A Surprise Award!

Godsown gave me this wonderful award for my blog. What a blessed surprise! There are 2 rules that go with this blog:
1. Confess to 5 addictions.
2. Pass award to 5 deserving bloggers.

Five addictions:
1. My itouch. I love it. I can check email and go on twitter and listen to my favorite music and look up bible passages and Catholic prayers and keep my appointments and contact info – and so on. I can keep all my stuff in one place.
2. My laptop. I love going online to read Christian and family-type blogs and to write my own and to inspire as well as be inspired. Plus everything I do on my itouch.
3. Chocolate. I am a chocoholic from way back.
4. Books. I have been an avid reader since I was a little girl. These days I read mostly Christian spirituality books. Some Christian fiction but mostly non-fiction. My bookshelves are so full. We keep giving books away but it isn’t long before the shelves fill up again.
5. Mocha frappaccinos.

Five deserving bloggers:
1. Sarah at just another Catholic pondering. I love her writing and her sharing of her love for her God and her family. She is funny and open and inspiring.
2. Amy at Smelling God. She is very open and honest and courageous.
3. Enola is also very open and honest and courageous.
4. Barb at SFO Mom – a great Catholic blog with a good mix of opinion, pro-life posts and sharing of her prayer and spirituality.
5. ShellieT at Abiding Love – is funny with her southern humor and fun website.

Ladies, If you have received the award already, then just accept it as confirmation of your blog's impact.

Protest Letter to Notre Dame President

Read this great post on Catholic Fire blog. The blog has posted a Notre Dame alumni group's protest letter about Obama receiving an honor from Notre Dame. Well written and right to the point.

Compassion

I have a picture on my living room wall called the Compassionate Christ. This picture shows Jesus with tears filling his eyes and his eyes follow you wherever you go. Sometimes, when I am busy, too busy I guess, I forget that picture is there. It is not right in my line of vision when I am sitting in the living room. But then I will look at it and I am reminded of Jesus compassion and his love for me. To know Jesus cries with me and for me, brings me such comfort and peace. If we can bring just a little of that compassion to others, what a world this would be. Don’t you think?

Grateful to God

Be sure to visit Truth 4 the Journey who hosts Thankful Thursdays every week. Here is my list of “thankful things.”
1. I am grateful for the healing that Jesus has given me so far as I struggle with my past as an incest survivor. I am doing a witness talk this Saturday and I am grateful for the opportunity to give testimony about the love and healing action of God in my life.
2. I am grateful for being a Benedictine Oblate. I love Benedictine spirituality and being part of their community. Following the Rule and meditating on it during Lent has helped me find balance and helped me to center on Christ more.

3. I am grateful for laughter. Laughter is so healing. I need laughter in my life and I have plenty of it! My husband makes me laugh everyday.

4. I am grateful for my Bug convertible. It was great convertible weather today and it brings me such joy to be cruising down the road with the top down. I get a sense of freedom.

5. I am grateful for my family who brings me joy and laughter and a full heart.

Catholic Carnival

Catholic Carnival is up! Check it out here and read some great blog posts. Did you know today is the Feast of the Annunciation? There are beautiful quotes about the Annunciation as well.

Three Reasons I Love Lent

1. Time to renew
It is time to renew my prayer life. Renew my relationship with God. Renew my spiritual life.
2. Time to refocus
I have been so caught up in social media, and blogs, and writing and marketing, I have lost sight of my priorities. So I repent and try to refocus my gaze on who needs to come first - Jesus.
3. Time to remember
Lent helps me to remember what matters most - my relationship with God, with my hubby, with family, my health. While I pray to be open to the new, I also look forward to the traditions of my family during Lent.
Why do you love Lent?

Looking at Jesus

I go to the chapel to pray. No one is in there. It is quiet. Silence is beautiful. I crave it these days.I sit in the pew right opposite the Blessed Sacrament. I just sit. I have nothing to say really. I just sit with the Lord.
I remember something from a poem about how prayers in the chapel are interwoven with prayers from others who have come before and will come later. I like that thought. So I just sit and ponder. Like Mary pondered.
When I go to Eucharistic Adoration, I often bring a bag of books. I don't know why. Am I afraid of the silence? Am I afraid of just "being" with God? Do I always have to accomplish something? Like reading this book or that one, or studying a devotional or a scripture verse? All good things, course. But what if I just went to Adoration to just sit with the Lord in the silence? Would I be bored? Would I know how to pray without a book?
Of course. I used to do centering prayer everyday. I don't any more. These days I like just sitting there. There is a story of a man who just sat in the church everyday. A priest asked him one day what he was doing. The man answered, "I just sit here and look at Jesus and he looks back at me."
I have to go back to work. Did I pray or did I just ponder too much? I take a deep breath in, reminding me that Jesus is present with me. I offer up all my ponderings (is that a word?).
Next time I go to Eucharistic Adoration, I will go with no books (well, maybe just one). And I will just sit there and look at Jesus. And know he is looking back at me. Loving me.
first published in Prayerful Morsels

Remembering My Blessings!

Truth 4 the Journey hosts Thankful Thursdays again this week. So here is my list of “thankful things”. I offer them all to God.

1. I am thankful for Mass. Sometimes I take it for granted but I was talking to a visiting priest who does ministry overseas in a small country where they get Mass maybe once a year. Once a year!! It becomes a big celebration and lasts for hours. People don’t want the Mass to end. I do not want to take Mass for granted ever again. I want to always feel that kind of joy.
2. I am thankful for my husband who does so much for me and loves me just the way I am.
3. I am thankful for having today off! I am working on a talk for a Women’s group about the loving action of God in my life and I am getting stressed about getting it done. I was able to take today off to do some quiet work on it without interruption.
4. I am thankful for Thankful Thursdays and for Truth 4 the Journey who hosts Thankful Thursdays! I want to always remember my blessings and this helps me to do that. I love reading others’ entries as well as they are often inspiring and they remind me of other things I need to remember to thank God for.
5. I am thankful to God for helping me to be more positive lately and to enjoy life regardless of the dark clouds that come my way sometimes. Lately I have been having a flare of my rheumatoid arthritis and I have been tempted to feel sorry for myself. The doctor’s nurse told me that I had such a good attitude about it. It reminded me to be positive and to surrender it all to God.

Small Successes - Silence

Here are my three Small Successes for this week.

1. I took time out for silence everyday this week. Some days it was an hour. Some days it was 10 minutes. But it was everyday.
2. I had a crazy day the other day. Instead of getting all worked up, I took a lot of deep breaths and said "Jesus" over and over. Amazing what breathing Jesus in and out can do for your nerves.
3. Got some blog posts done ahead of time. Have not been able to get that done before but this week I worked out a schedule that will relieve some of my stress. It seems that my stress comes from a time management problem. Perhaps this is a sign that I am working this out.

Thanks to Danielle Bean who is hosting Small Successes. Besure to check out her post. And make a list of your own too!

Catholic Carnival #216

Check out Catholic Carnival. Many very good posts. I haven't finished reading them all but especially liked the first one at Catholic Matriarch in My Domestic Church. She gives us a reading assignment. Be sure to read it!

Worrying about God

I have been worrying a lot lately. I am a worrier from way back. I worry about little things, I worry about big things. Doesn’t matter how much I love God or think I trust Him. I still worry. Lately I have been worrying that I am not putting God first. I worry that I am too selfish and put myself first all the time. I try to overcome this. Sometimes on my own (which, of course, never works). But also through prayer and through talking it over with some of God’s other friends.
So I decide to confide this to my hubby the other evening on our way home from church. After a day of ministry, I blurt out that I am just not putting God first lately. My husband, in total incredulity, says, “What are you talking about? You always put God first. Look at what you have done today.”
Still, I don’t quite believe him. Then he says the words that cut through all the junk.
“Just the fact that you worry so much about putting God first, shows you put God first.”
Which is, I guess, somewhat true. I mean, let’s face it, my husband is not exactly an impartial observer. But still, he is right to some extent. I myself have often said this to my directees. If you didn’t care about God, you wouldn't worry about how much you are doing for Him or how much you are praying or whether you put Him first on the list or not.
If we didn’t care about God, we wouldn’t care about where He is on the list. Or whether He is on the list at all.
But I care. And so, while I am a sinner and I know I do not put God first all the time, He is pretty much always high on the list. I know because I worry a lot about it.
Worrying about God may be one of the only good things about worrying. It tells us where our treasure is.

image by I See Modern Britain

Heart to Heart

Abbot Pastor said: Any trial whatever that comes to you can be conquered by silence. – Thomas Merton, Wisdom of the Desert
This is so true. It is especially true if I spend some time in silence before the Blessed Sacrament.
Spend a few minutes in silence and peace comes to me. Spend a few minutes in silence and answers come to me. Spend a few minutes in silence and acceptance of my present trial comes to me.
I may still leave the chapel with tears and a heavy heart. But the heart is made a little lighter by that silent time with God.
Silent time with God - a time when heart speaks to heart.

Image by aussiegall

God is Love

Psalm 118: 1 Give thanks to the Lord, who is good, whose love endures forever.
There is a Hebrew word for God's love - hesed. It is a word that describes the indescribable: the passionate, unrelenting, merciful love of God. I used to think that God loved me only if I was good, only if I deserved it, only if I went to church and didn't do anything too bad. I call that a Santa Claus kind of spirituality. If I am good, God loves me. If I am bad, my name gets written down on some list somewhere.
The big mistake I made was thinking that God loves like we humans love. Not so. Not even close. Our love is limited. God's love is limitless. Our love is conditional. God's love is unconditional. God loved us before we even existed. We DO love. God IS love. His very essence is love.
When we really get this, I mean REALLY get this, from the top of our heads to the bottom of our hearts, then we begin to really trust in God's love. Not only God's love for ourselves, but God's love for everyone else. And when we really get that, then maybe we can learn to love others, too. Then maybe peace has a chance - in the world - and in our own hearts.
First published in Prayerful Morsels

Thoughts on St. Benedict's Rule

I am so glad that I decided to read the Rule of St. Benedict everyday for Lent. It has been a long time since I have read it and I forgot about all the gems of wisdom in there. I am reading the Rule of Benedict, Insights for the Ages. This book has commentary written by Joan Chittister. I feel like I am getting re-connected with my Benedictine sisters and brothers. I am reminded of the Benedictine spirituality which is what drew me to be a Benedictine Oblate in the first place.
I continue to feel overwhelmed with my to do list. Sometime I feel like I am beating my head against the wall. Working like crazy and getting nowhere.
Reading the Rule, taking time for silence, spending a little more time with my hubby everyday, all helps.
St. Benedict talks about balance and moderation. A rule of life I can live with. A rule of life I need.

The Spiritual Journey

All the way to Heaven is Heaven. - St. Catherine of Siena

This is one of my favorite quotes. It reminds me to live in the present moment and to enjoy my relationship with Jesus, rather than wondering where I am on the spiritual journey.
I used to worry about where I was on the journey. That really isn’t important to me any more and it is impossible to know anyway. We never really arrive this side of heaven.
It is good to just know that I am on the journey itself. I struggle and I sometimes fall back 2 steps or more but I am trying. And I am enjoying the way. Most of the time.

Thankful Thursday - Lent

Truth 4 the Journey hosts Thankful Thursdays again this week. So here is my list of “thankful things”. I offer them all to God.

1. I am thankful for this season of Lent. I love Lent. It is a time for renewal and refocusing and remembering. I take more time for prayer and I try to be more open to God’s presence
2. I am thankful for Thankful Thursdays. It really helps me to remember to be grateful no matter what is going on in my life.
3. I am thankful for the Rule of St. Benedict. I am studying it this Lent and find it more informative and interesting than I thought it would be. I am learning a lot about St. Benedict too, who was very wise and caring.
4. I am thankful for my husband and all he does for me. He does everything around the house these days which gives me great relief.
5. I am thankful for my Spanish teacher. He is a very good teacher, fun, patient and caring. He goes out of his way to help people.

Listening to God

The first word of the Rule of St. Benedict, in the Prologue, is Listen. Definitely an important word to begin a whole Rule with. Certainly a good word to use to begin Lent with. How about to begin each prayer with? Listen ...
I have always thought of myself as a good listener. I am a spiritual director and I need to listen to my directees when they come to meet with me and share their spiritual journey with me. I would not be much help if I didn't listen. We spiritual directors need to listen to the person speak and to the Holy Spirit speaking in her/him as well as in us.
I am a wife and I need to listen to my husband. I need to share in his life and his thoughts and his dreams. The same with my children. What do I miss when I don't listen?
I wonder, and I ponder, when it is just you and me, Lord, do I listen? Do I listen to you in the silence? Do I listen to you in the events of my day and the people I meet? What do I miss when I don't listen?
Lord, help me listen to you. Help me to hear your voice.

A Learning Moment

I have learned something this week. It just came to me after a time of prayer. One of those "Out of the blue" things.
My husband is now a house husband. He works only 2 mornings a week so he does all the household chores – cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping, cooking. I realized today that I do what he used to do when I was in charge of the household.
* I don’t always pick up after myself.
* I don’t always notice when he does things, like washing the floor.
* I don’t always see what needs to be done unless asked to do it.
All of those things that he used to do that annoyed me, I am now doing. I don’t know if I am annoying him or not. He hasn’t said a thing. Which makes us different, because I used to complain. He isn't complaining.
There is a lesson in there for me somewhere. Like ...
* Being more aware of what others are doing for me and around me.
* Being more aware of what needs to be done ... and then doing it.
* Being more gracious and grateful for what others do for me and showing it. Or at least say Thank you for all you do!
Thank you, Lord. Thanks for all you do and for all you have given me, especially my husband.
And hubby, a special thanks to you. I love you.