Friday, I got to represent Northwoods Catholic School for the first time. Teachers and administration from all of the 51 Catholic schools in the Galveston-Houston Diocese gathered in the co-cathedral of the Sacred Heart for a Mass before starting the new school year. Angie Hilbun, Liz Cunningham, and I carpooled up with NCS teachers and staff to join this event.
Since we arrived an hour early, I figured I had time to walk around and check out the inside of the cathedral. Following Liz, I walked up the side isle and turned to the right wing.
I stopped dead in my tracks, totally startled. What was he doing here? Did he seriously just follow me from Ohio to Texas?
Ok, let me clarify. He = Jesus.
That rose window of the Sacred Heart was precisely the one I had stumbled across online months earlier. During the two weeks I spent at home in Ohio during the summer, that image had been a source of encouragement and strength in my prayer and surrender to God. It had brought me to His peace by inspiring trust in His immense love and faith in His ways, even when they are beyond human understanding.
And little had I know that that stained glass window belonged to the co-cathedral of the Galveston-Houston Diocese, the diocese to which I was being sent.
God’s often closer than we think.
