In a recent post detailing the surrounding churches providing spiritual comfort in my new neighborhood, I left out a Catholic church approximately a half mile away. St Francis de Sales is perched at the intersection of State and Snow Rd. Two miles south waits the Holy Family Hospice and St Anthony of Padua Parrish. The presence of faith in Parma is pervading. St Charles of Borromeo has established itself as a home for daily Adoration and evening Mass. I have started sitting on the St Joseph side of worship, frontal pews, becoming familiar and consoled by what are becoming friendly faces. My routine will change with the coming week, a shift change landing me on third shift from Sunday evening to Thursday morning. Routine and repetition are important to me. I am still putting together an itinerary for daily Mass, prayer, and AA meetings. The French author J.K. Huysmans has captured me. I discovered him from the novel ‘Submission’ by Michel Houellebecq. I am fascinated that a turn of the century, Eighteenth to Nineteenth, French intellectual, after a life of wandering and decadent self-discovery—a life of sensual pleasure, ideological exoticism, respected artistic reputation, a life centered upon individualistic pursuits, would become so devoted to the Catholic faith, especially regarding the monastic life. His authentic conversion is one of struggle and strife, penetrating into the realm of mysticism and a deeper calling of surrender and self-awareness. His accumulated knowledge, and insight, of Catholicism, Mary and the Saints is breathtaking. Who are You God? And who am I? It is not a feel good, sugar coated story, nor an intellectual reasoning into dogma and ideas. I am still working through the first novel of the Durtal Trilogy, yet the sense the conversion detailed, and lived by Huysmans, is one of a profound and advanced awakening. “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light. (Ephesians 5:18)” It is pleasing to discover a new author of eternal meaning.
The Exaltation of the Holy Cross
J.K. Huysmans before the Crucifix.
