Take Courage

     Last week, I had the chance to participate in a "Busy Student's Retreat" at the UH Catholic Newman Center. The logistics of this particular retreat were unlike anything I had ever experienced. For 4 days, all participants were asked to commit to 30 minutes of solo scriptural prayer, 30 minutes with a spiritual director, and 30 minutes of community prayer (daily mass/evening prayer). Although I was excited for the retreat, I'll admit that I went in with plenty of hesitation. How fitting that the Busy Student's Retreat took place during my busiest week at college thus far. St. Francis de Sales once said, "Every one of us needs half an hour of prayer each day, except when we are busy - then we need an hour." Well, I was super busy. So naturally, I was assigned to an hour and a half.
   
     During our first meeting, my spiritual director - a lovely woman, Sr. Anita - asked me to share with her my goals for the retreat. She asked, "What do you need to get out of this? What do you want?" It was a loaded question. I answered her simply saying, "Clarity. I need help figuring out what God wants. I want to more clearly see His will above my own plans." Each day, Sr. Anita would give me a passage of scripture to reflect on and share the next day. I dove headfirst into each one. I went word by word trying to somehow interpret the passage in a way where it applied to my search for clarity. Well, it didn't work. Each night, I would find some meaning in the passage, but it was never what I was expecting to hear.
   
     Let me give you an example. On the evening of Tuesday, October 29th, Sr. Anita asked me to read Mark 10:46-52. This is the story of The Blind Bartimaeus. Here's a little summary of the story, in "Ivonne language"...

Jesus and His disciples were walking along the road when they see this guy who's crying out 

"Jesus, have mercy on me!" Jesus notices what's up and tells his disciples, 

"Get him over here." So, the disciples go to the blind guy and say 

"Take courage! He's calling you!" The guy gets all excited and goes to Jesus. 

Jesus asks him, "What do you want me to do for you?" Blind guy says, "I want to see." 

Jesus says, "Alright cool. You can go. You have faith, so you're all good!" 

Then, immediately, the blind guy regained his sight.

     Alright, so I'm reading this thinking, "Well, I'm not blind. So, this obviously has nothing to do with me." But, I couldn't say that to Sr. Anita during my meeting the next afternoon. So, I forced myself to reread it again... and again... and again. I put it down and pretty much gave up. Eventually, I made myself pick it up once more, hoping to come up with something at least remotely useful to share with Sr. Anita. However, this time, it all made sense.

     I was (and at times, still am) the blind Bartimaeus. From the moment I walked into the retreat, all I was praying for was clarity, "I want to see." For the longest time, I had been frustrated that I wasn't getting immediate results. Ahh, but here's the kicker. I never actually did anything other than pray and wait to get answers. Nowhere along the way did I ever exhibit any amount of courage. There's a reason it's the first thing mentioned, folks.

     Most of us young Catholics right now have a huge problem in this department. We stress and worry about whether every single little decision we make is in line with God's plan. We pray unceasingly for the clarity to discern that. But, we don't ever do anything. The question I've begun to ask myself is, "What does taking courage look like for me?" I strongly suggest you ask yourselves the same question. But furthermore, actually answer it. Pinpoint the areas in your life where you need to demonstrate more courage. A friend once told me, "When you pray for courage, God won't give you the sudden sensation of being invincible. Rather, He will give you opportunities to demonstrate courage." I'm willing to bet all of us are given opportunities to demonstrate courage on a daily basis. Let's tackle them together.