saint of the week

Holy Spirit

 

Last weekend I enjoyed a wonderful time at Rehoboth Beach in Delaware.  One of my oldest and dearest friends invited me and one of my sisters to join her and her sisters for a "Ladies Weekend."   The weather fluctuated between blissful and blizzard like, but we were able to spend some time in the sun, go biking, walking, shopping, play games, go to mass and have a nice dinner out.  It was very relaxing although at any one time, at least one of us moms were on their cell phone talking to their families at home.& nbsp; I was wishing it was more than two days, but yet I missed my husband and children.  Packing up my minivan, which we named Nellie several years ago after the station wagon we had as a child, we left at noon on Sunday.

Traffic was heavy but moving steadily as we made our way through Delaware listening to "Life is a Highway".  For the first time ever I did not break into a cold sweat driving over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge!  I was even able to loosen my while knuckled grip in order to change hand positions while enduring the teasing of my passengers.  In Maryland, I noticed the engine light.  The van missed once when trying to shift.  Yet we went onward listen ing to John Cougar Mellencamp.

We stopped in Maryland to get a bite to eat and when we began again, everything seemed okay.   Crossing over into Pennsylvania, the light went on again and van slipped again.   We pulled into a gas station and checked the transmission fluid.  All was well.  . . but not really.   By the time I dropped off my friends in Pittsburgh, the van was grinding.

Up the hill to my house, she was barely moving.  I pulled into the driveway engulfed in smoke with a trail of fluid behind me. 

 

It turns out Nellie was critically ill that day.  Her injuries were quite extensive and not worth fixing.  I feel in many ways that I have lost a dear friend.  I remember when we bought Nellie because I had 2 children in car seats and we needed the room.  I remember one January when we drove home from Johnstown in a blinding snow storm and the stomach flu struck both kids at the same time.  Fours hours of puking kids and slippery roads later we arrived safely at home. The many stickers on Nellie were a tribute to our family's many adventures with her.  The odometer was a testamen t to her age.

I read a bumper sticker at a store on the boardwalk that read:  It's not the years in your life; it's the life in your years.   That being said, Nellie the minivan had a great life.

 

This Sunday is Pentecost.  We celebrate this feast as the birthday of our church.  On this day we honor the third person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit.  I assure you that the Holy Spirit is alive and well, moving and working through us all in big and small ways.  The Holy Spirit is inspiring us, protecting us, guiding us, loving us, helping us, pursuing us and sometimes even pushing an old minivan loaded with moms safely back home to the ones they love.

 

You might say that the Holy Spirit is putting life in our years.  

 

Here is a prayer to the Holy Spirit:

Holy Spirit, you who solves all problems, who lights all roads so that I can attain my goal, you who give me the divine gift to forgive and forget all evil against me and that in all instances of my life you are with me, I want to thank you for all things and to confirm once again that I never want to be separated from you, even in spite of all material illusions.  I wish to be with you in eternal glory.  Thank you for your mercy towards me and mine.  Amen.

 

--
"All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well". St. Julian of Norwich


Jamie Dillon