Between the Ascension and Pentecost

Last year, just before the Feast of the Ascension, we learned that something was not quite right about our pregnancy. We also learned that there were two little ones! It was a horrible combination of joy and terror. We were told to wait another two weeks for another ultrasound that would reveal to us more.

In my discombobulation amid not knowing what was going on in my own body, Deacon G reminded me of the uncertainty of the disciples during the time between Jesus' Ascension and the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the very period of the liturgical year we were observing at the time. What a bizarre time it must have been for the disciples as they awaited... what exactly? Could they really know what the coming of the Holy Spirit would be? All they knew is that Jesus, whom they had devotedly followed for three years, to whom they had committed themselves, whom they believed was the long awaited Messiah, was gone. Again. 

The agony of not knowing about my babies was excruciating for me. I cannot say I was relieved to learn later that they had died, but at least there were concrete expectations at that point that I could grasp. I lived as a walking tomb for another week before my body took care of things biologically.

I won't go into the particular aftermath and the long, perhaps still continuing, journey of my recovery from the miscarriage. Not at this moment.

This moment is for the uncertainty between Ascension and Pentecost. It is the uncertainty that we have been thrown into due to COVID-19 this year that reminded me of my experience last liturgical year. For this uncertainty, while not crushing my soul in the same way as the loss of my children did, is definitely taking its toll on my mind. The irony that I oversee mental health ministry for a diocese while the current state of my mental health balances on a very thin string does not escape me. I am flailing. The planner in me is crying out!

Underneath the terror and mayhem in my mind is a tremendous (albeit constantly attacked) hope. Something amazing is coming. I can't even begin to wrap my head around what it is or what it looks like. But I know in my heart that this is a game changer. I just hope we don't let it pass us by.

We can't see it right now, but things will never be the same. Sure, we are constantly changing and evolving. But this is cataclysmic. 

I am excited to be witness to the saints who will arise during this time. Saints capital S and saints lowercase s. 

This is a make or break moment that I get to be a part of just by being alive. And let's hope to stay alive. Things are reopening, and I don't want to become a statistic of the second wave. (What wave? I feel like the toll in this county has just been going up up up.)

Yes, I am freaking out right now. Yes, I don't know what this means exactly. Yes, it is very very uncertain in these times. And yes, I don't even know when the coming is coming. I pray for conversion like nothing else this world has seen. I hope I get to see it.