In the mid-1980’s, I spent a lot of time with Michelle, a seventeen year-old parishioner who suffered from a terminal brain tumor. In the last weeks of her life on Earth, I visited with her every day. It’s difficult to declare God’s love to a dying teenager and her family.
It was a humbling way to learn that I cannot give away what I do not have. I had no answers to explain their suffering, and could not pretend otherwise. For weeks, Michelle and I together drew closer to the precipice between life and death. I could be but a fellow pilgrim on that path, not a guide.
Michelle’s room was decorated by her loving family and scores of high school friends. It was filled with flowers, stuffed bears, and balloons that reflected their love for Michelle, and their broken hearts over what was happening to her. It was difficult to reconcile that room, with its flowers and gifts that screamed life, with the image of a young girl rapidly departing from it.
On the night before Michelle died, I was with her in that room. After Anointing and Viaticum, she held my hand as I grasped for something that would ease her fear, and give her hope. I don’t know what made me think of it, but I told her of the life of St. Therese of Lisieux, The Little Flower.
I told Michelle all that I knew of Therese, which wasn’t much. She entered the Carmelite convent in Lisieux at fifteen, and left this world on September 30, 1891 at just twenty-four years old.
Her Journal of a Soul became one of the most widely read spiritual biographies of all time. I struggled against tears as I spoke of Therese’s “little way,” and asked Michelle to practice it now by surrendering herself to God. By this time, Michelle had lost her ability to speak. She fought against the drugs meant to buffer her pain, seeming to drift in and out of consciousness as she tried hard to listen to the story of St. Therese.
I spoke of St. Therese’s cryptic promise, “After my death, I will let fall a shower of roses.” I told Michelle that I believed the young Therese will meet her on this path, take her hand from mine, and walk with her so she would not be alone. I asked her not to be afraid.
Michelle had not opened her eyes for some time. I wondered if she could even hear me. I told her that some people believe they will receive a rose as a sign that St. Therese has heard their prayer for her intercession. Perhaps I was trying to find hope for myself as much as instill it in Michelle. I looked around her room for a rose among the flowers sent by friends, but there was not one rose to be found there.
When I looked back, I was startled. Michelle was staring at me intently. Too weak to raise her arm, she rested it at her side, her index finger pointing upward at the ceiling as she continued to stare at me. There was an urgency to her stare that seemed to take all the strength she had left. I looked up. Among the several helium balloons tied to her bedposts, one had broken free and drifted to the ceiling. It was one of those silver foil balloons.
Emblazoned upon it was a large, brilliant, vibrant rose.
The balloon had arrived that afternoon, her mother later told me. As soon as Michelle could see that I noticed the rose, she closed her eyes. She never opened them again. The next morning, I was with Michelle as she surrendered her life.
In the days after celebrating the Mass of Christian Burial for Michelle and her family, I was haunted by the memory of the rose balloon. The sheer miracle of it felt so vivid, so alive at the moment it occurred. I had an overwhelming sense of awe, a sense that St. Therese really took Michelle’s hand from mine and walked with her soul the remaining distance. I never spoke of this to anyone until now.
The rose balloon can be easily dismissed now as coincidence, but it didn’t feel that way at first. I could feel what Michelle was feeling as she pointed to it. “Stop looking around my room. It’s right there! Hope is right there!” At that very moment, I felt Michelle’s fear give way to hope.
The days to follow stretched into weeks and months and years. My own trials became many, and heavy. They distorted that moment with Michelle, and hid it in clouds of doubt. In time, my own tribulations drove Michelle’s rose from conscious awareness. I didn’t forget it so much as it just didn’t seem to matter anymore.
HAUGHTY MINDS AND SIMPLE SIGNS
Years later, my life and priesthood imploded under the devastating weight of false witness. I spent the eighteen months before my trial living with the Servants of the Paraclete, a community of priests and brothers in New Mexico. One of my housemates was Brother Bernard. He still writes to me. Well into his 70’s now, his Irish wit has not diminished at all, and age has only intensified his simple, trusting – and sometimes irritating – Irish piety. We who serve the Church with advanced degrees in theology and the sciences at times find the combination of sharp wit and simple piety to be, well, humbling. That’s the irritating part.
Brother Bernard has a sort of comic book-like league of spiritual super heroes who, in the simplicity of his faith, will always come to our aid. Clearly, the Wonder Woman of his team of saintly rescuers is Saint Therese of Lisieux, the “Little Flower” and a Doctor of the Church.
When Brother Bernard writes to me, he doesn’t miss a chance to proclaim that he prays to St. Therese for me. When I lived with him, he loved to take out his collection of St. Therese holy cards and other memorabilia. Now every one of his letters contains one of those cards.
We of haughty mind and proud heart have trouble wrapping our brains around the spiritual arena inhabited by Saint Therese. Her “little way” of transforming every moment into a prayer of union with God is hard to relate to when faced with painful and weighty issues – like an unjust imprisonment.
In one of his letters a few years ago, Brother Bernard reminded me of that cryptic promise: “After my death, I will let fall a shower of roses.” He told me that I should look for a rose as a sign that St. Therese hears his prayer.
I thought of the now distant memory of Michelle and the rose balloon. Whatever it had evoked in my own soul then was gone. I scoffed and mocked Brother Bernard’s letter. I am in prison in the harshness of steel and concrete. Roses do not exist here. In all these years in prison, I have never seen a rose. I put Brother Bernard’s letter aside, and put this pious nonsense out of my mind.
Two days later, well before dawn on the morning on October 1st, I emerged from my cell, cup of instant coffee in hand. The cell block was quiet and empty except for one young man sitting alone at a table. As I approached, he complained to me that he had been up all night with an attack of ADHD. A promising artist, the troubled young man had spent the night drawing a card with his treasured colored pencils.
“I’ll trade you this for a cup of coffee,” he said as he handed me the card. I sat down. I had to! On the morning of the feast of St. Therese, I was holding in my hand a stunning three-dimensional sketch of a magnificent, brilliant rose.
Editor’s Note: Several of you have expressed a desire to join Fr. MacRae in a Spiritual Communion. He celebrates a private Mass in his prison cell on Sunday evenings between 11 pm and midnight. You’re invited to join in a Holy Hour during that time if you’re able.
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{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
Dear Fr. McRae,
I am afraid I am way behind in reading your articles. Too much to do and way too little time seem to be my theme song.
However, this morning I read your article about the Roses. You are the instrument St. Therese used to send me a sign that she has heard my prayers. Thanks for this article. It touched me profoundly.
I always seem to need the consolation of knowing those I am praying to for intercession with Our Lord are indeed hearing and answering me. I don’t always hear an answer but often I get a sign. Today I rec’d that sign in reading your article , albeit way past the date you posted it.
This morning I have been preparing my 2nd grade CCE class. We are studying the 10 commandments and the Great Commandment. I have come up with a little exercise which I hope will help these young students remember this lesson. Somewhere along the way this morning I have prayed and asked for St. Therese to pray for me and for us. So there you have it, my sign that she is listening and praying for me.
I loved your article and intend to read it again and again.
Even though I can’t get to this site as often as I’d like, I have never forgotten you, Fr. McRae in prayer. So you are remembered daily without fail.
Yesterday I happened to hear the life of St. Gerard Majella aired on EWTN. He had been unjustly accused by someone he had helped in the past of sexual improprieties towards her. He suffered in silence for quite a long time, losing his priestly privileges, until this person finally told the truth. He so loved God that he was content to be silent as Our Lord was silent during His passion as He was accused and tortured. He was quite a holy man. His life was never easy. And today he is a great saint known for interceding in the lives of many many people for the health and well being of their children. I want to read about him and ask for his intercession as well.
Maybe someday, Fr. McRae, you will be remembered as a holy man of God like St. Gerard. We are all called to be holy and to be great saints, aren’t we?
God bless you Fr. McRae.
Oh Father.
I come here wanting to read you and be inspired, but also so badly to comfort you…and then you go and show me that you have more faith than you know.
It is indeed a roller coaster this faith. There are monasteries, filled with men solely devoted to piety, who are praying for the world and its cacophony right now. It is quite a sacrifice to deliberately choose to be in absolute silence praying for a world they no longer know.
I do not know, cannot know, how God weighs the sacrifice of those praying for the world from place where there is an inordinate amount of cacophony and impiety within.
The Little Flower was the saint who first made a real impression upon me when I was reading Lives of The Saints as a little girl. She has remained a constant my entire life and her book both inspires me and intimidates me. The distractions of gloom and pessimism and ‘facts’ that deny the power of faith are so intrusive that the notion of being able to hold each moment and make it a prayer of gratitude seems like reaching for the stars…and yet she managed it and someone who never had any notion of affecting anyone is such a profound influence to so many generations later.
I still end this letter wanting to comfort you, both out of such a river of compassion, but also a fount of gratitude. There are so many prisons we live in these days with our choices of thoughts and worries and focus on the world. Hearing of your situation SHOULD be such a path to our freedom through gratitude, yet without applying faith and prayer, without the gratitude, we remain anchored by thoughts that, not offered to God to handle, oppress us…oppress me.
I do not like that you are in such a barren place, almost as barren as being without vision, but what filters out of your soul, the gut honest thoughts so at variance with the careless contemplation of the day, is so intensely a blessing.
In a day where I have chosen thoughts to imprison myself, you write with the candor of a child and the humility of a faithful servant. I know you question yourself and for all my love of writing I am sorrow filled that I cannot beam into your soul the amazing gift that your life has become to myself and others.
God keep you safe and watched over, FAther. Thank you so much.
With love and gratitude and a very strong hug,
Jeannie
Father, I have only just come across your website and learnt of your story thanks to a link from a post on another blog about St Therese.
Her relics are travelling around England at present and will soon be in my area. I had been searching for a special intention to focus on during the visit and my prayer has been answered – you will be prayed for there and from now on …..
May God bless you and grant you strength.
Oh, Father… what a beautiful story- I was in near tears… I have loved St. Therese for most of my life now… and she truly cares about all of us!
Thank you for sharing this with us. Please know that today I prayed for you in front of the Blessed Sacrament…
October 2, 2oo9: The Guardian Angels.
Dear Father,
Just driving to the grocery store I want my guardian angel to come along. May your guardian angel stand strongly beside you 24/7 wherever you are.
Eileen
What a wonderful story, Father! Thank you for reminding me of the loving intercession of St. Therese.
I read this yesterday and have been having a very, very dark week (which is unfortunately ongoing.) But it helped to read of the miraculous, knowing the Saints are present even when we don’t have the eyes to see their intercession. What a blessed moment you had! Thank you so much for sharing it with us, too.
Father,
This post was so moving. You write with such honesty. Ours is an awesome God. There is such tenderness in the way he communicates with us when we are feeling disheartened and impatient.
Jesus was falsely accused and he was despised and mocked. In the end all but a few deserted Him.
I am sure there are moments when you feel like Teresa of Avila “If this is how you treat your friends no wonder you have so few of them!”
Jesus understands our puzzlement and I am sure He does not mind a joke like Teresa’s.
You are in a heart breaking place but like Maximillan Kolbe you are bringing solace and light where you are and if a miracle happens and your accusers recant and admit their false accusations you will not forget the souls you have encountered in this hard place.
God Bless you and the souls you encounter each day.
Yes – very powerful.
Many years ago I read “The Story of a Soul.” It opened me to much grace. And now, when I look at a rose, I can only think of that shower of roses Therese promised us – when she would become a missionary for souls.
God bless…
Father,
Thank you so much for sharing this beautiful post. It’s so easy to get caught up in my own little trials, and despair, but your words have given me so much hope this morning, and perhaps a bit of courage to do better. Your faith in so much darkness is so inspiring.
I wish I could do something more for you, but please know that you – and all persecuted priests, are constantly in my prayers. May St Therese continue to intercede for you, and God bless you mightily.
Father,
This is a beautiful and humbling story. I have a feeling Michelle is joining her efforts with St. Therese; may every comment and prayer be a rose to you.
As always you will be in my prayers.
Powerful!