Reflection...

For more than a month now we've had a young Haitian girl (9 years old) named Jodelin staying with us, along with a nun, Sr. Cadet, also from Haiti.  Jodeline lost her leg below the knee in the earthquake, and she's here to receive a new prosthesis from the Children's Hospital.  There is so much to say about having them here for the last month, but the experience is still too real, too close to me right now to write about it in any detail.  For me, it's the New Testament come to life.  It's my Franciscan calling being lived out everyday, right here, in my home.  H has been bringing them to all the doctor's appointments while I've been at work.  Monday Jodeline gets her real prosthesis and then she is done, they'll be ready to return to Haiti.  I've only now been able to bring myself to write only this much about this experience, which God has graced us with.  He knows all of our weaknesses and uses them to give others strength.  I was and still am the most unworthy of vessels for this job, but I have seen the face of Our Lord so often that my whole way of thinking has been turned around.  Words without actions are worthless.  Into my world that I thought I knew stepped three women who showed me the meaning of love and action; Helen, Sr. Cadet and of course, Jodeline.

A different path...

After many months of prayer, prayer which came to me in many different forms and from many varied places H and I have decided to  take a slightly different yet parallel road on our journey to Heaven.  Our Lord called us to join the Secular Franciscan Order many years ago, and now He calls again, directing us to the path of Third Order Franciscans.  The reasons are too many to post; God draws us to Him and we respond, most times in ways we would never imagine.  In discerning this new path I have tried to humble myself in my thoughts and actions to the utmost of what I can know, meaning, I have tried to give everything over to Our Lord through Our Blessed Virgin Mother.  I am nothing, and in that nothingness I garner my strength.  When I think, even abstractly, that I am in charge, in charge without knowing I call it, when the will takes over my thinking, instead of letting the soul do the work, I become terrified.  I cannot do this, I cannot start a chapter.  Yes, not only to become TOF, but to start a chapter here at our parish.  Tomorrow, the 23rd, we'll be having a 'Meeting of Inquiry', just a small get together to see who might be interested in what we are doing.  Many people have inquired to us about the Third Order, knowing we are Franciscans, and if we could provide information to them.  The desire is there, in people we know.  I believe the Latin Mass has brought this idea of a Third Order into the beginnings of a birth, of sorts.  Pray for us as we begin again down the to Our God, following in the footsteps of Jesus, holding the hand of Francis.