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Contents © 2001
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.

MAY 2001 CONFESSIONS

MORTIFICATION

My subscription to the daily prayer guide Magnificat ran out just in time for Lent. Casting about for some sort of spiritual reading -- thank heaven for promptings of liturgical seasons -- I picked up my wife's copy of Divine Intimacy, a book of meditations on the interior life based on the Teresian method of prayer. My first reading considered The Spirit of Mortification, and contained this: "It would be absurd to refuse a single one of those providential opportunities for suffering and to look for voluntary mortifications of our own choice ... they will not be as effective as those which God Himself has prepared for us. In the mortifications offered to us by divine Providence, there is nothing of our own will or liking...." Excellent advice, especially during Lent. But I didn't pick up the book again.

This Holy Week was my first spent in California, away from the company of my parents, my brother and his family. I stumbled through it like a child taking its first steps. Simply being away from my La Mesa home used to contribute to the atmosphere of difference that helps to make an occasion feel "holy" -- separate unto God. More of that atmosphere was provided by the spirituality of those who had gathered: my parents' sanctity, the air of religious talk, the familial prayer, the sacrificial work involved with large gatherings....

Now, I was home with myself, and the days had an unpleasantly ordinary feel to them. I got a whiff of this at a penance service on Monday night. After unburdening my sins, and after the priest's weary reminder that advice he might give would be useless if I didn't really want to change, he asked me if I was going to attend Holy Week services. I was surprised to hear the question -- I had always attended those services. But then I realized that it had been my parents' tradition carrying me along, that now, I would be going (or not going) under my own steam. Rather than speaking a forthright "Yes," I stammered, "Yes, I plan to attend." Father made the services my penance, along with special attention to be paid to Divine Mercy Sunday.

My wife called our church to find out the time for Holy Thursday Mass; eight o'clock, she was told. This meant the kids would be asleep; she couldn't attend with me. I made it just in time, only to realize that the eight o'clock was the Vietnamese service. I was the only Anglo in the packed building; I stood in the back corner of the vestibule. I tried to pray inwardly, but it's hard to concentrate when there is something coming at you in another language, and there were no missals about. There was no Eucharistic procession, and we did not sing the Pange Lingua, my favorite moment of the Liturgical Year. (I imagine that had been done at the six o'clock service.) But though the event was not spiritually pleasing, I was not bothered -- Father's letter in the bulletin (which I read during his homily) quoted Padre Pio: "If we knew the value of suffering, we would ask for more." Here was a little providential inconvenience, to be suffered gladly.

Good Friday brought several more of those providential sufferings. The entire day was tinged with a nasty headache of unknown origin -- I thought it was hunger, but it remained after dinner. During a disagreement with my wife, I gave into the giant leap backward which has accompanied any progress I made this Lent -- a quickening of my temper. I stormed out the door for a cooldown walk around the block. Work troubles combined with familial chaos to made me late for Good Friday services -- a special cross for me, who hates being late to church. (I know it's a good thing to avoid, but, judging from its souring effect on my temper, there must be some pride mixed in there.) The headache, together with the distraction of a child in my pew armed with a Barbie and a crinkly plastic bag ("Stupid doll! Stupid doll! Stupid doll!" she repeated), made participation in the service difficult. Then, after communion, the population of the parish school poured in for their upcoming service, chattering and jostling. I didn't garner much fruit, except perhaps from the acceptance of all this as mortification.

By Easter, I had joined my children in sickness, always stepping back from collapsing into bed. Mass was less grand than I had hoped -- an impression no doubt colored by my own condition. But as I led my son back from communion, the Host still on my tongue, I was reminded that pleasure in the world and its gifts has little to do with the joy of Easter, however much I am used to their intermingling. Most of the world is far more miserable and wretched than I, yet Easter comes to them as well. The pleasures I was used to enjoying were merely reminders of the real good of the day, which concerns the leaving of this world (and its mortifications). The kids had an Easter egg hunt; we told our eldest about the Resurrection; dinner was delicious. Next year, I hope to be better prepared, but I am happy to have gleaned something from this year, no matter how simple the lesson.

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