RCIA

This fall I've joined the RCIA team at my local parish in Louisville. I will be helping accompany a group of people who are thinking about becoming Catholic. Thursday we had our second meeting, and I loved it! One of the other team members was presenting on the Creed, and every so often we would go off on a tangent to explore another angle on an issue. For instance, when we got to the part "I believe in the Holy Spirit," we had to pause and share how we imagine the Holy Spirit to be. One woman had always heard this Person of the Trinity called the Holy Ghost, so she imagined it to be "like a ghost: white sheet, holes cut out for eyes!" But she knew that couldn't be the whole picture. Another woman talked about having heard the Trinity presented as an apple: one person the skin, another the flesh, and the other the core: all necessary for one apple, but different aspects. I shared my own understanding of the Spirit (Hebrew ruach, Greek pneuma, Latin anima) as wind or the breath of God breathing in us. And so we'd share. And then we'd get back to wherever we were in the Creed.

Some of these inquirers have not had much formation in any tradition; others already have a deep faith. I am floored by how connected they are with God. And yet they want to know Catholicism. They have so much to bring to the Church, and I am so excited to get to journey with them. Their seeking God strengthens mine. In teaching Sacraments during the day, I've been sharing with my high school students about the adult process of coming to the Church; on Thursday evenings, I get to live it with real seekers. Wow. What a gift.