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Still Faithful

Posted by eph21920 on March 17, 2015 in Connected, Faith, Prayer

A few years ago, a wonderful teenager asked me to be her Confirmation sponsor. Of course I said I would and it was a beautiful day. I have tried to stay in touch with her as she graduated from high school and even college. I sent cards and trinkets for special occasions. Like so many of us, she had times when she was very faithful and times when she wandered away from God. Today I received a text from her with a picture of a bookmark I gave her. She is using it in one of her prayer books. She is getting ready for a big exam for a job in a couple of weeks. She reminded me of her Confirmation name and I promised to begin praying a novena to her patron saint. It was great to know that she is still nurturing her relationship with Christ.

I Found God today in recognizing the faith of a young woman.

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Faith Is The Reason

Posted by eph21920 on March 16, 2015 in Uncategorized

I Found God today in beautiful thoughts from a blog I came across. It is worth sharing, reading, and pondering in our hearts.

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It’s Not Fair

Posted by eph21920 on March 15, 2015 in Faith, Humility, Jesus, Life

The Gospel reading at church today included probably the most famous verse, John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life.” The priest told a very touching story:

A very faithful man died and went to Heaven. During his life, the man prayed and did his best to follow God. Jesus greeted him there and they walked and talked together. They came across the man’s neighbor. The man asked why the neighbor was there. During his life he was mean and greedy. He treated people poorly and cared about no one but himself. Only as the neighbor was dying did the man enourage him to give his heart to Jesus Christ, which he did. “It’s just not fair,” the man said. Jesus turned to him with a tear in His eye and responded, “You are right. It is not fair…… It is not fair that while you knew me for most of your life, he only knew me a short while.”

This reminded me of a conversation I had with a parent while I was coordinating Religious Education for a church. The parent wanted to know why some kids could be Confirmed in the church after only a year or two of instruction, while others were going faithfully every year. “It is not fair,” they complained. “You are right, it is not fair.” I replied. “It is not fair that while your child is receiving the benefit of continually having Jesus in their lives, other children do not have that available to them.”

I Found God today in a reminder of our desire to have Jesus in our lives, of His desire to be in our lives, and of the desire we should have to share His love with others.

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Pi Day

Posted by eph21920 on March 14, 2015 in Family, Food, Joy

Pi Day! Today as we were having breakfast, I remembered that “Super Pi Moment” was coming up – that the numbers in the date and time would match up the first 10 digits in the infinite number pi. I looked it up to see what time that would be, and it was occurring at that exact moment. That was pretty funny. Later my sister came to visit and brought some pie! We had a wonderful afternoon and enjoyed the delicious treat. I am so happy to have my sisters so close. It was a welcomed break to have two days back to back with family and celebrations of sorts. Later in the day I was looking through a book I got earlier in the week from Fr. Leo. The book “Grace Before Meals” describes just how important it is to celebrate events, big and small, and how food plays such an important role in family life. It includes scripture references, conversation starters, and recipes as well. It made perfect sense to me as we have celebrated the past couple days and enjoyed being with family.

I Found God today in enjoying celebrations, food, and family.

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New Job

Posted by eph21920 on March 13, 2015 in Answer, Family, Grateful

Today my sister came for a visit. She has been struggling recently trying to find a job. At her previous job, she was treated very poorly. It drained her and dragged her down something terrible. When she got to the house, she told us all about an interview that she had this morning. She thought it went pretty well and was impressed with the company. While we were chatting, she received a phone call from the company who offered her the job. They told her the hiring team unanimously agreed that she was the perfect fit. Needless to say, we were all elated.

I Found God today in a good job opportunity for my sister and I am so grateful.

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Closed Caption

Posted by eph21920 on March 12, 2015 in Answer, Family, Problem

Both my mom and dad are hard of hearing to a certain extent. That can make it pretty challenging to watch TV all together. Typically the volume would be too loud for one and not loud enough for the other. Then the fluctuations in the sound between music, voices, background noise, and commercials added another layer of frustration. A few weeks ago, we put on a movie and realized that we could put on the captions. It worked great. We could put the volume to a reasonable level and my parents could both understand what was happening. Tonight I figured out how to put the closed caption on the TV so we can watch all the programs and read what is happening at the same time. We tried it out on my parents’ favorite show and it was a wonderful new change. Perhaps it sounds silly, but this simple feature will make spending time together in this way much more enjoyable.

I Found God today by finding a way to help my parents and I enjoy spending some leisure time together.

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Pacemaker Checkup

Posted by eph21920 on March 11, 2015 in Family, Healing, Sick

Yesterday my mom wasn’t feeling very well – she felt her heart was beating hard and fast. So we checked her pulse. It was normal, but it was skipping every now and again. This, of course, made her pretty frightened. So, we called the doctor and explained the situation. The nurse talked us off the ledge and moved up the follow up appointment for this morning. When we got to the examination room, the nurse put a device over the pacemaker and read the information. The device stored everything that had gone on since it was implanted a week ago. Then she did some adjustments from her computer that directly affected the pacemaker. All my mom had to do was sit in a chair. Everything showed on the computer screen. I was in awe of the whole thing. The nurse said she felt one of the leads going from the pacemaker to her heart had moved a little and was not exactly in the place it should be. She changed the settings a bit and assured us that the device is still working properly. She answered all our questions and made an appointment for another follow up. The whole appointment helped to calm all of our nerves and gave us a better understanding of how everything works. We are giving more time for the healing to take place and praying that the lead doesn’t move any more.

I Found God today in the awesome knowledge and technology that is doing a wonderful work in my mom.

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You Are What You Eat; Angel of the Day

Posted by eph21920 on March 10, 2015 in Eucharist, Faith, Life, Stranger

Tonight was the last night of the parish mission. Quite honestly, I was tired and did not really feel like going out again. But I knew that listening to Fr. Leo one more time would be uplifting to say the least. So I pushed aside the temptation to just stay home and got myself to the church. It was the most packed of the 3 nights – standing room only. Fr. Leo was once again incredibly engaging, funny, and relevant. The topic for the night was the presence of Jesus in Holy Communion. He used one of my favorite lines – you are what you eat! He spoke about how Jesus was born in Bethlehem, which means “the house of bread”. After His birth, Jesus was placed in a manger, which is a food trough. Jesus’ first miracle was changing water into wine at a wedding feast. And not just any wine – the best wine ever. Then he fed 5,000 people with only a bit of food. So – from the beginning, God was telling us that He is the food that we need to thrive and survive and He will make Himself available to us. Jesus Himself said,  “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.” John 6:53-54. This is only part of the scripture. Jesus goes on and on when he is questioned about “eating his flesh” and “drinking his blood”. He had an opportunity to clarify or explain, but He continued on this course, even though many people walked away because it was a difficult thing to comprehend. And so it is today. Fr. Leo challenged us to think about if we are not allowing ourselves to be fed by Jesus Christ, what are we feeding ourselves with? We spent a few minutes in Eucharistic Adoration, just being in the presence of Christ. It was beautiful.

I Found God today by having a deeper appreciation for Jesus Christ present in the Eucharist.

TWOFER!!

As I said, the church was packed when I got there 10 minutes early, but I found a spot to sit in the very back against the wall. I sat next to a woman and we started to chat. She told me that she had spent several years caring for her aging parents until they passed away. I told her that I had just move home to help care for my parents. She talked about the blessings and difficulties she experienced as she choked up several times. She gave me some advice for finding help for myself. I told her she was my angel for the day. She said that it was the other way around as she was able to remember and talk about her parents. I was so happy that I fought against the temptation to just stay home tonight.

I Found God today also in an encounter with a woman who shared her wisdom and faith.

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About Mary

Posted by eph21920 on March 9, 2015 in Faith, Mary

So, I was happy to be able to go to the church mission again tonight and listen to the dynamic Fr. Leo. The topic for the evening was, “Finding God Through Mary”. I have heard many times the thought that Catholics “worship” Mary. When Fr. Leo was in seminary preparing to become a priest, he took a course on Mariology in Rome. He explained that Catholics do not worship Mary, but we do honor her. She was after all, the first Christian. In Genesis we read about Adam and Eve – the first perfectly created individuals. They wanted to be like God and in doing so, did not listen to Him. They did what they wanted and therefore separated themselves from God. Mary was also perfectly created to bring forth God’s Son Jesus into the world. She is the new “Eve” and Jesus is the new “Adam”. Unlike Eve, Mary said Yes to God and did His will perfectly. She is necessary to bring salvation to the world. Without Mary, we would not have Jesus. She is always pointing us to Jesus. The last words in scripture that she says are, “Do whatever He tells you.” Jesus himself invites all of us into a relationship with Him, to be His brothers and sisters with God as our Father, and Mary as our Mother. I admit that I have a hard time fathoming this whole thing. But I have a hard time fathoming the fact that Jesus Christ took the world’s sins – my sins – upon Himself so that we can live in peace, hope, and love on earth and into eternity. What I do know is that the more I learn about Mary, the closer I feel to her, and the closer I feel to Christ. And the closer I am to Christ, the more I am able to make good choices and loving actions.

I Found God today in learning more about His Mother Mary.

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To Be A Saint

Posted by eph21920 on March 8, 2015 in Answer, Humor, Saint, Youth

Tonight I went to the church to hear a guest speaker –Fr. Leo Patalinghug–  who is leading a mission for the parish. He was very dynamic and kept everyone laughing and learning. Tonight’s focus was about how to become a saint – after all, all saints go to Heaven! He brought several teenagers to the front and asked them to think about what a saint looks like. Then, they were asked to pose like a saint. There were some praying hands, one was “resting in the Spirit”, one was pointing to picture of Mother Teresa on his t-shirt, one looked like a warrior, and a couple weren’t quite sure what to do. Then he asked them to think about what mean or bad people look like and strike another pose. They were attacking one another, ready to fight, turning their backs, crossing their arms, and making mad faces. Fr. Leo talked about how it seems to be easier to replicate bad than good. The images of the saints we have are doing very holy things and seemed awkward to try to depict. He had the youth all link arms and make a long line. The were symbolic of the people in our lives that influence us to make bad decisions. Then he portrayed God and was calling the person on the end to be a saint. The person could not go anywhere because he was attached to all the negative things in his life. He had to fight and struggle, and finally call out to God for help to become detached. We can do this when we avail ourselves to the Sacrament of Reconciliation. God heard his cry and helped him out of the situation. Now he was attached to God. And now, he was to go to those who were in a bad way and bring them to God too. And that is how you become a saint. His whole talk was very engaging and inspirational. I hope I am able to attend another one!

I Found God today in a demonstration of God’s grace and mercy.

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