Two Moms - No Escape, March/April 2000
by Rebecca Robinson
I am a convert to the Catholic faith, but I'm a little stubborn.
(My mother used to joke that my head was made of cement.) So
it took both the Blessed Virgin Mary and, I suspect, my biological
mother in heaven, teaming up together, to drag me into the Catholic
Church. I didn't realize what these two had pulled off until
later. What a team!
When my mother died suddenly in 1982, I lost my best friend. At that time I led a very worldly life, and did not attend a church. Mom's death was a wakeup call. I knew I'd better start thinking about eternal things instead of just the here and now. On an impulse I joined the Catholic Church. But I didn't want to hassle with RCIA classes, because I thought I already knew everything I needed to know about the Church! So I talked a Catholic priest into letting me in without instruction. I really tried for a couple years to be Catholic. But it just didn't work. So I drifted away; it was just too different from what I was used to, and I hadn't learned enough about the beauty of the Church to stay. But I felt hollow inside.
A few years later, a friend showed me a picture of the Blessed Virgin Mary. She wore a golden dress and was majestic. She had a long rosary that looked like it was made out of light. The whole figure glowed. I didn't know much about the Catholic idea of the Virgin Mary, but I was fascinated. I felt a warm sensation around my heart. A few weeks later, I suddenly found myself back at the same Catholic Church I had joined years earlier. I couldn't even remember the old obstacles that had kept me away; they were mysteriously gone! Then I found out about the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and that did it. I fell head-over-heels in love with the Catholic Church. I began praying the Rosary daily.
One day I was hanging pictures on a wall at home. I hung my mother's picture on a wall and then moved a picture of Our Lady some distance to the left of it. In the picture my mom was turned sideways, her head tilted up, mouth in a wide grin, hands together. As I backed up to see if the pictures were straight, I froze. I had inadvertently placed the pictures so that Mom appeared to be praying to Our Lady, but smiling mischievously, as though these two were sharing a secret joke. Then it hit me: I suddenly had a very strong suspicion that my mom in heaven had teamed up with Our Lady to drag this wayward daughter into the Catholic Church!
Some time later I "accidentally" stumbled on a book about Maximilian Kolbe. Something clicked inside; I adopted him as my patron saint. Then a friend lent me a book by Bud Macfarlane, Jr., called Pierced by a Sword, and I knew the MI was for me. I was consecrated into the MI on May 13, 1998. Interesting things began to happen. I was able to organize 24-hour Eucharistic adoration all over the city, and helped to get a Catholic radio station started in our area. Now, I'm funneling materials about the Catholic Faith through a small evangelization operation out of my home. It just goes to show, when two moms join forces, there's no escape!
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