by David Powell
“After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue. They stood before the throne and before the Lamb … These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress … They will not hunger or thirst anymore … For the Lamb who is in the center of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to springs of life-giving water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
These words are read every year on All Saints Day. Looking back, I feel I never really heard them until 50 years ago in the chapel of the international seminary in Innsbruck, Austria, called the Canisianum.
It was my fourth week in this seminary to which I had been sent at the age of 21 after a very trying seven-week course in German. Feeling quite homesick and confused on that All Hallows Eve of 1964, I struggled to understand the German proclamation from the Book of Revelation quoted above.
Suddenly, the words leapt out as if the voice of the angel was speaking directly to me, “Take a look around you at these students from 22 different nations gathered around this throne here today. These words are happening to you right here and now.”
As I look back, this “call from the angel” had flowed from a call from another angel six months earlier – my mom. She had been ill for quite some time and I would have turned down the call to go to Innsbruck, but then the angel inside her spoke these words: “Do not let my condition keep you from doing God’s Will for you.”
So here I was in Innsbruck, strengthened by that powerful Halloween Mass but still feeling somewhat lost as I struggled to understand a deep German theology course on the Gospel of John.
So often at the end of these lectures I would stay seated at my desk ,partly out of exhaustion but also moved by the call to let the Word speak to my soul. I think now of that phrase from Hebrews 4:12, “The Word of God is a two-edged sword penetrating between soul and spirit.”
New Weltanschauung
Then with the beautiful Alpine Mountains staring me in the face, I would walk back to the seminary and later take another walk after lunch with international seminarians. Truly I was living what German philosophy would call a change in your “weltanschauung” (world view). Experiences like this, including summer travels, slowly began to penetrate that deep sense of homesickness.
Toward the end of my second year, my mother passed away at a time when I also had overworked myself to the point of exhaustion. That summer, I left the seminary feeling like a failure. But on Nov. 9, 1966, in the middle of a weekday Mass, from out of nowhere a call came again, this time of peace and forgiveness. I walked out of that church feeling like a new person. This, in turn, enabled me to respond to the call of teaching that I received shortly thereafter.
By 1972, I was deeply involved with the formation of an alternative school program called the Learning Community of Mater Christi H.S., Astoria. Once again, the “call of the angel” came through loud and clear at a charismatic prayer meeting. In tears, I realized that in the midst of my busy work for the Kingdom of God, I was starting to lose myself, as it were, because of a lack of prayer.
In the meantime, God also was calling me through a young woman at this prayer meeting whom I had met in graduate school. Unlike a few of the other girls with whom I had been somewhat serious, this girl, Carol, as I told my closest friend, seemed to see right through me. My friend burst out laughing after I told him one of her insights into me. He simply said, “Powell, marry her!”
Fortunately for me, I did. Carol and I have continued to try to be open to God’s call for over 40 years of marriage, like many other couples I am sure. In my case, that extraordinary All Saints Day Mass of 50 years ago opened me up to deeper dimensions and broader horizons that have continued to develop over time.[hr] David Powell is a retired Catholic high school religion teacher and former director of several parish religious education programs.
“For the Lamb who is in the center of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to springs of life-giving water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (Rev. 7:17)