My crime...I had a car accident in St. Joseph, Missouri in March that I must admit was my fault. Being good Benedictines we don't own our own personal cars but our convent has five general use cars that we can sign out when we need to go somewhere. I was on my way to Atchison, KS with another sister for a vocation fair at Benedictine College when a closed interstate forced me into a part of the city of St. Joe that I was not familiar with.
We were lost, we were trying to figure out how to get back on the highway, the two-way street we were on became a one-way with both lanes going in the same direction which I was not aware of. I was driving along in the right lane and proceeded to turn left when suddenly, there was a huge bang/jolt on my left and I looked up to see the front of a pickup sticking in my driver's side door. We were very shook up but no one got hurt thank God. The police were called, I got a traffic citation and we were towed to our car dealership. Our Sr. Cheryl who is in charge of the cars has a reputation for being hard on any sister who gets a little dent, etc. She was very kind to me, though, and was more concerned about our health than the state of the car. (She is actually a softie inside...but she likes having that reputation :) Of course, the car I was driving had to be our newest car!
I've never been to court so I was nervous not knowing what to expect. However, a part of me was very curious to experience a court room. I was sort of familiar with those TV shows like "Judge Judy." My 'appointment' was at 8am and after checking in I was told to proceed to the court room. It was a small room in the basement of the courthouse and 20 people were already sitting on the benches around the room. I thought to myself, "Great, this is going to take forever." Plus I also thought, "Hmmm...I wonder what they are here for?" There were people of all sorts...but no other nuns as far as I could tell! I wouldn't be surprised if as they were looking at me they were asking themselves, "What did that Sister do?"
A judge's bench was at the front of the room. At 8am the TV screen lit up and our judge appeared on screen in a video. He explained what would happen during our appearance and what would happen if we plead guilty or not guilty. I was grateful to hear at the very end of the short video that traffic court violations would be heard first. After the video ended, our judge appeared in 'real life.'
My name was the third one he called so I didn't have to wait very long.
"Do you understand the charges against you?" he asked.
"Yes," I replied. "How do you plead?"
"Guilty."
"Okay, that will be a fifty dollar fine plus court costs, that total will be $76.50. There will also be a couple of points on your license." Then he smiled and said, "And have a nice day."
That took all of 45 seconds! I was expecting a bigger fine so I was grateful.
Sometimes I think about judgement day, especially if we have had a scripture reading at Mass pertaining to that. What will it be like to be thrust suddenly before the face of God the instant we die?
I will have to plead 'guilty' in that instance also.
I trust that God's mercy is as great as his justice so I'm counting on a big smile and "have a nice eternal life" from God, too!
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