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Lessons from the Garden: Patience
In the dead of winter, the idea of planning a new little cut flower garden was a bright spot. A meager 4ft x 8ft garden bed was full of possibilities. Can we actually make dahlias grow and flourish? They have a reputation for being finicky. Should we start our zinnias from seeds inside? Where should I get unique varieties of the cosmos I want to grow? The possibilities are endless. In mid-March we started our seeds in a corner of the basement, complete with a seedling tray, grow light and heat mat. It all went well, and seedling deaths were kept to a minimum. The preparation that goes along with…
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Heroes, Villains, and the Parking Meter Lady
I was having a morning. You know, one of those mornings.The type where you wake up early after having been up in the middle of the night for a couple of hours with your baby. The kind where you wake up groggy and grumpy and don’t handle things rationally. Where you wake up on the wrong side of the bed.That kind of morning. That morning I decided to take the kids to the library because we needed to return some books. It also seemed like a good diversion. We loaded the stroller, fed the meter, set my parking meter timer on the phone, and went in. We checked out our…
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Let Him Fight for You
In college, I was so afraid of allowing God to show me his plans for my life, especially my vocation. I remember talking with a vocations director from a religious order because I was so confused. I had an intense fear of being called to religious life and a strong desire to be married. The idea of allowing God to show me what he wanted left me spiritually paralyzed for quite some time. But that sister said, “It’s time to raise the white flag.” But I’ll be honest, I didn’t know what that meant when she said it. Maybe it should have been obvious, but I learned that the white…
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Have Peace in Me
This daily reading reflection was originally written for the Nativity Parish blog. You can read today’s mass readings here. Fr. Jacques Philippe, a favorite spiritual author of mine, said in his book Searching for and Maintaining Peace, that “all the reasons that cause us to lose our sense of peace are bad reasons.” He dedicates a whole section to this very topic. When I read that phrase, I found myself coming up with excuses as to why all my worries and anxieties were justified. Regardless of the severity of whatever it is on my heart and mind, I kept coming back to a few realizations. First, I can control virtually…
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The Temptations of Jesus
Before we dive into the temptations of Jesus, please take a minute to read the 1st reading and Gospel from the 1st Sunday of Lent. I am forever amazed by the scriptures. The way the New Testament fulfills the Old Testament, the ways that the Old Testament is a shadow of all that is to come in the new. Our Lenten observance is no different. It is steeped in scripture, and has its roots in the garden with the fall of man. The temptations of Jesus don’t come out of nowhere, we see where they come from when we look closely at the account of the fall. Now, I’m skipping…
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Learning to Pray with Scripture: Lectio Divina
Here’s post two in a series that will include instructions, tips, and ideas on how to pray in different ways. If you didn’t read the intro post, check it out here! If you are seeking a fuller, richer, more abundant life in Christ, prayer is essential to you. And one of the absolute best tools for prayer is the Sacred Scriptures. Why? Because the Sacred Scriptures are God’s love letter written to us. It is the inspired word of God. The wisdom of the Church tells us that “in the sacred books, the Father who is in heaven comes lovingly to meet his children, and talks with them” (Dei Verbum,…
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When Prayer Doesn’t Work
Before you begin, read Mark 5:21-43 I have been thinking about prayer a lot lately. Not necessarily how do I pray or what should I pray, but rather what is prayer, really? How does prayer work? Why doesn’t prayer work better? I mean, let’s be honest, I feel like most people (myself included) have wondered why God isn’t answering their prayers. Now, this is such an incredibly broad topic I won’t be able to talk about it from every aspect. So today, I’m addressing the “big” stuff. Why did I have a miscarriage even though I lifted up desperate, incessant prayers that it wouldn’t happen? Why did my daughter/son/mother/father not recover…
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5 Tips to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
In trying to live fully and joyfully, one big struggle that I constantly encounter is comparison. Male or female, married or single, student or worker, this struggle doesn’t seem to discriminate. At every stage of my own life, I have struggled with comparing myself to others. In college, I always wished to be one of the girls with a boyfriend who would get engaged senior year and married soon after college. After college, I still struggled with being single when everyone around me seemed to be getting married and having kids. Even now, comparing myself to other moms is very real. The truth is, the seasons of life have changed over…
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O, Death, Where is Thy Sting?
When I was in college, noon mass on Fridays was typically celebrated by Fr. James Albers (now Abbot). At the end of mass, we would always sing The Ultima, a Benedictine prayer asking Mary to intercede for us that we may have a happy death. Fr. James would always remind us to keep death before our eyes, not in a morbid sense, but to remember the hope and glory before us in eternal life with Jesus. Those words have been on my mind a lot lately. Do you keep death before your eyes? Do you keep the end in mind, that you may not forget the goal of this earthly…
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Living Abundantly
“I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.” John 10:10 I have always loved this bible verse, my heart always skips a beat when I hear it. I desire deeply this abundant life Jesus talks about. However, I don’t always feel that I’m living abundantly though, can you relate? Part of my struggle has been in failing to understand what Jesus really meant by saying this. Freedom, defined by the world, is true abundance. In this sense, freedom means not being tied down, not having too many commitments. It means doing what you want to do when you want to do it. And being able to pursue…