Farewell Austria!

With the most of the students now departed for their return to the USA, I thought we needed to jump to a farewell post -- and Trish has come through for us yet again!

A blog post by Trish Irvine, Spring 2010

A couple weeks ago I was ready to go home and see my family. I was glad for the experiences I had here and I loved this semester, but I was ready to share my experiences with my family and plant my feet on some (flat) South Dakota soil. Now, my feelings are slightly more complicated. While I still want to see home, I am beginning to understand everything that I will be leaving. Even if I return to Austria, I can never return to the present—to this time, in this place, with these people, at this stage in my life. If I did someday return to Gaming, which I hope to, it will be a different Gaming. So much of my experience is tied up with the people I traveled with nearly as much as the places I saw. I didn’t see the Europe that many people go to see. I saw Europe on a budget, staying in hostels, riding on ridiculous “overnight” trains with multiple changes in the middle of the night, visiting churches, shrines, and holy places. That Europe is the Europe that I will remember from this semester, and it is a beautiful Europe.

The other day at Mass the song line “He gives and takes away” struck me as extremely true. After being ready to go home, I soon realized everything I would be giving up and I began to wish I could stay for longer. Yet this semester is a gift and I shouldn’t be unwilling to let it end. Rather, I decided to savor the last few days and do what I had previously procrastinated. I hiked up Book Mountain to watch the sunrise. The view was wonderful and I couldn’t help but be in awe as the pink-orange sun rose in the sky surrounded by the peaks of mountains, green and lofty. Words fail. There is a type of gazing that is in itself a prayer, and this was how I was viewing the landscape. We walked down the mountain and had breakfast. I felt very accomplished that I had been awake for four hours by the time I ate breakfast.

The Easter Ball was a great experience—being able to dress up in traditional Austrian wear, sample to finest the Mensa has to offer, watch the Austrian slap dancers perform, and dance to traditional and modern music. One of my favorite parts of the evening was being taught how to dance some Austrian dances. The ballroom was in chaos as we ‘galloped’ across the floor, probably looking ridiculous in our façade of Austrian wear. Yet it was extremely fun chaos. The Austrian slap dancers were a nice entertainment between dancing lessons. Overall, the night was wonderful although the only taint was the knowledge that the next day was the last day in Gaming.

The next morning I went to the waterfall. It was a nice walk/hike and a good way to spend the last morning of my Austrian experience. After the trip a couple of us jumped into the creek. The water was cold but not bitterly. My attempts to soak up the last moments in Gaming were working but made me desire longer in this place of beauty.
There are definitely things that I will miss about Gaming. I will miss my classes. I feel like I learned so much this semester and the professors were wonderful. They were the type of classes where the material interested me and that facilitated my learning. I will miss Ministry to Moms. That was one of the most beautiful things about this semester—going into a family’s home and helping in whatever little way I could. I was blessed enough to be able to help two families and they both showed me ways to be Christ-like. The only ‘inside’ experience I have had of a family is my own and that is skewed by my personal attachment. But these families are growing in sanctity and I was honored to be able to witness it. One evening I ate supper with a family and then stayed and watched the comedian Brian Regan’s performance on DVD. It was a taste of home and family in the midst of school and friends. Being welcomed into another family was a wonderful and humbling experience.

I will miss living in the Kartause and the Kartause community. I love that at noon, the community pauses for Mass—professors, students, faculty, and families alike. It shows what is truly important in life and that everything can still get done even when taking time out to receive Jesus. I will miss the intense snowball fights and banter that is shared between some of the children and the students. I will miss the small group of students here and how well you get to know people. I will miss music ministry and being able to offer something for the Mass. I will also miss my job—writing about my wonderful experiences for a virtual community is definitely one of my favorite jobs.

There is so much about this place and these people that I will miss. But it is because I had such a beautiful experience that I will miss it so much. In that case, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I have no doubt, however, that with as richly as God has blessed me this semester He will continue to do so as I return home. I ask for your prayers this summer as I return home and then begin my job in later May as part of the Totus Tuus program in the Sioux Falls, SD diocese. All that I have experienced here in Austria will be aiding me as I encounter Christ in children and adults alike. Thank you for the opportunity to share my Austrian experiences with you. May the Lord bless you and continue to guide you closer to Christ. Auf wiedersehen, Osterreich, you will be deeply missed.

The Shroud of Turin—Santa Sindone

A blog post by Trish Irvine, Spring 2010

Turin, Italy has the great privilege of housing the Holy Shroud of Christ, or as they call it in Italy the “Santa Sindone.” This year, from April 10^th-May 23^rd the Shroud is on display. The last time the Shroud was on display was 1998. With that in mind, it is quite a feat that I happened to be studying in Austria during the time of its exposition. Even better was that our final four-day break fell perfectly for going to Turin to venerate the Shroud. On only the second day of display, we were able to see with human eyes the Shroud of the God-man.

When we walked into the church I was surprised to see the Shroud so clearly. We had reservations for a later time to see the Shroud closer, but as it was we could get a good view. Despite the many signs that forbid taking pictures, people held up their cameras and phones, snapping and flashing for a keepsake to take home with them. Honestly, I was a little disappointed at first. ‘This is it?’ I thought as I looked at what seemed to be the exact same as the replicas I had seen before. Slightly unimpressed, I thought that at least I could say I went pretty close to the Shroud.

As the time drew near for our viewing of the Shroud we headed to get in line. It was unbelievable how many people were there, waiting to enter the church to see the Shroud of Jesus. The line stretched for what would have been blocks if it wasn’t a park-like area. Now we began to wonder if we would be able to even get through the line before we had to leave to board our train for Austria. We were meeting a few people there who were already in line and had been waiting for twenty minutes. Some of the group decided they would rather sit and pray in the church before the Shroud then spend the time in line to get a few minutes close to the Shroud. As a last effort before giving up, we asked some workers if we could join the rest of our group in line and they let us. Somehow I just felt that God wouldn’t let us come all the way to Turin only to let the reservations go to waste.

We prayed a rosary as we waited and it began to feel like a mini-pilgrimage to the Shroud. As we drew closer they began displaying famous pictures and paintings of the Passion of Christ followed by a brief walk through a museum with beautiful chant music resounding. A few minutes before we saw the Shroud they put us in a room with a large screen and began showing us a simple movie about it. There were no spoken words, only short subtitles in about eight different languages that told which part of the Shroud they were zooming up on. When the movie concluded I understood more fully what I was about to experience. The build up to seeing the Shroud again was critical as I turned from a tourist to pilgrim. The wait, even if it seemed inconvenient, was necessary to prepare my heart to truly appreciate what I was about to see.

The seemingly endless line opened into the church and it was racing towards the Shroud. However, I am extremely fond of Bl. Pier Giorgio and his tomb was on a side altar a little ways before the Shroud. I stopped with a friend to pray before his tomb. The gate was open and I pressed my rosary to the step before the tomb. Yet my heart desired more. I asked a worker if I could touch my rosary to his tomb. She told me that there were alarms that would go off if I did so. The lady was very kind, though, and gently pressed my hands, telling me that I could pray there. We then continued toward the Shroud. There are three lines to see the Shroud, with the front line being primarily for those with wheelchairs or strollers and the other two being for the rest of the pilgrims. Yet by some miracle, we found ourselves in the front line not knowing how we managed it. As the lady led a prayer in Italian, I was in the middle, directly before the Shroud, just about as close as one can possibly get.

I stood, gazing at the Shroud and finally being able to understand the beauty of the event I was experiencing. This cloth was as old as the Church I am a part of and this cloth touched my very Lord. The Eucharist is Jesus Himself, but there was something so beautiful about seeing that which was wrapped around the physical body of Jesus. I gazed at the portion of the Shroud that touched Christ’s face. It is the closest I can come in this life to knowing what Jesus looked like. I could’ve stood there for so much longer, striving to understand the vastness of the gift I was receiving. The people in line behind us wanted to see as well, however, and we were quickly ushered out.

How does one explain the joy of being before the Holy Shroud, the Santa Sindone? Someone later mentioned that Mary touched that cloth as she wrapped Christ in it. That added another element to it that I hadn’t considered. The Shroud isn’t simply a nice idea, it is a piece of history preserved for all of the doubting Thomas’s of today and for all of us who often fail to dive into understanding God’s gift. Christ’s blood is on that cloth, but I receive Him in Mass. How contrary we are. We will stand in line for 1 ½ hours to see that which touched Christ and yet we insist on using many extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion so that we can quickly receive Jesus before carrying on with our day. The more holy places I go to and the more wonderful things I see, the more I am reminded of the blessing of the Eucharist. If only I could be as joyful to receive Him as I am to see things that are beautiful but of far less importance. Yet even in this ‘failing’ it is a sort of gain as well because as I encounter these manifold beauties, I fall more in love with the Author of Life.

I dislike throwing around extremes and absolutes such as “This changed my life forever” or “This was the best thing I ever did.” I’m not sure I could posit that. However, I can honestly say that seeing the Holy Shroud of Jesus Christ was amazing and helps give more meaning and depth to my spiritual life. Sometimes I think about how both Jesus and Mary were brought bodily into Heaven and how people may think it is rather “convenient” that the bodies of two of the main people in the Christian faith disappeared. Yet we have this cloth with the imprint of a man. Studies say that the imprint seems to be made from some form of radiation (the resurrection?) and that the person who was wrapped in it stopped bleeding and later began again. This cloth was that which enshrouded my Savior. And I was able to stand before it and pray. How can I not be different?

Kind People and Small Miracles

A blog post by Trish Irvine, Spring 2010

Her name, she said, was Kirsten. To me, she will be the lady who saved my ten-day trip from beginning in sorrow. Exceedingly kind, Kirsten guided a group of us when we were at a foreign train station in the middle of the night. Perhaps some explanation is necessary.

This past week I was able to have ten days off from classes and travel Europe. Due to the length of time, my plans were to go to Fátima, Portugal and Madrid, Spain. Our plans weren’t foolproof, however. Through a mixture of nearly every form of land transportation, we plotted our course to Fátima. A few of our train transitions included intervals with less than ten minutes. The second transition with about eight minutes proved to be our downfall. We arrived to the station after our train had already departed. We needed to get to Munich; however, 4 am was the next train headed to Munich from our train station. With our original train leaving from Munich at 3:15 am and a plane leaving from Paris in the early afternoon, we were growing worried that Fátima would turn out to be just a nice idea in the end.

Here is where Kirsten enters the picture. She had been on the train with us before and had also missed her train to Munich. Although she didn’t seem worried to get to Munich soon, she became very helpful when we lamented that we had a plane leaving from Paris the next day. Thankfully, she was fluent in both German and English. Kirsten bargained with the taxi drivers for us, and although they didn’t really lower their prices, it was nice to have a “grown-up” dealing with them.

It was strange how implicitly I trusted her. She was beautiful and kind. To me, she was the bodily form of one of our guardian angels. The difficulty of our situation didn’t need to concern her, but she began to help us right away. When we told her the prices for the taxi were more than we could afford, she bargained again with the drivers. She called her boyfriend to see if there was any other way for us to get to Munich that night. In the end, when we decided to take the taxis, she traveled with us. We slept in the back of the taxi and she sat in the front with the driver, talking to him in German. For some reason, it seemed comforting to have her there with us. Her very presence was calming. Even the simplest things seemed to be sweet—as we stopped at a gas station for gas, she said “About ten minutes, girls” and that itself was calming.

When we got to the train station, I couldn’t resist my desire to give this kind lady a hug. For hours afterwards, we gushed about how heaven-sent she had been, how perfectly she helped us, how much God had answered our prayers before we even prayed them. She maybe didn’t even think she did something that wonderful, but her aid deeply impressed us.

This incident on its own would have been wonderful. Nevertheless, the rest of the trip was filled with random miracles and kind people. There were the train conductors on our way to Paris who didn’t kick us off when we didn’t have our seat reservations, the conductor on the way to Fátima who allowed us to purchase our seat reservation on the train, and the very kind man who drove us the 15 miles from the Fátima train station to the city of Fátima when there were no taxis or busses at 9 pm at night. Those helps were just on the way to Fátima: we also were helped by the kind receptionist at our hotel; one of the girls I was traveling with found her brother just when she was about to give up; in Madrid we wanted to go to Mass so we found a random church and knelt down to pray to discover a Mass started a couple minutes later; and we worked with the beautiful Missionaries of Charity who showed us the beauty of love.

The hostels we stayed at were fairly nice and the workers also kind. On my way back to Fátima for Easter I nearly hugged the Madrid ticket salesman who spoke English to me. The second hotel in Fátima was helpful and I found a shopkeeper who would bargain with me. The entire trip I encountered little blessings. At the time, finding an open compartment for the 4 ½ hour portion of our train ride seemed like a great blessing. Prayers were continually answered and blessings bestowed before I even had the chance to think of praying for them.

In a way, it was because I was entering so deeply in and striving to rely on God in all things that the little blessings seemed so great and important. Yet everyday I encounter blessings. As I write this, I am soaking in the vision of sunshine outside my window and the delightful sound of birds twittering and hailing the arrival of spring. Sometimes I have to pause and remember that I am living in a foreign country and how that in itself is a great gift. After experiencing the kindness of so many people in a variety of countries and languages, it makes me want to randomly help others as well. Perhaps in helping others it will lead me to a greater understanding of the beauty of serving people. “Entrust your works to the Lord, and your plans will succeed.” (Proverbs 16:3)—this past trip showed me the truth of this verse.

Grindelwald: Unexpected Plans & Unseen Beauty

A blog post by Trish Irvine, Spring 2010

Plans don’t always go as expected. That is an obvious statement, perhaps, but one that takes getting used to in practice. A couple weekends ago I went to Switzerland with some classmates. We stayed in Interlaken the night we arrived and made plans for the next day. Our plan was to go to Grindelwald and ride down the longest sledding hill in the world—nine miles long.

The next day, we took a train to Grindelwald, a town that is surrounded by mountains. We purchased our tickets for the gondola and were soon flying above the snow covered hills. The soaring mountain peaks were enough to steal our breath away. I have lived nearly my whole life on the plains of South Dakota. Being in the Swiss Alps was, needless to say, a very different experience. The sky was so blue and clear, another joy after months in the valley that is Gaming, Austria. Sunbeams bounced off the brilliant white snow making us squint.

There was a vast difference between the professional skiers that quickly raced down the slopes and my group as we stood gawking at the mountains trying to figure out where to go. After renting sleds we casually looked for people who appeared to know what they were doing. It took a while, but eventually we found some people that passed as experienced. The slopes for sledding, however, turned out to all be closed. We knew people who had come to the same slopes the day before and went sledding. Only a day later it was the exact opposite. It was unbelievable. Frustrated, we returned our sleds for a reimbursement and then soaked in the beauty of the landscape.

What does one do in the Swiss Alps when sledding is no longer an option? Of course, build a snowman. We went to a place that was out of the way and near the edge of the mountaintop and began our snowmen. Our project soon evolved into creating our families out of snow, dressing up the snowmen, and photographing our adventure. We decided that there are many people who can say they went sledding, snowboarding, or skiing in the Swiss Alps but there probably aren’t many who built snowmen there.

Since we had planned on sledding down we only had a one-way ticket up the mountain. Going to the information/help desk I sweetly asked in German if the man spoke English. For the first time, a person answered “No.” I was briefly perplexed as I thought about how I would tell him our problem without just purchasing a full-price ticket down. I passed my one-way ticket through to him. He looked at it and seemed to begin to grasp what we meant. My friend had a sheet on the sledding and so I showed it to him. Through a mixture of gestures, pictures, and, now that I think about it, perfectly useless English, he understood what our problem was. I was hoping we could get a reduced price ticket down. “It’s OK,” he said. I asked him how much it would cost. “No, it’s OK.” He motioned to the turnstile and we understood that he was letting us go down for free. Our faces must have been priceless as we enthusiastically exclaimed, “Thank you! Thank you! Danke!” The sweet ride down the mountain nearly smoothed over our disappointment. The fact that we had figured everything out despite the language barrier made the triumph that much better.

That night we took a bus to the other hostel we were staying at in Iseltwald. Upon arriving we found a note next to our key (perhaps not the best security system but very homelike) that said the manager had moved us from the dorm room to two-person and four-person private rooms with balconies that overlooked the lake. Quite pleased, we settled in and made friends with the other people in the hostel. A large group of the girls were actually studying abroad with a university from Ohio.

The next morning, we were exclaiming over the beauty of the lake. After Mass we took a walk around the lake. The water was so clear and reflected the mountains surrounding the lake. Everything around us was postcard worthy and we were continually exclaiming over the beauty. As we surveyed everything I couldn’t help but wonder how anyone could be an atheist in such a place. The locals probably don’t spend hours looking at the scenery like we do, though. It made me think of how blind we can become to our own surroundings. At home I am surrounded by beauty that I don’t even acknowledge simply because I always see it. Every place is a place of beauty, perhaps not always like the beauty of the Swiss Alps, if we only have the eyes to see it.

Fatima -- God's Surprise!

Fátima. When I first stepped foot on the Austrian soil in Gaming, I wouldn’t have said that I would definitely go to Fátima, Portugal. If I was offered the chance to go, I would have gone with joy, but having to work or fight to get there wasn’t an idea that was on the horizon. The Marian apparition site I desired to go to was Medjugorje. In a few months, it is interesting to see how my initial plans were traded for an entirely new set. Over 10-day break I went to Fátima twice and I will not go to Medjugorje this semester. Despite the unexpectedness of it all, it worked out better than I could ever have planned. God’s plans happen like that, though.

I have always thought it would be neat to go to Fátima, but it didn’t occur to me to plan for it. May 13^th, 1990 was a memorable day. I was born. It was also Mother’s Day and the Feast of Our Lady of Fátima. An older, less well-known feast was that it was also the Feast of Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament. With this in mind, I was open to the idea of Fátima, but Portugal seemed quite far away and there was no strong desire on my part. However, soon after the semester began, I found out there was a mission trip to Spain to work with the Missionaries of Charity. I love the Missionaries of Charity and I know some Spanish so it seemed to be perfect. It was also located quite near Portugal. The idea and desire to go to Fátima began at this point.

There came a point, however, when my prospects of being able to go to Fátima looked bleak. From Gaming, the fastest train we could find was 37 hours long. Other options interfered with the classes of the two girls I was traveling with. Yet the more difficulties we seemed to encounter, the more I desired to go to Fátima. Now it seemed to be a challenge that I was supposed to rise up to and conquer. Finally, mere days before our departure, we had our plan worked out, tenuous though it was. We were to take a train from Keinberg-Gaming to Paris-Est. From there we would take a metro and bus to the RyanAir airport Paris-Beauvais. After our flight from Paris to Porto, Portugal, we would train to Fátima. The downfalls of this itinerary were unavoidable—a couple train connections were less than ten minutes, the airport was located outside of Paris, and we had no train reservations on the portion of the train from Mannheim to Paris. With all of these weaknesses in mind, we set off with the goal of Fátima before us.

As inevitably happens, challenges arose. We did miss a train and had to take an expensive taxi in the middle of the night. The train conductors let us stay on the train to Paris for 20 euro, which we were happy to pay at the time. Overall, however, everything went quite smoothly, even to the point of getting a ride from a Portuguese family from Fátima train station to the town of Fátima. Sitting in the hotel room that night we rejoiced to be in the very place that we strove to get to. In our attempts to reach Fátima as quickly as possible, we had taken nearly every form of transportation we could think of: feet, train, taxi, metro, bus, and plane. Yet in the end, we were at the place that Mary appeared nearly 93 years earlier.

The next morning I entered the sanctuary grounds for the first time amidst joyful singing and the commencement of Mass. Pilgrims flocked to the area in front of the church where Mass was being held. Sunshine warmed us as we participated in the Palm Sunday Mass in Portuguese. Afterwards, we sat on the steps, looking at the grounds of the Fátima sanctuary.

I must admit my disappointment with Fátima. Now, I really do love Fátima but there was this part of me that expected the Cova da Iria to still be a grassy cove. I know this is irrational to expect a place of pilgrimage for so many people to remain as it was, but this sentimental part of me hoped it would be. I pictured myself praying at the place Mary appeared, surrounded only by sunshine and green grass. Instead, I knelt on the concrete with people continually walking around me. Despite the differences from dream to reality, I was able to know Mary better. I found myself imploring her to tell me why I was born on her feast of Fátima. My mother always said there was something to the fact that my younger sister and I were both born on Marian feast days. Mary didn’t give me a direct answer to my question, but I sensed that she agreed with my mother, there was a reason I was born on May 13^th. For the first time I thought about the fact that I was born on Mother’s Day in terms of my heavenly mother in addition to my earthly mother.

When I left on Sunday evening for Madrid, it was with the knowledge that I would be returning to spend Easter there. After only six days of being away from Fátima, I didn’t think I would be as excited as I was to return. There was a part of me that truly related to Fátima in a way that I didn’t expect. I found myself kneeling in the Apparition Chapel late on the eve of Easter Sunday joyfully telling Mary that I was back. I was still unable to do everything that Fátima offered, but being there was enough for me. At one point I walked to the visionaries houses by myself and it was beautiful to be on my own seeing the concrete reality of those who saw Mary.

Fátima wasn’t what I expected. It struck a deeper cord than what I had prepared myself for. When we were leaving for Madrid we found ourselves questioning why we had to leave. Again, when I left for Gaming, I found myself wondering why I must leave such a beautiful place so soon. However, my experience in Madrid with the Missionaries of Charity was wonderful. Gaming also offered an experience that even Fátima couldn’t provide. It is difficult, but I am trying to learn to embrace each change with openness because something good, albeit a different good, comes from each transition. God had plans for me in Fátima that I didn’t have for myself; I’m sure it is the same with the rest of this semester, the rest of my life.