Clearing the Fog

Dearest readers,

It has been quite some time since my last blog post, so I’m sorry about that! Once classes moved online, I was really overwhelmed and was adjusting to quarantine life. Since school has ended, I kind of have just been decompressing. But alas, I have a pretty intense experience to share with you all! And buckle in, it’s a long one this time (to be expected, since I must make-up for lack of content somehow!)

Today, my family and I were driving back to New York from Washington D.C. after moving my sister out of her dorm room. It was a hot, humid, and sunny day today, and we were outside for about an hour doing a photo shoot for her graduation. It was a relatively enjoyable day, save the humidity, but it’s D.C. … what should I expect.

Anyway, we left D.C. around 12 noon, so we would be home around 5:30/6. I was scheduled to speak at a virtual Girl Scouts meeting at 3:30 about chastity. Dear reader, I am sure that if you are mathematically inclined, you already see that 3:30 pm is right smack in the middle of the commute. Thankfully, we were in no rush to be home, and with the country still on partial lockdown, we did not anticipate too much traffic. (This detail will definitely date this post, but that is perfectly fine and appropriate for a blog.)

So, we pulled over in New Jersey (as a New Yorker, it kills me to admit that I actually had a profound experience here…BLEGH) at a rest stop so I could hop on the Zoom call. It was such a blessing to share the message of love and chastity to this group of young women alongside a woman of faith whom I really look to! The Holy Spirit was really moving, and during the talk, I was my usual, collected self. However, the talk is not the central focus of this post. What happened after the talk is something I will never forget.

As soon as the call ended, my co-presenter texted a quick thanks and commendation of the presentation, I responded, and then I put on my noise-canceling headphones. But soon, a terrible, tangible anxiety gripped me. She is lying. You should have added something else. Who are you to give a talk on chastity, you who have made so many mistakes about this in the past? You are a hypocrite. You didn’t do a good enough job, and now these girls’ future failure to live chastity is solely your responsibility. They hated it. They laughed at you. Now they’re going to do everything the opposite of what you say.

This voice, this literal demon, hated so much that Jesus’ call for purity was so gracefully delivered. Now, let me clarify, I rarely get anxiety and am usually confident when I publicly speak, literally by the grace of God, so this was an odd experience for me. Most of the time, I present for school and such, but this beautiful topic – chastity – seemed to bother the Devil so much that he came straight for me. I called St. Michael to me, and I know he flew to me, but I felt the pang of these hateful voices. I quickly took a moment to gratefully note how much spiritual growth it took for me to get to this point of identifying these harrowing voices as NOT from God and of trying to cast them out.

I prayed that the Pentecostal power of the Holy Spirit would take the words that came out of my mouth and move the hearts of the young women I spoke to them in a way that would bring them closer to the Father. (This upcoming Sunday is Pentecost Sunday…I want to write a whole post on Pentecost Sunday and why it’s important to me, so I will link it here when I write it!) I shook the voices off as best I could as we got back on the road. About 10 minutes later, we approached the Verazzano bridge. But this typically breath-taking, panoramic view of the NYC skyline was bleary with a thick layer of fog. We couldn’t even see the end of the bridge, and when we looked out the windows, there was a solid, misty gray wall. We were, quite literally, in a fog. The fuzzy lights that faded into thin air in front of us cast an eerie glow through the ground-cloud. I was reminded of the terrifying, soul-sucking Death Eaters from Harry Potter, and I almost expected to see one emerge from the fog.

Suddenly, another feeling of anxiety gripped me. This fog will not clear. Be afraid of what you can’t see. You will not see the Sun. This world is gray and cold. There is no clarity. There is no light here. I am going to be really vulnerable right now and want to express how genuinely afraid I was for a moment. Not because of the fog. But because of the wretched feeling I got from it. These are not my normal reactions to the weather. Sure, I get startled if thunders cracks relatively loudly, or if the wind blows powerfully. But I don’t get gripped with fear or anxiety. What was different this time?

Immediately, I felt something force me to remember the voices from before. The voices swirled around inside my head, cackling. You shouldn’t talk to girls about chastity. Don’t brainwash them. They will never accept you. They will never accept God, especially from you. None of them will ever live chastity just because of you. Swirling, swirling, swirling so fast that they blurred and created an internal fog, identical to the fog surrounding the car. I felt my breath catch in my throat. Should I say something to my family? They would think you’re crazy. They would never believe that this fog was because you spoke about chastity. More voices. More cackling.

I gasped for air, searching, begging for any help from my saint-friends or the angels. I felt St. Joan of Arc reminding me that “I am am not afraid, I was born to do this.” (Anyone who knows me personally knows how deeply connected I am to St. Joan.) She reminded me of my gift to speak the truth. Through my headphones, I heard the slow beginning of a song. The piano was quiet, steady, powerful, but I could barely hear it. The voices were still screaming at me, accusing me. Suddenly, I heard the word “altar” break through the fog. It was like seeing a lighthouse through the dark, or clutching a buoy thrown by a lifeguard. I tried to listen more intently to the song, and not the voices. “…as I fall down to my knees! Don’t let me drown, drown, drown!” The female voice was strong and powerful.

The nasty voices were finally retreating, and the second verse played. The voices were still there, but more faint. They weren’t even intelligible anymore, just some snickering here and there. There was a dramatic rest in the music before I heard:

“God, keep my head above water! Don’t let me drown, it gets harder! I’ll meet you there at the altar…”

I clutched these words to myself, and cried them deep in my heart. And suddenly, on a powerful, crashing downbeat, the voices were gone. They shattered like broken glass and sprinted quickly from me. I looked around, and out my window, I could make out the beautiful NYC skyline faintly. The fog was retreating. To the right, there was still a heavy fog, but the clarity coming from the West was hopeful. The song ended, and I looked down at my phone to see what song had just played. It was Avril Lavigne’s Head Above Water. I did a double take. Avril Lavigne? The same girl who sang the pop songs from the early 2000s?? The tie girl??

I immediately hit replay. Because that is who I am as a person. Spotify has a cool feature that gives you an insight into the story behind the lyrics, and I discovered that Avril wrote this song during a time when she was suffering from Lyme Disease. I literally had no idea that she had gone through that. I encourage you to read about her story more because it is not my story to tell.

As we reached the end of the bridge, the fog had almost completely cleared, and the sun was shining, thinly veiled by the fog. I looked up at it, and I remembered something that had come to me in prayer a few months ago regarding the analogy of the Sun and the Son (of God); how He is our hope in the midst of despair; our security in times of uncertainty.

Something else that came to mind was a podcast I listened to on the trip down yesterday from Jason Evert, the founder of the Chastity Project, and he had mentioned that beauty is so good that it should be veiled. And from that (bear with me here; I know my brain can jump around to a lot of seemingly unconnected things!), I remembered my first time wearing a chapel veil in Lourdes! This memory grounded me, re-confirmed my belovedness and femininity, and validated everything I had presented to the girls; it debunked the voices’ lie that I was a hypocrite. I am not perfect, but I do strive for deep relationship with God by embracing chastity and femininity, and it is the core of my identity.

I am grateful Jesus and His beautiful angels truly came to comfort me! He brought me back to the cause of this attack from the voices: I spoke the truth of God’s love to this group of young women. At this moment, I looked down at my phone, and saw that someone had followed my Instagram for this blog (@amusingwriter). It was one of the young women from the group I had just spoken to (I had given this account as my contact information in case they had any lingering questions, so it’s not like it was pure coincidence). This was His reassurance! I had reached the heart of at least one of these young women, and that was enough to show me that I was not a failure, debunking yet another of the voices’ lies. God showed me how He delighted in His message being spoken through me. I breathed a sigh of relief and released the tension in my body that I didn’t even notice before.

I listened to Head Above Water on repeat for the rest of the ride home. My heart was still racing from the voices, and I was immediately reminded of Jesus’ own temptation. He was tempted and lied to by the Devil, but immediately after Satan left Him, Christ was comforted by angels. I knew that St. Michael definitely had something to do with chasing away those awful voices. I took a few deep breaths and let the song play over and over.

By the time we got to my house, the sky was crystal clear, save a few fluffy, white clouds, and the sun shone brightly. The fog was cleared. The voices were gone. After receiving some lovely belated (because of delivery delays due to the pandemic) birthday gifts from my family (a beautiful shirt from Blessed is She and Ascension Press’s Great Adventure Bible — neither of these are sponsored, trust me, this blog does not reach far enough for either ministry to know who I am…although one day I hope they might, but not for sponsorship purposes…hopefully for content purposes) and a dear friend of mine (a lovely statue of Our Lady of Lourdes — read blog posts about my pilgrimage to Lourdes here and in the link about veils from above), I had finally shaken the coldness left over from the voices.

A few hours later, the lovely woman I had just presented with sent me a message with a link to a t-shirt with a St. Joan of Arc quote on it and some information about a parish in her name. (As I said before, anyone who knows me knows of my affinity for this inspirational warrior saint!) This is what the shirt said:

“In His strength, I will dare until I die.”

I was dumbfounded. DUMFOUNDED, I tell you. What a way to really kick a dog while he’s down (aka. kick Satan in the butt after defeating him in his own brutal attacks). St. Joan was just checking in on me, making sure that I was fully recovered from the dramatic attack, and I thanked her hundredfold for helping me fight yet another battle. Knowing her, she was definitely right in the thick of it right, alongside Mama Mary, and was kind enough to make sure that I came out relatively unscathed! But it made me think…

You know what, I will dare to speak the truth of God’s love. I will not stop sharing the love, peace, freedom, and joy of living chastity. And I will never, ever be silenced by the enemy, whose attention I have grabbed because of my rejection of his ways. It is true that the Devil attacks all people, but he gets even angrier and goes even harder on those who actively attack him back.

But I say, bring it on, world. I am not alone in this battle, I am not afraid, and I will not lose, for I am with God.

Boldy, chastely, and lovingly,