"The union of a man and a woman is being put on a par with the pairing of two people of the same sex, and tacitly confirms those fallacious theories that remove from the human person all the importance of masculinity and femininity, as though it were a question of the purely biological factor.

Such theories hold that man - that is, his intellect and his desire - would decide autonomously what he is or what he is not. In this, corporeity is scorned, with the consequence that the human being, in seeking to be emancipated from his body—from the “biological sphere”—ends by destroying himself.


If we tell ourselves that the Church ought not to interfere in such matters, we cannot but answer: are we not concerned with the human being? Do not believers, by virtue of the great culture of their faith, have the right to make a pronouncement on all this? Is it not their—our—duty to raise our voices to defend the human being, that creature who, precisely in the inseparable unity of body and spirit, is the image of God?”

— Pope Benedict XVI

I'm praying for you!

:)

Anyone who seeks truth seeks God, whether or not he accepts it.

- St. Edith Stein

I'm praying for you!

:)

The Holy Family Prayer

JESUS, Son of God and Son of Mary, bless our family. Graciously inspire in us the unity, peace, and mutual love that you found in your own family in the little town of Nazareth.

MARY, Mother of Jesus and our Mother, nourish our family with your faith and your love. Keep us close to your Son, Jesus, in all our sorrows and joys.

JOSEPH, Foster-father to Jesus, guardian and spouse of Mary, keep our family safe from harm. Help us in all times of discouragement or anxiety.

HOLY FAMILY OF NAZARETH, make our family one with you. Help us to be instruments of peace. Grant that love, strengthened by grace, may prove mightier than all the weaknesses and trials through which our families sometimes pass. May we always have God at the center of our hearts and homes until we are all one family, happy and at peace in our true home with you. Amen.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“God loves us; we need only to summon up the humility to allow ourselves to be loved.”

— Pope Benedict XVI

Merry 4th day of Christmas! :D

I'm praying for you!

:)  

We must not be discouraged by our faults, for children fall frequently. - St. Therese de Lisieux

Merry 3rd day of Christmas! :D

I'm praying for you!

:)

Imagine how great His joy
when she said yes
"I will be your mother"
God the infinite Love,
longing for His creatures
to accept His Love and love
Him in return, no more,
in her received a mother
Sin had separated Love
from the beloved, us from
God, and the whole world
ached and groaned in pain
The first woman, mother of
all, abandoned Him, but
with Mary, we were restored
How great His joy to be
granted a home in the womb
of His beloved creation,
to be joined once more
to the children He'd lost
He gives her to us as
Mother; know my joy, He
calls, for her voice is the
one which soothed Love's cries,
her arms the ones that cradled
Love's most delicate form
When all the world had
fled from Love, Mary turned
back around, threw her arms
around Him; she embraced Love
How great His joy must be.

Merry 2nd day of Christmas! :D

I'm praying for you!

:)

“God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. Yet on the part of the people, there are times of both light and darkness, fidelity and infidelity, obedience and rebellion, times of being a pilgrim people, and times of being a people adrift,” the Pope said. “In our personal history, too, there are both bright and dark moments, lights and shadows. If we love God and our brothers and sisters, we walk in the light. But if our heart is closed, if we are dominated by pride, deceit, self-seeking, then darkness falls within us, and around us. Whoever hates his brother — writes the Apostle John — is in the darkness; he walks in the darkness, and does not know the way to go, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.”

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Remember that God, during your prayers, is watching for your affirmative answer to the question which He is inwardly asking you: ‘Do you believe I am able to do this?’ To which question you must from the depth of your heart reply, ‘Yes, Lord.’”

— St. John of Kronstadt

Merry Christmas Eve!

I'm praying for you!

:)

My life is a poem
He already wrote
and I’m vainly
trying to make
everything rhyme
instead of just
enjoying the beauty
of the unknown.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Our deacon gave a homily today about the importance of Christ's entire earthly life as a sacrifice and a humbling act. He gave a fictitious example of Christ coming as a warrior instead and declaring Himself openly to the Israelites after banishing Herod. Unfortunately, he didn't go any further with this line of thinking, saying it doesn't matter how the Israelites would have responded because that's not what happened.

But I think it does matter. The Jewish people were expecting a warrior, someone to free them from their earthly oppressors. They were expecting a show of force and mighty signs of not just healing and forgiveness, but of power. But if God had come as a warrior in that fashion, if Christ had actually appeared and vanquished the Romans with a wave as His hand and shown His might to all the Jewish people, of course they would have bowed down to Him. They would have bowed down to Him because they would have had no other choice. He would have proven His power and even if they doubted in their hearts, they still would have been obliged to worship Him.

He didn't do that, though. He came as a helpless infant. He wandered through the streets healing lepers and forgiving sinners and teaching. His mightiest miracles were worked for people who already had great faith in Him. They were not used to prove His power. They were used to demonstrate His love.

God gave us free will, and He refuses to take that away from us. No matter how much it breaks His heart to see us stray from Him, He will never force us to love us. Love, by its very definition, cannot be forced. And He wants our love, not just our allegiance. He doesn't want us to simply follow a list of rules. He wants us to love Him and to know Him. That choice must be made freely, and coming as a mighty warrior who vanquished foes with a wave of His hand, although of course possible for God, would not have left us free to choose whether to love Him, to choose whether to follow Him.

He came as an infant so that we might love Him. We must choose whether to kneel before the helpless babe in the manger, the child who comes to us from the very beginning as a humble servant. He sleeps in a place reserved for food. The Great Shepherd comes to feed His sheep, and He reveals Himself immediately as their nourishment. He will feed us with Himself. Mary and Joseph have the privilege of clothing Him, feeding Him, providing for Him. He who is so mighty He requires nothing, He who no man could ever look upon and survive, He who could have anything He desired simply by willing it, makes Himself completely dependent on others. He allows them to love Him, to care for Him.

And He continues to do so. He is constantly present on Earth in the form of, once again, food. Just as He was in His infancy, in the Eucharist, He once again humbles Himself, this time to assuming the accidents of bread and wine. Once again, He appears as helpless. We keep Him enthroned in gold boxes. We sit watch with Him through the night, just as Mary and Joseph did the night He was born. We guard Him against people who would desecrate the Eucharist. We reverently adore Him. We welcome Him into our very selves, to take up residence in our hearts. Just as Mary and Joseph were granted the ability to love Him on Earth as a child, we are granted the opportunity to love Him in the Eucharist, and when we choose to love Him, a choice that we must make freely, we receive the greatest love in all of existence in return.

I'm praying for you!

:)

The readings for tomorrow (today, I'm up pretty late tonight) include a reading from Isaiah that foretells the birth of Jesus.

I just read that passage and what stuck out to me was this:

Is it not enough for you to weary people,
must you also weary my God?

Isaiah is exasperated. You annoy, hurt, anger, test, etc. humans. But that's not enough. It's not enough to sin against humans. You want to do all these things to God as well. 

And the response to this is not, "Stop complaining and listen to the commandments. See? Ahaz wouldn't test God and neither shall you."

The response is one of mercy and love. You shall receive a sign. The virgin shall conceive and bear a son. 

At first glance, that passage above sounds like Isaiah throwing up his hands in disgust, and I don't know, maybe he was. 

But God doesn't just throw up his hands in disgust and despair over us. He sees all of our sinful desires. He sees us railing against him. But he also sees us. He recognizes our enslavement and he has pity on us. Must you also hurt me? he asks. And the answer is yes. Our salvation requires his sacrifice, so he hands himself over to us. 

I had an idea just now about sin and justice and the role of the crucifixion in all that, but it doesn't make much sense anymore so I'll just leave off here. Sorry this is so disjointed. 

I'm praying for you!

:)

To love Mary is my constant wish. I have promised her “Your servant am I”. My, heart, O Mary, burns forever with love and joy, for you, ornament of heaven.

- From “Maria zu Lieben”, a German devotional hymn.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Keep your soul at peace, in order to be able to be attentive and very faithful to the inner movement of the Holy Spirit.”

— St. Peter Julian Eymard

I'm praying for you!

:)

I wrote this 6-word poem and a lot of people liked it, so I thought I'd share.

Death choked

when it tasted

Love.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Death choked

when it tasted

Love.

“If we but paused for a moment to consider attentively what takes place in this Sacrament, I am sure that the thought of Christ’s love for us would transform the coldness of our hearts into a fire of love and gratitude.”

— St. Angela of Foligno

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Sometimes the Catholic Church is criticized, “She honors Mary too much.” But the Catholic Church will never honor Mary as much as Jesus honored her, as much as God the Father honored her, by making her the mother of His Eternal Son, as much as the Holy Spirit, who was responsible by His power for her conception.”

— Cardinal Justin Rigali

I'm praying for you! :)

“Hasten, O Lord, enlighten my darkness. Speak to my soul. Show me the way in which I should walk and give me the grace to follow it. In delay there is danger but in haste is likewise peril. Therefore, Lord, give ear to my petition and show me the path that is safe. Amen.”

— St. Bridget’s prayer for direction.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“In one of his Advent homilies, Bernard of Clairvaux offers a stirring presentation of the drama of this [Annunciation to Mary] event. After the error of our first parents, the whole world was shrouded in darkness, under the dominion of death. Now God seeks to enter the world anew. He knocks at Mary’s door. He needs human freedom. The only way he can redeem man, who was created free, is by the means of a free ‘yes’ to his will….So Bernard portrays heaven and earth as it were holding its breath at this moment of question addressed to Mary. Will she say yes? She hesitates…will her humility hold her back? Just this once—-Bernard tells her—-do not be humble but daring! Give us your ‘yes’! This is the crucial moment when, from her lips, from her heart, the answer comes: ‘Let it be to me according to your word.’ It is the moment of free, humble yet magnanimous obedience in which the loftiest choice of human freedom is made.”

— Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives (Pg. 36)

Although, I don't think being humble and daring are mutually exclusive. God is both humble and brave and there are no contradictions in Him.

I'm praying for you!

:)

In case you didn't notice, I'm currently reading through Exodus, and there are some things that just seem random. I know they're not, but they really seem like it.
In Exodus 23, God is talking about the importance of truthfulness and of justice. Then He's talking about the three high feasts of the Jewish feasts.
Then He says, "You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk." - Exodus 23:19b.
It doesn't even seem connected to the first half of the verse.
The note on it in my Bible says, "this command, repeated in 34:26 and Dt 14:21, is difficult to understand. It may originate from a taboo that forbade killing the young that were still nursing from the mother, or that forbade the mixing of life and death: the slaughtered young goat with the milk that had nourished its life. The Jewish dietary custom of keeping meat and dairy products separate is based on this command."
So, I still don't know exactly why it's in Exodus 23, but at least I know why devout Jews don't eat cheeseburgers.

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“We have to state, without mincing words, that there is an inseparable bond between our faith and the poor. May we never abandon them.”

— Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium

I'm praying for you!

:)

"In the case of the family, the weakening of these bonds is particularly serious because the family is the fundamental cell of society, where we learn to live with others despite our differences and to belong to one another; it is also the place where parents pass on the faith to their children. Marriage now tends to be viewed as a form of mere emotional satisfaction that can be constructed in any way or modified at will. But the indispensible contribution of marriage to society transcends the feelings and momentary needs of the couple. As the French bishops have taught, it is not born 'of loving sentiment, ephemeral by definition, but from the depth of the obligation assumed by the spouses who accept to enter a total communion of life'." - Pope Francis

I'm praying for you!

:)

"Here I repeat for the entire Church what I have often said to the priests and laity of Buenos Aires: I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the centre and which then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life." - Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium

I'm praying for you!

:)

In Exodus 18, Moses is sitting in judgment over all the people all day - he's solving absolutely everyone's disputes. Then his father-in-law advises him to appoint other men to solve lesser cases.

"What you are doing is not wise...You will surely wear yourself out, both you and these people with you. The task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone." - Exodus 18:17-18

"Lighten your burden by letting them bear it with you!" - Exodus 18:22b

It's good advice to Moses at the time, and it obviously foreshadows the hierarchies within Judaism and within the Catholic Church.

But it's also important advice for our everyday lives. We can't do everything alone, and we just hurt everyone when we try.

Not only can we not do everything alone; we can't do anything alone. We are completely powerless without God, and true humility recognizes that we can accomplish all things but only through Him and according to His Will.

The task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone. Lighten your burden by letting Him bear it with you.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Happy Feast of St. Nicholas!

Do not celebrate it by punching heretics.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Is sooo cute.

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. If you are interested in something, no matter what it is, go at it full speed ahead. Embrace it with both arms, hug it, love it and above all become passionate about it. Lukewarm is no good. Hot is no good, either. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.”

— Roald Dahl

I'm praying for you!

:)

O Blessed Joseph, happy man, to whom it was given not only to see and to hear that God Whom many kings longed to see, and saw not, to hear, and heard not; but also to carry Him in your arms, to embrace Him, to clothe Him, and guard and defend Him. 
V Pray for us, O Blessed Joseph. R That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“We pray to obey God, not to “play God”. We pray, not to change God’s mind, but to change our own; not to command God, but to let God command us. We pray to “let God be God”. Prayer is our obedience to God even when it asks God for things, for God has commanded us to ask.”

—	Peter Kreeft I'm praying for you! :)

Vandy won! And I finished my grad school applications (I'm waiting on one recommender, but I finished all the apps themselves). And God is good. All the time.

I'm praying for you!

:)

So yesterday, my computer decided to quit functioning so I couldn't post anything to your blog. But, I'm thankful for all my friends, for all the support and guidance they've given me, and for teaching me how to love like Christ.

For today, here is a quote which quotes Monsignor Ronald Knox, who is the bomb.com:

“In the 1950s at the first Mass of a newly ordained priest, Ronald Knox, Monsignor Ronald Knox, preached and he said words which are true as well today. He said that everyone knows that the best Mass which is offered is the one in which all of the faithful walk out at the end of Mass and ask themselves, ‘Who said Mass today, what priest was it?’ We are meant to lose ourselves in order that Christ the High Priest can shine through. In order that we can see the mysteries which are being carried out on the altar.”

—	Fr. John Berg’s homily at the 25th anniversary Mass of the FSSP on October 18, 2013, in Rome.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 8: I am thankful for Vanderbilt (University) Catholic and for the Catholic and Christian community at Vanderbilt. This community has molded me into a better image of Christ and drawn me closer to Him.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 7: I'm thankful for my life and for all its ups and downs.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 6: I'm thankful for everyone who has helped me apply to grad schools.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 5: I'm thankful for all the beauty in the world.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 4: I'm thankful that God uses all things for His glory, including Vanderbilt football.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 3: I am thankful for Vanderbilt and for all the opportunities I have had here.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Day 2: I'm thankful for my family, especially my parents and my siblings. They've been there for me through everything and they've taught me a lot.

I'm praying for you!

:)

 From now until Thanksgiving, I'm just going to name some stuff I'm thankful for. If you want to think about stuff you're thankful for, too, that's awesome.

Day 1: I'm thankful for God's guidance in my life. Over the past year, He's showered me with amazing friends, amazing experiences, and even the grace to hear His voice directly, and I have such a clearer sense of direction in my life right now than I've ever had before.

I'm praying for you!

:)

In his homily today, Fr. Baker mentioned something about Jesus sweeping us off our feet, and I just got stuck with an image in my head of Jesus coming along and scooping me up into His arms. And I think the first image that came in my head was of the Church like the Bride of Christ and Jesus just sweeping each of us into His arms. But the other image was that of a child who's fallen down. And even though he looks hurt, he's got a look on his face that says, "I want to do this alone. I'm a big kid." So, his dad stands there and watches him, but the second the kid starts to cry, when he screams out, "Daddy!" his dad swoops in without hesitation and scoops him into his arms.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Since he clings to me in love, I will free him, protect him for he knows my name. - Psalm 91.

This is probably my favorite part of the entire Bible. And I wish I could read the original text of it and understand it, because it was probably even more beautifully written originally than in the translation.

I'm praying for you!

:)

IT'S SUNDAY OF AWAKENING!!

I tried to post today's and yesterday's posts in advance, but Blogger was down :(

Anyway, Awakening was amazing, as always. Jeff has a lot of great things to say about it.

And as always, I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

There is one saint in the calendar of the Church who has never been associated with the idea of punishment: even justice is alien to her, compared with the ideas of mercy and love. She is the one whom Catholics know as Our Lady.
Yet it is around this figure that the bitterest conflict has always been waged. No statues in Puritan England were more certain to be destroyed than hers, and the same was true in Spain in the 1930s. Ministers in their pulpits may question the divinity of Christ and cause no stir outside a few country rectories — but when the doctrine of the Assumption, which has been established as a feast of the Church for more than a thousand years, is defined as a dogma, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York claim that the division of Christendom has been widened. They believe in the resurrection of the dead — but to suggest that an actual resurrection has already taken place seems to them blasphemous.
No storm was raised when, a hundred years ago, Newman wrote: “Original sin had not been found in her, by the wear of her senses, and the waste of her frame and the decrepitude of years, propagating death. She died, but her death was a mere fact, not an effect; and, when it was over, it ceased to be.”
Temporarily there were other issues: the Protestant churches were worried by the idea of evolution, even the age of the earth was a cause of scandal because it was believed to contradict Genesis. But the conflict of science and religion always passes sooner or later: what remains is this mysterious savage war around the only figure of perfect human love.
What is the explanation? One theologian has explained it, for our generation, as a distrust of the concrete. We are so used to abstractions. Words like Democracy and Liberty can be used in quite opposite senses without arousing attention: they go in and out of our ears like air. So with religious belief. The Supreme Being, the Trinity, The Creator of all things, such phrases may once have excited thought, but they do so no longer. Even the concrete name Christ has become so diluted, into the Great Teacher, the First Communist, and the like, that only a small amount of opposition is raised by the idea that Christ is God — it is rather like saying Truth is God.
But the statement that Mary is the Mother of God remains something shocking, paradoxical, physical.
” — Graham Greene, ‘Our Lady and her Assumption’, 1951, in Ian Thomson, ed., Articles of Faith: The collected Tablet journalism of Graham Greene, 19-20
I'm praying for you!

:)

This is just one of the things Jesus told me during my accidental pilgrimage with Jake last spring:

I am Love. Love is not proud. But it knows its own talents, and it is not afraid to speak the truth. So do not be afraid to speak, when you know what must be said.

I'm praying for you!

:)

In Genesis 37, Joseph's brothers sell him into slavery. It's a pretty familiar story. But a part I hadn't thought much about before is 13:26-27.

Judah said to his brothers, "What is to be gained by killing our brother and concealing his blood? Come, let us sell him to these Ishmaelites, instead of doing away with him ourselves. After all, he is our brother, our own flesh." His brothers agreed.

He is acknowledging that Joseph is his brother, his own flesh, and he's suggesting they sell him into slavery. And he really doesn't seem to be suggesting that Joseph won't die, merely that they won't be the ones to kill him.

This seems utterly ridiculous at first glance - you're acknowledging your brotherhood, so you're going to do one evil thing instead of another evil thing, when you could just not do evil at all?

I think it's supposed to seem ridiculous. It's supposed to make us remember that we always have a choice to do good, to refrain from evil altogether.

But a lot of times, we tell ourselves that we'll just do the thing we consider less wrong and everything will be fine.

It's one reason so many Catholics use contraception. It's less wrong than abortion, right?

I don't do cocaine or heroin. I just get really drunk. That's less wrong, right?

I didn't yell at my friend. I just silently loathed her for a while. Less wrong?

And the problem is, we're way more worried about the relative wrongness of our actions than about the rightness of our actions.

It shouldn't matter if getting super drunk isn't quite as sinful as snorting coke. We shouldn't do either one. We shouldn't be concerned about avoiding the most evil stuff. We should be concerned about doing the right thing.

At the point where we're debating between sins, we've already decided to sin.

If he's your brother, you don't throw him in the cistern. You don't kill him. You don't sell him into slavery. And you shouldn't need a list of what NOT to do to him. Because you should love him.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Our Lady has 117 titles. She selected this title at Fatima:
“I am the Lady of the Rosary”.
St. Francis de Sales said the greatest method of praying
IS - Pray the Rosary.
St. Thomas Aquinas preached 40 straight days in Rome,
Italy on just the Hail Mary.
St. John Vianney, patron of priests, was seldom seen without a rosary in his hand.
"The rosary is the scourge of the devil" - Pope Adrian VI.
"The rosary is a treasure of graces" - Pope Paul V.
Padre Pio the stigmatic priest said: “The rosary is THE WEAPON”
Pope Leo XIII wrote 9 encyclicals on the rosary.
Pope John XXIII spoke 38 times about our Lady and the Rosary. He prayed 15 decades daily.
St. Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort wrote:
“The rosary is the most powerful weapon to touch the
Heart of Jesus, Our Redeemer, who so loves His Mother.””

—	The Pieta Prayerbook

I'm praying for you!

:)

'But the Lord had given her such a living faith that when she heard some person saying they would have liked to have lived at the time Christ our God walked in the world, she used to laugh to herself. She wondered what more they wanted since in the most Blessed Sacrament they had Him just as truly present as He was then.'

St. Teresa of Jesus

I'm praying for you!

:)

“If you will be honest about your life, you will admit that God has never failed you. He has never let you down. He may not have always given you what you wanted or orchestrated your life according to your desires or taken your advisement on His providential care for you, but when it comes down to it, He has never, ever failed you. You may have felt distant from God at times, but He’s never abandoned you. He has never left you or forsaken you. You have never been without His love and sovereign care.”

—	Matt Chandler

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Do you realize
that Jesus is there
in the tabernacle
expressly for you-
for you alone? He
burns with the
desire to come into
your heart… don’t
listen to the demon,
laugh at him, and
go without fear to
receive the Jesus of
peace and love…”
― St. Thérèse de Lisieux

I'm praying for you!

:)

Happy All Souls' Day!



I'm praying for you!

:)

You can't be half a saint. - St. Therese de Lisieux

Happy All Saint's Day (again)

I'm praying for you!

:)

HAPPY ALL SAINTS DAY!!!



I'm praying for you!

:)

I am with you and will protect you wherever you go. - God to Jacob in Genesis 28:15a.

I'm praying for you!

:)

blargh, grad school, blargh.

^that's about how sentient I've been lately.

but...

I'm praying for you! (just maybe not very intelligently)

:)

Today, we had a priest from Rwanda come and lead a healing service after Mass. He started listing off problems that Jesus had told him people had and saying they were healed. And he said anyone who had surgery in the past would be healed tomorrow. Afterwards, one of the women that was there with him actually came up to me and said I wouldn't need crutches tomorrow. A bunch of people got up and said they'd been emotionally/spiritually healed, and then somebody said her back had stopped hurting. It was unlike anything I'd ever seen, and I'm not really sure what I think about the whole service, the whole idea, etc. I guess if I wake up tomorrow and my leg's back, I'll let you know.

But actually, I've talked to God about this multiple times before, including tonight, and Jesus' answer always seems to be, "You don't want a cross to carry? You don't want the blessing, the privilege, of carrying your cross with me?"

Anyways, just thought I'd let you know what's going on in Vandyland.

I'm praying for you!

:)

In Genesis 24, from the point of view of Abraham's servant, he went and found a woman according to the commands of God and brought her back to Isaac as a wife.

But from the point of view of Rebekah, this took an extraordinary amount of trust. A random man showed up with jewelry and camels and said that God had sent him to bring her back as his master's wife. And really, when you think about it that way, going with him (which she seems to do with little or no hesitation) sounds kinda crazy.

But she has faith in God, and so she follows where He leads. And this is exactly what we're called to do.

The Holy Spirit, sent to us by the Father on behalf of our bridegroom Christ, comes to us and says, "I have been sent to bring you home as a bride for the Son of the One who sent me." And we have to freely consent, of course. Rebekah has the chance to say no without penalty. But if we go, if we follow, we must do so on faith.

Also, with our vocation in life, we are often called to follow God's will based on faith, without knowing exactly where it will lead us in this life. We have to trust that God is leading us towards a spouse (whether a human spouse or the Church or Himself) or towards a particular path with regards to our community or career if we are to live the single life. We don't get a road-map ahead of time. And we don't get to spend a lot of time deciding and saying goodbye to our old life. Like Rebekah, when we hear God's call, we must choose to have faith in Him, accept His call, and follow Him.

In a way, Rebekah seems to be an extremely good example of what Christ means when He tells us to deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow Him.

I'm praying for you!

:)

"Do not think that love in order to be genuine has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired. Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.”

—	Mother Theresa

I'm praying for you!

:)

"A journalist once asked Blessed Teresa of Calcutta: “What has to change in the Church?” Her answer: “You and I."

—	(Copied from “Being Catholic. Really” blog)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“The quest for God is essentially the search for the full account and meaning of life. And life has meaning because the essence of God is Love.”

—	Fulton J. Sheen

I'm praying for you!

:)

“If he who refuses to believe in the truths of the Catholic faith is blind, how much blinder is he who believes, and yet lives as if he did not believe!”

—	Saint Alphonsus

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

"Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength." -Isaiah 40:28-29

I'm praying for you!

:)

When God tells Abraham he and Sarah will give birth to a great nation, he falls over laughing (Genesis 17). So God says that he will have a son and name him Isaac, which according to my Bible's footnotes, means "laughter."

Never say God doesn't have a sense of humor.

I'm praying for you!

:)

In Genesis 16, Sarai literally tells her husband to have sex with her maid so that he can have a child. ("Have intercourse with my maid, perhaps I will have sons through her." - Genesis 16:2b). And then Hagar gets pregnant and decides she's better than Sarai. So Sarai drives her away (Sarai then mistreated her so much that Hagar ran away from her. - 16:6b). So, of course, Hagar runs away.

And an angel STOPS her and says "Go back to your mistress and submit to her authority." (16:9b).

The angel goes on to tell her about her son Ishmael and her numerous descendents.

But there are two things that are really interesting about this to me:

1. It's the first time that God speaks to a woman in the Bible one-on-one. God asks Eve why she ate the apple and then tells her that she'll give birth in pain, but other than that, He speaks to Adam. When he makes Adam, he brings him animals to name. Adam and God talk to each other. But God isn't shown having any one-on-one conversations with Eve. And after Adam and Eve, we really don't get much information about women until this passage. Yes, God speaks through an angel, but it is still a conversation between God and Hagar. (To the LORD who spoke to her she gave a name, saying, "You are God who sees me;" she meant, "Have I really seen God and remained alive after he saw me?" - 16:13).

2. I don't know about you, but if my life had been going the way of Hagar's and I was currently running away from Sarai, I'd be really upset by an angel telling me to go back. There's no real explanation given, no theological/moral/ethical discourse. Just "Go back and submit to authority." And she goes. She obeys without question, even though it seems completely unfair.

I don't really have any good explanation or answer, but that's what struck me about Genesis 16.

I'm praying for you!

:)

...the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: Do not fear, Abram! I am your shield; I will make your reward very great. But Abram said, "Lord GOD, what can you give me, if I die childless and have only a servant of my household, Eliezer of Damascus?" Abram continued, "Look, you have given me no offspring, so a servant of my household will be my heir." Then the word of the LORD came to him: No, that one will not be your heir; your own offspring will be your heir. He took him outside and said: Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you can. Just so, he added, will your descendants be. Abram put his faith in the LORD, who attributed it to him as an act of righteousness.
-Genesis 15:1-6

I'm praying for you!

:)

“We must meditate before, during and after everything we do. The prophet says: ‘I will pray, and then I will understand.’ This is the way we can easily overcome the countless difficulties we have to face day after day, which, after all, are part of our work. In meditation we find the strength to bring Christ to birth in ourselves and in others.”

—	St. Charles Borromeo

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:)

“To my humble supplication
Lord, give ear and acceptation;
Save Thy servant that hath none
Help nor hope but Thee alone.
Send, O send relieving gladness
To my soul opprest with sadness,
Which from clog of earth set free
Winged with zeal, flies up to Thee.
To Thee, rich in mercies treasure,
And in goodness without measure,
Never failing help to those
Who on Thy sure help repose.
Heav’nly Tutor, of thy kindness,
Teach my dullness, guide my blindness,
That my steps Thy paths may tread
Which to endless bliss do lead.”

—	Joseph Bryan, c.1620 (based on Psalm 86)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“No harm can come to me since, in whatever happens I see only the tender hand of Jesus.”

—	Saint Thérèse of Lisieux

I'm praying for you!

:)

Suscipe

My God, I am yours for time and eternity. Teach me to cast myself entirely into the arms of your loving Providence with a lively, unlimited confidence in your compassionate, tender pity. Grant, O most merciful Redeemer, that whatever you ordain or permit may be acceptable to me. Take from my heart all painful anxiety; let nothing sadden me but sin, nothing delight me but the hope of coming to the possession of You my God and my all, in your everlasting kingdom. Amen. - Venerable Mother Catherine McAuley

 We sang this in my high school more often than our alma mater.

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“It’s not enough to love, people have to feel that they are loved”

—	Saint John Bosco

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Jesus died praying, and in the abyss of death he upheld the First Commandment and held on to the presence of God. Out of such a death springs this sacrament, the Eucharist.”

—	Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, ‘God’s Yes and His Love,” in God Is Near Us: The Eucharist, the Heart of Life (Ignatius 2003)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Be quite sure that God will bless you and that the depths of your sufferings will be matched by the consolation reserved for you.”

—	St. Therese

I'm praying for you!

:)

Guess who I saw yesterday?! Only the awesomest seminarian ever :)

Praises of God by St. Francis of Assisi

You are holy, Lord, the only God,
and your deeds are wonderful.
You are strong.
You are great.
You are the Most High,
You are almighty.
You, holy Father, are
King of heaven and earth.
You are Three and One,
Lord God, all good.
You are good, all good, supreme good,
Lord God, living and true.
You are love,
You are wisdom
You are humility,
You are endurance
You are rest,
You are peace.
You are joy and gladness.
You are justice and moderation.
You are all our riches,
and you suffice for us.
You are beauty.
You are gentleness.
You are our protector,
You are our guardian and defender.
You are courage.
You are our heaven and our hope,
You are our faith,
our great consolation.
You are our eternal life,
great and wonderful Lord,
God almighty, merciful Savior.

Amen.

Happy feast of the Holy Rosary!

I'm praying for you!

:)

And finally, ending out Buckeye Awakening with another Mother Teresa quote:

Christ changed Himself into the bread of life. Changing Himself into bread, He became totally at our disposal so that, having been fed by Him, we would feel the strength necessary to give ourselves to others.

 Happy Sunday of Awakening!!!! :D

I'm praying for you!

:)

Blessed Teresa of Calcutta said:

As long as we make the best effort we are capable of, we cannot feel discouraged by our failures. We cannot claim any successes either. We should give God all the credit and be extremely sincere when we do so.

 Saturday of Awakening :D

I'm praying for you!

:)

A prayer to Mary by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta:

Mary, Mother of Jesus and of those who participate in his priestly ministry, we come to you with the same attitude of children who come to their mother.
We are no longer children, but adults who desire with all our hearts to be God's children.
Our human condition is weak, that is why we come to ask for your motherly aid so we are able to overcome our weakness.
Pray for us so that we can, in turn, become people of prayer.
We invoke your protection so that we may remain free from all sin.
We invoke your love so that it may reign and we will be able to be compassionate and forgiving.
We ask for your blessing so we can be like the image of your beloved Son, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Amen.

It's Friday of Awakening :D

I'm praying for you!

:)

So I've started reading a chapter of the Bible every night and then choosing one verse/phrase that sticks out at me to meditate on for the next day.

For Genesis 1, I chose "Evening came, and morning followed..." It's repeated over and over. And it started to seem almost like a promise. Evening will come, night will fall, but morning and light will follow.

For Genesis 2, I chose Genesis 2:15.

The LORD God then took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it.

It doesn't say to sit around in it. Apparently, from the very beginning, our human experience was to include work. But we were meant to delight in the work. Rather than simply working the Earth, we were to "cultivate" it and "care for it."

That's my thoughts so far. The queue is set so you'll keep getting updates while I'm in Ohio.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Sometimes, I'm extremely snide and I say/think things that I instantly regret:

Jesus: I love you so much I died for you.

Me: But your death wasn't permanent. You only temporarily died.

Jesus: If it would have meant your eternal joy, I would have gone into permanent oblivion for you. But your joy rests in being with me. I rose again out of love for you.

I'm praying for you!

:)

I know this post says it was posted on Wednesday, but it's still Tuesday!

Anyway, today (Tuesday) is the feast day of the best saint ever, St. Therese de Lisieux.

She said really cool stuff like this:

“Miss no single opportunity of making some small sacrifice, here by a smiling look, there by a kindly word; always doing the smallest right and doing it all for love.”

Basically, whenever people are complaining that they don't know how to put their Christian beliefs into practice, you can just point them to my patron saint and her Little Way.

I'm praying for you!

:)

Prayer is, beyond doubt, the most powerful weapon the Lord gives us to conquer evil passions and temptations of the devil; but we must really put ourselves into our prayer: it is not enough just to say the words, it must come from the heart. And also prayer needs to be continuous, we must pray no matter what kind of situation we find ourselves in: the warfare we are engaged in is on-going, so our prayer must be on-going also.

- St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Look for yourself and you will find loneliness and despair. But look for Christ and you will find Him and everything else.”

—	C.S. Lewis

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Too much of our time is spent trying to chart God on a grid, and too little is spent allowing our hearts to feel awe. By reducing Christian spirituality to formula, we deprive our hearts of wonder.”

—	Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“Do not allow yourselves to be robbed of hope, and carry on! On the contrary, sow hope.”

—	Pope Francis, September 22, 2013

I'm praying for you!

:)

Words of wisdom from Blessed Mother Teresa:

Who are we to accuse anybody? It is possible that we see them doing something we think is not right, but we do not know why they are doing it. Jesus encouraged us not to judge anyone. Maybe we are the ones responsible for others doing things we think are not right. Let us not forget that we are dealing with our brothers and sisters. That leper, that sick person, that drunk, are all our brothers and sisters. They, too, have been created by a greater love. This is something we should never forget. That sick person, that alcoholic, that thief, are my brothers and sisters. It is possible that they find themselves abandoned in the street because no one gave them love and understanding. You and I could be in their place if we had not received love and understanding from other human beings. I will never forget the alcoholic man who told me his story. He was a man who had surrendered to alcohol to forget the fact that no one loved him. Before we judge the poor, we have the duty to look inside ourselves.

I'm praying for you!

:)

“The world’s thy ship and not thy home.”

― St. Thérèse de Lisieux
I'm praying for you!

:)

“The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.” - Mark Twain

Btw, this is an excellent video (and one that I really needed today):

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:)

“Fill yourselves first, then only will you be able to give to others.”

—	Saint Augustine

 I'm praying for you!

:)

I love this photo. It looks like a painting, but it's real (true, I changed the contrast slightly on shutterfly, but it's still a photo). It's a picture I took out the window of a train in Italy. It's not a picture of any incredible must-see sight or amazing feat of architecture or human art. There will never be crowds gathered to stare at this exact location, but it is so beautiful. The buildings, houses and whatever else they are, are nestled among the hills which roll on, seemingly forever. It's nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, it's beautiful because it is ordinary. This is what ordinary life looks like, small people dwelling together, nestled in God's loving creation. He made the rolling hills and flowers and birds and trees and everything else we take for granted to show us His love and proclaim Himself to us. Beauty is not some unattainable wonder we need to travel around the world to find. Beauty is the manifestation of God, living and present in all things and all people. He is everywhere, and the whole Earth is full of His beauty and love. So we go on living our small, ordinary lives, and God keeps on loving us and drawing us closer to Him. That's reality, and it's beautiful.

I'm praying for you!

:)

May it please the supreme and divine Goodness
to give us all abundant grace
ever to know his most holy will
and perfectly to fulfill it.

-St. Ignatius of Loyola

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

Babies experiencing things for the first time.

Got these from: http://beben-eleben.tumblr.com/post/57970020395/babies-experiencing-things-for-the-first-time

First time watching fireworks:

 First time being dunked into water that’s way too cold:

First time getting caught in a bubble shower:

First time driving through a dark tunnel:

First time chatting with a puppet:

First time finding a new recipe in a cooking magazine:

First time forgetting how spoons work:

First time seeing ice cream:

First time meeting a puppy:

First time having their toes licked by a cat:

First time watching New Year’s fireworks:

First time living in a hollowed-out fruit:

 First time “drinking” out of a hose:

First time forgetting how glass windows work:

First time being forced to smell someone’s foot:

First time opening a present:

First time experiencing the sweet, sweet glory of television:

And finally, the first time experiencing the taste of sour:






I'm praying for you!

:)

Ok, so I just heard this ad for Adidas, and I've heard it 5 million times, but the words just now hit me.

"What better way to define yourself than through music?"

To which my response, "What worse way to define yourself than through music?!"

First of all, music, even though it may come from within people and be wonderful and unique and expressive, is an external phenomena. Music expresses; it does not define. Using music as a personal definition is no better than using a book character as your definition, or a rock (okay, so maybe it's a little better than a rock).

Secondly, unless you are personally a composer, music is created by other people. That means that defining yourself through music is simply picking things other people have made and claiming that as your identity - even if you're choosing which music defines you, you're still not truly defining yourself. You're allowing other people to define you.

Defining yourself by music takes the beautiful, unique subjective human soul you ARE and turns it into a mass-produced, easily swayed object. It turns identity into a comparison, when really, a human identity exists in being unique.

And finally, music can describe feelings. It can describe actions. It can describe looks. But a human soul is not feelings, actions, looks, or a sum of the three. Your identity rests in the fact that you are created and loved by God, in the fact that you are loved and capable of love. That's why we can say we love the sinner but hate the sin. You are not your hobbies, the sports you excelled at in school, or your favorite music. Really, you are a beautiful, unrepeatable mystery, undefinable to all except God (and possibly yourself). To reduce that mystery, the human soul in the image of the divine, to a collection of songs, no matter how beautifully written, is utterly demeaning.

Of course, music is beautiful. It can allow us to express ourselves, to communicate the deepest yearnings of our souls. We can sing in joy to God or in despair. We can create beautiful compositions (well, some people can, at least) that demonstrate the beauty and love of God and of humanity. But it can't define us. Nothing of this world can.

But of course you already know all this...

I'm praying for you!

:)

I joined Victory A Capella this year, and we're singing this song (except we're switching words like girl and baby to Jesus and Lord):

I'm praying for you!

:)

Sorry for the rant; here is a cute kitten:



I'm praying for you!

:)

So apparently, the secretary of state (technically, future secretary of state) of the Vatican (why would you choose him for an interview about celibacy, anyway?) said in an interview that celibacy for priests was not a matter of dogma and could be changed.

OH MY GOODNESS, THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IS OBVIOUSLY CHANGING. THERE ARE RULES THAT AREN'T DOGMA?!! WHAT IS THIS MADNESS?

Oh, and of course, they found some old interview with Cardinal Bergoglio before he changed his name in which he said that celibacy rules could be changed. (And they completely ignored the part where he said he didn't think they should be).

THE POPE SAID SOMETHING IS POSSIBLE. THAT'S CODE FOR "WILL HAPPEN." ALSO IF PRIESTS CAN MARRY, THEN THEY CAN MARRY MEN OR BE WOMEN. YAY, NO MORE RULES!

Basically, I'm face-palming right now over the idea that

1. Differentiating between dogma and non-dogmatic tradition is a completely new concept in the Church.

2. Stating that the Church has the ability to change something means she will change it.

3. Statements from anyone in a place of authority in the Church (at any point in their lives) can magically change any and every Catholic belief and tradition.

4. Allowing priests to marry would produce a "modernization" of the Church that would result in things like gay marriage and female priests and abortion and contraception.

5. The people posting these "articles" are getting paid for being "professional reporters" and/or "professional journalists."

Although, if celibacy got thrown out the window, you could be a priest and marry Stephanie ;)

I'm praying for you!

:)

“There would never be vaccination unless there were germs, there would never have been Prohibition unless there were something to prohibit, and there would never be atheism unless there was a God to atheate.”

—	Archbishop Fulton Sheen

I'm praying for you!

:)

Gossip

I killed him with words
With my tongue, my mouth
sunk my teeth into His
flesh and ripped until
blood flowed, but I did
not know He chose to
die. When my mouth
was full of His flesh,
He said, "Take and eat."
As His blood dripped
down my chin, He
said "Take and drink."
I tried to destroy
Him, but He destroyed
my sin. I wanted to
enslave Him, so He set
me free.

 I wrote this poem a few weeks ago after Mass, because I was just hit with a really vivid understanding of how we crucify Christ with our sins. He chose to die, but we still killed Him. In fact, we continue to kill him every time we sin. And when we use our hands to sin, we are killing Him with our hands. When we use our mouths to sin, we are killing Him with our mouths. I can't speak for everyone, but I think I sin with my words much more than with my actions. And during the Consecration a few weeks ago, I had an image in my head of me tearing into Christ's flesh with my teeth every time I ever uttered a sinful word (or failed to say necessary words). It's as if I think that I can destroy Him, destroy truth, by my words. If I repeat the same lies over and over, maybe I could convince myself that I wasn't even sinning, that there was no such thing as sin. And so I go to Jesus ready to tear Him apart, ready to try to devour Him. But He sees me coming. He knows how each of will injure Him, and He allows it. Because Jesus sacrifices Himself willingly, His death, which we have caused, brings about our redemption. I tear Him apart with my words, and He pours Himself, body and blood, soul and divinity, into my open mouth, and when His blood and flesh fill my mouth, my eyes are opened to the truth. He uses our sins to save us. He uses His death, caused by all human sin, as our salvation. He doesn't just wipe away or ignore our sins and then impose grace and salvation separately. He takes all of our failings, all of our hatred and malice and jealousy and anger, and he turns them around, using their results to glorify Him and to save our souls. So I don't think it's weird at all that God would tell me to eat His body and drink His blood, because it's not random. I was already trying to devour Him.

Sorry if none of that makes sense or if any of that is weird and/or completely wrong.

I'm praying for you!

:)

I'm praying for you!

:)

I wrote this poem a while back (Warning: It's pretty dark):

Crush.

I could crush

this skull, bone is

nothing more than

gathered dust, and

it could be dispersed

again, ashes to ashes.

I could dig my nails

into this flesh, dig a

grave deep into this

living coffin.

Blood would flow, dark

as my thoughts, and the

pain might just drown

me before it ran out.

But he mourns before

I start, so I just hang

my head in shame, for

the body on which I’ve

tried to inflict all this

is His, not my own.

I'm praying for you!

:)