Cup of Tears, Cup of Joy

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Cup of Tears, Cup of Joy

 

Twelve years ago, I was in the hospital, recovering from an atypical total knee replacement, and feeling sorry for myself because I didn’t make it to the bathroom in time. My tears could have filled a cup, even though I was in a comfortable room, getting great medical care, and had plenty to eat and drink. What did I have to cry about? The pain? The dependency on others? The embarrassment?

When I caught sight of the TV screen just inches away from the crucifix, I stopped crying: I watched a commercial with an emaciated woman clinging to her skeleton-like baby as she reached forward with an old tin cup in her hand. Dehydrated and dying, this woman was holding out hope and joy that her cup would be filled with milk for her child.  

Fast-forward to a month ago when I joined my cousins in one of many shanty towns in Cebu, Philippines, to distribute school supplies, clothing, and treats for the children. As we navigated leaving along the narrow pathway, I spotted a little girl with toothpick limbs as she stopped to drizzle water over her bare feet from a makeshift spigot before she entered one of the shacks. She smiled amid the stench and garbage, happily holding her “gifts.”

As I think of Christ on the Crucifix and the suffering He endured out of love for each of us, I remember the joy of a fragile mother and an impoverished child and feel somewhat ashamed of the tears I shed over so many seemingly trivial trials. God gets me, and I am consoled by the Psalmist’s conviction:

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” —Psalm 147:3

My prayer is to cultivate the strength to give up my cup of privileged tears and replace them with a cup full of joy and gratitude taught by a mother and a young child. As the new year progresses, may your cup of tears be filled also with hope, joy, and gratitude.

“…weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” —Psalm 30:5

© Paula Veloso Babadi 2025

Edited by Gabriella Batel

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When she is not playing pickleball or “Nana,” Paula Veloso Babadi cooks, gardens, and writes poetry and short personal essays. You can find her first book-length collection, Everywhere Hope, on Amazon.

Earthly Acts of Spiritual Love

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‘Love bears all things,
believes all things,
hopes all things,
endures all things.’ (1 Cor. 13:7)

If everything we have known from personal experience and from knowledge of history tells us that all human lives are entwined with suffering, then why are we so surprised by the persistent presence of that pain, and why do we expect, even demand that it go away?

We have within our deepest hearts a hidden and vague knowledge that the way the world is now is not how it once was, nor how it ought to be. That secret knowledge stirs conflict within us.

As a psychotherapist working in medical settings, many of my clients experience suffering due to debilitating diseases, disabling conditions, chronic mental illnesses, substance use disorders, and, too often, the gradual erosion of close personal and family relationships. Psychotherapy can help foster fortitude and resilience in contending with all the things that can afflict a client. But the need for fortitude and resilience is not limited to persons in
psychotherapy. All persons experience loss, adversity, injustice, and painful events in life. How could it be anything else, considering we journey through a fallen world of sin, where sickness and death beset everyone?

Our modern inclination is to think of the presence of pain as a mistake, as something to blame someone else for, as something that can and should always be removed or remedied. Many of the difficulties of daily life can and ought to be corrected, and of course, we should strive to resolve our problems and give aid and comfort others who suffer. But the existence of pain represents more than simple error or misunderstanding. Some pain can be alleviated, and yet, sometimes pain must be borne – because it is an unavoidable element of life in a fallen world, not because we are morbid or weak or masochistic.

In the beginning, God and the human person walked together in harmony. Yet, since the cataclysmic events in Eden, we are heavily hampered by hardship. The entire story of the Bible is the tale of how God has responded to the consequences of what occurred in Eden. The Bible would not exist if Adam and Eve had not fallen. All of sacred Scripture relates the story of God’s actions to guide and rescue his children who are dwelling in darkness
and shadowed by death.

Jesus took upon himself the abominable scope of pain in this sin-filled world, to show us how to bear it, while still keeping faith beyond sight, while simultaneously bearing with every other person compassionately, because they, like ourselves, are caught in this web of painful sin-tainted darkness,
and we are each on the way in search of His kingdom. Some might say, “Why doesn’t God bring this messed up world to an end, and just sweep
away all the pain and bring lasting joy in its place? If He really was good, that’s what he would do now!”

But, when were you hoping for him to replace His plan with yours? His timing with yours? Sometime long ago, before you were born, perhaps? Or before your children, or grandchildren, or great, great grandchildren have had the chance to come into this world? Do you know what part the people yet to be born might play in His greater plan? Maybe we can shoulder the situation as it is and strive to do our part to bring goodness into the world.

God pointed out to St. Paul that humble and courageous acts of faith and love will light the path of our feet through the rubble and the trouble of life.
In his first letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul shines a light on deeper dimensions of love. He surprises his readers with the suggestion that it is love that bears, believes, hopes, and endures all of the challenging things of life on earth. Quite often, love is considered to be movements of emotions, yet St. Paul shows how love engages the activities of will. Through all the hard and the cold and the unfair and unknown things of this life, it is these willful acts
of love that will guide our way.

Bearing, believing, hoping, and enduring are not simply aspects of love. They are the key actions of love. Yet these particular acts of love are limited to our time on earth and are not elements of how love will be known in heaven. One will no longer need to bear or to endure pain, anguish, or injustice in heaven, because those things don’t exist there. One will not need to believe in what is invisible, or to hope for what is beyond the known, because all the things hoped for and believed in will be fully known and revealed in heaven.

But here, now, while we still live in a body and are under the sway of concupiscence, we have available to us the essential tools of spiritual love: bearing, believing, hoping, and enduring. Jesus, and our blessed Mother, and the saints, have shown us by their example how to practice earthly acts of love.

copyright 2025 Tom Medlar

Announcing Alzheimer’s

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Announcing Alzheimer’s

By Lisa Livezey

Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what any day may bring forth.

– Proverbs 27:1 (NAB)

I stopped by my parents’ split-level suburban home for a quick visit and Mom met me at the door. “Lisa, I have ALZHEIMERS!!!!” she pronounced with angst. Dad stood in the background smiling tenderly.

The news was no surprise. In fact, Mom had announced her diagnosis to me three times already.

In a flash moment, I considered Mom’s exemplary life. She was a faithful wife, mother and grandmother, a registered nurse, volunteer librarian, had taken in foster children, kept an immaculate, organized home, and even led Bible studies.  She doted on her grandchildren, who hold happy memories of time spent at “Gigi and Pop’s” house along with weekends camping in the mountains.

Now at age 82, Mom was descending from the mountains and gazing despairingly upon the wilderness of Alzheimer’s disease.  For one so capable, no doubt the future appeared bleak and scary.

Giving her a hug, I said, “Don’t worry, Mom. It’ll be okay.”  Surely God would provide the daily help she needed, just as He had during her more productive years.

I knew Mom was in good hands with Dad’s stabilizing presence beside her. He capably handled Mom’s health issues and certainly would be her continued comfort and guide amidst the changing landscape of her brain.

Lord, Thank you for today. I know not what tomorrow holds, so help me to trust You with the future.

Reflect: Think about loved ones in your life who are experiencing change due to age or illness and offer up a prayer for each one.

 

The author’s parents, Christmas 2016, six months
before “Announcing Alzheimer’s” took place

___________________________________________________________

The above blog piece is the Prologue in Minding Mom: A Caregiver’s Devotional Story by Lisa Livezey (© 2024, En Route Books and Media)

Minding Mom: A Caregiver’s Devotional Story by Lisa Livezey | En Route Books and Media

Listen to the audio version of “Announcing Alzheiemer’s” read by the author.

 

Copyright 2025 Lisa Livezey

Mother Seton, Elizabeth Ann Seton at Emmittsburg, Maryland

What are you looking for?

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“The two disciples heard what he said and followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following him and said to them, ‘What are you looking for?’” John 1:38

 

My favorite hymn when I was a child was, Here I Am, Lord. I loved the rhythm and the simple prose, and I thought the sentiment behind the words was lovely even if I didn’t quite understand their importance. As an adult, the song continues to be my favorite hymn, and it brings tears to my eyes every single time I hear it. Though I still love the music and the words, it’s the deeper meaning that gets to me now. Jesus asks us to serve, and we need to respond like Samuel and the Apostles, ready to answer and do His will.

Awaiting God’s Call

This month, we celebrate the feast day of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, our first American-born saint. Two of my three daughters graduated from Mount St. Mary’s in Emmitsburg, Maryland. Emmitsburg was the home and final resting place of Mother Seton. Mother Seton to Emmitsburg moved in 1809, where she founded the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph’s, the first community for religious women established in the United States. It was in Emmitsburg where she also began St. Joseph’s Academy and Free School, the beginning of Catholic education in the United States. 

Before becoming a nun, Elizabeth was a wife and mother. She was not Catholic but was very religious. While nursing her sick husband in Italy, she learned about Catholicism from friends who lived there and was intrigued by the Church and its sacred traditions. The more she learned and attended Mass, the more she felt called to become Catholic.

Hearing God’s Call

Years, later, she heard the call to become a nun, and later, she heard the call to found the order and the school in Emmitsburg. 

Mother Seton wrote, “We know certainly that our God calls us to a holy life. We know that he gives us every grace, every abundant grace; and though we are so weak of ourselves, this grace is able to carry us through every obstacle and difficulty.”

Many generations before Mother Seton, Jesus asked Andrew and John, “What are you looking for?” (John 1:38) They immediately followed Him, asking where He was staying. Then they sought others and encouraged them to join as well (Andrew’s brother, Simon, John’s brother, James, and Andrew’s friend, Phillip). Without hesitating, they answered Jesus’ question with their actions. 

Jesus still asks this question, but so many fail to hear it or understand from whom it comes. So many of us spend our lives searching for meaning, for happiness, for belonging when Jesus openly and willingly offers us all that and more. When faced with Jesus’ question, we look for the answer in other people, in media and entertainment, or in addictions, and often overlook the most basic, most obvious places—Holy Scripture, the Mass, the Church. It was in the Church, at Mass, and through the sacraments that Mother Seton heard the call to convert, to become a nun, to serve, and to teach.

Answering God’s Call

We, too, are being called. We can hear God’s voice each time we attend Mass, go to Confession, or seek the Lord in Adoration. He is calling out to us to help Him build His Kingdom, to serve, to teach, and to bring others to Him.

Listen for the voice of Jesus in your daily life. Shut out the noise and the distractions. Be alert and awake. He is asking, “What are you looking for?” All you need to do is answer in the same way Mother Seton did, “Here am I, Lord; I come to do your will,” (1 Samuel 3:8, Psalm 40:9). “Speak, for your servant is listening” (1 Samuel 3:10).

Let us pray, “Oh my God, forgive what I have been, correct what I am, and direct what I shall be” (St. Elizabeth Seton). Amen.

 

copyright 2025 Amy Schisler

Edited by Heather Gaffney

Cath-Lit Live: Places of Grace

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Cath-Lit Live: Places of Grace

“Cath-Lit Live!” features brief interviews with Catholic authors who are releasing new books. Hosted by Catholic author and speaker Amy J. Cattapan, “Cath-Lit Live!” gives viewers a glimpse into the latest Catholic books while getting to know a bit about the author as well.

 

 

Places of Grace: My Visits to Shrines, Chapels, Graves, and Monasteries and the Graces I Received by Fr. Edward Looney

Places of Grace is a travel memoir recounting how God has worked in the life of Fr. Edward Looney through his visits to shrines, chapels, monasteries, and graves in the US and throughout the world. In Places of Grace, Fr. Looney recounts his experiences at shrines, chapels, monasteries, and graves, naming a grace he received from the Lord at each site. That grace will be different for each person. In his typical style, Fr. Looney weaves together personal anecdotes and experiences to arrive at a greater spiritual point, helping the reader and future pilgrim to better appreciate the holy sites they will visit during their earthly pilgrimage to Heaven. This book does not present the historical facts or architecture of holy sites, but the spiritual experience of a Catholic priest who hopes you will discover God’s grace at a shrine or holy site.

 

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About the author:

Fr. Edward Looney was ordained a priest in 2015 for the Diocese of Green Bay. In addition to a Bachelor of Philosophy, a Baccalaureate in Sacred Theology (S.T.B.), and a Master of Divinity, he holds a Licentiate in Sacred Theology (S.T.L.) from the University of St. Mary of the Lake-Mundelein Seminary. Fr. Looney specializes in Marian theology, having authored numerous works on Mary, including A Lenten Journey with Mother Mary and How They Love Mary: 28 Life-Changing Stories of Devotion to Our Lady available from Sophia Institute Press. He is a past president of the Mariological Society of America and continues to research, reflect, and write about Mary. Fr. Looney is a popular media personality, podcast host, and contributor to online publications and print publications like Living Faith. His interests include the Blessed Virgin, sainthood causes, shrines, and film/television.

You can catch “Cath-Lit Live” live on A.J. Cattapan’s author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.

 

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Copyright 2024 Amy J. Cattapan
Banner image via Pexels

What’s Your Name?

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What’s Your Name?

“What’s your name?” is probably the easiest question we can answer. The name we are known by. It’s the name our parents gave us, and maybe they put effort into choosing the right one to set us on our life path. In the past, babies were often named after an elder or someone in the Bible. That name was given to them upon their Baptism: their Christian name. Catholics, at Confirmation, take the name of a saint they want to emulate. In modern times, the Sacrament of Baptism, too often, is not a priority or consideration for parents and they choose names that are meant to be historical, inspiring, courageous, regal, or just “different.”

We all have another designation, one far more important and beautiful than any label loving parents can bestow upon us: the name God has given us. ike many of the things He creates, it’s a mystery that we will know one day, but not in this earthly life.

Appellations are important to God. He tells us many times. We see in the first chapter in Genesis how much he loves to title each one of his masterpieces: “God called the light ‘day’ and the darkness he called ‘night’” (Gen. 1:5). And: “God called the dome ‘sky.’” (Gen. 1:8). “God called the dry land ‘earth’ and the basin of water ‘sea’” (Gen. 1:10). The chapter goes on, right down to “… creatures that crawl the earth” and “green plants for food” (Gen. 1:30). A creator who knows us so well, he’s counted the hairs on our head and desires the deepest and most intimate relationship with each of us (cf. Mt. 10:30). Surely, he’s dubbed us individually with names that reflect that longing. In fact, in Isaiah 43:1, the Lord has said, “I have called you by name, and you are mine.”

Our name “… expresses a person’s essence and identity and the meaning of this person’s life,” explains The Catechism of the Catholic Church in article 203. We have well-known examples of God changing names, or giving a variant, to reflect of new mission. Abram became Abraham when God made him the “father of a multitude of nations” (Gen. 17:5). What other names from the Bible might reveal God’s charges for his flock? The apostle Barnabas has, according to Acts 4:36, a name that means “Son of Encouragement” and he was a supporter of Paul (who was still going by Saul at the time) before a skeptical troupe of apostles (cf. 9:27). Michael means “Who is like God?” Nathanael means “God has given.” Joshua to Jesus means Yahweh is salvation (Behind the Name).

Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers of the Diocese of Portland, Oregon addresses an important question we need to consider: are we living a life that is at least attempting to be worthy of a name God would give us?

“Is it ‘parked in front of the television?’ Is it ‘never pray with my spouse?’” He posed the issue in a humorous, yet serious way in his April 20, 2023 reflection on the USCCB website. He links the question of identity with cultural demands to rename and re-identify ourselves, warning of the threat to our eternal salvation by complying with modern social fads rather than God.

What do we want to be? We strive to be diligent employees to achieve raises and promotions; good parents to raise independent children; honest business owners to keep and attract customers. But who do we try to be for God? What does God call us to be? Would our Godly name reflect our greatest strength or perhaps reveal our greatest struggle? It is somewhat ironic that God chose Simon, a man who expertly made a living on an unpredictable, fluid surface, to become Peter―Rock―a sturdy and stalwart foundation on which to build his church. His original name, Simon, means “hearing, listening.” He must have listened intently when God spoke to him to be the one who recognized that the Jesus was the Messiah when all the others missed it.

“Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father” (Mt 16:17).

In another bit of irony, Paul means “small or humble” (Behind the Name). Eventually, he was humble unto the Lord, but in his convictions, he was anything but small.

“… every one of us has a mysterious name, expressing our own meaning in the designs of God, even unknown to us here below, and to be revealed beyond this life,” wrote Fr. Hugh Barbour, O. PRAEM.

Until the day we learn God’s special endearment for us, we know we all share this one distinction for which we can strive each moment: Child of God.

Copyright 2024 Mary McWilliams
Images: Pixels.com

New American Bible Revised Edition. New Jersey: Catholic Book Publishing Corp. 2010. St. Joseph medium size edition.
Catechism of the Catholic Church. New York: Doubleday. April 1995. First Image Books Edition.
Behind the Name. https://www.behindthename.com/name
Burke-Sivers, Harold. “Daily Reflection.” 20 April, 2023. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. https://bible.usccb.org/podcasts/video/2023-04-20-reflection-270
Barbour, Hugh. “Names Written in Stone.” Catholic.com. 23 Aug. 2020

 

Stumble onto a Forgotten Priest’s Homilies, and Wind Up in a Successfully Reflective Lent

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Ever feel like you’ve failed Lent? You enter the season ambitiously on Ash Wednesday, receiving the smudged cross on your forehead, determined to read through the New Testament or Exodus at a measured pace, only to get stuck on a confusing passage and give up … for now.

A local parish offers an evening Bible study, but when the day comes, you’re too exhausted from work. Maybe next week, you think, but then the six weeks go by and you’ve missed the whole thing. You try online reflections, but you just breeze through them over morning coffee. You chastise yourself for being undisciplined or for refusing to take your spiritual life seriously. But maybe you’re putting too much pressure on yourself. A more relaxed approach, such as leisurely readings by a forgotten, but once beloved priest could deepen your faith, self-reflection, and ultimately your relationship with God.

Fr. Ronald Knox is little known to 21st Century Americans in favor of other popular English converts such as St. John Henry Newman and GK Chesterton, but in his time, Fr. Knox was regarded as one of the most influential and prolific Catholics of the past century. He is a contemporary of Chesterton and an Oxford neighbor of CS Lewis, and February 17 marks the 136th anniversary of his birth. Raised in the Anglican tradition, even becoming an Anglican minister, the good father followed in his country’s stead, not because he believed it was the perfect way, but because he wanted to bring the Church of England back to Rome. When he realized his ambition was futile, he converted to Catholicism at the still tender age of 29.

Fr. Knox was much sought after as a speaker, preacher, and retreat facilitator for his way of bringing depth to simple concepts and simplicity to the profound. His self-deprecating humor, orthodox theology, and insight into the human condition found its way into countless published homilies, broadcasts on the BBC, and even detective novels. He is also highly respected for his English translation of the Bible, known as the Knox Bible.

One collection of his homilies that might elude a mainstream audience is his title, The Priestly Life. Originally published in 1958 and re-released in 2023 by Cluny Media, this compilation of 16 retreat talks addressed to priests could just as easily be called The Saintly Life because it speaks to the saintliness we are all called to live. With the wisdom of a compassionate confessor, Fr. Knox, who seems to know what’s inside the flawed heart that yearns to be whole, begins with the Alpha and Omega framed in Biblical history, then gently leads the reader (or listener, originally) to realize his sinful nature, bringing him to humility and repentance. Catholic theologian and author John Janaro quotes Evelyn Waugh’s in a 2021 essay, calling the priest and his ministry an “apostolate of laughter and the love of friends” (Janaro).

His chapters in The Priestly Life address so many of the “No, not me” sins: sloth, apathy, grumbling and complaining, blaming. In “Murmuring,” he engages the reader with a compelling story of the Israelites venting and complaining about Moses and God. You read along, nodding and chuckling, amazed how much they sound like your co-workers. He goes on to explain why the grumbling, a “very difficult sin to avoid,” is a three-fold sin against God, neighbor, and self and realize, “That’s me!” and feel an urgency to go to Confession.

“Part of the reason why God put you into the world was to exercise the patience of others by your defects; think of that sometimes when you are going to bed” (pg. 81).

He speaks to his brother priests in “Accidie” about a “tepidity” of spiritual life. “What I mind about is not so much that I seem to get so little out of my religion, but that I seem to put so little into it. Or perhaps I should put it this way: what I mind about is that I should mind so little” (pg. 90). He also addresses a type of malaise, of going through the motions. The scenarios sound much like ruts that most everyone, at some point and in honest moments, experiences in marriage, work, and life in general. “All of the savour has gone out of his priesthood; he sometimes thinks, even out of his religion. Was he, perhaps, not meant to be a priest … is it possible that he has made a mistake?” (pg. 89).

Fr. Knox, in other chapters, addresses perseverance, death and obedience. In his piece on the Blessed Mother, he eschews “Mariology” and sounds more like a loyal knight honoring his heroine queen. While each chapter serves as retreat on its own, they also impart an appreciation into a priest’s very human life by which we might gain more compassion and understanding of a demanding and sacrificial choice, Wouldn’t that help make a successful Lent?

Copyright 2024 Mary McWilliams

Knox, Ronald. The Priestly Life. 2023. Cluny Media. Providence, Rhode Island.
Janaro, John. Monsignor Ronald Knox. 2021. Magnificat. Catholic Education Resource Center.
Photo Credits: Keegan Houser and Eduardo Braga

Roses and Ashes

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Gather ye Rose-buds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying.

 Robert Herrick, “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time” 1648

In a rare, but not unprecedented, synchronicity this month, St. Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday will fall on the same day. These two dates last came together in 2018, and they will do it again in 2029. According to the Fayetteville Observer, this convergence seems to happen approximately three times in every one-hundred-years. The Twentieth Century also recorded three occurrences, in 1923, 1934, and 1945. (1)

The origins of our contemporary St. Valentine’s Day celebration are hidden in history. Even Roman Catholic sources record an astounding variety, of what can perhaps best be regarded as legends. He may have been a priest, a bishop, and/or a physician. It’s unclear whether the stories that have been combined under this saint’s name include the life one man, or the lives of two.

There is some evidence that, on an actual occasion, a prisoner named Valentine left a letter for his jailer’s daughter signed, “from your Valentine.” He’s said to have healed the child of her blindness; we all prefer to believe he did. He may well have converted her to Christianity. He might have converted her father, too. Plausible evidence does exist that a man named Valentine was imprisoned and martyred for his Christian faith. Other tales suggest that the little girl, and possibly her father, died with him. (2)

One fact is clear, that the official liturgical calendar of the United States makes no reference to a saint’s feast on February 14. On the USCCB website, it’s marked only with a purple dot indicating a day of Lent. There is no alternate reading for a saint’s feast day. (3)

Another mystery is how a saint, whom most legends report died as a martyr for his Faith, came to be a symbol of chocolate, flowers, and every other sort of indulgent romantic concupiscence.

Ash Wednesday, on the other hand, is a reminder of the death we all will experience. The Latin counsel memento mori, “remember you will die,” dates back to the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates, from sometime before his death in 399 B.C. (4).

The use of ashes as a symbol of penance and anointing for death by the Hebrews is documented in the Old Testament books of Esther 4:1, 484-465 B.C.; Job 42:6, 700-500 B.C.; Daniel 9:3, circa 550 B.C.; and Jonah 3:5-6, circa 500 B.C. (5)

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale, Illustration from The Book of Old English Songs and Ballads, Circa 1920; Public
domain, via Wikimedia Commons

A solemn recognition of Ash Wednesday has been practiced since the earliest days of Christianity. The words, “For you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” from Genesis 3:19 (6), have been spoken through millennia in both the Eastern and Roman Catholic churches. They are still used for Ash Wednesday services in many Protestant churches today, as well. 

But the question remains. What meaning can we discern from this mysterious union of love with death, that seems to appear as a trinity in multiple centuries?

For one answer, we might turn again to scripture, and discover that Song of Songs is the only one of three writings classified by biblical scholars as ‘Wisdom books’ that appears in Protestant bibles. Our Catholic Bibles contain all three, with the Book of Wisdom and the Book of Sirach included (7). Here is another trinity.

The Song, also called Canticle of Canticles, is a romantic poem that evokes all the sensual joys of earthly lovers, as metaphors that describe God’s desirous love for us. In Christian churches it is read as allegory (8). The determination of the bride to reach her lover, and the strength of their bond, represent the Sacrament of Matrimony on earth and Christ’s love for His Bride, the Church, in eternity.

When the cross of ashes, death, and dust is marked on our foreheads again this year — and the day wavers from joy, to penance, and grief — may we remember the powerful lover who awaits us, and continue to sing the Canticle:

“… Set me as a seal upon your heart,

as a seal upon your arm;

For Love is strong as Death …

Deep waters cannot quench love,

nor rivers sweep it away …

 … You who dwell in the gardens,

my companions are listening for your voice–

let me hear it!

Swiftly, my lover,

be like a gazelle or a young stag

upon the mountain of spices.”

Song (Cant.) 8:6-7, 13-14 (9)

John William Waterhouse, Gather Ye Rosebuds While Ye May; 1909, Public domain, via Wikimedia
Commons.

© Copyright 2024 by Margaret King Zacharias

Featured Photo: John William Waterhouse, Gather Ye Rosebuds While Ye May,1908, Public domain, via
Wikimedia Commons.
Footnotes for Roses and Ashes and Sources for Further Reading
  1. https://www.fayobserver.com/story/news/live-wire/2018/02/06/live-wire-when-was-last-time-ash-wednesday-and-valentines-day-were-same-date/15307391007/#
  1. For a few different perspectives, see:
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/will-the-real-st-valentine-please-stand-up
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Valentine
https://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/catholic-contributions/history-of-st-valentine.html
  1. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021424.cfm
  2. https://dailystoic.com/what-is-memento-mori/#:~:text=Memento%20Mori%20—%20(Latin%3A%20remember,but%20dying%20and%20being%20dead.”
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Socrates
  1. https://catholicstraightanswers.com/what-are-the-origins-of-ash-wednesday-and-the-use-of-ashes/
  1. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/genesis/3
  1. https://www.artesianministries.org/bible-study/why-are-catholic-and-protestant-bibles-different/
  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_of_Songs
9. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/songofsongs/8

Preparing Snacks in Secret

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A little story

I ran the summer youth program at the YMCA and had two particular students, Jimmy and Larry. Jimmy was a good kid with a single mother and little sister. He could be a real pill at times, but he always meant well. Some of the other teachers couldn’t stand having Jimmy in their classes because he would interrupt and question their authority. Jimmy spent a lot of time with me in the office because he got kicked out of the classroom more than any other kid I’d ever seen.

Larry had the same background as Jimmy. He was smart and had a single mother and little sister. But Larry was the angel of every class. Every teacher would comment on his behavior and how smart he was and would let him do things that typically would not be allowed. By acting the way he did, many opportunities opened for Larry, and he took full advantage of it.

After a year of seeing both boys in action, I began to see things that showed who they really were—not what others tried to imprint on them. One day, when Jimmy was alone and no one was watching, he spirited off to the kitchen. I quietly watched from a far corner to see what he would do. Jimmy opened the fridge, pulled out the big box of cheese slices and the box of crackers from the cupboard, and began to prepare them for a snack for the 120 kids in the program. I had heard from the other teachers that someone had been prepping the snacks for them, but they had no idea who had been doing it. Now I knew. This… was the real Jimmy.

I then saw Larry sneak off from his group when he had the chance. It was science day, and there were a lot of tweezers, magnifying glasses, and pH balance paper on the back fields. I saw Larry from a distance with a large magnifying glass in his hand. Instead of looking through it, he was concentrating the sunlight onto the ground. As I got closer, I saw he was scorching and burning worms that had come to the ground surface. He was delighted to see them scorch and then burn. It was a little disconcerting, really.

Fast forward

A few years ago, I ran into both Jimmy’s and Larry’s younger sisters while shopping. I asked how they were and then about their brothers. Jimmy’s sister blurted out, “You’d never believe it! He’s a priest in Madison, Wisconsin! We never saw it coming!” The reaction was quite different from Larry’s sister. She looked at the floor and said, just above a whisper, “Larry got high one night and murdered the entire family he was staying with. He’s on death row right now in Texas.”

In the readings, we hear about being physically “clean” and “unclean” (Leviticus 13). We hear what safeguards society took to ensure everyone’s safety from being physically unclean and how to prove a change of state—from being physically unclean to clean. But the Old Testament deals only with the physical. Paul, in 1 Corinthians (10 and 11), points out that being clean has little to do with what we eat or drink. He asks if what we are doing is pleasing to God. Notice, it’s not about what others think or see, but what we are actually doing that matters to God. By example, Jesus was “moved with pity” when the leper knelt at his feet and begged, “If you wish, you can make me clean” (Mark 1:40). Jesus wasn’t looking at the outside. He was reading the desire through the man’s actions.

As we move into Lent, we have the opportunity to be “moved with pity” for those around us. To do so, we need to read the actions and not the words of others. So, what is the one thing you can do for someone that will make a change in their life? Or better put, what snacks can we secretly prepare for our neighbor?

Copyright 2024 Ben Bongers

Hearing God’s Voice in Unexpected Ways

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Hearing God’s Voice in Unexpected Ways

I am savvy regarding computer programs, social media sites, and internet surfing. Recently, I found a new feature on my cell phone that allows me to create stickers from photographs. I found joy quickly when I made stickers of the dog and began to share them. I only recently realized this feature has been around for a long time. A little deflated that my discovery was old news, I didn’t let it steal my joy and continue to play with it today.

The other day, as I was digging through photographs for sticker making, I stumbled upon a short video I had captured a few days earlier. I had been sitting at my desk, and out the window, I saw one lonely leaf on the tree, literally wiggling side to side. As a butterfly lover, I thought it was a very large chrysalis. Jumping out of my chair, I reached for the binoculars, quickly discovering a rolled-up leaf had remained after the tree lost its leaves for fall.

I am obsessed with caterpillars and butterflies, so my perception is, in a sense, tainted. Anyone else looking at that tree would have seen a leaf blowing in the wind. I, however, had an inside scoop. Only a few months earlier, I had witnessed a considerable caterpillar making its way up the most extended branch. Still, it never dawned on me that it was winter and the butterflies had transformed many months ago. Since I am currently working on a project writing about bugs and caterpillars, I chalk up the vision I saw to divine inspiration! After all, my first book began with a caterpillar clutching a leaf as a storm erupted around it.

I should also note one other important aspect of my leaf video. In the moment I recorded, the sky was dark and gray. Yet, when I watched it back, a small area of light appeared, proof in my eyes this was a Holy Spirit-filled moment. Always in tune with how God communicates to me, I knew there was a reason I was so captivated by the leaf in the wind.

Because I am a woman of faith, open to the promptings of the Spirit, my perception is programmed to view the light in the video as God’s whisper. However, anyone else looking through the same lens and watching the same video could pick up the reflection of the ceiling light bouncing off the window.

Another example is how we perceive God’s fluffy clouds in the sky. There have been days when I’ve seen things like a bunny, a vintage feather pen, a replica of the Ark, etc. Someone else looking at those same puffy clouds probably wouldn’t see them as I do. That doesn’t mean my perception is wrong. It all depends on how God has conditioned my eyes to see what He has placed on my path.

The stirrings in my heart and the knowledge of God’s presence are all I needed to convince myself of an experience of a Spirit-filled moment. Circumstances have trained me to expect God to show up and do big and small things. The instance in the tree is one of those small things, but it may have a more significant impact someday.

Going to scripture, I reflect on Luke 24:13-15, when the disciples walked the road to Emmaus. Because they had witnessed the death of Jesus, they did not expect him to be on their path. God had closed their eyes at that moment, but their perception was also conditioned by what they had experienced earlier.

When we are consistently open to the promptings of the Spirit, God can and will do big things. He will set the scene right when He has something to show or share with you. How you perceive it all depends on your willingness to let God in. It might be something that only you can see or something others think is entirely absurd—these are the moments when you stop and pay attention. God is most likely speaking to you and only to you!

Copyright 2024 Kimberly Novak
Images: Canva

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