I was in the kitchen, washing vegetables and getting ready to make dinner, when my teen daughter started pondering who she might pick if she could have dinner with someone famous, living or dead. We bandied back and forth, tossing out different names and genres of people, and I said: “I hate to pick the most obvious person, which would be Jesus.” That prompted Chiara to ask: “If you could have one million dollars or five minutes with Jesus, what would you choose?” Without hesitation, of course, I said: “Jesus.” I wasn’t looking at her, but I guess that answer gave her pause, so she went a step further: “If you could have 10 million dollars or five minutes with Jesus, what would you choose?” To which I quickly said — without looking up from my prep work: “Jesus.” And from there we moved on, although the conversation stayed with me.

Later that night, I found myself coming back to it and replaying it in my head. On one level, I was not at all surprised by my answer because who wouldn’t take five minutes with the Son of God over anything else, material or otherwise? But another part of me was fascinated. So often I feel like my faith isn’t as deep as it should be, especially during these tumultuous times in our country and our world when we seem to be caught in some sort of existential death spiral. I wish I could let go of the anxiety that has me in its grip lately and trust that, in the words given to the great mystic Julian of Norwich by God, “All shall be well.” It’s not easy, and most of the time I feel like I’m failing and falling despite my best efforts. And then along comes a moment that stops me in my tracks and reminds me that no matter how things may feel on the surface of my spiritual life, deep down there is an abiding faith that knows without hesitation or question where my true loyalty lies.

When I decided to search Julian’s famous quote for deeper context, I came across a beautiful General Audience given by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010 on this very topic:

“Julian of Norwich understood the central message for spiritual life: God is love and it is only if one opens oneself to this love, totally and with total trust, and lets it become one’s sole guide in life, that all things are transfigured, true peace and true joy found and one is able to radiate it,” the late pope said, talking about the challenge of why evil and suffering exists.

“… God’s promises are ever greater than our expectations,” the late pope continued. “If we present to God, to his immense love, the purest and deepest desires of our heart, we shall never be disappointed. ‘And all will be well, all manner of things shall be well.’ This is the final message that Julian of Norwich transmits to us and that I am also proposing to you today.”

It’s a message that continues to speak to us today, when the level of anxiety in our world has reached epic proportions. Talk to friends and family members and the sense of dread is almost palpable, thanks to a culture where violence and division and false promises are the norm. And, so, like Julian, we come back to God. Again. Always.

Put aside all that the world holds out to you — both the terrifying and the tempting — and spend five minutes with Jesus. Choose that.

This column originally appeared in the July 25, 2024, issue of The Evangelist.

Photo by Sonja Langford on Unsplash

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Yes, we are all also in the process of living, but, like it or not, the dying part is wrapped up in it, often so deep we manage to ignore it until there’s no choice. This past month, dying was front and center. I left Pyramid Life Center the next morning only to learn my childhood friend, Kari, had died late the night before. I cried for most of the drive home as I thought about her smiling face, about the children, husband, siblings, father and many friends she leaves behind, and about the stellar way she lived her life and the graceful way she lived her death.

Kari’s death followed close on the heels of the death of a Jesuit priest we knew through campus ministry at Le Moyne College in Syracuse. When our son first visited the college, it was Father John Bucki, S.J., whose broad smile, open arms and wise words drew all of us in. I have no doubt he played a big role in making Le Moyne Noah’s top choice, and he continued to be a powerful influence right to the end, not just on the students on campus but on all of us who were caught in the gravitational pull of his joy for life and for his vocation. It was a beautiful thing.

When both of these dear people died, the Facebook posts left on their pages told a story of lives well lived but, more than that, lives touched. Scrolling by on my computer screen were people expressing gratitude and recounting stories of how Kari and Father Bucki made them better people and, in some cases, changed the course of their lives through the simple act of loving first, always, no matter what.

So, when I heard those words—“For those who are in the process of dying…”—I thought not of those on death’s doorstep but of my own inevitable journey toward death, whenever that may be, and the legacy I might leave behind. I cannot hope to have the impact that either Kari or Father Bucki had, but can I, in the time I have left, love a little better, smile a little more, weave a little extra joy and compassion and grace into the process?

I got my answer on how to do that on the last morning of the retreat. Another group staying on the grounds was preparing for a full-immersion baptism in the crystal clear (and very chilly) lake. A group of us hurried down the hill to witness it. As we stood on the shore, a woman dressed in her Sunday best walked into the water, aided by friends from her church. After she was baptized, she came up out of the lake beaming with happiness. The faith and grace and power of that moment left many of us with tears running down our smiling faces. A few minutes later, another woman stepped forward, a little more tentatively. In an effort to ease her way, one of the ministers said, “With every step, say ‘Jesus.’” And suddenly the clouds in my cluttered mind parted and those words were all I could see.

We are all in the process of dying. The only way to get through that is to keep inching toward heaven, no matter what the world throws at us, and with every step, say “Jesus.”

This column first appeared in the October 12, 2017, issue of Catholic New York.

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That post appeared on Not Strictly Spiritual on Jan. 21, 2014, in response to a sex abuse story that was circulating in the news at the time and making me ask myself that very question: Why do I stay? I originally planned to re-post that link on Elizabeth’s Facebook thread as my response to the new version of that old question and be done with it. Easy peasy. But then I thought, no, that’s not my truth because it would imply that the sex abuse scandal is the only thing that makes me wonder sometimes why I stay. And, quite frankly, abuse is just one thing among many that can make this faith a challenging matter.

Don’t get me wrong. My Catholic blood runs true blue and has for all of my almost 53 years. I love the Church deeply, but sometimes the Church makes me crazy. You know how your family can make you crazy? Yeah, like that. There are days when I want to run away, change my address, and take up a new identity. Family can do that to you, and the Church is my family, the Church is my home, and, since I’ve worked for the Church for 30-plus years in one form or another, the Church is also my business. When you spend that amount of time with anything or anyone, it can sometimes make you want to run screaming from the room. And yet I haven’t run. I haven’t changed my identity. I am here, not without some fairly regular whining, but here. Firmly planted, whether I am giddy with the joy of faith or grumbling in the pain of darkness. But why? Why not walk away and be done with even the most minor frustrations? Why not find an easier path or maybe even “create my own religion,” as some tell me they have done, where I crop out the hard stuff and fill the frame with only flowers and light?

Because life is never just flowers and light, because there will always be frustrations, there will always be something to whine about, something that doesn’t go according to my plan, and I cannot imagine getting through my daily dose of drama without God ever-present in my corner, without Jesus always in front of me, without the Eucharist providing food for the often-difficult journey.

When the crowds around Jesus start to have trouble with some of his difficult teachings and begin walking away, he asks his closest followers if they, too, will leave.

“Lord, to whom shall we go?” Peter answers. “You have the words of everlasting life.” That was the reason I gave in my original blog post on this topic, and it remains at the heart of my answer today. Always I identify with Peter, who never fails to screw up but somehow gets it on a deeper level. He doubts, he denies, he runs away, but Jesus sees through it to the faith that lives inside him. I pray Jesus can do the same with me, see through my mistakes and missteps and failures to the faith that is sometimes shaky, often lukewarm, but always present. For my entire life my faith has been the air I breathe. Like the beating heart we don’t question until it starts to fail, my faith has been beating inside of me for almost 53 years, often without my taking the time to stop and admire its steadfast rhythm and life-giving power. Until someone asks me, “Why stay?”

Like Peter I can only say, “To whom shall I go?” If not here, where? If not this, what? This is where Truth lives. This is the Way. This is the Word to which I cling. Jesus, the Alpha and the Omega — with me, with all of us, until the end of time.

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So, here, courtesy of Rome Reports, is the text of the pope’s message today.

A thought to ponder as you read: Have you missed Jesus on your own Road to Emmaus? I’m pretty sure I have, at least a dozen times.

From Pope Francis:

The joy of Easter is born of our faith in Christ’s Resurrection and his continuing presence in the Church and in our world. With the Resurrection, all has been made new and fresh hope has been poured out upon our world. The question which the angel asked the women on the morning of the resurrection is directed to us as well: “Why do you seek the living among the dead?” (Lk 24:5).

The Gospel shows us three examples of a life changing encounter with the Risen Lord and invites us to a similar encounter. Like Thomas, we need to grasp the reality of Christ’s rising to new life. Like Mary Magdalene, we need to hear Jesus’ voice calling our name. And like the travelers on the road to Emmaus, we need to find renewed joy and hope by recognizing that the Lord is ever at our side.

These disciples sought the living among the dead, yet Jesus led them, by different paths, to faith in him and the power of his resurrection. Today he challenges each of us to seek him, the Living One, and to leave behind everything that holds us back from encountering him and sharing in the rebirth, the freedom and the hope which he alone can give.

(The photo above is a dirt road on the property surrounding the Abbey of the Genesee in western New York. Miles of empty road weaving through corn fields when the season is right. Beautiful for contemplating our life journey and our Road to Emmaus. Get thee to Genesee, if ever you have the chance.)

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Alleluia! Happy Easter!

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I waited for everyone to clear out and then went closer to the altar to get some photos. That’s when I noticed an old woman sitting in a pew, skull cap pulled far down on her head, raggedy oversized clothes, big bag full of something at her side. She had all the markings of a homeless woman and our eyes met and we both smiled and I said hello and walked on by. But for some reason, just as I was about to leave, something — perhaps the echo of “Whatsoever you do…” that was running through my head at that moment —  told me to go back. And so I did.

I sat down in the pew right behind her, leaned in and asked how she was doing. She smiled again and asked me where I was from and how long I’d been in town and if I had children and a home. And I asked her if she had any family nearby. She said her 27-year-old grandson took care of her, but it was pretty clear that they must be struggling mightily because this woman looked like she had seen some very hard times in her life.

I told her my name was Mary and she loved that and said she would pray for me. (Her name is Zenobia, by the way, in case you’d like to send up some prayers for her. I think she could use them.) And then we talked a while more — about the troubles in our world, about the need for peace and the need for prayers to get that peace. She pulled out a prayer card of St. Jude and told me to take it. Then she held out a little vial of oil from a nearby shrine to St. Jude and told me to bless myself with it. I did what she told me, all the while feeling that I was in the presence of someone very special. We finally said goodbye, promising to pray for each other, and as I walked away my mind kept coming back to Mother Teresa’s challenge to see Jesus in the “distressing disguise of the poor.”

A few minutes later, as I stood in the gift shop, waiting to buy a beautiful wood carving from Mexico, Zenobia came in, saw me, and told the shop manager, “This is Mary from New York!” Then she asked to borrow the phone, and the woman at the register ushered her behind the counter. She came back to me once more, took my hand for a minute, and then left. I asked the woman ringing me up about Zenobia, and she said, “She is the real deal,” and went on to tell me how holy and good and strong Zenobia is and how she has an “interesting effect” on people. And I knew just what she meant.

So I thought I was doing a good deed by sitting down with a poor woman in a pew, but it turns out I was the one who received the greater gift today. I set out to see a church, but I ended up seeing Jesus.

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