Today is a gift.

God wants you to be in the world, but so different from the the world that you will change it. Get cracking.
-Mother Angelica

I have the ability to hide in my little world.  I go to daily Mass and home and to my sister's home. I also go to the grocery store when needed.  But what I really want to do is travel!

I just got back from a week of camping with a group of strangers.  I felt that I had been thrown head long into a world that I did not feel comfortable in.  It was a singles group which really is not my scene, but a mutual friend wanted me to meet up with a women. She thought we would hit it off.

The woman and I were able to find common ground and we had a good time until we had to be with the group.  They were negative in so many respects and there was a fair amount of casual sex.  It reminded me that my life had changed in small and big ways.  I no longer felt part of the world.  Especially that world.  So I made sure that I started my day with prayer; to ground me, to put on my armor, to help me remember that I am a child of God. The Rosary in my pocket was a good physical reminder of who I want to be and how I want to conduct myself.

I listened to their stories about how lost and hopeless they felt. Only one other person went to Church on Sunday. We went to Mass together.  There were remarks about going to church so we could be saved.  I needed to go to get grace and be strengthened.

As much as I wanted to hide in my RV and not interact I knew that I had to get out there and be Christ-like. I attempted to put a positive spin on the negative.  I was to be a witness to them.  I did my best.

The week did help remind me that I love being in my RV, seeing the country and admiring God's handiwork.  I was and am feeling guilty about wanting to be out there when I have commitments here at home.  As I was discussing this with my favorite sister, she reminded me that I need to do this traveling thing while I still can.  She reminded me that each day is a gift and that I can't squander it.  My parents and brothers agree with her.  Then Father Charlie talked about it in his homily at Mass.  I know he sees my heart and reads my mind!

I want to find a way to meet my commitments and still travel.  It would be a shame for that new RV to just sit and gather dust.  I bought it for a reason.

Lord you gave me the desire to serve you.
And You gave me the desire to travel.

Help me to find a way to do both.
Your will, not mine.
~Cindy

We do not recognize Him!

"Holiness is not for wimps and the cross is not negotiable, sweetheart, it's a requirement."
-Mother Angelica

I love the readings during the Octave of Easter. Jesus is raised from the dead and He appears to His disciples and His Mother, Mary.  Yet, each time that He appears to them they seem not to recognize Him!

This has always concerned me.  Why didn't they, who walked with Him, ate with Him, and shared in His public ministry not recognize Him when He appears to them?  Father Charlie hypothesized that perhaps Jesus looked different, or perhaps they didn't expect to see Jesus.  Jesus takes the time to appear in places that they had all been together during His life. I love that fact that Jesus cooks breakfast for them on the beach.  What an incredible image of Our Lord on the beach, fish and bread on the fire cooking for His disciples.  How much He loves them and us to do the most ordinary of tasks for them.  He feeds them!

We too are like the disciples.  We don't recognize Jesus when we see Him.  Perhaps it is like Father says, we don't expect to see Jesus there.  But there He is, sitting in the pew behind us chatting as they plan their golf date, or the parishioner that rubs us the wrong way or that we rub the wrong way.  He is in the homeless person on the corner that we wonder are they really down on their luck and should we just drive by.  Jesus is in the family member that has hurt or disappointed us.  Jesus is the rebellious teen or the forgetful parent. Jesus is in the sick or dying spouse that we care for on a daily basis until we fear we can't do it any more.

Let us not forget that Jesus is also in the innocent smile of a child.  The painted sunrise and sunset are gifts from God.  Jesus is in the smile of a total stranger that lightened our dismal day.

Jesus is not in the tomb.  HE IS RISEN!

Lord help me as I move through my day
to see You in others.
Help me to see You in others that annoy, hurt or anger me.

Help me to see You in my small cross.

Help me to lighten the cross that others carry.

~Cindy

God Writes Straight

God writes straight with crooked lines.
-Fr. Charlie

I know that I have mentioned Fr. Charlie's quote that, "God writes straight with crooked lines" before.  Lately it is a mantra that has been circling in my head for a couple of weeks.

When Joseph is sent to meet his brothers, they want to murder him.  Instead they sell him into slavery.  Later when they are starving and head to Egypt they are saved by the very brother they wanted to murder.  God took a seemingly bad situation and made it a good one.

As I reflect on my life I see where God has taken what I considered a bad situation and He turned it around for good.

When Michael was diagnosed and we knew he was terminal we could have been stuck in that mess of crooked lines.  Instead God wrote straight to our hearts and freed us from our fears and doubts and drew us ever closer to Him.

Now one of my daughters has been diagnosed with cancer and once again the lines are crooked.  Even now I see God's hand writing straight.  This diagnoses has allowed us to begin healing our relationship.   God doesn't want us to have regrets.  No, He calls us to lay every thing at His feet so that He can carry our burden.

Certainly during Holy Week as we approach the crucifixion of Our Lord we see the crooked lines.  Peter denies Him, Judas betrays Him, and Jesus feels abandon in the garden. Yet through all of this God's hand is writing straight.  He turns this sacrifice into our salvation.

Lord,
Help me to not become entangled with crooked lines.
Give me the strength to see that Your hand is already writing straight.
~Cindy

And my Knee HURTS

Many would be willing to have afflictions provided that they not be inconvenienced by them.
-St. Francis de Sales


I am feeling like a little whiney baby complaining about my knee pain.  It hurts.  It has been hurting for a long time now.  It is exhausting somedays just to sit.  So I finally got into see the Orthopedic Doctor the other day.  I wanted the doctor to tell me that I was going to get a new knee.

Instead I was told that we would be trying cortisone injections.  Not that my knee is not a candidate for surgery, it is. We need to try this first.  So I got the injection.  Then I hobbled out to the car and laid my head on the steering wheel and sobbed.

What just happened?  I did not get the outcome that I thought I was going to get.  Instead I was told I needed to do this other thing first.  No the injections will not cure what is wrong with my knee.  In fact, if and when the injections do not work then yes, I will get a new knee.  I believe the words he used were,  "The golden age for knees is 65."  Small comfort when you can't walk to do your grocery shopping, or pick up you mail, or drive!

I am a couple of days away from the trauma of the visit and I have a different take on things.  No, I still am not really satisfied, however, I was reminded that even a new knee is not a guarantee that I will be pain free.  I am not looking to be pain free.  I just want to be able to function.

Then Matthew Kelly reminded me in his video on Making Sense of Suffering that only our Catholic/Christian faith adequately explains suffering.  Suffering has value.  Suffering has value when we offer it up with Jesus' suffering where it will be perfected.  Not sure that I was willing to offer up my suffering initially. Still struggling actually.

 I know that I am never going to feel the way I did before.  I am going to be inconvenienced.  I am going to be in pain.  It is what I do with that pain that is important.

O Lord,
my knee hurts,
I want to offer it up with Your suffering.

Help me to see this as an opportunity to
join You in Your suffering.

Remind me to look at You on the cross
and be silent.

~Cindy

In the Presence of God...

It is true I am not always faithful, but I never lose courage.  I leave myself in the Arms of Our Lord.
-St. Therese of Lisieux

I have just attended the week long Lenten Mission presented by Fr. Michael Moore of the St. Patrick Fathers.  It was a week filled with intense emotion.  There were times when I was sure that God and Father had spoken.

It had been a challenging week before the retreat. I was feeling inadequate and less then what God expected of me.  I was raking myself over the coals for old and new faults.  I was spending a lot of time beating my breast.

Quickly I found that I was the only one beating me up!  God had forgiven me.  As Fr. Michael would say, "God buried the hatchet.  It was I that marked the spot so that I could unbury it."

I am still thinking and praying about all that was said during the Mission.  It gave me focus and started me walking again with the Lord, sans hatchet.  I am trying to fall into the Arms of Our Lord with abandon.  Trusting Him.  Being courageous.

I stand in the Presence of God,
with all my faults, wounds, hurts,
and disappointments.

I stand in the Presence of God,
with all my doubts and faith.

I stand in the Presence of God,
quietly replying...
Here I am Lord.

~Cindy

Lent...

Let the mouth FAST from foul words and unjust criticism for what good is it if we abstain from birds and fishes but bite and devour OUR BROTHERS? St. John Chrysostom

I actually look forward to Lent.  It is a time to prepare for the great Solemnity of Easter.  I find the quietude of the Lenten Devotions lend themselves to introspection, reflection and action.  I am drawn into the Passion of Our Lord in new ways each time.

Today I was reminded of the quote of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin:

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

So many times it is easy to be confused about what and who we are.  The world pulls us in many directions.  We blithely post on Facebook and other social media words of encouragement and passive-aggressive posts begging our friends, and we know who they are, to share if only for one hour to show their support.  Yet we walk past the beggar, the homeless, and gossip.

During this time of Lent, let us quiet our minds and hearts.  Let us listen in the night to the Lord's call for us.

Lord,

Here I am.

~Cindy

The Liturgy of the Hours

Prayer reveals to souls the vanity of earthly goods and pleasures.  It fills them with light, strength and consolation, and gives them a foretaste of the calm bliss of our heavenly home. - St. Rose of Viterbo

I love technology and all my little gadgets.  I revel in the idea that I can put something on my calendar on the phone and it will sync to my computer and iPad.

For awhile now I have been praying the Liturgy of the Hours digitally.  It was easy and straight forward.  I could even listen to it being read to me.  But I have been being pulled back to the Dead Tree Books for a bit.  There are those in my family who at reading this are shaking their heads wondering what took me so long.

I have a lovely prayer book that I use every day and have been having the nagging feeling that it was time to purchase the Four volume set of the Liturgy of the Hours. Thank you Amazon Prime for delivering them it two days!  The down side is that the guide for 2016 is on back order.  So for the time being I go to the digital edition and stumble in my book until I find the correct readings/prayers.

The Deacon at our Church was kind enough to give me the LOTH 101 right after he blessed my volumes. Still stumbling around, but from everything that I have read that is normal.

But I love my books with their ribbons and thin pages.  They rest in my hand and have weight that feels right.  There are no notifications dinging and scrolling across the screen.  I am able to fall into the rhythm of the readings without distraction.

I have ordered the book, "Divine Office for Dodos," from the Confraternity of Penitents Holy Angles Gift Shop.  They promise me that they will have me flipping to the proper Proper of the day in no time!

Lord,
I am so grateful 
for the opportunity to pray in unison
with others around the world.
This gift of the Liturgy of the Hours
is second only to the Liturgy of the Mass.

Let me lift my voice in your praise.
~Cindy