During the pandemic, we had no option but the virtual mass and it was a soul saver for my spirit. I’d watch the local one of our parish. Sometimes I logged in to view the one from my brother’s high school in Texas, where I knew people I knew were also watching. It kept us connected on a spiritual if not physical level, better than the phone calls and Zoom meetings we tried to orchestrate. Since the pandemic lifted, I’ve... Read more
The other day, I read an Op-ed in the Washington Post, in which the author begged the Almighty to speak to the President. I read it, and thought it sincere. Prayer does that. When we begin to speak to God, or even when we to pretend to do so, we often find ourselves actually speaking to God. It is each heart’s orientation whether we recognize it or not. The truth of our hearts will out. Every moment we recognize something beyond ourselves,... Read more
On July 3rd, we celebrated my fifty-eighth year of life. This past year, I’ve struggled with anemia, and it means no matter how much I rest, I’m tired. Tired is not fun. It means naps are a required part of my day, and I miss those hours I lose to necessary sleep. However, I do have a doctor and she’s keeping me working on treating it –it’s the result of a combo of my medication and prior diagonsises. ... Read more
In the course of writing since 2004, I’ve told some stories more than once, always discovering there was more to learn from those moments than what I’d said before. Today at mass, a favorite gospel story came up, and it reminded me of my own dad’s experience of the storm at sea. Yesterday was his birthday and he would have been eighty-two. The big thing I keep coming back to from that story of when my dad and his fishing... Read more
Recently, I took a quiz from my local paper about where I want to go –and the bottom line is, I want to be by a pool or body of water with little to stop me from doing, or from doing nothing. I grew up with the beach as an expectation and reality, not a possibility. Now, it feels like life is too busy and too full to stop for such a long time, much less to be... Read more
So I wrote this post three days ago and thought I’d scheduled it to be published, but it vaporized into the internet underworld and fortunately, I’d saved some of it. I didn’t realize it hadn’t published until I tried to read it. So here we are, on the feast of the Sacred Heart. I made it to mass because it was my daughter’s end of the school year. She won an award. As a result, I managed my first, first... Read more
June 7th is the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Now I have heard of the devotion to the Sacred Heart and I have seen images. However, I’ve never practiced this devotion. In truth, I struggle with devotions, not because I doubt their efficaciousness, but because I lack the discipline My novenas tend to be septenas or dovenas or trevenas –but not all in sequence. Devotions which require exactitude are not my specialty. The spirit is willing but the... Read more
We all know the parable of the rich man who comes to Jesus and asks, “What must I do to merit eternal life?” to which ultimately, Jesus tells him to go and sell what he has and give to the poor so as to build up treasure in heaven, and to come and follow him. We don’t know if the man who went away sad because he owned much, recognized the caling to which he was being offered. Maybe he... Read more
“The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here.” –President Abraham Lincoln from the Gettysburg Address. This is the attitude everyone should hold if asked to give a speech at the end of a commencement. When someone says something that is memorable, skads of internet ink gets spilt taking the offending person to the woodshed. I won’t be doing that here, it’s been overdone. What I will do, is counsel aspiring graduation speakers. Given that I have... Read more
I love summer. It’s my favorite season, all of it. Every year we make a list and yes, a lot of it is tradition and repetitive, berry picking, ice cream trucks, going to the pool, reading a book, going to a drive in, hiking, fireworks, but part of the joy is thinking in advance about all the fun we will have. So I present on this Memorial Day Weekend, my summer list. It’s not all the usual stuff, but there... Read more
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In