“Afterwards the other virgins came and said,
‘Lord, Lord, open the door for us!’
But he said in reply,
‘Amen, I say to you, I do not know you.’
Therefore, stay awake,
for you know neither the day nor the hour.”
– Matthew 25:11-13
This verse from Matthew was the end of the Gospel reading for this Friday, August 30th. It’s the ending to the parable of the ten virgins, which is only found in the book of Matthew. It’s theme is obviously eschatological in nature- be prepared for the Judgment Day…”you know neither the day nor the hour.”
Sometimes I feel like I get numb to messages I’ve heard over and over again. I feel like a lot of people do. Sometimes I wait for my pastor to shed light on Scripture in a new and informative way that makes me less numb. I get annoyed if he fails to do this during his homilies. But I’ve come to realize that I can’t always expect and demand a priest to open my eyes to new and interesting interpretations and meanings. Sometimes I need to do some thinking myself- let God speak to me. I need to spend time in silence and reflect for myself.
For most people my age it’s the start of a new school year. Labor Day weekend is the threshold of a new year. So maybe it’s a perfect weekend to jolt myself out of summer slumber. Maybe it’s the perfect weekend for all of us to do that.
Those who know me might find it odd that I feel numb or complacent in my faith at the moment. And I kind of find it odd myself. Over the past several months I’ve been battling Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, a rare but highly curable cancer of the lymphatic system. I feel like I assumed that my faith life would kick into high gear the moment I got diagnosed. Isn’t that what always happens to people who are seriously ill? They see that they can’t take life for granted and they live every moment to the fullest and rely fully on God to get them through the tough times.
I guess that’s what I thought would happen with me. However, though my treatments have not been easy, I haven’t felt really desperate or despondent since my diagnosis. I have such amazing support and my prognosis has always been so good that I guess I never felt the need to act in the way I thought seriously ill people were “supposed to act.”
Then this week happened.
It turns out one of the chemotherapy drugs I have been treated with for the past 20ish weeks can sometimes cause lung complications. And lo and behold, I am one of those rare cases of someone having lung complications from it. Scans of my chest from last week showed the toxicity in my lungs was progressing alarmingly fast. And my doctor, out of a need to fully disclose all possible outcomes, used the words “possibly fatal” to describe what happens in the rarest of cases.
Ok, please don’t freak out at this point. I had a lung procedure two days ago and it looks like my lungs should be fine. I just need to be monitored carefully and potentially treated with steroids.
So now that you know that I will most likely be ok – I’m getting my last chemotherapy treatment this Wednesday (yay!) – we can move on to the ultimate point of why I’m writing this insanely longwinded essay at 2 o’clock in the morning.
Over the past week I’ve done my fair share of freaking out. It was the first time in this whole long cancer ordeal anyone had used the word fatal. And let me tell you, that is a scary word. But instead of letting it get the best of me or making me curl up in a corner in the fetal position, I asked myself the question, “Why are you so scared?”
Ok, the next few things I’m going to say will most likely sound cliché, but….deal with it? Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.
Anyway, I asked myself why I was scared. What about death was scary to me. This led me to the question, “Would I go straight to heaven if I died soon?” And the answer I got was….no.
And before you think I’m going off the deep end or anything, I would like to point out that I’m just being logical here. I’m not a saint. I’d like to be, and yes that should be my ultimate goal in life, but I’m not. And it’s not like I’m some crazy person either. The complacency I mentioned earlier is one that I sometimes slip into by sticking too much to a routine. I go to mass at least once a week, read my Bible every day, go to Confession when I need to. It’s not like I started being a hyper immoral crazy person, I just became a little numb.
At this moment in time I’d probably angst it out in Purgatory for awhile…and I probably will eventually no matter what. But that’s not the point. I realized that I was scared of Judgment Day happening for me much much sooner than I had ever expected. I was scared it would happen before I had time to “grow up” and stop being a snarky young adult who’s too sarcastic for anyone’s own good.
I know a lot of older people who have near death experiences tend to have this realization and then start to work harder on themselves and their relationship with God. I saw my grandfather do just that after he had his first heart attack. But that’s the thing…people don’t usually have these scary near death realizations until much later in life. And maybe my having this at 22 is really a blessing in disguise. I shouldn’t be waiting until I’m older to take my life and my soul more seriously. Because I honestly “know neither the day nor the hour.”
My point in writing all this is not to be melodramatic or anything, but simply to share my thoughts. At this start of the academic year I’d just like to pause and give thanks for the amazing gift of life I have been given. And I’d like to thank God for making me appreciate it all the more through my own personal struggles. Though I hope none of you reading this ever has to go through what I’ve been experiencing, I do hope this in some way affects you. Personally, I hope I’m one of the five wise virgins, not the five foolish ones.
Rachel is a recent graduate of the College of William and Mary. She interns at The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens and works at a YMCA (hand gestures included).
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