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Emails to God – Supporting My Wife Going Catholic, Part 3

14 Nov

This is the third part in a series I am doing as a companion piece to my wife’s blog. She is explaining in a six-part series how she came to join the Catholic church this last Easter, so I thought I would flesh out some of the details as I experienced what she experienced. You can read her blog at www.meganwillome.com.

In today’s post, my wife introduces our local priest, Msgr. Enda McKenna. Let me give you a description of Enda. If every priest were like Enda then everyone would want to be Catholic. If every Christian pastor were like Enda then everyone would want to be a Christian. You get the idea. He is a sweet, gentle soul. I often describe him as a doll of a man. Just precious. He’s in his early seventies. He has soft white hair and an Irish twinkle in his eye. He grew up in Northern Ireland, and has that slightly whimsical Irish stereotype about him. He doesn’t take himself too seriously, and I adore him. Here is a picture:

Msgr. Enda McKenna
St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Fredericksburg, Texas

Through my work, I am privileged to be a member of our local ministerial association, even though I joke that I am the amateur Christian among the professionals. That is where I first met Enda. He is the first Catholic priest since I have lived here to actively participate in our ecumenical Christian ministerial association (okay, there has only been one other priest since I lived here, but I was really impressed when he started to show up and participate). Without exception, all of the pastors in the association love Enda. One retired Baptist pastor has particular affection for him. Enda was one of the first pastors to reach out to him when he lost a son to a car accident.

So that’s a description of Enda. Now, back to our story. When last we left off, my wife had started visiting St. Mary’s during the Christmas season, and I was visiting a church that meets in a bowling alley. Our two children, daughter who was 11 and son who was 14 weren’t visiting with us because we felt like were were in such flux, so we were doing family worship services together on Sundays. I also started having a Friday morning breakfast with one of the men from the bowling alley church so that we could share our lives and develop our relationships with God.

Around March of 2011, about three months after my wife and I were attending different churches, I mentioned to my friend, Tom, that I was feeling really disconnected spiritually from her. He looked at me and his advice was profound. I think I have this quote right: “You need to suck it up and go to church with your wife.” Hmm. That wasn’t the advice I was looking for. I had hoped he would encourage me to work through this with her in a way that we would both find a church together. But God obviously had her on a bit of a spiritual quest, trying to make some sense of her own relationship with Him given the loss of her mother and how her own view of her Christianity might have been wrapped up with her mother’s. As I said in my last post, it wasn’t that I resisted going to St. Mary’s because it was Catholic. I resisted because it was liturgical. Having grown up Baptist, visiting Lutheran churches was about as liturgical as I had gone. Worshipping Sunday after Sunday in the Catholic style…scared isn’t the right word. Let’s just say, it didn’t enthuse me.

I started attending St. Mary’s with her in early March 2011, and I talked to Enda at one of the ministerial association meetings about us visiting St. Mary’s. He had seen me there with her and wondered. I told him that Megan would probably enjoy a chance to visit with him about what she was experiencing, so I think he made it a point to visit with her that Sunday morning that she describes in today’s post. That is not to say that Enda wouldn’t have sought her out anyway. He is a generous soul and as accessible a Catholic priest as I have ever known, willing to change his schedule at the drop of a hat for anyone. But I think he was particularly aware of my wife’s quest as a result of our conversation at the ministerial association.

That’s where Megan ends her narrative, so that’s where I’ll sign off too. We’ll see you next Wednesday with Part 4.

 
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Posted by on November 14, 2012 in Miscellaneous, Musings and Stories, Supporting My Wife Going Catholic

 

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Emails to God – Prayer Requests (Colossians 1:9)

12 Nov

9 For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

Dear God, this verse is appropriate for today because I have some friends who need special prayer. To protect their privacy, I will use initials, but you know who they are.

  • For CS, he told me last night that he is going in for testing on a possible tumor in his ear. A tumor anywhere in the head would be in my top five of places I wouldn’t want a tumor—maybe even the top of the list. Please be with him today. Be with the ENT who is seeing him as well. Father, even now, please miraculously touch him and remove any danger from his body, if you are willing. I know you can do this father. I ask it on my friend’s behalf. Please, give him healing and a story to tell that will help him to glorify you and draw others into your presence.
  • I pray for GD and his wife, CD. Please be with them as they look for GD’s healing. Work in his body. Please touch it and move it into the next phase of recovery. This doesn’t seem life-threatening, but it is scary and hard. These people love you. Please strongly support them. Give CD strength as well. She has her own health issues, and she needs your strength to be able to care for her husband and support him through this. At the same time, raise up hands, arms and feet around them to do your work in their lives. Help them to see that it is you and recognize you as being the author of all things good in their lives.
  • I pray for BB and EB. They have to be so fatigued. Their health battles have been long and wearying. Please help them to feel your touch and hope. Help them to live with your power and joy. I don’t know that I could do it if I was them, but I have more faith in their ability to find you in the midst of these struggles than I do in my own. Please help and encourage them.
  • I lift up PO to you. He has going through an important procedure last week and I pray that you will help his body to adopt its new pieces and help him heal. Use this as a special opportunity to reveal yourself to him and those around him. Help him to feel your touch and your presence.

Father, in all of these cases and more, please do not let the pain and stress of these events go in vain. Please help each person whose name is flowing through my heart right now, including myself, to turn loose of the world and grasp on to you. Help us to pray without ceasing. Help us to submit our wills to you. Please forgive our sins. Forgive our selfishness and idiocy. Give us each the strength we need to do your will and give you glory in our families, in our work, in our churches and with our friends. Help us to decrease as you increase and make us your royal ambassadors.

 
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Posted by on November 12, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – Supporting my Wife Going Catholic, Part 2

07 Nov

I am continuing my process of writing companion pieces to my wife’s blog posts about how she ended up joining the Catholic church (click here for her blog). I’m doing my best to line up my posts with her timeline, trying to give my perspective on a fairly monumental shift in our lives.

My previous post about this last Wednesday ended with me saying that our family was in a bit of a church crisis at the end of 2009. My wife, daughter, and I were attending one church while our then 13-year-old son was attending another that he liked better. What I didn’t say was that my wife’s mother was gravely ill. My wife hasn’t written much about this in her “Going Catholic” series, so I want to be careful to not violate her privacy in this area. What I will do is give you a description of my mother-in-law.

In short, the people who knew here saw her as a spiritual giant, a prayer warrior, and thoroughly Godly woman, and she was all of these things. When she passed in March 2010 I would conservatively estimate that there were over 700 people at her funeral. I think I’m safe to say that, without exception, the people there admired her greatly.

She had gone through her own spiritual journey. I’m a little fuzzy on some of the details, but growing up Episcopalian, I believe she would describe herself as having discovered God in a new way in college. It was when she joined Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) in the late 70’s that her discipling relationship with Jesus took off. She eventually became the teaching leader for her group, and started to have tremendous influence on countless women that would continue until her death, and probably beyond. She eventually left the Episcopal church, and by the time I met her she and my wife’s family attended a Bible church. My wife grew up Episcopalian as well, and the change to the Bible church came in late middle school. By the end of her life, however, my mother-in-law and father-in-law had returned to the Episcopal church.

Again, I don’t want to tell too much of my wife’s story and violate her privacy, but instead explain what I experienced during this process. After my mother-in-law’s death in march 2010 my wife found herself being uncomfortable in the church we attended. It wasn’t the church specifically. She felt like it was something within her. We tried different churches, but she never felt comfortable. For my part, being very frank, I have never enjoyed going to church so I was probably not the best-equipped person to lead us through this transition. There were some Sundays that, with no specific place to go, I would just choose to sleep in. This was difficult for the kids because, being middle schoolers and high schoolers by now, they were just like me at that age and didn’t want to go to church–especially a different one every week or two. It wasn’t exactly fair to them make them try a new place each Sunday, so we stopped making them go with us when we would visit a place.

By the end of 2010, we were trying a “family worship service” on Sundays with our son leading music on his guitar and having a short devotion/lesson. That part was going surprisingly well at the time. I had found a church that I liked that met in a bowling alley (obviously, it was an informal group), but Megan was still looking for something different. Then one Sunday (I think it was one where I had slept in), she came home and told me that she visited St. Mary’s Catholic Church that morning and really loved it. It was the first time I had heard her describe a church that way–really ever. I had never heard that kind of enthusiasm from her about any church in the 20 years I had known her. It kind of scared me because I was thinking that there wasn’t a way I could follow that path–not because it was Catholic in theology but because it was liturgical and formal in its structure. My response would have been the same if she had said Episcopalian. It made me nervous and resistant.

That is where our story ends today because that is where her blog ended. In summary, at the end of 2010, my wife’s family was dealing with the loss of her mother, I was visiting a nondenominational church that met in a bowling alley, my wife had visited St. Mary’s for the first time, and we were doing family worship with our children on Sundays. It was also during this time that I started to have a once-a-week Friday morning meeting with a man I met at the bowling alley church. This new friendship proved to be pivotal in how I would support my wife on her journey.

 
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Posted by on November 7, 2012 in Miscellaneous, Musings and Stories, Supporting My Wife Going Catholic

 

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Emails to God – Loving God with all of my Understanding (Mark 12:8-34)

05 Nov

28 One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, “What commandment is the foremost of all?” 29 Jesus answered, “The foremost is, ‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord; 30 and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” 32 The scribe said to Him, “Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that He is One, and there is no one else besides Him; 33 and to love Him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as himself, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” 34 When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” After that, no one would venture to ask Him any more questions.

Dear God, I was in mass yesterday and these verses were the Gospel reading. I noticed something for the first time in verses 30 and 33. Part of the commandment as stated in the Old Testament and by Jesus is to say that we should love you with all of our mind. The scribe, however, changes that word to “understanding.” I looked it up in a couple of translations, and the change is consistent. Frankly, this change helps me a little, and it should help each of us receive your grace as we work out our faith with fear and trembling.

To say that I love you will all my heart, strength and UNDERSTANDING is big difference. The word understanding, for me, implies that there is grace for my limited mind. As long as I am giving you all that I have in the understanding department, then I am fulfilling what the commandment meant when it said to love you with all of my mind.

Father, help me to understand you better, and reveal to me where my understanding is flawed. I am sure that there are parts of my theology that have been corrupted by thousands of years of errant teaching that has been handed down from one generation to the next—mostly innocently, I’m sure. Help me to break beyond that and to feel your presence with me as I evaluate any given situation and submit myself before you and your throne.

 
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Posted by on November 5, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – “NYC Sees No Homicide for Days after Sandy” (NBC News Staff)

03 Nov

Dear God, I saw this headline this morning when I turned on our computer: “NYC Sees No Homicides for Days after Sandy.” To put that in context, here is a quote from that article: “That’s unusual in the United States’ largest city: In the week of Oct. 15 to Oct. 21 this year, for example, there were five murders, according to the NYPD CompStat Unit. That same week in 2011 saw 13 murders.” It made me wonder what is behind that.

I think the obvious answer is that petty anger towards others gets lost when a tragedy comes along. You can see it in situations like the steps to the capitol after September 11, when members of Congress joined together to sing “God Bless America.” You can see it in families when long-standing feuds crumble when a terminal illness comes into play. I even see it in the little things. I recently had a conflict with one of my children, but then a minor crisis arose, and we were all of a sudden on the same team, pulling together to resolve the situation.

I reject the idea that you send us calamity, but I sometimes wonder if that’s one of the places where you are when calamity strikes. People ask, “Where is God in tragedy?” “Where was God in Katrina?” “Where was God when my parents were getting a divorce?” “Where was God when my father was dying?” I think the answer is that you were there doing what you are always trying to do—bring reconciliation between us and you and us and each other in the midst of the bad things that happen in life. I’ll admit, there are some atrocities that I cannot find you in, but that is a topic for another day.

Father, help me to rise above and put things into perspective. Right now, we are going through a conflict at work, and I would like to be able to put this kind of a light on it and ensure that we are responding to it in the right way. There are grudges and hurt feelings that we hold against other family members and friends, and I want to be able to move past those so that we can all be about focusing on you and what kind of a blessing you might have us be for those around us.

 
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Posted by on November 3, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – Pure Spiritual Milk (1 Peter 2:1-3)

02 Nov

Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind. 2 Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, 3 now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.

Dear God, what drives me away from pure spiritual milk and towards malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander? Yes, I know there is spiritual warfare, and I know Satan drives me to these things, but, I guess what frustrates me is that he is so effective at it. What is he able to do to me that makes him so effective?

I wonder if a lot of it is simply him messing around with our feelings of being loved at any given time. For example, if I am truly feeling completely, 100% loved then can I really slander or envy someone in that moment? If I am basking in your presence and tuned into how you feel about me then can I hold on to malice or be deceitful?

The only way to really feel you like this, I think, is to discipline myself to drink your pure spiritual milk until my soul adjusts to it and I crave it. As I take it in and crave it then I will be able to feel you and you will increase in me as I decrease. The trick is to drink your pure spiritual milk. What does that look like? I suppose it looks like me spending regular time in the Word, bringing my different daily challenges to you, praying continuously, and eliminating things from my life that Satan wants to use to draw me away from you.

Father, help me to have a complete day of drinking your pure milk. Help me to not let it be limited to this time I spend journaling to you. Holy Spirit, remind me throughout the day of my need for pure nourishment and help me to gladly and hungrily take it in.

 
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Posted by on November 2, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – Supporting my Wife Going Catholic, Part 1

31 Oct

My wife has started posting a series on her blog about how she ended up “converting” to Catholicism (www.meganwillome.com). I decided it might be good if I posted corresponding posts to describe my own church journey as it corresponds with hers. I think mine will probably be longer and less succinct than hers, so if you’re game you can read along.

It starts when I was eight years old, and my parents were trying to reconcile after a six-month separation. They found themselves at a marriage retreat at Laity Lodge, which is in the Texas Hill Country about an hour from Kerrville. A Catholic priest lead the retreat, and it was through that process and a prayer my father prayed with the priest during one of the breaks that my father became a Christian. When my parents came home and my dad moved back in (the exact order of events is a little fuzzy for me), we all joined the First Baptist Church in our town. Now, many Baptists grow up with anti-Catholic sentiments, but I never did because of my dad’s experience with this priest. My dad, for his part, grew up Methodist, but during the separation had started attending a Baptist church in San Antonio, so joining the Baptist church in our little town seemed a natural fit.

So I grew up Baptist, absorbing more Baptist theology than I realized. I won’t go into the whole story about my own developing relationship with God, but, suffice it to say, by the time I met my wife 23 years ago I was a discipling Christian as was she. Neither of us felt like we had cornered the market on theology and approached our adult lives post college in a very ecumenical way. We usually drifted towards Baptist or non-denominational churches (which are usually theologically similar to being Baptist), but we remained open to different Christian denominations.

After we moved to our current town nearly seven years ago, we looked for a church our children would enjoy. They were both in grade school, and we were trying to replace a church with a vibrant children’s program. After visiting seven different churches, all of differing denominations, the children chose the Methodist church. This suited us fine, and the kids were happy.

Unfortunately, three years later the church went through a terribly divisive time. We tried to stick it out, but it was difficult because nearly all of the families left. The final straw was when we took our son, who was then in the 7th grade, to the youth room on Sunday morning only to find that it was locked and the lights were out because there were no youth to serve. We needed to find something else.

We visited a Lutheran church for a while that my wife, daughter (three years younger than our son) and I liked, but our son didn’t. They were doing confirmation and he had trouble getting into it. Having grown up in a confirmation-free Baptist world I didn’t know how to coach him through it. So we tried giving him the freedom to go to other churches on his own. He tried the Evangelical Free Church youth group for a while, but he didn’t end up liking that.

This is where I’ll end this part of the story since this is about where my wife’s blog post today ends, but, in summary, by the end of 2009 my wife and I were attending a Lutheran church with our ten-year-old daughter, and my son was visiting the Evangelical Free church’s youth group. Something was about to happen, however, that would send my wife on a spiritual journey that God led me to support.

 
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Posted by on October 31, 2012 in Miscellaneous, Musings and Stories, Supporting My Wife Going Catholic

 

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Emails to God – Salvation through Grace (Ephesians 2:8-9)

30 Oct

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.

Dear God, the idea of salvation through faith vs. works is still a difficult one for all of us. I am a big proponent of the idea that our brains are hard-wired by the age of three, meaning that whatever we know in the first three years is hard to change for the rest of our lives. In this case, for most of us, our parents expect us to perform in one way or another, rewarding good performance and disciplining bad performance. After three years of conditioning to this, how can we not expect the same of you.

The ministerial association asked me to preach at a community-wide Thanksgiving service in a few weeks. I’ve been thinking a lot about the topic I want to choose and what I want to say. My topic is going to be finding you in tragedy, and being thankful for what you do for us in the midst of strife. One of the ideas that will undoubtedly come up is whether or not you cause negative things in our lives or simply work through them when they happen. Do you reward and discipline us based on our behavior, or simply pour out your blessings continuously, supporting us in the difficult times as well as the good—they just look different. I hadn’t thought about it before, but I think this verse will work as one of the verses I will use. It reminds us that our relationship with you has little to do with works because you simply cannot tolerate the best of us without grace.

Father, use me during this sermon in a few weeks as well as today. Use me as I work with our staff and board. Use me as I present to a group of donors who are coming to hear about the Center. Use me as I meet with patients, do my work, and represent the Center. Use me as I love my wife and parent my children. Use me as I write, speak, and, most importantly, listen. To the best of my ability, I offer myself to you.

 
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Posted by on October 30, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – A Living Sacrifice? (Romans 11:32; 12:1)

29 Oct

For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all… Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.

Dear God, I don’t think I have ever seen these two verses linked together before, but after reading it again, they below together. Paul didn’t separate his letter into chapters. He wrote it all as one unit, and so if I look at 12:1 without looking at what came before it, then I am missing something. It’s the word “Therefore” that told me I should look at what preceded it, and what precedes it is Paul talking about the Israelites having their hearts hardened and you going to the Gentiles. Now all of us, in our disobedience, can receive your grace and mercy. So now I am supposed to offer my body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to you. This is how I can worship you.

So what does it mean to offer my body as a living sacrifice? What does that look like? And how am I doing? It’s funny how some days are better than others. Yesterday, for example, was an interesting day. I woke up with zero motivation. I went to church with my wife, but then I came home to take a nap. Then I watched my favorite football player play, followed by another nap. Then I spend the rest of the day reading a book. I had things I intended to accomplish yesterday (exercising, writing, paying bills), but I did none of it. I just let the day go. Did I make a mistake? Was I being selfish? Was I getting some rest that I needed? Did I fail to sacrifice myself to you?

Father, as I go through this day, help me to remember that I am choosing right now to completely submit myself to you as a living sacrifice. I am giving you all that I am for all that you are. During the day, as I start to take my life back, please remind me that I agreed to give it all to you. Be glorified through me, and help me to be the man you need me to be for the sake of my wife, my children, my coworkers, and everyone else with whom I come into contact.

 
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Posted by on October 29, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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Emails to God – Submitting to Scripture (2 Timothy 3:14-17)

26 Oct

14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15 and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Dear God, this is my first “email” to you in several days. Where has my head been? What has made me so buy that I couldn’t stop to do this? Sure, I traveled quite a bit (900 miles in 8 days), but I had time to do other things that I wanted to do. Why didn’t I discipline myself to stop and meditate on scripture? I have no good excuse. I am simply sorry.

I suppose this “verse of the day” from Bible Gateway is appropriate because it reminds me that I need to be mindful of scripture in my life. Each day’s reading almost always has something to say to me about how I can align myself more rightly with you. I’m not talking about being aligned through your grace, but aligned through my own thoughts.

Father, the first person scripture needs to be about teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness is me. Yes, I can use it to encourage and teach others, but only after I have submitted to its wisdom and authority myself. So here I am to worship. Here I am to bow down. Here I am to say that you’re my God. You’re altogether lovely. Altogether worthy. Altogether wonderful to me.

 
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Posted by on October 26, 2012 in Miscellaneous

 

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