Restless, during a morning meditation this Lent, a poignant memory popped into my reflection and changed my prayer. In my younger years as a guidance counselor, I sometimes visited a classroom to deliver a message or speak to a student. One morning, as I quietly opened the door to the woodworking class, I was taken aback by the hush in the room and the alluring scent of sawdust and wood shavings as the students went calmly about their projects.
In the centre of the classroom, clamped to a large table, stood a life-sized, maple cross made in the workshop and destined to have a permanent place in the school’s front entrance. As I surveyed the peaceful scene, a young student wearing his white shirt and dark pants quietly walked to the large cross, put his back to it and measured himself upon it. He paused for a short time and silently walked back to his work. Only I witnessed the moving experience and was awed and overcome with love. As is often the case, so much of what one feels is left unspoken.
Image: Unsplash/Aaron Burden
As my mind returned to my meditation, the long-ago memory provided a deep grace in my day. How blessed were those students to have that old rugged cross in their midst during those Lenten days. I’m sure the young fellow was not the only one who had deep thoughts about Jesus and the meaning of life.
Looking back over my years in education, I was blessed to be among thousands of young people making their way through the academic grades. I am proud of our Catholic education system that imparts scriptural knowledge and moral values in an atmosphere of peace and kindness. Today, I pray for the amazing youth in our schools and for the fresh-faced young people in Russia and Ukraine who neither asked for a war nor ever dreamed they would be called to serve. I hope we are able, like that young student years ago, to measure ourselves against the cross - and have it steady us.
-Sister Jean Moylan, csj