Time

If I could sum up what the past year and half has been full of joy and heart ache. The loss of my grandma to the joy of the Holy Saturday of 2009. There is differently a lot more that I have been seeing with in my family. The longing for healing of loved ones. The toll that it has taken words fall short. The healing power of music has given my heart the rest and comfort. Knowing that before there was time. I was loved. That I was known by name. "Before there was time....."

I Have Loved You With An Everlasting Love Fr. Michael Joncas cover

"Thus says the LORD: 'The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness; when Israel sought for rest, the LORD appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you." Jeremiah 31:2 to 3

What a great comfort the readings for the Mass have been a comfort to me this week. This song I have love you with an everlasting love. Came to mind as I prayed with the first reading from Tuesday August 3. Reminding once again that I am loved with a love that lasts forever. Is something I can not get my heart and mind around. Yet, this love is made real each time I am present at Mass. Present in the time of prayer and to those I run into day to day. Being able to share the love that I have been given. Who is it that you need to love today or is it you that needs to feel the love of God?

Dancing for joy to tears of sorrow

The combo of wanting to dance for joy and having the such deep sorrow. If hasn't been for the support of friends who are praying for me. You know how you are and I am grateful for you prayers. Also, for allowing me be able to express in word and tears what's my heart. I would have walked away from the Church. It seems that it is in these crazy mixed up moments that God seems the most tangible and real. Being able to face the why questions that have been coming up. Taking the time to give them light and to answer them. The answers to these questions very well might be ones I do not want to hear. Yet, it is something that will have to be faced. Crazy as this may and does sound. I love that I can at the sometime dance for joy and have such deep sorrow. For sorrow lasts for the night and joy will come in the morning. This was true this past Monday morning after working the over night and feeling quite down. I had an eight a.m. with great news. That the wondering and the waiting finally being to be asked "Will you marry me?" And the answer give was "Yes!!" Which was just the news I needed to bring a smile to my face. If I did not think people would thing I was some crazy lady I would have gotten out of my truck and stated to dance around it. This all seems so crazy to me that at the same time it is likely to feel such great joy and feel great sorrow as while. Cause me to wonder if this is how God feels. When we turn away and reject his love. It is quite likely, since we his children so often walk anyway from him and say we are going to do things our own way. It has also been a week that I have had a deep sense of sorrow. Sorrow of remembering what it is loss loved ones. There are a few other thing that at for know to keep to myself, friends, and to pray over.

Element of Surprise

Seeing Sister Margarets look of disbelief. That we came for a party to say good by. What a great joy. Knowing that forever this group of women will have the bond of comminity and love. It was great knowing that all the sisters knew that the party was going to happen. Expet for Sister !! What a great time of being togeather!

Wheat or weeds

The readings for this week have been centered around soil, wheat and weeds. As the words of these readings from the Gospels for the weekly mass have been working on my heart. The sense of need for confession and to becoming what it is to be more like Christ. Being in the world and not of it. The quetions of what is to take a stand for those who need it and how that looks likes. So, what is it to be wheat rather thw weeds?

Your Grace Is Enough

What is it to share your love and grace. Being able to have the grace to live out my call in life. Relizing that your grace is enogh for me. When all seems to cone crashing down and it feels that I can no longer carry on. When prayer comes only in painful quite. The pain of longing for the lover of my heart and soul. The wonder of His grace and love. No one can fully understand. He loves us worts and all. Even when we are at the lost.

Sorrows

What it must have felt that day when the events of the Passion took place. Knowing that all to soon that Jesus would willing go to the cross for all of us. He willing became poor and one body. For us thag we may live. Sorrow is present within my heart. Slowly, it crept into my heart and has made its home. Is this anything like what Mary felt as she took in the pain and sufferinf of he son upon the try. After all she knew that Jesus had to take this placw upom the tree. For there is no grater love then this. Then to lay down ones life for ones friends.

Restless spirit

This last week I have been restless. Being able to pray for any amount of time has been diffcult. A sense of deep hurt and fear seemed to have hit. Not really being able to put it all together until late Friday night and yesterday. Praying though parts of Matthew this week. Reminded me that I have to be salt and light to a dark and tasteless world. That I have to use far less words when I pray for the Father already knows what I need and what is the best for me. That true love and forgiveness comes from his love. Being able to enjoy community with him. Is to allown him to speak to us. Even with a restless spirit. That is hurting and crying out to the healer.

Love as I have love you

We are called to love as He has loved us. How is that the one sent to us can have such love for those who put him on the tree. It was my sins and failings that put him there and my lack of love that kept him on the cross. A love that I can not even start to explain or even understand. A love that drove God to allow Jesus, his beloved son to die. Even the death upon the cross. What would this look like if this would be in today? Lethal injections or something more inhuman?
Would I be able to lay my life down for those I have never known? How can I love as he first loved me. Since, He died for my sins. Knowing that I will once again have to ask for forgiveness. What is it to love this much? With the heart and mind of Jesus. I do not know. Only that I have to daily ask for the help to do this.

Entering Holy Week

This time last year I was coming in to the final days of R.C.I.A. It was with much joy in remembering the great anticipation in finally becoming fully Catholic. Yet, it is with some sorrow as while. Sorrow in knowing that I would shortly be having to deal with the loss of my beloved grandmother. Who struggled for most of last year of being in poor health. Along with the serious health issues of my mother that are still ever present. Its these events that have made my faith tangable. Each time I'm at I go to Mass I am overwhelmed by being able to receive Christ. It is in know Him that was with me then. As while as know. So, this year I am reminded of the time of prep airing for being received. The time to truly make sure that this is what I desired and not a felting fad. Saying yes at the during the Easter Vigil was profoundly powerful. A time of huge and overwhelming graces that words seem to fail.

Shared Journy

What is it to share this journey that I am on? Showing that chasing after the call to a life that many do not understand. How is it that I a women in her early thirties a convert to the Catholic Church? Possibly, one day become a religious sister. I know that with out any second guessing that it is by the grace of God. That it has been only by His promptings or more to the point the kicks in the butt. Ever since I was about fifteen years old. That there was something I am called to. That goes against the time in which I live. By the questioning of those who taught within the faith tradition I once belonged to and called home. Finding that what I was taught and told just did not add up. With what I would read in the Bible. Which, did not help me come to a faith of my own. What it did do was cause me to wonder if about God and Jesus Christ. Whether or not if anything was true in the Bible or just a bunch of man made stories. That did not stop me from trying to find the truth. Even though it has take a lot of time. Yet, God's time is prefect. He will not force anyone of to do anything that he or she does not want to be doing.

Do or do not there is no try

As He was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and knelt before Him, and asked Him, "Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?"And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone. "You know the commandments, 'DO NOT MURDER, DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, DO NOT STEAL, DO NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS, Do not defraud, HONOR YOUR FATHER AND MOTHER.'" And he said to Him, "Teacher, I have kept all these things from my youth up." Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him and said to him, "One thing you lack: go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." But at these words he was saddened, and he went away grieving, for he was one who owned much property.

-Mark 10:17-22

This weekend I spent the weekend with this Sister at Rosary Hill and what a weekend it was. I differently need to get going with discerning my vocations. No longer can I just sit on my hands to wait for it to just come to me. I have to get going. What is it that is holding me back? What 'riches' have a hold on me? No longer can I be I be idol in looking into what it is that my vocation is. Run full speed a head not stopping for anything. Seeking after the lover of my soul. The one who is head over heals for me. With the voice that has been quietly calling me since I was sixteen years old. Yet, been tuning for way to long. It is time now for me to take action and to stop siting on the side lines of life. Taking the time to be still to hear the voice of the creator.

A little of this and a bit of that

This year I hope to blog on a more consistency then I have overt he past several months. The craziness of life has gotten the best of me. The time that I need to spend in prayer, reading, and everything else has been replaced with work. Working way to much has started to show in it self. In my lack of interest in the things I love to do. Blogging being one of these things. I noticed greatly when I spent a few days at Rosary Hill. A great group of Dominican Sisters. Given the chance to join them in their ways of life. Their way of life was a breath of fresh air and it gave me the wake up call that I needed. Slowing down and taking time for myself is something I need to starting doing more of. With the work I do at Pioneer. I must take care of myself or I will be of no use to anyone.
So, hears to the a new year and to a fresh start.