came this calf!" 

For those of us who find ourselves in positions of spiritual middle management, who provide some support to others spiritually but who aren't the leader, or for any of us who are Christian but who aren't in fact the Holy Spirit, this is a valuable lesson. We need to be able to hear the worries and pains of other people without a) thinking we can step in as savior and fix it or b) without recognizing within ourselves the same capacity towards weakness. What we need to do is bring both ourselves and those we support before the Lord. We are equal pilgrims on the journey, nothing more. As we both bow before the Lord, we can then work together to carry out His directives for us. 

How Will I Know (If He Really Loves Me)?

I was encouraged recently to put some work into what I would say to someone who comes to me with a basic explicit or implict question: Does God love me? Am I worthy to lay claim to being loved by God?

Let's take for granted that the person asking this question already can answer it intellectually, and agrees in her mind that, yes, God is love (1 John 4:7), that He loves the world (John 3:16), which includes me. But what if this information has about as much personal resonance as the fact that there is a species of monkey called the Japanese macaque that lives in a forest outside of Osaka? In other words, what if I don't dispute the veracity of the claim, but I cannot connect to it as having any meaning for how I live?

Let's continue with affirming the intellectual assent towards the theological truth that God exists and that He is good with the reminder that God rewards those who earnestly seek him (Hebrews 11:6). I would point out that this matter of seeking God is a function of faith -- a choosing to trust and to entrust. I would further affirm that Jesus does not need big faith; he will work with, cooperate with, very basic, very small faith (Matthew 17:20). It can be helpful to pray, "Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief" (Mark 9:24). 

One path of approach here is to begin with some meditation on who God is. "God is love." 
God, I believe that you are love, but I admit I don't really know love. I don't really know who you are.  What kind of feelings rise up if you tell God this? 

Do you feel nervous, as around a stranger?
Do you feel excited to think that you can address God and actually speak to him?
Do you feel guilty, as if you've damaged something?
Do you feel cut off, like you are talking to a brass sky, and that there's nothing out there?
Do you feel inadequate, like this shouldn't be difficult for you? 
Do you feel silly, like you shouldn't need this?

What feelings arise? 

It's important to look at the feelings within you because as in any relationship between two people, what is going on within both is vital information. Feelings are information, even though I myself am much more than what I feel.

I would talk through the feelings that arise, to try to touch upon the basic need in us, and the revealed truth about who God is.

If I feel nervous, I might need to know God accepts me as I am today. I don't have to prove my worth. (I am fearfully and wonderfully made [Psalm 139:13-14]; I am created in the image and likeness of God [Genesis 1:27]; You are precious in my eyes and honored and I love you [Isaiah 43:4])

If I feel excited, I might need to be encouraged to start out on the long discipline of daily growth (Be diligent in these matter, be absorbed in them, so that your progress may be evident to everyone. [1 Timothy 4:15]; So as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in him, rooted in him and built upon him, and established in the faith as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving [Colossians 2:6-7])

If I feel guilty, I might need help to understand that it is God's love that purifies us, and that we all stand in need our purification. It's no barrier to God loving us. (If we acknowledge our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins,  and cleanse us from every wrongdoing [1 John 1:9]; Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world [John 1:29]; But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us [Romans 5:8])

If I feel cut off, perhaps despairing or rejected by God, I might need help to realize how constantly God is in pursuit of me (I will allure her now, I will lead her into the wilderness and speak persuasively to her [Hosea 2:16]; the Good Shepherd goes after the lost sheep until he finds it [Luke 15:1-7]; Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door then I will enter his house and dine with him and he with me [Revelation 3:20])

If I feel inadequate, I might think receiving God's love is something humans should be able to master all on their own, without help from God or others. (Therefore encourage one another and build one another up [1 Thessalonians 5:11]; We must consider how to rouse one another to love and good works. We should not stay away from our assembly [Hebrews 10:24-25]; Draw your strength from the Lord and from His mighty power [Ephesians 6:10])

If I feel silly, like I shouldn't need love, I might need help acknowledging that God is my Father, and I his child, and the preciousness and safety of this status (Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven [Matthew 18:1-5]; When I see the heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you set in place -- what is man that you are mindful of him? [Psalm 8:4-5]) 

This of course could be a conversation enduring and morphing for a lifetime. Once we surface our felt needs and get an intial handle on the truth God would speak into that need, I would recommend spending a time of daily prayer with a passage from the gospels, asking the Lord to speak into these basic needs more about who he is and who you are. Journal a bit about it. Then bring it back into spiritual direction to explore it some more.