So here I am, a mere five hours away from when I need to get up, shower, and drive to the airport for a flight to Chicago and then Philadelphia... and what am I doing? Blogging. That's right. The excitement is not allowing me to sleep. :) I realized that I hadn't posted this yet, so here it is! :)
At the end of the CMC year, missioners write reflections on the experience. Below is mine. I tried not to have a self-imposed length limit-- so hopefully that comes across. No amount of words could adequately express it all, but here's a small piece for how grateful I am for this experience. So, thanks, Mother Cabrini, for making this all possible. We are, as she said, "merely spectators of God's wonderful works." :)
God has a way of giving us exactly what we need when we need it. (In fact… God is SO good at that!) My first year with Cabrini Mission Corps, I learned in a very tangible way that Ministry is Relationship— the heart of ministry and mission is the acceptance of God’s love for us and sharing in the lives of others. This second year, I believe that God opened my heart to receive this gift of relationship even more. The gift of relationships is really all I have, when I think about it. It’s like in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, when Lena’s grandmother says, “In this life, family is the most precious gift we are given, the most sacred. Turn your back on them and that is when you truly have nothing.” Our interactions with others are just that—precious gifts that cannot be taken for granted. Time and time again I was reminded by those in my community and those at my mission site to look at every day and every encounter with another with a spirit of gratitude. Even the most simple interactions with students, people on the NYC subway, and the workers at Lyric Diner at the corner 3rd Ave and 22nd Street were sources of joy for us. Most especially, I was reminded to see God’s invitations of grace and relationship with him as the summit of this gift of relationship.
I was led by joy to Mother Cabrini High School in New York City, where I spent two incredible years. At the beginning of this year, I had my students re-write the words to John Bell’s “The Summons.” All of the students’ papers touched me as I read their own interpretations of the lyrics. One, in particular, still stands out to me. Ashley Garcia revised one question to be: ‘Will you let me be the most important person in your life?’ I feel that this simple question is precisely what God asks of us every day. My relationship with God is the single most important relationship in my life and all others contribute to that foundation.
Many times, I feel like God has continually invited me into this question. Who am I to you, and who are you? What do you stand for? As part of the debriefing process, missioners give mission appeals at parishes in the Philadelphia area—the money raised during the collections go toward Catholic missions around the world. I had to laugh when I saw the reading for the Gospel for that Sunday. I felt that they returned to the exact theme of coming to know who God is for me. See, the reading for the day was from Luke’s ninth chapter, where Jesus practically grills his apostles by asking: “WHO do people say that I am?!” What a question. Jesus looks into our eyes and still asks today: “Who am I to you?” Whether we are full-time missionaries or not, this question is inherently linked to discovering who we are and answering the call to be who God created us to be.
In the same spirit, my spiritual director this year had told me to ask myself: Who is Jesus to me? Where do I see the face of God? Where do I feel God’s presence? These years as a missioner have revealed to me Jesus in the marginalized, the forgotten, the misunderstood, and the underestimated, but also Jesus the dreamer and Jesus the faithful one. From the Midnight Runs where we would spend the day preparing toiletries, clothing, and bag lunches to distribute to the homeless; to retreats and prayer groups with the students; to mourning with a student who had a miscarriage and healing with another after her abortion; to celebrating college acceptances; to teaching how to serve a Mass—these relationships revealed to me the hope and resilience found in God’s people and the power of community found in sharing our faith with one another, and what sacred gifts these are!
Speaking of community— Mary, Crystal, and the sisters we lived with were my heroes this year. Living in a Cabrinian community of diverse, accomplished, well-traveled, intelligent, caring, warm, supportive, and spirit-filled women helped me in so many ways. We laughed, cried, and shared in the daily joys and struggles of life. When friends and family of the missioners came to visit, there were the MSC’s, eager to welcome and get to know our visitors. When I did not receive my first choice internship for graduate school, I was heartbroken. Mary and Crystal creatively cheered me up and said, “If you thought that was the perfect match for you, think of how awesome the next step will be—because God always makes sure things work out in our best interest.” And they were right—the internship that I was offered the very next day matched me even better than the first. It was truly a Spirit-thing that Mary, Crystal, and I went through CMC together. I have never felt more supported, more challenged, and more present in my spiritual journey than with these two young women. Whether we were pursuing the sacred in the many young adult programs that NYC offers, to salsa dancing at night, to visiting with other volunteers and missioners, to blog sessions in the community room, to staying up late cleaning, to sharing about our days at the mission sites, to singing and dancing for the Senior MSC’s, Mary and Crystal kept it real—they were sources of constant inspiration for me, yet we all saw each other as equals. These relationships with the CMC’s and MSC’s continue to impress upon me the importance of gratitude within relationships.
On my last Sunday in New York City, Mary and I went to Sacred Heart Convent to celebrate Sr. Claudia’s birthday with Mass and lunch. Fr. Benedict’s homily was a reflection on the nature of freedom, love, and vocation. He said, "What keeps you from love—that is your slavery. Where you can love most—that is your vocation." To include this quotation at this point may seem off-topic from the subject of this reflection as a whole, but I once again was filled with such a sense of gratitude as I heard Fr. Benedict share his thoughts on the Gospel. What a great way to close these two years as a missioner—with a spirit of thankfulness for my vocation to love as well as my personal slaveries of self-doubt and struggle (at times) to love myself. There is no doubt in my mind that the relationships I have been gifted with these years have greatly helped me name and claim my vocation and slaveries. I will take these joyful moments of relational and spiritual growth with me to the next phase of my life. I hope and pray that I will continue to live the values of Mother Cabrini (especially disponibilitá!) as I go forward from life as a missioner. Thank you!
*And Thank You! to Mary, Sr. Arlene, Crystal, and Gina for their pictures! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment