A Journey Through My Bible {A Window Into My Soul}

The other night, I went to retrieve a picture of myself for a little project. It's one of the few baby pictures I have in my possession, (the rest being maintained in a fabulous 80s-style photo album at my parents' house), and I knew exactly where that picture was: tucked between Ezra and Nehemiah in my NAB Bible.

"Kinda strange place to keep a baby picture," one might think. But my Bible is chock full of such things. As I rifled through the pages to find my photo, I found myself pausing continually at each natural break in the binding to look at another card or note or photo, taking in memory after meaningful memory, tucked away in its own special place.

It must have been sometime in high school that I started using my Bible as a spiritual scrapbook of sorts; no doubt influenced by my own mother's practice, as I can picture even now hazy memories of paging through her worn Bible, running my fingers over the groove of the underlines and markings, bookmarked intermittently by her own paper memories slipping out from between the pages.

And as I rifled through my own pages the other night, I took the time that for so long I've neglected to take, revisiting each and every page marker, savoring some of my earliest, happiest, and silliest memories, combined with some of my most profound spiritual experiences; and while certainly not all-encompassing, together they create a meandering path through my most spiritually formative years, straight to the center of my soul.

So I invite you to travel with me for a bit as I record and re-ingrain these moments and memories in my mind and on my heart.

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Before I launch into its contents, I'll give you the background of my rather unremarkable-looking book. The military crest on the front is because I went to a church on an Army post that was part of the military archdiocese. I received it at some point while going through Confirmation class, and although I have many other Bibles that are more attractive or more practically-sized, this is the one that made the cut for constant use. I'm pretty sure it came down to the easy-use tabs we were given to put on the pages at the start of each book. Being rather lazy and not wanting to sing the books of the bible song in my head every time I went to look up a random scripture, the tabs became my happy crutch to find what I was looking for, and thus helped me begin my journey. Since we've stepped off together some fifteen years ago, these are the tidbits its pages have collected and protected for me (though not at all in chronological order!):

Front Cover: Sketch of Laughing Jesus. This portrayal of Christ was a long-running favorite of mine. Also a birthday card from my uncle with a crazy cat on the front; printed inside the words, "Feeling frazzled? I'm here for you!" along with a heartfelt message. It makes me smile every time I see it, and serves as a reminder to keep him in prayer.

Genesis 3: Quick-reference page with apologetics topics and all their supporting verses.

Exodus 4: A list of prayer requests/individuals needing prayer from sophomore year of college.

Leviticus 5: An affirmation card from a college retreat, on which nameless individuals shared kind, encouraging, beautiful words about me. They still bring happy tears to my eyes.

Leviticus 24: A simple prayer card with my favorite scripture-based prayer on the back; the Magnificat, in which Mary, the mother of Jesus, praises God for His goodness.

Numbers 16: A sweet note in French from 'mon ange gardien.' The note all started with an internship. As a French major in college, I had the tough "assignment" of spending half a summer immersed in the French language and culture. Most of my classmates were assigned to a program in which they took summer classes at a French university with the option of doing some travel. But I knew one of the instructors in the French department from church, and somehow (I don't even remember how it all came about), I landed a gig as a counselor for a middle-school girls' camp in the French Alps. This involved me traveling to Paris for a few weeks prior to the camp and following the camp to help plan and live with the consecrated women (similar to nuns) who ran the whole show.

The end of May found me alone, lugging my monstrous suitcase stuffed with a few months' worth of belongings, navigating the TGV line (high-speed train) from Charles-de-Gualle airport to the metro, where I had to catch a few more lines and ask directions in my halting French numerous times in order to make it to the nuns' town home on the outskirts of Paris. This was before the widespread use of cellphones, and forget any traveling with an international plan! The evening I arrived was also the very day that France was playing Spain in the World Cup and Zidane's fated headbutt ruined it all, inciting some rather riotous behavior. It's a miracle in itself that I made it to my destination alive. 

Once there, I immersed myself not only in the French language and the French culture, but also the unique yet traditional French approach to religious life. I woke early each day to join the women in morning prayer, eat breakfast in silence, and learn the value of each person's daily tasks. They also taught me the necessity for rest and community interaction alongside our daily work, and the importance of indulging in the sweetness of life (to include a mandatory sieste in the courtyard each afternoon with French-pressed espresso and platters of bons-bons). We walked in the morning to the market for fresh fruit and vegetables, at noon to daily mass at different parishes, and in the afternoons to the boulangerie and patisserie to pick up baguette and meat for each evening's meal. In addition to cutting, printing, and organizing crafts for the camp, I was put in charge of the cooking and the errands during those preparatory weeks in Paris, until it was time to board the bus for our 10-hour drive to the French Alps where I would be the counselor in charge of daily sports.

It was in this Parisian setting that I had a profound breakthrough regarding prayer. Each morning I would suffer on my aching knees for a half an hour straight, watching the clock, nodding in and out of sleep, and wondering how these yahoos who knelt here every day of their lives could possibly shift so little in discomfort and appear so serene. Within a week I had my answer. Gradually I stayed awake more, shifted less, spent more time lost in reflection and less time focused on others, until one morning, I was met with the shocking fact that morning prayer was over, and I wanted more time. Half an hour was no longer enough.

It taught me that prayer is not an art or a talent reserved for the great saints. Even a bumbling distractible slacker like myself can embrace it wholeheartedly. All it requires is patience, perseverance, and above all, presence. The more you show up, the more you get in return. By the end of the month I could have stayed an hour. I talked so much less and listened so much more. I started getting answers. Loud and clear. It just took the commitment of showing up and trying a little more each day, and I got a little more out of it each day. It's a lesson I could stand to learn again. And again and again.

But back to that initial note: more to come on its actual content when we hit the Psalms!

Deuteronomy 1: A St. Paul prayer card from an incredible trip, or pilgrimage, rather. During my freshman year of college, my mother was planning on attending a ten-day biblical and historical-based trip to Malta and Rome. It followed St. Paul's "footsteps" from his shipwreck in Malta and subsequent journey being taken as a prisoner to Rome. At the last minute, a spot opened up on the fully-booked trip, and it just happened to coincide exactly with my spring break. So with one of the most incredibly-rushed passport orders in the history of the world, I was off to Malta and Rome with my most influential spiritual mentor, my mother, sharing an unbelievably fascinating and and intellectual 10-day journey through the hallowed grounds of history, lead by some of the most learned and brilliant theologians of our time. It included a trip to the church in Malta where St. Paul himself worshipped undercover, a VIP passage into the crypt of St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican to see St. Peter's grave, visits to the ancient catacombs, and personal tours of cathedrals, the Pantheon, the Colosseum, and Roman ruins led by those brilliant seminarians attending some of the most renowned seminaries in the world. It was magical, and I only wish I had taken better notes, as my brain could not possibly retain all the knowledge thrown at me during the trip!

Deuteronomy 10 & Judges 3: Two name cards with my name on it, with its "Irish Gaelic origin, meaning 'Pearl; the Strong.'" There are also verses on each card, both coincidentally from Isaiah.

1 Samuel 1: A tactical notebook paper torn out with verses written from a Bible study in the field.

1 Samuel 16: A handwritten note card that I had affixed to my mirror for a long while, with the verse "Not as man sees does God see, because man sees the outward appearance, but the Lord looks into the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7.

1 Samuel 25: A goofy/sweet message that came with a floral bouquet, sent to me by my now-husband, Peter, when we were dating at West Point. I had been assigned the guard duty of sitting at a desk all day keeping an eye on the company's living quarters. Hence the title, Cadet in Charge of Quarters, or CCQ.

1 Kings 1: Random school pictures from 8th and 9th grade.

Ezra 10: That baby picture of me that started this whole thing!

Tobit 14: A note sent to me by a friend's mother while I was in cadet basic training, and had no outside contact other than written letters. I read the most encouraging ones over and over, and kept many of them for years.

2 Maccabees 4: A bookmark with a quote from Blessed John Paul II that says, "True happiness lies in giving ourselves in love to our brothers and sisters."

Job 3: More touching affirmation notes from a college retreat.

Psalm 1: A picture with my best friend from high school. And it is also here, in the Psalms, that the squiggles and underlines of my early grasping and scriptual study begin.

Psalm 120: A printed note saying "Michel t'a Visité." Going back to the girls' camp in France...as we arived and nestled into our chalet at the foot of the Alps just above Lac Léman (better known as Lake Geneva), in some of the most beautiful country I have ever laid eyes on, our middle school girls played games, sang, darted from one end of the chalet to another, and played Secret Santa. Or Secret Angel, rather. As part of our focus on kindness, we had set up little mailbox slots for each girl for the duration of the camp, and every week they drew names to be a guardian angel, or "ange gardien" for another person--leaving little notes and sweet gifts in her mailbox. Girls were also picked on a daily basis to be a 'Secret Archangel,' sneaking around doing good deeds for others and leaving little papers as their clue that a secret archangel had been there, hard at work. I loved watching them light up while plotting their angelic deeds, and the little notes I got in my own little mailbox were just delightful!

Song of Songs 6: A pamphlet from Sacre Cœur in Paris. On an earlier trip to France in 2005, I had the good fortune of tagging along as translator for the history department during spring break as they traveled through Normany and visited World War II sites. We spent the last two days in Paris with some free time to see the sites, and as luck would have it, I stumbled into the Basilique Du Sacre Cœur right as mass was starting. My luck continued as I followed the crowds after mass down into the crypt, where they were doing the Stations of the Cross, since it happened to be a Friday during Lent. Singing in the most beautiful melodic French, I followed crowds from station to station, reflecting on Christ's passion together with souls from all over the world.

Wisdom 2: A ticket stub from that same day in 2005, denoting that it cost me 5 euros to gain access to the Dome of Sacre Cœur. It was here I had planned to meet up with Peter, who I was dating at the time and who coincidentally was in Paris the same week with a different group. We spent some quiet time at the top of the dome, reflecting on life and looking out over Paris together. That day marked a pretty rough patch in our relationship, but it opened the floodgates to vital communication--communication that, with time, allowed us to grow together in wisdom and in understanding of each other in the most beautiful way.

Isaiah 1: A prayer card from West Point containing the Cadet Prayer.

Isaiah 41: A postcard of St. Cecilia's tomb in the catacombs of Rome. St. Cecilia was one of the early martyrs, decapitated for refusing to renounce her Christian faith. I chose her as my Confirmation saint, and later I bought this postcard during that same pilgrimage to Malta and Rome with my my mom, after we stood in at St. Cecilia's tomb together in the catacombs.

Isaiah 52: A picture from my senior prom.

Jeremiah 2: A program from a Sunday in October of 2005 when I got to accompany Peter in a recognition of all the candidates going through classes to become members of the church. I was not his official sponsor (I thought it unwise at the time lest we confuse our romantic relationship with his own personal spiritual journey,) but I got to stand in when his sponsor could not be there. It was a special day.

Jeremiah 29: The scribbled and underlined and highlighted verse of Jeremiah 29:11, one of my favorites that is also inscribed in my class ring. "For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare, not for woe! plans to give you a future full of hope."

Ezekiel 2: A paltry collage of Peter and me with seven pictures, presumably from when we had to spend a whole week apart.

Ezekiel 45: A picture of me with my siblings--one of my favorites to date.

Obadiah 1: A card with a pressed flower on it from the Holy Land.

At the start of the New Testament: A prayer card for the incredible priest who officiated our wedding.

Matthew 1: A bookmark with a bear and balloons on it with the words, "His love will bear you up!" And on the back, a note from my mother from October 2nd, 1991; she wrote it after I had listened to an Adventures in Odyssey cassette tape and ran to tell her that I'd just asked Jesus to come into my heart.

Matthew 6: More underlines and highlights marking my other favorite verse, Matthew 6:34. "Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?"

Matthew 16: A paper gift bag from le Chateau Royal d'Amboise, acquired during my tour around Paris with Peter.

Matthew 25: A tag from "branch night" at West Point, which was the day we found out what specialty branch we would be assigned to during our Army career. Rather fittingly, it is resting next to a card containing Joan of Arc's picture.

John 11: Individual papers taped together from a scavenger hunt that Peter put together while we were dating, during another stretch of time we had to spend apart. Each paper was accompanied by a handwritten letter, hopefully stashed in a memory box somewhere!

Romans: Pretty much the entire book of Romans is marked up with notes and underlines from seminars and lessons that I wish I still remembered from our pilgrimage to Malta and Rome.

Galatians 1: Notes from a lecture on the "Feminine Genius," an incredibly rich teaching on the role and importance of authentic feminism--I hope to one day attend a full course!

Titus 2: Two more notes from my "anges guardiens," one sweet one wishing me a "bonne nuit!"

Between the reference pages: A contact roster from a summer training assignment with an aviation unit; shortly after I went back to school, they deployed to Iraq and lost their company commander and several others in ground-to-air combat. I kept the roster as a reminder to pray for them all by name.

Back cover: My roster number from Airborne School, and a pressed flower petal from yet a third trip to France and Switzerland--a Christian leadership conference that cemented my faith all the more. 

And scattered throughout, always changing their place: Numerous other prayer cards for different causes or people who have died--the most meaningful being my St. Jude card. A long-standing tradition of my faith has been to ask others for prayer, both on earth as well as those already in heaven, called saints. The belief is that their prayers for us are powerful in their own right, because nothing separates the saints from God, so their prayers for us are not clouded by the confusion or distraction that we on earth face. St. Jude, nicknamed "Saint of the Impossible," was one of Jesus's apostles and became my prayer buddy long ago when I started asking him to pray for my now-husband. I asked for his prayers again, along with those of my friends and family, when after two children and two pregnancy losses, the doctors told me that my ability to have more children was highly questionable. I became pregnant again immediately, and as it turns out, our son was both due and subsequently born on October 28th--St. Jude's feast day. (A feast day is generally marked by the day a saint leaves this earth and joins God forever in heaven, resulting in a great celebration for that person's soul). My St. Jude prayer card not only serves as a reminder that God is ever faithful (even when we aren't), but also a reminder that I am incredibly blessed by so many on this side of heaven--and the other--who are always willing to pray for me!

And perhaps the most influential of all, tucked in between the pages of  Jude and Revelation: A Polaroid picture of me attempting to thank the inmates of Aurthur Kill Correctional Facility in March of 2006.

A wise crew of incredible people used to come up from NYC to help with our semi-annual cadet retreats at West Point. They would share many wise words, but inevitably the conversation would turn to their life-changing experiences running retreats for the inmates at a correctional facility in Staten Island (which has since closed). So the next spring on one of my free weekends, that's where I found myself: staying at the group leader's house in Staten Island, preparing to spend three days in a men's prison. I was told in no uncertain terms to leave any form-fitting clothing behind and wear only large bulky pants and sweatshirts. No make-up, and no sharing my full name or contact info either. Upon entering the facility we had to remove all personal belongings so they could be locked up at the front desk, lest any of the inmates be tempted into theft. On one level I was terrified to enter a place where so much violence and depravity and sexual perversion reigned, but on another level, I felt prideful about being a "good" person going in to "help" them. Thankfully, just a few minutes in that room with those men chased away my ridiculous pride; I was instantly humbled by their life experiences, realness, and acceptance and trust in me. I was ashamed that I thought of all I'd be "teaching" them, as I found they taught me so much more. I soon understood that what they shared from the heart could actually put them in jeopardy. That open vulnerability of their thoughts and emotions could make them a target in this place where calousness was almost synonymous with survival. But so many of them bared their souls anyway, and the glimmers of truth I saw shining from the depths of their dark reality were bright enough to restore my feeble faith in humanity. I was so deeply affected by the raw faith of these men who had seen and felt and dealt out so much darkness in their lives. One stayed up past midnight writing me the kindest, most compassionate letter filled with gratitude and stories about his past and conversion. Another gave me a picture of his latest work of art, a striking painting of a stained glass window with a woman's face in the middle, tears streaming down her cheeks. A third asked me to help him contact his son who had grown up and joined the marines since he knew I was in the army. He wanted so badly to tell his son he loved him. (Once home, I searched in the military database of email addresses with no luck, but I never looked any further and lost the paper shortly thereafter. I'm not sure I'll ever get past the guilt of giving up so easily).

When it was time to leave on the last day of the retreat, I got the chance to say goodbye to the group, and I remember being frustrated because I didn't have adequate words to convey my experience with them. I felt like they had opened my eyes to the ugly, awful reality that the world can be, but in a way that was necessary to show me that the most profound, absolute forgiveness, unconditional love, and redemption can be born tenfold out of such utter wretchedness. Before I left, they gave me this Polaroid picture taken of me trying to express my gratitude, along with a card they'd all signed with personal messages. And finally, there was the letter that Johnny lost sleep writing:

I've tried my best to take his words to heart.

I've had many amazing experiences outside of these listed here, and a growing collection of memory boxes and books fill our house, holding ever more significant pieces of my life. But this simple Bible, with all its treasured adornments and deeper meaning, remains an indispensable window into my soul.

What about you? Do you have an item or tradition that tells a significant part of your story in an unexpected way? If so, I'd love to hear about it!