I don’t know if this is of any help in any way, but it came to mind when I read your question. It’s a letter I wrote to a young seminarian who reminded me of my son. This is posted from my personal journal. It may be too long for one post.
Letter to a seminarian
I pray that you will foster relationship with God, and that if you have a genuine vocation, you can be faithful. You may not become ‘holy’, however much you try or pray. You get to become more human. To be truly human is to be holy (whole) for we are made in God’s image. The efforts of a sincere heart teach us that only God can realise our hope to fulfil God’s dream of us.
Whether things go well or badly with our efforts to love God and others, God will bring us through. God is good at fixing up all the broken stuff. Mostly what we have is ‘emet’. If it is sufficiently genuine, then ‘emet’ can look like ‘hesed’ and thus meet the need of unconditional love in others.
I began praying for Priests and Religious primarily through daily Mass, in Lent 19… Around that time, when I entered into the church to pray, I repeatedly found a priest’s 10-year-old ordination card. Eventually I said, “Okay, I’ll pray for him, Lord”. After a year, wondering if he had remained faithful to his vocation and was all right, I phoned the Catholic Centre for a contact number. When I phoned, he had the grace to know I was not just crazy and talked to me comfortably.
I did not expect to hear from him again, but about two weeks later, he phoned to say, “Trishie, will you please pray for me. I am thin, but getting thinner. I have been given a variety of tests, but the hospital cannot determine what is wrong.”
We communicated by phone during the next eighteen months. There was neither improvement in his spirits or health nor any clear diagnosis of his condition. Although he had not met me, he trusted me and spoke honestly regarding his difficulties. After several months, he drove to my house to meet me and to share afternoon tea. Finally, he phoned to say that he was seriously considering abandoning his vocation in favour of marriage and companionship. “You are the only one who argues for me to remain a priest”, he told me. “My fellow religious say that if it is making me ill, I should leave.”
I invited him to lunch. When he saw that I had cooked him a roast dinner and apple-crumble, his eyes filled with tears. “I hadn’t expected anything like this”, he said. After lunch, we talked in the lounge room. I sincerity defended the priesthood—yet in vain, as he departed unconvinced. All those months of prayer for him seemed ‘useless’.
I used the only ‘card’ I had left. Some painful things were happening in my life and marriage, many difficult things characterised it from the beginning. I wrote him several pages, full of the pain, stress and loneliness. I do not think a letter like that could convince anyone that marriage cannot be beautiful, and might not be for him personally. Because I had listened with understanding, it seemed that his perception of me gave my words power. “I read your letter two or three times”, he said over the phone, “and I have been able to recommit myself to Christ; this time with realism. I had been trying to ‘do’ too much for God.”
I never phoned him again, nor he, me. I have met him twice by chance. (The last time was at the Archbishop’s investiture.) He was happy, and spoke with lilt and sparkle that was first evident in that phone call where he spoke of his re-commitment to Christ.
The miracle is worked at the human level, with the ‘emet’, the choice of patience kindness, and loyalty. For over a year, I had listened, giving gentle encouragement but hearing again the same flat, sad refrain. He was a sincere and righteous person, but worn out with trying so hard to do everything for God. Suddenly, in the face of human reality, he realised that he needed to leave more to God.
This will be your life, to live with prayer and faithfulness that leads to the miracle worked by your human ‘emet’, that is, by your choice and decision to offer God’s ‘hesed’ even when it appears to be failing or regressing. When the miracle that is hidden in humanness comes, it may be sudden and unexpected, and even unnoticed by you or others. The miracle is human because humanity is the miracle that we are given, in image and likeness of God. The extraordinary is most often found within the ordinary and human. The Eucharist is a case in point. I hope you will always love the Eucharist.
