A Girl and Her Glitter

So for the past month I have been seeing glitter, everywhere! No parties, no make-up or shiny clothes, and no Kesha, but lots of glitter. Where is it all coming from and why does it matter? Our Lady of Guadalupe loves glitter.

Let me explain. On February 10th, a Tuesday, I walked into CCM at UMW to prepare for daily mass and then prepare for my weekly bible study later that night. I had just put my backpack down when my FOCUS discipler, Vicki, comes walking in with the biggest smile on her face. She said that she had just gotten back from St. Marys, the local Catholic Church down the road, and had just seen Mary, our dear Mother. At first I was very confused, but then she explained that there was a replica of the Tilma of Our Lady of Guadalupe that was being shown at the church until 9pm that night. Not only was it being shown, but you can go right up to the tilma and touch it too! Now I have a very special devotion to Mary, so I was really excited that I would be able to go and visit her, especially so close that I could actually touch her, so I decided to go with my friend Katie.

Now for those of you who don't know the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe; in 1531 a man named Juan Diego was a poor Aztec indian who had converted to Catholocism. He was walking to a place known as Tepayac when he then encountered a beautiful woman, who was speaking in his native tongue. She identified herself as the Virgin Mary and asked him to build a church where she was speaking to him. Juan then went to the bishop and told him what had happened, but the bishop wanted the lady to appear to him again before he would say whether he would build thiss church or not. He went back and Mary appeared to him again, saying the same thing. Juan then went back to the bishop who said he would only meet Juan's request if this lady gave him a sign. When Juan finally returned to see Mary, she told him to go to the top of the hill, cut the flowers, and bring them to her, which was amazing since it was freezing outside. He gathered the roses in his tilma, took them back to the Virigin Mary, who then told him to take them to the bishop. Juan then went to the bishop, opened his tilma to drop the roses in front of him, when he found that on his tilma, there was an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The bishop then requested for the church to be built where Juan had meet with Mary.

While the actual tilma is still shown on display today at the orginial site in Guadalupe, Mexico in the church, it is also displayed high above the ground, since many years ago someone had tried to bomb the image. However, there are replicas that will travel around with a group of missionaries to many different churches so that many more people may experience the graces bestowed by the Virgin Mary. The amazing thing of the replica tilma is that it has been approved by the pope and has been shown to perform miracles. Many of the signs that are shown from this replica are; touching the hands of Mary they feel warm, touching her heart you can feel her heart beat, touching the heart of baby Jesus in her womb you can feel his heart beat, shine a light in her eyes and the pupils will dialate, and she will also cry oil. She has performed several miracles, such as recoveries being shortened from major surgeries, and being able to have a child after having been barren for many years. One other thing that the missionaries who travel with her noticed is that she will leave glitter in places. There are different colors, and they have different meanings:

Silver-I show magniminity of my heart. Ask what you want
Gold-I incline toward the weak. I will heal you spiritually, physically, psycologically, and morally.
Blue-i announce that I am nearby. I am with you
Green-These open you to hope in God, acting in His favor.
Red-In time of trial you offer me a sacrifice, remember that I love you.

So after hearing all this from the missionaries when I was in the church, I stood in line waiting my chance to see her, feeling like a child on Christmas morning, where I just can't wait. Finally, I went up, I felt her hands first, but I didn't feel anything. I began to get discouraged, wondering if my mother wasn't there with me. Next, I felt her heart, and there was the strongest heartbeat I have ever felt. I was feeling my Mother's heartbeat, and I almost burst into tears of joy. My Mother was with me, and oh so close she was! I then felt her stomach and sure enough, there was a faint little baby Jesus heartbeat as well. It was so beautiful to be that close to both my Mother and my Savoir.

So after we prayed, Katie and I then went back to CCM to tell everyone of what we saw and experienced. I then sat down with my friends, getting ready to do some work on my bible study, when I found some gold glitter on my hand. I felt so loved, so gratified that she chose to show me glitter already, to show me that she is always with me. I was blessed with the opportunity to go back that same night to see her once again, and this time I brought more people to experience the same love and affection from her as I had earlier that day. This time, I was able to feel the warmth in her hands, like she was taking my hand and holding it, leading me closer to her son.

Since that beautiful that when I got to see my Mother not once, but twice, I have seen glitter in many different places, with all sorts of colors. I even have some of my friends who went with me or know how close I hold Mary to my heart come up to me and share with me how they show or found glitter and what color it was so I can tell them what it means. My favorite time was when my friend Melanie was getting ready to take a very hard test in one of her classes. She asked me to pray for her, so during the time when she was getting ready to take her test, I was walking along campus and said a Hail Mary for her to do well on her test. Later that day she came up to me adn exclaimed that she had gotten to her classroom, sat down at her usual desk to get ready to take her test, and behold there was glitter all over her desk. I asked what time she found this and the time she said was just about the time that I had prayed to Mary for her intercession on Melanie's test. It was a beautiful prayer experience for sure!

Whether you see glitter or not, know that our Blessed Mother is always with us; she loves us very much, and is our most direct way to be closer to her son, Jesus. Ask her to intercede for you, for a son can never refuse his mother, Jesus can never refuse a prayer request from Mary.

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us!

Read more about Our Lady of Guadalupe here.

Climbing Oak Trees

So for those of you who don't know me that well, I am Roman Catholic. A year ago, I would have just said that  I was Catholic, but then I learned this past year that there are multiple rites in the Catholic Church; 22 to be exact! So what is a rite then? A rite represents a church tradition about how the sacraments are to be celebrated. So the sacraments are all maintained in all these different rites, but how did there come to be so many rites in the Catholic Church? When Jesus ascended into Heaven, the Holy Spirit then came down upon the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire, where they were then able to speak in many different languages. (Acts 2: 1-6) This allowed them to go out into the world so that they may proclaim God's love and word to everyone that they would meet. Peter did this when he traveled to Rome to established the western church, or the Roman Catholic Church, in which he became the first pope. Before he established the church in Rome, he evanglized the people of Antioch, and founded the Melkite rite of the Catholic Church, also known as the Greek Orthodox. Therefore, Roman and Melkite Catholics are from the same patriarch!

So how did I come to learn about all this? My one good friend from school, Melanie, is Melkite Catholic, and she began to teach me some of the prayers and chants that they do for the liturgy of the hours, which is one of my favorite prayers to do every single day. Finally, a few weeks ago, she invited me up to her home parish which is a Melkite church to join her for a service. I was both nervous and excited; I barely knew anything about the Melkite rite, but at the same time I was excited to learn everything about them; traditions, similiarities, differences, and everything inbetween.

When we got to the church I was blown away by how beautiful it was; it was decorated all around with icons of everything; saints, apostles, Mary, Jesus, prophets, angels, and Bibical events (the Annuniciation, Transfiguration, Last Supper). As soon as we entered the church, I began learning some differences between the two rites. For example, while the Romans genuflect whenever they are in the presence of Jesus, the Melkites do a metany, which is bowing and touching the floor. They touch the floor out of a sign of humility, for we are not worthy to be in the presence of the Lord, for we are lowly sinners. They bow instead of genuflect because the people of Antioch believed that genuflecting was for servants and slaves, while we are sons and daughters of God should not at as servants and slaves do. To make the sign of the cross, you take your tumb and first  two fingers and put them together, for this represents the Holy Trinity. You then make the sign of the cross going from right to left instead of left to right. This has several meanings; one is that Jesus is to come from the east (the right) when He comes again, so the sign of the cross is made as if Jesus were coming to Earth again from the east (the right) across the Earth (over to the left). The other meaning is just that at one point the direction of the sign of the cross was all the same, but when the priest would turn to the crowd and bless them with the sign of the cross, the people were confused of how to copy him, which is why there is a division in the direction of the sign of the cross.

What I loved about the actual service was how everything is chanted; readings, the Gospel, the sacraments,everything except for the homily. There are also no books to follow along, which allowed for me to really listen and enjoy the mass. While the way of receiving the Eurcharist was different, the sacrament itself was the same. Finally, one of my favorite parts of the service was actually at the very end where they will serve the people blessed bread. This is because they believe that after receiving communion,the first thing that should be eaten should be blessed.

I could go on and on about how beautiful everything was, what the similarities and the differences were, but you all would be reading for hours on end.

So what do I say when people ask me about the different rites of the Catholic Church? I say that Catholocism is like an oak tree; it has roots and a sturdy trunk of which is the basis of the tree and holds everything together. You then have your branches which all differ; heights, lengths, leaves, no leaves, and so on. The trunks/roots is God; it's Jesus, Mary, the Holy Spirit, the sacraments, everything that we believe all together as Catholics, what holds us together. The branches are the different rites; while we are all connected to the same trunk, the sacraments, we have different traditions that we follow. These branches, these rites, give us a new perspective on our faith, on how beautiful the work of God really is, bringing together many cultures and traditions by having and keeping the sacrements pure.

So what do I say to those people who ask me about the different rites? I tell them to go and climb the oak tree and have a new view. Go and experience and learn about the different rites. I have been blessed to experience both the Roman and Melkite rites and there are aspects from both of them that I love very much; from the Roman I love all of our saints, the rosary, the Divine Mercy Chaplet, and the liturgy of the hours, while from the Melkite I love the chants, the chocki prayer rope, the Jesus prayer, and the prayers in the Horologian (their version of liturgy of the hours).

Go climb the tree, get a new perspective on our beautiful faith, and discover something that you never knew was there.

Learn more about the different rites here.

Learning the Little Way Part 1

Have you ever heard that saints will follow us? If someone had told me this a year ago I would have given them my infamous skeptic look and thought that they were just crazy. Saints are best friends with Jesus, they are in heaven, why would they spend their time following us, when it is we who should be following their ways to be closer to God? That's just it, that is why certain saints will follow us around, giving us little signs here and there because they want us to learn about them, to see just how they strengthened their relationship with God and how they can help us to strength ours. So I have been followed or as I've been told "stalked" by several saints lately, on which you will hear of more and more as this blog goes on, but one that has majorly been a part of my lfie for the entire school year has been St. Therese of Lisieux. St. Therese was this beautiful young girl who grew up in France and became a Carmelite Nun, one who is cloistered, can't go out in the real world, when she was but a teenager. She became famous for what is known as "the little way". You may have heard her also refered to as St. Therese the Little Flower. I remember my grandma always loved to talk about her when I was a little girl, but I never really stopped to learn much about her, until this year.

For Christmas, my one friend Katie gave me the book, The Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux. I was so excited to finally be able to learn more about this beautiful saint whom I've heard of since I was a little girl, whom has been following me around for the past few months, but whom I don't know very much about. St. Therese was the youngest of 5 daughters and was a young child when her mother passed away from cancer. St. Therese, along with all of her sisters all became Religious Sisters. Pauline, the second oldest, whom also became a mother figure during Therese's youth, asked Therese to write her about her childhood and how she remembers it, since she was blessed to have remember very vividly much of her youth. The first section of the book, Therese writes to her older sister, who is Mother Superior of the Carmlilite Order where both her andTherese are, all about her childhood; her relationship with her sisters, with her father and mother (before her mother died), and with God.

I have only just begun reading this beautiful book by St. Therese about how she was as a child, and God truly watched over her and blessed her at a very young age. While a very holy person, she speaks very simply as so all can understand. For example when she is talking about people, she compares their souls to flowers in a garden; "Jesus willed to create great souls comparable to Lilies and roses, but He has created smaller ones and these must be content to be dasies or violets." Some peoples souls are bigger, some are smaller, but she also states, that "Perfection consists in doing His will, in being what He wills us to be." God gives us what we can handle; some souls are able to handle more while others may handle less, but God loves each and every one of us as His own. How beautiful that a four year old little girl could compare God's graces bestowed on His people to a garden of beautiful flowers?

As I continue to read this beautiful story of a soul, I am learning so many things to apply to my life and to teach others. Saint Therese is truly a beautiful soul, one who suffered much, but who loved God till the day she took her last breathe, a true and devote love which we all should aspire to have.

Saint Therese of Lisieux, pray for us!

Welcome Home

So I have been sick with the flu for the past couple of days, which means staying in bed, doing pretty much nothing. Now for those of you who know me, this isn't something I tend to do often, if at all. I'm a person who loves to constantly be doing things; organizing events, being with friends, doing things for others, so if someone tells me I'm sick, I'm gonna go crazy! Tonight I went over to my Catholic Campus Ministry on campus to have my weekly bible study with my amazing group of girls. I was still run down from having the flu so I hadn't been over there all day. When I walked in the door, all my friends greeted me with open arms (well as open as you want to embrace a sick person) and asked how I was doing, if I needed anything, and so on. I was greeted with notes, letters, and soup from some of my best friends. I had only been gone for a couple of days, yet I was received with such love and open arms, I wondered, why would I ever want to leave?

My bible study tonight looked over one of my all time favorite paraboles, the prodigial son (Luke 15:11-32). One of my greatest and funniest memories of this parabole goes back to when I was a junior in high school at my third workcamp. We went to North Carolina and the theme for the week was based on the story of the prodigial son. Every night at workcamp we had what was called program where we would all get together as a camp, do praise and worship and then listen to what the theme of the day was based on what the theme of the week was. So before we would listen to the Emcee talk about the theme, the camp would show videos to get all the workcampers excited to hear about the theme. This year they decided to have a fake reailty show called, "Meet the Prodigials" where they would have interviews with all the family members and follower them around and see what their reactions were. As cheesy as it was, it put the story in a way that we could physicaly see what was happening and really start to feel the impact of how the father loved his younger son, no matter how far he strayed.
When we read Luke 15:11-32 we find that Jesus is telling this story to the Phariesses, because they have asked Him why is He associating himself with sinners all the time. Jesus tells the parabole; a younger son goes to his father askes for his inheritance and then leaves to live a life of lavish sin. He then looses everything and lives with the pigs. The son finally comes to his senses and returns home to ask forgiveness of his father. The father sees his son in the distance and runs out to meet him. He greets him and welcomes him back with open arms, slaughters the best calf for him, and throws him a party because he was lost and know has been found. Meanwhile, the older son is jealous because in his eyes he has been nothing but a loyal servant to his father, having never once disobeyed him. The father then tells him that all that he has is his, but we must celebrate the return of the younger son. Then the parabole just ends.

I never thought of the ending before, how it just ends right there, nothing more. It's like one of our favorite tv shows that they leave you with a cliff hanger right as the seasons takes a break and the next episode won't be back for another two months. So why the ending? Think about who Jesus was comparing the the characters to in His story: the younger son is the sinner/tax collecters, the older son is the Pharisees, and the father is God/Jesus. While the younger son went off an sinned, he "came to his senese" and returned back to his father, who saw him in the distance, ran to him, and welcomed him home with a party. No matter how much we sin, when we finally cometo our senese, God will always be waiting for us with open arms to welcome us back to his kingdom. As for the older son, he was already in his father's good graces, having not disobeyed, but only saw himself as a servant, never as a son. The Pharisees let pride get in their way, that they know so much that they will never do wrong and are eagarly searching for their reward now. The father then addresses the older son as "My son" to emphasize that he is first and foremost his son, not his servant. Jesus then leaves the parabole ending open so the Pharisees will write their own ending to the story, so that they may grow closer to God, but on their own means.

What character are we in this story? Are we the younger son; one who has strayed from the church and are starting to realize that we are in the wrong, are we coming to our senses and are starting to come back whether it be by going to mass every week, giving 10 minutes a day to prayer, or saying the rosary more? Are we the older son; where we have a good relationship with God but we forget that we aren't servants, that we are brothers and sisters, sons and daughters and to not search for a reward, but to be selfless in our actions? Or are we the father; has someone we known gone astray from the church and we have to stand and wait to see them in the distance, and when they do will we open our arms and our hearts to openly and lovingly accept them into our lives and our faith?

I know I was so blessed to be welcomed back home into the ministry tonight by my bible study and my friends (who are also one in the same), and I hadn't even done anything wrong to them. While the story of the prodigial son is always focusing on the son, it's focus is really on the father, how God not only welcomes us back home with open arms when we sin, but we need to do as well when one of our own brothers or sisers comes home as well.

Just as God always welcomes us home, let us welcome each other home, from sin, sickness, and everything inbetween.

A Cross to Bear

"If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me" -Luke 9:23

These were the words in the Gospel yesterday that had me sitting in mass thinking and praying for a while. We've probably heard the saying before, 'to take up our cross' but what does that even mean? Do we have to carry the big wooden cross just like Jesus did on the day of His death? While it may seem it at times, that's not quite what Jesus had in mind when He told us these words in Luke 9:23.

We were all given some sort of cross to bear; it may be physical with a sickness, emotional with a suffering, or anything inbetween. Each one of us was given a specific cross to bear, but like both my mom and my grandma used to always say, God doesn't give us anything more than we can handle.

A couple of months ago I discovered that I have a gluten intolerance, which means that I can't eat anything with wheat, grains, or gluten in it. While it isn't an uncommon thing for people to have today, it doesn't make the frustration any less. At first I was mad and even scared; not only would I have to completely change my diet, but I didn't think that I would be able to handle this new-found cross that God had given me. I was troubled for a good month about this, when I finally when to St. Marys Church down the road from school to go and talk to the priest there. Father told me that indeed God doesn't give us a cross that we can't handle, but that doesn't mean that they won't be tough. He then told me something that will stay with me for the rest of my life.

He said to think of the saints, especially Maria Goretti. (She was 12 years old when she was stabbed to death by her neighbor because she wouldn't committ sin with him.) Her cross that God gave her to bear was her early death, and she never hesitated when the time came to go against God in order to save her life. Her act of martyrdom was not for her, but for others. Father then told me to take the cross that I was given, and offer it up for others, specifically someone who maybe isn't able to fully understand or handle their own cross because it is so much bigger than my own. Have my cross take a part of someone else's cross off of their shoulders, so they can better bear their own.

My cross may be big to me, but in the grand scheme of things, it isn't the worst cross that I would have to bear. God knows why He gave me this cross, and while I don't know now, or may not ever know, I still need to bear it, but I need to bear it in the name of Jesus. So if you are having a hard time bearing your own cross there are a couple of things that you can do about it:

1. Pray about it: Anything that we do, whether it is making a decision, giving thanks, or asking for help, we should always pray about it by interceding with our Blessed Mother and the saints, or even straight to God and Jesus.
2. Offer it up: This may seem hard, especially because when we are miserable, we like to focus on ourselves and how miserable we are, or that we think we are. Take a moment every day, or when it gets really hard to bear the cross and think about your cross in perspective to the world. Then, offer it up for someone, whether you know someone specifically or not, who does have a much more difficult cross to bear. Have your cross take part of theirs off of them.
3. Talk to a priest: If you are still really struggling with the thought of bearing your cross, go and talk to someone, especially a priest. They are always willing to be there and listen and will give some great advice.

In order to follow Christ, we must take up our cross daily and follow Him. It may be hard at times, and most days we won't want to face our cross head on, but Christ bore the biggest cross of them all, where He died on the actual cross in order to save us from our sin. If Jesus had the ultimate cross to bear, what's not to say that we can't bear our own personal cross everyday?

Luke 9:23

I'm Just a Little Missionary

I go to college. I'm going to graduate early. I major in geography. I read, play lacrosse, bake, run, travel, and chill with friends. I'm a twenty something who does all these things and more, but who am I?

I'm just a small missionary of Christ.

I guess you could say that I had my second "reversion" (or re-introduction into the Catholic faith) when I was a freshmen in college. Even then, it took me until my second year to really begin to realize that I'm not just a Catholic, I'm proud to be Catholic. It then took me another year to figure out that, I'm not just a Catholic, I'm called to be a missionary of Jesus. Now before jumping to conclusions, no I am not an actual missionary whereit is my job, like    in FOCUS (although they are very cool people). What I mean by missionary of Jesus is that we as Catholics are called to love others and share God's love and message to others. When we have something valuable and beautiful, such as a new iphone or a new car, we WANT to show it off to others, we want to tell everyone what we just got. It`s the same with the word of God.

So what does that mean then? It starts by being a geniue person; saying hello to everyone, holding doors open, inviting people to lunch or going to get coffee. It then grows into not being afraid to ask those questions; what do you believe, what excites you about the faith, what do you think God has in store for you? It means inviting everyone, both new and old friends to come to mass, adoration, liturgy or the hours, or bible study with you. It doesn`t have to always be a dramatic gesture; even Jesus started with the simple fishermen by asking them just to come and follow Him. He didn`t give all these details, He didn't start with the deep questions, He started with a simple invititation.

If we are to be like Christ, we must first listen and follow Him. I know, this is way easier said than done. For me, it feels like God is just dumping everything imaginable on me ranging from schoolwork to new eating habits, to relationships with friends and family. At times I want to scream "I can't take this anymore'" because at times it feels like I`m left alone. But that`s the beauty, we are never alone; it may not always feel that way, but even though we don:t always deserve it, Godis always with us and always loves us. In order for us to share His message as missionaries, we need to listen to it and live it first.

I'm been Catholic my entire life, and I'm just beginning on this journey now. It will be tough, it will ge frustrating, and we will want to give up, but with Mary, Jesus, and all the saints cheering us on, how can we loose? Pray everyday; both in need and thanksgiving, share love in both big and small ways, and always keep God`s love and word in your own heart.

I'm just a little missionary, but I have a big message to share.