I hate to admit it, but as a kid, I did not like the Feast of the Assumption.
It had nothing to do with the Feast itself – our celebration of Mary being taken body and soul into Heaven.
It was about the calendar. When Aug. 15 arrived, I knew school was about to begin again.
As I get ready to begin my fourth year as chaplain at St. John’s College High School in Washington, I’ve noticed how much our young people look forward to coming back to school. That wasn’t really how I felt as a kid. I didn’t hate school. I just loved summer.
I had lots of things to do with my large family. There were activities like swimming and tennis. I spent tons of time with friends and still remember those special evenings simply sitting around talking or going to the teenage parties we enjoyed during those slower summer months.
I think of that every year around this time. Labor Day is approaching, vacation time is winding down, work is about to pick back up, and schools are about to reopen. Now, about 65 years after those summers of my youth, summer still goes by too quickly. I suspect you might feel the same way.
Summer also seems shorter than it used to. Some of that is probably because I’m getting older, but our schedules really have changed. When I was a kid, summer really did begin on Memorial Day and end on Labor Day. The Catholic schools I attended typically closed shortly after Memorial Day and did not start back up until after Labor Day.
Now, summer begins closer to July 4 and ends by mid-August. Public schools stay in session well into June, so many families don’t begin vacations until July. Students in Montgomery County and Prince George’s County schools are back on Aug. 25, and many local Catholic schools – including St. John’s – start around that same time.
August has become a time to prepare for the new year. I know priests spend much of August thinking, reflecting, and praying about the year to come. Parish councils meet, finance councils plan, religious education programs get ready to welcome students, and schools prepare to open their doors for another year.
The calendar reminds us that seasons change. Our lives do, too. I’m going to enjoy this year at St. John’s particularly. The students who were freshmen when I started will now be seniors. Great things are happening, but I will turn 80 next summer, and I have told the school this will be my last year as chaplain. I will still help out and be available when needed, but it will be time to step away from the regular daily schedule I’ve enjoyed over the last three years.
For years, my outgoing voicemail message said, “Today is God’s gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God.” It echoes something Father Hans Urs von Balthasar once wrote about prayer: “What you are is God’s gift to you; what you become is your gift to God.”
I still believe that. God’s gift of time is part of God’s gift of life. I try to make every day a gift back to God, and I know many of you do, too. We encounter God in how we live, how we share, and how we spend our days.
May God be ever more alive in each of us as we end summer and return to busier, more active lives. Let us receive the gift of each day with gratitude, and let us give the gift of each day in pursuit of faith, hope, and love.
(Msgr. John Enzler serves as the mission advocate of Catholic Charities of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington and is a chaplain at his alma mater, St. John’s College High School in Washington. He writes the Faith in Action column for the archdiocese’s Catholic Standard and Spanish-language El Pregonero newspapers and websites.)
