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Over the years, I’ve had a few people on here that like to play the part of the extremely objective and indifferent wise sage. Basically, all religions are the same for these people and they’ll dabble a little here and dabble a little there. What I always find interesting is that in their quest to appear balanced, they always over-praise religions that aren’t Christianity and nitpick to death Christianity. Always with these kinds of people, the aim, whether intentional or not, is to show that Christianity isn’t that big of a deal. “It’s just like all the rest you see? See all the similarities? Nothing special here.” While it is true that in all religions there is at least a kernel of truth just in the fact that they are man’s search for God, but it doesn’t follow that they are all equal or basically the same. I know, I know, in our modern world of moral relativism and denial of absolute truths, we don’t like to say anything is better than something else. However, nobody lives their lives believing that is actually true. With Christianity there is one huge, immense, incredible difference and that is love. God is love and He wants a relationship with us. Christ—God—died for us, unworthy as we are because of love. Not only does God love each one of us and desires our goodness, He gives us numerous helps to assist on our path to Heaven. He is not a God that is distance and ambiguous. He’s not just the universe. He’s not elements of the world incapable of relationship. He’s not lording up in the clouds sneering down at humans. He’s not cold and indifferent to us seeing us as slaves. No, God is love and His love for us is eternal and limitless. This is unlike anything else and doesn’t even compare. Because if God came and died for us to save us so that one day we might be with Him, well, that right there is the most true, good, and beautiful spiritual reality out there. Those that call themselves Christians but play the indifferent game, have sadly not fallen in love with God yet and have not allowed themselves to be loved by Him. Because once you do, nothing can compare, Catholic Pilgrims. Have a blessed Friday.
I often wonder how frequently the Saints were rejected by people in the age they lived in. We know that many were beloved by people in their communities, thinking here of Blessed Giorgio Frassati. Yet, we also know that numerous ones were rejected and even killed for their faith. But, just like in the day-to-day of life, how frequently were they rejected? Christ was rejected pretty often as He traveled around. He says to the Pharisees today in Luke, “But first he must suffer greatly and be rejected by this generation.” Luke 17:25 As I sat thinking this morning, this is the destiny of faithful Christians, as well. I don’t think you can escape rejection as a Christian. It will come in different forms and different degrees for each of us, but it will come. Seems a bit lonely when you think about it. The only way to combat this is through prayer. That’s how Jesus always gained strength—He went off and prayed to the Father. The Saints always have deep prayer lives, because they need that connection with the One who understands. They also need the support of the Saints who have gone before them and understand. So, find comfort in prayer, Catholic Pilgrims. Pour out your heart to Christ, seek Mary’s intercession, and ask the Saints to lift you up with their prayers. We have more friends than we know, it’s just we can’t always see them. Have a blessed Thursday.
Today is the Feast Day of St. Frances Cabrini, so there couldn’t be a better day to announce who I’m reading for Season 5 of my “Journeying with the Saints” podcast. Around February last year, the movie about Mother Cabrini came out and as my daughter put it, “It’s pretty good, but it’s too girl boss and doesn’t show her joy and dependence on God.” Not long after that, a man named Michael messaged me and asked if I’d seen the movie. I hadn’t. He went on to explain that he had found the online publication of Mother Cabrini’s letters, but the book had gone out of print. He set about the task of basically recreating the former book so that it could be reprinted again. Through this labor of love, he discovered Mother Cabrini’s wonderful personality. “I don’t think the movie accurately captures her joy and love of God,” he told me. He offered to send me the book and upon receiving it, I knew immediately that I wanted to read her words for Season 5. It’s different than anything else I’ve read, so far. This book is a collection of her letters sent to her daughters throughout her numerous travels. It’s such a unique glimpse into the day-to-day activities and thoughts of a saint. This isn’t a book about high theology or conversations with God, but instead, a more personal look at the first U.S. citizen to be canonized a saint. Season 5 will be a bit different and I’ll explain more as we get closer to starting. We won’t be starting until February 1st, 2025 as I want to have a short break between Season 4 and 5. You are really going to enjoy this book. I hope you join me, Catholic Pilgrims. St. Frances Cabrini, pray for us!
I had a full house this weekend. It was wonderful. Both my daughters were home. My husband was doing a special project with a company and so we had a bunch of young guys here—smart entrepreneurial types. At one point, my daughter started having a conversation with a moral relativist and one of the things he said was that he didn’t believe that you could fully say if something was right or wrong. This is cowardice and as someone who has worked with kids that were sexual abused it enrages me. He seriously can’t condemn sexual abuse, racism, murder, arson, and many other evils? Of course he would because any decent human being who isn’t a psychopath would say that those actions are morally reprehensible. So, why claim that you are a moral relativist? It all comes down to one thing: There is some vice/sin that they want to continue engaging in or supporting and because they don’t want to be called out, they feign a moral relativistic worldview. Connected to this would, also, be someone who has done something wrong and they don’t believe in Jesus’ love and mercy. Since they have done something wrong and don’t want to feel super bad about it, they don’t want to say that others do anything bad. You may not know what it is that they want to engage in or what they have engaged in, but it’s there. The truth is, is that nobody really lives as if they believe everyone should just go around doing whatever they feel is right. Nobody lives as if there should be no standard of right and wrong. Nobody. Yet, many adopt this attitude because of what they want to do that they know, deep down, is wrong. It’s a self-preservation tactic. There are morally right things and morally wrong. For the most part, it’s not too hard to figure out, except when our souls are heavy with sin. No matter what we’ve done, we can always turn to Christ and repent, Catholic Pilgrims, and that will always make us feel better. Live the Faith boldly and travel well this Tuesday.
My undergrad is in criminology which falls under the sociology department. I had several female professors who were dyed-in-the wool feminists, but one in particular basically wanted the women in the class to hate men. Her and I went round and round. My Masters is in Applied Behavioral Science, which is just a fancy way of saying that I study criminal behavior. I specialized in sexual violence crimes. The professor that oversaw my thesis was a hard-core feminist. She was constantly giving me articles to read for my research from many man-hating feminists. I read so many and it became nauseating. Everything about men was evil according to these papers. Many of them even said that s€x between spouses could never possibly be good because the man always held the physical advantage. Best to be sexless, they claimed. Over and over, I read and was lectured on how men are bad. Men are awful. Men just want to hurt women. Even I, who had been hurt by two abusive boyfriends could see through all of this propaganda. There was no discernment of character. For these feminists, that are teaching young minds I might add, having XY chromosomes made you bad. All these professors, every one of them, was purposefully single, purposefully childless and not for some noble cause. They were also very bitter. I knew I never wanted to be like them. All over social media since Trump got elected, hundreds and hundreds of young feminists are in videos vowing to practice the b4 movement. This is a radical feminist movement that came out of South Korea where women refused to date men, have sexual relationships with men, enter heterosexual marriages, or have children. This is all in an effort to punish men. These videos are highly disturbing. This is what happens when you pit the sexes against each other. What a sad world it creates. Are there bad men out there? Yep. Are there bad women? Yep. But, it is not your sex that makes you bad. It’s your character. God created us male and female, Catholic Pilgrims. Therefore, neither sex can be intrinsically evil. Better to hold each other to high standards so as to build good character. And better to appreciate the good things each sex brings to the table than to refuse to acknowledge anything positive. Have a blessed Friday.
There was a time in my life where I was "lost" from God. I wasn't really lost, God knew where I was, but I wasn't among the fold. I sat this morning and thought about why I was lost for all those years. My conclusion, it was all my own doing. I was mad at God for not protecting me from an abusive boyfriend and his friends. The only logical thing to do, in my mind, was to sever ties. Crazy thing was, God let me go. Not because He wanted me to leave, but I think He knew that I needed to go be lost for awhile. I needed to see the consequences of removing myself Him. The ramifications of the decisions we make are sometimes the best teachers. So, I started out on my own, sure I could fix myself and all my pain without God. I didn't have a solid plan to fix the pain, but I was smart enough to figure it out for myself, I thought. For years, I just wandered around lost. Wounds in my soul festered and cut open pretty continually. I tried taping them shut with pleasures of the world and that held for a time. Kinda of like how a bandaid holds for half a day until it gets wet and then it's worthless. Anger, hatred, and self-loathing were the central emotions of my life. They were such a heavy burden. Until finally, nearly 14 years after my decision to make myself lost, Jesus finally broke through and said, "Are you ready to be done with this?" And I was ready. More than ready. Desperate actually. I had finally realized that being lost from God was not the answer. The crazy thing was, was that all I had to do was just turn around and there was Christ, waiting for me. There He was all along and I just had to say, "Okay, I'm tired of being lost." I will never ever forget my first confession. The heaving sobs and the flood of tears was the physical response of being found, or allowing myself to be found by Jesus. Relief has a funny way of showing itself sometimes. I was a hard-headed piece of work for most of my life. In many ways, I still am. That is probably why God knew I needed to be lost for a time so that I could see that my way was not the way. From all that, I learned with utter certainty, that I never want to be lost again, Catholic Pilgrims. Thank God, though, if for some reason I do, I just have to turn around and Christ is right there. Not only will He always come for us in this life, He will never leave us. Live the Faith boldly and travel well this Thursday.
I love my country. I love my family. I adore and worship God and love Him. Last night was a good night. Remember, we are still called to be Saints, Catholic Pilgrims. Trump needs our help to restore excellence, sanity, security, and integrity to our great country. So, go out and live the Faith boldly and travel well.
On Saturday, my family visited St. Dominic’s in San Francisco. Sometimes we don’t even realize how thirsty we are for such beauty until we see it and it’s like our deprived soul comes back to life. It’s a foretaste of Heaven. “I have let my peace be disturbed by outside influences…too many things still upset this more exterior part of my soul and make it suffer. Worries, sad memories, an atmosphere of unbelief, indifference, or scorn…all this has battered me and knocked me to the ground, bruised like the gentle Savior.” —Servant of God Elisabeth Lesuer I don’t know what is going to happen today. I hate election season because it is a heavy weight that bears down nearly suffocating us. The hardest weight to bear is the loss of control we feel over it all. At Mass on Saturday, the priest said that he used to ask his students in high school if they wanted to be saints. And they all said no. They thought that being a saint would stifle who they really were and keep them from being their true selves. What a lie. This is the one thing we can control—whether we strive to be saints or not. Because to strive for sainthood doesn’t require perfect external conditions. Many saints worked and moved in terrible times. They didn’t need everything to feel good or be comfortable for them to bring the light of Christ into a dark world. In fact, many of them sought out the darkness in order to bring the light of Christ. Did they make a dent? To those they served, I think they did. We often wait with bated breath for someone else to fix all the problems, when really we just need to open ourselves up to allow God to work through us. No matter who gets elected today, the world will still need us to strive to be saints. It is our duty, Catholic Pilgrims, no matter who is in office, to bring truth, goodness, and beauty to a fallen world. Even if many in the world don’t realize how desperate they are for those things. Live the Faith boldly and travel well this Tuesday. St. Michael, pray for us!
Yesterday, my oldest and my husband ran the Golden Gate Bridge Half Marathon in San Francisco. It couldn’t have been a more beautiful day. As I was standing at the start line, watching the waves of runners go, a much older man came up to me and said, “I have a odd favor to ask of you.” I smiled hesitantly and said, “Okay.” “I didn’t realize that they would have us start in waves. Would you call my wife and let her know so that she doesn’t worry? She’s getting ready to come over soon. If I start fifteen minutes later than she thought I would, she will worry that I’m injured and I don’t want her to worry.” “Yes, I can call her and let her know,” I smiled back. So, he gave me her name and number and off he went. I called his wife and explained everything. She thanked me for letting her know. Later, as his wave of runners went by, he spotted me and yelled with a thumbs up, “Did you get her?!” I yelled back with a thumbs up, “Yes, she knows! It’s all good!” And off he went. It was a small interaction but as I thought about it and this husband’s request, he was essentially asking me to help him love his wife well. What an honor to be brought in, even if briefly, to that moment. St Paul says the Philippians, “Humbly regard others as more important than yourselves.” Here was this husband getting ready to run a hard race and, yet, his main concern was for his wife. He didn’t want her to worry. That’s how I knew he loved her very much and all it took was a one minute conversation. Have a beautiful and blessed day, Catholic Pilgrims.
There are so many misunderstandings about what Catholics believe about the Saints. Some think that we think they are gods and goddesses. We don’t. There is only One God. Some are quick to remind us that there is only one mediator between God and man and His name is Jesus. We agree. We just know that the Saints can bring your intentions to Jesus, as well. Same as a friend on earth. Some think that we believe the statues we have are idols we worship, like the literal golden calf. We don’t. The statues are representations of our brothers and sisters in Christ. Some think that by loving and honoring the Saints we are taking from God. If you praised my children, you wouldn’t be taking from me as their parent, you’d be giving me honor by praising them. To add to that, love is not finite, it increases. The more you love, the more love grows in your heart. Some think that relationships with the Saints are unnecessary, all you need is Jesus. That would mean that community with believers on earth is also unnecessary. Christianity is about relationships and community. Some people accuse us of necromancy—conjuring up the dead. Those in Heaven are alive in Christ, even more fully alive than we are here on earth. To add to that, we do not attempt to conjure their spirits nor seek information from them. We ask them to pray for us. Through the many years that I’ve been Catholic now, I can’t imagine not having the Saints involved in my spiritual life. St. Maria Goretti, St. Faustina, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis de Sales, St. Teresa of Avila, Blessed Giorgio Pier Frassti, Venerable Fulton Sheen, and Our Mother Mary have all been such powerful friends to me. They are gifts from God. Their prayers are gifts. Their examples of holiness are gifts. Their friendship is a gift. Today, we celebrate All Saints’ Day, Catholic Pilgrims. We are blessed by this great crowd of witnesses. Have a blessed day and get thee to church!
Happy All Hallow’s Eve, Catholic Pilgrims. “I see the days grow shorter, I feel the nights grow cold. Young people feelin' restless, old people feelin' old. I sense the darkness clearer, I feel a presence here. A change in the weather, I love this time of year.”
Yesterday, it was actually chilly here in the desert. It was a little overcast and the wind was blowing cold. So, my son made us some tea and he turned on the fire place. One of my cats was curled up in her little bed by the fire. I turned on “Tis Autumn” by Nat King Cole. It was a perfectly peaceful moment. Nothing can soothe a soul like truth, goodness, and beauty. Our country—our world—feels negatively charged right now. Often, our response to all the bad is to reach into the well of more bad things. We try to soothe by getting worked up, fretting around and living on edge. Instead, our response to the bad should be to reach into the well of the gifts God gives us, which will always be things that are true, good, and beautiful. Those are the things that will sustain us, Catholic Pilgrims. We can’t hide from all bad, but we certainly can’t expect our souls to be healthy when we refuse to nourish it with simple blessings. Have a blessed Wednesday. *Picture is from the National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes near Emmitsburg, Maryland.
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