That Darn Restlessness

We all go through cycles in our faith lives. We have the just-came-off-of-retreat Jesus high, and we have the wow-I-can’t-even-remember-the-last-time-I-tried-to-listen-to-God low. Coming off of a summer absolutely filled with grace and the joy of being able to feel fulfilled at the end of every day, you could say I’m at a bit of a spiritual low. I moved back into my dorm yesterday and am in the calm before the storm of the craziness that is college. Before I get completely caught up in studying and activities, I realized in my restlessness that I need to figure out who I want to be. My time this summer taught me so much about myself, and so I want to share a story from this summer before I continue.

 

Every other day, Maddy and I have been tasked to make sure that each of the residents’ bathrooms is fully stocked with solution, gloves, and plastic bags. The bags come from the local recycling center and are just old grocery bags that people have brought to them. One of our residents is a brother of the Sacred Heart Community and many of his brothers come to visit him. One brother is particularly faithful about visiting him, and happened to walk by me on his way to visit. I had my cart with all the bags and gloves when he walked by. After making a joke, he pulled out a bag filled with these bags from behind his back and gave them to me. He said, “I always collect these for sister because I know you use them.” It was such a simple act, but to me it demonstrated something much more powerful that I have been struggling to understand, and so had a deep impact on me. 

Earlier this week, Maddy and I went to visit a friend of my family who lives in Mobile. She is a Daughter of Charity and has given her life to work on the education of young people. Her order is dedicated to helping those in poverty, so the school she works at and showed us is very impoverished. It was heartbreaking to hear the stories about the families who sent their children to that school and see how few resources the students had. Later that night we went to have dinner with her and the sisters she lives with. We asked them what they do and heard stories of all the poverty they faced and worked to combat every day. One of the sisters was working around the docks to help get immigrant shrimpers proper health care. It was very inspiring to hear of the work that these women were doing, but at the same time it was startling to think about all that poverty right here in America. Between that experience and the readings, I became very disheartened about how anyone would be able to actually make a difference and end poverty. 

Having Brother hand me those bags was in many ways a message from God to me. God was telling me that people don’t have to do grand and elaborate acts to end poverty and save the world. That is God’s job. Our job is to live a life just like Brother- to simply live consciously. It is easy to go through the motions of life and get caught up in simply doing the task we have to do that day, even if that task is working to end poverty. What is hard, and what we are called to, is to think about how each of our seemingly meaningless daily actions affect every person on this planet and bring about the kingdom of God. Instead of taking the easy route and throwing away those bags, Brother set them aside to bring to us because he knew we needed them. To me, that simple decision is how the world will be saved-by people living their lives with love, and choosing to take the time to think about how they can make small differences in the lives of everyone around them and leave this world a little better than they found it. In that act, Brother gave me hope for this world and inspired me to share that hope with others. 

 

When thinking about who I want to be, I always come back to this story. I know I’m not going to be the next Mother Teresa (ok probably not…) but I know I can change the world, simply by continuing to ask myself: How can I work to better serve God in those in need in my life? How can I better love my family and my friends and reach out to lonely strangers? I’m going to be honest, I very rarely ask myself those questions. But I know that’s why I’m so restless. I was created to love and be loved, to give and to receive, to learn, grow, serve, and be restless so I’m always working on coming back to the One who is peace. I believe with all my heart that happiness is a by product of the effort to make someone else happy, and I know I will never be happy unless I continue to work to live intentionally to help everyone around me. If everyone worked even just a tiny bit more to this end, our world would never be the same.   

 

Here are some excerpts from my paper for my class. I was reflecting on the similarities between mass, which is an integral part of my own spiritual life, and service. This post is dedicated to a beautiful saint in heaven who I was privileged to come to know this summer.

Christian tradition tells us that sacraments are efficacious signs of grace. Fr. Himes defines grace saying, “Grace is the perfect self-gift of God, the divine agape outside the Trinity” (Himes 103). Fr. Himes goes on to say, “Any thing, any person, place, event, any sight, sound, smell, taste, or touch that causes you to recognize the presence of grace, to accept it and celebrate it, is a sacrament, effecting what it signifies” (Himes 108). During my times of service, I began to see and feel the presence of God sometimes even more clearly than in the chapel, which had before been one of the only places I could feel God. My moments of self-gift became nourishing like the Eucharist, but in a different way and without diminishing the importance of the Eucharist in my life. I felt Jesus when I scrubbed dirty toilets, clipped the toenails of a resident, and went to visit sick residents in the hospital during our off time. I felt the love of Christ in the smiles and appreciation for my time and caring attitude. I looked Jesus in the eyes when I listened to their stories of heartache and pain. I worked alongside Christ in the kitchen and hallways. The selfless love that is God was everywhere around me, in so many different forms and sadly often tainted by the imperfection of this world, but just as real as in mass.

I have heard it said that being at the consecration during mass is like being at the foot of the cross. We share in the mystery of suffering during that act. Suffering is something that we naturally shy away from, yet Christian tradition speaks of it as something good, and something that contains hope. This seems paradoxical, but my time in service to those who suffer has proven this true to me. In service we suffer with those around us, just as in mass we suffer with Christ on the cross. Service is a call to compassion, a call to “share in the other’s vulnerability, enter with him or her into the experience of weakness and powerlessness, become part of uncertainty, and give up control and self-determination” (Nouwen, McNeill, and Morrison 12).  For me, being someone who likes to be in control, this seems to contrary to human nature. Everything about becoming vulnerable and facing death and suffering makes me want to run away. But the mass and the celebration of the resurrection shows us this suffering contains profound beauty.

One beautiful demonstration of this comes from a story during my time of service. The very first day on the job, Maddy and I went to a “religious discussion” activity. The discussion was on “the world.” One wonderful resident who has since passed shared something I will never forget. In response to the question of if she saw God in nature, she spoke of how the sufferings she faced as she grew older forced her to slow down enough to take notice of the small beautiful things in life and see God more clearly in the world around her. I was so moved this discovery of goodness in her situation despite her afflictions, which were truly tremendous. Service reveals the paradox of suffering which is a great mystery that the mass celebrates.

At the end of mass, there is a sending forth of all those present, because the mass is supposed to encourage us to help us do God’s work. That work is work of service. Service in itself not only exemplifies the message of the mass and the One who mass celebrates, but it is what the mass gives us the strength to go out and do. Service and the mass are about falling in love, and sharing that love with a community in need. My time at the home was so filled with the presence of God, and that presence led to a hope that no one could take away from the residents or me. These beautiful residents and staff taught me to love in a new, more life-giving way. Our interactions were efficacious and made real to me the love on the cross, the love in the Eucharist, the love of a radical, self-giving God.

The greatest lesson I learned from falling in love with the residents at the home was that everything rests on love, and love alone is our only hope. To me, this is the message of the mass because the mass celebrates the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, and nothing exemplifies pure, selfless, agapic love more than that. Christ’s death on the cross was the single act that most perfectly depicted what God is all about. That act of wholly selfless love is what we aim to take part in during service to others. I learned during my summer as Fr. Nouwen put it, “the basic principle that no one can help anyone without becoming involved, without entering wholly into the painful situation, without taking the risk of becoming hurt, wounded, or even destroyed in the process” (Nouwen 153). We need to look no further than the love we celebrate in mass to know this is true. God could not help us without becoming involved, and it ended up costing God an incredible amount. My time trying to “help” the poor and lonely at the home has confirmed this principle. As I write this I have just been informed of the death of a resident at the home. Tears stream down my face as I think of the beautiful lady I had come to know and love in my process of service to her. I think of the way she shared her faith in kindness to everyone around her, in love for the aids, the nurses, myself, and especially her devoted family. My attempts to bring happiness to a group of people faced with suffering have cost me as well. But the lesson is the same one that the mass celebrates: love is not love without cost, and it is always worth the cost. 

The Meaning of Hope

This summer, I have spent 7 weeks so far and 1 week to go at a Little Sisters of the Poor Nursing Home in Alabama. This is a actually a class through the Center for Social Concerns at Notre Dame on service called an SSLP (Summer Service Learning Program). This week we read and wrote about suffering. I wanted to share what I wrote because I wish everyone could be able to see what I have seen and learned what I have these past 7 weeks.

When I really think about it, I have to admit that the place where we (myself and Maddy, my co-SSLP student here and friend) have spent our summer is truly a place of suffering. Saying that doesn’t seem right because there is such a sense of love and hope and vitality here, but the truth is that everyone here is suffering an incredible amount. Not only does everyone here have health problems, including terrible aches and pains, but they also deal with loneliness and the loss of their independence, which are debatably much worse than their health problems. Not only that, but everyone here has lived a full life in a world that is often very cruel, and so many of them have dealt with incredible trauma and loss. Some of the residents have endured unimaginable abuse in their lives, some have seen every member of their family die, and others have never even had families. Many of them probably feel that they are burdens to their families and others wait to die alone. Even writing this I am getting depressed.

So why then, when I think about my time here, does it seem to be filled with joy? Why will this place always remain in memory as a house of hope and life, instead of death and despair? I think there are many answers to that question: and at the center of it all is the Trinity. The Christian faith gives us hope of a Father who loves us unconditionally and has adopted us as His children, Jesus who died for us and opened the doors to Heaven to live with Him forever, and the Holy Spirit who remains with us always. This hope transforms the earthly sufferings of so many of our residents and gives them joy.

I truly believe, after spending so much time here, that this hope would be so much farther away from the residents, so seemingly unattainable, if there were not people here to exemplify this hope for them and make it real, instead of some far-off idea. I believe the Sisters and staff and other residents here have been called by God (and very remarkably responded to that call) to show the love and the hope of Christ to all our residents who are so filled with suffering. As Fr. Himes so beautifully put it, “The Christian response to evil must be the affirmation of goodness of the finite being. So we are all engaged in affirming and fulfilling our being, not denying it. And that fulfilling of our being is our capacity for self-gift.” The Sisters and other workers and even residents here combat the evils of this world and heal the suffering of those around them through the gift of their self and their love.

I love the question posed by Fr. Nouwen in the reading, “Who can take away suffering without entering it?” I believe the answer is no one. Those who serve at this home know that, and have taught that to Maddy and I. The Sisters stay with residents in the hospital and when they die and the whole community mourns with their families and joins in prayer for all those who need it. This attitude of self-gift is infectious, and I am so thankful Maddy and I have caught the bug. We have, through the grace of God, truly come to understand “the basic principle that no one can help anyone without becoming involved, without entering wholly into the painful situation, without taking the risk of becoming hurt, wounded, or even destroyed in the process.”  Everyone here has opened their hearts to us, and we have opened ours to them. This love, this agape that truly IS God, does not end their suffering, but transforms it and gives those who experience it the ability to overcome it. I am truly blessed to have been able to learn this lesson from such beautiful people and know I will carry it with me for the rest of my life.

 

And so it begins…

I’ve been contemplating blogging for a while now and attempting to bring it to God in prayer, but it just hasn’t happened. Until now. This summer I have been working at a Little Sisters of the Poor residence home for the elderly as a summer service project through Notre Dame. It is a class, so we have readings and reflections that we must complete each week. For quite some time now I have been struggling to see God in all the little moments of my daily life. This summer, taking the time each week to reflect upon my experiences and try to search for meaning in them has added a whole new depth to my spiritual life and filled me up tremendously. As I am approaching the end of my time here in service, I have decided I don’t want to stop reflecting on where I have seen God in my interactions with others and this world. And so once again, the idea of a blog popped into my mind. I got up some courage to pray about it and felt a resounding “YES” to the question of if this was a good idea or not. I pray so hard that this blog will touch all who need to be touched, but also that I will be able to live up to what I write. I know I am a much better person in my head than I am in real life, but I hope getting part of me out of my head and into this blog will help me to mend that. I hope to grow in faith with this blog and be able to journey closer to the Truth along with anyone reading. I believe one of the greatest tragedies in life is when we stop paying attention to the miracles that happen all around us and forget to live intentionally. Perhaps writing about my miracles and intentions will keep the story of my life from becoming a part of this tragedy – although grace is probably my best bet on that one. Pray for me all you who read this, and know I am praying for you too. 

Love,

Kaitlyn