The Apostle Falls: Simon Peter Denies Christ

The fall of Simon Peter was a scandal of Biblical proportions. His three-time denial of Jesus is recounted in every Gospel, but all is not as it first seems to be.

Note from Father Gordon MacRae: At Beyond These Stone Walls, I try to present many important matters of faith, but I also try not to overlook the most important of all: Salvation. In 2023 we began what I hope will be an annual Holy Week and Easter Season tradition by composing past Holy Week posts into a personal Easter retreat. The posts follow a Scriptural Way of the Cross. You are invited to ponder, pray and share them in our season of Highest Hope. They are linked again at the end of today’s post.

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Holy Week, March 27, 2024 by Fr Gordon MacRae

I had been 17 years old for only one month when I graduated from high school in May, 1970. Unlike most of my peers, I was too young to go to war in Southeast Asia. Some of my friends who went never came back. On my 17th birthday in April,1970, President Richard Nixon ordered U.S. troops into Cambodia while the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam began. Across this nation, college campuses erupted into violence and walkouts. At Kent State in Ohio, four students were killed by national guardsmen sent to prevent rioting. In response to the protests, Congress passed an amendment to block U.S. troop incursions beyond South Vietnam.

The measure did not forbid bombing, however, so U.S. air strikes continued and increased in Cambodia until 1973. The combined effects of the incursion and bombings completely disrupted Cambodian life, driving millions of peasants from their ancestral lands into civil war. The Khmer Rouge was formed and then became one of the deadliest regimes of the 20th century. Meanwhile, the United States was yet again in a state of rage. Satan loves rage.

This was the setting of my life at seventeen. It seemed that evil was all around me then, but not yet in me. As 1970 gave way to 1971 and I turned eighteen, The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty was published by Harper and Row. I do not today recall how or why I came to have a copy of it so hot off the presses, but I read The Exorcist within weeks of its publication. I cannot say that I devoured it. At one point, I feared it might devour me.

The book left a vivid imprint on me, so much so that halfway through it I had to set it aside for a month. In its pages I came face to face with the personification of evil, accepting that it was a catalyst behind so much of this world’s agony. But I also had no delusion that I was any match for it. William Peter Blatty’s disturbing story of demonic possession seemed to be an allegory for what was happening in the world in which I lived.

Two years later, in 1973, the film version of The Exorcist was produced to scare the hell out of (or into) the rest of the nation that had not yet read the book. Because I did read the book, I was somewhat steeled against the traumatic impact that so many felt from the film. Its influence was evident in its awards. The Exorcist won the Academy Award for Best Writing and Screenplay for William Peter Blatty, and Golden Globe Awards for Best Motion Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Actor.

An Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress went to Linda Blair for her unforgettable portrayal of Regan, the possessed and tormented young target of an unnamed demon. The film’s producers hired a priest, Father William O’Malley, to portray “Father Dyer,” one of the priest-characters in the book and film. That lent itself to an aura of realism present throughout the book.

Ultimately, The Exorcist also set in motion my resolve to find something meaningful to embrace in life. I began to explore more deeply the Catholic faith that my family previously gave only a Christmas and Easter nod to. I felt called to a journey of faith just as most of my peers were abandoning theirs, but it did not last long. At the same time, my family was disintegrating and I was powerless to stem that tide and the void it left behind.

I was haunted by a sense that even as I embraced the Sacraments of Salvation, evil and its relentless pursuit of souls was never far behind in this or any age. Both seemed in pursuit of me. I was living in a verse reminiscent of Francis Thompson’s epic poem, “The Hound of Heaven” which begins:

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days ;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years ;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the midst of tears
I hid from Him.

Not even Satan can hide from God. I wrote the previously untold story of my path to priesthood on the 41st anniversary of my ordination. It was “Priesthood Has Never Been Going My Way.”

While pursuing a degree in psychology in the later l970’s, I had an interest in the work of psychoanalyst Erik Erikson and his stages of human development. Erikson predicted that in the latter years of our lives — the years I am in now — we enter a crisis of “generativity versus despair.” Many of us begin recalling and recalibrating the past, especially at “inflection points,” the points at which we changed. At this writing, I am 70 years old and counting. I realized only in later years that The Exorcist was an unexpected inflection point in my life, a point at which I turned from one path onto another.

The Betrayer Judas Iscariot

Even at age seventeen, the Catholic experience of Holy Week became a most important time for me. I began then to see clearly that the events of Holy Week were a nexus between the promises of Heaven and the pursuits of hell. The sneakiest thing Satan has ever done in the modern world was to get so many in this world to cease believing in him, and then to marginalize God. Many in the current generation calling itself “woke” now believe that Satan, if even real at all, has just been misunderstood.

The nightmarish story of The Exorcist was like a battleground. I was deeply impacted by a scene near the end of the book and film when the Exorcist, Father Damien Karras, tricked the demon into leaving young Regan and entering himself. He then leapt through a high window to his death on the Georgetown streets of Washington, DC down below. The scene set off a national debate. Had Father Karras despaired and committed suicide? Or had he heroically saved the devil’s victim by sacrificing himself?

Just as I was recently pondering this idea, I was struck by the photo atop this section of my post. It is my friend, Pornchai Moontri standing against a map of Southeast Asia which, I just now realized, is also where this post began. I had seen the photo previously in his January 2024 post, “A New Year of Hope Begins in Thailand,” but I failed to look more closely at it then.

Look closely at the T-shirt Pornchai is wearing in the photo. It quotes another inflection point in both his life and mine. His T-shirt bears a quote from St. Maximilian Kolbe who became a Patron Saint for us and who deeply impacted our lives. Maximilian also sacrificed his life to save another. His simple but profound quote on Pornchai’s T-shirt is, “Without Sacrifice,There Is No Love.”

That is how Father Damien Karras defeated the devil. Pornchai today says it is also how he was released from the prison of his past. And it is how Jesus conquered death and opened for us a path to Heaven. Sacrifice is the “Narrow Gate” He spoke of, the passage to our true home.

Earlier this Lent, I wrote “A Devil in the Desert for the Last Temptation of Christ.” It was about how Satan first set his demonic sights in pursuit of Jesus Himself. What utter arrogance! At the end of that account, having given it his all, the devil in the desert “departed from him until an opportune time.” (Luke 4:13)

By his very nature, the betrayer Judas Iscariot provided this opportune time. The Gospel gives many hints about his greed and ambition, traits that leave many open to the subtle infiltration of evil. Satan plays the long game, not only in human history, but also in a person’s life and soul. In the allegorical book, The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis laid out the long, subtle trail upon which we humans risk the slippery slope toward evil:

“It does not matter how small sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge a person away from the Light and out into the Nothing ... . Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.”

— The Screwtape Letters, Letter #12, p. 60-61

Judas Iscariot gave Satan a lot to work with. He served as a treasurer for the Apostles but he embezzled from the treasury. The Gospel of John described him as “a devil” (6:70-71), “a thief” (12:6), “a son of destruction” (17:12).

The Gospel makes clear that Jesus was betrayed because “Satan entered into Judas called Iscariot” (Luke 22:3). At the Passover meal (John 13:26-30), Jesus gave a morsel of bread to Judas. When Judas consumed it, “Satan entered into him.” That would not have been possible had Judas truly believed in the Christ. The Gospel of John then ends this passage with a chilling account of the state of Judas’ life and soul: “He immediately went out, and it was night.” (John 13:30).

In the scene laid out in the Gospel of John above, Satan finds his opportune time when Judas let him in. I wrote of a deeper meaning in this account in one of our most-read posts of Holy Week, “Satan at the Last Supper: Hours of Darkness and Light.”

The Turning of Simon Peter

The Eucharist had just been instituted and shared by Jesus among his Apostles. All the Gospels capture these moments. All are inspired, but Luke is my personally most inspiring source. The Evangelist cites at the very end of the meal its true purpose: “This chalice which is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 23:20). Jesus adds that “The Son of Man goes as it has been determined, but woe to that man by whom he is betrayed.”

The others at the Table of the Lord are alarmed by all this talk of Jesus being betrayed. They launch immediately into a dispute about who among them would do such a thing, who among them would never do such a thing, and finally who among them is the greatest (Luke 22:26). Simon Peter leads that last charge, but first we need to look at what has come before. How and why did Simon come to be called Peter? The answer opens some fascinating doors leading to events to come.

On a hillside in Bethsaida, a fishing village on the north side of the Sea of Galilee, a vast crowd gathered to hear Jesus. They numbered about 5,000 men. This was Simon’s hometown so he likely knew many of them. After a time, the disciples asked Jesus to send the crowd away to find food. Jesus instructed the disciples to give them something to eat. They protested that they had only seven loaves of bread and a few meager fish.

In a presage of the Eucharistic Feast, Jesus blessed and broke the bread, and with the few fish, a symbol of Christ Himself, the disciples fed the entire multitude on the hillside (Luke 9:10-17). Immediately following this, Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” Simon replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Simon is thus given a new and transformative name and mission:

“You are Peter (in Greek, Petra and in Aramaic, Cephas — both meaning “rock”) and on this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

This is more than a figurative gesture. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Hades is the abode of the dead, the place where souls descend through its gates to an eternal Godless realm of the dead (Psalm 9:13, 17 and Isaiah 38:10) where they are held until the Last Judgment. It is the precursor to our traditional concept of hell being under the Earth, the place of the habitation of evil forces that bring about death.

In Hebrew tradition, the Foundation Stone of the Temple at Jerusalem, called in Hebrew “eben shetiyyah,” was a massive stone believed since ancient times to seal and cap off a long shaft leading to the netherworld (Revelation 9:1-2 and 20:1-3). It is this particular stone that the Evangelist seems to refer to as the rock upon which Jesus will build His Church. The Jerusalem Temple, resting securely on this impenetrable rock, was thus conceived to be the very center of the Cosmos and the junction between Heaven and Hell.

Jesus assures Peter, from the Biblical Greek meaning “rock,” that Peter and his successors will have the figurative keys to these gates and the power to hold error and evil at bay. By being equated with the very Foundation Stone itself, Peter is given the unique status of a prime minister, a position to be held for as long as the Kingdom stands.

Later in Luke’s Gospel, Simon Peter insists that he is “ready to go to prison and even death” with Jesus. Jesus corrects him saying, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” (Luke 22 : 31-32)

We all know, now, that Peter’s faith did fail. It gave way to fear and led him to three times deny being with, or even knowing, Jesus. But there is a lot more packed within that brief statement of Jesus above. The word “you” appears three times in the short verse. Like the rest of Luke’s Gospel, it is written in Biblical Greek. The word used for the first two occasions of “you” is plural. It refers to all of the Apostles, except Judas who had already gone out into the night.

The third use of the word “you” in that passage is singular, however, referring only to Peter himself. Jesus knew he would fall because his human nature had already fallen. But, “When you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” Peter’s three-time denial of Jesus pales next to the betrayal of Judas from which there is no return. The story of Peter’s denial is remedied, and he “turns again” in the post Resurrection appearance at the Sea of Galilee (John 21:15-19).

Jesus brings restorative justice to Peter’s three-time denial by asking him three times to “feed my lambs,” “tend my sheep,” “feed my sheep.” Then Jesus tells Peter what to expect of his unique apostolate:

“Truly, truly I say to you, when you were young, you fastened your own belt and walked where you would; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will fasten your belt for you and carry you where you do not wish to go”

— John 21:18

This was to foretell the assaults from beyond the Gates of Hell to which the Church will be subjected. And then, in John 21:19, He spoke His last words to Peter which, in Matthew 4:19, were also His first words to Peter. Through them, He speaks now also to us in this Holy Week of trials, assailed from all sides:

“Follow me.”

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“Stay sober and alert for your opponent the devil prowls about the world like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Resist him steadfast in the faith knowing that your brethren throughout the world are undergoing the same trials.”

— First Letter of Peter 5:8-9

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Photo by Nicolas Grevet (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 DEED)

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: You are invited to make our Holy Week posts a part of your Holy Week and Easter Season observance. I cannot claim that they are bound in Earth or Heaven, but we will retain them at our “Special Report” feature until the conclusion of the Easter Season at Pentecost:

The Passion of the Christ in an Age of Outrage (2020)

Overshadowing Holy Week with forced pandemic restrictions and political outrage recalls the Bar Kochba revolt of AD 132 against the Roman occupation of Jerusalem.

Satan at the Last Supper: Hours of Darkness and Light (2020)

The central figures present before the Sacrament for the Life of the World are Jesus on the eve of sacrifice and Satan on the eve of battle to restore the darkness.

Waking Up in the Garden of Gethsemane (2019)

The Agony in the Garden, the First Sorrowful Mystery, is a painful scene in the Passion of the Christ, but in each of the Synoptic Gospels the Apostles slept through it.

The Apostle Falls: Simon Peter Denies Christ (2024)

The fall of Simon Peter was a scandal of biblical proportions. His three-time denial of Jesus is recounted in every Gospel, but all is not as it first seems to be.

Behold the Man, as Pilate Washes His Hands (2014)

‘Ecce Homo,’ an 1871 painting of Christ before Pilate by Antonio Ciseri, depicts a moment woven into Salvation History and into our very souls. ‘Shall I crucify your king?’

The Chief Priests Answered, ‘We Have No King but Caesar’ (2017)

The Passion of the Christ has historical meaning on its face, but a far deeper story lies beneath where the threads of faith and history connect to awaken the soul.

Simon of Cyrene Compelled to Carry the Cross (2023)

Simon of Cyrene was just a man on his way to Jerusalem but the scourging of Jesus was so severe that Roman soldiers feared he may not live to carry his cross alone.

Dismas, Crucified to the Right: Paradise Lost and Found (2012)

Who was Saint Dismas, the Penitent Thief, crucified to the right of Jesus at Calvary? His brief Passion Narrative appearance has deep meaning for Salvation.

To the Spirits in Prison: When Jesus Descended into Hell (2022)

The Apostles Creed is the oldest statement of Catholic belief and apostolic witness. Its Fifth Article, what happened to Jesus between the Cross and the Resurrection, is a mystery to be unveiled.

Mary Magdalene: Faith, Courage, and an Empty Tomb (2015)

History unjustly sullied her name without evidence, but Mary Magdalene emerges from the Gospel a faithful, courageous, and noble woman, an Apostle to the Apostles.

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Prison Journal: A Midsummer Night’s Mid-Life Crisis

As major transitions loom for our friends behind These Stone Walls, Social Psychologist Erik Erikson was the catalyst for a midsummer night’s mysterious dream.

In eleven years of writing from prison for These Stone Walls, this has always been the most difficult time of year to produce a post. Labor Day is looming in the United States, and in 2020 it is on the latest date possible. It’s a time of staff vacations in prison so pretty much every department is understaffed. This year, Labor Day conspires with a pandemic for limited access to everything.

All outside vendors, visitors, volunteers, program facilitators, and medical providers are currently barred from entry. Visitors have been barred for months. What was once a three-hour visiting period twice per week with family or friends was reduced last year to ninety minutes. In the time of Covid-19 it is now reduced to a single monthly 45-minute no-contact visit from behind glass with masks, and it has to be arranged three weeks in advance.

And as you know by now, my friend Pornchai Moontri and I have the added stress of knowing that major change is coming but we know neither the day nor the hour. Each day I face the possibility that I could return from work to an empty cell and no chance to wish him well and give him my blessing. Such is the nature of prison.

We do have a plan for when Pornchai finally arrives in Thailand after an ordeal in ICE detention. I hope you have read our recent posts, Pornchai’s “Hope and Prayers for My Friend Left Behind,” and my bombshell post, “Human Traffic: The ICE Deportation of Pornchai Moontri.” These have been the most visited posts of the year during our most difficult days of the year. Now, more than ever, our faith in Divine Mercy is getting a workout.

All of this has conspired to create a perfect storm lending itself to anxiety and, for me, a mid-life crisis. It is not my first, nor will it likely be my last. When I told a friend that I think I am now having one, he sent me this story about a midlife crisis. It is not a true story - at least, I hope it isn’t true - but it made me laugh and I needed a good laugh right now. Maybe you do, too:

• “Approaching her sixtieth birthday, Mildred lapsed into a depression that sent her to a therapist. He diagnosed her downward spiral as a possible midlife crisis, and assured her that it is a very common phenomenon. The therapist suggested that Mildred take up something new and challenging, perhaps something adventurous.

• “‘Well, I’ve always wanted to try horseback riding,’ said Mildred. Affirmed as a great choice by the therapist, she stopped at the library and checked out a couple of books on horseback riding. When she felt she had a grasp of the rudimentary details, Mildred ventured out on a Saturday morning for her first ride.

• “Approaching the horse with some trepidation, Mildred placed her left foot into the stirrup, grabbed the crop atop the saddle just as the books suggested, and found mounting the horse to be surprisingly easy. Then the horse began an enjoyably slow but steady pace. As it worked up to a more pronounced gallop, however, Mildred found herself growing anxious.

• “The horse picked up a little more speed, but Mildred’s anxiety grew along with it. Fearing that she was slipping from the saddle, she began to panic. Clutching the horse in her panic as it gained speed, Mildred began to scream for help as she struggled to hold on for dear life. Then, just as Mildred began to tumble completely from the saddle, Walter the Wal-Mart Greeter rushed over, and unplugged the horse.”

Erik Erikson on the Origins of Our Midlife Crises

I have known and counseled many people in the midst of a midlife crisis. I’ve had more than one of them myself. It’s a time when values and beliefs are questioned and sometimes even abandoned. The concept is not at all new in psychology or literature. In a few past posts on These Stone Walls, I have written that Dante Alighieri began the Inferno, Part One of his famous 14th Century literary masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, with what may very well be world literature’s first description of a midlife crisis:

• “When I had journeyed half of our life’s way, I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray. Ah, it is hard to speak of what it was, that savage forest, dense and difficult, which even in recall renews my fear. So bitter — death is hardly more severe! I cannot clearly say how I had entered that wood; I was so full of sleep just at the point where I abandoned the true path. But to recall what good I found there, I must also tell you the other things I saw.”

I was once an avid student of psychology before studying theology. Dante put a spiritual spin on the “shadowed forest” of his midlife abandonment of ‘the true path.” That is fitting, for a midlife crisis is as much a spiritual phenomenon as a psychological one. Its evidence is just as Dante described it seven centuries ago.

Since Sigmund Freud became the Father of Psychoanalytic Theory in the early Twentieth Century, the various efforts to understand what makes us tick are fascinating. I once wrote a controversial TSW post about the secrets we keep even from ourselves entitled, “Be Wary of Crusaders! The Devil Sigmund Freud Knew Only Too Well.”

But I have since abandoned a good deal of psychoanalytic theory and practice as bunk. To be clear, the practice of it is often bunk but the science behind it is sometimes still helpful. There is one psychoanalytic pioneer, however, whose work has withstood the test of time and contrasts well with human experience.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Austrian-born Harvard social psychologist Erik Erikson developed his Stages of Psychosocial Development which today remains a standard for understanding how we develop psychologically. Much of his work became pivotal for comprehension of one particular stage of growth: adolescence, the most stressful time in the life of every parent. Erikson defined the central crisis of adolescence as one of identity verses role confusion.

Though he never used it, the term “Identity Crisis” has its origin in his work. For parents, an adolescent identity crisis results in experimentation, sometimes recklessly so, and a questioning of the parental status quo and value system. It is the time in which many parents are stressed to the limit.

The identity crisis is but one of Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial development. The other stages and their respective life crises are, in a nutshell: infancy (basic trust vs. mistrust), early childhood (autonomy vs. shame and doubt), preschool years (initiative vs. guilt), middle childhood (industry vs. inferiority), adolescence and its crisis of identity, young adulthood (intimacy vs. isolation), middle adulthood (generativity vs. stagnation), and late adulthood (integrity vs. despair).

My Midsummer Night’s Anxious Dream

For this post, my focus is on the backdrop of every midlife crisis. Erikson never actually used the term, but it clearly has its origin in his stages of development. It comes in between the last two of the eight stages, between middle and late adulthood when the human psyche naturally begins a nostalgic, and sometimes excruciating examination of the past and a measurement of one’s place in it. Our minds are very complex, as is this subject, so let me stick my neck out a little with a personal example.

Early in the morning of August 17, 2020, I was awakened at about 3:00 AM by a troubling dream that seemed to play out in epic performance. It needs a little background. I began religious life as a member of the Capuchin Order, one of the main branches of the Franciscans. It was while a member of the order that I began formal studies in psychology working toward both undergraduate and graduate degrees

My mentor in this was Father Benedict Groeschel who years later would part from the Capuchins along with the late, Father Andrew Apostoli to become founders of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal. Like them, I, too, left the Order on very good terms, but in a very different direction: to study for diocesan priesthood. I wrote about how that experience, from almost day one, became a crisis in its own right in “Priesthood, the Signs of the Times & the Sins of the Times.”

I don’t have to tell you where that change in my path ultimately led me. Now, at age 67, I look back over the decades and find myself spontaneously doing exactly what Erik Erikson predicted. My mind wanders often into a sort of inventory of my life and my place in it. All these years later, I find myself questioning my decision to leave my religious community, wondering to this day whether I did the right thing.

It’s interesting that I still, after forty years, refer to the Order is “my community.” The inner struggles that we have are often expressed in dreams, and in dreams my conflict is evident. The early morning dream of August 17 this year was no exception. It was both then and now. Dreams often have temporal confusion.

In the dream, I was in my Capuchin habit at Mass with my community, but I was also a prisoner having just been released on a sort of leave from prison. I was the age that I am right now, but everyone else in the dream was as they were back then. Except for my friend, Pornchai, who was with me at the Mass. In the dream, I was stricken by how out of place we were. Pornchai and I were deeply wounded by life while all the others present had been sheltered - just as I would want them to have been — from the sort of trials we have endured.In the dream, before the Mass ended, I had to leave. I removed my habit and left it there in the chapel. Others gathered at the door as Pornchai and I walked away. He asked me, “Where are we going?” I answered mysteriously, “We’re going to where this path leads.” It was then that I woke up, troubled, anxious and depressed. Only later in the day did I realize that the date was August 17, the day that I first professed vows in the Order forty-five years ago.

As I look back with some nostalgia, I realize that those years were among the happiest of my life. Then something happened that suddenly altered them. It is a story that I have never before told, but I know that someday I will tell it. It adds no light, but only more mystery, to the path I ended up upon.

That path led down a long and winding road to where I am right now, approaching 26 years in prison for crimes that never took place. This is not the sort of “community” I had in mind when I first discerned a vocation to religious life all those decades ago. It is also not lost on me that this condemnation and imprisonment began in 1994 on September 23, the feast day of the most famous of the Capuchin saints, Padre Pio, who would later insinuate himself behind These Stone Walls with us.

He Knows What He Is About

Over the last decade at These Stone Walls, we have told a story very much like the one Dante Aligheri told seven centuries ago in The Divine Comedy. It may have been divine, but it did not always feel much like a comedy. Like Dante, having strayed from the path I was on - though not by choice - I entered the dark wood of prison and brought the readers of These Stone Walls with me. Across this decade, we told a tale of all that I had found there, both the good and the bad. In the end, it is sometimes difficult to tell the difference between the two.

My friend, Pornchai Moontri is an example. On the surface of life he was seen as just another bad actor who made terrible choices that led him on a path to prison. My recent post, “Human Traffic: The ICE Deportation of Pornchai Moontri” pulled back the veil to reveal his life as a victim of horrific crime long before he was driven into one of his own.

Thanks to readers, that post found its way into several internet sites dedicated to addressing human trafficking. Pornchai’s story was told prolifically at These Stone Walls, but it remained hidden in plain sight until one of you shared it in just the right place. Whoever you were, you acted as a bond of connection between persons, a very important concept that I will return to below. In my midlife crisis dream, Pornchai asked me, “Where are we going?” I told him, “We’re going to where this path leads.” It seemed to me to be a strange response until I pondered it. Our path - the paths of all of us in life - lead along the threads of connection placed there by God through us - through the bad as well as through the good.

These Stone Walls became Pornchai’s religious community, the community of faith that formed him. His leaving, and leaving me behind, is painful, but at least one TSW reader has equated him to Timothy, the companion of Saint Paul. In that sense he is not leaving. He is being sent.

Where do I go from here? I have not even pondered that yet. My priority at the moment is to do what I can to spare my friend from the one-size-fits-all nightmare of ICE detention. Thanks to some of you sharing my posts in the right places, there is now a glimmer of hope for that. Just a glimmer, so please pray for that intention. I hope that in a month or two, These Stone Walls will have a voice from Catholic Thailand.

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From the voice of Saint John Henry Newman: “Some Definite Service.”

“God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which he has not committed to another. I have my mission. I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next.

“Somehow, I am necessary for His purposes... I have a part in this great work. I am a link in a chain, a bond of connections between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it, if I but keep His commandments and serve Him in my calling.

“Therefore I will trust him, whatever, wherever I am. I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him. If I am in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. My sickness, or perplexity or sorrow may be necessary causes of some great end which is quite beyond us.

“He does nothing in vain. He may prolong my life, He may shorten it, He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends, he may throw me among strangers, He may make me feel desolate, hide my future from me - Still, He knows what He is about.”

— St. John Henry Cardinal Newman - March 7, 1848

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NOTE FROM FATHER GORDON MACRAE: Mine is not the only “Prison Journal” in circulation these days. I have just pre-ordered my copy of the soon-published Prison Journal of George Cardinal Pell from Ignatius Press which promises to be a spiritual classic. You may also like these lesser classics from These Stone Walls:

• Priesthood, the Signs of the Times and the Sins of the Times

• Pornchai Moontri: Hope and Prayers for My Friend Left Behind

• Human Traffic: The ICE Deportation of Pornchai Moontri

• Priesthood in the Real Presence and the Present Absence