Always a Mercy Missionary

Last Sunday, a former Mercy Missionary came in before the 10am Mass and greeted me.  As we briefly caught up in the back of the church, a man came in, someone who no one recognized, someone who clearly lives on the streets.  He was not completely connected to reality.  He walked up the center aisle, gestured and spoke something indecipherable to a row of seats with no one in it, spoke and gestured toward the altar, then went and sat on the other side, all alone, moving still with agitation. 

Isabel asked me, “Do you know him?”

“I don’t.”

“I’m going to ask him if he wants to sit with me,” she said, then walked over to this man, invited him to sit with her, and brought him back to sit next to her and her family. 

Once a Mercy Missionary always a Mercy Missionary, I thought, as the Mass began and this man, who had been agitated, was sitting peacefully next to Isabel. 

The Mercy Mission changes us.  It teaches us not to fear those living on the streets, even if we don’t know them, even if they are acting in unpredictable ways.  It teaches us to see past the erratic behavior or drug use or physical uncleanness, to see past our own prejudices and preferences.  It teaches us to see them as unique and unrepeatable persons, known and loved by God. 

That’s what Isabel saw on Sunday.  Rather, that’s who Isabel saw on Sunday: a beloved child of God, worthy of being noticed, of being seen, of being invited in. 

There are 26 others like Isabel, who have learned through their time in the Mercy Mission to have hearts of compassion, to look on others with a gaze of mercy, to recognize, beyond and beneath and before all external appearances, the unique beauty of each man or woman whom they encounter, whether housed or homeless, to see each person as a beloved child of God. Once a Mercy Missionary, always a Mercy Missionary.

~Sister Teresa