Many years ago I found this picture among the numerous random mementos kept in boxes placed there untouched for who knows how long. It so happened that this particular item was one of those ‘sacred findings’ that connected with other happenings in our life. The unfortunate thing is I have forgotten where, in what box it belonged. Was it among the treasures of my husband’s Italian grandmother? And if so, which one? There was however another possibility. Let me start from the beginning of this one.
During the 1990’s we met a certain priest who served at Our Lady’s Shrine near us. His was a late vocation that began after the death of his wife. He was there for us during a difficult period, always available and kind. There is much more to his story for another day. I will just say that his wife was most likely a saint who suffered greatly throughout her life. He was her caretaker for 31 years and became a priest after her death..
His wife spent a few years at a monastery in Lufkin, Texas. She had a devotion to the Child Jesus and great spiritual gifts. But though she had entered other orders, she was turned away from every one of them after a period of time. Lufkin was the last in the series of rejections and she went to live with one of her sisters in Ohio. That is where she met and married her husband, our priest friend.
Now back to the other possibility of where that picture came from. When my husband was a student at a school of higher learning in Texas, he and his brother went on a silent retreat to that same monastery in Lufkin. I didn’t realize this until after the priest we knew passed on, when I happened upon a box of my husband’s that revealed the location of his earlier retreat. I am not sure the picture of Little Jesus was there among his mementos but I still think it might have been.?
Stayed tuned for other segments of this story that includes two other visual mementos.
DJ Pasternak, Author 