How to Start a Retreat? Yep!
Friday morning August 2, 2024. Make it to Mass 8 AM. Put six Hosts in my Pyx before Mass and set my Pyx on the table next to altar. Listen to the Word! Receive Communion. At the end of Mass, Fr. comes to step in front of Altar and waits for me to come. He gives me the Pyx. Then He Blesses me as he sends me on my Mission to a State Prison.
The Story Unfolds: Preparation for things yet to come: Jump into my Chapel:
Get in my truck which has become my moving Chapel. Begin my usual prayers on the way. Well Lord “What do you have in mind for me today”? Prison is the place I enter, where I have little control. Six Heavy Doors I have no ability to open. Usually don’t know who will show up for my Catholic / Communion service? Been going about – how come I don’t remember when I started? Oh yea my first year was in the application process. End of first year no joy! Yep! My prayer, “Lord I have done everything I know how to do”! I guess “prison ministry” is not for me! Lord, done everything I know how to do, I will stop pursuing this ministry!
About a week Later! My cell phone rings! I answer and to my surprise it’s the Chaplain from the Prison. My answer, without thinking! “yes”! Next thing I know I am being finger printed – silly silly – I was in the military – I already have finger prints – what the hay! Got my mug shot. A locator Card – interesting – a card left at the main entrance gate in case – yikes – the prison goes Lock Down with me in there! So they know to look for me! Next I get a Badge with my picture!
Been going 14 Years now?
After 14 Years I encounter an Orphan: Accident?
Today August 2, 2024. Young man 39 in for drug offense’s, tells me he is an orphan adopted by Catholic Parents. He started coming a couple months ago. I have concluded he is looking to find “what the Hay” is this Catholic Religion his parents introduced him too! Can I say this Catholic thing? Yep! He was Baptized and received the Sacraments.
My description something happened and now he has developed a Thirst!
My Calling: To Speak about being Stretched:
My calling is to speak to inmates about being stretched. Take them to a place that creates a stretch: An uncomfortable place through the suffering prison incarceration creates, if they will begin to search for the “Open Door”. So I am a story teller about the places (HIV / AIDS Prison) I was called and sent to be ever so “uncomfortable” so the really real discomfort would create a door for the “Holy Spirit” to conduct Class! Oh my! Way way outside the structure of Church buildings!
What? What do You want me to do Lord – What?
Can you imagine it was my diaconate Catholic Church leaders who directed my class to embark upon a summer ministry that would make us each “uncomfortable”! Holy Smokes!
Lord Help me lead them to your Open Door!
My constant prison ministry prayer is! Help me Lord do your will so these men can find their way through the open and available door suffering creates so they may find the gift and treasure buried within themselves hidden in the suffering underway awaiting discovery!
A mouthful! Wonder if anyone can understand?
In walk four Hispanic inmates. One does not speak English! My test he is! Can I pause from time to time and ask his brothers to translate my stories for him that he may feel included! Sometimes me talks too much!
This day – Friday August 2, 2024 the good Lord had something in mind for me! After telling one of my “I was stretched stories”! My 39 year old orphan brother speaks up! He tells us, he volunteered for a job / task in the prison some time ago and it just didn’t work out! So he began looking for another volunteer job. Then he tells me / us! ( I am all ears!) He was assigned to work with a 14 year kid with a 30 year sentence! More, “the kid” has been abandoned by his mother and father! He is an angry kid! Yet in his his anger he has managed to find things he can laugh at!
Anyone with me? Yea the morning of the day I go on Retreat! Can anyone hear me?
Imagine if you can!!! An “Orphan” 39 looking for the meaning of his faith / religion has been paired up with a mere kid age 14, whose parents have abandoned him. Yes – God was speaking to me and answering my prayer! A grown man whose weakness is drugs paired with a kid! Both orphans thrown into this prison independently, a place of suffering wondering – is there a chance to find the treasure of self hidden within prison walls! My prayer! Help my faith, trust and risk to share my story help anyone?
Next I turn to the Hispanics and ask them to relate my story to their Spanish brother! I wanna cry! Why? You see this none English speaking man is much much older. When he reads it reminds me of when I was in the sixth grade in a Catholic school and my teacher asked me to read a third grade reader out loud! I was not a fluid reader! I was embarrassed! I still remember quite clearly! Stumbling over words – aware everyone on my class was listening! Yes, I am 81 and I still remember!!!
What the Reader can’t see: I was Set Up:
In 1994 I bought 102 acres of land in the middle of tree growing country in central Georgia. To be named “Whispering Pines”, visited by the Parish priest who woke me up to God was called me in 1979! During his visit he named the place for me! “Land of God’s good fun!” Whispering Pines talking to my soul! The trees growing and stretching skyward in the background of the Chapel at St. Ignatius House. Anyone notice many trees have very sparely spread limbs as if he stretch toward the source of Life is the primary objective! My journey in 1990 among people with HIV/AIDS! Lord what am I doing here! I do not relate much to these people yet I sit her and listen to whisper of souls crying out to heard!
A Treasure Hidden:
My prayer and my stretch story to the orphan inmate who found himself paired with a 14 year boy, 30 year sentence whose parents had abandoned him! Lord have mercy – how did that happen Lord? A treasure unfolding hidden in the story of two men years apart searching to find what can not be seen in the midst of suffering where almost no one looks!
Yep, I somehow made it to the retreat some 73 miles from my home and wife.
A New Story Unfolding:
1st night I encounter a story about a “blob” standing outside the huge glass widow I stair! As my eyes search I discover the journey of my day is unveiled. A stretch where no one travels with me. Next Friday I have a story to tell to orphans ears and to stretch Hispanic ears as they grasp for the words to translate the message to a brother patiently waiting.
Multitudes of humanity confined within Heavy Gates:
Multitudes of tress! Young, older and old tress all stretching in hope to source of life high above in the sky. Few limbs considering normal tress. Yep those tress are in competition and stretching with all their might reaching for the source of light that assures constant life more abundant in the midst of suffering! They are reaching from the floor of a natural cliff far far below where the vegetation is thick and dead leaves and branches cover the ground. A level where the rays of the sun are effectively blocked. Death abounds at the foot of the tress providing future nourishment for the growth of the trees. A dying taking place necessary for the growth of new life high above. A kind of natural area concealed in darkness and only when ones looks for the sky can one find and see the stretching of life seeking the precious source of light that sustains life and essential life sustaining new growth!
A Peek into the Darkness searching for the Light:
Yes, a peek into the prison I visit on a weekly basis! Packed with humanity into precious few spaces! Can anyone make a difference? Although crowded with humanity, precious little space allowed for one to escape the darkness grasping from within to stretch and find the narrow crease one can chase the source of Life! An escape from the darkness that seeks to hold one bound in darkness! Only a creative imagination can find the narrow gap that allows one to find the path that leads one to the source of light – yes – the place where new life and hope hide far above the darkness!
Stations of the Cross:
Weeping occurs when wonderment escapes and embraces the light shinning in the midst of suffering of one who opens ones soul to encounter the spirit that unfolds the leaves surrounding the treasure that awaits in hiding! Can you see?
to be continued ……….
