The Day I Walked On Water

"Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water." He said, "Come." 

Peter got out of the boat and began to walk on the water toward Jesus. 

But when he saw how strong the wind was he became frightened;

and, beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" 

It is a little-known fact but in my youth, I walked on water! In the southwest side of Chicago where I grew up, there was a park called McKinley Park.  Besides a wonderful network of bike paths, it had a lagoon with three small islands on it and I visited each of those islands on foot one frigid January morning.  Oh, come on, you didn't think I walked on water, did you?  It was water I walked on, it was frozen. At one end of the lagoon, there was a pipe that served as the source of the water and my buddy and walked over the ice to this spot. Around this pipe was approximately six feet of open water that for whatever reason was not frozen.  My buddy pointed at something and suddenly I found myself under the ice, my friend had pushed me into the water. God was with me that day because He kept me calm.  I didn't thrash about and navigate away from the hole. I was out of air and pushed myself off the bottom and my friend grabbed me and plopped me on the ice like a marooned seal. I can't say I prayed when I was six feet under water with an ice ceiling above.  Luckily I was in and out of the water in only a fraction of a minute so there wasn't time to imitate Peter and call on the Lord to save me, but He did anyway.  Had I navigated away from the hole in the surface by thrashing around, I would have drowned that cold winter morning and God did not allow that to happen.

You really have to love Peter. He was the first pope, that goes without saying, but if you look at how he behaves, he seems to represent us as if he is the quintessential human.  He was called by Christ and with great bravery, he climbed out of the boat.  He defied the laws of nature and the water supported his weight as he walked towards Jesus.  Then, he looked about and saw how strong the wind was, how the waves were tipped with white caps.  He was in danger!  He started to sink. He cried out to Jesus and Jesus for His part grabbed him and together they entered the boat and the storm ended. 

So it is with us.  We begin a project that we believe God has called us to do.  The first steps are taken and we are pleased with the results.  Then, suddenly, we realize that we do not have enough experience in this.  We panic and say to ourselves that, "I am going to fail."  It is then we choose one of two actions.  We will either allow our human nature with all of its limitations to hold sway and we give up or we call upon Jesus and He tells us, "Be not afraid."

Faith can carry us farther than our human nature could ever hope to. Believing that the Lord will bless our work because He called it us to it will keep us moving in the right direction. We just need to keep repeating the instructions Jesus gave to the men on the boat, "Be not afraid."

Purgatory is a place of Hope. Those that are there will eventually go to heaven.  We can speed that journey by praying for the poor souls, by offering up our sacrifices, by offering up the masses we go to and the communions we receive.  Remember the Poor Souls and they will remember you.  Pray for the poor souls today!