Travel/Photography/Churches
The Other Side Of Chicago: The House Of Worship
Visiting Chicago’s soulful destinations
Aside from winter, a convention and meeting up with my High School friends, Trader Joe’s and Walmart were all that’s on my mind for a month-long stay in Chicago. Though the architecture and museums were worth spending time, I had more than enough of them from my first visit.
Maybe I should try the road less traveled. Visiting Catholic Churches.
As I wrote them down together with their addresses and what bus or train to take, I realized they were all doable.
The Churches of Chicago
There were around 20 churches that I visited. Churches with names of saints and titles I’m not familiar with. So grateful to my aunt and her friends who made my kind of adventure possible.
When I told my high school friends that I’d been to the Shrine of St. Jude which is housed in Our Lady of Guadalupe church they were shocked more than amazed. How brave I was to set foot on the south side of Chicago. They themselves would not dare. Especially going there by public transportation.
I agreed. There was a feeling of eeriness in the area and some people on the train were not on their best behavior.
But I studied both grade school and high school in a school named after St. Jude. He has a special place in my heart. When my mother got sick two years prior, she believed that Our Lady of Guadalupe healed her.
Setting my foot on the churches on the other side of the world was a beautiful experience. There was diversity, from the language to the parishioners. The deafening silence and solemnities of the mass and church goers were a far cry from the marketplace-like atmosphere of Sunday masses here.
How I wish churches here are like them. I know it’s wishful thinking because here, attending a mass is a serious business.
With friends
It was St. Patrick’s Day when I met my High School friends. Instead of joining the crowd in downtown Chicago, we went in the suburbs. They were the ones who planned the day.
Surprisingly, we went to BAPS.
The BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir of Chicago, Illinois is a Hindu place of worship. It was built by the BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha. It is located in Bartlett, a suburb of Chicago.
It was my first time being in a Hindu place of worship. To feel Hinduism. Having been born and raised as a Catholic, it was a different experience that I truly appreciated. For one, I didn’t know anything about Hinduism.
Baha’i
There is a temple in Wilmette, a suburb of Chicago worth visiting. It’s Baha’i House of Worship.
The Bahá’í House of Worship in Wilmette is an intricate concrete masterpiece with thoughtful details that reflect oneness for humanity…..Chicago Architecture Center
The temple is a place of worship of the Baha’i faith. But everyone is welcome for meditation, prayers and reflections.
If you want some kind of serenity and solemnity, visit the temple when you are in the Chicago area.
I can say, all the Catholic churches, the BAPS and Baha’i house of worship are beautiful inside and out. A beauty that radiates to anyone who will spend some time in there.
Visiting a house of worship is not about religion and being religious. It is about giving respect and appreciation to something that we are not and someplace we haven’t been to. It is about imbibing a not-an-everyday-kind-of-world.
If you will ask me what I have benefited from visiting all those houses of worship? I can say it’s like I gained some brownie points. That I was one step forward in my faith, relationship with our Creator and spirituality.
Well, that’s what I thought. That I was at an advantage, religion-wise.
But what happened next was the other way around. I had the brownie points so that I can deal with our Creator’s tough love.
Though my mother was a cancer survivor, her 77-year-old body was not strong enough for diabetes, heart problems and kidney failures.
She always said that when a person passed the age of 60, be grateful. The succeeding birthdays are bonuses. How many bonuses one will have? No one knows. Just make the most of every day.
A month after my Chicago trip was the start of her 11-month relationship with hospitals.
The challenging months of our lives. The siren of the ambulance, emergency room and ICU were some of the toughest to deal with. Seeing her in pain was the worst.
We were drained physically, emotionally, mentally and financially. Our faith was even put to the test.
I thought those brownie points would spare us from pain. But that’s not the way heaven worked. I need to see things from a different perspective.
That I was not in an advantage, religion-wise. God didn’t reserve a seat for me in a standing room-only place just because I sat in countless churches. I didn’t become God’s apple of the eye just because I chose to visit churches than parks and museums. Those brownie points were for my spirituality, to save me on rainy days.
The spirituality that saved me from breaking into pieces. It gave me the strength to carry on and to cross over.
You know what? Chicago happened on March of 2015 and my mother passed away on March of the following year.
As I looked back, visiting all those houses of worship is like having a knight in shining armor. A treasure I will cherish for the rest of my life.
A treasure that taught me that spirituality is more important than religion.
