Formative Influences

The EWTN series The Journey Home features the stories of non-Catholics who somehow find their way into the Catholic Church.  Sometimes the show includes "reverts" also, those cradle Catholics who left the church at some point and then later returned "home."  From watching this series, I know that the three greatest hurdles for most of the non-Catholics are Mary, the Pope, and the Sacrament of Confession.

Strangely enough, it is the unity of the church under one head, the Pope, that most often convinces those who have most closely questioned and studied what they have believed all their lives.  It is the ministers, the theologians, those who have had conversion experiences and who seek to live their faith more deeply who finally come to the realization that Christ would not have left us without the authority to know the truth of what we believe.  Frankly, I am simply amazed at the number of pastors, youth directors, and ministers who come to a point in their ministry where they need to define Truth, and this after years and years of dedicated prayer and study.  It is their search for Truth that finally leads them to the teaching authority of the Catholic church. And in their search, they most often turn to those who have made the same journey of faith -- seminary colleagues or other pastors who have converted to Catholicism.  They want to know "the story," the "journey" of how others have come to believe what they do.

For those not so deeply immersed in the questions of Truth, for the "ordinary churchgoers" or believers, however, the first question they want to ask is "Why do Catholics worship Mary?"  Alternatively, they might ask, "Why do you pray to the saints?"  I could never understand the question about "worshipping" Mary until I finally read an explanation in one of the conversion stories.  I think it was Dr. David Anders' book, The Catholic Church Saved My Marriage, that explained the difference between the Protestant experience of "worship" and that of the Catholic: the Protestant defines "worship" as singing, praying, and preaching.  The Catholic defines worship as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass-- participating in the total Oblation of Christ on the Cross, His death and resurrection and receiving the Eucharist.  Worship for the Catholic is directed to God the Father in the Person of Christ the Son through the Presence of the Holy Spirit.  Worship is entering into the eternal and ongoing Life and Activity of the Most Holy Trinity through the Sacrifice of the Mass.  There is no "worship" of Mary; she is the one standing at the foot of the cross, offering her most beloved Son in obedience to the will of the Father.  She is the chief "worshipper," and she teaches us as we "worship" with her.

We can sing to Mary, or about her; we can pray to Mary, asking for her help and intercession; we can imitate her submission to God; and we can even preach or listen to sermons about Mary -- none of which constitute "worship" for the Catholic.

When I was a child, my parents had bought a wonderful series of books -- a child's encyclopedia.  One of the books in the set was called People and Great Deeds. I cannot tell you how many times I read that book, a collection of short biographies about famous people.  My three favorite stories -- and formative influences -- were those about Johnny Appleseed, George Washington Carver, and Madame Curie.  Those stories gave me big dreams of great deeds.  I too wanted to help people the way my heroes had done: sowing seeds of trees that would eventually produce apples, or maybe discovering useful scientific secrets that would forever improve people's lives.    Above all, I wanted to be dedicated to something greater than my own life.

In school, I was fortunate enough to read and re-read the lives of the saints.  Our school library had dozens of books about famous saints.  I gobbled up those books as fast as I could read them -- not realizing at the time the influence they were having on my spiritual development.  We are taught to love God with our whole heart, our whole mind, and our whole strength.  But what does that look like?  How do we actually do that?  Just as it takes audio-visual aids to teach us about abstract concepts in chemistry, geometry, and literature, it takes living, breathing people -- saints-- to incarnate for us living examples of what it means to love God and to love our neighbor.  Looking back now, I deeply regret that I did not purchase the lives of the saints for my children along with the Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss books they devoured.

If we are to enter into our faith with conviction and love, we deeply need to see, hear, feel, touch formative influences -- people who have gone before us and who can show us the way "home."  We cannot make it up on our own.  Peter needed the formative influence of Jesus; Clement needed the formative influence of Peter; Ignatious of Antioch and Polycarp of Smyrna both needed the formative influence of St. John the Apostle -- and so the story goes.  Reading and contemplating the lives and the words of Mary and the saints model for us the multiple ways of responding to the Gift of the Father: the Word and the Spirit.

This morning I read these words from an obscure saint that few have ever heard of--St. Emily de Vialor:  If God did not breathe into me the spirit of zeal, my heart would cease to be quickened and then I would not be able to do anything.

Do her words cause me to "worship" Emily?  Far from it, her words cause me to realize how dependent I am upon the Living God, Who constantly breathes His very life and breath into me and into the whole world.  Thanks, Emily, for being one of the formative influences on my spiritual life--for showing me how to love God with my whole heart, my whole mind, and my whole strength!