Healing Mass: Witness

A couple of weeks ago at my parish there was a healing Mass with Fr. Michael Scanlon, TOR as the main celebrant. I attended, primarily because the evening time fit my schedule best. But it was providential. Let me simply share the experience.

The fact that I was at Mass alone enabled a certain level of attentiveness and quiet for prayer that is not always the case. Oh, I don't at all begrudge having my children present at Mass, and I've finally learned not to get upset with them for being children (and how to assume potty trips into prayer, and I'm almost good at praying despite tiny percussive lip noises). But, you know, if it isn't children presenting a distraction, it will be something else, and there was that to contend with. (Children truly are excellent virtue coaches.) Despite that (use your imagination or fill in your fav), from my first moments at the Mass my spirit was ready and anticipating -- or being called to anticipation.

Now, I have heard Fr. Michael's "healing homily" before. There is nothing redundant about hearing it more than once, any more than I could imagine meeting Jesus in Galilee would have made his followers say "Oh, you again." I'd summarize his key point thusly: Jesus, who is truly present in the Eucharist, is the One who heals. Fr. Mike challenged us to realize, to have the eyes of faith to see, that we are actually and really approaching Him, the God of the Universe, in the Eucharist, and that He always has rich graces for us -- always. Because He is the Lord and not we ourselves, we may not receive what we ask for, but we can always receive what He has for us, if we but believe, and receive.

Immediately after the close of Mass, there were prayer teams available to pray with people as desired. I thought Fr. Michael's explanation of this was very beautiful: that as we had just received Jesus sacramentally, so now this was the time for the Body of Christ in the community present to minister to one another in prayer. In a way, this was so familiar and "routine," and yet it struck me in a new way. The only reason why we are any good for each other as fellow Christians is because of God's saving action in the Sacraments, in His Church.

So, there I was, still in this state of openness, but feeling somewhat suspended in a wordless void. I figured I would go to one of the shorter lines for prayer. I felt a very general sense of my prayer request: it was about communication. I couldn't phrase much more than that. But my heart began to feel moved. I began to feel God's merciful action coming to meet me in this place where I had no words. I began to cry.

It was my turn, and there I was. I approached the women and told them simply "I want to be able to talk." I was rather grateful for the first thing out of the first woman's mouth: "Lord Jesus, you know what that means." The other thought I meant I wanted to sit down and chat, but I said no, I want to take what is in my heart and run it through my mouth to another person without anything getting in the way. (Gee, and I could have just said "I want to be healed from endometriosis"! It would have been so much more straight-forward!) We exchanged a few sentences in conversation and then prayed. I left peaceful, knowing something had transpired, that Jesus had given me something, but not understanding yet what it was.

In the next couple of days, though, I found the word for what this healing was from: shame. Shame is the experience of curtailing behavior through negative thoughts and feelings about oneself. Now, the following observation is not a commentary on being quiet or introverted, because those things are not necessarily related to shame, but I know that from earliest childhood the behavior I learned to curtail out of shame the most was my speech and the movement of my heart towards others. At one point as a teenager, I constantly felt like I had to curtail my very act of living, literally. But it was only after this healing Mass that I could see how strongly shame had dominated my life. And there has been a gradual sort of healing. It had been well over 15 years since the last time I imagined falling into a giant meat grinder every time I thought about saying something important to someone. Receiving the sacrament of matrimony has been tremendously healing for me as well. One thing I know for sure though is that healing deep wounds takes a power far greater than the mere passage of time. Healing requires Jesus.

Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift! He truly is my Redeemer and my Ransom. He alone makes me more of myself instead of less. I am also aware that receiving healing takes one out of one's former comfort zone. There are new waters to navigate, even new skills to learn and new exercise to undertake. I guess this is why everything in this life is a journey, and never an arrival.

For good measure, here are the perfect lyrics.