tried to be perfect for God. It was easy for me to believe in God, creation, and spiritual things because of my special visions. I remember the day when I learned the meaning of “supernatural” and “sanctifying grace,” because, although I never thought to tell anyone, I literally saw grace from God flowing to earth. I saw all creation praising God, too.
I don’t mean I imagined that I saw it, but I saw the light of grace in reality. Visually I saw the light that was intimate between every molecule of nature, and in turn between every being, and all this illuminated creation was connected to the Spirit with strands of silver light. I loved seeing a field of uncut grass with wild flowers in a soft breeze. I could see the mists were really little angels. I saw moving lights. “Scintillae,” I learned to call them as I got older, but I saw these little, tiny, sparkling stars that slipped in and out all the time between people, between trees and bugs, between birds and fishes, and I saw all the little lights running back and forth like atoms.
Some days I would not see many sparks of light at all, and at other times I would see millions of scintillae forming webs and patterns, like nets of light, and at times I saw everything wrapped in this light—like everything was wearing fine Irish lace and catching golden light. I frequently saw these lights in nature, but the only place I was sure to see them every single time was in church, at the altar, moving about the candles and altar cloths, and the tabernacle had a platinum glow.
Light sometimes formed into patterns and mandala-like emblems that bounced off of one another. I didn’t think to speak of these to anyone because I thought everyone saw them. This is how I began to know about “holiness.” God’s grace was visible to me.
There was a story that made me love to drop into the church every time I passed by; a quick visit, genuflection, making the sign of the cross with Holy Water, and seeing the lights on the altar. It was a simple story my Aunt Nita first told to me.
In the story, there is a boy named Timmy. Timmy was a good boy, and everyday crossed the street from his house and passed by the church on the way to school. He’d been taught to stop in, pray a moment, and say hello to Jesus in his house. So each morning, on the way to school, Timmy went into the church, made the sign of the cross with his hand after dipping it in Holy Water, and would say a soft prayer—just a whisper, “Hello Jesus, this is Timmy.” Timmy visited the church sometimes three times a day. He went back and forth from his house, across the street from the school and church, and one day, Timmy got hit by a fast moving truck as he crossed the street. He was in the hospital dying, and he lay in the bed as all the family stood silently around him so sad, and he looked up. There, at the end of his bed, was an apparition of a man dressed in brilliant golden light, and with long hair and a beard. He said, “Hello Timmy, this is Jesus!”
I know it is a Tadpole-stupid thing to hang onto all my life, but I never forgot that kid Timmy’s apparition; I mean, “The sighting of Jesus,” as he went up to Heaven. As a boy, I thought it was a true story, and I thought everyone could see the “divine lights” like I did.
I was sure of one thing. I had a vocation to be a priest. I was sure and certain beyond any shadow of a doubt that I was “called” by Jesus to be a representative of his on earth, and, as a boy and even later as a man, I thought I was here to help the poor and the people who were suffering, alone in fear, or modern slaves. I wanted to bring this light to everyone. I wanted to help the people who had never seen the light to see it. I wanted to share in the ministry to bring “seeing the light” to the suffering people who didn’t see the light.
Sermon after sermon, Bible reading after reading, stories about Jesus all talked of the light. It was everyday reality to me.
I had a harsh surprise when the day came to tell my father that I wanted to go to Mettray to study for the priesthood, with the priest teachers, not the regular high school at Assisi. It was a harsh surprise the way my father was so mean and angry about it. He began fussing at me, and telling my mother to shut up because she didn’t know anything and I was absolutely not going to go to that damn priest factory! He talked angrily about the lying priests and the “damned” church until I cried; finally, he went out to his study, and Mother comforted me.
I got scared for my daddy: he was so angry I thought he was getting sick. I didn’t know it was, partly, an act to test me, to make sure I made this decision and was going to stick with it. I was used to him testing me to make sure I was not being a bad kid, someone who said one thing and did another. But his anger was real, and I began to fear him more. I went to bed many nights that summer not knowing what I’d say or do the next day. During the dark of night, I’d see him standing in the door of my room, watching me like a shadow of a man, a ghost; I was afraid he would come to my bed, tear off the covers, and yell at me. He came to the door every night and stood there, a black figure in the darkness. I never knew why he stood there staring at me for long times during the dark night.
Nothing violent or angry happened again after he cooled off. He came around. He negotiated tuition with the officials at Mettray, in his angry way, he told them that, by golly, they could take his son away from him but they couldn’t make him pay them for it. If I was going to be a priest and work for the church, then damn them, they should pay my tuition for me. He must have hit on a nerve, because I found out through Father Terry secretly that my tuition was one-half the regular tuition. I thought this was a shameful thing and tried to hide any knowledge of this fact from my peers.
When he agreed, to my surprise, he began to have tears form in his eyes. He said, “Son, I will agree to you going to Mettray, but I want you to promise me you will be a good priest, never ever doing any wrong, and always remembering your mother and I love you and it is a great sacrifice for us to give you up like this in your youth.”
God! I cried too. Mother, and then the baby cried. That stopped us all, and Mother had to tend to him. Daddy and I hugged. I think it was the only time he ever hugged me except when we were headed for church in the Mercury.
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