This is an amazing picture of the lamb being blessed by a cardinal on the feast day of Susan's patron saint, St Agnes, which means lamb! No, they are not going to slaughter this lamb.... they take the wool from the lamb to make the pallium...An interesting custom is observed on her feast day. Two lambs are brought from the Trappist abbey of Tre Fontane in Rome to the Pope to be blessed. On Holy Thursday they are shorn, and from the wool is woven the pallium which the pope gives to a newly consecrated metropolitan archbishop as a sign of his jurisdiction and his union with the pope.
"For the peace of Jerusalem pray:
"Peace be to your homes!
May Peace reign in your walls,
in your palaces, peace!"
For the love of my brethren and friends
I say: "Peace be upon you!"
For love of the house of the Lord
I will ask for your good."
From Susan's journal... this was her small room at the monastery where the sisters spoke only French... long before she had mastered it! Sunday Feb 5th.... "So the second day of my retreat has begun and is almost over. Today was a better day because it started out with prayer and Our Lord in the Eucharist. The Mother Superior is so helpful, she is always helping find the page during prayer, but I also get the feeling that she is trying to figure me out. Good luck! I don't even think that I could do that. Hey, you know what... it is the Lord's day, so I had a pretty good one. I began reading more of the encyclicals on the Sacred Heart today. 
At first I was kind of torn because how can I give it all to the Sacred Heart, but still be a slave to Mary? I soon understood that Mary is the one that will lead me to the Sacred Heart, and that if I want to learn to be a perfect disciple of the Sacred Heart... all I must do is follow her lead. The stuff I am reading about the Sacred Heart is really good. I really like how it talks about concecrating all people to the Sacred Heart, believers and non-believers alike, and how God's grace will work with all people through His Sacred Heart. I must continually pray for the conversion of all peoples.
"I must remember to offer up all that I am and all that I do to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I should be happy and joyful to suffer so as to make amends for all the sins against His Sacred Heart. I should do all things with great love." Susan wrote in her spritiual journal in Feb of '06
"Today I was gifted with something else my heart has been yearning for... adoration. The sisters have a holy hour in the morning, but it is only before the tabernacle. So tonight before evening prayer...they had the Blessed Sacrament out and I was so happy. I would really miss it if I only had it once a week, but I guess that makes you honor, love, and thank God for it even more. The sacraments can never become something rountine for us. They must be something alive and changes us every time we receive them." Susan/Hallel on retreat in France and discerning a vocation Feb '06
Beautiful Mary that Susan encountered in a hidden away place at one of her retreat houses in France... Wow! ...." I could see a statue of Our Lady behind a door to a balcony, so I went in. Do you know where the door led me? To the balcony of the chapel... Our Lady was there waiting for me. It was so great!" Susan on retreat in France in 2006
She is so beautiful! And she is responsible for the wonder we have in our amazing Church! She bore our salvation to the world and He loved us with his LIFE! And then He gave us the Church to be a part of and we are all members of the Bride... His Spouse... the Church! Mary is a total image of the most beautiful woman that was ever created! She held God in her womb! I was just talking to Maria, my 3rd daughter who has had 2 children in the last few years... we were saying how amazing it is to hear that first heartbeat of our offspring in our wombs! Now a days that happens at 8 or 9 weeks usually! 
Pat had just said yesterday that from his perspective as a man that has never experienced it himself... men just do not have that blessing that women have.... "It must be just amazing to hear that heartbeat and know that it is not your own, but the little one growing in you as a result of your "fruitful love"one for the other." Maria and I agreed that it is about the most beautiful sound that there is! Nancy shared that she was crying so hard at the sound of her new baby..." I was moving around because I was crying and they had to keep finding it again, because I would move... so filled with such emotion!" I can imagine the sheer joy and wonder and emotion that Bill and Nancy felt to hear the sound of a new life that the Lord had answered their heartfelt prayers and desires! There is truly nothing more wonderful and special and miraculous! How can that ever be considered just something that can be torn out of a mother, because it is inconvenient or unwanted? How can Planned Parenthood lie to women and tell them that it is just a lump of tissue and not a baby with arms and legs and a heart beating? They are certainly taking a huge sin heaped upon their heads... to mislead women in that way! I know that in some of the larger cities... like the prolife center that Maria worked at until recently... they have an ultrasound machine there to show them their babies... that is the best way to save lives of the innocent little ones that are future lights to the world! 
It just so happens that when I worked in Birthright on Monday night a week ago... I found this adorable humble homemade teddy bear... to me it was the epitome of humble and unique and special... I took some pictures around the office including these two models that we have on display at all times of a two month old and three month old baby in the womb! Very appropriate in light of what we are talking about at this time! So important to "see" the baby... but how much more wonderful for those that "know and believe" in the sanctity of life from conception to natural death to "hear" the sound of that tiny perfect heart beating from so early in its amazing sacred holy blessed LIFE!
I named him GUS... God's unsung Sanctity-of-Life... I thought that he was the poster teddy of humility and sweetness.. as he was obviosly made with love and very dedicated devotion... As a friend that came into the office while I was working, to deliver some baby things that she had gathered in a drive she organized in their church as the Reverence for Life committee chair..."He is made very well and it is so humorous and cute...the way that his eyes and nose are in almost a straight line... it gives him such a sweet expression and he is so special." ( The quilt that he is sitting on was made by the ladies at her church for the babies that are given the gift of life!) He just pulls at your heart stings and makes you want to have him in the arms of a small child that would love him so much that his eyes would fall off and the stuffing would be coming out! I mentioned him to a fellow volunteer that I called while I was there... she knew just who Gus was, and said that he would be right for just the special child... Like the Hispanic father that came in looking for winter jackets his two young children. The things that we take for granted... there are the poor in our midst! Lord, show us how to serve and help and give to those in need... You are there and we need to minister to you! 
This poster has been on the wall at Birthright for as long as I have been volunteering there ... over 30 years! These babies are now that old and most probably have babies of their own! I found a little knit cap that I just couldn't resist! Well, I pray that Gus can carry on his legacy...even if he sits on the shelf in his humbleness and speaks of a grandma that made him to show her love and respect for life and the wonder and joy that a little one brings to families and to this world! 
Just a few more from Susan's time in Rome... she met the Community of the Lamb and it led to her discernment to become a bride of Christ in this amazing "call". How she loves her Church and felt at home in Rome! It was such a gift... and when last year she got an opportunity to live with the communiity there in Rome ... she loved each and every day there! May we all rejoice today on this celebration of His Church! We are forever blessed with The True Church's wisdom and love and beauty! Jesus we trust in you! Bless our Church throughout the world but especially in our midst... in our own homes! Amen and Halleluia!
Bless-bless, Barb "Brothers and sisters: You are God's building.... Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy that person; for the temple of God, which you are is holy." I Corinthians 3:9-11, 16-17
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