|
|
 | |
This time we speak with the Lowe’s who tell of their life experience as a Catholic family. Howard is English and Arantza is Spanish. They have nine children and two in heaven. Arantza devotes herself full time to her family and Howard is an English teacher.
How did you meet each other?
H.- We met one night in Madrid.
A.- At two o’clock in the morning, in a bar that was closing...
It was the eve of the feast of Our Lady of Almudena.
Did you have faith?
H.- Yes, I did have faith, but looking back I could have been living it with
a little more care and discipline.
A.- I was against everything that the Catholic Church taught. It could be said
that my position was radical leftism. But what I dreamed of when I defended the
left-wing ideologies, I have seen fulfilled and incarnated in the teachings of
Jesus Christ and the doctrine of the Church.
Could you each sum up your journey in the Faith?
A.-When I met the man who would be my husband, everything in me would have predisposed
me to reject his way of thinking and to not understand how he could believe those
things, about the Faith and also his way of understanding marriage. For a girl
who the first thing she did every morning was buy “El País” (which,
for the English readers, would be something like “The Guardian”),
it was impossible to understand his opposition to divorce, for example, or contraceptives,
and to see him enter a Church to go to confession. I couldn’t comprehend
it. We spent hours debating all these subjects, I found his way of thinking to
be contrary to common sense. Yet God is stronger. On the day of our wedding I
could once again receive my “first communion” after years living
outside the Law of God. Since then God has worked wonders in my life.
H.- God picked me up just as I was finishing my Drama degree in Manchester. I
had dreams of working as an actor, but it was while performing at the Edinburgh
Fringe that my mother suffered a terrible car accident, followed two days later
by a stroke, that to this day has left her paralysed down one side of her body.
Lacking any other real motivation, I remember thinking that I had to finish the
degree for her. Meanwhile, the world of suffering and faith began breaking through
the fog of my student life, and I found myself hungry for God. Visiting my father
in Australia, I walked into a religious bookshop, picked up a book on Fatima,
and was, in moments, convinced of the need to convert. Back in the UK I lived
for five years looking after my mother, leading a very disciplined and prayerful
life. After trying various religious houses, I was accepted into the diocesan
seminary, subsequently moving to Dublin with a missionary congregation. It was
there that I discovered that God wanted me firmly in the world. Moving to live
and work in Spain, I took up a job teaching and there there met Arantza. I could
not work out whether her name meant orange or spider and was happy to find the
name actually comes from the great Basque shrine of Our Lady. More importantly,
I knew she was for me, and soon after we were married.
What was and what is your idea of marriage?
H.- Marriage is a great gift. This increasingly becomes tied up with the awareness
that only in the Giver is the gift of marriage fully appreciated and realised.
A. - Before my conversion, my idea of marriage was the very negative and grey
idea that our culture transmits: that love is free and that what is genuine and
authentic is to live the day and follow your own feelings. But I had already
suffered greatly in my life, in spite of my youth, with these ideas and when
I met a young man who was different (Howard), I knew interiorly that what he
could offer me was different. The idea of a strong marriage that would last our
entire life was what I truly desired in the depth of my soul and I couldn’t
deny it. And I was not wrong. A love like this, according to the plan of God,
gives you a peace, a happiness and blessings that fill your being according to
what our human nature is. This is what anyone would desire!
Is it not boring?
A.- To live, placing God first is a great adventure that will frighten you if
you see it without faith. In each couple, in each life, it is so different. “Do
not be afraid,” as John Paul II repeated to us. “Open the doors to
Christ.” “Do not be afraid; He does not take away anything, He gives
everything,” our dear Benedict XVI says. This is true. Our life is a madness
to the eyes of the world, with our bank account frequently showing negative digits,
without our own house, without a fixed job, not even at this point. Yet, we have
seen it all as the Providence of the Lord, who has not left us and He has saved
us in many difficult situations. The Lord leads us on paths that we do not know,
and could never have imagined.
Why are so many marriages broken?
H.- For one reason or another, many Christians do not prioritize their relationship
with God before entering into marriage. They lack faith and singleness of heart
and are often carrying within them the weight of unconfessed sin. If they do
not quickly put this right their love becomes constricted and even strangled.
A.- “Do whatever He tells you” If we think that we know more than
the Church, we do not let ourselves be guided by God through the obedience to
His Commandments. If we do not let ourselves be filled with the wisdom of Christ,
we act according to other criteria.
And when the moments of tiredness and suffering
come?
H.- Praying more and asking God for the strength to battle through. It’s
a question of having a strong spiritual life and believing in the value of the
Cross. Being aware of how much more other people are suffering also helps, especially
those who suffer with their backs to God’s grace. Thinking about heaven,
hell and purgatory does not do any harm either.
A. – I ask Our Lord for help. I have the picture of the Divine Mercy in
my room and there it says, “Jesus, I trust in You.” In moments of
special difficulty, I say to Our Lady, “Show me that you are my Mother.”
I also need to go to confession, so that I do not get discouraged by my mistakes,
so that Our Lord may renew my strength and my spirit to follow Him and know
that, in spite of my mistakes, I can have the hope of going to Heaven. I try
to go
to Mass daily, if possible, and that does me a lot of good and I can pray to
God and give Him thanks.
What has been the most difficult moment in your married life?
H.- When the children have been ill or in hospital.
A. – When my husband did not have a job. Also when the children were sick
or when we had to move… and sometimes also when the economic situation
was difficult (but then I remember these words, “Seek first the Kingdom
of God and everything else shall be added unto you.”)
Whenever I had a hard time because I was alone with many little children, then
I felt that God was with me and the cross gave me great happiness. At one moment,
I had four children under the age of two, that is to say, triplets and then
Gabriel. Later when Gabriel was a year old and the triplets three, I became
pregnant with
Joseph, the eighth, a very hard pregnancy where the doctor told me to rest,
which I wasn’t able to do, and take medicine which made me exhausted. My last
pregnancy, with Myriam Fatima, was also practically nine months of rest, abandoning
her and my life into the hands of God.
Arantza, what is maternity?
It is the most sublime experience that can be had, even with the cross. It
is the greatest gift and where you feel the power of God, so silently, so deeply,
like in Bethlehem.
Can a married person have an interior life?
H.-It is essential. Aware of my weakness, I try and make great use of all that
God offers: for instance, making the Mass the centre of my day, whenever possible,
frequent confession, time in prayer after Holy Communion, praying the Divine
Office, keeping the Presence of God, the rosary, deeper prayer at least once
a day. You have to work at being able to bear witness to Christ at every moment.
Then, you have to know yourself, especially your weak points, continually keeping
your guard up. The devil, the world, and your wounded nature, never let up.
You have to gradually grow in the virtues. Our greatness is bearing the heat
of battle,
day by day, for Christ and the salvation of all.
A.- Once a friend of mine, who dedicated herself to her six children, I at
that time had seven, told me, “I feel like a contemplative nun while at home
with so many little angels.” And it is true. If you remove the noise from
your life, with the silence and the company of the innocence of your children,
it is truly great and comparable to a monastic life, without doubt. Mary’s
example can make us reflect on this, she who was the woman of silence and who “meditated
everything in her heart.”
What did you experience when your first child was born?
A. – I will tell about when the seventh arrived, I thought, upon
hearing him cry, “God willing, he will not be the last.”
How do you understand this sentence, “Life is not given except
through suffering.”
H.- Our Lord said to Rose of Lima. “Let all know that after sorrow
grace follows; the measure of heavenly gifts is increased in proportion
to the labours undertaken; this is the only ladder by which paradise
is reached; without the cross there is no road to heaven.” What
more do we need to say?
A. – “The Birth Pains.” We must not fear suffering.
Life comes from the cross. “The Kingdom of God suffers violence.” We
cannot enlighten it without suffering. It makes us more like Christ and
it is a great mystery that we can take part in His suffering. Suffering
makes us more a person.
What do you ask from God for your children?
H.- That none that God has given me be lost. That they be confirmed in
his grace. That they hear God’s call, follow God’s call and
be faithful until death. That God grant them vocations to the religious
life or priesthood. That they be protected. I could go on…
A. – That they may always be faithful. That I may see them all
in Heaven.
Why is education so difficult at present?
H.- False notions of what constitutes education, prevail almost everywhere.
We are dealing, on the whole, with infidelity. We are not being faithful
to how we should bring our kids up. The mind of the Church, of Christ,
is very clear on this. We are to raise them in the love and fear of God,
to provide them with a synthesis of faith and culture. Instead, we provide
them with access to every corrupting influence the media offers. We feed
them with the doctrine of self-realisation and self –esteem, combined
with dissenting theologies that regard sin as obsolete and Magisterium
as out of touch. We train them to take up good positions in society,
whilst they have never been taught how to keep their position in Christ’s
Kingdom.
A.– Everything is against the Faith. In the mass media, a strong
ideology is stealing the children from the authority of their parents and
it pushes them on towards a hedonistic and amoral world. And when the educators
are not against the evangelical values, they are not always clear on what
path to follow.
What do you do on a personal level to build the civilization of love?
H.- Being open to life and having great trust in God’s Providence,
despite difficulties. To firmly believe the Church exists for all, to have
a heart that is open to all.
A. – Try to form our children so that they may not fall into the
sterility of relativism, which does not know how to distinguish what is
worthy or unworthy to live. We do not watch television at home, except
a few programs of EWTN that we receive from the USA. It is good to mantain
the English at home. The television is the first danger. At home we do
not follow fashions that go against the dignity of women and of the men
that see them, we do not have magazines, nor listen to the radio, nor,
nor, nor... Some could say, how many things you prohibit, but no. At home
my children are joyful, and they also complain and fight, it’s true.
But we do not miss what we do not have. They play with the cats, they read
quite a lot, especially the older ones, they draw, or they come with me
to go shopping. Oh! And we also have several musicians. We go out on trips
to the country and we go to Mass every day. They love to serve as altar
boys and listen to the word of God every day. They are being formed even
though we don’t realize it. We want our children to understand that
it is possible to live differently.
Is it difficult to love? How can you learn to love?
H.- With God, it is
possible. It’s also the most important commandment, so we have to
work on it day by day, above all in the family. If we keep others in our
prayers, we are going in the right direction.
A – Yes, sometimes the kids can get on your nerves. But that is what
the sacrament of Penance is there for! We learn by denying ourselves, taking
up the Cross, and following Him.
How do you live the commandment of the Lord, “Go and preach...?”
H.- “Being a teacher is a great place to bear witness to the Gospel.
Having a large family really gets people thinking.
A.– One day I said to a friend: I would love to do more for those
young people that I see on the street! They reminded me of my first youth,
people who are completely disoriented in their life, living their youth
by going from bar to bar, passing through the drama of abortion, living
with different people, not knowing exactly why... and in the darkness of
pantheism, New Age, the idolatry of your country (such as the Basque country,)
and supporting the crimes of terrorists. I said to my friend that I would
love to have the daring to go out to the public square and preach like
so many saints did. She told me something that I will never forget, “Every
time that you go out on the streets with your children, you are preaching.” (At
that time I would go out with a three-seat stroller and a baby on my back,
and the others following me as best they could).
Could you speak to us about Our Lady?
H.- Mary is central to the life of faith. I am convinced I owe her my salvation.
That is, it is Mary who will keep me on the path of her Son. I am determined
to be grateful and entrust myself and my loved ones entirely to her. The
Rosary and Scapular are particularly important nowadays, and we would be
foolish to be blind to ‘the signs of the times’ and ignore
them.
A.– My third daughter, who died right after being born, is named
Maria. I left her in Mary’s arms. I then understood devotion to Our
Lady, when I offered Her this little daughter, because I had not understood
it up until that moment because I had just recently converted. I realized
that She, our Mother, intervened then and my new-born daughter went to
heaven. What I asked was to feel myself close to my own mother who was
dying of cancer and she granted it to me in a way that is only comprehensible
to the eyes of the faith. This little angel made me look up to heaven at
my dear mother. My mother had a strong and tried faith, but death was there
and she was human. Later, Our Lady intervened more than once as a response
to very specific prayers. “Show me that you are my mother.”
©HM Magazine No.133 - November/December
2006
