Laughter

"We were like those who dream.  Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.  Then it was said among the nations, 'The Lord has done great things for them" (Psalm 126:2).
    One day, it will all be like a dream.
    Today, my baby has a fever.  Our water was cut off.  My daughter is failing math.  My other daughter is still picking her nose. :)  Even our dog is throwing up!
    This life is hard.  The maternal vocation, especially one that is constantly open to new life, so that there is no definitive end in sight, is a true cross.  It is a labor of love.  But isn't that a bit like Christ, who gave his whole life as a sign of love for us?  I, too, am giving my whole life for my family.
    I have hope.  I am happy.  I can laugh.  I know that, one day, those of us who share in the cross will, too, share in the resurrection.
 
 

A Mother

     A mother is at the center of God's love note to us.
     We are like anguished lovers.  All human beings search for meaning and purpose--it is inherent to our dignity that we would know why we live and what makes us happy.  For all of human history, human persons and communities have sought answers to these questions, searching, like pining suitors, for the hidden power present in the midst of things, or even postulating a supreme dignity.  
     When the time came, he sent his love note to us.  God responded to us.  He answered our inquiries of love.  He said, "This is who I really am, and yes, I will be yours."  It is remarkable that in all this human searching and questioning, God would answer.  He gave us a definitive revelation of who he is and how he wants us to belong to him.
     His answer began with a tiny baby, born of a mother.  A mother was at the center of his answer to all of human longing.  The most important event of all of human history, the most powerful answer to our most central questions, the verification of our dignity and worth, that determines our eternal horizon and invites us to share in the divine nature, occurred through a woman.
     God could have revealed himself in any way.  Even coming as a man (which is in itself incredible and counterintuitive), he could have come as a full-grown man.  Coming as a baby, first conceived and then growing in utero of a woman with child, and then born, held and nurtured in a mother's arms--none of this needed to be.  Clearly it is part of the message, part of the response.  God is saying, "Motherhood is important.  I speak to my people through motherhood.  And you can come to know me through motherhood."  Through Mary and Jesus, God elevated motherhood and re-invented it as a sacred, spiritual reality.
   

Motherhood: "I love to love"

   A great woman I recently met told me her story about a life crisis she had in which she had to choose between her career and her family.  Her husband took a job in another town, and so her family moved away from her job.  But she decided to commute, and keep her job in her previous home town.
    To her surprise, she discovered that this was a bad decision.  She missed being with her family more.  She realized, "As much as I love my job, I also love to love."  She found that loving her family was even more fulfilling for her.  So, if she had to choose, which she did, she changed her mind, and quit that job.
    Out of the blue came another, even better job in her new hometown, one she could not have anticipated. She said that God is a miracle worker, letting her have her family and a great job.
     I love this story.  I find it exciting when women discover how rewarding it is to give themselves to family, in whatever capacity.  So many women are culturally pressured to think that prestigious jobs are more important than family.  I love it when women try out various ways of living, and discover, as though for the first time in history, that family is so rewarding.  "Loving to love"--that says it all.
 

A Mother: The Suffering Servant

"Behold, My servant will. . . be high and lifted up and greatly exalted" (Isaiah 52:13).
      Catholic mothers rightly see themselves in this beautiful passage from the Suffering Servant's passage in Isaiah.  It depicts the future Messiah, who will be "pierced through for our transgressions,  crushed for our iniquities" (53:4).  The Messiah, the Scripture tells us, will bear pain and suffering, for our sake.  And by his pain, we will be healed:  "The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed" (53:5).
     Mothers, especially those who live out their vocation with devotion and faith, live a close parallel to this Suffering Servant described here.  The devout mother suffers intense pain for a time.  She gives up her hopes, her dreams, her comfort.  She relinquishes her time, her interests, her control.  She takes on physical suffering: stretch marks, unwanted weight, strange blemishes; labor and delivery pain; challenges with nursing, infections, postpartum struggles.  For years, she carries a baby on her hip, hunched over, back out of alignment.  She spends years for each child she bears, giving her body over to this child.
    But mothers do not suffer in vain.  Mothers suffer for the sake of another.  Like the Suffering Servant, mothers endure pain and difficulties, out of sacrificial love for their child and their family.  They resemble the Suffering Servant, who bears pain for the well-being of his people.
    I recall crying, two years ago, lamenting my postpartum weight, fatigue, and general misery.  My husband said to me, "You have taken a hit for the team!  We all see and appreciate what you are doing for us!  We have this precious baby boy in our family now, because of what you have endured!  Thank you, Kathryn!"  That sentence meant the world to me.  It carried me through many more months of emotional and physical challenges.  I knew that "this too shall pass," but my eighth pregnancy and postpartum phase was a long and arduous path.  Mothers can hit terrible lows.
    But like the Suffering Servant, faithful mothers one day will be "high and lifted up and greatly exalted."  We wear our crown of thorns, only one day to wear heavenly crowns.  The kingship of Christ began with his suffering on Calvary.  But it ended in eternal glory.   So too, mothers who share in His suffering will one day share in his radiant triumph.
    It is a great hope that we may rightly share, that our suffering will be redemptive and that one day we will enjoy the great exaltation of Christ.

Lent Explained to Our Children

   Five kids sat around me as we discussed what we were giving up for Lent.
   "Sweets!" said one.
   "Chocolate!" said another.
   "Movies!"  said the third, to which all the kids replied, "Ohhhhhh!"  That really touched a nerve.
   I asked, "If Lent is a time for fasting, prayer and almsgiving, and you know what your are going to do for your fast, what are you going to focus on for your prayer?"
    They were silent.
    I said, "One thing we can do is think about ways we need to improve, areas of our lives that we need to bring to God.  The Bible says, 'You are concerned with the speck in your neighbor's eye, but you have a log in your own.'  We can take that time to consider what the log in our eye is."
    They nodded.  But I could tell that one of the girls was pondering if she really had a log in her eye. Indeed, she is a very virtuous, sacrificial, humble girl.  So I said, "Lent can also be a time to become more grateful.  You know that I teach poor, distressed, and homeless mothers at the crisis pregnancy center.  You could be one of their daughters.  But instead, you have our family.  You could spend Lent thanking God for that."
    This comment stirred responses.
    "Yes, you and dad are married, unlike some of my friends' parents!"
    "And we have enough to eat, and clothes enough to wear.  We have so much!"
    "That's right," I replied.  "In Mass today, the priest will put ashes on your forehead, and say, 'From dust you have come, and to dust you shall return.'  You may think about that--nothing you have, even your breath or life, much less you opportunities and comforts and many blessings, is owed to you.  It all comes from God.  God is the giver of all good things.  Perhaps you could write many of these blessings down, and pray over them every day as your Lenten prayer."  They were resolved to do that.  One of them said, "This is a better way to go through Lent, rather than just giving up chocolate!"
    The other one piped up: "If I do that, do I still have to give up movies?"

Quote from St. Claude de la Colombiere

"Everything that happens to us in this life happens by the order or the permission of a God has always has loved us, and who loves us still more than we love ourselves.  He regards us as his creatures, as his children, as his heirs, and his reflections.  The benefits we have received from him have surpassed all our desires; they surpass even our imaginings, and those benefits that we receive from him every day are without measure and without number. . .  I would believe that the greatest evils are very great goods and that your heaviest blows are very gentle and magnificent caresses. . .
    Reflect a little on what he has done for you.  You are presently in affliction; consider that the one who is the author of this . . . is the one who comes to you with such goodness in the sacrament of the Eucharist, who has no greater pleasure than of uniting himself to you and conversing with you."

Mothers as Ministers

   Recently I had a conversation with an acquaintance who is my elder.  She was trying to be very cordial.  We are both pro-life, and we broached that topic.  When I mentioned that I sometimes serve at our local crisis pregnancy center, she said, "Ooo!  My!  You are a minister!  You have a ministry!"
    Although I knew that she was trying to be kind, I was fuming inside.  I thought: "That's so wrong!  I do NOT have a ministry because I leave the four walls of my home and serve strangers a couple measly hours per month.  I AM a minister, indeed.  But I am a minister because I am a mother!  My ministry is within my home!"
    Catholic mothers are ministers.
    1) We give our lives as sacrificial offerings to other people, out of love.  This is to reflect the sacrificial love of Christ.  Reflecting Christ is to be a minister.
    2) We bear the image of Christ in the Eucharist.  Just as Christ feeds us with his body and blood, so, too, do mothers feed others with our bodies and blood, both carrying children in utero and nursing our children.  Only mothers bear Christ's image in this way.  Bearing the image of Christ is to be a minister.
    3) We are prophetic: we shine the saving light of Christ through family life.  Through our tending to our children, through rearing them and loving them, we say to the world, "Christian family life is a special path to God, an extraordinary way to heaven.  Come, follow Jesus."  Our regular lives of laundry, changing diapers and carpooling is a form of evangelism.  To be an evangelist is to be a minister.
    Yes, I am a minister.  So are all the other Catholic mothers in the world.  We have important ministries.  We not only minister to our children, husbands, and other family members, but we pour prayers, love, and holy labor into the world each and every day.  Even the most private of our chores, even the most mundane of our tasks, can be a ministry to the world.  I do have a ministry.  I offer my vocation for the salvation of the world.

Mary Mother of God

   The Feast of Mary Mother of God is one of my favorite days of the year.  To me, it is the true Mothers' Day.  It is a day in which the universal church celebrates the mother of Christ, who is himself True God and True Man in one Person.  It is a day in which we celebrate the shocking mystery that a humble, uneducated, simple woman from Palestine could be the mother, not just of Jesus, but of God.  To deny it would be to deny the hypostatic union.
    Sitting in the pew with all my children on Jan. 1, the feast day, was a joy for me.  Walking into church, I told my six year old, "I love this celebration of Mary and of all mothers.  Mothers are so important--they are among the most important people in the world.  They are a primary source of the security, comfort and peacefulness of many people.  They are a major force of peace on earth.  Mothers are really important."  My six kids were all listening.  They giggled and nodded: "It's true!"

A Mother's Light

    The Gospel says, "You are the light of the world."  Yes, we should all let our light shine!  The Gospel also says, "No one after lighting a lamp puts it under a bushel basket, but on a lamp stand, and it gives light to all in the house." (Mt. 5:25)
    The question is: What is your lamp stand?
    We have a natural inclination to shine our lights by using our talents and doing our various jobs well.  If we are a fifth grade teacher, we think, "I am going to let the light of Christ shine as I teach."  If we are a cantor at Mass, we think, "I am going to sing for Jesus."  We often think about leaving our homes, and shining the light of Christ in public.
    But note that the Gospel says, "It gives light to all in the house."  Perhaps the metaphor is appropriate for moms to take literally.  Those in our house should see the light!  The lamp stand should be first and foremost in our homes!
    It is a holy endeavor to pray for each person in our home, think about them, and ask God, "What are they most needing right now?"  Maybe one daughter needs some one-on-one time with you.  Maybe one son needs you to help him organize his room.  Maybe your children need you to refresh family prayer time, make it slower paced, more focused and enriched.  Maybe one of your children is net yet engaged in a personal relationship with Jesus, and needs to hear you explain how you found Jesus and keep your relationship with him alive.  Maybe your family needs a home-cooked meal, enjoyed all together over a leisurely evening.  Maybe your family needs more rest.
   Attentiveness to the details of each person in our family is a chance to BE CHRIST to them.  If we slow down, forget everything else, and just be the presence of Christ for them, that is one powerful way to let our lights shine.  We shine the saving light of Christ through our love.

Gospel of Matthew--Lectio Divina

   This Advent I am beginning to read through the Gospel of Matthew using the format of lectio divina.  Lectio divina is a kind of prayer of Scriptures popularized by St. Theresa of Avila and other Carmelite saints.  The method is to read a small portion of Scripture and silently reflect on it, one verse at a time.  It is astonishing how God can speak to us through Scripture if we just create silence and stillness of heart.
    I have read the Gospel of Matthew many times.  But reading it this morning as the sun rose while all the children were still snoring in their beds, I was shocked by what I read.  First, the Jews had awaited a Messiah, a Savior, for too long.  The genealogy of Jesus mentions the deportation to Babylon.  Where was God, where was the Savior, during this deportation?  Where was He during all the other horrible sufferings and slaughters they had endured?  The very Gospel itself is saying to me: "The Messiah came.  The whole point of the Gospel is to testify to that very truth.  The promise of a savior WAS INDEED fulfilled.  But the Gospel is not hiding the fact that God took a long time.  It is almost shouting it out.  Much suffering occurred before God's appointed time for a savior.  The Gospel itself is reflecting that.  Please remember, Kathryn, that God chose to send the Messiah in a messy way, in a way that was not neat and punctual.  God's timing uses imperfection--that's part of how God works.  God's timing will often seem to us way off--too late or too soon."
     I am confident that God is telling us something about Himself through this timing that frustrates us.
    My conviction is that one of His favorite things to do is to show up when we have despaired He will not show up.  This timing shocks us and prompts us to depend on Him.  It is how we develop faith.  Abraham and Sarah are called the father and mother of faith.  Why?  Because God promised them a son from whom a whole nation would be born, and then let them get way too old to have a child.  They lived their entire adult lives well into old age, watching God not fulfill His promise--yet.  They must have spent most of their days for many decades, tempted to conclude that God had failed them.  Did they despair?  I do not know.  Probably sometimes.  But eventually they saw God work His miracle of Sarah conceiving and bearing a child.  But that blessing was only to be followed by Abraham being called to sacrifice Isaac.  Imagine the faith necessary to tie Isaac to an alter and pull out you dagger.
     This story in Genesis is a clear message from God as to how He works.  He takes away everything, in order to give us something and show His hand.
     I marvel at the so-called "problem of evil." I confess that I have sometimes asked, "Why does God allow this suffering?  Maybe God is absent.  If there were an all-good, all-loving God, He never would have allowed this to happen."  But the Bible is purposeful in telling us that God always allows pain, suffering, death, injustice, and travesty, as He appears in our lives.  His epiphany is always through messiness.  Poor Moses received the epiphany of the burning bush, while in a 40 year exile for having committed murder!  The Bible is screaming out the message: "Avoiding or preventing suffering is just now how God works!"
     I can understand how an atheist might imagine an all-perfect, all-loving God, and then see the suffering in the world and conclude that such a God does not exist.  But as Christians, we have to let the Bible show us who God really is.  He is all-powerful.  He is all-good.  But He does not use that power or goodness to preserve us from pain or tragedy.  His signature is to allow horrible sufferings, and then to show up and do something astonishing in the midst of it.
    This impacts me powerfully.  My life is messy.  My timing is all off.
    But the Gospel of Matthew is teaching me: that is how God works.  This is His path for you, Kathryn.  He is allowing all these imperfections, all these "Too late's" and "Not enough's" so that I will lay down my own sense of power and accomplishment and let God work miracles in my own life.  
   

My New Spiritual Goal

    Having just begun Advent, and thus a new liturgical year, I have made a spiritual resolution.  I am choosing to work on being steady.  My emotions can fluctuate a little too fast.  They can go a little too low and a little too high.  So, I resolve to pray for the grace to stay steady.  This steadiness will build on my goals the last 2 years: faith and joy respectively.  Steadiness builds on faith since faith assures us that God is in control.  Rather than steadiness being a delusion, it is holy and right, an adherence to Providence's path for us, even through rough and unexpected twists and turns.  Steadiness also builds on joy, since joy comes even in the midst of trials.  In the past year I have come to see that God loves me so much more than I had ever realized, and I find joy in the ways He has powerfully intervened in my life, rescuing, saving and blessing me.  Since He is so obviously intentional and mindful of me, I feel joy in being cared for and loved.  I see this year's goal as securing the fruit of these two years of hard interior work and making sure that, rather than it going to waste, my soul is strengthened to the fullest degree for the glory of God and the praise of His name.
    Last week, on the first Sunday of Advent, I was praying in Mass.  I had a different spiritual goal in mind.  But as I was kneeling I felt the Holy Spirit impress upon my spirit: "Steady."  I thought, "Wow, this is a true prompting.  I would never have come up with this word.  I've never heard anyone laud steadiness as a Catholic or Christian virtue."  Nevertheless, I felt it strongly then, as I do now.  So, hopefully led by my loving God, I choose this virtue as my spiritual goal of this liturgical year.

Motherhood is a Privilege

     Amid the back to school shuffle, I have been tempted to get exasperated.  So many details--uniforms, school supplies, lunch boxes, parent orientations, carpools--the list goes on.  Last night ended in my tears as I felt that I I would never get to the bottom of my list of things to do for them.
    This morning, I watched the sun come up as I said Morning Prayer with the chant of the Monks of Christ in the Desert playing in the background.  After praising God for our family's many blessings, my mind turned to all that the day had in store: Jacob's first day of high school, errands, cooking for school lunches for the following day.  The thought struck me: "What a privilege.  These days of caring for these precious human beings whom God has placed in my life are priceless.  I do not want to miss a moment."
    Lord, give us mothers the grace to see that caring for our children is the highest vocation we could have.  Though some of the tasks may seem small and trivial, they are in fact the heart of love.  Doing them thoughtfully is one of the primary ways that we send the message to our children that we love them.  Love for our children is divine: it is a participation in the life of the Trinity.  Lord, help us to carry out each task with the poise and awareness that what we are doing is holy, sublime work.  It is the greatest job on earth.

Offering it Up

   Just since this past weekend, Sebastian's toddler terror has improved.  Yesterday, we were with some friends and their children.  As I held him, he screamed, directing me to go somewhere.  I said, "I will not move until you say 'Please' in a nice voice."  We stood their a long time.  But he finally said, "peees" in a nice voice.  YAY!  Then I moved.
    A few minutes later, a child asked him for the baby buggy Sebastian was pushing.  I said, "Sebastian, in one minute, it is Oliver's turn.  Please give it to him then."  Sebastian looked at Oliver, and gave him the buggy.  The moms all clapped.  It was great!
     Sebastian is one and a half.  For me as a Mom, one and a half till two and a half is the hardest stage.  The child has found their will, but does not have the language or the self-control to handle discipline and direction that older children respond to.  So, it is a limbo time, in which both the child and I as the mom are frustrated.
     As I stand on the precipice of a year of this trial, I have decided how I'm going to handle it: I'm going to offer it all up.
     Offering up suffering: This is a Biblical idea in which we offer our sufferings as prayers: “If we are being afflicted, it is for your salvation and consolation” (2 Cor. 1:6).  If we unify our sufferings with those of Christ, and if Christ's sufferings are powerful in bringing godly change, then so can ours be powerful prayers for healing and grace in the world (also see Colossians 1:24; Rom. 12:1).
      I'm going to offer up Sebastian's toddler trials for this prized intention, that "All my kids grow up to be hard core Catholics."  That phrase just popped into my mind yesterday, and I really like it.  I am really moved by this idea, that they not just manage to remain Catholic, but that they give their lives for the faith in sincerely, complete ways.  Hard core!  Yes!
     I would go through not just one more year, but TEN more years of toddler frustration, if only my children would emerge so solid in their faiths!!
     Motherhood is so well suited to offering up sufferings and frustrations for holy intentions!!  Help me, Lord, to offer more up!!

Motherhood as Christological

"Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." (Philippians 2:5-11)

Isn't this just like motherhood?  Who among us has not emptied herself, stepped aside from who she could have become, pour out all she might have done, and given herself up for another?  Aren't we slaves of a sort, until our children are on their feet?

Yet it is not self-immolation.  It is not self-degradation.  It is not poor judgment.  No, it is Christological.  It is being like Christ. And in becoming like Him in His death, we hope to become like Him in His resurrection.

What is your scourge?

   I had the most wonderful conversation with a mom today.  She was telling me about her husband who is not Catholic.  She has never pressured him, and is grateful that he attends Mass faithfully each week and supports her being a Catholic mom.  But she sees herself as struggling, compared to Catholic families who are all Catholic.
    "The strange thing is," she confided in me, "My youngest son is considering the priesthood!  I am shocked.  But he draws pictures of himself in the hand of God.  I asked him whether he wants to be a priest, or whether he feels God talking to him, calling him to be a priest, and my son said, 'Both.'"  She teared up: "This is astonishing to me!  I did not realize we were on that path!"
    She did not realize that they were on that path, which means she did not think they were "Super Catholics."  She thought of her family as barely passing as Catholics, just grateful that her husband cooperates with going to Mass.
    But I thought to myself: "Isn't that how it is?  God gives us a cross, a scourge, something that keeps us very, very humble.  Then He can work with us."
    As the New Testament says: "Humble yourself in the sight of the Lord, and He shall lift you up."  We are truly lifted up, only when we are humble.  And often, He is generous enough to give us a scourge the helps us to be humble.  He offers it as a gift: our child marrying a non-Catholic, a divorce, an illness, a death, a disfigurement, a disorder, a mental illness.  He offers us these scourges, not to harm us, but to help us see that we are not perfect.  Oh, how horrible it would be if we thought we were!  We would be kept from "being lifted up!"  God allows us our crosses, out imperfections, our embarrassments, in order to make us saints.  Funny how we think we have to be picture perfect to be saints.  Actually, we have not to be perfect, in order to be saints.  Thank you, Lord, for our scourges!

Mary at the Wedding Feast

     The story of Mary at the wedding feast at Cana dumbfounds me.  I still cannot comprehend her overriding her son, and getting away with it.  She says, "Help them with the wine."  He says, "No."  She tells the servants, "Do whatever he asks."  And then he asks them to fill the jars with water, and he turns it into wine.  180 gallons of excellent quality wine.  
     He really defers to her.  He really obeys her.
     As this passage is the Gospel for the week, having been proclaimed at yesterday's liturgy, I have all week to soak it in and see what God has for me in this Scripture.
     One key fact is that commentators since the early Church have understood the wine to represent salvation.  I am with Mary: "Salvation for everyone!  Salvation for the sick, the dying, the hopeless, the evil persecutors, the confused, the homeless, the hungry, the unborn. . .  Salvation for us all!"

Moms Changing the World

   Nine moms were sitting around Winnie's kitchen table praying a rosary.  One mother of eight sat nursing her little girl, looking so tired but peaceful.  A mother of seven closed her eyes as she prayed, deep in concentration.  Her sixth has Downs Syndrome.  Yet another mother of eight, one of whom is severely autistic, looked down at her beads as she prayed.  Below us were two moms on the floor: one tending to her twins in matching carriers, another keeping her two toddlers occupied.  A host of children was swarming around us like honey bees, playing with a toy kitchen and building blocks.  
    In our rosary, we read a short reflection before each decade.  One reads: "Jesus came quietly into the world, in poverty and anonymity.  Yet he came with power to change the whole world."
    I thought, "That is what these women are doing!  They have completely yielded their lives--every moment of every day--to Christ's kind of love.  Every moment of their lives is a sacrifice, imitating the cross.  All day long they serve the needy, feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, and teach the ignorant.  Because of their abundant family sizes, these women have not one minute to themselves.  They have so little time, so little comfort, so little rest.  They are living out poverty.  But it is a poverty of love.  It is truly a vocation made in the image of Christ.  If he came to change the world, then I believe he is going to do it through these moms."
    Choosing a powerful public career may make some difference in the world.  And so will being a Catholic mom.  It is a vocation deeply embedded in the spirit of the gospel.  Despite its poverty and anonymity--or because of its poverty and anonymity--it is a calling that shares the love and the power of Christ.

Spiritual Goal of the Year

   Each year I pick one spiritual goal to pray for and work on.  I begin each new Advent, the beginning of the liturgical year, with this new focus.
   Last year, my goal was joy.  I am far from finished in my cultivation of this beautiful gift from God.  But it was so funny--this week I was passing out the final exam for my students.  One of them was staring at me, sort of quizzically. I asked him what was wrong.  He replied, "Oh nothing.  You're just so. . . so. . . joyful!"  I laughed and thought, "What a gift from the Holy Spirit, here as my year has just finished, to have confirmation of some progress on that front!"
     This year, my goal is faith.  Strange--the year of faith declared by Pope Benedict a few years ago came and went, and I did not plumb the depths of faith as I felt I should.  I did try--but somehow came up short.
    But during my year of joy, I realized: "Joy comes from FAITH!"  It definitely does not come from circumstances, which are often so hard.  It does not come from our natures, which are often driven by fight or flight instincts, keeping us from joy.  But FAITH: that is where joy comes from.
    So I resolved that this year, I should dedicate my spiritual life to the pursuit of faith.  Lord, grant me a huge increase in faith!

You are a Saint

   I ran into an old friend today, whom I had not seen in 4 years.  It was lovely to catch up.  I asked her about her 24 year old son.
    "Oh, please!  Are you kidding?  He is a complete disaster.  I raised him better, but he is a louse.  He does not have a good job.  He is not making anything of himself.  Maybe it is the media culture--I don't know.  He is with a woman who has a one year old child.  He could do so much better.  But at least he loves that little girl.  I did raise him right, and that much, at least, shows.  But no, I am sobbing every day that he is not yet whom I know he can be."
    Immediately I thought, "You, my friend, are St. Monica."
    Today, Catholics and other Westerners revere St. Monica as a great mother saint.  We think of her with a halo.  But until the last months of her life, her son was as my friend described: not headed in the right direction, with the wrong lady, not becoming the man she knows he could be.
     Augustine received baptism on the 24th of April, 387.  Augustine and Monica had a vision of heaven together, and she died about five days later.  She was buried on Nov. 13th, 387.  So, for almost seven whole months, Monica's great life ambition, to see her son a faithful Catholic in an intimate, loving relationship with Christ, was fulfilled.
     But for her whole motherly life save those seven months, she was a failure.  She was disappointed.  She would have told any woman, such as me, what my friend told me today.  Monica would have sounded just like her.
     We are saints.  You are a saint.  If your child is a catastrophe, well, join the heavenly hosts.  If your child is a wreck, here is your halo.
     Pray for your child!  Influence your child every way that you can. Never give up.  Be persistent.  The faith of the one who has hope even when there is no hope is grounds for canonization.  

The Guidance of God

I truly believe that God can speak to you and guide you as you discern decisions.
Last week I was praying for God's guidance regarding a decision I had to make about taking on more professional work.  That day, a hundred times through the day, crises occurred and I thought, "I don't have the time to do even what I'm already committed to."
So I chose against the further professional work.  The following day--no crises.  Everything was back to normal.  But I am at complete peace about my decision because I know God wanted me to see how saturated my life already is.