Sometimes It’s the Small Things

Neat Things I Didn't Author
Agony in the Garden

I can study the Catechism or Scripture, but sometimes it’s just a phrase or sentence in random places that I reflect upon the most. A friend regularly sends out different reflections throughout the week and, to be honest, I don’t read through them all. Today, however, I did read (skim) through it and this stood out for me:

God the Son, in your eyes, I am like a poor, helpless sheep whom you gently pick up and carry when I’m worn out from my sins…. I am completely unworthy of your love, but so grateful to find rest and a true home in you. Lord, grant me a generous heart.

Yes. Please.

Words

Jennspeak

Have you ever stopped to reflect on how you’ve learned words? Certainly, a lot of our knowledge is from our parents and from school, but what about those words that we learned on our own, by reading in context and things like this?

Do we *really* know what they mean? Precisely?

Maybe not. I know there are quite a few words that I only know the meaning of in a general sense. There are probably a lot of words that I’ve only read and never heard, so I’m not certain of the correct way to pronounce them.

Like “banal”. I always thought the emphasis was on the first syllable, which had a long A sound. But, I have heard many people on the radio pronounce it with a short A, and emphasis on the second syllable. And what exactly does it mean?

Merriam-Webster says it means, “lacking originality, freshness,” where I always thought it meant something like, “boring” or “meaningless”.

Maybe I should work harder to look up these words I don’t really know. Instead of tending to skip past them and remaining ignorant. 🙂

Here’s another one: Ineffable = “incapable of being expressed in words; unspeakable; not to be uttered”

Perhaps some day, I’ll master the English language…. Some day a long time from now…. 🙂

Sacred Space

Prayer/Prayer Requests

A friend sent me a link to Sacred Space, a prayer site run by Irish Jesuits. On a whim during my lunch today, I popped on and starting praying with their prayers, reflections, and Scripture for today.

The Scripture was the story of the miracle of the loaves and fishes. After reading the passage, they ask you to reflect upon how this Scripture made you feel.

In the beginning, they describe the people as being like sheep without a shepherd. This made me think of myself as a sheep, and how I would feel if I were without my shepherd. And I became sad. I need my shepherds. I would be lost without them.

Then, they spoke of how all the sheep were gathered up and held within the communion symbolized by the loaves and fishes, and I saw in this the analogy of the Mass. It made me reflect upon the profound connection that there is between our priests and the Mass. And upon how much I need both.

I need this sacramental life like I need air to breathe. And I can’t imagine my life now without it.

Thanks be to God.

The Love Dare: Day 2

The Love Dare

I know that this isn’t the next calendar day after Day 1, but I felt that I should pick up where I left off, instead of trying to cram many days into one. I felt that would be cheating, somehow. I need to learn each lesson as I come to them and spend the appropriate time on them before looking at the next.

Today’s dare focuses on kindness, the second pillar of love (the first being patience). They tell us that kindness is comprised of four separate things: gentleness, helpfulness, willingness, and initiative. And that kindness is love in action. To truly be kind, I need to be aware of my basic selfishness and die to self, so that I can live for the good of others. This is really hard; I think we are by nature selfish. I think that I have a high degree of empathy for other people, but I still need to fight with myself to *do something* about it. Especially when that “something” involves some sort of sacrifice on my behalf.

Today’s dare is to do one unexpected gesture of kindness for our spouse. It was a sacrifice for me on a number of levels, and it was not made easily. But it was for the love of Christ, and He turned that sacrifice into a blessing for me, as well. This doesn’t really surprise me. After all, our priest is known to exhort couples at their wedding to try to “outdo” each other in kindness. If the relationship that I am working on is the one between Jesus and myself, then I really have no hope of being able to outdo Him in kindness. 🙂 Although, I can try. 🙂

Epiphany House Blessing

Prayer/Prayer Requests

I found this tradition in a Catholic bookstore around my first Epiphany (which was in 2008), and have kept it a tradition in my household ever since. Basically, you are taking time on this day to consecrate yourself and your household to God for the year, up to next Epiphany, when you do it again. You can find prayers for this house blessing in several places online, this one is the site that I used tonight to bless my house and to consecrate myself to the Lord.

Since I live alone, I said all the prayers myself, aloud. 🙂

I prayed the Magnificat from the Bible I received from the RCIA program, when I was joining the Catholic Church.

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Then I sprinkled holy water in each of the rooms of my house. I don’t really have a good “sprinkling” technique, so I kind of splooshed gobs of water in each room from my holy water bottle. I’m sure God can work with that. 🙂

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I didn’t have any incense with which to incense each room in the house. Instead, I took a candle I received at a memorial Mass for my godmother, lit it, and prayed for her intercession in each room in my house. I tried to tailor my prayers to the activities that normally occur in each room (E.g. pray for friends and relationships, that I consume media that feed rather than diminish my soul, etc. when I was in the living room). I asked her to take all these prayers to the throne of the Lord.

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As the last part of the house blessing, I inscribed + 20 C + M + B 13+ above the entry doors to my home.

Front Door:
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Back Door:
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Epiphany

Our Lady of Good Counsel, Sacraments

This is the first Epiphany Mass in four years in which I did not cry. Four years ago today, my godmother, Pat McDonald, died and went home to Jesus. While I am happy that she is no longer sick and suffering, the selfish part of me misses her quite a bit.

It is also rather fitting that today, on Epiphany, I would celebrate Mass at Our Lady of Good Counsel, with Fr. John, who was her spiritual director and a good friend of us both. At one point in her illness, she was no longer up to serving at Mass at St. Anastasia as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion. With the additional prompting of our pastor, Fr. JJ, I agreed to take her spot on Team 1.

Last summer, I signed up to me an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion at Our Lady of Good Counsel as well (I’m a parishioner at both parishes). I’m only called to be a minister there about once every month and a half. As it happened, today was one of those days. Not only that, but for the first time since the summer, Fr. John was the priest celebrating Mass. And! It was the first time that I got to distribute the Body of Christ (as opposed to the Blood of Christ). AND! I was assigned to stand next to Fr. John while doing it. 🙂

My red sweater fit in nicely with all the poinsettias on the altar and the red trim on Fr. John’s white chasuble. 🙂 Not that that matters, but it was a nice detail.

I was so joyful up there, handing Jesus to people. I’m sure I was grinning ear to ear the whole time. LOL!

It is Masses like this where I never want to leave. I just want to stay there in the company of Jesus and my friends forever. God willing, this will happen soon! 🙂

Here is Pat, taken on a trip to the Holy Land, overlooking Jerusalem.
Pat McDonald, Overlooking Jerusalem, Gallicantu Area
I love you!

Detroit Pistons Game!

Sporting Events, , , , , ,

I impulsively jumped on a contest sponsored by my friend and dentist, Dr. Greg Elliott and won tickets to a basketball game on Friday, Jan. 4th. The Detroit Pistons were playing the Atlanta Hawks.

I invited along my friend, Sandra, and we headed to the Palace after work from Ann Arbor. We got pretty good parking and the door that we entered was *right by* our section! We couldn’t have asked for anything better! Our seats were right on the aisle, too! 4th row in the second tier. 🙂 We could see everything.

Even more impressive, to Sandra, was the fact that it was Star Wars night, and we got to see Storm Troopers everywhere! 🙂 She even had her picture taken with one:

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I don’t like the way this guy is pointing his gun at me…

We arrived in time to get snacks: popcorn, pretzels and soda. The popcorn and soda were bottomless, but, alas, we did not make it past the first serving.

R2D2 looks on as one of the Hawks stretches out in the middle of the court:
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When our guys were announced, they got the cool lighting! 🙂
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On the back of the program, there were different things that you could text in to try and win things throughout the game — to make it a little more interactive. The first one was to predict who would win the tip off:

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I didn’t get an entry in this one. The wrong team got the ball.

I was pretty surprised with how many times the game was interrupted when it was not a time-out or break in the game. Perhaps they were for commercial breaks…? The plus side, was that we got to see a lot of side acts and dance routines.

At one point, they showed a video of one of the players light-saber dueling with Hooper in the locker room:
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At one end of the court, there was a board displaying tweets sent to @detroitpistons. I tried all night to get my tweet up there. FAILED. Not sure why; I used all the right hashtags and stuff.
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Some action shots:

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“Detroit Basketball” in Star Wars font:
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Okay, I think we both know that this post is already a glut of photos. Why not add to it? 🙂

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SWOOSH! 2 points for Detroit!
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It was so funny… This Atlanta player looks either scared or bewildered in every picture I took of him. 🙂
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DEFENSE! DEFENSE!
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YES!
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We must have brought our luck to the game, as Detroit won! 🙂

Day 1: Love is Patient

The Love Dare

I suppose today’s dare actually began during Mass at the very beginning of the day today. Right after receiving communion, as I knelt down to pray, I remember reflecting upon the host that I had just consumed. I felt as if God were speaking to me of His plans for me for the coming year. I think what he wants for me this year is an increased sense of docility to him. A softening of my heart. A new gentleness.

How fitting then that this first day tackles the subject of patience.

I think that part of being a patient person is docility to the will of God. If I know, if I *truly* know, that God loves me and always wills for my good, then I can suffer anything, because I know that He will see me through it.

The reading tells of a fruit of patience: “Patience brings an internal calm during an external storm.” Docility, reliance, peace. The reading also says that, “it gives you the ability to hold on during the tough times in your relationship rather than bailing out under the pressure.”

I am not often angry with God, but there is a relationship that I have that I was on the verge of bailing on. Not that I wish ill toward anyone, but I have been hurt so many times before by so many people, that I tend to quietly leave situations rather than to suffer more hurt, particularly when I do not think that the other party is that interested in my friendship. I mean, if they do not really care, why should I keep trying?

But this is the hardness of my heart speaking, I think.

And if I want to practice patience for Jesus’s sake, then I think He is giving me a situation where I can try to show patience — and perhaps it is in this relationship.

So today, I got the opportunity to see things, or at least one instance, from the other party’s point of view. And I certainly have fault. Clearly, what I need is to have patience in this instance. Patience for God to work in me. For Him to soften my heart and help me to grow and learn to love better. For as I treat others, so do I treat Him. I pray that He will help me and give me the grace that I need.

The Love Dare: The Beginning

The Love Dare

I watched the movie Fireproof recently, and as I talked about in a recent Quick Takes, I have been kicking around the idea of using the Love Dare in my relationship with God.

Okay, you’re right. It should be done with one single person in mind and God is three persons. Let me be more specific, then. I will see if I can apply the Love Dare to my relationship with Jesus. I get that it’s going to be a challenge sometimes, but I am hoping that I will still be able to see an improvement in the relationship as I become more aware of my own selfishness and seek to do what is best for Him (or based on His wants for me and not my wants for me).

Just like it says in the trailer, it’s a decision to begin leading your heart instead of following your heart. Many of the saints experienced what is called a “Dark Night of the Soul”, where they experienced aridity in their prayer life and/or couldn’t feel the presence of God in their lives. It is during these times that they had to lead their hearts.

I have a decent amount of knowledge about God, but as I reflected on this Year of Faith that we are in, I realized that while learning ever more about God is a good thing, I don’t want it to be the only thing. A personal relationship with the persons of the Trinity is what changes a “religious scholar” into a “theologian”. And I want my heart to be in it. I want my heart to be in Him. Isn’t that his main point to the Pharisees?

And so I begin.

Please pray for me, as I keep you in prayer as well.

Safe!

Holidays, Sacraments

Earlier this evening, I went out with a friend to see Les Miserables again. I still love it! Afterwards, we went to Chili’s for dinner. Towards the end of the meal, I was starting to not feel well, so when I got home, I decided to take a nap before Midnight Mass.

I set my alarm, but when it went off, I still wasn’t feeling better, so I kept hitting snooze.

Finally, I decided to get up and go. Because I really do love going to Midnight Mass to start off the new year. And because I was concerned that if I let myself just sleep, I might miss the 10 am Mass tomorrow morning. 🙂

I really need about 20 minutes to make it to Ss. Cyril and Methodius on time, but left about a quarter to midnight. Traffic and lights were cooperative and I made it to a seat in the church just as the last bells of midnight were ringing and they were announcing the hymn for the processional. 🙂 SAFE! I thought. Sliding in to home plate, just before the priest greets us all with a loud “Happy New Year!”

Week 1: The New Year

It was a lovely Mass. As I sat in my car, ready to go home, the radio was on and I caught the tail end of one song. All I heard of it was a phrase, “See Heaven’s got plan for you.” And as I was leaving the parking lot, the next song sang to me, “I’m glad you came!” Both great things to hear right after Mass! 🙂

If the link works, here is the first song that I was listening to: