Once again, I have been inspired whilst washing dishes. Nothing compares to scrubbing tiny cooked bits of deer meat off of a pan to make one think of God.
My thoughts wandered to my Mom, and how God has once again shown his grace to me. Seven years ago, my Mom needed to stay with us for a while. We happily welcomed her, and we all crammed into our student housing apartment, Mr. S, Mom, me, #1, and then #2 made her way into the world. Six months later, she and I had a terrible fight to which she left, and to which I promised a terrible thing, that she would never see me or her grand kids again. Obviously, I was not yet exuding Christian love was I?
It was a year later when I was confirmed, and that day changed both my life and my Mom's, though neither of us knew it. I had to choose a patron saint, and this was a terribly difficult task. I was leaning to Saint Perpetua, who willing gave her life in the arena, leaving behind a baby, to proclaim her Christian faith. But I was not that brave, or mature enough to see how a woman could have the strength to abandon her baby. Perhaps a male saint then? I love Saint Benedict, and often recite his prayer against the devil and evil, but I still didn't feel right.
I was always strangely drawn to Maria Goretti. I knew I couldn't choose her, a young girl who chose to be stabbed twelve times by her cousin rather than to allow him to rape her, and then forgave him as she was dying a horrible death of septicemia. I knew that many YOUNG girls choose her, as a beacon of strength and purity. But a 22 year old with 2 kids didn't exactly have much in common with her. Still, I was pulled to her, and just days before I was confirmed, I opened my Lives of the Saints to my birthday, July 6. Guess whose feast day that is?
Needless to say, my confirmation name is Maria Goretti. Yes, and that has to do with my mom how????
I had kept those bitter words, and for years never even spoke to my mother. But having an outpouring of the Holy Spirit on you does strange things. During one of the large en masse confessions they aways have during Easter, I was confessing my many sins, and at the end, out popped "and help me Lord. I have so much anger toward my mother. I have tried and tried, but I just can't forgive her." I burst into tears, because the reality of the weight of anger I had been carrying was open and exposed.The Father counseled me with the best (or should I say most effective) penance I have ever had. He told me "I want you to pray for your mom, every time you think of her. But pray that God blesses her the way he sees fit, not the way you think she needs to be blessed."
Let me tell you, that was the hardest prayer I have ever uttered. I thought I knew exactly how my Mom should live her life, but I was giving her to God. I must have said this prayer many thousands of times, because who doesn't think of their Moms at least every day? Slowly, my anger, bitterness, and resentment chipped away. My Mom called one day 18 months ago and wanted to visit me. That was tough. I was so scared. Would we fight?Would we cry? I guess I wasn't the only one with these thoughts, as she came with a vanguard of my sister and Aunt, while my husband told me to meet her at a park, so we would not have the bitter memory of me kicking her out, should things go bad.
The Lord is truly good. The woman who stepped out of the car that day was the woman I remembered as a little kid. Not the bitter, self absorbed woman who I had fought with. She was strong, and loving, and she had her giant heart on her sleeve. God had done it. Even though I thought I knew what my Mom had needed, I realized that HE knew better. I could never have imagined my mom this beautiful and whole.
I finally got to share the loss of my baby with her, and the joy of the next new child with her. In fact, two days after my due date, she said she was going to send good juju to me that my labor would soon start, and as soon as I hung up, I had my first contraction. No joke.
God always knows what he is doing. That day that I choose Maria Goretti, I didn't really know why. I didn't have much in common with her. But now I get it. See, for me, Maria isn't about that. She is about forgiveness, of giving it up to God. She forgave the man who murdered her, so much to the point that she later came with the Virgin Mother in visions to him after her death and converted him to Catholicism. I am truly blessed to have such a powerful sister in Christ praying for me.
So if there is someone if your life that you can't forgive, offer it up. Ask God to bless them the way He wants to, not he way you think they need to be blessed. Because God is good, and he always knows what he is doing.
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