Baptism - openning the door to Divine LOVE with the first kiss on the soul.

I was gifted this picture for Christmas from Nancy and Bill and family... I love the sweet faces looking up from their parent's arms!  Nancy shared that Maximilian is in this picture as it was just days before their loss of him at 20 weeks in the womb.  So much hope and love surrounded his time in the womb and now he is keeping our eyes and hearts set on heaven. 


http://familysoulstory.blogspot.com/p/my-most-cherished-cross-patrick-gerard.html
My own story of being open to life and raising lights now is flowing into the lives of my 5 here on earth with me.  How I prayed that they would not have the pain of loss which filled my years of childbearing... instead the Lord places me there with them, and Nancy spoke most eloquently the words that are from my heart, too!
http://www.dosmallthingswithlove.com/2017/12/j1st-022-on-still-being-here.html

Epiphany mass with my parents before I headed for home.  My father's cochlear implant has been lifechanging for him and all of us that can now communicate with him again.  He is a wise and wonderfully faithful man, husband and father to us children!


How excited was I to find one of the 4 options for the first reading was Isaiah 55:1-11?  Over the moon with a shot of JOY which surged through me as I read the familiar words -
"All you who are thirsty,
come to the water!
You who have no money,
come, receive grain and eat;
come, without paying and without cost,
drink wine and milk!"
http://familysoulstory.blogspot.com/p/the-amazing-story-of-13-becoming.html
My father was reading Isaiah 55:1-2 when the Holy Spirit told him and his family of 13 to become Catholic!

Such a glorious stunningly beautiful sight when Jesus was placed on the altar for adoration after a prayer service/wake of a dear farmer friend last evening in the church/St Elio in Ghent where John and Bobbi will be married in June.  A deeply powerful experience with the angelic voices of the sisters of Mary the Morning Star and the rosary shared with Jesus on the altar!  Out of this world - literally!

To Jesus through Mary!


My day has gotten away from me... Today is the Feast of the Baptism of Jesus!  I loved these stunning words shared by a convert, Rhonda Chervin , from Judaism;
The purpose of baptism is not to provide the person with a conscious religious experience, but rather to open within him the door through which divine love can flow, to turn the soul toward God by implanting on it his first kiss, as it were...
To deny the child this expression of Christ's self-giving, on the grounds that the infant is too young to choose freely, would be similar to withholding parental love until the child was of he age of reason...By comparison with the love on God's part, we are always half asleep.  Just as Christ has infinite love for the fresh individual uniquely conceived, so the Church, manifesting the divine love, rushes to bring the infant into contact with it by making him a member of the Mystical Body of the Church.

Beautiful Christ Child in the poinsettias! 








Found some pictures on Maria's blog - Mary and Joseph found each day and returned to the stable to O Come O Come Emanuel!

Elves on the Kids night out at the parish... looking good!