VESSELS OF CLAY

Back in the dark Ages when I was in seminary (1957-1969: high school, college and theology), every day from 12:00 noon to12:15 there was a time set aside for what was called “Spiritual Reading”. If our Spiritual Director did not have a meditation for us to ponder before lunch, one of the students read from a spiritual book that was to give us some food for thought.

The only book I can remember anything about from all those years was one that was read when I was in high school. It was written by a priest, Leo Trese, and was called Vessels of Clay. The point of the book was that even though priests were, by their vocation, to be role models for the people they were called to serve and even though this was a tremendous responsibility, anyone aspiring to become a priest needed to be reminded that he (always and only he back then and still now in the RC Church) was still a very fallible and fragile person – a vessel of clay.

Over the years I have come to realize just how true that is. Clay vessels are easily cracked and even broken into pieces. They are not like bronze vases that can be slightly dinged and then re-polished or hammered back into their original shapes. They are not almost unbreakable and even everlasting like those made of metal. All earthen vessels, all vessels of clay must be handled with care and sometime even with kid gloves.

Trese was trying to remind his readers, and especially us young seminarians, that as great a vocation as everyone said we were called to fulfill in being a priest was, that was no guarantee that fulfilling it would be easy and that simply because we were priests we would be automatically holy people and inspiring leaders to the various flocks we were called to lead and serve.

Over the years I have learned from experience that it has not been easy and that I have not always, if ever, been that holy and inspiring person. Every one of us, every priest and every lay person, we are all, each and every one of us, a vessel of clay. The older we get, the more nicks and cracks. Some of us, perhaps many of us, have been broken and then pieced back together almost as good as new, but not quite.

The fact that I am just like everyone else has given me some consolation even as I recognize my many failures and shortcomings. It should give all of us consolation. No one of us is perfect. We are all fragile human beings. We have all made our share of mistakes and committed our fair share of sins, maybe even more than our fair share. But with the help of others, with our own self-will and determination and with the grace of God, we have been pieced back together.

Trese’s book has been a constant reminder over the years, if only in the back of my mind, that it does not take much for the vessel to be cracked and even broken into pieces if I am not careful. But that is true for all of us no matter who we are, what our vocation or how old or young. The truth is that “Handle with Care” should be stamped on all our foreheads and into all our brains.