With Arms Wide Open

"I am He whom thou seekest!

Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."

- "The Hound of Heaven," Francis Thompson

     I looked up at the crucifix as I knelt in an unfamiliar church. I had just finished taking my PRAXIS test (my teacher test) and I was on my way home. I was hoping I'd make it in time for a 7 PM service for Good Friday. Did you know that there was only one church in the Archdiocese that had a 7 PM service? What's even more interesting, is that I found the church. I walked into a church that I had passed multiple times on my journeys through Mayfair to visit my Nunnies. It was long, spacious and had a lot of steps. I surprised myself by how close to the altar I walked to (I'm the typical, let's sit in the back Catholic) but knelt there praying anyway. I watched as the priest showed the altar servers where they would be going throughout the service. Suddenly, the open tabernacle caught my eye. 

    In most Catholic churches, right below the Crucifix, is the tabernacle (the vessel in which the Blessed Sacrament is held). After Holy Thursday Mass, the tabernacle is left open while the Blessed Sacrament is reposed in another location (a chapel, a repository, a different part of the church). The tabernacle in my home parish as well as the one in this church I was visiting have two doors that split down the center and push away to either side in order to open, that is, the same way one would have to uncross their arms and spread them to give a hug. 

     Many times I have quoted a dear priest friend of mine when talking about hugs from the Savior. So many times I have needed to hands of a friend when I was suffering or when I wanted to share good news. Often I have found myself in Chapel in tears wanting only for someone to find me and allow me to curl up next to them and cry with them. I've wanted someone to hold me safe from the pain. I've wanted to run into someone's arms and have them swing me around at the mention of good news. But often, in those moments, no one seems to be around...except for Jesus. I look to the crucifix in those moments and I hear Jesus say, "With arms wide open, I'll show you love. I'll show you everything" (CREED). The best hugs come from someone who is always ready with open arms to hug and love you. 

      On Holy Thursday night, while I was laying in my bed reflecting on my night, I was thinking about the AGAPE prayer service Sister Marcelina had told me about that her Sisters do on every Holy Thursday night. AGAPE, my favorite greek word since high school, means unconditional love. There are three different types of love in the GREEK language: eros (physical love), philos (love between friends) and agapos (unconditional love). In the Gospel of John, Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves him. In English, we hear love three times. In Greek we hear philos twice and agapos as the final question. This is how I fell in love with the Greek word AGAPE, while studying the Gospel of John in my Senior Greek class with Senor O'Connell. Every so often I go back to those memories of class and learning those words of love and I can always guarantee a personal reflection on AGAPE love during these holy days of the Triduum.

      These days are the most awesome and accurate actions of AGAPE. Jesus loved us so much, beyond all conditions (regardless of whichever sins we commit, whatever amount of wrong we do, no matter how long we go without speaking to Him) and so much that He gave His life for us. At the Garden, He loved his apostles despite the fact that they fell asleep while keeping watch with Him. He loved the sinners, the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the sailors, even those who arrested Him. He loved them all so much that He allowed himself to be arrested. And what was His crime? Imagine that one could be convicted of loving too much. For truly those who love much, suffer much. Jesus suffered because of His AGAPE love for us all. With arms wide open, He stretched His arms across the cross so as to remind us of his AGAPE hug. 

      That's not the end, however. I go back to the Tabernacle. During the Mass, the tabernacle is opened right before the congregation receives the Eucharist, which is the Body and Blood of Christ. When the tabernacle is opened, it is a literal reminder of the opening of Jesus' arms. His AGAPE love is present above the tabernacle in the visual of His arms wide open, in the tabernacle as the doors open like arms opening for a hug or the be spread on the cross, and in the Eucharist. The AGAPE love is the love from Heaven present among us. The truth is, Jesus' arms are always wide open, ready at any moment to give us His hug, to give us His AGAPE love. Yet, often we do not take advantage of His love. We look at His open arms and turn away. 

      As I reflected on the beauty of the open tabernacle and the arms of my Beloved spread across the cross for His death, three lines from the poem, "The Hound of Heaven," written by Francis Thompson, ran through my mind. While it may be hard to understand with all the dravests and seekests and thees and thous, when one converts these words to modern English, it says "I am the one you seek. You drive love away from yourself, you who drive away Me." I have been working with this poem as I work on my Seminar paper because it was a personal favorite of Eugene O'Neill. For the past month and a half, I have reading and re-reading "The Hound of Heaven" trying to figure it out. As I reflected at Good Friday service, I had a revelation. So many of us, myself included, is the hound of heaven. The first few lines talk about fleeing the Lord, running away like Jonah had, like O'Neill did, like I do. 

      "You drive away love from yourself, you who drive away Me." How often have we looked at the crucifix, the open tabernacle, the Eucharist and refused the love of God?! How often have we searched for love in so many other places and refused to believe the AGAPE love of Jesus on the cross?! So many times we have driven away the love of God by our actions, by our sins. We have built walls and walls of sin, emotion and refusal. We have refused to believe in the love of God and the AGAPE of Jesus. So many, many, many times have we looked at the Crucifix and not believed that we were worth the unconditional love of Jesus. 

      Yet, I also read this another way. "You who drive away love, drive away Me." That is, whenever we drive away love for whatever reason. Whenever we believe that we are not worth the love of another, or that we are not capable of being loved, we drive away God who is LOVE. Anytime we do not accept love because "we accept the love we think we deserve" (Chbosky), we drive away the love from God. The love of God is present in each human being and when we do not accept another human's love, we are refusing the love of God as well. As I thought of this, I began to cry. 

     There are so many reasons why I often only accept the love I think I deserve and there are many people who have tried to love me beyond that. Often, I have had a hard time believing I am worth the love they try to give me. When I read the lines of the poem, I suddenly realized that every time I drive away the love someone is trying to give me, I am also driving away God. I am driving away his AGAPE  love present in another person. I am driving away the reason He died on the cross, the reason for Holy Week, the reason for EASTER. I am driving away God. 

      Often times, we are so busy throughout our days to even remember that we are loved by others, much less by Jesus. There are other days when we are in search of love and cannot find it. On these days we must remember to turn our eyes to Jesus on the cross, with His arms wide open telling us that it is "with arms wide open, I'll show you love" (CREED). 

Hanging Out With Jesus, My BFF

"True love is finding your soulmate in your best friend."

- Faye Hall

     Last week, I was blessed enough to spend five days with some amazing girls from IU, our Campus Minister, our Chaplain and about 125 students and CMs from various other colleges all over the USA. I went into the week already overwhelmed by the fact that this was one of three weeks of Summer I had left. Part of me wanted to be home with my little sisters doing summery type things like going to the beach and getting tan, but I knew, just as I always say, I was exactly where God needed me to be at that very moment in time. And so, I unpacked knowing that this was where God needed me but unsure as to why. 

     We eventually all piled into the auditorium at Marymount University in Arlington, VA for our opening session. I sat in slightly bitter about not being home with my Sisters or soaking up the sun. I suddenly became a shy little Becca when it came to making new friends and was not about talking to new people. All I wanted at that moment was to get in a bed and sleep. But we had a long night ahead of us and lots of new friends to make. I got comfortable in my auditorium seating and pulled out my notebook, you know, if I just casually wanted to make note of something. Oh who was I kidding? I always have been and always will be the perpetual student who loves learning. I had more notes on my paper than I think our speaker had on hers. Trust me, I was bursting with energy from the moment she started. Instantly my attitude changed. Why? Well, because Sister Grace Dominic was giving a talk on Connection with Christ. Yep. Instantly, my who attitude about the whole week changed. 

     Sister Grace Dominic immediately caught my attention with her stories of little four-year old nephews. It was quite amusing, especially after having attended Mass that morning with my God-daughter to hear her sing the entire Mass "YAH YAH YAH YAH YAH YAH." Yeah...she definitely is a product of my God-mothering already. I love little kids in Mass because they always give beautiful insight to what our celebration really is. Sister had me sold. She is, by far, one of the most precious Sisters I have ever met. She has a beautifully sweet speaking voice, a lovely charism and a precious personality. I know that may seem like nothing new to my dear friends, but what is new is that she was part of a community I never really got to know: The Sisters of Life. Miss Greene would be so proud. Needless to say, I held onto her every word.

     That night I went to bed really reflecting on the things Sister had told us. And as I reflected on the many things that spoke to my heart, I had one idea in particular really singing to my soul: a best friendship with Jesus. I love metaphors, as you may or may not know, and anything that really applies to my life sparks my attention. This idea of best friendship immediately stuck to me like glue. And here's why:

     When Sister began speaking of best friendship, I thought of my little sister, Mary and her best friend, Julia. Having gone to all of grade school together and then splitting up for high school, they have remained best friends through and through. They weren't best friends at first, but as they got older and wiser, they immediately found a kinship between the two of them. They became almost inseparable. Now, after knowing each other for almost 12 years, they are even closer. As the oldest, I have become the taxi driver and big sister for both. Almost every night I am home during the summer (and any other time), I am driving one of them to the other's house. Every other night one is sleeping on the other's floor, although my Sister has her own bed now at Julia's house. They go on vacation with each other's family, they do almost everything together, they have a system down. They are so good at being best friend's it;s actually scary sometimes. Okay. One may be thinking: don't they get sick of each other? I mean, I get sick of them sometimes. And they do. They have one day a week where they don't see each other. They get mad at each other, they call each other out own their emotions, they give each other grief. I mean, isn't that what it should be?

      I have to laugh when I think about my sister's best friend and my best friend, Mary Kate. I think back to high school and yes, we were inseparable. We did everything together, and if we didn't we always consulted the other first. But now that we are in college, we have learned that best friends doesn't mean doing everything together, but that we can move on to separate things and still be the best of friends. Often, I find myself visiting her family, calling her mom, at the most random and perhaps inopportune times. I can call her up and tell her I am outside in my car waiting for her and she'll come out with me. I can walk through her front door without having to knock. I can not talk to her for days and weeks and yet, I know she's always there for me. Now that we are older, we have essentially taken on the persona of two older ladies who sip whatever it is we feel like sipping on the front porch thinking about life. We are, essentially an older version of Mary and Julia. Look out girls.

     As I was thinking about our best friends and laughing to myself at all our funny fine moments, I began to adapt it to my relationship with Jesus, which, praise God, is a best friendship. However, for many this is not true. Think about your best friend. Who is it? How do they perform BFF duties? Where would you be without them?! For me, a best friendship with Jesus is literally spending every moment possible I can with Him, whether it's at His house for a meal (the Mass), His house for family time (adoration and prayer), walking in the park on a date (literally walking in the park) or doing service opportunities with Him. Just like I consult my best friend about almost everything in life, I always pray about it with Jesus first. He always gets first consultation. And just like all best friends, we are comfortable with each other enough to tell each other when we are frustrated. Often Jesus tells me that I need some confession time and there are times when I let Jesus have it with my flustered words. Like seriously Jesus, why did You have to let this happen?! You are such a drama queen. Just like real best friends, we hang out all the time. 

     Then I began to think about the one time Julia had to have severe back surgery. She was scared, frightened and cried a good amount. All of us at church were praying for her, but still she experienced very human emotions when it comes to having surgery, especially for a young teen. After surgery, she couldn't do a lot of things for a very long time. She couldn't run or do anything really active. She had to sit in a certain position and do all kinds of things that made her stand out in the crowd. She was immediately different and could have easily been ridiculed for being so. However, like a real true best friend, Mary stood by her every moment. She visited her in the hospital, helped her adjust to life with a new back and even stood up for her many times. This meant that all the things Julia couldn't do, Mary didn't do. She literally suffered through it right next to Julia. She was there through all the hardships which proved that she wasn't Julia's best friend because it just happened to be convenient for her. Nope. She was a true BFF through and through.

      So many times we proclaim ourselves best friends with Jesus. It's all great while He's performing miracles and gaining followers, because hey, more friends for us. We'll go out to eat with Him while He's multiplying loaves and fishes, we'll take a ride in His boat, we'll give up all our time for Him because we're going on an adventure. Yeah, sure no problem. Being best friends with Jesus is easy. Until He gets to the garden and we can't stay up with Him because well, I'm too tired, Jesus. Being best friends with Jesus is easy until He gets condemned and scourged at the pillar and we're embarrassed that He might be a criminal and we don't want to get arrested for association. Being friends with Jesus is easy until He has to walk the way of Calvary and we can't because, well, we might get blisters or something. And being best friends with Jesus is easy until He is hanging on the cross. No, we can't be there for that. Definitely not, no, because well, that's just too painful to watch.

     So many times we say we are best friends with Jesus and yet, we deny Him at the times when our best friend needs us the most. We aren't there for Him when things get rough. We aren't there when things are painful. Why? Because it's not convenient for us. But remember Mary and Julia. They have literally done everything together, including the painful suffering of Julia's back surgery. They have literally been there for each other through everything. Imagine if suddenly Jesus decided He didn't want to be our best friend anymore? Because it just didn't seem convenient enough? We'd sure be stuck in a rut then, now wouldn't we? But no, Jesus continues to be there for us through and through. As for us, we need to step it up a bit. If we really want to be best friends with Jesus, we need to suffer with Him through the cross. If we want to be best friends with Jesus, we need to hang out with Him all the time...and that means hanging with Him on the cross. You wouldn't want your best friend to suffer alone, now would you?