Trust and Validate

Trust: faith, hope, reliance, expectation, confidence, dependence, custody, care, responsibility, protection.

Validation: substantiation, confirmation, legalization.

        This morning I learned a concrete lesson on how to sustain relationships from a gentleman who shared a practice he and his wife have shared over their years of marriage. Without being specific about what they do, he remarked that each year he and his wife exchange or express trust and validation. Trust I get. No relationship exists, grows or deepens without trust. That’s the glue or practice that protects common endeavors or works, such as, monastic life, school communities, parishes, work sites, etc., etc., etc. 

       The more I have thought about validation the more I got an understanding and appreciation of what that can mean on the practical level. Validation means more than just a renewal or remembrance of what I did over fifty years ago. The image that helped me appreciate the use and act of validating, is the difference between the one-time public signing of my name on my profession document in 1962 and the community’s annual renewal of vows once a year during our retreat. 1962 was a leap of faith and a hope that I’d be happy and faithful to my choice until the end. This August during our renewal of profession I will remember to do more than renew. I will validate and confirm what I really did in 1962. 

      Sr. Mary Catherine Wenstrup, OSB