My wife and I are starting a private classical high school in northeast Texas.
Six months ago, we were told we could rent empty classrooms in a beautiful location right next to a Catholic parish, which would enable our students to walk to daily Mass.
We were thrilled. The location perfectly fits the stately English style of our Chesterton Academy. I waited for the lease contract to be sent over.
A month later, I was still waiting.
Two months later, still waiting. I messaged the person who was to send the contract and got no response. I tried again but was met with radio silence.
I realized they must have changed their minds about renting to us.
No big deal, I thought. There must be hundreds of places to rent in our small city. I’ll find the best option, and we’ll secure a location.
I found several good options and spoke with the leasing agents. It was then that I learned we would need a certificate of occupancy from the city before we could have our school at any location.
No big deal. How hard could that be?
Turns out, very hard.
What I naively thought would be an easy process turned into meetings with the city’s building inspectors and fire marshals. Location after location, they shot us down.
“It won’t work, sorry.”
“You have to install an automatic fire sprinkler system. It will cost over $100,000.”
January went by. Then February.
We hired a headmaster for the school, who will start in the summer. We had a score of students ready to attend the school. We had to have a location.
So I turned to Saint Joseph.
Saint Joseph—that stalwart defender of the Holy Family and protector of the Church—is renowned for interceding for any need and obtaining the necessary graces for it.
Our team started a 30-day novena to Saint Joseph to find a location.
March passed, along with St. Joseph’s feast day, and the first novena ended. No location worked.
I started a second 30-day novena.
April arrived, and still no location met all the constraints and requirements.
The end of April came, and with it the end of the second novena. I found a location that I thought could work. It stood a few hundred yards outside the city limits and thus only needed to comply with the fire code.
We moved forward in negotiations with the landlord, and after six months of searching, the landlord sent over the lease contract.
I signed it on May 1, the feast day of Saint Joseph the Worker.
I couldn’t have planned that if I had tried.
I told my son that God’s providence often shows up this way: a small but unmistakable set of circumstances that align perfectly.
Sure, an atheist could dismiss it as a coincidence. But we Catholics know better. Nothing happens outside of God’s perfect wisdom.
Not every prayer is answered so clearly, nor so favorably. Often, the answer to our prayer is “no.” Sometimes we don’t get an answer one way or the other, at least not in the timeframe we were hoping for.
But we believe in faith that every prayer is answered, and that God works for our good in every circumstance, even when it is painful.
So whatever you are facing right now, turn to God in prayer.