Veronica Stach
I recently turned 27 years old. The birthday was a humble one, but no doubt one of my best. It was the third time my mother was sharing my birth story; she hadn’t stopped since the morning. “… and then at 3 o’ clock the contractions started and that’s when I started to feel the pain. But within 50 minutes you were out, and after much suffering you arrived at about 3:50 pm. This was a Friday so...”
The realization hit me slowly and then I was flooded with disbelief and awe as it dawned on me. “Your pain started at 3 o’ clock Mama!?” “This was on a Friday?” Suddenly the Lords’ face popped into my mind. My dear Lord, hanging on the cross, looking at ME.... and I understood. I had been born during what Jesus revealed to St. Faustina as the Great Hour of Mercy. Our Lord died on a Friday at 3 o’ clock... when my mothers’ pain began. The hour that began with His death, ended with my birth. I was overcome by emotion. It was as though I could see Him smiling down at me in that moment saying, “See? YES, I love you this much. I have chosen the date and time of your birth from the beginning of time so that today I may remind you. I died so that you may have life, my beloved. I have been bathing you in my great mercy and love from the moment you entered this world. You are MINE.” Tears. Joy. Awe.
This was a few weeks ago, but it wasn’t always like this… FAR from it actually. Reflecting on it brought me back to the first time my hardened and broken heart experienced His incomprehensible love; the first time my heart uttered “YES” to his never- ending invitation.
Like many stories you may have heard, I was raised a cradle Catholic, however I never quite understood what being Catholic truly meant. Neither did my parents at the time. I knew it meant I had to follow the rules, go to church on Sundays and often found myself frustrated on the topic. I was a rebellious child, always questioning, never humbly complying. However, all my questions were always met with “It is because it is,” and that was it. Now, although this was not enough, I was far more enthralled by beauty and matters of the heart than motivated to pursue knowledge and truth, and so I put it on the back burner and sought comforts of the world. All that mattered was MY truth, my desires, my dreams and my longings. At that point in time my deepest longing was for a relationship. I was a high school girl thirsting to be seen, known and loved.
It was in the next couple years, between high school and my university career, that I became completely and utterly lost. My identity became who I dated, how I looked and what I could provide. After my first relationship fell apart, I was convinced I was unlovable, replaceable and forgettable; worth disposing of, worth being forgotten. In a desperate effort to avoid such suffering, my immature mind reasoned that the only solution was to harden my heart completely; become cold, numb and to use others before they could use me. It was during this phase of my life that I tried tirelessly to deny the longing in my heart to be loved; that I tried to snuff it out completely. My suffering and deep desire to be seen and known became a burden, a weakness; and so, I resorted to pride as my main form of self- defense. I hoped that in living like this hollow creature I imagined, I eventually would become it and sculpted by disillusionment and darkness itself, I would never again fall prey to the pain of disappointment. I had thought myself a genius then; convinced I could live without love, without anyone at all. Yet oddly enough I needed worldly pleasures, and substance abuse to convince me of this ignorant bliss. I trekked onward in this destructive lifestyle for the first few years of my university career as my grades plummeted and my life began to lose meaning. The dark I hoped to tame ate away at me instead, leaving behind nothing but a shell of a girl, not yet a woman.
Twice I fell into this trap and refused to turn to God. Twice I denied He had the power to change my life. Twice I chose to rely completely and utterly on myself, like a wounded lone wolf refusing help. Both times I ended up in the same place. Lost, broken and hopeless, the questions that I tried for years to both satisfy, and then ignore, screaming at me louder than ever before. WHO AM I?! AM I LOVED?
I truly believe these are the deepest questions within every human heart. Undeniably. Only when I finally faced the truth of these questions did I realize my desperate thirst for their answers. It was this realization that, in December 2014, brought me to a Youth Teams of our Lady (YTOL) New Year’s retreat.
Still hesitant, suspicious, I vowed to give it an honest try. However soon enough, I realized the topic of the retreat that year was Chastity. I scoffed and rolled my eyes thinking, “This was a mistake,” already regretting what would have been much easier- RUNNING. My dismay only increased when it was announced that we would be having a 3- hour adoration. Quite honestly, I remember vividly thinking, “Kill me now.”
And so there I sat, stubbornly glaring at the Eucharist and the people around me with judgement, irritation, my pride swelling. I wanted nothing more than to run and hide, to protect myself from the thoughts and the pain I could feel threatening to break through the dams I had worked so hard to build. I didn’t want to face it, for fear of what would happen if I did. I chose to remain numb for the first hour, desperately attempting to distract myself with anything at all. The second hour dragged into focus and I became restless. Scowling, I turned my gaze to what they called “The Monstrance” and let the dams break. “FINE,” my thoughts screamed, “Let’s go then!” I let it flow, and the brokenness, the anger, the fears poured out of me with the power of rapids. I hadn’t even noticed but my eyes had started sweating… I was done; spent. Everything I had been hiding in the secret caverns of my heart, exposed.
Suddenly, the band began to play the song “Lord I Need You,” and as I stared up at “Jesus”, my heart uttered in the most hopeless of whispers, “Lord…. I need you.” What happened next threw me to my knees. It was as though the weakest of “Yes’s” was all He needed to burst through the door of my heart. I was suddenly overcome by sobs as a sense of incomprehensible love flooded me. I saw my life flash before my eyes. I saw every instance where I slapped the Lords’ hand away and made decisions that hurt me. I saw how He cried for me and suffered by my side, even when I rejected Him. I realized how desperately He had tried to guide me every step of the way, and yet, I refused. All of this I came to realize feeling like a little girl held in the gentle embrace of her loving Father. It was as though I was the prodigal daughter, and I had finally come home. It was in this very moment that my hardened heart was drowned in a love, an IDENTITY, that I couldn’t possibly comprehend, but had always sought.
The answers to the questions my heart yearned to hear were suddenly crystal clear.
Who am I? “You are MINE.” Am I loved? “More than you could ever know.” All my life, I had been seeking my identity, my worth and meaning in all the wrong places. For the first time, 6 years ago, I found out- I AM BELOVED.
THIS was the defining moment in my life where I uttered my first “YES,” the first YES of many. THIS is where I left my world, my “nets” and all I’ve ever known and for the first time RESPONDED when He urged, “Come, follow me.” THIS was the moment the mud was washed from my eyes and finally, I saw TRUTH. I hardly understood it, but I could not deny it. Suddenly this world, and all it had to offer, paled in comparison. I realized that I was never made for a lifetime but for an eternity; that I was not made for lust but authentic love, joy and not just mere happiness. I finally realized the SOURCE of the longing in my heart all these years. THIS is where my story really began.
If you were to tell me then that a few years later I would be leading retreats, sharing my testimony or, perhaps most shockingly, become a Chastity Missionary, I would have given you a big fat “HA!” Yet, there I was… receiving more than I ever bargained for, transforming in ways and experiencing grace like I never knew possible.
It was from this moment on that I realized: without a relationship with Christ, I lacked meaning, I lacked hope and I lacked identity. If I am to become the woman I was created to be, if I am to live a life of love and if I am to become the best version of myself, it can only be with the very one that created me as my source.
They say the longest journey we will ever take is from our head to our heart and this, my friends, is the journey I’ve been on since that moment 6 years ago. Daily He guides and invites me to say “yes” yet again. Daily, if I let Him, He converts, heals and sanctifies my heart leading me one step closer to not only hearing and “knowing” but truly understanding the life He has called me to. Often, my own humanity and brokenness get in the way, but despite this, I trudge on, no longer aimlessly, but as a beloved daughter of God, with one destination: Heaven.