Greetings from Wexford! It has been a busy but fruitful couple of weeks in Ireland. Jenny, Kelli, Erick, and I are finally getting into what seems to be some sort of routine (even if that routine is being ready for plans to always change at any moment). We begin the day with mass at 10 and then have tea afterwards with some of the parishioners. After tea we congregate in the office and do whatever work needs to be done that day. Sometimes we pick music for mass and other times lesson plan for our time in the schools. Most days our desks are filled with sheet music for the vigil and folk choirs as we try to sort out which versions of songs we want to play or find where the violin music may have been stored. Each day there is something different at the top of our agenda and something new to learn about this ministry.
Our organized chaos of an office
While our official schedule doesn’t begin until that 10am mass, I have found so much peace in the hour before I have to officially be at the church. Since arriving in August I have wanted to make sure that my year in Wexford is a time to dive deeper into my personal prayer. I was fortunate to have been taught good daily prayer habits while serving with NET Ministries in the United States but, once I arrived to college I found it hard to make sure my daily prayer was consistent. The hour before mass and my day begins has provided me with so much peace and grace to face the day. I am able to walk to the church in the fresh (sometimes rainy) air with my rosary beads in my pocket. Once I arrive at the church I sit and talk and listen to God. It has been incredible to see how the outlook of my day shifts when I begin in prayer and offer my day to Him.
Part of the walk to the church (with the best smelling rose in the world)
Last week I read a reflection from my Magnificat that spoke to the difficulties and joys that come with living and working in community while being so far away from home. I find that no matter where I am or what I am doing, God is the only thing that can fill the emptiness in my heart. I am overwhelmed by how loving He is in the routine and spontaneous of my day.
“O Uncreated Beauty, whoever comes to know you once cannot love anything else. I can feel the bottomless abyss of my soul, and nothing will fill it but God himself. I feel that I am drowned in him like a single grain of sand in a bottomless ocean.”
–Saint Faustina Kowalska
My piano teacher would be proud of how much I have been practicing since I arrived in Wexford
