As you know, my mission (brand?) since I jumped online has always been to portray and teach the joy and truths of the Catholic faith. By late 2019, I had already achieved the goals I set out to earn when I started my creative work in 2009.

So, I set a new goal: to write my first, full-length novel.

If you’ve never written fiction before, it take a LOT more time and mental strength to write than non-fiction. Non-fiction is linear and research-based which, so long as you know your subject, all you need to do is write from point A to point B all the way until point Z and boom! Your book is done.

Writing fiction, however, requires that you have the entire story in your head regardless of what moment in the story you are writing. Every characters’ story arcs, every plot twist, every example of symbolism, allegory, and cause/effect must be present in your mind All. The. Freaking. Time. Even when you aren’t writing, the ideas keep coming which makes it impossible to focus on much else. It’s like a light switch you can’t turn off… or on.

It was in this mental state that acedia made its move on me. And Avarice wasn’t far behind.

I thought about how I wanted my fiction to appeal to a wider audience. I wanted my stories to be in every school library in the country both public and parochial. I thought about what I knew best (my Catholic faith) and how to keep the religious stuff tucked inside a secular narrative, hidden but ever-present like C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia.

I thought about potential publishers, agents, and my new audience.

Then I thought, how soon before they realize that I’m Catholic?

And then, how soon before they throw my manuscript in the trash as unmarketable in the public sector?

That’s when I started to erase who I’ve always been. I created a new me, one free from the confines of Catholicity.

I tried to re-brand myself.

That’s when the darkness hit. Hard.

First, it was the pandemic that left without a routine, with several children (my students and my own flesh and blood) to teach online, and precious little sleep to cope.

The straw that broke the camel’s back, however, was that my faith was put on pause.

We couldn’t attend Mass or visit the adoration chapel (which is non-existent in my new neighborhood), I felt spiritually sapped. I had nothing to feel connected spiritually:

• No free time to pray (or even think), no sacraments to partake in (save my marriage which, in hindsight, saved me from total spiritual despair)
• No connection to the outside world (save what zoom provided which, as we all know, isn’t much).
• No holy desire. No zeal whatsoever.

I wedged a blade between the religious me and the secular me. I asked the same question every waking moment of the day: Why can’t religious me and public me come together in… me?

For months, I felt like I had my shoes on the wrong feet.

It wasn’t until November that God answered my question in a big way.

I had been pitching my novel for months finding *checks notes* ZERO agents or publishers who were interested in it. I sent many, MANY queries to mostly secular publishers but, I ended up sending it to one Catholic imprint as well. While I waited, I began writing my novel’s prequel and lacklusterly thought that the whole series was useless.

I, also, felt like I was useless.

My wife was having more quality time with our newborn which made me feel inadequate as a father. My other children seemed to be growing further part from me and closer to their homework and new neighborhood friends. My passion to teach was hampered with worries about the pandemic as day after day, more students were disappearing from my classroom due to “close contacts” with people who had tested positive for Covid.

I simply couldn’t write anymore. I was exhausted. I passed through this “Dark Year of the Soul” that had me doubting my religion, my profession, my art– my entire life.

Then, by sheer grace, a publisher requested my full manuscript.

It was the Catholic publisher.

God had answered my question. C.S. Lewis never divided his soul for different audiences; he remained resolute in his Christianity so that different audiences could have a compass to follow. He was the magnetic north that a world deprived of truth looked to in its time of spiritual need.

The light switch inside my soul flipped back on.

I’m Catholic, and 2020 helped me understand that there are no confines in branding myself as such. On the contrary, it is because of my Catholicity that I can reflect more light in a world so in need of it. The audience, be it secular or religious, sees said beams, and follows.

“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” -C.S. Lewis