Faith

Maureen Crowley
Heil

When missionaries visit our office, sometimes they "go shopping" in our storage closet. Parishes donate their surplus vestments and sacred vessels to us, and we, in turn, make them available to clergy in the missions.
We usually have an assortment of vestments; chalices and ciborium are scarcer. A monstrance is rarer than hen's teeth.
Imagine my surprise when a colleague brought a big black case into my office, asking, "Can you use this?" 'This' was a three-foot-tall monstrance, made unusable because it was missing its lumen -- the glass housing in which the Eucharist is held for Adoration. I was told that lumens of the exact size are difficult and expensive to come by.
Challenge accepted.
Through the power of the internet, I found what seemed to be the perfect size in an Italian shop willing to ship it. It was non-returnable. I said a prayer and bought it. They didn't know about my secret weapon, my husband, The Engineer.
In my house, we do not call an electrician or a plumber. The Engineer does it all. Car trouble? No trouble. The Engineer once drove a car with a 1976 body housing a 1974 engine. Its 1975 standard transmission replaced the original automatic one.
He made the lumen fit.
The list of people asking for a monstrance is long. First was Father Bernard Zulu of Chipata, Zambia, who spends weekends at a rural outstation where supplies are limited to say the least.
Providentially, I would be traveling to Malawi the next month, a mere 2.5-hour drive from Chipata, and could deliver the monstrance myself if I checked it with my luggage. But how would I accomplish this?
Enter The Engineer. He attached a metal handle to the top and sides and casters to the bottom of the case so that it rolled like a suitcase.
In the airport terminal, the man behind the luggage drop counter said, "I saw you come in. I was hoping you'd come to me! What is in that case?"
My answer? "Are you Catholic?" "I was..." he replied. When told it was a monstrance, his jaw dropped, and he asked to see it. As the case opened, his eyes lit up. He called his coworkers over to explain the treasure revealed.
He told me he always loved the smell of incense at Adoration. I told him it still smelled the same and that Jesus would love to see him. I thanked him for his part in helping people a world away come to love the smell, too, as they adored the Lord. Then the big black case rolled away towards its Zambian outstation home.

- Maureen Crowley Heil is Director of Programs and Development for the Pontifical Mission Societies, Boston.

• 

  'One Nation Under God'Archbishop Richard G. Henning

• 

  Preserving human voices and faces: World Communications Day 2026Sister Hosea Rupprecht

• 

  The Communion Rite -- Breaking of the BreadFather Robert M. O'Grady

• 

  The Work of Your Hands in the MissionsMaureen Crowley Heil

• 

  Knowing GodScott Hahn