Have you ever strayed from going to church for a long time or been a weird spiritual break only to start going back and start thinking that the priest/pastor/whatever you call them in your faith wrote his sermon planning your return? This happens to me literally every time.
I have been on this weird emotional/spiritual journey since I was 15 and entered into my first abusive relationship. He convinced me that Catholicism was wrong in so many ways and made me stop going to church, much against my mother's thoughts on the idea. She of course has always been a fabulous mother who never wanted to push me but more guide me towards anything that would make me happy and safe. For 12 years I have continued this patter of abusive relationships. It's part of the reason that I have such low self-confidence and strength in who I am as a person. I have also similarly been in and out of church, exploring other religions, examining my own spirituality, etc. I tended to stop going to church once I found a new guy who didn't agree with it and would stay out for quite a while. (I have a friend who says that emotional abuse and control is the worst of all offenses because it targets who we are as people, not just pain to our body). It wasn't until my son was born that I decided I wanted to return to Catholicism. It helps that the priest that baptized my son is a true spiritual leader, guiding people to make their own choices, not expecting perfection from anyone, and truly trying to help people understand the teachings of Christ. If I had lived in Dallas, returning to church each week would be no problem. But, sadly, I'm still stuck in St. Louis so I keep going back to my in and out occasional visits to church, not always following through, etc. etc.
So for the past three weeks I have been returning. I had yet still to find a priest I like, but I'm really trying to change who I am, look at the world and myself differently, and that's hard to do when your virtually alone in a city with a young child. So God I told myself I was putting it in God's hands and if I could get some guidance in my one hour a week of church, then that is all I want or need from Him. Today, I went to church, kid free because his dad ACTUALLY took him like he said he would (amazing I know). The priest was one I hadn't heard speak before even though he is the head priest of the church. I connected instantly to his words and was taken in. I literally had that feeling like he was speaking to me. I felt guided and blessed and had a deeper understanding of how to move forward with my life. All of this and part of his homily had to address the second reading about women being subordinate to the husbands. Anyone who knows my overly feminist ideals on life know that I was probably slightly irritated when that homily started.
He spoke about how when we are young, we have a desire to leave our homes, venture out into the world and see new things that we swear our parents were always keeping from us. Everyone knows when they are a teenager fresh out of high school that our parents were DEFINITELY keeping all the "cool" things about the world from us for 18 years. This was most certainly me. I never had a desire to go back to Dallas or live in Texas for the rest of my life. Then he proceeded to say that as we get older our desires change and we want to go back home. The difficult part with this is knowing that if and when we do go back, we are not going back the same person, we're not planning to return to being the person that left, and don't need to stay at a stand still because we returned. In sense, we need to continue to move forward while still embracing the past.
This spoke to me on so many levels. In the past 8 months, I have begun this journey of moving forward and going back. I have regularly seen a counselor for all of the relationship issues that I have while continually going back and forth on a relationship that I knew was not right for me. I have had to become a mother while still trying to hold on to the youth that I have. I have made decisions to move back, decisions to stay in St. Louis, decisions that are changing every day. But ultimately, God puts us on a journey to find what is already inside of us. A journey to find that true person that we already are, but refuse to acknowledge.
I don't know a lot about myself at this point as I think I kind of got stuck at 15 years old trying to be who that person wanted me to be, and then next and the next. But, I now am starting to see clearer with each day that passes. My son was a beautiful gift from God and even though he drives me CRAZY at times, he was given to me (through two forms of birth control) to bless my life by helping to guide him to be a positive person. My family (biological and not) have shown me that they support me through every step no matter how much distance is placed between us. And God is leading me to see that the best way for me to truly move forward with my life, to truly learn who I am and what I am capable of, I need to go back to who I was. I need to go back to the place I was always so eager to leave. Not just the physical, but the emotional place, the spiritual place, the physical place, and the supportive place. I have embraced that it will not be an easy journey, but of course it I was easy, I wouldn't appreciate it for what I have learned along the way.
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