Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

On the return home from a very long international flight I found myself standing at O’Hare baggage claim with the rest of the passengers waiting for my bag to slip down the chute onto the carousel. I became alert once the mechanism activated and the first of the bags started their descent onto the carousel. Everyone crowding around the edge, eyes all focused on each piece of luggage. Would mine be there? Did it make the tight connection?  Hundreds of bags slowly presented themselves, slipped down the chute and onto the carousel. All bags as different as the passengers. Different sizes, shapes, softness, colors. Each containing the belongings of those tired travelers. No sign of mine.   Slowly bags are claimed and removed. Less people now and I’m trying not to worry. I’m looking for a large, soft sided, dark blue case with some red yarn tied to the handle. Lots of dark blue cases but  not mine. I found myself mesmerized by the slowly circling bags and reflecting ...

Can it really be that the Advent Season has already come upon us while we have been waiting and watching – waiting for this horrible virus to die out, watching in horror as the numbers of people infected soar.  As we continue to wait and to watch.  I reflected upon the words “wait,” “watch,” and “alert.”  It seems to me that we human beings spend a good amount of time waiting.  As a child, I waited for my birthday, for Christmas, for my turn, for “hurts” to heal.  As the first born in a large family, I remember watching my mother wait for the arrival of the next child to be welcomed into the family.  We then were alert to that child’s first tooth, first steps, first day of school.  We hear in the Advent readings from the prophet Isaiah the Israelites waited for release from captivity in Babylon for 50 years.   That was a lifetime for most.   About 20 years ago, the Sisters in our congregation committed ...