The Wine-Dark Sea

I say, “If only I had wings like a dove that I might fly away and find rest.
Far away I would flee; I would stay in the desert.
I would soon find a shelter from the raging wind and storm.”

Recently I have felt so restless, so buffeted by raging winds and storms. My soul longs for peace, for a refuge. Right now the desert has a very great appeal. And so to the desert of Lent. The deliberate renunciation and flight into the shelter of the fast where suddenly the choices become fewer and life becomes simpler.

This Lent I’ve got a few things I want to do. First, I’m going to fast from social media. No Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus or Google Reader. Nothing that will push content at me. I will continue to write in this space—but not participate in blog memes like Jen’s 7 Quick Takes and Like Mother Like Daughter’s pretty funny happy real. I want to focus on writing for me and not writing for others. I will check my email—but only once a day. I might visit a few of the blogs that I love but again, I’m going to restrict the amount of time I give myself to read online. I’m going to replace that time with prayer and spiritual reading.

I also have wanted to take up the Forty Bags in Forty Days challenge. I want to declutter and get rid of things we don’t need. This house is too small and we have too many things. More, I have come to realize that excessive worry about these things is troubling to my spiritual health. I want to detach and focus on trusting in God. I want to stop hoarding books and clothes out of a fear that someday we might want them. I want to make this home more of a haven for my family and I’ve realized that my inability to get rid of the stuff is making this home less homely, less hospitable. I’ve got a plan of all the spots in the house that need attention and oh am I eager to get started.

I want to spend more time in prayer. I want to try to get to daily Mass once a week. I want to spend more time reading with Bella and Sophie and Ben (and maybe Anthony too!)

I plan to try to give up sweet things as well just because it always seems to make Easter sweeter if I have been abstaining from chocolate. The few times I’ve not done so it was not fun. It isn’t at all about losing weight. Rather this too is about simplicity and focusing on the good foods we have and not the automatic reach for the sweets when I’m stressed or tired or bored because I need to fill in a gap in my day.

And so here we go…. into the desert.

Back in October I wrote about Amy Welborn’s new memoir, Wish You Were Here. I was very privileged to get an advanced reading copy. Now Amy announces that the book is finally available. Amy has created a new travel blog and is posting pictures of Sicily to go with each chapter.

Here’s what I said about the book in October. (I meant to write more but life happens. Right now I don’t seem to be able to grab much writing time. I’m hopeful that as everyone mends things will look up; but right now things are still a bit crazy.)

Wish You Were Here: Travels Through Loss and Hope by Amy Welborn

I feel like nothing I can say will do justice to this book. It is so intense so personal, so that at times—most of the time—it feels like eavesdropping. But it is beautiful, a treasure I am so profoundly grateful that Amy was wiling to share this journey with us.

The book is very easy to pick up and put down, which is good because it’s a book I want to nibble at rather than gulp. To swallow it all too quickly, to wolf it down as is too often my wont, would be a terrible shame. This is a journey to savor slowly. Partly because sometimes, sometimes it’s a little bitter. Mostly, though, because it is so beautiful and rich.

The short sections, each one like a cut facet on a gem, sharp and focused, jump back and forth. Now you are in Sicily, now on the other side of the Atlantic back at home. Now you are in the “present” on a curious journey through an ancient land, full of sun and shadow, sparkling ocean, vivid architecture, curiosities and personalities at every turn. Now you are wandering through the halls of grief, startled to find death just over your shoulder. Faith is everywhere, elusive, beguiling, always the end of the journey, glimpsed at every turn.

Here’s what I wrote in the comments over at Reading for Believers (which Betty Duffy elevated into it’s own post):

I’m trying not to be all gushy and fangirl about Wish You Were Here. Amy’s was one of the first ever blogs I read and I’ve always felt she was sort of a kindred spirit. And I remember reading what she wrote at the time of Michael’s death and her blog posts about Sicily so I sort of feel like I’m approaching the book with a very strong predisposition to love it. And maybe there are funny echoes in it for me in that I’ve never really wanted to go to Sicily very much until I married a man who is half Sicilian and then we discussed it as our dream honeymoon but couldn’t actually afford to go. So there is that layer of the emotions from my own marriage weaving throughout.

All that said, I do think its a magical (I’ve not read Didion’s book; but I can already tell you this is completely different) sort of mash up of travel memoir and a very Catholic exploration of grief. She does both genres so well but the way she slips seamlessly from one to the other is sort of breathtaking. (See, I’m gushing.) Just to do a reality check I read a chapter to my sister this evening while we were making dinner. Oh even better than I thought. The prose is lyrical but down to earth. The imagery doesn’t beat you over the head but somehow the details of every tourist stop are marshaled so that you are constantly staring death in the face. Most of all what strikes me is how faith informs everything. It doesn’t make death and grief easy, doesn’t make it go away. Just that it is the medium in which they happen.

I’m still reading, still trying to get a handle on it. Hopefully a fuller review will follow. But I won’t make any promises because, well, life happens.

Karen Edmisten’s new book is shipping early! I got my copy yesterday on Tuesday (but then on Wednesday Anthony spiked a fever and I’ve been holding him almost non-stop while battling his ear infection ever since and so I was unable to finish this post.)  I am honored that Karen chose to include a short poem I wrote. Although I didn’t write it directly about my own miscarriage, that experience obviously informs the piece. I wrote it when I was asked to pray for a mother who had recently lost a child to SIDS. But at the time I felt funny about publishing it. It seemed too raw as a response to a stranger’s grief. Then I remembered it almost a year later when a dear friend had a miscarriage. I went back and re-read it and found that it was good. And true. So I published it. I have been told by many women that my little poem has brought them comfort. Now, nestled inside Karen’s gem of a book, I have hopes that it will reach many more than it could tucked away here in my blog’s archives.

But oh I was going to write about Karen’s book. Did I mention what a treasure it is? I thought I was done grieving our baby Francis but as I’ve perused these pages I have found my tears flowing again. In just three weeks the anniversary is coming—five years since that terrible day. And yet that date, February 25, lies just between two wonderful anniversaries that have since joined our family’s calendar of celebrations: February 20, Anthony’s birthday, and March 4, Sophie’s birthday. I think God knew what he was doing when Sophie was due almost a year to the day from the day I lost Baby Francis. This is the way the world is, death and life so intertwined you can’t pull them apart. Had Francis not died, I’d not have my Sophie. It is a grief and a joy both. And now Anthony. It is a miracle when you consider that after the miscarriage I was told I had cancer and was going to have a hysterectomy. I went through such a dark week, thinking Bella would be the only baby I’d get to hold. And then there was Sophie… and Ben… and Anthony.

Life after miscarriage. Sometimes I feel like I don’t belong in that sisterhood of grieving mothers because mine has been such an easy cross when I know so many mothers who struggle so under such a heavy weight. But I do know that whenever I hear of a mother—or father, let’s not forget the fathers—who has lost a baby, I know my heart now reaches out in a way I don’t think it could have before.

And then there were these words, that Colleen penned recently after losing yet another of her babies:

But I hold in my heart the greatest of all consolations, the hope of heaven.  For I realize, that even when my body is well past the age of bearing babies, even if I should live until I am 100, always, I will be an expectant mother, until the day I hold my babies for eternity.

I love that. I will always be an expectant mother. There is still that eagerly awaited little one, the one my arms ache to hold and that hope of a longed for meeting in heaven.

I hope that After Miscarriage finds its way into many hands, many homes, many hearts. The stories, poems, prayers and memories Karen shares are a beautiful balm for grieving parents because they are full of the healing love of Christ.

Homeschooling has kind of stalled out for us since before Christmas. It’s not that Bella isn’t learning, I’m sure; but formal lessons of any kind have fallen by the wayside as I’ve not had much energy for gathering myself into a purposefulness. So today it was a wonderful surprise to find ourselves stumbling into a little impromptu lesson inspired by today’s feast, which is one of my favorites.

It is a frequent custom, though it doesn’t happen every single day, for Bella to get a chapter from a longer book read to her while the boys nap. So we read her chapter of our current book, a life of St Rose of Lima. Then I read a picture book for Sophie. Then I pulled out my Bible to read to them the passage of the conversion of St Paul from The Acts of the Apostles, part of my resolve to read to Isabella from the actual Bible more often in addition to retellings from her various Bible story picture books.

After we’d read the story of Saul’s vision on the road to Damascus and his healing by Ananias and his preaching of Jesus, then I thought it might be fun to show them some art inspired by that famous story. I googled “Conversion of St Paul” and clicked on Images and found the Carravaggio that I expected and a Michelangelo. Then I found this great Biblical art website that has catalogued a most impressive number of images of the subject, four pages of thumbnails. We didn’t look at all of them, there wasn’t time. But we clicked through to see quite a few of them. We had fun trying to identify which figure was St Paul, where the light was, or where Jesus was. It was interesting to try to figure out why each artist interpreted the picture as he had. Then Bella told me that none of them looked like what was in her mind. I told her that if she wanted to she could try to draw it; but she said she wouldn’t be able to get it right. Bella and Sophie had no idea that this was a school lesson and they are developing visual literacy. They just had fun looking at the pretty pictures.

Some of the images we looked at were from illuminated manuscripts and one, by Fra Angelico, was clearly from a psalter with the square neumes of chant notation so I turned on my iPod and played the girls the Invitatory Psalm from today’s Divine Office podcast while we looked at the image and I briefly explained that the picture was from a song book and would sound something like the one we were listening to.

One image that caught Isabella’s eye was very colorful and very modern looking. The link took us to a gallery of images from a contemporary Chinese artist, He Qi. So we clicked through and looked at all the images in the gallery, and Bella was able to identify the subject of almost all of them, thus demonstrating to me both her visual and her Biblical literacy. She immediately knew the subject of the Finding of Jesus in the Temple, the Annunciation, the wise and foolish virgins, she identified an Agony in the Garden as Jesus on the Mount of Olives with the apostles falling asleep while he prayed. (Here’s the index to the gallery where you can see all of He Qi’s work. I’m in love and have spent hours staring at all the images in the galleries)

We couldn’t actually tell which character in Brugel’s painting is meant to be St Paul.

We had a nice little side trip because Sophie spotted the one picture that wasn’t a conversion of St Paul but an image of the Road to Emmaus. So they asked me what that story was and I retold the story in my own words. (One of my favorites, because my parents used to own a Catholic book store called Emmaus.) That led to Bella asking about why were the women in the upper room and us discussing whether the apostles taught Mary about Jesus or Mary taught them about him.

Then Anthony woke up long before we’d exhausted the girl’s curiosity, which is probably a perfect place to end.

Bella was captivated by this one but neither of us could figure out which figure is supposed to be St Paul.

We’re all still sick and the house is a terrible mess from days of everyone being too tired to pick up properly; but it was one of our best learning days in a while. Isn’t it funny how that happens? Isn’t it funny how this spontaneous excursion was so much better than anything I might have planned ahead of time? Why do I spend so much time worrying? If I just rusted more I would see that Our Heavenly Father has it all taken care of.

And now it is time for me to go to bed. I think today was Day 6 of everyone being sick. I’m ready for this saga to be over.

I don’t listen to the Divine Office podcast very often; but I have the app on my phone and sometimes when I can’t find a chunk of time to sit and pray I can at least listen to the office on the go. The other night, for example, my sister put on Evening Prayer while I was coking dinner. Although I only heard about 80% of it because of interrupting kids, still it was very nice to be able to pray while I worked.

But this morning it was a special treat. I played the podcast on my phone as I got myself and the children dressed for Mass and was very pleasantly surprised to hear them chanting the psalms instead of the usual recitation. This is how the psalms are meant to be heard! I’m guessing that they only do it for Sunday’s office because I’ve never heard it before; but perhaps someday they may move to chanting all the hours? I can hope.

Daria has been writing about chanting the psalms over at her blog. As I told her, I’ve been wanting to learn to chant the psalms for a long time; but I don’t read music and don’t think I’m likely to learn anytime soon. I know musical people tell me it’s not that hard to learn to read chant notation; but I just don’t think it’s something I’m going to be able to pick up. The beauty of chant is suppose d to be that you don’t have to be musically trained in order to learn it. I think I could learn the chants by ear if I heard them often enough. So here’s hoping that more resources become available for people like me .

Well last night we we survived Midnight Mass with four children with not a single child fall asleep or needed to be taken out. In fact no one fussed at all. Or at least not what anyone but me would have called fussing. Ben did whine and complain in a loud toddler not-whisper but I don’t think anyone who wasn’t our immediate neighbor heard him. And Bella did cry quietly when she realized she’d forgotten her blanket at home (Especially frustrating because the only reason she even wanted it was that before we left I’d prompted her that she might want it.) Anthony squirmed a bit and had one moment of exuberantly grabbing a bulletin and shaking it loudly during the homily. Sophie only beamed sleepily from ear to ear and hugged her blankie in tired excitement.

Abigail asked if I have a secret to getting four kids to Midnight Mass and if I’d post about it on my blog. While I’d love to take all the credit for our success, I suspect much of it is due to the temperament and personality of my kids (and perhaps that is in turn due to my temperament and Dom’s?) And even more I suspect that it is due to sheer grace. Though I can’t stress enough that having a third adult is a giant help—my sister who lives with us and who therefore can be counted as a second mommy when it comes to cranky toddlers because they have known her as a part of their immediate household all their lives. Ben spent the second half of the Mass, after he’d got tired of Daddy, in Auntie Tree’s lap. Had she not been there Dom would have definitely been out in the vestibule. Or more likely were she not in the equation we wouldn’t have gone at all.

Last year when we took Bella and Sophie and Ben we weren’t at all sure it would be a successful experiment. We were quite prepared to throw in the towel if things looked like they were going downhill. But it worked. And the stars in the eyes of my little girls made the loss of sleep and subsequent temper tantrums worth it. They were still talking about Midnight Mass as Advent began this year and there was no way we could tell Bella and Sophie that they weren’t going to go again. The only question in our minds was whether or not to try to bring the boys too. Last year, I’d assumed we wouldn’t try it again this year. There’s no way a 10 month old could cut it, I thought. And yet as the day grew closer, I was more sure that we should try. I still expected that I would probably end up in the back with Anthony; but I felt like we should give it a shot anyway.

And yes tempers were short today and children were overtired and cranky. And there will probably be more and worse repercussions tomorrow and aftershocks for the rest of the week. But they were all very good during Mass. And it was totally worth it.

Every time I looked down to meet Sophie’s eyes her face lit up with a glow that I can’t even begin to capture. Oh the smiles that little girl can give! And most especially when we sang her favorite song, Silent Night. She was in heaven.

Bella had a harder time; but even she doesn’t regret going. And though Ben spent most of the time complaining, his first words were wonder-struck: “Lights! Christmas trees! Look, look, Christmas trees! They have frost on them!” His not-whisper toddler voice carrying too-loud in the hushed church.

Dom says, and I agree, that walking into the church fifteen minutes before Mass began he felt like the guy walking onto the plane with four kids. It seemed like everyone was sizing us up and groaning in anticipation of the bad behavior of our little clan. But then after Mass many people came to compliment us on their good behavior.

Still, even if their behavior hadn’t been so stellar I might still consider the effort well worth it. Why? Because I can think of no other way of teaching them with our actions that Christ is the heart of Christmas. We go to Mass every Sunday. It is one of the prime ways my pre-school children mark time. So getting up for Mass on Christmas morning wouldn’t necessarily make a dramatic impression. But waking in the middle of the night and putting on brand new clothes and going out into the cold and dark to sit in a bright church… we are teaching them that Christmas is worth losing sleep over. It’s worth the effort and the inconvenience.

They get the magic of midnight Mass. Even Ben who kept asking, “Why is it dark? When is it going to be light? Why is it dark?”  Why is this night different from every other night? What makes Christmas so distinctive in their world, what makes it different from every other day and night isn’t only the tree and the pile of presents and the festive music on the radio… what makes it different is the magic of getting up when they are normally asleep, the magic of the church transformed into a bright wonderland of light.

Actions speak louder than words and the ancient practice of keeping vigil, of watching during the night hours, teaches our children more than any number of sermons or picture books, more than Christmas movies or any kind of lessons I can devise. This night is holy, set aside for God. We give him our precious night hours, we give up sleep so that we can be present at the manger, present at the feast. We come to adore him in the silent night. We come to listen to the angels delivering their tidings of great joy. We come to hear the proclamation and to sing his praise in the watches of the night. This is the meaning of Christmas not the tree and the trimmings and the presents and the food. If we want our children to understand that Christmas is about Christ, then we need to put the Mass at the center of our family’s celebration. It is worth the sacrifice.

Now, of course, prudence dictates that if your kids aren’t as calm and placid as ours, you might want to wait a few years. Our parish is small and Midnight Mass is not at all crowded. The church was, sadly, only half full. The Mass was not really longer than a normal Sunday Mass. If it were standing room only and we had to get there an hour early to get seats, I’m not sure we would have been there. If it were epically long, then I’m not sure we would have gone. If our kids were the kind that climb the walls, that run up the aisles, that scream and rant, that projectile vomit at the drop of a hat, then we would not have been there. So please don’t feel like I’m condemning you if your calculus leads you to stay away from Midnight Mass. Consider your children, consider your parish, consider all the factors and weigh them carefully. But one of the factors you should weigh in the balance is the value of wonder.

Consider the child whose eyes are aglow, who blinks and rubs his eyes and cranes his neck to see all that is new and different and wonderful as he gazes at the tiny baby in the manger whose birth is the reason for the candy that will make him sick and the presents that he will forget or the present that he will treasure. What will that child remember in years to come? What will speak of Christmas to him when he is older and living on his own? What seeds might you plant now and is today’s labor of missed sleep and temper tantrums worth the harvest he may one day reap?

As I watched Ben ask questions and Anthony stretch his neck to look and Sophie smile and Bella dream, I knew that we would be back again. Maybe next year, maybe not. We’ll see how things look then. But I am determined that even if we have to give it up for a few years Midnight Mass will be what my kids remember most fondly when they think about Christmases of long ago.

[I wrote this last year and hesitated to post it at the time. But on re-reading it I’ve decided to go ahead and put it out there. ]

God did not make death,
nor does he rejoice in the destruction of the living…. 

For God formed man to be imperishable;
the image of his own nature he made him. 
But by the envy of the devil, death entered the world,
and they who are in his possession experience it.

Wisdom 1:13; 2:23-24.

No one scorns the haiku for being shorter than War and Peace
Nor scolds the daffodil for being briefer than a redwood
But this little life cut off so young
We mourn and cry “too soon too soon”.

Surely the Author knows when to end each tale

And yet
Jesus wept

So should we all
For in the beginning death was not

And though there is a plan perhaps for even this little sparrow’s fall
Still we cry
For we know that a sparrow was meant to fly.

9/1/2009

Mrs Darwin shares a beautiful column about miscarriage by Father Rob Waller.

No words can take away the pain of miscarriage, although faith and time can lessen it. Some parents find the words of St. Bernard of Clairveuax helpful. He wrote to a couple that had a miscarriage. In response to their question, �What is going to happen to my child? The child didn�t get baptized,� St. Bernard said, �Your faith spoke for this child. Baptism for this child was only delayed by time. Your faith suffices. The waters of your womb � were they not the waters of life for this child? Look at your tears. Are they not like the waters of baptism? Do not fear this. God�s ability to love is greater than our fears. Surrender everything to God.�

Your faith spoke for this child.I never had a doubt that God honored my plea for my baby to be received into his arms when I realized I was miscarrying and in the middle of the night placed my hand over my cramping womb, whispered the baptismal formula and named our baby Francis. I knew that the waters in my uterus and the waters of my tears were enough so long as the words and the will were there.

One commenter on Mr. Darwin’s blog post said a young man told her her baby was in hell! How terrible that anyone would tell a grieving mother otherwise than that her faith was sufficient for her child. Our God is a God of love and mercy, a perfect Father, whose Son told us that a father would never hand his child a stone when he asked for bread. How could we want more for our children than he would give? How could He condemn our children when we beg Him to hold them in His loving arms? Is it possible for me to love my baby more than my Heavenly Father does?

*  *  *

And that would have been all I wrote except that before I hit submit I came across these thoughts on St. Francis by Kate Wicker:

 

“Francis was to become a man who wanted to laugh with joy at his freedom in God’s beautiful world and weep with compassion and love at the sufferings of his Lord, and he never seemed to know which to do.”

I haven’t always been sure how to react to God either. Do I cry? Laugh? Rejoice? Mourn?

God is too big to conjure up just one emotion. There have been times when I’ve been in awe of Him. Being close to nature or giving birth to a child can do that to me. I feel so small as I experience an indestructible sense of wonder: God created this mountain, this dancing dandelion’s white fuzz puffed into air, the depths of this vast ocean, this new life nestled in my arms.

There are other times when I don’t want to accept the atrocities of the Passion of Christ. It’s too painful. Wasn’t there another way? I don’t understand. I don’t understand. And I’ll shudder thinking of Jesus, bloodied and battered, crucified for us all. And I’ll cry when I hear about a child who has suffered, hollowed out and starving because there was nothing left to eat. Or I’ll weep in confusion when I’m reminded of the woman whose baby was ripped from her arms in tsunami that formed in the same ocean that seemed so beautiful to me once but now seems violent. Again, I’ll say: I don’t understand.

And suddenly I made the connection. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me before; but when I read what Kate said about not knowing whether to laugh or cry, it suddenly occurred to me that today I should be celebrating the feast of St Francis for our baby Francis who went to heaven via miscarriage more than two years ago.

It’s a funny synchronicity, writing about the miscarriage and then reading about Francis.

It’s an odd connection, really. I love St. Francis, have a special affection for him. As does Dom who attended Franciscan University. And yet we’d almost certainly not have named the baby Francis had it been full term. That wasn’t one of the names we were considering. But somehow when I knew I was miscarrying it felt right. That was the name for this little one whose face I would never see.

For each of our children we’ve tried to acknowledge their patron saint on their feast days. Even if it’s just picking a rose and looking at a holy card of St Therese for Sophie Therese. But until just now I never thought to do that for our baby Francis in heaven.

I suppose I should try to think of a suitable way to acknowledge this day, to remember two beloved Francises in heaven. Perhaps that’s enough. Remember and talk about them. And yes say yet another prayer that one day I will see all my children together joyful in heaven.

I woke up this morning from the midst of a dream I couldn’t shake. i think it sprang from reading the story of Hannah and Samuel yesterday and from this post by Rachel Balducci about how hard it is to have her little baby in a full body cast.

In my dream Benedict was a toddler, maybe a bit older and larger than Sophie is now. We were having some sort of religious ceremony, putting a sort of ritual garment on him that he’d have to wear the rest of his life. It was sort of like the fringed garment that Jewish men wear under their clothes. In the way of dreams, its appearance changed a couple of times. At first it was a rough uncut piece of sheepskin but then it appeared that there were several layers sewn together and the one next to the skin was rough, like a door mat, the ones with thick ropey fibers, and directly next to his skin was the side with the little rubber spikes that prevents the mat from slipping.

We put it over his head like a poncho and it was so heavy and so rough against his tender skin, the points biting and the fibers rubbing. I cried seeing my little boy having to wear such a burden and yet knew I was doing it out of obedience to God.

And I suppose that’s what the dream really boils down to: how hard it is to give my children over to God, to keep in mind that my children aren’t mine but his and are merely given to me for a time to care for them as His steward. (I wrote a long reflection on that here after my miscarriage.) And that in turn relates to broader concerns I’ve been pondering recently: trusting in God, relinquishing control, letting go of fear and anxiety, suffering for our children but also suffering with our children.

Dom also pointed out that we’ve also been discussing the question you don’t have to deal with when you have a girl child: to circumcise or not. I’m not sure how much a part that played in the dream, but certainly that comes into it to. It’s obviously not a religious question for us but one of health concern. So often as parents you have to make the tough decisions, the things like immunizations that hurt your child and protects him at the same time and all the limits and boundaries you set that can seem harsh and unnecessary to a child but you know you do for their own protection.

Heavy thoughts for so early in the morning. Just had to get them down because the dream won’t let me go.

This morning I stepped out of my comfort zone and attended a Bible study group for mothers at our parish. I’ve felt a little adrift ever since we moved here in November, knowing no one at our new parish except the two priests. Of course this past winter was absolutely terrible for getting out and exploring and meeting new people. I was exhausted and nauseous and the weather was… well it was winter in New England, nuff said.

I know in two more months I’ll probably be going back into retreat mode, dealing with the arrival of baby Benedict and all that entails. Fortunately God has given me a golden season right now, a lovely, leafy springtime. I have energy again and am not too debilitated by my sciatica and aching back. The girls are both taking simultaneous afternoon naps, leaving us nice wide-open mornings. Time to reach out and make some connections while I can. In the past few weeks we’ve enjoyed story time at the library, meeting other mothers of 2 and 3 year olds. Now a new Bible study starts up at the parish that actually meets at a time I can make and even offers babysitting. Time to meet other moms from church.

I had no idea what to expect, but I was certain that this was something I needed to do and I’m so glad I went. I’m not looking to make a best friend or have deep theological discussions about scripture, though neither do I discount these possibilities—anything is possible; but for me that’s not what this is about. It’s about stepping out of my comfort zone to make connections and become a part of a community. I hate going to Mass every Sunday and not knowing anyone. Oh there is almost always at lest one nice soul who stops by to compliment the girls. We are starting to get to the point of recognizing some faces and even saying hi to a couple of people. But I want to feel like I belong, like I’m a part of something, not like I’m just visiting.

And so there I was, walking into a room full of strangers with Sophie in my arms and Bella at my side. Shy introvert me. At least the girls sort of provide an ice-breaker. There’s an automatic script that everyone can go through when you’ve got a baby in your arms: how old is she, what’s her name, etc. It’s familiar and comforting and made the whole process a little less stressful for me.

It was a small group, I was so glad. Just four other women plus the woman who was babysitting. Everyone else already knew each other, of course. It’s not a large parish, not a large town for that matter. They were all very welcoming to me, though. One said she’d noticed us at Mass and complimented me on the girls’ behavior.

The Bible study manual the group is using is a Marian Bible study for moms put out by Our Sunday Visitor. Lots of annoying fill in the blank workbook questions of the kind that drive me crazy; but I know are helpful for getting discussion rolling. Otherwise the layout is rather good. Lots of meat to chew on. Today’s chapter was on the Annunciation and began with the angel’s visit to Zacchariah and the went on to a bunch of prophetic Old Testament texts that point to the Messiah, then on to the actual annunciation from Luke. We skipped over a few sections for the sake of time.

I liked that the intro to the chapter framed the discussion specifically for moms with an anecdote about the author losing her cool while trying to do too many things at once. A spaghetti sauce moment she called it. Much of the discussion revolved around the virtue of patience and giving up our need for control to allow God to be in charge. Everyone shared several anecdotes about her home and children, I felt like I got to know everyone else a little bit. Surprisingly, I think I probably talked too much rather than too little. Odd to find myself spilling my guts about my miscarriage and cancer scare to women I’d just met an hour before.

I was glad our pastor stepped in at the beginning and end of the session. He was understandably called away in the middle. He was able to help guide the discussion a little deeper than it might have gone without his guidance. And since he’s a family friend, I feel like I have a prior connection with him that made it a bit easier to slip into being a part of the group. Especially when at the end when we were wrapping things up and chatting he commented on being able to see the Bettinelli in Sophia.

I felt like a bit of an intellectual snob at several points during the session. I’m pretty sure I’ve read and studied theology more than any of the other women. I’m a huge reader and in the past few years I’ve really tried to get better educated about my faith. My husband and sister were both Theology majors after all and I grew up in the Catholic bookstore that my parents owned. I met Dom at a Bible study he was running that really challenged me at time. And I know that for my intellectual pride can be a stumbling block. So I think on that level this Bible study will be good for me. It will challenge me in a different sort of way, to focus on faith not as an intellectual exercise, as can be my wont, but in terms of my motherhood, my vocation, the daily trials and tribulations. And at the same time it won’t be the same kinds of challenge and support I get from my online friends, who though they are all very different are still all so much more like me than any of the women I met today. Even when more women join, I suspect it will still be a group of women very unlike me. One of the women said today in a moment that floored me that she’d never considered Mary as a person, a mother who’d had faced challenges and trials. She was just a pretty image, a beautiful, perfect woman.