If you have any inclination toward joining the Good Counsel Intern Programme Charis' blog should give you a picture of what it's like, warts and all!
So, under intense
pressure from Clare in the shape of threats to withdraw my good reference and
just general messages every couple of days telling me to sit down and do it,
and (most recently) the declaration that God told her I have to, I have sat
down to write my leaving blog. Here it is, so grab a cuppa, kick back and
relax, and read my scrawl!
When I left Good
Counsel Network, I was told by a member of staff who shall remain nameless that
it had been a great honour for me to be there and that everyone had done very
well to put up with me for all that time (that person knows who they are
and I saw the perfect sign for them the other day which read: ‘The National Sarcasm
Society: like we need your help’ ;) ), and that, in a nutshell, is the essence
of my time at Good Counsel. It was indeed a great honour to stand outside
abortion ‘clinics’ for hours on end in the blistering heat and freezing cold
rain (Not simultaneously. Except sometimes). Oh, and did I mention to get
shouted at by random passers-by? And ignored by most of the others?
And I was humbled
with joy at the honour of getting up at stupid o’clock in the morning to make
the long journey from the intern house to the vigil in time for eight. And at
participating in two 40 Days for Life
campaigns where basically for a month and a half of your life you get almost no
sleep, spend hours travelling to vigil sites, develop ear strain and thumb
twitches from pleading with volunteers by call and text to come pray, develop
abnormal eating patterns, and then you collapse at the end. Only to start a
'normal' (i.e.all-year-round -ed) vigil again at eight the next day.
And it was an
honour to have to calculate whether you can actually afford to buy a coffee to
get warm after a winter vigil shift because £60/week can disappear fast in
London! (But the good news is I discovered that if you go to the same Pret often enough you get free coffee
sometimes . J )
So what on earth possessed me to stay for a year, a whole nine extra months
when I only came for three??
Because it was an
honour to get to walk mothers through a difficult time in their lives. To help
mothers who have had abortions towards healing. And it was an honour to get to
hold the babies who otherwise wouldn’t be there. To be a part of the story of
people whose lives are going to change the world somehow just because they got
the chance to live. It was an honour to get to daily Mass and Adoration. It was
an honour to get to know people at the vigil, in the office, and even on their
way into an abortion centre before they changed their minds, who I can honestly
say are the most inspiring and amazing people I ever met or maybe ever will. It
was an honour to be part of the Good Counsel family and forge friendships I
know will last a lifetime.
It was an honour to
learn to love the rosary like never before—praying it for hours outside the
‘clinics’ each day and then the intern rosary in the evening changes you! It
was an honour to live by faith when there was no money left and yet you knew
that this was God’s work and somehow He was going to provide what was needed.
And to grow in every way beyond what you thought you ever would by doing things
you never thought you could (Organising and MC-ing for an event Lila Rose was
speaking at, seriously?!). It was an honour in uncountable ways to be part of
the mission at Good Counsel for a time and I know that it has changed me for
the good in so many ways (and hopefully knocked years off my time in
purgatory!).
On the putting up
with me front, well, I would have said it was the other way round..! But maybe
I can’t really comment on the subject of putting up with myself from someone
else’s point of view; it’s something slightly outside my range of experience.
Maybe it’s because I was always late for everything… Or would start ‘just one
more job’ as everyone was trying to close the office and go home for the
evening… Or procrastinate endlessly about things… Or
would grumble loudly about going to vigils…
However, leaving
such issues to one side, my three-months-that-became-a-year at Good Counsel is
now over and I’m away doing other things. What did I actually achieve? Nothing
that earth shaking; I just played a small part in a small organisation that’s
saving lives one mother and baby at a time. Basically, I am a drop in the
ocean, but, as Mother Teresa said, the ocean would be missing something without
my drop. So yes, if you were wondering about going to a vigil or joining the
intern programme, you should! It will be the hardest and best thing you ever
do. So let’s all be drops that will build into a deluge and turn our country
and our world PRO-LIFE! I can tell you, it is an honour.
For more information on joining the intern programme email us at fredathome2@yahoo.co.uk and see our website.
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