Sainte Odile

Tomorrow we are hiking up Mount Sainte Odile. Saints are real important around here as you know. I'm not all about praying to/at/for them, but there is something important about them and their stories...

Odile was born into a noble family in the 7th century. She was born blind. Angry that Odile was both a girl and blind, her father was furious.
Before he could kill her, she was sent to a convent in Burgundy. At the age of 12, her blindness miraculously dissappeared at her baptism (?!). Her brother soon came back to bring her home to Alsace. They got home, and Odile's dad was so angry to see her that he killed her brother. Odile ummm, revived him (?!) and left home again, to go into hiding in Germany. Her father pursued her, but was deterred by divine avalanches and such (!?).

Her father, some years later fell ill. Odile came back home, finally, to nurse him in his final days (!!!!!!?????!!!!!?????). His heart being healed by her witness of Love, he founded a convent (and died), of which Odile became abbess (the big woman in charge) until her death. Well, quasi-death, because the nuns prayed so hard that she came back to life. (?!?!?) But she said "You don't know what you're missing," took communion, and then died again.

Bogus-seeming miracles aside, we can learn from Sainte Odile's story. In the face of a world that tells us that people are expendable, we can take a stand and say otherwise. God's grace redeems us (in French, racheter, "buy back"), and equips us to return into the depths to love those that hate and misunderstand us. If you're not all about divine avalanches and reviving people from death, DO be all about going into the depths armed with God's love. DO pray for God's strengthening love daily. And no, don't do it because you could become in charge of a convent. Do it because that's what God asks us to do.