"To console
and to renew
is my call
as a Catholic
Woman Priest
and all is well
with my soul
to console
and to renew.
Truly, it hurts
to love——
as my being
yearns toward horizons
and all is well
with my heart
as a Catholic
Woman Priest.
So why do I dress my soul in church garb
recalling betrayal
and all those
old wounds?
Why do I clothe my body
in the cloth
of a cleric
when my patients
wear pajamas
to the chapel?
Why betray
the mentally ill
with adornments
out of their reach?
Why don’t I
as a Catholic
Woman Priest
wear pajamas
to the chapel
preach in my socks
and consecrate
with unkempt hair?
To console and
to renew
in the likeness
of the suffering?
Abruptly, my queries are hushed.
Out of the silence and shadows of Holy Week
a patient
speaks a truth—-
“So beautiful”
she says of
the white alb
and scarlet chasuble.
“In chapel
our stigma
is taken away—-
if I see you
in the world
you will give me
Communion.”
Truly, it hurts
to love—-
with the patient’s
truth my own
being turns inward
toward myself again
and all is well
with my soul.
I vow to live
communion at
new horizons of truth and suffering
where I am called to console and to renew."
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