From Grief to Grace: A Treasured Addition to My Bookshelf

As a mom of six, I’ve been privileged to hear many birth stories. In From Grief to Grace, author Jeannie Ewing recounts one of the most transcendent I’ve ever heard – the story of her daughter Sarah, born with a rare genetic condition called Apert Syndrome, characterized by facial abnormalities and fused fingers. Jeannie’s obstetrician told her, “It felt as if God’s hand, not mine, delivered your baby. … We all noticed how you and your husband responded to Sarah. We agreed that you both were either Christians or in denial.”

Despite the doctor’s consoling words, Jeannie felt plunged into a grief that lasted for months after the delivery of her baby. Her spiritual journey impelled her to write From Grief to Grace: The Journey from Tragedy to Triumph, which she characterizes as “a conglomeration of my life experience mixed with my understanding of human suffering.” In the book, Jeannie reveals insights from psychology and theology as she explores the meaning of grief, its common causes, and its ultimate purpose. She gives specific tips in dealing with grief caused by death, infertility, miscarriage, abortion, divorce, addiction, mental illness, and chronic disease. The book is enhanced by an essay by Jeannie’s husband on the distinctly masculine way that men process grief as well as achingly relatable meditations on the Stations of the Cross, the Sorrowful Mysteries, and the Seven Sorrows of Mary.

“We are all given a choice in the midst of grief: victim or victory,” writes Jeannie. “We are not called to despair, to give up, or to give in to the inescapable losses along our life’s journey,” because the Christian life is “a life of hope and expectancy, of earnest anticipation and resurrection,” she adds.

Sometimes God leaves us in our grief no matter how much we pray that he will take it away. It is then that we realize how joy and sorrow can coexist. “If we permit God to enter into our wounds … we find that sorrow contains inexplicable, inexpressible joy,” she writes. We don’t have to fully eliminate or ignore our grief in order to experience illuminative moments of joy.

God sometimes gives us purpose before he gives us healing. And that purpose is greater intimacy with God and with others. God wants us to do more than study or memorize the tenets of Christianity; he wants us to embody them. “Grief, then, is the impetus that inserts us into a realm of living these spiritual tenets instead of simply learning about them,” Jeannie writes. The raw power of grief draws us inexorably out of the ivory tower into the midst of the frail and impoverished human condition.

Grief empties us and forces us to face the reality that we cannot control everything in our lives. We “remember in our interior grappling that we are weak, and our weakness is a gift that leads us to the arms of our Heavenly Father,” she explains. Recognizing our weakness, our powerlessness, our dependence on God may deal a sharp and painful blow to our ego, but

[t]he difficulty of being Catholic is that our Church isn’t designed to make us feel good about ourselves. … Instead of an egocentric faith, we are blessed to have a theocentric one.

In providing us with incontrovertible proof of our vulnerability, grief opens our hearts to feel compassion towards others. Our brokenness helps us to understand another’s pain. And so, even in the midst of our own grief, we can minister to others who are suffering. Jeannie advises us that this ministry “will not be comfortable, so don’t expect it to be. Instead be at ease with the discomfort, and rest with the struggle the other person is experiencing.” The desert of our grief and emptiness is where we, like Moses and Jesus before us, will find our mission of mercy.

No one is immune to grief, although it manifests in different forms. My greatest grief has stemmed from my husband’s recurring brain tumors rather than from the illness of a child, but in reading From Grief to Grace I felt that Jeannie’s personal experience of grief closely mirrored mine. Her understanding and wisdom were spiritual life rafts when my prayers had deteriorated to unutterable groaning (Rom 8:26). From Grief to Grace contains eloquent, intelligent and deeply moving insights into the eternal question of why we suffer. It is a treasured addition to my bookshelf.

My thanks to the author and publisher for providing a free review copy of this book.

Image courtesy of Lil G Photography. Used with permission.

Turning Challenges into Channels of Grace: Special Needs, Adoption & More (4 Keys Downloadable Worksheet)

This is number nine in a series of downloadable worksheets to use at home, in small groups, or during break-out sessions with our Catholic marriage advice book, The Four Keys to Everlasting Love. TO DOWNLOAD AND PRINT, CLICK HERE.

Chapter 9

Turning Challenges into Channels of Grace:
Big Families, Special-Needs Kids, Adopting, Fostering & Stepparenting

One of God's favorite ways to expand our capacity to love is through our families. No matter how big our hearts are at the start, they can always grow bigger. Many special family circumstances challenge parents to do more than they think they ever possibly could. Challenges like big families, special-needs children, adopting, fostering, and stepparenting can all be transformed into channels of God's all-powerful grace.

As Manny and Karee say in Chapter Nine of The Four Keys, they feel surrounded by everyday heroes called to be extraordinary parents. "Whereas we have six kids, many of our friends have more -- into the double digits. Several of our friends have children with a range of special needs, including autism, Down syndrome, and muscular dystrophy. We have watched other friends struggle with the cross of infertility and then turn that cross into a blessing by adopting or fostering children in need .... Still other people we know have turned stepparenting into an act of selfless love," they say.

Chapter Nine talks about all these special family circumstances, explaining how:

• large families are a sign of God's blessing and the parents' generosity
• every human life, even if weak and suffering, is a splendid gift
• adopting or fostering a child is an expression of spiritual fruitfulness
• stepparenting shows great openness of heart

Conversation Starters

You can use the following conversation starters to get a discussion going between yourselves or in a small group. If it helps, think it over on your own time, take it to prayer, and jot down your answers before talking about them.


1.  What particular challenges do you think large families or blended families face? What families do you know who have managed such challenges successfully?





2.  Do you have friends whose children have special needs? What strikes you about the role the child plays in the family?






3. Do you have friends who have chosen to adopt or foster a child? What have you learned from them about what it means to be a family?





4.  Have you considered adopting or fostering children? What about special-needs children? Do you feel called to have a large family, or a larger one than you have now?

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Winning Essay on Mercy as Lifelong Married Love in Sickness and in Health

With this moving tribute to her grandparents' lifelong married love, tenth-grader Allyson Swartzberg won second place in the Jubilee of Mercy Essay Contest sponsored by the Department of Catholic Studies at Seton Hall University. I'm proud to know Allyson and her parents, Pam and Mark!

When most people hear the word “sick”, they experience many emotions, including sadness, sympathy, and compassion. Sometimes sickness even causes us to be patronizing. Because of my grandparents, those are emotions I no longer feel when I think about visiting the sick. My grandfather, Jim, was an amazing man, perhaps the best man I’ll ever meet. For as long as I can remember, my grandpa had Alzheimers disease. I’ve heard it said time and time again that when someone has Alzheimers, he becomes a different person. In my experience, the opposite is true. When I think of Alzheimers, I will always think of love, mercy, and compassion, and that’s all thanks to my grandma and grandpa.

My grandmother, Diva, cared for her husband at home as long as she could. When that was no longer possible and he moved to a nursing home, my grandma went to be with my grandpa every day. She never once complained that he had forgotten her, nor did she ever decide to stay home and let someone else take care of him simply because it was easier for her. She could just as easily have let the nurses care for him in her stead, but she wouldn’t dream of it. Diva would go and feed my grandpa, even if it took hours. I remember days that my mom would take me to see my grandfather at the nursing home, only to find my grandma leading my grandpa in a slow dance, just as he had once led her. She was never impatient with him, nor was she spending time with him out of pity or to give herself a sense of fulfilling her duties. My grandma went, not out of duty, but because she wanted to be with him. Up until my grandpa’s death, Diva and Jim were the definition of “relationship goals”.

I may have been young when my grandfather passed, but when I think of love, Jim and Diva are the first people that come to mind. Love is selfless, it is entirely self giving, and that is what my grandparents had. From the first time I watched my grandma care for my grandpa, I knew without a doubt what it meant to love someone completely. I learned that love isn’t jealous. It isn’t self serving, nor is it a give and take. True love for others is a complete and total giving of oneself, without worry about what you may or may not receive in return. When you put someone else’s needs before your own, you free yourself from the pain of expectation.

My grandpa spent his life helping others, first as a helicopter pilot in the army and later as a working father of five and loving husband. Not once did my grandpa ask what he would get in return for his support and charity, and because of his selfless love, he was anything but alone at the time when he was most vulnerable. For the years that he was totally dependent on others because of his disease, he didn’t need to rely on paid caregivers to nurse him through the pain; everywhere he turned, there was another family member or friend waiting to help him. He never asked for anyone’s help, but because he had been so loving and selfless to others, he found himself surrounded by compassion, kindness, and tender care.

My grandparents have shown me what mercy really is; love for your neighbor. To show mercy to another is to love another, regardless of whether you’ve known the person for a day or a decade. When you truly love someone, you care not about what you might get, but rather what you might have the chance to give. Jim and Diva showed me what I could only dream was real; they showed me that true love does exist. I know now that true love isn’t just something you see in the movies and that it can exist between more than just a “cute couple”. True love is the ability to know that you may get nothing in return, and still want to give all that you have to another, whether he be a stranger or someone you’ve known all your life. Mercy is love, and if we all show mercy, we can change the world.

Why God Sends Us Imperfect Popes

Pope Francis set tongues wagging again with his latest comments that contraception might be used to prevent birth defects caused by the Zika virus. The secular media seem delighted by the implication that the Catholic Church's traditional opposition to artificial birth control might be eased.

In response to reporters' questions during his flight from Mexico to Rome, Pope Francis compared contraceptive use during the Zika outbreak to contraceptive use by nuns to prevent pregnancy due to rape in war-torn countries. While the Catechism calls contraception "intrinsically evil" (CCC 2370), there are exceptions where the goal is not primarily preventing new life. For example, the use of emergency contraception (like Plan B) to prevent conception after rape is allowed, even in Catholic hospitals, based on the argument that the contraception is primarily a form of self-defense against the rapist (USCCB Ethical & Religious Directives, para. 36). The question is whether married couples using contraception to prevent conceiving a baby with birth defects is similar to victims of rape attempting to prevent conception of their rapist's child.

Honestly, I can't see portraying an act of love between spouses as comparable to rape or a disabled child as an aggressor equal to a rapist. And many Catholics who think similarly have felt betrayed -- again -- by Pope Francis' off-the-cuff comments. In the words of one mom in my Facebook feed:

This is what I think the Pope should have said: that every life is valuable, even the life of a baby with special needs, even if that baby dies or has many medical complications or can never add 2 + 2. There are never any guarantees. Your child can develop a virus AFTER birth. My very perfect baby developed Infantile Spasms, and was as alert and responsive as a newborn baby when he was 8 months old. He was floppy too - like a rag doll - couldn't hold his head. Now he is interested in books and letters and clocks and numbers, and he carries on amazing conversations. His doctors cannot explain how well he is doing. But we loved our son even when he couldn't respond to us. He was still a person, and he still had incredible value and human dignity. We should not be so scared of disabilities because in God's eyes, there ARE no mistakes, and every child is perfect in His eyes.

Jesus' constant compassion toward the sick and crippled is a hallmark of the Gospels, and the Catechism stresses that the disabled "deserve special respect" and "should be helped to lead lives as normal as possible" (CCC 2276). Pope Francis' comments don't seem to reflect the same concern for life. But here's why that shouldn't worry us.

Not the First Imperfect Pope

It's possible that Pope Francis spoke without thinking and without considering the hurtful implications of his statements. If so, he wouldn't be the first Pope to do so. In fact, St. Peter had a well documented habit of putting his foot in his mouth.

When Jesus foretold his own death to the apostles, Peter blurted out: "God forbid it, Lord!" Then Jesus responded: "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me" (Mt 16:21-23). On the mountain at the transfiguration, when Moses and Elijah appeared in glory before Jesus, Peter -- "not knowing what he said" -- jumped in with the suggestion to build little houses for them (Lk 9:28-33).

Most dramatically, at the time of Jesus' crucifixion, Peter denied Jesus three times. Confronted by servant girls and bystanders with the truth that he was a follower of Jesus, Peter "began to curse, and he swore an oath, 'I do not know the man!" (Mt 26:69-74). We don't know what the bystanders wanted from Peter. Maybe they were on a witch-hunt, looking for the next person to crucify, or maybe they were searching for a reason to believe in Jesus. The answer they received made Christians look like cowards and liars. The answer was a betrayal.

So, why did Jesus choose Peter as the rock on which to build his Church (Mt 16:18)? Jesus could have chosen St. Paul, who traveled tirelessly throughout the Middle East, founding churches and carefully penning letter after letter to encourage, reprimand, and guide the fledgling Christian communities. Instead, God chose St. Peter, whose response to the appearance of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was to give an impassioned homily and then baptize all 3,000 people on the spot, no catechumenate or RCIA or teaching or doctrinal formation required (Acts 2:41). Peter welcomed them all and trusted God to sort it out later. (Can't you just imagine Pope Francis doing the same thing?)

Peter was often the first to say things that he later regretted, but he was also often the first to proclaim and act on his faith. When Jesus asked the apostles, "who do you say that I am," Peter was the first to answer: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God" (Mt 16:15-16). He was the first to walk on the water towards Jesus (Mt 14:28-29). And he was the first to run into the empty tomb (Jn 20:6). Peter's passion for God could not be denied, although he was clearly an imperfect man.

So the question is not why has God sent us an imperfect Pope now, but why has God done so from the very earliest days of the Church? The first reason is to keep us humble, as individuals and as a Church. The second reason is to push us towards a more mature faith.

Humility 

Pope Francis admits, "I am a sinner."   This is how a Christian says that he's not perfect, that he makes mistakes. Pope Francis has also reminded us that we are a Church of sinners. None of us is perfect, popes included. Sometimes we complain that it's too hard to imitate Jesus or his mother Mary because they were too perfect. We can't turn around and lose respect or love for Francis because he's not perfect enough.

The call to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect (Mt 5:48) does not amount to a promise of perfection on this earth. "Be ye perfect" means failing -- sometimes spectacularly, struggling to keep trying, until at the end of our lives we throw ourselves on the mercy of God. Because we aren't perfect, we can't be perfect, we absolutely cannot even come close without him.

In explaining her "little way" to holiness, St. Therese of Lisieux described how she needed an elevator to heaven: "I wanted to find an elevator which would raise me to Jesus, for I am too small to climb the rough stairway of perfection. ... The elevator which must raise me to heaven is your arms, O Jesus, and for this I have no need to grow up, but rather I have to remain little."

In other words, holiness is not a result of our best efforts to avoid ever messing up. Holiness comes from someone greater than ourselves. Pope Francis once asked, "how can a Church made up of human beings, of sinners, be holy?” Answering his own question, he continued, “We do not make the Church holy,” he said. “God, the Holy Spirit, does.”

An imperfect pope reminds us that each of us is imperfect, too, yet still welcomed, cherished, loved and called to follow Christ.

A Mature Faith

The clear teaching of Pope St. John Paul II has always consoled me. I was similarly consoled when Cardinal Ratzinger, John Paul II's close friend and adviser, became Pope Benedict XVI (although Benedict made some famous media missteps of his own). In contrast, Pope Francis regularly shakes me up. He unsettles me.  I find myself alternately exhilarated and aggravated. Rarely does he bring me consolation.

But a mature faith doesn't need consolation. Look at Jesus on the Cross, look at him weep tears of blood in the Garden of Gethsemane, imagine Mother Teresa ministering to the poorest of the poor while mired in spiritual darkness unable to sense the love of God. We are called to a mature faith that stands firm regardless of internal and external temptations.

St. Paul explains that "infants in Christ" are fed with milk when they are not ready for solid food (1 Cor. 3:2). Consolations are like milk, given to us to make us strong. "But solid food is for the mature, for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil," as it says in the Letter to the Hebrews (Heb 5:14). If through prayer and study, we are confident that we can distinguish good from evil and right from wrong, why be bothered by what our pope tells a reporter on the plane? Nourished by the solid food of Scripture and the Catechism, our faith can stand firm and our hearts can be undisturbed.


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When Infertility is a Gift: Why NFP?

Liz and Kent Gilges have experienced great joy and great suffering through their six children. Their eldest child, Elie, died at age 10 of an incurable brain tumor, which Kent chronicled in a heartwrenchingly beautiful memoir called A Grace Given.  In this latest installment of Why & How Natural Family Planning Works for Us, Liz and Kent explain how infertility -- which they detected by using NFP  -- can sometimes feel like a great blessing.

1. Why do you use NFP?

We had many reasons to use NFP, and they changed along the way. Although I believe it's what God wants, Kent wasn't Catholic when we got married and he wasn't fond of Natural Family Planning. He called it Natural Family Having.

I always wanted to get married and be a mom. When we got engaged, I started using NFP to track my cycles just as a matter of course, not to avoid or achieve pregnancy. I wanted a big family. But then we reached the point where we had four children under the age of 5 (including a set of twins), and our oldest child Elie was severely mentally and physically handicapped because of her brain tumor. It was a big strain on our marriage. Still, I wanted to have more children.

A priest told me to be grateful for what we had instead of wanting more. So we used NFP to avoid another pregnancy. That worked on my husband's heart to appreciate the kids that we had, and then he wanted more kids. It was a role reversal. We had two more children, and when our littlest was 11 months old, Elie died.

For years after that, we badly wanted another child, because we felt that our family was empty. We were actively trying, but the babies just weren't coming. Seven years after Elie died, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I went through a mastectomy, chemo, medication. I absolutely was not supposed to get pregnant while on the medication. At that point, I figured that God knew we were open to life, so we were definitely the exception to the rule against artificial contraception.

When I asked a priest what we should do, he didn't suggest artificial contraception, which was kind of shocking to me under the circumstances. Instead, he said to learn a new kind of NFP since the old way wasn't working due to how the medication affected my body. The new way of NFP showed that I wasn't having any cycles at all, the hormone levels just weren't rising or falling. I told my doctor, and even though he resisted the idea since I was only 44, he finally ran a blood test on my hormone levels. The levels were consistent with someone who had been in menopause for 5 years already.

I felt God had answered my prayers by giving me the gift of being infertile so I didn't have to worry about my health, the intimate part of our marriage, or about following God's will by remaining open to life. It was a win-win-win situation.

2. Which method of NFP works best for you?

In the beginning of our marriage, we used the symptothermal method because I was very regular. It really fit my lifestyle -- take my basal body temperature once in the morning, and done. But after the cancer, I wasn't cycling at all. My temperature was always low because of the drug, and in the symptothermal method that's an indication that you're fertile, so we couldn't have relations.

So we switched to the Creighton method, which tracks mainly cervical mucus, and the method itself was nearly unbearable for me. It required constant checking, always paying attention, and we had to pay for lessons with a Nurse Practitioner. Not everyone can do that. I thought God was asking too much. But it was the Creighton indicators that revealed my infertility and convinced my doctor to confirm it with a blood test.

3. What are the biggest pros and cons of using NFP, in your experience?

Pros: The biggest pro is that God really knows better. He's the best planner. I had two miscarriages after our eldest daughter Elie was born, but she got so sick so young. She needed me. We also wanted another child very much after Elie died, but we actually needed time to grieve and the cancer was coming.

Using NFP to avoid pregnancy after the twins were born helped Kent to appreciate the good in our kids and to want more. The first babies were my choice but then later he really had a desire for us to have more children.

Cons: The culture tells us we can do whatever, whenever, and it's very countercultural to act with self-control and self-discipline. We're not one of those couples who say NFP's been great for our marriage and we love it! It's been challenging. It takes sacrifices, especially for the man.

But when you're sick with breast cancer and lying in bed for 6 months, you also abstain. At that point in our lives, abstaining wasn't something completely foreign to us. So NFP taught us how to sacrifice early on.

4. What NFP resources does your diocese have?

We live in the Diocese of Rochester, and there's two teachers for the Creighton method and two teaching couples from the Couple-to-Couple League. The new bishop is wonderful, and we hope he will put even more NFP resources in place. [Editor's Note: The diocesan web site also provides links to two short YouTube video testimonials on NFP, as well as downloadable brochures and bulletin inserts.]

5. What NFP resources have been most useful to you?

We love the newsletter from the Couple-to-Couple League. Also, we used a very old book called The Joy in Sexuality and Fertility Control. We used it for more than 20 years.

6. How do you think your marriage would be different if you used artificial contraception instead of NFP?

I can't imagine it would have been better. I don't know if my husband would have been as wonderful as he was accepting all the changes in my body and sacrifices in our intimate life that came with the cancer.  I think it would have made it much more difficult. 

Catholic Resources on Extreme Parenting (Special Needs, Adoption, Fostering, and More!)

My request for Catholic online and print resources on extreme parenting circumstances got an amazing response, so I'd like to share it with you. There's more on adoption than I thought, including an excellent new resource scheduled to be released by Pauline Books in 2015 (huge shout-out to author Jaymie Stuart Wolfe and the sisters at Pauline). But there's much less on fostering and step-parenting than I was hoping to find.

Please, please, please if you have more to add to the list, respond in the comments or by email to santoskaree@gmail.com. It's so important to support parents taking on this holy but often incredibly arduous work.

Adoption

• Adoption: Room for One More?, by Jaymie Stuart Wolfe (forthcoming from Pauline Books in 2015)

• Adoption: Choosing It, Living It, Loving It, by Dr. Ray Guarendi (St. Anthony Messenger, 2009)

• Longing to Love: A Memoir of Desire, Relationships, and Spiritual Transformation, by Tim Muldoon (Loyola Press, 2010)

• While We Wait: Spiritual and Practical Advice for Those Trying to Adopt, by Heidi Schlumpf (ACTA Publications, 2009)

• Little Lucy's Family: A Story About Adoption, by Eleanor Gormally (ACTA Publications, 2008) (for children)

Special Needs

• Faith, Family, and Children with Special Needs: How Catholic Parents and Their Kids with Special Needs Can Develop a Richer Spiritual Life, by David Rizzo (Loyola Press, 2012)

• A Special Mother is Born, by Leticia Velasquez (WestBow Press, 2011)

• Ha Nacido Una Madre Especial, by Leticia Velasquez (Ediciones Rialp, 2013)

• Be Not Afraid: peer-based support to parents experiencing a prenatal diagnosis and carrying to term, www.benotafraid.net

• National Catholic Partnership on Disability, www.ncpd.org (includes resources on sacramental preparation for special-needs children)

• www.specialkids4specialdads.com by David Leis, father and grandfather to special needs kids

Big Families

• Big Hearted: Inspiring Stories from Everyday Families, ed. by Theresa Thomas & Patti Armstrong, eds. (Scepter Publishers, 2013)

• Table for Eight: Raising a large family in a small-family world, by Meagan Francis (Penguin Group, 2007)

Fostering

• Helpful Sites for Families with Struggling Kids at A Mother on the Road Less Traveled, by Heidi Hess Saxton, https://heidihesssaxton.wordpress.com/the-emn-blogroll-other-helpful-sites/ (also includes other extreme parenting resources)

Step-Parenting

• Resources for Catholic Step Parents and Blended Families at CatholicMom.com:  http://catholicmom.com/family/step-parents-and-blended-families/

What Kids Really Think of Their Siblings With Down Syndrome

In honor of Respect Life Month, which starts this Wednesday, I'm highlighting a Newsday article written by Mary Kay and Bruce Barket, friends of mine whose youngest of four children has Down Syndrome. According to the article, studies show that 88% of siblings of children with Down Syndrome think they are better people for having a sibling with Down Syndrome. Or, as the Barket's 8-year-old daughter expressed it, they are thrilled to be siblings with "the cutest baby on the planet."

From the article "How our Maggie Transforms Our Lives" (full text available here):

"Richard Dawkins, renowned atheist and author, recently asserted that is was immoral to bring a baby with Down syndrome into the world and through Twitter told a woman carrying such a baby to 'abort it and try again.' ... His error is not one of philosophy, religion or morality. He is wrong because his basic premise, that people with Down syndrome somehow decrease happiness and increase suffering, is wrong."

"Margaret Rose, the youngest of our four children, has Down syndrome. We love her beyond description and feel blessed to have her in our lives. Her two sisters and brother argue over who gets to hug her first, hold her the longest and play with her the most. ... Maggie, who will be 2 next month, is sweet, playful and affectionate. She possesses a strong, almost stubborn will and has an abundance of energy. ... Her happiness is downright contagious."

"True happiness and joy are not found where Dawkins would have you look. They are discovered when people of any intellectual ability lovingly and selflessly interact. With love, life's problems don't detract from happiness; they become an avenue through which love finds expression and it is in the act of love that Maggie, like all of us, proves her worth."

If you have time today, stop and say the rosary or even just ten Hail Marys for an end to abortion, especially of children with Down Syndrome. And have a blessed Respect Life Month!

If you enjoyed this post, we highly recommend:

• Good Times for a Good Cause
• Abortion Has to Stop, Says My Second-Grader
• When Choices Hurt, Prayer Heals

Good Times for a Good Cause

Pro-choice people sometimes complain to pro-lifers, "Why don't you stop telling people what to do and actually help them?"  Actually, there are a lot of pro-life organizations that extend a helping hand to women in crisis pregnancies.  Good Counsel Homes is one of them.  My husband and I attended their annual From the Heart benefit dinner earlier this year.

Good Counsel Homes runs four homes to shelter homeless single pregnant women and their children.  They also teach the moms life skills, such as nutrition, social skills, parenting, personal budgeting, and computer education.  "There's a lot of classes," one of the former moms, Fellesia, grumbled good-naturedly in her speech during the benefit dinner.  Many of the moms begin GED programs while staying at one of the homes.  The goal is for moms to leave after one year with the ability to live independently.  Good Counsel continues to offer help and advice to moms after they leave in order to ease the transition.  "It's not like the shelters," Fellesia enthused, "it's more like a real home where people actually care about you."

This year's From the Heart dinner honored a local doctor, Dr. Robert Scanlon, an ob/gyn whose practice is completely in line with Church teaching.  That means no contraception, no abortion, and no in vitro fertilization.  When Dr. Scanlon accepted his award, he asked sincerely, "I'm being honored for being a pro-life doctor?  What other kind of doctor could I be?"  Then he quipped, "I'm especially thrilled to be receiving this honor from a saint!" looking at the founder of Good Counsel, Christopher Bell.

When Chris Bell took the microphone, he told the crowd, "As any married man knows about himself, I am no saint.  Just ask my wife and kids."  But it's his kids, as much as his work with Good Counsel, that provide the greatest evidence of Chris' closeness to sanctity.  Chris and his wife Joan have seven children, including six adopted children with special needs.  Some of the Bells' kids also attended the award dinner.  The one who caught my attention was a teenager, who was constantly speeding from room to room, chatting, laughing and dancing.  It wasn't until the third or fourth time she crossed my path that I realized she was missing part of one arm and was walking on a metal leg.  The joy on her face distracted me from her slight limp.

My husband and I attended the dinner this year in part to help out my friend Mary Kay, who was organizing the dinner and who had just given birth to her fourth child, Maggie, a few months earlier.  Mary Kay had planned on bringing Baby Maggie to the dinner, and I offered to help Mary Kay take care of her.  Baby Maggie was a surprise to her parents in more ways than one.  After struggling to conceive children earlier in her marriage, Mary Kay was completely surprised to find herself pregnant so easily at age 42.  And when Maggie was born, her mother and father discovered for the first time that their baby had Down's syndrome.

I had never held a baby with Down's syndrome in my arms before Maggie.  I didn't know what to expect.  But Maggie felt just like any of my children when they were about five months old.  She wiggled and squirmed and latched on to my bare arm in the way that nursing babies do.  And when her mom and I shared a funny story, Maggie laughed and laughed.  "Most of the time I don't think much about how Maggie has Down's syndrome," her father Bruce said.  Holding Maggie, I could understand why.  When you're a parent, your child is just your child, not a statistic or a syndrome, certainly not a mistake or a problem.  Surrounded by all the warm-hearted and wonderful people at the Good Counsel dinner, I was happy to be pro-life.  What other type of parent would I be?

Readers:  What's your favorite charity?  Tell us about it in the comments!

Photo 1:  Floral arrangement from From the Heart dinner dance
Photo 2:  Mary Kay and her daughter Maggie