mnartists.org: Kathryn Begnaud

50 Hours with God

Kathryn Begnaud — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 18:21:49 GMT

application: 50 Hours with God

Club Carp

Kathryn Begnaud — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 18:05:09 GMT

application: Club Carp

Are We There Yet?

Kathryn Begnaud — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 17:37:47 GMT

application: Are We There Yet?

Remain in My Love

Kathryn Begnaud — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 18:18:25 GMT

application: Remain in My Love

Pie Day

Kathryn Begnaud — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 18:06:08 GMT

application: Pie Day

And The Wind Sang Alleluia

Kathryn Begnaud — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 17:57:30 GMT

application: And the Wind Sang Alleluia

Remember Me?

Kathryn Begnaud — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:40:17 GMT

Remember Me?[/b]

[i]Published August 2008, Chicken Soup Anthology[/i]

Dear Saint Peter,

I know you’re terribly busy at the pearly gates. Believe me when I say I’ve been to others first. I tried Saint Christopher, but my letter came back as addressee unknown. So I tried Saint Anthony but learned I had the wrong department; he only works on lost items. Although I did plead my case for “loss of mind” and “loss of youth”.

I’m told you are in charge of customer service and since I hate to bring my issue of dissatisfaction directly to the Big Guy, I thought perhaps you could shed some light on my situation.

I’m the one who asked for your help thirty years ago when I wanted a baby. You must have a lot of pull; we received five within seven years. Remember me now? I was the one who kept saying, “Enough already!”

We raised those five boys and kept them out of jail—most of the time, anyway. But here’s the situation: They have found other women, other lives, other homes. You had a Jewish mom, so you know how it is: They don’t call, they don’t write.

The problem is I’m lonesome. So I was thinking…

The second Tuesday of each month, could my home be filled again with those little boys running around wildly, jumping from couch to chair to footstool? To fill my life with their noise and music and fighting?

Oh. I forgot about the fighting.

Hmmm. Make that one day every other month. One day when they laugh and play and get in trouble at school or dent the car.

Oh, wait. Let’s catch our breath. Perhaps we should trim that back to two days a year. Just two little old days, days when they ask for money to buy…

Hold your horses there. How could I be so selfish? I forgot how busy you are and I’d hate to impose.

How ‘bout we just leave things as they are? I’ll simply learn to accept my quiet and clean house, my new car without dents. Instead, I’ll just focus on my poor wonderful life of peace and serenity. Meanwhile Pete, keep up the good work. And, God Bless.

Kathryn A. Begnaud[/i]

An Immensely Gifted Cat Family

Kathryn Begnaud — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:30:27 GMT

[/i][/b]
An Immensely Gifted Cat Family[/i][/b]

Self published Dec 2010
For My Parents, James and Marilyn Lynch

There once was a family of immensely gifted cats who lived in the countryside in Old Man Abram’s barn. The family consisted of Father Cat, Mother Cat and eleven kittens who scurried and played and pounced and rolled together all day long. Though Old Man Abram, who lived alone now, complained constantly about the size of the Cat family and frequently grumbled that he had already spent much of his life “feeding many mouths thank you very much”, nevertheless he could not bring himself to break up the large Cat family of thirteen. It would have been unthinkable.

               Instead, every evening without fail, Old Man Abram scooped up the youngest litter, dumped them into the sloop of his shirt and carried them into his house for a short visit and a delicious treat of warmed milk laced with sugar. Father Cat and Mother Cat and the older kittens trailed quietly behind and Old Man Abram held the screen door open until the last tail had cleared the threshold.

               Once inside, Father Cat always sat closest to the rocking chair by the fire so that when the old man relaxed his arm to its full length, his hand would come into contact with Father Cat’s fur. Then Old Man Abram would scratch Father Cat behind the ears and Father Cat would purr heavily and stretch his neck just so—while the old man
commiserated with him as though they were two old comrades sharing war stories. The old man told Father Cat tales of his own children who were now all grown up and off in the world leading their own lives. Father Cat looked up with understanding and watery eyes when the old man’s voice filled with loneliness and he began to realize that a day would come when the kittens too might be gone.

               During the daytime, life was busy and there was no time to be lollygagging in front of fires. It was the duty of each member of the Cat Family to keep the barn clear of mice and birds and it was stressful, sometimes even anxiety-ridden work. All day long Father Cat worked tirelessly checking the outer perimeter of the building’s foundation for telltale signs of newly gnawed wood or expanding crevices or holes. Mother Cat paced indoors in front of the barn’s wide doorways and archways like a sentry; back and forth she wove a path with her head slightly dipped below her shoulders and ever-moving like a goal tender daring any critter to cross over.

               The kittens, who had begun their educations, were each assigned an upper level window in the barn’s hayloft to watch over and because each window offered a different view of life beyond, their dreams began to form separate from one another. But dreaming was tiresome and as they sat in those sunny windows they struggled to stay awake; they bit their tongues in order to
remain alert so that they might bat away any birds before they could enter the barn. Birds were considered vile because they left their droppings willy-nilly on the bales of straw and hay and alfalfa—food for the larger animals. As important as they knew their education and training at the windows were, they often forgot themselves in that sun-drenched utopian warmth, dozed off, catnapped and then suddenly jerked awake. And when they came awake with that jerk, their minds were still sleepy and foggy and all they could think to do was romp and leap and play and before they knew it, all eleven kittens were falling on top of one another and wrestling and giggling in a kitteny sort of way. When Mother Cat caught sight of the goings-on in the loft above, she meowed at the top of her vocal chords for them to stop their tomfoolery and attend to their responsibilities. The kittens then hung their heads and walked grievously back to their respective watches.

               As each night fell—following their visit to the house for that warm snack by the fire—Father Cat led the kittens back to the barn with Mother Cat bringing up the rear like a gentle guard, taking care that the pokier kittens did not get carried away with their fiddling around. Then, before curling up together in the hay, Mother Cat cleaned her fur and the fur of each child. Each kitten purred in anticipation and then grew sleepy with delight when Mother turned their way. It was not that any of them were particularly fond of baths. No, they certainly were not. Rather, they were fond of Mother’s attention and loving touch. It was during these bedtime preparations that the kittens came to believe themselves to be immensely gifted. They were not sure where that belief had come from or what immensely gifted even meant. They were human terms that Mother and Father had picked up from Old Man Abram and now purred the message as they nudged the kittens to sleep.

               Father Cat was especially gifted and knew by a secret measure he carried within his body, something the humans called instinct, that the weather was soon to turn bitter and cold. He knew how to gauge the passage of time by how the stars and moon travelled in the night sky; he recognized the ever decreasing length of days and so he prepared carefully by laying aside a ration from his daily hunts for the long winter ahead. He took the oldest kittens with him and began teaching them to lurk, to lay low on their haunches and to pounce with brilliant speed and silence.

[size= 6pt]4[/size][/i]

               One evening, a night that Father Cat knew by using his gifts would be the longest span of darkness during the year, he paced the barn and waited for the old man to come as usual and scoop the kittens into the garments he wore over his body. But the old man did not come and did not come and soon Father Cat knew that the time was long past for sitting by the fire, for warm snacks and a good scratch behind the ears. He grew impatient and owly and Mother Cat meowed and told him that he was getting spoiled by that old man. But when the moon grew very high in the night sky and was directly overhead, even that ornery old Mother Cat became worried and so all together she and Father Cat and all the kittens ventured out of the barn and across the moonlit lawn and atop the ice encrusted snow to the house. Father leapt upon a window sill and saw the old man in his rocking chair and saw that the fire was indeed glowing warmly and that the teacup was still on the side table. Pawing on the window glass and getting no response from the old man, Father jumped down and began to work at the screen door with his claws until the door opened. The heavy door on the inside was not closed as tightly as it should have been and the entire Cat family was able to squeeze through the narrow opening.

[size= 6pt]5[/size][/i]

When they entered the old man’s living room, the kittens stopped and stared at a strange sight. An enormous evergreen tree stood in the bay window and it twinkled with lights of all colors. Mother smiled and meowed as she explained that for some reason the old man dragged an evergreen indoors as soon as snow covered the earth and the days grew short and the nights seemed endless. Perhaps, she wondered aloud, the sparkling lights chased the darkness away? Not interested in explanations, the kittens jumped into the tree and climbed up the trunk. Leaping from branch to branch they pawed one another and hissed, which is how they displayed laughter.

               When suddenly a shiny ball that had been hanging from a branch went sailing to the floor and cracked, Mother Cat meowed loudly—signaling they should stop the nonsense and behave themselves. They were guests, she reminded them, and so the kittens obediently gathered themselves into a large group of fur at the base of the tree. There, as they caught their breaths and settled under the tree, they spotted a tiny stable, much like a miniature of the barn where they lived. Diminutive little human beings, some who appeared to be shepherds, stood in the tiny stable and the tiny humans—who did not so much as flinch when touched by a paw—were surrounded by even smaller lambs and donkeys.

               Then, when the kittens heard their father’s mournful purr and turned their faces to him, they saw that Father had leapt up and onto the old man’s lap; saw that he was burrowing his furry head into the old man’s belly and that he had begun nudging the old man’s hands. Still the old man did not wake. When Father buried his nose further into the old man’s open hand, his purr grew soft and quiet and they recognized it as a small cry. When the old man’s limp fingers finally fell open, a tiny human baby figure wrapped in white tumbled from his grip and fell to the floor.

[size= 6pt]6[/size][/i]

               The kittens, their eyes wide with fascination and wonder, watched as Mother gently gathered the tiny figure into her mouth—just as she carried them—walked to the base of the tree, and placed the baby in a miniature manger.

Then inching close to the manger, they saw that the specks of hay and straw and alfalfa that lined the crib there were gleaming and spotlessly clean and they lifted their heads proudly, knowing they had done their work well. Together the thirteen gathered around the manger and formed a wreath of fur that encircled the child and kept him warm. Through the dark of night they kept watch and held one another in that immensely gifted and endless circle of love.
By Kathryn Begnaud, For Mom and Dad[/i]

[size= small] [/size]

In My Father's House

Kathryn Begnaud — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:21:25 GMT

In My Father’s House

Published January 2010, Ligourian Magazine
(Re-titled by Magazine as "Forgiving the Unforgivable"

In my father’s house we had many large old rooms and my parents liked to say that they decorated those rooms with children, eleven of us. As if that wasn’t enough of a crowd, many others lived with us over the years, some were strangers, but most were friends who found themselves temporarily homeless. Our doors were never locked, the house was open and keys were left in the ignition. Anyone could use the cars—if they could get them running!

Dad ran a grocery store in town and over the years gave cases and bushels of food to our nuns and to our Catholic school lunchroom. I remember riding with him to deliver those baskets of food and of how proud I was of his generosity. He was a good man, and better yet, he was silly and playful and full of humor. He and Mother had still been children themselves when they wed, and in many ways, Dad remained child-like through old age.

We raised horses and were awaken in the middle of many nights as a mare was ready to deliver. Throwing parkas and boots over pajamas and bare feet, we would race out to the barn and huddle together around a stall, steam rising from new life, Mother and Dad sipping coffee out of chipped mugs with broken handles, brothers and sisters holding each other for warmth and excitement, seriously debating what to name each new foal.

On summer nights, we rarely slept indoors, nor did Dad. He threw blankets on the grass, counted the falling stars and watched the dark sky twinkle. Dad called the sky the ceiling of God’s Cathedral. We fell asleep listening to him talk with wonder about those stars, naming them all sorts of silly names (names that we thought were the real until we got to high school). He told us stories of angels and saints, told us all about heaven—painting it in great detail (it looked much like our farm)—and described with relish all that we would do together when we got there (heaven, it turns out, provides softball, horses and dogs—no cats due to our allergies—as well as fabulous music and comedy at any time of day). He filled us with wonder at the universe and our place in it, with wonder about the presence of God in everything around us, and with a hunger to know God.

Our home was filled with plants and animals of every kind, even a goat who taught himself to open our kitchen door and kept eating Mother’s brooms. It was a house filled with laughter and prayer and every kind of free entertainment children could dream up.

What a life it was! We were the church. We were the family of God.[/i]
[i][/i]
Then into God’s family crept sin.
Job loss, financial strain, illness and fourteen pregnancies, never-ending worries, home foreclosure—all of it wore us down, down. Then into God’s family crept alcohol—first as a soother, then a numbing agent, until it became a monster and we all lived in wide-reaching denial. Finally, into God’s family came sexual abuse at the hands of the one man who was leading us to God.
[/b]
Is not the Family of God immune to evil?[/b]
So many today are asking: How is it possible that a man so connected to God, so strong in faith, in love with the church and awed by creation—how is it possible that such a man can commit despicable acts? To that I answer—it is quite easily possible, and how very silly, how truly ridiculous for us to think that this would never happen in the Family of God. It has always happened and it will happen again. A family born of the spirit, a church born of the spirit, but living flesh and blood lives, will always be subject to every human failing and weakness.

So many are asking if it is possible for a man, or woman, to embody both good and evil? Or, does the degree of his sin negate all the good he has done with his life? And to that I answer, only we have the power to negate one another’s accomplishments, to dismiss another’s faith, to disregard what lies deep within the heart of the greatest sinner. Only we do that. The plants do not, the animals do not and God does not. God judges alone, without our assistance. God sees into the corners of hearts, places we can never go. And sinners can rest in the corners of God’s heart, in one of the many dwelling places created there by Jesus, places for each of us to rest.

I am not excusing the behavior. However, I am here to tell you, and as a victim of sexual abuse I have the right to say this, that there are, in most instances, far greater sins. Greed. War. Torture. Deforestation of the planet. Gluttonous consumerism. Reckless mining of the earth. Hunger. Genocide. Homelessness. Sins that effect whole populations and impact the earth for future generations. These—the darkest acts committed by humans against one another and nature—are greater than all the addictions and dysfunctions that infiltrate our families and our church. Yet, somehow it is so much easier for us to feast our eyes upon the sins of the flesh, the sins grown out of loneliness, or the myriad of desperate acts that sprout from the imperfect formation of humans. It is much more enjoyable to stroke and appease ourselves with claims of own innocence and so-called healthy sexuality.

Do we dare question the validity of another man’s hunger for God based on the “publicness” of his sin? All have sinned, all have failed. We have simply not all had our failings splashed on the front page of every newspaper in this country. Most abusers are not monsters. Contrary to what the world’s media would have us believe, most abusers are not wolves in sheep’s clothing. They too are sheep.[/i]

We must forgive. Otherwise we compound the sin of our brother, taking that sin onto ourselves when we ostracize him from the family. Oh, how the devil dances as the sins grows with our unwillingness to forgive. Wrongdoing should not expel us from the family, but should catapult us to the center for support, accountability, restitution, mercy, forgiveness and most of all love.

Forgiveness does not mean we should excuse or deny, we should not move the broken ones to new families or new parishes, but we must—for our own sake as well—embrace as members of the same body even those parts that have caused harm.

If we do not do so, we are no longer one body. We are only amputees.

How can we follow now?[/b]
Again, so many today are asking: How will we ever recover?

My own family struggled for over twenty years, praying, running to the church, leaving the church, coming back to the church, blaming, weeping, all the things that happen in families and happen in the church when this sin enters in. And we asked over and over, “How can we ever again be made whole?” We were like Thomas when Jesus promised he was going to prepare a place for him and Thomas answered, “How can I follow, when I do not know where you are going?” We too, not entirely sure what was happening or why, wondered how had things come to this, questioned where the Lord was going and how would we follow when we didn’t have a clue where to begin anymore?

The single most important scripture for me during that time of breaking through denial was from the Gospel of John: “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.” There was, and is still, no other way. There is no alternative. As a family, and as a church, the only way to find our way back to Jesus is in the truth because He is Truth. When Jesus says, ‘you will be where I am’, he could have equally said, ‘and I will be where you are’. For that is the gift he gave my family. He met us where we were. And then, he held us there while we wept.

So we told the truth. Some spoke it aloud before the others were ready to hear and embrace it. That caused anger and fear and feelings of betrayal on both sides. But the truth, as it has a habit of doing, snowballed. Soon the fruit of truth—faces awash with the tears of freedom, peace and joy—appeared in my family. Liberation became a magnet and soon others wanted to speak the truth and we learned how to do that in love. First to one another, child to mother and mother to child, father to daughter, sister to brother. No excuses, no denials. Just the stark-raving, gut-wrenching, naked and sober truth. Drowning in a sea of tears became for us a second Baptism and in the center of all that activity was the Crucifixion. We told the truth over and over and each time it got easier, each time we grew wiser and each time we more closely glimpsed the Resurrection. The longer we lived in and walked in the truth, the richer our lives grew in ways far beyond our greatest hopes. Walking in the truth empowered us with the courage to re-define who we would be now, as the Family of God, the family who had failed and was then redeemed and healed.

[size= small]The Greedy Truth[/size]

During that time of healing, we found Jesus to be a selfish lover. We found the truth to be greedy and not easily satisfied. The truth was not satisfied that we deal only with abuse, but soon we were looking at other dynamics, our traditions, our habits, our beliefs. The women in my family grew strong, assertive. And the men learned that the women were equally capable and gifted. Traditional male and female roles could be pushed aside, all things were possible. Other prejudices revealed themselves when held up to the light of truth and we began to change our thinking. We continue to work today to change our thought processes and ideas, to explore how we have used our views as excuses to create exclusions. And though we continue to disagree on many topics and we grow at different rates and in different directions, we walk on, with intention, as a family. We can still gather under the twinkling stars, the ceiling of God’s Cathedral, and listen to Dad describe what heaven looks like. It still looks very much like our old farm.

[size= small]Riding on Hope into the Future [/size]

Today this family of God, our beloved and battered church, sits on the brink of what could be an amazing journey filled with hope and possibility. We, who warm the pews, pray that the church uses the clarity of this moment in time, the truth of its own frailty and humanity, as an opportunity for true love and humility, shared wisdom and authority. We continue to honor the ordained who lead us in light, and in many instances speak for us. We pray that the ordained give voice to our beliefs, our concerns, and our needs. We honor the laity who teach and even preach to us from the street, from the kitchen table, and from the marketplace, reminding us that everyday life is holy.

This great sin that fell upon us has humbled us immeasurably and what we learn from it could make us very strong. We should radiate the discovery of what it feels like to realize that we can[/i] love the unlovable, that we seek to forgive the unforgivable, that we have had that ability planted within all along—which means that we too will always be loved and forgiven. Therein lies our all of our futures, intrinsically and miraculously linked.

application: Into My Father's House

The Grandmotherly Love of God

Kathryn Begnaud — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:07:55 GMT

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The Grandmotherly Love of God[/b]
Published February 2010, St Anthony Messenger[/b][/b]

[/i][/b]
When he’s happy, he does a run-hop-run in a sort of galloping, skipping gait. I can hear him skipping down the hallway, his bare little feet in search of me. All wound up this morning because he’s found an old Tootsie Pop in the bottom of the toy-box, he jabbers excitedly in the language of a two-year old, breathlessly amazed that such a treasure could be found buried under the Legos. Calling my name in his wonderful gibberish, he pants, “Maama, Maama!” He cannot yet say Grama, which pleases me because there is no one else named Maama. It is a name that belongs to our relationship only, to him and to me.

When he finally skids into the living room and finds me there, I act as if I don’t even know that he exists. With my feet propped upon the footstool, I turn to the local section of the morning paper and take another leisurely sip of coffee. I can see over the ruffled edge of the flimsy newsprint that he’s now jumping up and down in front of me, trying desperately to communicate. I know that if I ignore him long enough, he will climb up onto the sofa next to me, take my face in his warm little hands and turn me toward him. That’s all I really want from him. His nearness. I bide my time reading and, sure enough, he is soon next to me, sitting as straight and tall as possible, stretching his short legs to their full length and even then they do not reach the rim of the couch cushion.

“Maama?” he asks tapping his two biggest toes together.

“Yes?” I pretend halfhearted interest, barely glancing in his direction. He knows he is going to have to carefully plead his case. He does not know yet how easily my heart will burst for him.
“Wook,” he says. “Sucker.”

“Hmmmmmm,” I say, acknowledging his find.

“Open?” he appeals to me with his eyes widened, brows arched and head leaning so far to the right that his tiny ear rests atop his shoulder. I am nearly drawn into this trap. His eyes so blue and pure, his face so beautiful and near that I can count the ten freckles sprinkled across his nose and I want to smother it with kisses. But, I cannot because he will know then that he has won and how easy it was. Instead, I say, matter-of-factly, “Not now, Aiden. First you must finish your cereal.” I point sternly back in the direction of the kitchen.

“Oh, no[/i]!” he laments and buries his head into the sofa cushions with great sorrow and high drama. His worst possible fears were coming true. His mouth is hanging open as though grieving and I pull in my cheeks to avoid smirking. I go back to reading the paper as he sits and stews and contemplates his next move. From the corner of my vision, I can see him picking slowly and carefully at the candy wrapper just to see if it is possible to remove it without adult assistance. Every time the stiff waxy paper makes the sound of a crinkle, he looks quickly up at me to see if he has been observed. After partially freeing the wrapper, and realizing he that he could go all the way with it, he stops himself—apparently deciding that ultimately it is in his best interest to win my cooperation. I am unsure now who is manipulating whom.

Suddenly his mood changes and he snuggles close to me. I know now that his plan has hatched and that he has likely broken into an angelic smile for my benefit, so I must look down upon him—because this is the part I cannot miss. Unconsciously tapping the Tootsie Pop against the palm of his tiny pink hand, he turns and plants kisses upon my bare arm. I cannot decide if I should die laughing or weeping.

“Pweeaassse?” He implores and I can now see my own son, his father, in his face. I am so full of love for both of them that it causes me a twinge of pain and sudden unexpected waves of lonesomeness wash over me for my own children when they were young. “Pweeaase, Maama?” this new young child, this gift of God, this vessel of pure love, asks again.

I think about making a deal with him, demanding that he eat three more spoonfuls of Cheerios before candy can be allowed. I’m sure that’s what he expects, but if I do that he will soon be off in other parts of the house playing and running again, forgetting that I exist and I will sit alone again with my newspaper. I must think quickly. “Grama will open the sucker for you, but you must[/i] sit right here next to me while you eat it. We cannot have you running around with a sucker stick in your hand. You could fall down and get hurt.” Safety makes sense to him, so he nods in agreement. He cannot hide a look of supreme satisfaction. He actually thinks he has been victorious over me. Of course, he is right.

Though he thinks we are bargaining over a piece of candy, I am bartering for something far greater. He makes me laugh, but not in the way of having heard a joke, rather in a bubbling up of joy. He began unknowingly teaching me something that I could not, at first, name. Something of which, I had not even been aware, I had been longing to learn. The child was leading me to God in a new way, taking me upon a path I could not have traveled when raising my own children. I was too exhausted then, too obsessed with getting it all right. This child was placing me inside God’s heart so that I could taste more closely what it is to love as God loves, for God surely loves like a grandmother. I began seeing the world, seeing him, seeing myself with the eyes of God.

In the past few years I have only scratched the surface of this grandmotherly love of God, this new kind of love. Or rather, this particular face of love that is new to me. So many of us, when young, thought that romantic love was real love, when in fact it is only the mustard seed of true love. And though the love of parent for child and child for parent is closer still to god-like love, grandparent to grandchild is the closest I have come to glimpsing the love that God has for us. It is more pure than what we feel for our parents, our spouses, even our own children because it is unencumbered by expectations; is uncluttered by disappointment and the only burden of responsibility it carries is boundless love.

One year for Christmas, when he was just learning to walk, I gave him a small baby-doll dressed in blue. He was immediately smitten with it and for several years would not sleep without it. When my own sons—five grown men—saw that I had given the boy a doll for Christmas, they gasped in unison. A communal surge of testosterone filled the room as they all objected to the gift. But I told them that when boys learn to hug teddy bears and dolls, they begin learning how to be more affectionate fathers—so I won that small battle—though they continue, even today, to refer to the doll as an “action figure”.

A few years later, when my grandson entered kindergarten, the children were invited to bring a favorite toy or book to class for Show-n-Tell. He was very excited to share his most valued possession with his new friends, but when he pulled from his bookbag the battered and well-loved doll, the entire classroom burst into teasing laughter. He was surprised and confused and tasted humiliation for the first time in his life. Yet, his parents reported, by the end of the day he seemed able to shake it off.

However I, months later, could not shake off the pain of the incident so easily. Even though I knew this was a miniscule bump in his life’s journey, I wanted to throw my body in his path to absorb any hurts before they reached him. I not only regretted giving the gift that led to his embarrassment, but I visualized myself marching into that classroom and committing horrendous acts of violence against other five-year-old children—other children who were also innocent and ignorant. From my vantage point of age and some wisdom and understanding, I saw the imperfection of this planet beginning to move toward him and I saw again the world with the eyes of God. I saw that even in innocence and ignorance—or perhaps especially in innocence and ignorance—we cause other members of the human family pain and I wondered if God finds that unbearable.

I saw, through tears, that after only five years on this planet, my grandson was already learning how to build that protective shell around his psyche and I realized what a profound waste of human energy that is. [/i]I wondered if this, a small example of our human condition, demonstrates how it is that God might weep over—whether we are victims or perpetrators of—acts of unkindness, sarcasm, racism, sexism and homophobia, selfishness and apathy, consumerism and greed, isolation, loneliness. Not because we have broken a rule and landed ourselves in a state of sin, but because we have—with our words and attitudes and beliefs—pierced thorns through others’ skins, left scars on their hearts; we have all drawn blood.
[/i][/b]
Having come into the experience of tasting the grandmotherly love of God, I could not help but to see (and believe me, I tried to look the other way) the glaring difference, the gap really, between the love I feel for my grandchildren and the love I feel for others in the world. I do not know if it is possible, but I began to wonder, to fantasize, what the world might be like if we all loved as though we were grandmothers, which, I have come to believe, is what we are called to. I decided to pay closer attention to this and began wondering what this kind of love, if global, might look like. Then, while at Mass, I heard something in the Gospel of Matthew that I had never before noticed. That’s the beauty of repetition. Things often pop out when you most need to hear them. The small detail that struck me anew is an easy detail to miss because this gospel is so familiar we could snooze through it. Most of us can recite it from memory:

[i]He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the king will say to those on his right, “Come… For I was hungry and you gave me food, thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.” [/i]
[i]Then the righteous will say, “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison and visit you?”[/i]
[i][size= small][/size]And the king will say to them in reply, “Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me.”[/i]

We know these words. We pray the words. We weave the words into our liturgies and sing them in our hymns. Yet, we sometimes miss the most astounding aspect of this story Jesus tells, which is that neither group, those on His right hand nor those on His left—the “saved” nor the “unsaved”—neither group realized that they were serving God—or not serving God as the case might be. The righteous were just as surprised as the sinners to learn that God had been waiting all along—all their lives—in the poor, the imprisoned, the excluded. [/i][/size]

The righteous had no idea that their acts of kindness had anything whatsoever to do with pleasing God. This point bears repeating. The good were not consciously trying to be good and loving, rather their actions were innate and reactionary and, possibly, even pro-actionary. Their actions were not about gaining merit, chalking up points, or storing up heavenly treasures. So if they expected nothing for themselves, what then motivated them? [/size]
I can tell you, for myself, as a person who would never pass up a few brownie points, this whole concept rattled me, left me scratching my head—until I learned of my grandson’s experience in the classroom. Then I understood. Because the immense love and empathy I felt in that situation had nothing whatsoever to do with pleasing God or gaining anything for myself. I saw that the empathy of God’s sheep is born of pure love, love without stipulation or promise of reward, love that is not even about pleasing God—yet is, whether we realize it or not, born of and planted by God.
This grandmotherly love of God is something I can remember and carry with me into the world. Because I’ll tell you, it is not easy for me to remember to see the face of Jesus in every other face on this planet. I forget. But I can easily imagine the faces of my grandchildren. If it were they who were starving, if it were they who had no place to call home, I would act without hesitation, without stopping to consider personal consequences. We are not only capable of such love, and called to such a love, but according to this gospel it is our one and only purpose on this earth. That’s the picture of love that Jesus paints and the picture of Judgment Day seems not to be about fear, but rather, about how we will be each asked in the end, “How well did you love?”[/i]

application: The Grandmotherly Love of God

The Miracle of Amber

Kathryn Begnaud — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:01:15 GMT

The Miracle of Amber[/b]
[b]Published March 2008, St Anthony Messenger Magazine,[/b]
[b]2009 Catholic Press Association Award, 1st Place, Best Essay for Magazine (North America)[/b]

Our parish priest announces, one day before I go under the knife, that The Age of Miracles is in fact not over. It just appears differently. He maintains that God continues to work miracles today, albeit not in the fashion of miracle working that his son brandished. Miracles in 2006, according to Father Bill, often take the form of medical advances, surgery, drugs, etcetera. Glory be.

Over the years, my tummy has been sliced every which way leaving a map of scars inside and out. I am always nervous and apprehensive as I lie in the pre-op waiting bed. And I always pray. My prayer is specific. I want to see God, in this world, in this hospital, among these medically trained staff. I deliberately ask God to show himself in the humans around me. Some see God in nature, beauty, music. But I must see God in another human and when I do (and I always do), my apprehension evaporates and is replaced by peacefulness. In past surgeries, God has inevitably revealed himself in the anesthesiologist. I can see him in their eyes. I fall asleep looking into those eyes and imagine being held in the arms of God.

During this surgery however, I do not see God so quickly or easily. With the gas mask in place, instead of searching for the Holy of Holies, my mind returns to my own fears. This will be the most serious surgery I’ve ever had.
I awake after having a goodly chunk of my colon removed. My hands move immediately to my hips and I feel no hanging plastic bags or tubes. I know now that a colostomy was not deemed necessary and I fall back into oblivion and thankfulness.

During the next several days complications present themselves and result in my having a tube inserted into one nostril, which I must swallow via gags until it reaches my stomach. The tube vacuums my stomach for four days in order to prevent further vomiting and retching. Doctors and nurses pass in and out of my consciousness taking vitals, shooting more drugs into IV’s. Each leg is encased in tight stockings from tiptoe to groin, each limb wrapped with pneumatically pumping bandages that massage my legs to prevent blood clots. Another tube is inserted into my last free nostril to deliver oxygen; while another is inserted into my spine through which painkiller is delivered and still another is buried under the skin of my abdomen and pumps novocaine throughout my incision, which runs about eighteen inches, north and south, and pulls flaps of abdominal flesh together with dozens of shiny metal staples. A morphine pump is clipped to my pillowcase from which I can trigger extra drugs if needed.

The medical staff are technical wizards with their tubes and machines. Pain is kept at bay as they tend to my every conceivable discomfort. Nevertheless, I feel like the sum of many body parts rather than as an individual person. One checks my legs for clots while another takes my temp and pressure while still another dresses my open wound. Each intently works on one or another area of my helpless body. Though I have had nothing to eat or drink, other than occasional ice chips, for five days now, I am no longer hungry. I am beyond physical hunger except for one thing. I desperately want to bathe.

To lie in a bed unbathed for five days is a kind of suffering I hadn’t anticipated, a sort of miracle I hadn’t sought. There are far worse things in this world I scold myself. There are folks in this hospital that will never go home. A hot shower is the least of their problems. And yet my skin begins to crawl, to itch, to die, to shed. My hair, spoiled and accustomed to wonderful aromatic shampoos and rinses cries neglect. It is oily, sticking to my head and bending in foreign directions and actually hurts, but I don’t dare complain lest everyone think I am vain or ungrateful. It isn’t appearance I am concerned about; it is something else I need that I cannot quite name.

Hidden in the throng of specialists and registered nurses, stands a pretty little student nurse named Amber. I spy her in the corner of my room while I am poked and prodded as she waits her turn to minister. She is well worth the wait—my personal guardian angel for the day. She has no other patient in the world other than me. Her first task is to get me standing erect. I lean on her little frame as she jostles tubes and pumps and catheters, hanging the evidence of my bodily secretions and consumptions on poles with wheels. We take a slow stroll to the door of my room, which is unbelievably exhausting.

She asks if there is anything I want. Anything at all. Other than a chocolate milkshake I tell her, I desperately want a hot shower. She disappears to obtain permission and returns smiling. I can shower she says but she’ll have to go in with me. There is a shower designed (down the hallway) in which I can sit and she can assist. I am so thrilled that I am determined to walk as far as the shower without passing out. Anything for a good hot shampoo and scrubbing.

Arriving at the shower, a total wimp unbelievably weakened by a walk of fifty lousy feet, Amber and I dodge the poles and tubes and catheters hanging here and there as she removes my old gown and carefully lowers me onto the shower chair.
Odd to be stark naked in front of strangers isn’t it? Mind you, mine is no longer a beautiful body. It is a body that has birthed five sons. Arms and hips that creak with arthritis, breasts that droop from feeding babies. It is an old body, well-used with plenty of fat folds and scars drooping here and there, a body etched with stretch marks. And yet the little nurse is so respectful, so immensely gentle and kind—and I so desperate to feel hot water spray over my skin—that nakedness is forgotten.

Amber is a student. Green. Still learning. I’m not sure if she’s ever yet done an assisted shower. But she proceeds seemingly with no thoughts for herself. She seems to get inside my skin and know exactly what is needed as though she is[/i] me. Her empathy takes on a spirituality I hadn’t expected. As she begins gently spraying me with a hand held nozzle, wonderful steamy water showers down my back and over my head. She lathers a fluffy wash cloth and strokes my back.

I feel reborn. Tears surprise me and begin flowing down my cheeks and I hope she doesn’t see them as they mix with the shower spray. She soaks my hair and sudses it up, massaging my scalp, pulling her little fingers from my scalp to the end of each strand. She hands me another soft cloth to wash my face and chest. She washes my arms slowly, carefully moving around needles and tubes, thoroughly rinsing each carefully, telling me we don’t want soap film or my skin will itch.

I finally look askew at her and see that her white uniform is absolutely soaking wet. You’re drenched I say. I’m so sorry I say. She smiles, says don’t worry about it, that she doesn’t care. I stare at the floor of the shower and see that her tennis shoes are also squishy wet. I worry about how she’ll get home. It’s the middle of February in Minnesota and well below freezing outdoors. She just whispers shush and keeps washing and rinsing. It is a delicious warm blessing I never want to end.

That’s when I see God.

In the faith tradition from which I come, we celebrate a story of Passover where Jesus washes the feet of his disciples. In this sacred moment, Amber kneels down at my feet, a picture of Jesus flashes before my eyes and I choke back a sob. Her knees on the hardened wet tile floor of the open shower, she begins to wash my feet. Not a quick cursory wash like I myself would do, but slowly and lovingly. She takes each toe, sudsing each with her bare little hand, washing the soles, the corns and calluses, my ankles, my legs. My heart is bursting with gratitude for her sacrifice, for her service. She gives of herself with dignity, both for herself and for me. My tears run freely now, but she acts like she doesn’t see them. She just smiles softly as she rinses and pats my skin dry with a soft towel.

We move aside to a dry area of the room as she lotions by back and robes me with wonderful clean pajamas. I sit on a dry chair and she lotions my feet and legs and places clean socks and slippers on them. She tilts my head back into her tiny hands and gently combs the snarls of my hair and says I look lovely. Lovely! I can’t stop the tears as I laugh and accuse her of lying. A lame ‘Thank you’ is all I can get out of my mouth, so afraid of openly sobbing at this point.

We hobble back to my room and she places me in the recliner. Oh, the heavenly position of sitting upright again. She scurries about my room, squishing around in her wet clothes and shoes, and changes all my bedding.

She gently lays me down back in the bed and covers me with heated blankets. I am exhilarated and yet fully exhausted from the workout of cleansing and walking. I try to stay awake, but rudely zonk out before I see her again. I sleep through the end of her shift and never say good-bye. Then I see she has left a hand-written note on my nightstand that simply reads, “God Bless. Amber.”

God blessed indeed. Right here. In Saint Paul, Minnesota.

SIDEBAR[/i]

My experience with Amber was so vivid and moving, I wrote the story my first day home from the hospital because I never wanted to forget it. And, I was determined to find the young woman. I wanted to send her the story in a thank you card. All I knew was that she was a student nurse.
After calling the hospital and giving the exact date of Amber’s visit, I learned she was a student of The University of St. Catherine (or, as the locals say, St. Kate’s) and that the college was not allowed to release students’ full names. Saddened that I could not reach her personally, I sent the story to the college’s news staff and asked that they pass it on to Amber.
A week later I received a phone call from St. Kate’s. They wanted permission to use the story as a teaching tool in their nursing program. Then, they told me something that I found even more moving than my experience with Amber.
Apparently students evaluate themselves after doing stints at local hospitals. Amber had graded herself poorly after ministering to me. She had felt inept, had thoroughly doused herself, accidentally loosened an IV in my arm and caused bleeding and ultimately considered the experience a failure on her part.
For Amber, and other student nurses, to study such “failed” experiences from the patient’s point of view was a gift. I was thrilled to have been able to offer such a gift and to receive yet another gift from Amber. The reminder that when we minister to others, it is the heart that matters. That God sees the heart and the intent of our actions. That God uses us to touch the lives of others, even when we have not yet perfected our abilities, even in our flawed and still-forming human states.

application: The Miracle of Amber