In beginning my first year of Theology studies, I’ve done much reflecting on these nearly seven years since graduating high school. I am no longer the same man I was then. I left my home in Fargo and lived a while in Warsaw. Then I lived in Nebraska for seminary and would be back on occasion to Fargo and Warsaw during holidays and summers. Now I am in St. Paul, Minn.—the last place my younger self would have chosen to live.
In these transitions, there has been sorrow, joy, frustration, and a sense of feeling lost. None of these places have ever been truly “home” to me since I left Fargo the first time. I belonged in each, and always the most in Fargo with my family, but even Fargo no longer has the same sense of peace and refuge it had when I was growing up. Not because of my family, but because of me. I’ve changed, grown, and found that my home in this world depends not on my family, a religious community, or even my diocese but upon my God.
Hearing this, one might think I would have then found my place of refuge, but God is infinite, and I needed a special niche to call my own in the vastness of his glory. Yet as the snow begins to fall and the world changes from green and gold to silver and blue, I have begun to reflect once again, and I realized that the place I am looking for is a place that I already know.
From my earliest memories, this time of year has been the one I love the most. This time when the crystalline ice and gentle snow transform the world into a palace with a silver floor and a sapphire roof—this time when all the world remembers that this winter palace was given a new royal chamber, that is, a new Holy of Holies. This new Holy of Holies which contains the New Ark of the Covenant and the presence of God made man within her, this is my home. My home is a little cave where I can worship the divine infant who sleeps on the breast of his mother. This is my little niche in all the infinite gifts God has given.
I look back now upon my life and find that this has always been the case. From before my use of reason, I was most drawn to the lady in blue and the baby she held. When I was an altar server, my favorite Mass to serve was the Midnight Mass. That night is the one night when the world seems most like heaven, as the perfect woman cuddles her perfect son. To me the winter has never been bleak but beautiful.
Now as I write this article in the last place I would have chosen to live, I find that I am quite content. I am happy and at peace amidst the tests, the homework, and the rigors of seminary formation because, no matter how long or short my up-coming break will be, I am already home. Now as the yellow light of my lamp illumines a small corner of this room as I type, I think of Bethlehem and the little lamp which illumined the faces of Jesus and Mary—and I am at home with them. No matter what happens in life, no matter where my bishop sends me, I will never need to leave home. No matter the loneliness or fatigue that might come upon me, I will always have this place of refuge.
I was once tempted to think that I would never have a home. I feared that the frequent moving from seminary to seminary and parish to parish would leave me feeling like a vagabond who didn’t belong anywhere. Now I know that my home is in God, not just as an abstract idea but as a profound part of my life. My Jesus and my Mary welcome me every day to warm my soul in the little cave of Bethlehem. My Jesus and my Mary are my home.