#catholic strong
My past year was scattered with pain and it was during these times that I realized how very present God is in my life. Thus my year was an amalgamation of serendipitous blessings. The work that I accomplished spoke to my strengths and passions and enriched my life in professionally and personally transformative ways. The joyful humans whom I met touched my soul with virtues and grace, truly exemplified and imparted on me, and will remain with me in spirit for a lifetime. It was an absolute blessing to bear witness to a beautiful collective humanity and I go forth in this new year with reignited confidence, compassion, gentleness, and above all, gratitude, joy, and strengthened dedication to my entire well-being.
God is goodness and love; my mantra these days. Thank you to the humans passionately pursuing His good work, humbly living our faith in action, and profoundly touching the lives of others.
Let brotherly love continue.
Do not neglect hospitality,
for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels.
Be mindful of prisoners as if sharing their imprisonment,
and of the ill-treated as of yourselves,
for you also are in the body.
Let marriage be honored among all
and the marriage bed be kept undefiled,
for God will judge the immoral and adulterers.
Let your life be free from love of money
but be content with what you have,
for he has said, I will never forsake you or abandon you.
Thus we may say with confidence:The Lord is my helper,
and I will not be afraid.
What can anyone do to me?Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you.
Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Intrinsic to our faith as Catholics, Mary is always with us in spirit, and we grow to understand, appreciate, and admire her nurturing presence far more deeply during difficult times. Please join my loved ones and I in praying for Mary’s intercession and supporting a cause close to our hearts: the Christian Refugee Relief Fund, a campaign to end genocide against Christians and other minority groups including Yazidis in Iraq, Syria, and the surrounding Middle East and North Africa region. The Fund directs 100% donations to benefit these vulnerable humans through medical clinics, food programs, and the rebuilding of homes for families displaced by ISIS.
Our brothers and sisters are being tortured and exterminated for attempting to exercise religious freedom that we, as Americans, take for granted every day. Let us speak out for the rights of all who are vulnerable and express solidarity through our faith in action.
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“In her very person as a Jewish girl become the mother of the Messiah, Mary binds together, in a living and indissoluble way, the old and the new People of God, Israel and Christianity, synagogue and church. She is, as it were, the connecting link without which the Faith (as is happening today) runs the risk of losing its balance by either forsaking the New Testament for the Old or dispensing with the Old. In her, instead, we can live the unity of sacred Scripture in its entirety.
To use the very formulations of Vatican II, Mary is ‘figure,’ ‘image’ and ‘model’ of the Church. Beholding her the Church is shielded against the aforementioned masculinized model that views her as an instrument for a program of social–political action. In Mary, as figure and archetype, the Church again finds her own visage as Mother and cannot degenerate into the complexity of a party, an organization or a pressure group in the service of human interests, even the noblest. If Mary no longer finds a place in many theologies and ecclesiologies, the reason is obvious: they have reduced faith to an abstraction. And an abstraction does not need a Mother.”
Excerpted from Rapporto Sulla Fede, a series of 1985 interviews given by Pope Benedict XVI to Vittorio Messori. Recently, I found this book in my archives from high school and this excerpt—Women, a Woman—summates the beauty and truth of our veneration of Mary. ♥
Often, both consciously and subconsciously, we take blessings for granted in this life. Reflection has the serendipitous capability to instill both sobering and invigorating feels. Lately I’ve been thinking how fortunate, how so very blessed, I am to have been nurtured in a devoutly faith-filled home, one with an abundance of sacrifice and unconditional love. How beautiful, too, for those same morals and values to permeate the education that my siblings and I received, that my parents sacrificed for as ensuring both home and school taught us to live faith, hope, and love trumped all.
When I was a child, I was truly a child in my thoughts and reasoning: shallow, selfish, and unable to fathom the clerics’ extreme sacrifice in devoting their lives to educating my classmates and I. Fourteen years of Catholic education followed by an incredible college experience, I thank God for all that they instilled in me. And I hope that I’m going out and living it every day.
Saint Paul, beautiful human, wrote:
Brothers and sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
For today’s children and tomorrow’s future, I support Catholic Strong.
