Last year during Lent, the Archbishop of Ottawa Terrence Prendergast came to pray at our little cathedral because we had invited all Christians participating in a 40 Days for Life campaign to join us in a quiet day of prayer and reflection.  He spent about 45 minutes kneeling in one of our creaky pews, where the varnish long ago has worn off in big patches.

It is almost embarrassing how small and poor we are.  Our cathedral has threadbare red indoor/outdoor carpeting over yellowed gray linoleum tiles.  On the day in question, there were only a handful of the faithful holding the prayer vigil.  What a contrast to the beauty of the churches in his diocese that have to hold multiple services to accommodate all the worshipers. Ottawa has two heavenly basilicas that have recently gone through multi-million dollar renovations.  They are truly representations of heaven on earth.  Their choirs sound like angels singing. We could probably fit our whole congregation into half of the archbishop's private chapel.  Bishops like him suppress parishes that are ten times our size as not viable.

Yet we survive and it is astonishing how many of our people tithe, how many do the daily offices, how many are serving Christ  in the world through their work, how many pitch in to make our little cathedral a family where the beauty shines out the way Mother Teresa's smile lit up her face.  We're full of imperfections, many of us have our cranky moments, don't get me wrong, but the radiance is there for those with eyes to see.

A Roman Catholic priest said to me once, "The TAC has its detractors in Rome. They say you exist only on paper.  But then we keep meeting people from the TAC and you are so vibrant and alive."

"Yes, we are small," I admitted.  (We are especially small in Canada, but even worldwide, by Catholic Church standards, our whole TAC Communion is smaller than the Archdiocese of Toronto).  "But when we become part of the Catholic Church and the graces that will come to us from that start flowing, we will grow like mustard seeds."

And we will.  There have been many times in my life when I have encountered holiness and beauty in humble surroundings and wondered why there isn't a line of thousands standing along the sidewalk trying to get in.  I think of our dear Bishop Robert Mercer and how he came to Canada from the warm climate of Zimbabwe to serve as our bishop years ago.  The cold weather never agreed with him.  He didn't drive so he used to take the bus (not always the nicest way to travel) to our far flung scattered little parishes, sometimes to visit with a handful of people. What sacrifices he made for us for such seemingly small returns. Yet he lifted us to heaven the way he prayed the mass.    And when he read from the Word of God, it came alive.  If he read from on of Paul's Epistles it was as if Paul was standing there.  Holy, holy, holy worship.  It often takes my breath away.  What homilies he gave.  With Bishop Carl Reid and Father Peter Jardine, the beautiful worship in our tradition continues.

So many of our clergy had to walk away from lovely buildings, music endowments, stipends and pensions when they left the Anglican Church or, as they have said, because it left them.  I have written about our Bishop Carl Reid and how gifted he is, how he could have perhaps led a much bigger, glitzier congregation with his many talents and abilities and he's here with us, sometimes seeing the people he has catechized go on to become Roman Catholics because they were not Anglicans to begin with and felt they could not wait.

We get sneered at in some circles because we are so small.  But the image I have of the Holy Father and of godly bishops like Archbishop Prendergast is this:  they know Jesus went in search of that one lost sheep and brought her back on his shoulders.   We are small, but the Holy Father has offered a way for us to come home.  As humble and poor and beleaguered as we are, we are precious in his eyes.  Every last one of us.

I am so proud of our bishops and how they have led us to this point.  They are willing to give up everything, even risk their priesthood out of obedience to the Holy Father and Christ's command that we be one.  No, none of them know whether they will even be approved as Catholic priests.  How can we not be humbled and amazed by this?  How can we not follow their example to surrender our lives fully to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?  And because of the kindness and generosity of the Holy Father and the many good Catholic Bishops I have come to know and love in the course of my work, we can only begin to imagine the heavenly joy and the breadth of Christ's love that awaits us.

I think of what Father Chris has written about Our Lady of the Atonement and how it started with 18 people two decades ago.  I believe that will happen to us here in Canada.  But God does not measure success in terms of numbers or wealth. Sometimes it is in the hidden, the small, the obscure and the weak that He resides.

The picture shows Archbishop Prendergast who is visiting parishes. I stole it from his blog, where everyday he offers something new on his joyful "journey of a bishop."