I first met Carmen at Adeodatus, the weekly prayer group held at the Rectory of St Rita’s Shrine is South Philadelphia. The group is geared towards those formerly incarcerated or working through addiction looking to grow in their faith amidst challenging circumstances. While I am quite new to the ministry at A.D.R.O.P., Carmen has been a friend and participant in the community for years. I was quickly drawn to his warm, friendly smile and gentle, jovial character. He appeared to be quite at ease with himself, and freely spoke about the place of God’s love in his life during the night. After hearing bits and pieces of his past over the course of a few meetings, I was intrigued to hear the story of his faith journey and how he came to where he is now. The following is a synopsis of what he shared.
Carmen grew up as the oldest of three in South Philadelphia in a warm, Catholic, Italian home. From his childhood, he was blessed with a charming personality and a good heart, the beloved of his parents. School could not hold his attention though, and it took effort to pass his classes. His interest would lie primarily in his friends and the enjoyment of life. Even in elementary school, he and his friends were exposed to the use of various narcotics in their neighborhood and began to experiment. By middle school, Carmen had moved from sniffing glue and smoking marijuana to shooting heroin. He was lost in the youthful pursuit of passing pleasure, not thinking much of the future or the consequences.
By high school, Carmen got into trouble and found himself in detention on a regular basis. Undeterred, he would return home to greet his family and then head back out to spend the rest of the night getting high with his friends. “What a waste of time,” he told me, “party after party, every night of the week.” He now regrets how much pain he put his parents through, who had high hopes for him, and worked hard to send him to Catholic school. Though those days are long passed and his parents did not live to see his recovery, Carmen asks for their forgiveness for what he put them through. He admits he has wept a river of tears over the misguided choices of his youth.
As he shared, it was clear that though his past mistakes have filled him with remorse, he now accepts his unfortunate direction at so young an age with a sense of peace and understanding. While he doesn’t blame anyone for his choices, he acknowledges that he and his friends were in part victims of their environment and the culture surrounding them. “I shouldn’t be justifying what I did, but it is what it is. I know in my heart that I may never be the man God wanted me to be, but I am going to be the man that I want to be for Him today.” I am struck by how Carmen has moved on from the past in order to make the most of the present as a time to live for God, as St. Peter says, “so as not to spend the remainder of one’s days in the flesh on human desires, but on the will of God.”
After graduating from St. Thomas More Catholic High School, Carmen married, began work as a cement laborer and continued to spend his nights getting high with his friends. Before long his marriage fell apart and his wife left him, seeing that “they weren’t going anywhere” living such a life. He found it hard to hold down a job as substance abuse began to impact his everyday life. He eventually moved back home with his mother but couldn’t get along with her new husband. After a number of fights, his mother asked him to leave. At this point, discouraged with life in South Philadelphia, he entered the service with the Navy. He spent the next few years on the open seas across the world but was dismissed before term when he failed to comply with naval directives.
When asked about his religious experience during these years, Carmen shared that his Catholic upbringing did not translate into a personal relationship with God. Instead, he delved into the more captivating world of Eastern religion and meditation practice as he matured. However, the discipline of spending time each day in quiet meditation helped him stay sane and calm in the midst of repeated conflict and mental distress. He also reiterated that the love and security he experienced at home with his parents gave him a spiritual foundation and advantage that many of his peers lacked. He saw the devastating results that followed those who were raised in families that did not especially love or care for their own.
After returning home from the navy, the patterns of drug use and fighting worsened. Though he held down a few jobs for a number of years, in the end they served to feed his addictions outside of work. Making money to get a drink or take a hit unknowingly became a part of his daily life. As the years unfolded, he lost friends, family and girlfriends to premature death due to overdosing and alcohol abuse. That he himself was spared, he admits, is a miracle and intervention of divine providence.
For many years, Carmen managed to stay out of trouble with the law but eventually was arrested. After losing his job and then his living arrangement upon the death of his girlfriend, he eventually found himself homeless and begging for his next hit on the streets. “I was beat up, spiritually bankrupt, there was nothing to live for really.” In such a state, at age 57, he recognized his desperate need for help and a change of direction. Thankfully, a good Samaritan stopped one day while he was on the side of the road and led him to a rehabilitation program at the VA hospital in Chester county. The program was designed for 28 days of sobriety and it ushered in a turning point for Carmen, as he began the process of getting sober and “his life back in order.” From the VA, he was directed to a halfway house and recovery program intended specifically for veterans. This is where he continued to live, in sobriety and recovery, for the next one and a half years.
At first the question of surrendering his addiction seemed daunting to Carmen. But when he encountered the 3rd step of AA, “Are you willing to turn your will and life over to the care of God as you understand Him?” he realized he was more than ready to leave his old life behind. “I had enough. Lord, Your will be done!” At the point of surrender, Carmen encountered a spiritual Presence that gave him peace and assurance – “an overwhelming Power, giving me the strength I needed to endure…” In reality, Carmen says, “He is everybody’s higher Power… people only have to realize that… that is why there is all this chaos in the world,” because “people are living without God.” Now his desire is to be close to God. When he sits in his living room and listens to Christian music, a tear drop will often come to his eye. “It has been a long journey, and I have cried a river… how can I not be grateful? ... Lord, thank you for everything, thank you for being in my life today—You’re the only thing that really matters, everybody should be aware of that... It’s such a relief to know that someone cares for you.”
Carmen acknowledges he could not have come to sobriety on his own. “I know if left to my own devices, I’m going down… Looking back I was sick, though I knew something was wrong… but now, I am aware that it is God who brings fulfillment… that a Power greater than myself can tend to my every need. That’s the faith, but it doesn’t happen easily.” After nine years of sobriety, Carmen’s faith continues to grow and everyday becomes “more and more about Him.” He recognizes that divine Providence has worked in his life to bring him to where he is today:
God did things that I know came from Him. One day I was in my apartment and lying down, I said this prayer: ‘Lord, please free me from the bondage of self and take these difficulties away from me,’ and it was like an ‘aha’ moment, a deep feeling that he took everything out of me, everything away from me… and filled the void with His love… Dear Lord, wow, I actually cried that day. It was like a spiritual awakening. Let’s face it, if God is going to do that for you, touch you in such a way, why would you turn Him away? Why would you not believe anymore?
Nine years later, at age 65, Carmen is a practicing Catholic, a regular attendee at AA, NA & Catholic support meetings all over the Philadelphia area, and living quite happily in a place of his own. He spends much of his time attending meetings in order to support and encourage the recovering community. For him this brings fulfillment—to accompany others who are seeking to maintain sobriety and grow in their practice of faith. He reminds me of one of the many figures in the gospel who through their encounter with Christ were freed from their affliction and immediately stood up and followed Jesus. He acknowledges that there are many people who attend AA & NA meetings but come and go because they lack a personal relationship with the Lord. Therefore, he recommends alternative programs that emphasize the centrality of faith to persevere in recovery, such as Celebrate Recovery and Adeodatus.
“Life is good today, thanks to God, but it’s not all perfect… Live a good life,” he says, “but expect a greater life in Him… I am a sinner. There are times I fall short, but I ask God for forgiveness…” He tries to live as Christ did, “with all his heart, all his mind, all his soul… doing His will and helping others… there is no other way, Jesus is the way…” To those who might be struggling in their recovery, Carmen says that “whatever you do in your travels, make sure you keep the Lord close to your heart, and then get the garbage out… ask yourself: why do you want to do this? Let go and let God…” He advises the rest of us to meet those in recovery with gentleness and kindness, like Christ, not speaking down to them from a spiritual mountaintop, but offering hope and comfort.
His diagnosis for addiction is “Obsession and compulsion equal addiction… Once you get started, you are compelled to do it over and over again… but by the grace of God the obsession can be gone… just say no and turn away… ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life’… Why can’t we believe that? Why would Jesus lie? Would he ever say: ‘No, you can’t come in?’”
I cannot help but think of the parable of the Prodigal Son in the gospel of St. Luke when the younger son of a wealthy landowner sets off with his portion of the family estate only to squander his wealth on reckless living. When famine struck and he lost everything, he hired himself out to a citizen of the country who sent him to feed swine. In his distress, he came to his senses, and resolved to return to his father as a hired servant. But his Father, spotting his son from afar, ran out to meet him and embraced him with love. He then brought him home with rejoicing, calling his servants and preparing a feast.
Carmen appears to me as one who has wandered far through many foreign lands but now knows the true joy and rest as a beloved son in the house of the Father. He now keeps close to His heart, remembering that he is only a pilgrim passing through this life on his way to his native country:
O God, grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change...
Courage to change the things I can,
And Wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace.
Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is,
Not as I would have it.
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His will.
That I may be reasonably happy in this life,
And supremely happy with Him forever in the next.
Amen.