Pray and Do Not Worry

It was late afternoon, and my son and I were running late for an appointment—again.

As we walked across the parking lot, a woman approached us.

“Would you help me?” she said. I could see the distress in her eyes, and I could tell she really did need help.

She pointed to her car, which was parked on an angle. She explained that she was trying to back out of the parking space she was in, but whenever she put the car in reverse, the sensors started beeping at her that she was too close to the car next to her.

She was too scared to move her car. She was asking me to help direct her so that she could back out.

All I wanted was to get to my son’s appointment, which we were just barely going to be able to pull off, but I could also see her anxiety. There was no one else around. I also appreciated that I looked like a safe, trustworthy person to ask—a mother walking with her son.

So, I stopped to direct her while she climbed into the car. Every time she backed up, she hesitated. I knew the sensor was beeping in her ear. And even though I kept calling out, “You’re fine, just keep coming,” she was nervous. The car was telling her one thing, and I—a stranger in the parking lot—was telling her another.

Finally, though—finally—she pulled the car far enough out of the space that she was safe. She waved to thank me and drove away. We went inside to our appointment, late but not that much later than if we hadn’t stopped to help.

But later as we walked back into the lot, I remembered that driver. And I thought of how difficult it can be to trust. We want to believe everything will be OK, but we also live with worries and concerns about all that can go wrong.

Plenty can go wrong. That much is true. But quite a bit can go right. As we’ve started a new school year, I could give you a list of worries about my children—socially, academically, extra-curricularly, health-wise, transportation-wise, and on and on and on. But I have found many times that you are often worrying about the wrong thing. You’re putting energy into focusing on something that won’t even be an issue. And most of it is out of your hands anyway.

At this time of year, as we look ahead to the feast of St. Padre Pio on Sept. 23, maybe we can find peace in the words of that Franciscan priest who lived not so long ago.

“Pray, hope, and don’t worry,” he told us. “Worry is useless. God is merciful and will hear your prayer.”

Let’s try to turn it all over to God and trust that everything, fundamentally, will be all right. Tomorrow will come, and God will be there, holding all of us in his hands.

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