WOMEN WHO SPEND ALL DAY IN CHURCH (First published in 'NZ Catholic' July 26)

            I have it on good authority that a recent Sunday homily somewhere made fleeting reference to ‘women who spend all day in church’. I infer (wouldn’t you?) that these women are a bit of a liability.

I might be one. I’m at Mass, usually prefaced by the Rosary, most days, and at Adoration 2-3 times a week. There’s also my ‘organdizing’ (remember Winnie the Pooh?). As a tyro at the organ and having no instrument at home I practise in the church.

When a shortage of organists meant our Sunday Masses were sometimes compromised by CDs (think agonising pauses and occasional bursts of ridiculously inappropriate music), I started praying for our music ministry. Before long I was looking at the organ and thinking, ‘hmmm’.

I put the case to ‘im indoors for a piano. It could fit in the hall, I said. But ‘im indoors’ office is just through the door so that was never a goer. And when I realised I’d have to practise in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament I was delighted.

Because it’s killing two birds (practice and Eucharistic prayer) with one stone. St Teresa of Avila, whose amazing achievements were funded by profound contemplation, was a very busy and practical woman who spent hours every day in contemplative prayer and ‘in choir’. She knew the Eucharistic power to transform our lives on earth and raise us to sublime heights in heaven.

Every time we receive Holy Communion in awareness and a state of grace, our blood runs more with Christ’s and our soul joins more with his, giving us more grace, more benefit for our whanau, more progress towards peace on earth and if we keep that grace intact, more happiness in eternity.

‘Im indoors (who’s a fan for the national programme so the piano idea was pretty silly) tells me he heard a psychologist advising about teenagers and saying he was impatient, as if that were a fact of life and he (and his teenagers) had to live with it.

‘My ways are exalted above your ways’ (Is 55,9). Sadly, it’s typical of experts in human behaviour not to realise that any chronic behavioural problem can be solved by the Eucharistic Jesus. The changes effected in Christ’s Eucharistic companions today, not just in behaviours but in the nitty-gritty detail of their lives and in the people around them, are amazing.

Maybe Father had had pastoral experience of women with unwashed dishes, unmade beds and unhappy children, but love for the Eucharist isn’t something esoteric. It’s profoundly practical. In fact for Teresa, an important benchmark for spiritual growth is ‘the performance of ordinary duties’.

God makes me laugh, the ways he invents for spending time with him, like simplifying  your lifestyle, prompting people to help you, even finding great clothes on the cheap.

La Santa’s namesake, Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, knew the benefits. ‘The time you spend with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament,’ she said, ‘is the best time that you will spend on earth.’