I’ve fallen into a summer routine. There are fairly slow
mornings, early afternoons at the library or the pool, and then the hustle to
drop my girls off at the dance studio. It’s hot and hazy and just the right
tempo of busy. And then, there is this window, nearly every day, when I drive
six minutes from the studio to the Adoration chapel of a parish that is not
mine. I was entrusted with the code, and I let myself in and take a seat in
what is now “my” chair. For fifteen minutes or half an hour or even an
hour—depending on the day—I’m about as close to heaven as I can get. I have
fallen in love with this place and this time. Mostly though, I’ve fallen in
love with Christ exposed. I cannot articulate the perceptible change in my
spirit since acquiring this habit, and I
will claim my right as a Catholic grandmother to just smile and say, “It’s a
mystery.” A mystery for which I am exceedingly grateful.
As the crisis in the Church has unfolded, my pastor has
frequently reminded me that the primary reason we stay—the reason we cannot
even entertain the notion of leaving—is the Eucharist. And for over a year, I
have heard him when he says it. But it has only been recently that I’ve been
drawn to the Eucharist as the means by which we can be healed of pain rendered
when we feel betrayed. We stay for Eucharist, so let’s go to the Eucharist. I
have, and it has made all the difference.
There is another new routine this summer. It’s the one where I
check real estate sites and research all the components of relocation. As my
family ponders a (rather large) move, I’ve done what the manager of a home
does: I’ve dug deep into our potential new home. The most dismaying and
potentially discouraging thing I’ve discovered is there appear to be no
Adoration chapels. Here, there is one in my parish. There is one in the
neighboring parish. And there is one down the road a piece, conveniently
located super close to the dance studio. But there appear to none in our
potential destination.
I’ve long been told that one way to measure the health of a
parish is to see how often confession is offered. My parish offers confession
Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and twice on Saturday. It seems like there is always
a line. In my moving research, I
discovered parishes that offer confession once a week for fifteen minutes. When
I relate my Adoration and confession finding to friends over breakfast in my
parish hall, they tell me, “Go! Change that! Make it better.” I want to cry.
I’m not really an activist. And I don’t yet know where God will
take me. So maybe there will be a time for changing things, but for now, I have
learned a lesson in immense gratitude. In this diocese, the opportunities for
the things that keep us Catholic are abundant and they are healthy. We are here
for the Sacraments. We are here for the liturgy. And here, in the Diocese of Arlington,
we have beautiful churches where those gifts are abundant. We are in a unique
position to access the riches of the Church and make them ours. More than that,
the healing grace that comes with those gifts is what gives us tangible hope
for the future.
If you are reading this column in your diocesan paper (or on your
diocesan newspaper website), Mass, Confession, and Adoration are within your reach today,
tomorrow, and the next day. Go! And when you’re there, pray for the Church and
pray that the grace available to you so readily will also be made a reality in
the places where it is not yet. I promise that the more you go, the more you
will be changed by going.
Foss, whose website is takeupandread.org, writes
from Northern Virginia.