Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

Covid-19 will be the defining story of 2020. Today Julie shares her thoughts with us on the Covid lockdown and our Catholic Faith.

By Julie Cosden

The Holy Eucharist. (Credit: Jerico Chimeno / Aid to the Church in Need)

There is an old adage that “absence makes the heart grow fonder.” Over the course of these strange and trying months, I have found myself musing on some poems and proverbs of old, however overused or sappy, about the heartache of being apart from the One you love. I echo the words of the lover in the Song of Songs - “Have you seen Him whom my soul loves?” – as I go another day, another week, another month without Holy Communion. Like so many modern-day Catholics in the western world, this has been a new experience for me, and not one without frustration, sadness, and discouragement.  And yet, I remind myself that the Lord is allowing this time, not to punish us or to seemingly move farther away, but rather the opposite: to draw closer to us, to prepare us, to increase our stamina and endurance, to encourage our growth in patience, hope, and trust in his ultimate fidelity and provision.

Worship during Covid. (Credit: Jerico Chimeno / Aid to the Church in Need)

Over the history of the Church, there have been many periods when the frequent reception of Holy Communion was sadly not a part of the life of the faithful. There are countless saints, both canonized and unknown but in Heaven, who endured periods, often years, without Mass or the Eucharist. I discovered one such saint a few years ago, St. Mark Ji TianXiang, who as a lifelong addict, was denied both absolution and communion due to the misunderstanding of addiction at the time and yet continued to practice his faith fervently for over 30 years without access to the Sacraments. I think of Fr. Walter Cizsek, a Jesuit priest, who spent years in Soviet prisons and labour camps, reciting the Mass by heart daily in his cell without bread or wine. Our own history in Ireland tells of the strength and perseverance of the faithful when denied the Sacraments. Or of the thousands of Christians in Japan who lived without priests for over 200 years.  To quote an article by Meg Hunter-Kilmer: “They baptized their children in secret, passing down the faith in whispered lessons, praying before images of the Madonna and Child that were disguised to look like Buddhist images. In 1858 Japan finally readmitted Christian missionaries, who found 10,000 hidden Christians waiting for them. Imagine being raised with the near certainty that you would never in your life attend Mass, knowing of the Eucharist only because your grandmother’s grandmother’s grandmother once went to Mass. It puts social distancing in perspective.”

Holy Mass in Mexico. (Credit: Aid to the Church in Need)

And of course, this continues today in many parts of the world where Catholics are oppressed, supressed, or live in such impoverished, remote areas that they may only have the opportunity to attend Mass once every two or three years, if at all.  And yet, it is often in these areas and through these dire circumstances that Christianity thrives. Here we are in Western Europe, where up until six months ago we all had daily access to Mass and Confession, yet there are so few believers. Before you think I’m advocating that the church might be better off without Holy Communion for its growth and renewal, let me clarify: Jesus instituted the Eucharist so that we might become one with Him and be sustained by his body and blood.  It is the greatest gift He has given us. But this is the same Lord who said to St. Paul “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9) We must remember that God is not confined by the Sacraments, that there is grace available to us in every moment of our day, and that we carry with us the sustaining graces from our Holy Communions throughout our lives. There is no expiration date on grace, nor does it come with terms and conditions. And if God is allowing this time, he will provide the grace for us when we cannot gain access to it ourselves. Perhaps this is His way of reminding us that it is always He who provides the grace, and that we are utterly dependent on Him. This is a hard concept for even the most faithful to accept when we have been raised in a culture that gives us what we want whenever we want it. Perhaps it’s time for us to lean into our dependence on God’s provision and accept whatever he chooses to give, or take away.    

I found, in my own experience of the first lockdown earlier this year, that Jesus had never felt closer to me as I went about my days in isolation. I leaned into my routines of prayer, prayed my rosary on afternoon walks, watched Mass online, read Scripture each morning, and made visits to the local church to sit with the Lord, hidden in the tabernacle. I thought of all the Catholics around the world who didn’t have access to the Eucharist because of persecution or poverty, and more often both, and offered my imposed fast for them.  I thought of my loved ones who are away from the Church and the Sacraments and offered prayers for them. I trusted in the power of making spiritual communions and clung to the fact that “I belong to my beloved, and my beloved belongs to me.” (Songs 6:3) and that nothing, including this mandated break from Holy Communion, could take the Lord away from me.

Eucharistic adoration in Papua-New Guinea. (Credit: Aid to the Church in Need)

And so as we stare into another period of lockdown without Holy Mass, I just want to offer some thoughts and suggestions for how we might approach this sacrifice, for that is what it is: a sacrifice.  I would encourage you to double down on your own prayer life, particularly intercessory prayer, and enter into solidarity with Catholics around the world who are not able to enjoy the frequent reception of communion, regardless of Covid.  Aside from prayer, let’s use this as an opportunity to grow in the virtues of patience and perseverance. The scriptures are filled with analogies of the harvest - a time for sowing and a time for reaping - and the patience required to wait for the Lord’s plan. Remember that St. Paul’s great tome to love in 1st Corinthians, Chapter 13 ends with “love endures all things” and so we can use this time to endure in our love for Jesus despite the fact that we cannot now receive Him. Remember that Jesus is still there in all the tabernacles throughout the world, waiting for us to visit Him and keep Him company while His churches lie in wait. Think of all the lovers who have been separated by war, emigration, death, and circumstances outside of their control, and remember that you always have access to your beloved in the quiet recesses of the tabernacle, and of your heart.      

And lastly, it has been my experience in life that some of the most fruitful sacrifices I’ve been asked to make, I would never have chosen in a million years.  Perhaps it’s easier to say “I’m choosing to give up this thing that I love” than to say “I accept this pain, this loss, that I didn’t want or choose.” In his gem of a book, Interior Freedom, Fr. Jacques Philippe says “There is another way of exercising freedom: it is consenting to what we did not originally choose. It is precisely then that, in order to become truly free, we are called to choose to accept what we did not want, and even what we would not have wanted at any price. There is a paradoxical law of human life here: one cannot become truly free unless one accepts not always being free. The fact is that the situations that really make us grow are precisely those we do not control.” And where there is growth, there is fruit, there is new wine, there is restoration. 

Holy Mass in Russia. (Credit: Aid to the Church in Need)

This is a time of preparation for what may be coming down the road, both hardship and renewal, both of which will require patience, perseverance, and most importantly, enduring love. And so we wait until we can once again be reunited with Jesus in the Eucharist, when he says “Arise, my friend, my beautiful one, and come! For see, the winter is past, the rains are over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of pruning the vines has come…the fig tree puts forth its figs and the vines, in bloom, give forth fragrance. Arise, my friend, my beautiful one, and come!” (Songs 2:8-13).                     

Originally from the United States, Julie Cosden has been living and working in Ireland with different Catholic organisations over the past four years. Prior to moving to Ireland, Julie was the Vice President for Student Affairs at Ave Maria University in Florida and holds a Masters Degree in Systematic Theology from St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia.