The third gift to be received is the kingdom come life in the spirit I want
to tell you a story about one of the women who came to live with us, Patty.
Sp Patty came into our lives and when her boyfriend found out she was pregnant he
gave her an ultimatum and he said, "Okay you pick: me or the baby. And if you pick
the baby you can move out." Crushed and betrayed she chose the child and she
moved into the convent with us. Although raised a Buddhist, Patty was often in
the chapel before we were, for morning prayer, and she spent time in Holy Hour
and she just looked at Jesus and during this time she let him touch her. Touch
her wounded heart, her bruised memory, her understanding of her identity, her
sexuality, and reveal and speak truth to her about her dignity, his plan for life
and love, her beauty. Her baby son came two months premature which scared us all
and fearful for his health Patty asked that he be baptized a Catholic at the
hospital and given the name Patrick Joseph. He was put into the neonatal
intensive care unit—one of those little incubators—and live he did. Patrick was a
fighter! He was so little she could only hold
him for ten minutes a day because his heart raced so fast when he was in his
mother's arms he lost weight. I know. But it became like a real image of Holy
Communion because Patty would prepare the whole day for her ten minutes with
Patrick, hold him for 10 solid minutes, and then put him back in and pray in
Thanksgiving, basically, for the time she had with him and prepare herself the
next day for her time with Patrick. It was powerful.
Now patty realize that if this is what I want for Patrick and his death, this is
what I want for both of us in our life, so she joined up with the RCIA classes
to enter the church and one of our other guests who moved in, she had grown
up in Russia and had never been exposed to religion, loved Patty so much and was
so struck by her joy that she started going to our RCIA class just to
hang out with Patty. So she's like sisters I'm gonna go with Patty to RCIA. I'm like, "bye!"
that's so much fun. RCIA.
So Patty's student visa was up and she decided rather than try and figure out
what to do with a premature baby as far as daycare is concerned she
decided to return to Thailand where she was from and she told the priest
preparing her for her sacraments about this sudden change
and he said, "Patty you are indeed ready for Baptism and First Holy Communion." And
so I was with her the night before the ceremony and we went shopping we were
still looking for her path to small garment so I just want to paint the
picture for you Manhattan Macy's Thanksgiving Day
weekend 9:00 p.m.
stores closed in an hour. We ran in and sister Rita and Patty ran went one way
and I have a three-month-old in arms and I'm running the other way and it was
like Chariots of Fire
and at this point in my young religious life I hadn't shopped for a while so it
was like very exciting I was like "66 percent off!" So I'm rifling through the dress
rack and I don't I don't know what I look like you know Here I am a sister,
in full habit, dress shopping, at night, with an infant, so the gentleman who
worked there approached cautiously said, "Sister, can I help you with anything?" I said "Yeah you can pray that we find the most
perfect baptismal garment for that young woman over there. Patty? Patty?" No Patty to
be seen. He was like "oh yeah, yeah. is it something like this?" And he pulls it out and it was like [angelic music]
It had pearls all down the collar it was like teacup length. Fit her like it
was made for her—details are important. He went and got shoes that weren't even
on sale and the back that matched perfectly he said "Tell her to pick out
any accessory she wants." And we went back to the cash register let me just tell
you that didn't add up. Totally generous family discount of some
kind. We don't know if he was an angel. We never saw him again
but we never went back to Macy's
No. Anyway, when we got home patty was like, "Sister my heart is going like this."
I feel like tomorrow is my wedding day.