After 10 years of working on our project at St. Francis Lodge that my wife and I are building for the Nuns in northern Minnesota from the funds we get from the sale of my book, I wasn’t sure how I felt about our now being able to complete our mission by building the lodge for the Nuns by October of this year. I think the past 6 months have been so painful fighting the county we are building our retreat in that I may have been questioning myself as to why I am really doing this and is this really going to make a difference in this world or be worth it. It was almost like I didn’t know if I was happy to finally be at the door step of having the mission complete so we can truly share our home with special people in the future who are the front line workers for God’s Divine plan or again, am I just crazy.
On my way home yesterday back to the Twin Cities, I replayed over and over again my life, to this point on this project, and where I thought the future would bring us. Needless to say, it was like a wrestling match.
On highway 64, about 20 miles south of Ackley, MN, everything changed for me, forever. I was just going to pass a slow moving truck pulling a boat when God helped me realize how blessed I am to be alive and he does have more work for me. I got out in the left lane to pass the truck and boat, and for some reason got back behind the truck and boat when a white station wagon whisked by me in the left lane going at a high speed. I did not see the car. If I had stepped on it and tried to pass the truck and boat, as I was intending to do, we would have all been killed. I don’t know why I got back behind the truck and boat. It was as if someone else took the wheel from me and brought me to safety.
Needless to say, the ride home was quite a soul searching experience and last night I laid awake most of the night thinking of the “what if’s?”. What if I killed an entire family? What if I was killed? I would never have given any of us a chance in that potential accident to be say good bye to those we love, and the thoughts poured out all night.
This morning when I finally got out of bed and walked our dog Howie in the beautiful morning sun, I remembered the first time my father took me to work for a month on an old Monastery in Wisconsin where Franciscan Monks were and how peaceful it seemed. We camped on the hillside in the woods overlooking the Monastery. Other than the head Priest, the Monks never talked to us. The would go about their working in the large garden or small orchard. I would follow my father around while he worked on knocking down an old wall with a large hammer so they could create a new entrance in the old building. At night, we could hear them praying in the chapel and sometimes singing Gregorian Chant. I was only 3 years old in 1957 when we went up there from Kankakee, Ill. that beautiful warm summer. But I have never forgotten it. It was my happiest time with my father. One of the monks came up to me one morning when I was watching him pick tomatoes in the big garden and he made the sign of the cross on my forehead and I think that was the beginning of something special. Today, I feel that peace again and know God has something more for me to do and that St. Francis Lodge is there for his plan.
God Bless You.
Sal
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