Recently, my aunt's brother in law, Tom, passed away. Tom was such a fantastic person - born with Down's Syndrome, he was a joyful and loving light to all who knew him, a blessing to everyone he met. While I was struggling through my divorce, Tom became fiercely protective of me and my three children; and it was shortly after this time that he gave me what appeared to be a purple rosary. At the time, I was deeply touched by this sweet and beautiful gift. It was a testament to his simple, faith-filled desire to pray for me and care for me. How little he knew what a miraculous gift that "rosary" was.
One night, I picked it up and I noticed something peculiar about the rosary. Instead of five groupings of ten beads (each separated by one) it had fifteen groupings of three beads. Curious, I decided to do some research at Google University and discovered that it was actually a chaplet to Saint Joseph. Tom, who wanted nothing more than to protect my family, had inadvertently gifted me an intercessory prayer to Saint Joseph, the patron saint of families and fathers. So I took this gift from Tom (and from God who was clearly working through him) and I prayed the prayers that came with it, every night for about a year.
When I met Niles, my now-fiance, our first in-person conversation predictably landed on the topic of previous jobs. My heart skipped a beat when he revealed that his very first job was working for his dad doing finish carpentry, a skill that he took into some of his adult jobs as well. Here I'd been praying for a foster-father of sorts for my children, and God un-ironically sent me a carpenter. It was like a little nudge, a wink from heaven. The fruit of Tom's gift and prayer, poured out to us and perfected by God, as only He can do.
In May of 2022, we took a trip together to Hawaii and there Niles proposed to me. As we finished eating at an ocean-side restaurant in Kona, the sun setting in pale pink water-colors over the waves, we started discussing where we would go for Mass that Sunday. On the way back to the car, we crossed the street and practically walked right into the sign for St. Michael's Catholic Church. Once again, God was drawing us close to Him. That Sunday, we attended one of the most beautiful and reverent Masses I've ever been to (with achingly lovely Mass parts in the Hawaiian language) and as I prayed, I looked up and saw the statue of Saint Joseph, holding his carpenter's square. I held Niles's hand and peace washed over me. He was my carpenter, my Joseph, and in some imperfect, yet profound way, I felt God doing what He does best: transforming the broken parts of our lives into something whole.
Not a single human family can live up to the image of our Holy Family, but somehow God creates pockets of holiness in the imperfection, little bits of light that patch the dark holes in the fabric of our fallen stories.
I've prayed countless chaplets, rosaries, and novenas; I’ve thrown my trust into God, begging Him to help us find wholeness, to stitch our lives together with His light. "Your will not mine, Lord," and as I've prayed, I have been almost suspiciously free from doubt or worry about whether, in the end, everything would work out. Even among the occasional arguments and the inevitable obstacles that we've faced together, (and not always in lock-step with each other, I might add), I have never really doubted that we would persevere. After all, the Holy Family has been walking beside us through it all, gently guiding us and interceding for us, wrapping us in their prayers. They remind us that our love for each other is ultimately a small window into God's love for us, a love that continually takes my breath away.
A few days ago, my daughter wrote a paper for school about her dreams for herself and her family. Her dream for me was "for my mom to have a happy marriage with my stepdad". On an otherwise unremarkable day at school last week, my phone rang and Niles reported that his previous marriage was officially annulled and we are now free to marry each other, in the sight of our God who is all-loving and infinitely compassionate. May our family, in this final step, continue to be drawn closer to Him, in gratitude and awe.
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