For a lifelong Catholic that isn’t necessarily an extraordinary statement and to be clear I always receive communion when I go to mass. But it’s been a many years since “I WENT” to Communion. The difference between receiving communion and going to Communion is that for the first time in years I was able to go up in the normal communion procession along with the rest of the congregation. I went to it. They didn’t bring it to me.

In recent years and had become so difficult for me to drive my motorized wheelchair that I asked my pastor the late Fr. Larry Crawford if he or one of the other Eucharistic ministers could come down the aisle to where I sit and bring me communion. Even when I was still able to drive my old wheelchair, I had to put the stick in my mouth to steady my hand on the wheelchair control. It got to be too difficult to drive up, take the stick out, receive communion, put the stick back in my mouth, get my arm in the proper position to drive, and then drive back to my pew. He said it was no problem because he would send Eucharistic ministers down the aisle to give communion to other elderly and disabled people.

After Fr. Crawford retired and unfortunately passed away shortly thereafter, our new pastor Fr. Mike has always come down the aisle to bring me communion. In the three or four years he’s been here that’s the way it’s always been.

But now with my new power chair that I can drive using a joystick that I control with my lips, for the first time today I drove up in the normal communion procession and took communion just like everybody else.

It was a very good day.