Guest Blogger: Deanna Bosco Sass
Living for Jesus Christ matters. In high school I became part of a small group of about eight students who met every morning at the flagpole for a prayer service. This same group also asked the school board for permission to start a “Bible Club”. And we were also part of a teen Charismatic prayer group in our parish, as well as teaching religious education there. But still, most of my classmates weren’t particularly interested in religion… until much later.
Others remember a person of faith. At our 40th high school reunion, amidst-the blasting music, the hugs, and the squeals of delight upon recognized one another through the disguise of graying hair and wrinkles, IT began to happen. My classmates remembered me as a person of faith. And now some wanted to share their own spiritual journeys. One by one, my classmates shared their sacred tales with me: tales of Cancer, (healing) divorce, (remarriage) death of parents, (becoming grandparents) unemployment, (retirement), loss of homes, rebuilding lives touched by loneliness, infidelity, drug and alcohol abuse. And in the midst of it all, many remarkable classmates found God, and they couldn’t wait to share.
An open door for faith sharing. One story in particular touched me very deeply. One former loud and proud agnostic took me by the hand and said, “I want to tell you what happened to me. Five years ago, I was down to 80 pounds and in the end stages of cancer. Then I was admitted to the hospital because of a bothersome, but threatening, yeast infection in my mouth. In the middle of the night, a nun came in to my room, and wrapped a hand-knitted shawl around my frail shoulders. The person who made it prayed with every stitch, for the person who would receive it. And then she herself prayed with me. Right then and there, I accepted Jesus into my heart. I prayed to Him, as if I had known Him all my life, I cried, and I begged Him to heal me. That next morning I mysteriously ‘turned a corner,’ my labs improved, my appetite came back, and I began to heal. The cancer was gone. That was five years ago. Since then, I go to daily Mass, and I praise Jesus, every day before my feet hit the ground!”
We need each other’s gift of faith. It was a great delight that Jesus could use my witness of forty plus years ago, to prepare me as a ‘receptacle’ of these sacred stories from my classmates. They may not have needed for God at 17, but at 58 they had to a whole new perspective on life. I was so blessed by their stories. I left that reunion, with a heart overflowing with gratitude to the God who never gives up on us. Jesus pursues us with His gratuitous gift of love, until we are ready to receive it.
Deanna Sass is the Director of the Department of Pastoral Care, Diocese of Trenton, a Counselor/Psychotherapist, and a Spiritual Director. To reach her write JourneyWithYou@aol.com