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Consecration Aids: 24: I Know The Nurse
Fr. Christopher Lee, SMM
D OCTORS are a busy lot – especially our city doctors.
The more specialized they are in their own field, the more people flock to them. Nor is it at all surprising or unusual at times to have to wait for hours on end in the waiting-room of a doctor’s office.
I remember my first visit to the office of one of the most competent doctors in the New York area. Remember it ? – How could I ever forget it! It was one of those humid stifling summer days with not a breeze in sight. I had to sit in the crowded anteroom and wait approximately three hours before my turn came to see the doctor. (Confidentially, if I hadn’t had a stomach ulcer at the time, I think I would have developed one that afternoon!)
Now you wouldn’t believe it, but shortly after, while still under the doctor’s care, I found out that I wouldn’t have to wait any more before seeing him. Now, don’t get me wrong; It’s not because I’m better than anybody else, or because of the Roman collar I wear (I had it on the first time I went there, too !), but it’s simply because now the lady in white at the desk (I mean the nurse of course), knows me. She knows my busy schedule and pressing duties as a priest, so she up and spoke for me with the doctor.
Our Lady Has Already Briefed Him
The result? Well, today, I no sooner step into the waiting-room than she politely greets me, asks me a question or two concerning the general state of my health and immediately proceeds to contact the doctor. Within a matter of seconds sometimes she issues forth smilingly from the inner office, beckons me and discreetly ushers me into the doctor’s presence.
”Good to see you again, Father!” the doctor says, ’I understand that you’re not feeling too well, lately,” or, ”I hear you’re doing fine!” Then, of course, I know the lady in white has already briefed him on my general condition and that he’s ready to take over from there.
Spiritually, I’m afraid, lots of people are still waiting in the anteroom of the Divine Physician’s office. I don’t know about you, or the fellow next to you, but I must confess that it took me a long, long time to learn how to avoid the waiting-room in my visits to the Doctor Who resides night and day in the tabernacle of the altar. Frankly, I must avow that it used to take me the longest time to get to the door of the Doctor’s office, and even after being admitted through it I found I had no tongue to speak, no ears to hear and no eyes to see. And all the while I expected the Divine Physician to do something for me.
Author: Fr. Christopher Lee, SMM
This is the Twenty-fourth in a series of articles covering Consecration Aids.
Who can afford to lose time during those precious minutes one spends before the Blessed Sacrament every day in consultation with the Doctor of souls ? Why was I wasting so much time day-dreaming or idly reciting someone else’s prayers ? Wasn’t I aware of the fact that the Divine Physician had placed a nurse, a Lady in white, there at the desk in the waiting-room of His earthly office – His tabernacle?
Holy Slavery
One day, I stumbled across these words of St. Louis de Montfort: ”This devotion (Holy Slavery) to Our Lady is a short road to find Jesus Christ” (T.D. No. 155 ). ”Who wants a short road?” I asked myself. Someone who is in a hurry, someone who doesn’t want to lose any time, came the answer to my mind.
And who can afford to lose any time in the spiritual life? Who can afford to lose time during those precious minutes one spends before the Blessed Sacrament every day in consultation with the Doctor of souls ? Why was I wasting so much time day-dreaming or idly reciting someone else’s prayers ? Wasn’t I aware of the fact that the Divine Physician had placed a nurse, a Lady in white, there at the desk in the waiting-room of His earthly office – His tabernacle ? Didn’t I know that no one could get to see the Doctor without first being called by the nurse? Didn’t I know that if I spoke to her first, she would prepare my case and present it to the Doctor for me?
The answer, of course, is that I didn’t. How blind I had been all these years, I thought within myself, to have failed to notice the Lady in white and to have almost completely ignored her in my visits to the Divine Physician of my soul! Was it any wonder then that I had been made to wait so long in the anteroom, twiddling my thumbs and fretting away precious hours of my time?
The Immaculate and Her Slaves of Love
I then and there resolved to stop at the Nurse’s desk at every one of my visits to the Doctor of my soul, present in the tabernacle of the altar. Try it yourself on your next visit. See for yourself how, even without an appointment, you will quickly be ushered into the presence of the Divine Physician of your soul. See, too, how the Nurse in white, the Immaculate, gives Him a ”briefing” on all her slaves of love.
And what a welcome you will get from the Doctor, too !
