Having said our goodbyes last night we leave at 6:30 am, whispering so as not to disturb our sleeping host family. By 7am we’re in to Manhattan, Kansas ready for morning Mass.
A sobering image of Our Lady of Sorrows dominates the sanctuary at the Seven Dolors Church, preparing us for today’s disturbing Old Testament reading. In it, Japheth makes a vow to offer human sacrifice in exchange for victory over his hated enemies. It turns out the sacrificial victim chosen randomly is his only child – a daughter. Still, he keeps the vow.
Incomprehensible.
Scripture doesn’t shy away from violence, which has always been a part of human history. Such stories remind us to choose love over hate, highlighting the devastating consequences of life without love. The priest ends his short homily with these words, “Hate is like burning your house down to get rid of a rat.”
After coffee and a light breakfast, we drive a couple hours before stopping in Victoria, Kansas to see the Basilica of St. Fidelis. It’s the only basilica in Kansas, an impressive structure constructed mostly of local limestone in a time when there were no power tools to ease the labor. Its granite pillars were delivered from Vermont by railway, and then hauled by men and horses the remaining 3/4 mile to the site of the church. The basilica was built by German Catholic farmers for whom it was essential to make a beautiful place to pray, no matter how hard the labor or how long it took.
Terrain varies between grassy plains, scrubby hills, and grassy plains again, until a few miles East of Denver where the Rocky Mountains outline the horizon before us.
The sight of Mountains immediately awakens in me a sense of awe and wonder at their majestic presence. Though my body is tired from too many hours in the car, my heart is joyful to be here.
We’re staying a couple nights in a retreat hermitage at the Mother Cabrini Shrine not too far from Denver. I’ll say more about this place tomorrow.
And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.
-I Corinthians 13:2
Inundated with Love 