This story is the second in a series previewing the Eucharistic Congress.
Blake Gibson, now 41, figured he’d been dealing with depression since junior high school. The worst kind of depression, too, sometimes resulting in suicidal thoughts.
So it was the day Gibson nearly succumbed to those dark thoughts, only to suddenly pivot.
“Something said, ‘Confession is at 10:45,’” Gibson said, recalling the message that rushed into his head as he contemplated ending his life. “So I went to confession.”
Father John Herrera, then serving Saint Gregory the Great and Saint Francis Xavier Catholic Churches in Enid, heard Gibson’s confession and gave him a pointed penance.
“He said, ‘For your penance, the Blessed Sacrament is exposed outside. I want you to go and kneel in front of the Blessed Sacrament. And for as long as you feel called, ask Jesus to continue to open your memories and continue to heal the scars on your heart.’
He said, ‘I can just tell you have these scars on your heart from something, that you don’t feel that you deserve love. But God is always giving us His love.”
There, on his knees in adoration, Gibson encountered that love.
During adoration hours at Saint Francis, he said he found himself with a smattering of elderly ladies sprinkled throughout the church.
“Of course, I break down and cry,” he said. “And I’m out there crying and praying and someone just comes up and gives me this giant bear hug. And I thought it was one of the little old ladies who saw me.
“I went to pat their arm to tell them thank you for hugging me. And I look around and there’s no one there. I just had this feeling of, ‘I love you. You can never disappoint me.’”
Gibson is one of many Enid Catholics discovering the joy and love of Jesus in the Eucharist, with Saint Gregory the Great presenting a thriving perpetual adoration program.
Only a handful of parishes in the archdiocese offer perpetual adoration and Enid ranks as the smallest community in the group. Yet since making the bold move in April 2021, with COVID still lingering, parishioners continue to fill the 24-hour time slots, at least two at a time.
During this period of Eucharistic Revival in the Church and heading toward the Eucharistic Congress this summer in Indianapolis, Father Herrera doesn’t have to look far for inspiration.
“It makes sense that we put our people before Jesus in the Holy Eucharist and let him do the heavy lifting,” he said.
With a reassignment to serve four panhandle churches on the horizon, Father Herrera felt a need to do something special for the parishioners in Enid.
“‘If this is my last year in Enid, what is the best gift I can give to our people?’” Father Herrera asked himself. “It was continually put on my heart, ‘Well, give them to me.’”
Soon, with the blessings of Father Mark Mason in Enid, and Archbishop Coakley, the plans for perpetual adoration sprouted.
There was prayer and fasting, dedicated to invigorating the community.
There were pledge drives and talks aimed at attracting adorers and Father Herrera preached on the benefits of perpetual adoration.
They formed captains – point people to recruit when openings occurred or substitutes were needed – assigned to each day. That eased the burden from one person being charged with accounting for all hours, 24/7.
They utilized a platform, AdorationPro, for easy-access scheduling for adorers.
And the people responded, committing to all but a few of the week’s 168 hours, with two people per slot.
They transformed a cry room into a chapel, which is required for perpetual adoration.
Soon, it was go time. And they’re still going, strong.
“It was absolutely the Holy Spirit that got all this going, impressing on people’s hearts to take a risk with all these people who are recommending this for their lives,” Father Herrera said. “Just try it, it’s going to be a great blessing for our parish.
“It was a great privilege to be a part of that.”
Pat Molitor, a parishioner of 33 years, fills the 7 p.m. Thursday and 3 p.m. Friday time slots for adoration. And he fills in where needed, serving as a sort of super-sub, averaging 8-10 hours a week in front of the Blessed Sacrament.
And he recognizes a distinct difference, in himself and others.
“What I see in Enid is a community that is more on track in a country that has never been more offtrack,” Molitor said. “I see a Catholic community within the sub-community of Enid that is highly on track.”
Molitor offered an analogy to describe what’s taken place.
“People that are going to adoration now on a weekly basis, minimum, they’ve all been given spiritual hearing aids,” he said. “They can more clearly hear what the Holy Spirit is telling them, and act on it.”
And the actions are measured in impact.
The churches in Enid run a soup kitchen that feeds 360 daily – including 200 delivered meals – all funded by donations. Saint Joseph Catholic School is enjoying a surge in enrollment. A thriving Hispanic community is enhancing small faith and prayer groups, perpetual adoration and a Cursillo movement.
The six Masses at the two churches each weekend feature mostly full parking lots.
And there’s a strong vocations ministry in Enid, to the point that they’ve been put on the short list to speak this summer at the Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis.
“I know you can tell a tree by its fruit,” Molitor said. “People are either developing, or have developed a personal relationship with Jesus. And it’s causing them to behave in a way that more and more every week imitates his behavior.”
Blake Gibson confirms what that relationship has done for him and his life, and his wife and daughters.
And Gibson traces it all back to that penance of adoration.
“I went home and told my wife, ‘My depression’s cured.’”
Soon, he quit his depression medication, cold turkey.
Now, Gibson said, he has a devotion to adoration.
His permanent time is 3-5 a.m. Tuesday, although he fills in other slots when needed, preferring the early morning shift “because you cannot hear anything else in the world.”
And now in the quiet that once tormented Gibson, there’s peace.
“I tell people, ‘God saved me in confession. And he showed me he loved me in adoration,” Gibson said. “And continues to do so.’ I was a faithful, practicing Catholic by every definition of the term when that happened. We never missed a Mass. I probably went to bi-monthly confessions. I prayed a rosary every day.
“And it wasn’t until God completely saved me that I realized I could be doing so much more.”
John Helsley is the editor of the Sooner Catholic.
Photo: Children from St. Gregory the Great Catholic Church in Enid prayed recently in the adoration chapel. Photo provided.