Have you ever been in a place – a prayer service or just a gathering – where you came away KNOWING that the Presence of God was in that place? Where it was so vibrant you could just about touch it?
Friday evening we celebrated Our Lady of Lourdes and the first Friday of Lent with a healing service. There were about 50 who gathered to pray – this included the 20 or so who received the annointing for the sick. I was not one receiving the sacrament, but as I listened to Nancy speak about healing, I understood that I have experienced deep healing in the last few years.
Had this been 6 years ago, I would have been in there to receive the sacrament of annointing of the sick – or I should have been (whether I would have done it then or not is a different question). Nancy alluded to the fact that one common denominator for those who Jesus healed was that each person who was healed was open to being healed. When I made the doctor’s appointment several years ago ( 7? 8? ) and sat down and said “I think I may be depressed” – that opened the door for healing. Before that, I had been immobile – kind of like the paralytic who sat by the pool at Silaom for 34 years, unable to get into the healing waters because no one could/would assist him. So, perhaps, the healing had to begin before I could even get to the office.
It’s been slow, but after some pharmaceutical assistance and years of counselling there is a wholeness growing inside. An acceptance of who I am. An acceptance that I too am broken as are all humans, but that I am also created perfect – in the image of God/Goddess – creator of us all. A paradox, but a truth to be accepted. On Friday night, the power of healing of mind, spirit and even body came sharply into focus and nearly knocked me over with powerful reality.
A friend remarked that I sounded surprized by the fact it can happen. And I guess I was – I knew it, but Friday night I KNEW it. I’ve heard that if it’s not news, it’s not the Gospel. The Gospel was proclaimed to me in a small Catholic Church on Friday night, 11-Feb-2005.