Never letting go

Prodigal: one who has returned after an absence. As a prodigal daughter I am filled with awe and gratitude at open doors. Morning mass, all welcomed. Many drive by not even aware of what amazing love transpires behind these beautiful doors. Many, like I used to be, drive by knowing, but lost touch and keep themselves preoccupied so it doesn't hurt so much.

Still, after all this time, I am overwhelmed at the love that comes pouring into my soul at mass, or at Adoration, or at my own backyard shrine. I stop to think, how could it be? me?

Why do I know this love? I don't deserve it, but I reach for it just the same.

I am presently studying "The Apostolate of Holy Motherhood".

Trying my best to live in accordance with it's direction. There is a lot of staying home, being quiet and praying. Lots of praying.

Chapter 81 "My Sacred Heart Is Your Resting Place" Jesus says, "If you but make the effort, I will reach out My hand and grasp you, drawing you closely to Me where you will find your rest and the joy which surpasses earthly pleasures........Blissful and eternal love is yours for the asking, but first you must desire this above all else in your life and proceed in courage and faith in your ascent to Me............Stay with Me in love; never leave Me. Think of Me always and I will dwell within you perpetually....."

I'm so grateful! excited and full of hope!!

peace be with you♥

Rainbows at Night

I haven't been on the computer lately all that much. I felt the need of lots and lots of quiet time. I need to pray. I want to be very sure I am living the messages of Medjugore: Pray, Peace, Sacraments, Fast, Holy Scriptures.

Once in awhile, one needs to get one's priorities in order; it's simply foolish not to. Foolishness, silliness and hilarity mixed with drinking alcohol is not a smart way to go. When I look back on the times I acted like that, I'm embarrassed.

I'm ashamed.

I confess, I've wasted much of my life to foolishness. Why? What's wrong with having a little fun?

I love fun, but only the kind that evokes love, and makes me so happy for the other person I want to hug them.

I have found that simple pleasures truly are the best. I shy from things that shock my soul. Like t.v.

I really believe that most of the reality shows have been sneakingly damaging to many, many souls.

My daughter watches them sometimes. The other day, I caught a glimpse of one. It was a mother who had about ten little kids. She was getting a divorce. They showed her sitting on the couch explaining why divorce was the right thing to do.

"Oh, so simple. I see, ........that's the way you do it." Thoughts like that permeate people's minds when they are given an opportunity to be shown how to be evil, yet look acceptable, normal and even attractive....or worse, justified.

What about a reality show where you live day in and day out with a parish priest? Straight away, people would think it would be about exposing his secret sins. Might they watch it if it were not?

What if it were a holy, good and loving priest? A parish priest is a busy guy. Always putting out fires and helping all sorts of people, he also brings us hope.

Hope.

Evil tries to take hope from us because loss of hope pulls us away from God and we start depending on people to cheer us up, or encourage us. We become weak and even more scared.

There are tens of thousands of people right now praying for nine straight days a Novena of Hope.

You can read about that at mej.com

Help by praying for people to hope in God, not the news media, or the bottle or their anger's fury.

If you haven't prayed because you think there is no hope for you because of past sins, that God will not hear you, or if you are afraid of His Wrath (which is the beginning of wisdom), regardless, go to God.

Tell Him what I said when I thought I was too lost; "I am Your child, help me!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Who am I to be sitting at Mass this morning receiving Holy Communion?

Who am I? I'm nobody. Just an ordinary woman who believes, who has experienced God's love and refuses to let go.

Our Lady said if you knew how much She loved you, you would jump for joy.

I've experienced Her love, just a tiny bit, for a second, when my son died...........that second has got me through 22 years of deep grief, relentless fears and doubt.

Sometimes at Mass I think to myself, "oh my dear Lord, where would I be right now had God not allowed Our Lady to guide me?!!"

She is leading me on the path to Heaven.

My sins? They are paid for.

By who? Yes, you've heard it a million times from a million people, it's Jesus, God's Son. You've heard His Name.

I'm still in utter awe that me, a scrawny middle aged woman, a sinner and pity-party-type person with no education, really; I have nothing except my family, anyway, regardless of my failings and my miserable goof ups, I am a daughter of Jerusalem, an Israelite (belongs to God). I'm all the things this world hates.

I'm all the things that embarass people.

Yep, and I'm eternally grateful.

Last night, after the storm, I saw a rainbow at night. I've never seen that before. I had been praying and meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary. When I finished, I went to the window and saw this rainbow. I called to my husband to come and see and he said "go get your camera!"

So, thanks to him, I can share it with you. The other photos are taken at the same time, the firey sky is the west, the bluish is the north, and the rainbow was in the east.

Peace to all you who happen by.

How to be good

How many times have you heard or said, "be good"?

I say that to my dog when I leave the house, most times she listens. I say it to my daughter and husband, and most times they listen too! And, I say it to myself!

In re-reading a passage in the book "The Poem of the Man God" by Maria Valtorta, where Jesus explains a way or method of how to do this being good stuff.

In replying to Peter who had just asked what Jesus and the disciples were discussing as he came upon them. (Jesus had been teaching about being good).

Jesus said, "order, patience, perseverance, humility, charity.

Peter asked what order had to do with it.

Jesus responds, "Disorder is never a good quality. I mention it first, whereas I mentioned charity last, because they are the two extremities of the straight line of perfection. Now you know that a straight line on a plane has neither a beginning nor end. Each extremity can be either the beginning or the end, whereas in the case of the spiral, or any other design which is not enclosed in itself, there is always a beginning and an end. Holiness is linear, simple, perfect and has but two extremities, like a straight line.

Peter said, "It is easy to draw a straight line..."

Jesus says, "Do you think so? you are wrong. In a drawing, even if it is a complicated one, some imperfections may not be noticed. But an error is noticed at once in a straight line.

Joseph, when he taught me the trade, insisted a great deal that the boards should be straight and quite rightly he used to say, "see son? a small imperfection may not be seen in a decoration or in a turned work, because the eye, unless it is very experienced, if it watches one point, does not see another. But if a board is not as straight as it should be, even the most simple work will not be satisfactory, such as a poor table for a peasant. It will be on a slant or it will wobble. It is only good for the fire".

Who starts his spiritual work in an unplanned manner, starting from useless things, jumping from one thing to another, like a restless bird, will end up by not being able to join the various parts of his work. They will not fit in. Therefore, order and charity. Then, holding those two extremities firm in two vices, so that they may not move, you can work at all the rest decorations or carving, whatever it may be."

So there you have it, Order, patience, perseverance, humility, charity. These 5 things starting with order, ending with charity will help you "be good".

You can apply this to all sorts of things you want to be good at. Even shopping for groceries, making a bed, planting flowers or washing dishes, etc. Practice being good at small efforts and discover that you will remember to apply these methods at doing good in other areas of your life.

By the way, I highly recommend reading The Poem of the Man God:)!!

Peace.

Look for it

The other day I was reading an article "The Secret of a Happy Family" by Mary Ann Budnik. I found it on the EWTN site. She wrote about how many of us center our lives around the quest to be happy. Mistakenly, we may dedicate all our energy towards pursuits of power, wealth, fame, winning the lottery, etc. CS Lewis points out that:

"God cannot give us happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing."

When I read that I thought how true that statement is. God is the sole creator of happiness.

He wrote the book on it!

We can try to figure it out on our own, but we usually take ourselves and those we love down the tubes.

She also pointed out that as parents we fail to teach our children the value of suffering. There will be times when they will suffer. We have to help them learn how to handle these sufferings to keep them from searching the world over for a distraction. (The world has plenty of distractions; drugs, etc...........no shortage there, ugh!)

I remember my dad crying when his mother passed away. I was a little girl, he was around 55 years old. I can still see him sitting all alone behind the barn with his head in his hands, sobbing. I ran up to him, put my arms around him and asked him why he was crying.

He said, "I miss my mother!" and he allowed me to comfort him.

I remember thinking how huge his love must be to hurt this much. I'd never saw my dad cry before.

I also remember the strength that showed in his face, a determination.

Then, many years later, dad passed away & I experienced the same thing; finding a quiet place in which to cry and even saying the same words, "I miss my dad!"

Dad allowing me to see his pain, gave me the ability to sit with my own, and to find strength. Love never dies, it gets stronger, even after death, loves grows.

Amazing when you finally realize the realtiy of this fact!!!!!

I don't need a holiday named Memorial Day, to remind me of those whom I love that has passed on, or those whom I didn't know but paved the way for me. This reflection is respected every day in the Mass, in my heart and in my child's eyes. I see my son in my daughter's eyes. I see my dad in my brother's eyes, my mom in my sister's eyes. When my niece laughs, I hear her dad's laugh. When I see my nephew's smile, I see his brother's smile.

All the love you have ever known surrounds you. God never takes, only gives.

I've read where people cry the most, not when they are hurt, but when they find hope.

Today, Our Lady of Fatima

This Mother of fair love will take away from your heart all scruple and all disorder of servile fear. She will open and enlarge it to run the way of her Son's commandments (Ps. 118:32) with the holy liberty of the children of God. She will introduce into it pure love, of which she has the treasure, so that you shall no longer be guided by fear, as hitherto, in your dealings with the God of charity, but by love alone. You will look on Him as your good Father, whom you will be incessantly trying to please and with whom you will converse confidently, as a child with its tender father. If, unfortunately, you offend Him, you will at once humble yourself before Him. You will ask His pardon with great lowliness, but at the same time you will stretch your hand out to Him with simplicity, and you will raise yourself up lovingly, without trouble or disquietude, and go on your way to Him without discouragement.

(taken from "True Devotion To Mary" by St. Louis DeMontfort) regarding the "Wonderful Effects" of devotion to Our Lady, and was entitled: Deliverance from Scruples, Cares and Fears.

One of my favorite messages of Fatima is that in the end, Her Immaculate Heart will Reign.

that's a relief!!!!

Moving Forward, clean or dirty!!!

Ever wonder where you went wrong? But at the time, it didn't seem wrong? I can remember one, that for some reason came to my mind today. It was years and years ago.

It wasn't too long after my son died and I was trying to cope with doing everyday things.

I had put a little black/white t.v. on the kitchen table and let it play in order to keep me from thinking. All day, my daughter and I watched I Love Lucy, Andy Griffith and Mr. Ed. I couldn't tolerate the loud, noisy shows on regular channels, (they shocked my soul.)

One early evening I was setting the table and saw only 3 plates, instead of 4. Four chairs but only 3 place settings.

And that was then it all started, with this one thought, "my family is inadequate."

This thought was cancerous, extremely malignant and spread to every corner of my brain. And that is how I began believing other thoughts of "who cares, what does it matter anyway, I'm no good, I can't do this", etc., etc. I wish I had listened to the other little voice that said, "investigate this thought, you know it's not right."

Oh no. That would have been too easy and I love learning things the hard way.

I just didn't connect the dots till this morning when I was putting down 4 clean placemats, even though, still, only 3 are needed.

I have come to accept my little family of 3 as adequate. I am proud to be the wife/mother of this family. And we are busy, prolific and good people.

I had been asking God, a lot, lately what made me screw up in life so much? or why did I fail at this or that? why, why, why??????

This is my answer: I believed the thought my family was inadequate. I basically, without really understanding it, told God, "hey, hate to tell you this but I'm not happy with only 3". And that was the beginning of my unhappy journey of feeling inadequate, believing I was not good enough and basically a heavy weight around who's ever neck had to put up with me.

I believed it, like it was a religion: I was NOT good enough, at anything or for anything.

Nowadays, I am utterly amazed at how important it is to pray. Pray, when you don't feel like it. Say sloppy prayers if you have to. Just try. And question the source of thoughts.

Ask for the gift of discernment of spirits.

Years ago Jesus TOLD me to ask for this.

Right afterwards I thought, "oh swell, that's the one I DON'T want." (I'll explain this in another post)!

So, if you believe that God has rendered you inadequate you'll have a really hard time when mud is thrown at you like, mid-life crisis, deaths, demotions, criticism, rejection, failing grades, being excluded. I could list examples a mile long which feeds into this inadequacy attitude, and how it all becomes a concrete part of who you are and how you see yourself.

As for me, I am on a non-ending course of healing. I guess life is just that.

So what do these mud covered bikes on top of a pristine clean car got to do with it?

I'm seeing Divine Mercy carrying His mud covered sheep forward! God teaches us ALL the time!

Oh! speaking of sheep, while you are here, look at our black sheep Betty.

Why sweat it?

I haven't been in an art making frame of mind lately.

Lent this year was powerful for me and I've spent most of my free time praying. I'm determined to discipline myself to pray and as each day passes, I feel my soul soaking up the energy praying provides.

How I understand it, is like this; conversion comes in stages. Like kindergarten through high school. I was held back a couple times because I wasn't paying attention, I'd rather play than pray. Being in charge, making my own rules and banking on getting by with the skin of my teeth, after all I know I'm going to Heaven, so why sweat it so? That was my mind in playtime, or a perpetual recess if you will.

Here's why you want to sweat it TONS and pray, pray, pray and make gigantic efforts to get as close to God as possible: because a soul estranged from God hurts Him, and your life becomes dark. You lose your way and before you know it, it feels (I repeat: feels) like all hope has vanished from your heart.

And if the evil one gets his way, you'll believe all hope is lost.

Okay so, you are sitting in the back of the room facing the wall wearing the dunce cap and feel like crap. Now what?

Ask for help. If you can't ask for help in detail, just say Jesus. Keep saying His Name.

After I had fallen away and had to wear the dunce cap, I went to confession. The priest asked me what was it I wanted from the Church? I just broke down, sobbed and could barely answer "I want to come home".

The priest said, "if you can't meet God 1/2 way, He'll come the rest of the way".

Confession is the best way to get rid of a dunce hat. How so? After you've made your heartfelt confession you realize that you are a child of God. You realize God never left you and went on vacation to leave you fend for yourself. A child of God doesn't need to go about as a cone head.

But, ya gotta ask.

Which, takes humility.

Anyway, so now how to do I feel? Grateful. I'm no longer drenched in fear and it's a lot easier to smile.

I think I may feel these things I'm saying so deeply because God became real to me when my son died. But, after a few years went by, I decide I didn't like the pain of my son's absence, so I needed to distract myself from all that pain. You see, it doesn't take much to mess up because we all lack love in our hearts, and I just fell hook line and sinker into complacency and sloth (to name a few). I was being a brat. I didn't think I mattered all that much.

(No wonder God tells us to be on guard!)

But you see, from the beginning of my conversion in 1987 Our Lady worked and worked to lead me to Jesus. And now I am in the class where you learn to live that Jesus Christ is THE Savior. And it just so happens He is the Teacher of this class. Works out great.

Do you know, those words turn people off? "Jesus Christ is my Savior" Tell a stranger this and they'll most likely roll their eyes at you and try very hard to avoid you. Hey, it doesn't need to be a stranger, it could be your friends or family just as well.

Tough, too bad! it's my truth, my life and I'm not holding back to be politically correct. This is serious business folks! I'm spending the rest of my life thinking about what pleases God, not phony progressiveness or whatever one identifies as up to date in accordance with today's thinking.

I don't think being able to please everybody will help you love them. You just end up depleted.

Ever cry in gratitude that you made everyone happy?

Speaking of tears, I try not to cry in mass, sometimes I manage, sometimes not. But when I think of how awful it is to "feel" lost, and knowing I am in the folds of Our Lady's mantel, that I'm getting ready to receive Jesus in the Holy Sacrament.....that I am THERE in mass.... I become overwhelmed with gratitude. Simply overwhelmed. And it fills my heart with love. I don't ever want to be a dunce again!!!!

Today at mass, I started thinking how not too long ago I was afraid to go outdoors and get my mail, let alone drive all the way to the church.

Fear is useless! And that's putting it mildly!

Picture this; Our Lady got me by the ear, sat me down and said: PRAY.

Oh, what a beautiful Mother we all have. Even if you are a Baptist, She is your Mother. (And I can say that because I was Baptist at the time my son died and Our Lady helped me.)

I'll end with the message of Our Lady Of Medjugore dated 3/25/09:

"Dear children! In this time of spring, when everything is awakening from the winter sleep, you also awaken your souls with prayer so that they may be ready to receive the light of the risen Jesus. Little children, may He draw you closer to His Heart so that you may become open to eternal life. I pray for you and intercede before the Most High for your sincere conversion. Thank you for having responded to my call"

Thanks Mom!