It might sound crazy, but I’m praising God that our home computer was destroyed.  Well, not that it was destroyed per se, but that in His mercy God allowed us to know the true cause of the total crash.  The techie who rebuilt the machine was able to pinpoint the source of the terrible virus which infiltrated our PC, as well as the precise time at which the system was infected.

Thank God we were not home when the virus attacked.  We had travelled to another city for the baptism of our dear friends’ son.  As a result, no one in our family came under false suspicion.  No one had to be interrogated or questioned or put on the defense.  There was only one person on the suspect list; only one person with access to the computer (though thoroughly lacking our permission to use it).

In our short absence, we had trusted our home and pets to someone we love, someone we thought we could count on; someone who knew the rules of the house and had agreed to follow them.  Instead, he was tempted to transgress, and gave in to the temptation.  He simply lacked the self-control to avoid forbidden fruit.  His sinful choice led to the complete destruction of our PC and subsequent severe damaged to our relationship.

Relatively speaking, the computer’s hard drive (already rebuilt) won’t suffer the kind of long-term damage that viewing sinful images causes the human mind and soul.  The young man who defied our rules and breached our trust needs our prayers for a full recovery from the vice; for freedom from that deadly demon.  We pray that he will be set free from the type of dishonest and sneaky behavior that led to the crash.  Unfortunately, he may not choose healing and might continue to engage in sins that may lead to the death of his soul.   Thus far he has shown no remorse, and offered no apology.  In short, he seems unaffected by the suffering, inconvenience and expense his behavior caused us.

Learning from our mistakes, we have since put a password on the machine, updated our anti-virus software and restricted the guilty party from being left alone in our home ever again.  Our relationship with him has changed, not ended.  As such, we have been given a new spiritual challenge:  learning to be in the presence of someone who willfully and unapologetically betrayed our trust while showing him loving kindness and living virtues.  This has not proven to be an easy task, to say the least.

I gain strength and perseverance in this trial by simply remembering our Lord in His endless mercy, His love for sinners and His willingness to be in their presence and serve them despite their vices and miseries.  I have found comfort in reflecting upon the Last Supper, our Lord dining with Judas, fully knowing and accepting his role as the betrayer yet loving him as one of His own at table.  What tremendous love!  What unspeakable compassion!  I pray that I may be blessed to receive a small dose of such perfect love and that I may in turn shower it upon someone at my table without regard for whether he is deserving of it or grateful for it.

May I always remember first and foremost my own unworthiness and sinfulness, and remain free from vindictive impulses against those who have hurt me.

“Lord, make me a channel of your peace…”

My mother in law always asks us for a Christmas wish list, usually due no later than Thanksgiving weekend.  Her Christmas shopping begins in earnest after she’s received our wishes and determined which gifts will bring the most joy (within a given price range).  Sometimes the wish list is a starting point and she chooses different gifts from a similar thread yet which as officially un-wished-for come as a complete surprise to the recipient.

If you’ve ever gone to great lengths to prepare a wish list or registry for some gift-getting occasion (a birthday, Christmas, wedding, etc.) you may remember silently suffering when the gift opening ended without the appearance of the particularly wished-for item.  This same pain in not receiving a desired object can also plague our spiritual life when we have spent hours, days, or perhaps years in prayer begging God for some particular grace, conversion, gift or healing without it being made manifest.

But God loves to listen to our wish lists!  We must remember that these prayer requests are not ‘get lists’ the same way our wish lists for Christmas don’t guarantee the items will appear under the tree.  In a certain way, our longing or wishing prayers to God become our constant prayer, ever on our lips (burning in our hearts).   St. Augustine wrote “…if you wish to pray without ceasing, do not cease to desire” (Office of Readings, p. 303).  The deepest desires of our heart (known already by our Almighty God) if given a voice in prayer, allow us to truly pray without ceasing as St. Paul encouraged.

The constancy of you desire will itself be the ceaseless voice of your prayer.  And that voice of your prayer will be silent only when your love ceases.  For who are silent?  Those of whom it is said:  Because evil has abounded, the love of many will grow cold. ~St. Augustine (p.303)

Yes, it can be very difficult to keep desiring something when it seems that God is answering with a great big NO.  But according to St. Augustine, a giving up of our desire or the silencing of our prayer would mean that evil has crept in and our hearts are consequently suffering from frostbite.   Brrr!  That doesn’t sound too appealing, does it?

So keep your deepest wish list handy in your prayer life.  Give voice to the longings and desires of your heart.  Trust in God and know that your prayers will always be answered; appreciate the mystery of HOW and WHEN.  Expect the unexpected, and never stop expecting.

As this Christmas Season draws to a close and we begin to pack up our Christmas treasures, let us not abandon our wishes.  For our deepest longings never go away, not like the desires for material things either forgotten once received, or simply upgraded for newer wishes and wants.  No, our real wish list, the greatest desires of our hearts continue to burn within us day and night.  These desires must not be stifled or set aside and abandoned.  Give them a voice.

The Liturgy of the Hours: According to the Roman Rite. New York: Catholic Book Pub. Co, 1975. Print.