What They Are Missing

Father Gabriel is St. Pio's kind of priest. When I taught in a Catholic high school, the students returning from the Sacrament of Confession would complain sometimes. "Father Gabriel listens to our confession and then he asks us questions about sins we didn't even name. I don't think that's right. He asks us about sins against purity even! Puts us on the spot. Do you have any sins against purity that you need to confess today? Oh, that's so not right!" And they would slump into their seat and pout a little at that point.

I wasn't Catholic then - just a Spanish teacher in a Catholic high school. But I had a memory from my own high school days that gave me wisdom and helped me to have the right words.

When I was in high school, I remember sitting in Algebra class. We'd finished our homework assignment, and we were talking quietly. I guess the Catholic kids were getting ready for Confession at their parish, because they were talking about it. They asked each other what do you say at Confession - do you really say what you did? No, I just say I hit my sister or got mad at Mom. Stuff like that. I remember thinking about their Sacrament - as an outsider looking in. And I remember saying to myself, "That can't be the way it's supposed to go. That can't be right."

When I became a teacher at Beckman High School, I made sure that I underscored the importance of a good confession and the squandered opportunity of a bad confession. And when they complained about Father Gabriel's confessional, I didn't let it stand. I made sure they knew that it was for their own good - for the good of their souls. And they needed to get over their little tantrum right then and there.

We know that adults can cause scandal, when they do not practice the faith in a rightly-ordered way, yet they flaunt their version of faith in public, in high-profile positions, in places of power.

But even young people can cause scandal, when they do not practice the faith in a rightly-ordered way, yet they flaunt their version of the faith in public. Perhaps in a public school, even. Perhaps in the presence of a Protestant preacher's kid.

Even our young ones need to know that this Catholic faith is the most important thing to us. That it is worth practicing. That it is worth practicing correctly. That it is worth sharing. And that it is worth sharing correctly.

When I speak about the Sacrament of Confession - now that I'm Catholic - my eyes fill with tears, and I tell my dear ones, oh, you don't know what you are missing. Those words of absolution, that chance to bring out all that I have done and all that I haven't done - and to just lay it down. To hear words from the mouth of the priest - and to have my spirit recognize the words of My Lord. My soul recognizes My Lord and My God! I don't know how that is possible. I just know that it is. I try to explain all of this to my non-Catholic friends, and I sigh finally and just end with, you don't know what you are missing! But, oh, how I wish you did!

What They Are Missing

Dyersville and the Field of Dreams

"What you gonna do? Write about it?"

That's what Ray says to Terrence Mann in the Field of Dreams, just before Terrence slips into the cornfield to discover what lies on the other side.

Terrence Mann smiles that winsome smile and responds, "It's what I do."

And then he's gone.

In 1989, I taught Spanish at a small high school in Dyersville, Iowa. Field of Dreams had just wrapped up filming on location and everyone was talking about it. The students at Beckman High School were no different. More than once, I had to turn my students' attention back to verb conjugation and away from movie talk. Someone had waited on Kevin Costner when he dined at the local restaurant. He'd tipped well. Others had to tell me which car number they were in the line-up at the end of the movie. Everyone had a story. Everyone wanted to share it.

Back then, I wasn't Catholic. I simply had a teaching position in a Catholic school. I had no intention of plunging into the Catholic cornfield to see what I might find on the other side.

I guess that I was a little like Terrence Mann when Ray first encounters him. My life is fine just the way it is. I don't need whatever you are peddling. I don't need you coming into my life so you can shake things up.

Next thing I know, I'm hooked. Next thing I know, I'm like the Terrence Mann at the end of the movie.

And I'm the one smiling. I'm the one saying this is the most exciting thing that has happened to me. I'm in. I'm all in. Like Terrence Mann.

"What you gonna do? Write about it?"

To which I heartily reply, "It's what I do."

Dyersville and the Field of Dreams

Name It And Claim It - The Eyes Still On Earth

It was November of 1990. I was on my way back from Chicago's O'Hare Airport, having just returned from a trip to England. I wasn't familiar with the radio station, but it was Christian. So, I settled in to pass the drive back to Dyersville, Iowa, presumably in good company.

The preacher was a wealth-and-prosperity teacher, the kind that truly believes you can name-it-and-claim-it.

Literally, he announced that people were calling in to say they had received boats, and cars, and homes! He encouraged the listeners who had not yet found the source of all good things to call with their pledge that moment. And their wildest dreams would come true.

I wondered what the poor people of third world nations would say to that. I wondered what Our Lord would say to that.

Maybe the answer is in today's noon reading.

Colossians 3:1-2
Since you have been brought back to true life with Christ, you must look for the things that are in heaven, where Christ is, sitting at God’s right hand. Let your thoughts be on heavenly things, not on the things that are on the earth.

If we truly are Christ's, we don't mix up earthly gain with heavenly riches. Certainly, it is possible (especially in our country) to be prosperous and heavenly minded. But prosperity teaching actually has one fundamental flaw. The eyes are fixed on things of earth as the spirit tells itself that it is really being very holy. It is probably the worst self-delusion there is.

God gives good things, no doubt. And sometimes, those things are earthly gain. But the wise man does not confuse what it means to keep the eyes on the prize. He never presumes that being godly means being prosperous.

Name It And Claim It - The Eyes Still On Earth

The Our Father - a rose by any other name

Basilica of St. Francis Xavier

Dyersville, Iowa (Home of Beckman High School)

As Protestants, we called it The Lord's Prayer. It was just one more way we were different from Catholics. It seemed I was always noticing the differences - and always assuming we (Protestants) had it right. Even saying the words "The Our Father" seemed odd as they fell from my lips.

I had plenty of opportunity to try on the new title when I was hired as the new Spanish teacher at a Catholic high school in rural Iowa. After all, we had to open every class with prayer, and the teacher usually did the leading.

In short order, I implemented a new assignment. "We are going to learn the Our Father and the Hail Mary in Spanish. And we will be opening every class with one of these prayers."

I was there two years (180 days each year). I had five or six classes of students each day. That means I said those prayers around two thousand times!

I don't really think it matters what we call the prayer . . . a rose by any other name and so forth. . . but I do see the value in the simple act of saying the prayer.

I used to think it was a rote prayer and too many Catholics said it without feeling a thing. But I have come to love these prayers, along with the Rosary.

There are times when I do not know what to pray or how to pray. There are times my own mind runs out of ways to say what I am feeling in my heart, but I find that I still long to be with the Lord and talk with Him. When I am just not ready to get off my knees, when I want the conversation between us to go on even though I have run out of words, I simply slip into the prayer Our Lord loved most.

If I try, I can even still do it in Spanish. It's silly, I know, but I think my patron saint, St. Teresa of Avila (herself from Spain), must be smiling about then. I can almost imagine what she's saying. . .

That preacher's kid with the minor in Spanish. . . she's finally Catholic! It only took about two thousand Spanish Our Fathers!

The Our Father - a rose by any other name

One Bread, One Body, One Lord of All

I taught Spanish in a Catholic school a decade and a half before I entered the Church. It was my first significant exposure to the Mass. During those two years at Beckman High School in Dyersville, Iowa, I frequently attended the school-wide Masses and sat with my students. I picked up little pieces of the back-and-forth liturgy that transpired between the priest, the student body and God, but I always remained seated as the students went forward to receive Holy Communion. I didn’t quite understand why I wasn’t permitted to receive. I felt the sting of this separation most acutely when the Communion song was ’”One Bread, One Body.” I longed to be with my students as they went forward.

When we returned to the classroom, students would sometimes ask me why I didn’t go forward to receive the Eucharist, and I would simply say, “I’m not Catholic.” That seemed to be reason enough for them.

Years later, I finally entered the Church. Today, my favorite Communion song is “One Bread, One Body.” I pause and listen to the voices around me. Then I stand to my feet and make my way to the aisle, joyfully letting the words soak in. Memories from those school-wide Masses fill my mind as I make my way forward to receive Our Eucharistic Lord, and I am amazed that, some fifteen years later, I am more in unity with the students I met all those years ago than I was as their teacher.

When the priest says, “Happy are those who are called to this table,” my spirit always says, “Indeed.”

When the priest holds the Eucharist before me and proclaims, “The Body of Christ,” I blink back tears and choke out my “Amen.”

It isn’t just sentimentalism because I no longer feel like an outsider. It is so much more than an emotional attachment to past memories. Today, I receive Holy Communion in the Catholic Church because I really am in union with Christ. My “Amen” is a yes to what the Church teaches and who the Church is. My Amen is a yes to the truth of the Real Presence. My Amen is a commitment to accept my place in the Body of Christ and a yes to whatever that reality might demand of me.

There is more.

Sometimes, I get a glimpse of just how deep the mystery of our unity really goes, and I realize it is doctrinal unity, physical unity, and it is also a mystical, spiritual unity.

Recently, my husband took a business trip to Seattle. He came home and pulled out a couple of little presents for our daughter, and then he said he had something for me. A co-worker had given him a gift bag and told him to give it to his wife. I do not know this woman. She wouldn’t know me if we met on the street.

The woman’s note to me explained that I had come to her mind while she was in prayer and again while reading her own copy of the book she was giving to me.

Inside, I found an inspirational book of daily readings. Immediately, I turned to the entry for the date mentioned in the note. With divine precision, the reading went directly to a problem I was facing.

How can someone in Seattle know what someone in St. Louis needs to hear? What makes a Catholic woman on the other side of the country act on the quiet voice of the Spirit rather than dismiss it as a silly thought of her own making?

There is no other explanation except to say we really are one in this One Body. During the month of January, we pray for unity. It is a tradition that began in 1908 as an octave created to begin on January 18 (the Protestant Feast of the Confession of Peter – similar to the Catholic Feast of the Chair of St. Peter) and to end on January 25 (the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul).

In this Year of St. Paul, let us be particularly faithful in praying for unity in the Body of Christ, “That the world may know that the Father has sent the Son” (the words of Our Lord in the Gospel of John 17).

Lord, hear our prayer.

One Bread, One Body, One Lord of All