A searing, white-hot pain shoots though my left leg, and almost immediately in the right leg I get a second jolt. As I am falling I hear a voice say clearly, firmly, and only once, in a conversational voice: “Trust me.”
I am lying there on the floor at the side entrance to Immaculate Conception Church in Elmhurst, Illinois on Easter Sunday in my vestments ready for the 9 am Mass unable to move my lower legs at all.
However, I am experiencing clarity and a kind of serenity in my pain. I have confidence that I will get up again. I will walk again and I will get up from my weakness and my sins to serve the Church.
In the E.R., the orthopedist studies images of my legs and announces that I have bilateral ruptures of the quadriceps tendons. He’ll operate the next day and he sounds happy about it. Most orthopedists never see complete ruptures of quadriceps tendons, much less a bilateral presentation; he is getting a chance to shine.
The direction of my life is changed. My plans disappear replaced by prospects of a long rehabilitation. All I know is that I cannot walk any more and without the surgery I would never walk again. The attachments of my muscles to my lower legs are ruptured and I can see a step-off just above both knees where the tendons are supposed to attach.
My mother used to say that when God was handing out patience, I was behind the door. I must say that I haven’t had much patience with this healing process at times. Things lie on the floor where they were dropped because I can’t bend down to pick them up anymore. Why the h-ll did I drop that envelope, fork, ….?
It’s almost two years since the accident and I am walking unsteadily, but walking. Sometimes I don’t even need a cane. Often I think of that voice, “Trust me!” It’s a promise and a prayer that asks for my assent.
On my ordination card forty-nine years ago, I thanked those who had helped me along the path to the priesthood. I remember a particular phrase on that card where I thanked God that He helped me when I stumbled along the way to ordination. As I stumble along, I still seek His path and will walk it in whatever way I can.
“While from behind, a voice shall sound in your ears: ‘This is the way, walk in it,’ when you would walk to the right or the left.”
(Isaiah 30, some verse after 18).