in defense of scars

“Maybe you’re not supposed to get over it. Some things you can’t move past. They scar you. Change you permanently.”

~Agent Mae to Coulson on TV’s “Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD”

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“If you can be still a suffer awhile, you shall without a doubt see the help of God come in your need.”

~Thomas A. Kempis, Imitation of Christ

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“Death is meant to indelibly scar our hearts because love is meant to wound us in that way.”

~Ron Rolheiser,

"Dying into safe hands."

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For the past few weeks (yes, from the end of Lent and into the Easter season), I have been discovering, little by little, the album “Evergreen” by Audrey Assad.

I find her lyrics quite compelling – and today, as I ponder the Gospel where Thomas says out loud that he needs to see Christ’s wounds, it is the beginning of Assad’s song, “When I See You,” that speaks to my heart:

You have loved me well, in a million ways
But my wounds are all I know
So I turn my head, and I hide my face
Too afraid to come back home

But all of the doors swing open
When I see You, when I see You
You make my heart unbroken
When I see You, when I see You
And I come undone, I come undone!

Every one of us is broken, wounded, and scarred in some way. This is, after all, a sign of truly living, of giving, and of dying for others on this our earthly pilgrimage. 

The scars left in me and on me by each wound, mark my life and define my spiritual journey. I would not be who I am today without each one of these marks, these scars.

This is reason enough to sing Alleluia on this second Sunday of Easter, don’t you think?

But our wounds not only tell our story. They also connect us to one another as the Body of Christ. Every one of my scars, visible or internal, can be– if I let them— a sign of mercy and an avenue for genuine compassion for others in their suffering.

Yes, I can speak to you of brokenness, because I, too, have been broken. I have felt despair. I have known unspeakable loneliness. I have walked the way of hopelessness.

Satan, the great deceiver, wants us to drink the Kool-Aid of fear and despair, the lie that says that no one can truly understand me, or my woundedness. Don’t believe it!

That which is most personal is also the most universal. Our personal suffering can and does unite us.

My friend Carrie, who fought until her last breath for more time on this earth in order to mother her young children as long as possible, described the gift of her scars this way.

The marks on her body, Carrie explained to me, was her road map, “a map I hope leads me to eternal life!”

In reality, Carrie and her scars were, and continue to be, a light post leading all of us to heaven. And I have no doubt that her suffering prayers on behalf of others as she walked through that pain, carried many people through their sorrowful journey.

Although I cannot take your pain away, I can walk with you—just as Christ, with all His visible wounds, walks with us.

In the words of my friend and retired pastor, Fr. Thomas Boyer, “As John tells the story, Jesus comes with his wounds, because a risen Lord with no wounds would not have much to say to the wounded people in that room or anywhere else… new life comes from these broken places, and this is resurrection; and it is a call to go, be broken and suffer a bit for the sake of another. 

ps. photos of Chihuly exhibit at Oklahoma City Museum of Art

remembering Carrie, on the 2nd anniversary of her death

A month before writing to say a final goodbye, my friend Carrie called to ask me for a friend’s address. She had a baby gift to send the new mother.

It was vintage Carrie. In the midst of everything, she was still thinking of ways to share in and bring joy to others. And when I say “everything,” I mean in the midst of cancer treatments, doctor appointments, pain management, and taking care of her family.

 No matter how dark things got or how much pain she was in, Carrie’s messages always included praise and thanksgiving for the God who gave her two amazing children—after medical experts told her in no uncertain terms that she would never have any. She called them her “miracle babies.”

When I hear people talk about fighting cancer, it is always Carrie who comes to mind. She fought that battle with all her might, all the way until the end. If that meant painful procedures that may or may not offer cure, but instead offered a way to extend her time on earth being present to her family, Carrie always said yes.

Carrie believed in and relied on the power of prayer. Not in the sense of telling God what to do, but always with a powerful balance: her complete trust in God’s Divine Providence—and a healthy dose of petitions straight from her humble mother heart.

Her prayers of petition were always grounded on her family. Carrie had no problem reminding God that she had to stick around longer because her son and daughter were simply too young to be without a mother.

I will never forget Carrie describing the gift of her scars… the marks on her body, she explained, was her road map, “a map I hope leads me to eternal life!”

In reality, Carrie and her scars were, and continue to be, a light post leading all of us to heaven. And I have no doubt that her suffering prayers on behalf of others carried many a painful journey, always reminding us of the ways God has already begun answering our prayers.

A week before her death Carrie wrote, once again, asking for prayers—always first for her family, and this time, for a holy death.

They are the most beautiful, loving, joyful children in the world, and

their own mother had to pierce their hearts. Above all else, I ask that

you pray for my Matteo and Francesca. Stefano is also devastated, of

course. My prayer is that the end will be peaceful and not panicked… If possible, I'd like to die at St. Francis of Assisi Hospital in Evanston. My children were born there, half the staff knows me, and I have felt that Francis was always with me in a special way--I was baptized by the Franciscans, wrote a book for a Franciscan, my spiritual director was a Franciscan, I was married at San Damiano in Assisi, and had my children at St. Francis.  I just think it would help to present a sense of peace for my children. I don't know if they would ever be able to handle mommy dying at home.

As the bilirubin on the liver function rises, I'm told my brain will

begin to get fuzzy. As funny as it might be to get emails from me in

that state, I think this is the time to say goodbye.

I thank you all for you the support we've shared, for allowing the occasional vent, for the encouragement, for the beautiful published works that have come out of sifting ideas, and for your friendship.

Thank you, and I love you,

Carrie

Carrie and Francesca rough housing with my first grandchild, Elenita

life + prayer = writing

The awareness that for me there’s an intricate connection between writing and life was a pivotal moment in my faith journey. 

But I often need reminding!

When I say connection, I’m not talking about balancing the hours of the day, or how to handle interruptions, or the necessity to often shift gears, or even my response to family demands. 

Certainly, all of those are skills and values that I’ve learned over the years. And how I react to “life” makes an enormous difference to the quality and the quantity of my writing. That is true. And for someone working out of a home office perhaps doubly so.

Yet there’s a weaving from my writing to my life and from my life to my writing—a back and forth flow, that is both indisputable and difficult to describe.

I’ve written here about my latest book project, the biography of Father Stanley Rother, Oklahoma martyr.  You can see some specific blog entries and read more about it here, here, and here.

And—you will be hearing a LOT more about the book and about Father Stanley’s story in the next few months, because it is in the final stages of production (woo hoo!) with a publication date of September 2015!

What you may not know is that I consider this book somewhat of a miracle, or at the very least, full of Divine interventions.

During the year that (under contract) I agreed to complete the book manuscript—and the six-month extension I requested, the “events” of my life included:

• ·      Multiple stays at the hospital with and for my dad and countless doctor visits as his health issues became more and more complicated;
• ·      The decline and death of my close friend and fellow writer Carrie Swearingen;
• ·      The diagnosis of brain cancer and death of my best friend and Camino de Santiago partner Pat Stankus—as well as
• ·      The births of THREE glorious grandchildren

That’s a lot of emotions, all intense ones – and to my weird, creative temperament—all energy sucking emotions. Or is there any other kind?!

There was one point as I saw my deadline looming closer and closer when I remember saying to a close friend, “I am certain that I was meant to write the biography of Father Stanley right now… so what is God telling me by what is happening in my life?  I honestly have no time, let alone any energy, to actually complete this book!”

My friend Patricia was silent for a moment, before replying, “María, it’s like prayer. You have to trust that the events of your life are meant to be incorporated into your writing, into the telling of Father Stanley’s story. Don’t separate the two… let one guide you to the other.”

That’s how I got from this:

To this!

you can pre-order the book on Amazon by clicking here