Ten Years

I graduated from college ten years ago.

There was no reunion... USF is so lame. I didn't even realize it until today that there should be one about now...

But I was on the way home from Opera in the Park when I suddenly got inspired to take a spin past my old campus, since it was close by and I could see the spires of the church from the next hill.

I drove around everything, and then decided I wanted to go inside the big church where I'd been so excited to graduate. It's not the most hallowed place, having hosted the likes of Nancy Pelosi and God knows who else of her ilk as speakers, but I did walk its gloried aisle to claim that hard-won diploma under the stunning dome, and that was a dream come true.

Going inside ended up being a special experience. Evening Mass was underway, and they had an amazing little choir with some real songbirds and a great pianist leading. They even sang a Chris Tomlin song, "Your Grace is Enough"....

And look what I found on a wall in a new side altar for St. Ignatius...

Then I went from altar to altar, reading descriptions they'd wisely placed at each station, and after a while I had to take a bunch of pictures. It was neat... everything had been restored since I'd left (though, creepily, they've wiped out several historic altars and are apparently waiting for big money to determine what will go in there).

Wednesday was the feast day of St. Peter Claver, the Jesuit who went to Cartagena, Colombia, to minister to the African slaves who survived the awful voyage. He baptized over 300,000 Africans, fighting the slave owners for their well being... and is known as "Slave to the Slaves", declared by Pope Leo XIII (originator of the battle prayer to St. Michael the Archangel) to be patron saint of all missions to Africa. There was a touching side altar to the mentor of Claver, a noted spiritual director named Brother Alphonsus Rodriguez...showing how he encouraged Claver to take up his call and go to the New World.

That painting encouraged me in my own calling so much. Here I am fretting and emotional about some of the challenges of going to Rwanda, and then I saw that painting of him discerning his call with a wise man... and I thought about how his was a one-way journey. He would never see his home in Spain again. He did not know what sufferings awaited him, and I am sure they are many - and when he was dying, he suffered acute cruelty from the man hired to care for him.

The side altar to Our Lady of Guadalupe also had a beautiful quote... she spoke some of these words to my heart last week, something I haven't experienced before. It is good to recognize that these words are not empty... they are God-inspired through His servant for our encouragement.I felt greatly encouraged when I finally went home, thankful for my adopted heritage as a Catholic and for all the ways that God is showing me He is love and He is in control.