Wednesday, May 1st, 2019
I haven’t posted for quite some time. There are two reasons for that.
Reason Number One: I was in Ireland the first part of April, returning home April 17. It was a wonderful trip. The highlight arrived on a day I wandered by St. Paul’s Church on Arron Quay (pronounced key) in Dublin and sought to physically get into the church. When I was there two years ago, I was able to get a copy of my great-great grandfather Patrick’s baptismal record but not able to set foot in the church. This time, I stepped into a social services office, kind-of- attached to the church, and was told I couldn’t get in, when just then, a very-Irish looking chap came out a side door and told me he’d let me in – for five minutes. He opened two locks on a side door with two keys. As I stepped in, the first thing I saw was a baptismal font that was at least a couple century’s old and no doubt the very font in which Old Patrick had the water of baptism poured over his wee head, probably complaining loudly as the cold water hit the warmth of his skin (churches were not heated in those days and the weather would have been cool). It near brings tears to my eyes as I think about the graciousness of God to let me see the roots of my heritage in a very personal way.
Reason Number Two: I picked up a virulent strain of a cold and I’m not sure what else in Ireland and arrived home in the States not quite in the Valley of the Shadow of Death but able to see it from where I stood. I’ve been wandering about that territory for the past two weeks and am just today starting to return to the land of the living. Praise God. One can feel quite alone when dreadfully sick, but I had the sense that Someone was above me, beside me, and within me giving me hope that this too would pass. And now it has.