I am reading the Autobiography of Fulton Sheen right now, entitled Treasure in Clay. Fantastic book about a fantastic human being. I'm always inspired by what he says or writes, but this passage made me consider my life in a completely different light. He is talking about how his autobiography is not really the story of his life, but is interwoven with the story of salvation. He can see his own life unfolding in the pages of the Bible.

"That autobiography is the crucifix - the inside story of my life not in the way it walks the stage of time, but how it was recorded, taped and written in the Book of Life. It is not the autobiography that I tell you, but the autobiography I read to myself. In the crown of thorns, I see my pride, my grasping for earthly toys in the pierced Hands, my flight from shepherding care in the pierced Feet, my wasted love in the wounded Heart, and my prurient desires in the flesh hanging from Him like purple rags. Almost every time I turn a page of that book, my heart weeps at what eros has done to agape, what the 'I' has done to the 'Thou,' what the professed friend has done to the Beloved.

But there have been moments in that autobiography when my heart leaped with joy at being invited to His Last Supper; when I grieved when one of my own left His side to blister His lips with a kiss; when I tried falteringly to help carry His gibbet to the Hill of the Skull; when I moved a few steps closer to Mary to help draw the thrust sword from her heart; when I hoped to be now and then in life a disciple like the disciple called 'Beloved'; when I rejoiced at bringing other Magdalenes to the the Cross to become the love we fall just short of in all love; when I tried to emulate the centurion and press cold water to thirsty lips; when, like Peter, I ran to an empty tomb and then, at the seashore, had my heart broken a thousand times as He kept asking over and over again in my life: 'Do you love Me?'"

I've never put myself into the moments of Christ's life in the way that Fulton Sheen does in this passage. My failures and triumphs affect our Lord in a profound way, as do the failures and triumphs of all mankind. God's love and patience is simply unfathomable, and I remain in awe at the gifts he continues to bestow on me.

Fulton Sheen, pray for us!