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Oh, this book. I have a thousand thoughts swimming around in my head about it.
First, let me say, I am glad I read this book. It’s not necessarily a feel good book and I spent most of the book a tad depressed. Yet, the story telling is excellent.
This is a story set in 1930s Mexico during the Catholic persecutions which gave rise to the Cristeros.
The story follows a “whisky priest” (you never know his name) as he tries to evade authorities. He’s such an interesting character because he isn’t a good man or priest, but he isn’t evil either. He’s a priest that has given himself over to vice (he drinks and has a child), yet you don’t dislike him.
He’s a bad priest and he knows it; he knows he’s unworthy to hear confessions and hold Mass and, yet, something in him hangs on to his calling.
Graham Greene the author was Catholic and he was not, I mean was not, a good practicing Catholic. He abandoned his wife and struggled with fornication and substance abuse, so I have to believe there is a bit of himself written into the character of the priest. With all that said, he gets the Catholic Faith. He writes it so well—the vice, the virtue, human frailty, redemption, hope, and suffering.
I don’t want to spoil the ending, so I won’t say much more. It is a book I would recommend, but to caution for sensitive souls, there is a scene where the priest is in a tightly-packed dark jail cell and a couple is being scandalous by engaging in sexual acts. It’s not overly depicted, but the author makes it clear what it is happening.
My favorite line from the books is: “He knew now that at the end there was only one thing that counted - to be a saint.”
How true that is, Catholic Pilgrims. May we always keep that at the forefront of our mind.
P.S. I did a bonus episode in my podcast where I read a short story by Graham Greene called “The Hint of an Explanation.” It’s all about the Eucharist. You can listen here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/journeying-with-the-saints/id1602865917?i=1000645856665
There's a note, just one note, in an Allison Krauss song that is proof to me that Heaven is real. I know that sounds crazy, but when it hits, I can't describe the feeling it gives me. All I know is that I wish it lasted forever and because one note makes me desire its sound for eternity, to me, that means my soul was made for eternal goodness. The song is "If I Didn't Know Any Better," for those wanting to know. When I look at the masterpiece painting "Ecce Homo" (Behold, the Man) by Antonio Ciseri, I literally have to be pried away. My soul is so moved by it that it's almost painful because I don't know how to express how it makes me feel. One time, my dad and I went to a John Hiatt concert together in a very cool theater in KC. At one point, we got to get close to the stage and John Haitt started playing the song, "Cry Love." I was so entranced, I couldn't move. I remember so vividly how captured I was in that moment. I went home that night and probably listened to it on my dad's cd player 20 times before my soul felt satisfied. It's one of my top three favorite songs of all time. In the "Brothers Karamazov," Father Zosima says, "Much is hidden from us on earth but, as a compensation, we have been given a mysterious, sacred sense of a living bond with another world, with a lofty and superior world." "And if the awareness of (the soul's) ties to that world weakens or dies in you, then all that has grown within you will also die. And you will become indifferent to life, will even come to hate it." I have my ties to Heaven: Music, paintings, churches, the Eucharist, my children's faces, my husband's love. All these things let me know without a doubt that Heaven is real and that I'm made for it. So many people have lost that tie or have never felt it and we see the consequence of that loss all around us, which is tragic. That is why it is so imperative that we promote the good, the true, and the beautiful, Catholic Pilgrims, so that we can help remind people. Live the Faith boldly and travel well this Tuesday.
Continue ReadingWe've probably all seen the videos of the young women (and men, too) who are defending their decision to never have kids. I'm not here to talk about that necessarily. But, I saw a young woman make a video where she said, "People always ask me what the purpose of my life is. The purpose of my life is to get my nails done. The purpose of my life is to take naps. Have you ever taken a nap? They are fantastic. The purpose of my life is to travel..." I watch those kinds of things with such sadness. No, you were not born so that you could get your nails done or take naps. Those aren't purposes for a life, they are activities that you do (all can be done with kids, I might add). The purpose of your life is to be a gift to others. Never has anyone been born where God had in mind for them a life totally lived for themselves. Never. The mantra of our western culture for far too long has been to focus on the self to an extreme degree. This has not made us more healthy, happy, fulfilled, or capable human beings. Yes, being a gift to others is not as easy as living for oneself, though I would argue that it's harder to go through life imploding in on yourself. Everybody has a purpose and that purpose is to be a gift to other human beings through loving them, caring for them, supporting them, and enriching their lives. And it can't just be a now and then kind of thing, it has to be a gift of self that stretches you and asks something of you. Christ's life is a full and complete gift to us. Mary gave herself to the whole human race by saying yes to being the Mother of Our Savior. The Saints give themselves away for love of God and love of others. You were made for more than nails and naps, Catholic Pilgrims. So, live the faith boldly and travel well this Monday.
Continue ReadingI went to grade school in a very old looking building right in the center of my hometown. If I think about it hard enough, I can actually conjure the smell of that building up in my mind--floor wax, chalk, sunlight on old books, and wood. One year when I was home for Christmas, I asked my mom if she could get us in to look around. It had been at least 34 years since I'd been in there. The last time I had walked the halls, I had been a kid. Since my mom knows everyone in town, she got us in. It smelled exactly like I knew it would. Naturally, everything was smaller than I remembered. As I was walking down the halls stopping by each classroom I had once been in, I thought to myself, "It's so weird to come back to a place you once spent every day in after all this time." I looked in my 3rd grade classroom and it was almost like I could picture little Amy sitting there with her penny loafers on and her new glasses. That room had once been my whole world when I was 8-years old. Take, also, the church that my husband and I were married in. I haven't been in it since the day we walked out as husband and wife. Isn't that weird? I drive past it all the time when I'm home, but I don't go inside. Mostly because it's a Protestant church and I'm Catholic now, so there's really no reason to go in. But, it was in that church that my life with Dustin started. There are lots of places that are so significant to our lives that we will never go into again: Hospitals where we were born, hospitals where our children were born, homes that we grew up in, homes of our grandparents, churches that we attended and schools. Whenever we move for the military, right before we leave our home, I like to sit in the empty, clean house and just think about all the memories made there. All the memories that will just seep into the walls and I wonder if the "ghosts" of our laughter and love somehow linger. I hope it does. Life is a funny thing, isn't it? In the moment, certain places are our whole world and then time marches on and those buildings and towns get replaced by other buildings and towns. And sometimes, you can't go back, you just have to keep moving forward on our pilgrimage through life, which ultimately leads to the place we all long to be--Heaven. Have a good Thursday, Catholic Pilgrims.
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