Welcome!  I’m Elizabeth, another YAM-NW board member and cradle Catholic.  Beyond YAM you can find me serving as a lector at my parish and digging holes as an archaeologist.

This week, I was assigned the 2 ^nd reading this past Sunday (1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13).  We all know part of this reading from weddings – “Love is patient, love is kind…” but I have always preferred the verses further down:

                [Love] bears all things, believes all things,
                Hopes all things, endures all things.
                Love never fails.

However, as I prepared this past week, I found myself returning to a verse near the end.

                At present I know partially,
                Then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.

Throughout the week, I tried to define what it would mean to be fully known by someone.  This person would know and understand every thought and every emotion and its history.  They would understand, more than I understand, the joyful freedom I feel in the nature especially in the mountains and our National Parks.  That my job’s fieldwork and the required long drives are the 2 ^nd and 3 ^rd best environments for mediation after an Adoration chapel.  This individual would know exactly how each and every book I have read has changed me for the better.  They would see my two favorite heroines, Anne Shirley ( Anne of Green Gables) and Frances Nolan ( A Tree Grows in Brooklyn), in me and how each rereading brings me closer to the woman God created me to be.

Beyond joy and happiness, an individual who truly knows me would enter into my moments of anxiety and fear.  They would know that my jealousies come from watching others reach goals I had dreamed for myself and the fear that my decisions and actions have closed those doors.  Even if those dreams are ones I no longer want for myself.  They would understand that after every faux-pas, failure to reach a goal, or to simply love those around me I can’t help but beat myself up and am defensive because I cannot handle similar discussions about my behavior from others.  Finally, they would know my deep fear that my lack of visible emotion and logical thought process means I am not able to love the way I should.  I would never need to hide any thought or emotion from such an individual.  With this individual’s love I would be safe to feel and act with love, honesty, and vulnerability.

Here's the thing, I AM fully known by God.  He knew me before he formed me, He knew my role in His symphony of salvation before I was born.  He made me so that beautiful old churches and beautiful landscapes such as Yellowstone and the Badlands would bring me to a joy beyond tears and a worship beyond words.  He knew the complexities of culture and accomplishments of humanity would bring me to a greater understanding of Him.  That my heart joyfully shouts Glory! when I stand on Monk’s Mound in Cahokia, the largest man-made edifice at one of the largest pre-Columbian archaeological sites in North America.

He also knew as He created me that I would struggle with questions of my own self-worth and that the ambition that He gave me would also cause me to become jealous and anxious at times.  He knew that the injustices of the world would make me feel paralyzed.  And instead of being able to articulate this feeling of powerlessness I would instead give into anger.  He created me as a Ravenclaw but understands why I am mistaken for a Slytherin.  He knows why emotive love is difficult for me and why it causes me fear.

It can be so difficult to feel this safety and trust when the one who knows me fully feels remote and incomprehensible.  But He loves and knows me so well that He became man and then the bread and wine offered at Mass every day.  Because He loves me so completely and fully, He bears, believes, hopes, and endures so that I may come to Him.  Because He loves me I am safe to love others and to try to know them fully.  With His full knowledge of me, I am free to love others fully.  And how would the world change if we all loved others fully?

So I ask you what God asked me at the breaking of bread this past Sunday:
How would you love if you were fully known?