Victor Frankl once said, “If architects wish to strengthen a decrepit arch, they increase the load that is laid upon it, for thereby the parts are joined more firmly together.”
We all turn pages in our lives when ordinary day-to-day existence changes forever. Sometimes those pages are dog-eared in our memory due to the permanent altering of our preconceived notions of life. My own occurred when I was riding high, at least in my estimation, young and strong, full of curiosity and an insatiable desire to learn.
Fresh out of a master’s program with several lucrative job offers in my pocket and a wind driving me towards a doctoral program, I felt like the “queen of the world.” Yet, unbeknown to me, a nasty virus was quietly at work in my veins, slowly applying the brakes to my life. Several years later, I still battled daily pain, unexplained fevers, and days spent inside four walls. In the way of the chronically ill, I came to accept an uneasy compromise with a now alien body. What I failed to recover from was the intrusion of a God who cared not for my earthly plans, but was intent on shedding my temporal desires through the chisel of pain and isolation. I was wise in books, but ignorant in life. I did not know how to thank Him and let myself fall close to despair.
Instead of complete surrender, I began to read. Like a match struck in a cave, the riches of God’s word and the history of His Church lit my mind with iconic images of heroic suffering and sacrifice. The mysterious One drew close to me, although His presence felt strange and foreign from the Sunday School God of my childhood.
I was raised by a devout Southern Baptist mother who nurtured me in a love of God and His word. My pilgrimage, in reality, began as a child. Although I did not take the steps for Baptism until I was an adult, I never experienced a time during my formative years that I was unaware of God’s existence. My understanding of Him and my knowledge of His role in my life wavered and failed many times. Yet, I knew in my bones that God did exist and was responsible for creation.
During those years of isolation, a number of old friends reintroduced themselves. Once valued companions of literature such as C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and George MacDonald kept me company when sleep failed me. I also caught up with distant cousins of legend such as Francis of Assisi and Joan of Arc, having been reacquainted by G.K. Chesterton and Mark Twain. From my lonely chamber, I enjoyed the brilliant minds and passionate hearts of the communion of saints. Saint Francis and Saint John of the Cross stood as shining examples of the love of God shown through the weakness of man. I marveled at what these men possessed, this fire burning ever bright inside them.
My world changed from an outer drive into an inward journey. It took me a long time to discover that life is not mine to conquer, divide, and distribute. I was influenced by a superficial spirituality that I blame only on my own conception. If the path I walked was God’s will then why did adversity rear its obnoxious head? The illness stripped away a veneer of selfishness, like peeling a Vidalia onion, which all Southerners recognize as deceptively sweet, but still an onion.
Over a period of years, my health returned. Then my acquaintance with pain took another inevitable turn. The loss of family and friends we cannot escape in this earthly realm. I learned that I was no different, no matter how safe I felt in the womb of my family. After the shock of my brother’s death, I handled it in the only way I knew—by escape. I fled to another country under the guise of work, but in effect, as an attempt to run ahead of the searing hole in my life. Inside me, a restlessness grew until it could be contained no longer. It cried from the very depths of my soul.
Nikos Kazantzakis in Zorba the Greek says, “I prepared excitedly for my departure, as if this journey had a mysterious significance. I had decided to change my mode of life. Till now, I told myself, you have only seen the shadow and been well content with it; now, I am going to lead you to the substance.”
On my journey through storybook English villages and lonely Irish coasts, I was not searching for my heritage, but for the deepest, truest calling in my life. I read. Late nights, sleepless hours, I accumulated a stack of volumes by my bedside that I dug into in the wee hours of the morning. These included among others the writings of the Church Fathers, the lives of the saints, and the Holy Scriptures.
In experiences of the Lord’s Supper as a Baptist, I felt the significance of the event. Yet, the way it was celebrated, once every month at the evening service, never satisfied a peculiar hunger I had when I heard the words, “This is my body, given up for you.” Soon I found myself curious about other denominations’ partaking of this singular meal and visited a number of Presbyterian, Methodist, and Episcopalian services. After hearing a progressive, disturbing homily at an Anglican church, I looked forward to the Eucharist where I could partake in this most sacred meal. When the chalice was handed to me, it was empty. I looked up into the eyes of the celebrant and suffered a hollowness unlike anything I had felt before.
I left the church and walked uphill to the stunningly beautiful Catholic Church, where a noonday Mass would begin in ten minutes. I was nervous. Catholicism seemed like an exotic bird, lovely to look at through the bars of a cage, but frightful to encounter on one’s own. All anxiety melted away as I watched the priest elevate the Host. I knew from that moment I was home.
My actual reception into the church did not take place until three years hence. In the intervening time, my sweet Godly mother was called home. I told her of my decision while she was fighting her last battle in the hospital. She smiled and said, “You look at peace. You have found what you were looking for.” Not everyone would agree. My embracing of the fullness of the Catholic Church was disturbing to many of my closest friends and family members. The cross continues to be ever before me, but I find solace in the communion of the saints whose prayers bid me on.