The “little things” in life provide us with glimpses of the sacred and they have much to teach us about the ways of God. Each day, we are invited to pay close attention to the in-breaking of God’s grace and grow in gratitude. Whereas our larger culture has reduced Easter to a single day, our Catholic culture offers us Fifty Days of rejoicing as a result of the Resurrection.
How can we keep the spirit of Easter alive all season long? Whereas Lent invited us to turn away from unhealthy habits, Easter is providing us with constant encouragement to make a commitment to healthier living, to being better people, and to focusing more fully on how our actions relate to your wellbeing and our personal spiritual growth.
Speaking of growth, as we are celebrating Christ’s rising, He who makes all things new, the world around us is sprouting with new growth, too. Give some thought this spring to starting a Mary Garden at your home. It can be a wonderful way to prolong the celebration of the “Eastertide.” We remember that, at the Crucifixion, Mary became the mother of us all. She was also present at the Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Fiftieth day. A Mary Garden could be in a corner of a garden you already have or a brand new space you carve out. Either way, it is simply a garden planted in honor of Our Lady. It can be small or large, indoors or outdoors, potted or planted in the ground. Use it as an inspiration to pray and thank Mary for her help and intercession.
St. Damien was a Belgian missionary priest who devoted his life to working among the Hawaiian lepers on the Island of Moloka’i. He first reached Honolulu in 1864 and was ordained a priest the same year. Moved by the miserable condition of the lepers who had been deported to Moloka’i, he volunteered to take charge of their settlement.
Known for his compassion, Fr. Damien provided spiritual, physical, and emotional comfort to those suffering from the debilitating and incurable disease (leprosy or Hansen’s Disease). He served as both pastor and physician to the colony and undertook many projects to better the conditions there. He became the people’s most effective advocate to obtain promised government support. Soon the settlement had new houses and a new church, school, and orphanage. Morale improved considerably. A few years later, he succeeded in getting the Franciscan Sisters of Syracuse, led by Mother Marianne Cope, to help staff the colony.
Fr. Damien contracted Hansen’s disease and died of its complications. As requested, he was buried on Moloka’i. When Hawaii became a state in 1959, it selected Fr. Damien as one of its two representatives in the Statuary Hall at the US Capitol.
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The famous author Robert Louis Stevenson wrote a defense of Fr. Damien and his work among the people on Moloka’i: http://robert-louis-stevenson.org/works/father-damien-an-open-letter-to-the-reverend-doctor-hyde-of-honolulu-from-robert-louis-stevenson-1890/
