My choice, not God's

I saw these powerful pictures in the weekly Catholic paper and had to share them.  They show a Catholic priest who had been freed by ISIL after being held by them for sometime visiting Rome to pay his respects to the Pope and thank the Vatican for their help in his release.  You can see the true respect between these two people brought together by chaos and suffering. 

As I began my week, an older French woman I know here came to me after mass to tell me her husband had died.  She has great respect for me thanks to our first meeting when she shared the pain of her life journey caused by the Thai Catholic Church as a result of her marrying a Thai Buddhist.  The Church, to which she has remained ever faithful, ostracized her because she married a Buddhist.  I was the first priest to tell her how her Church had wronged her.  For her, this was a powerful experience as it seemed to liberate her. 

So nowshe told me of her husband's death and much more.  Despite whatever the Church has inflicted upon her, she has remained faithful both to her Church and her husband.  She obviously has great love for both.  So, as she spoke lovingly of her husband at the time of his death, she described how life has been a great journey for her, a journey of her choosing, not God's. 

The priest through his choice of vocation and mission ended up as a prisoner of ISIL but was obviously never defeated in his love and hope.  It is the same for this woman.  She fell in love and made her choice in life but whatever heartache came her way, even from the Church, she was never defeated in her love and hope. 

We make ourr choices.  I live in a society that beleives in kharma and having your life mapped out for you because of a previous life.  I will not deny their truth as that would be cultural arrogance on my part.  I will just say that God is with us in our choices, no matter where they lead us.  God bless that lovely woman who shared so passionately and openly with me and gave me a great lesson in life in doing so.