The Pat and Barb Verly family and their 5 children, in laws and grandkids along with many prayer warriors have been drawn together by John's cancer... sharing daily for 8 months started this blog- Family Soul Story - Our faith, family, farm and now our cancer journey called HEALING have colored and deepened our world. WE continue to share and depend on the support of our prayer warrior community, that has lowered us into the Lord's presence for His healing!
Getting ready for the big shower for Bobbi on Sunday.. grandma polished up this wonderful glorious amazing beginning of Ruth and Paul's marriage - in Rome 3 days after their Sacrament of Matrimony here in Marshall! St JPII blessing their marriage as Paul asked him; "Please bless us with a happy healthy family." With their 6th child, sweet little Joy reflecting upon this answer to prayer! Six wonderful healthy happy children, and a marriage in which they share life-giving in word and deed one to the other!
Joy you have been surrounded by prayer and loved always!
As the Psalm 1 from mass today - "Blessed are they who hope in the Lord."
Ruth and Paul have placed their hope in Jesus and His Bride, The Church! Their prayers are being answered in a powerful and beautiful way!
A painting I did for Ruth's quilt before she left for college in 1998... my answer was at that point revealed to me... I knew all the children I would be given to raise as lights after embracing my Most Cherished Cross, farmer Pat, and receiving the LIFE/LOVE/LIGHT in our marriage/family/domestic Church!
In the distance is a cemetery in which are buried our 7 losses, so this was special way of having us all together. Therapy indeed for this woman, who shocked my doctor, who happened to be the planned parenthood doctor in town, by telling him boldly at my first prenatal visit with Ruth that I wanted to have 12 children. With the pain of loss throughout my childbearing years.. How I pleaded with the Lord to let me know what His Plan was for me, but it took 17 years of fertility to finally know the full picture. https://familysoulstory.blogspot.com/p/my-most-cherished-cross-patrick-gerard.html
Now we are on to the next generation and although I prayed long and hard that they would not have to face the losses... the Lord's plan continues to include the pain of loss, too! Keeping our eyes on heaven that much more!
Our first calf was born this morning! A heifer that is large and healthy to face the cold. How we pray for moderation in the cold and a good season ahead. Such a familiar pose now for 2019... Pat kneeling and praying with the newborn calf and a hand on the gentle momma cow, too!
Sunday with Hallel and Nancy.. thinking about Hallel and her call to be Christ's!
I am jumping around today as I am at the farm with the kids while Pat and Ruth are out getting the cow TV in place...
In reading over the readings with Pat at morning prayer after reading them before bed last night... the meditation of the day addressing the Gospel really caught my heart... The Grace to be unafraid of self-denial by Venerable Francis Xavier Nguyen Thuan - how does this address the Gospel which includes the warning to be rid of an eye or an foot of a hand rather than be cast into hell! It would be extreme self-denial to rid ourselves of something concrete like this or something that is a deep seated sin or indulgence we have given ourselves and made excuses about...
Hallel using his grandma's ice cream scoop from the farm at lunch after mass!
Venerable Cardinal Nguyen; A whole stream of public opinion tells the Church to moderate its requirements of sacrifice and renunciation, to lower its expectations of priests, religious, and lay people.. Some people believe that a more lenient attitude, a less demanding way of life, would attract more vocations and believers to the Church. But experience has shown that this is an illusion.
2 1/2 year old Josephine helping her Aunt move chairs on Sunday!
I know from Hallel and others we have followed into a "Yes!" to Jesus that they want to wear habits and be set apart and to radically embrace the Gospel of dying to self so that Jesus is in control of their lives!
Cardinal Ngyen continues; Young people want to give themselves completely, and to become authentic disciples of Christ. They want an unequivocally evangelical life and detest partial commitments... They are not afraid of self-denial; their only fear is to undervalue the evangelical call, to live a mediocre Christian life...
Lord, we, the youth of the whole world turn our eyes toward you, our ideal. Draw us to yourself. We offer boundless thanks to you for what you demand of us. Thank you for giving us the freedom to choose and for respecting our human dignity despite our weakness. You have saved me, Lord, and you made me a child of God. You are not like materialism to which people may become slave in their hunger for consumption, and by following the path of false pleasures. I will follow you alone, Lord. I accept being a child of God and embrace all the demands that name entails. I am convinced. I must follow the narrow way- the only way that leads to everlasting life.
Cardinal Nguyten Van Thuan (2002) was imprisoned by the Vietnamese government for 13 years.
Watching grandpa getting ready to put up the wires for cow TV...
Snow on the deck taller than Joy ... Lord, we pray for better weather for calving!
Up to the waste of Our Lady of the deck... she would look in over Pat and I and our family here, and now our oldest daughter and her farm family are under her loving motherly gaze! Bless-bless, Barb
Joy is about a month away from being 2... It seems like yesterday, but it must have been 2 years ago when Ruth would get up to watch cow TV and nurse her new baby... Now Joy is watching the cows with her family on the best invention ever... a surveillance camera that watches the cows and we can see them on our TV in the house!
Complete with mooing that we can hear in the house. It was fun to see Ruth and the kids again after being gone for 2 1/2 weeks in Kansas City! I was over there while Ruth helped her dad load up some open cows to go to market. Grandma gets to be in the warm house with the kids and cow TV!
Joy usually doesn't engage much with what is on the TV when they have on shows, but she sure was interested in the cows on the screen in the kitchen!
The words from Sirach today ring like a bell in the midst of our family growing by 3 grandchildren in the month, also of running into a friend when we were paying our taxes and talking about the girl's large families by today's standards... Ruth with 6, Nancy with 5 and soon Maria to welcome #6! "I guess they liked growing up in a large family." I commented to her smiling look... and foremost on my heart and mind is the unthinkable killing of those babies that survive abortion! How can this be?
The first reading from Sirach today speaks of Wisdom in relation to LIFE! Wisdom breathes life into her children and admonishes those who seek her. He who loves her loves life; those who seek her will be embraced by the Lord.
She found the mini chocolate chips and grandma had to spoil her... look at that smile of delightful JOY!
The Wisdom of Our Lord and His Bride, The Church, leads us in our domestic Church/family/marriage of one man and one woman to be open to LIFE! All of those children have LIFE breathed into them and we love them and share our Faith with them with JOY! The Lord's plans are mysterious and I and my daughters have learned that our plans are not his, with difficulties and losses along the way to our family. Those crosses allow us to depend upon Him and trust!
The word "admonish" means to advise or urge someone earnestly... How my heart is burning with the Truth from Wisdom that ALL LIFE is sacred and to be protected and cherished from conception to natural death! How I am admonishing wherever possible of this Truth and am desperate and so disappointed to have so called Catholic people in Congress not standing up for LIFE! They are obviously not listening to the Spirit of Truth and the Wisdom of Jesus and His Church! "If my colleagues can’t say that it’s wrong to leave a living, breathing baby, cold and alone on a table, to die of neglect, then they are not only tacitly endorsing infanticide. They are helping to create a society where some people count more than others, and where the vulnerable are always at the mercy of the powerful." – Senator Ben Sasse THIS is the NUMBER ONE CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE today. Democrats have it WRONG.
Piles of snow almost taller than the semi here to pick up our fat cows! Lord, we need warming weather for calving please!
Joy and the cows.... Farmgirl.. can't wait for getting outside in the spring!
How do we know that we are belonging to Jesus and have The Wisdom you receive by The Holy Spirit dwelling in you? It says clearly here... "He who loves her loves life." Every fiber in our being is screaming out against the unbelievable horror of abortion at any stage - the taking of innocent life! But to even kill babies after they have survived the attempt to kill them in the womb and leave them to die!!!! How can that ever be voted for and how can any person sign their name to that with any kind of a clear conscience?
They are trying to smear our love for life by calling us anti-abortion and not Pro-Life! We love ALL LIFE and we should be called LOVE-LIFE with no hesitations or with no limitations! From conception to natural death!
It does not take any kind of special understanding to see how wrong and hateful this is! How????
Jesus, we love you and long to share with all the Truth of the beauty and value of every LIFE! More from Sirach today; Wisdom comes back to bring him happiness and reveal her secrets to them and she will heap upon him treasures of knowledge and an understanding of justice. Oh Lord, how we pray that we may share the LIGHT of Truth with so many that are misled and lied to by the master of lies, Satan. This culture of death is a sign of how darkness has hidden the light of Truth. May we make a difference as the culture of LIFE will prevail! Jesus, we trust in you. Bless-bless, Barb
So nice to be home, and then on the Washington and Maria's new son's arrival! More love to share! All life is a gift no matter how small!
This family picture from two years ago when Hallel had her home visit was placed on the screens inside and outside of church sharing our JOY at her taking her final vows last August!
This picture is now outdated as Nancy and Bill have a newborn son, George. In a few weeks Maria will welcome her son - #6 child, and finally John has added wife Bobbi on June 2nd and they will welcome baby Verly at the end of the month! I long for the day that all our new babies are here healthy along with their mothers and getting them together. A mother can dream!
On their wedding day missing Hallel and all the newborns we are welcoming within a month of each other!
"Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me." Mark 9
The Gospel today speaks our language and leads us to the Truth shared by The Catholic Church that families are to be open to life... It is so true that welcoming siblings and sharing with them our love and our everything can not be compared to acquiring things and stuff. The addition of family allows us to die to self and give without counting the cost as Jesus asks of us, and things and stuff makes us more self centered and concerned about me. There is no happiness found there in that selfish place... where as by caring for others in a growing family is not always easy, but can offer a small slice of heaven in our domestic Church/family if only we allow our heart to grow more and more belonging to Jesus and not we ourselves.
The latest cluster of 3 girls... about 2 years ago! All within 10 months of each other. LOVE!
Pat was sharing that a person from Congress was saying that people should think twice about bringing children into this mess of a world. I told him that we heard that 40 years ago at our engagement weekend... When we shared that we wanted to have a large family, not one of the other couples agreed with us! They all said that at most 2 kids or one or none due to the mess the world was in in those days. It made me question if we were being selfish to want to have a large family - "The world needs lights!" Pat wisely told me and that has become the motto our family lives by... now to the next generation! https://familysoulstory.blogspot.com/p/my-most-cherished-cross-patrick-gerard.html
Our 5 children together in France for Hallel's final vows! Such a beautiful occasion in which Hallel spoke these words to her Spouse, Jesus. "I promise unto death." Such a powerful reminder to all of us in our marriages.
More words to us from Jesus in the Gospel today: "If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all."
Stressing to us how we are called to be humble and not assert our wants of desires or selfish motives above those around us... most especially those closest to us in our domestic Church/family, who tend to be the ones that we treat the worst and are the hardest for us to give and love and forgive those things that drive us nuts... as their faults seem glaring to us!
I love so much that we were able to share France with all but the 7 youngest in our family... we were 19 of our 26 and in a few weeks we will reach 29! LOVE! Sharing this time with Hallel and her Community of the Lamb was a huge impresion upon the Spiritual growth of our young ones!
The raising of LIGHTS is taken very seriously by our children and their families! After these last 2 1/2 weeks with Nancy's family and sharing in their prayer each night gathered as a family - Wow!!! We were so impressed when we spent some days with Maria's family at their family rosary and prayer together and studying of the Faith with sincere love and devotion. I will be heading that way soon to help out when their son arrives!
This man is my Most Cherished Cross which I embrace to find LIFE/LOVE/LIGHT!
Pat told me about an article he read where a wife went from loving everything about her husband to when they got married and 6 months later loved nothing about him... she became very critical of all that he did or didn't do. She finally came to the realization that this had happened and she was not happy and took steps to look for the positive and point those out and change her heart. Pat then said that he felt that I do a fairly good job at appreciating him, but it really convicted me to be more positive. As Ruth and Paul live their marriage as being "life-giving" to each other in what they say and do! So important and life would be much better if we did that with each new day. Lord, help me!
I am eternally grateful for my parents bringing us into The Church 48 years ago! Each day has been filled with wonder and JOY and the strength that I have needed to face some major struggles including John's brain cancer, Patrick' traumatic birth, and the Lord's plan for our family to grow with many losses as well as those of my girls!
The 5 with grandma Anna in 2003... Pat said that he dreamt about his mom last night out helping them milk cows. She taught me all I know about being a farm wife, but she was much more loving and giving than I! The Lord blessed her with 10 children, and she was a huge part of the kid's lives growing up!
Both of our parents were role models for being open to life and the blessings of growing up in a large family.. Hence on our first date we both agreed that we would like that for ourselves in our marriage.
The precious feet of John and Bobbi's baby Verly! Their lives are about to change so powerfully with their child after so many years of waiting and praying for John as Bobbi was told by the Lord when they were seniors in high school that she would marry John Verly! She trusted all those years, and prayed without ceasing through brain cancer, seminary, and the ups and downs!
Raising LIGHTS! We are so filled with wonder and awe and JOY to see Ruth and Paul's 3 oldest serving on the altar! Sharing our Faith with them each week at mass is the BEST!
This last Cross Christmas with close to 75 of our huge family which is approaching 120+ with the additions of this year! A picture of LIFE! How we celebrate that Truth!
It will be exciting this weekend when Ruth and I will host both sides of our family for a baby shower for new mom, Bobbi! Celebrating with JOY new life and all that means for our family, John and Bobbi's new family growing in love, and for the world as a new life/new light to raise to cast out the darkness with the culture of LIFE that our amazing Church promotes in this crazy world! A world that just rejected in Congress the protection of a human baby that survives an abortion to get medical help and their life protected as they then have a right to life! How has it come to such savagery?
The 3 boys that are very close and pray for each other... "My buddies Luke and Romeo" prays Dominic with his family each night for family prayer time!
Between the 3 that are 6(Rose, Patrick and Bernadette) and the girls that will soon all be 2 (Josephine, Evangeline, and Joy),we have the boys that will all be 5 in September (Luke, Dominic, and Romeo)! Now we will have 3 in a month and a half! Originally they were all due in March. Bobbi termed it "March Madness!"
Baby George! Grandma is missing him and his family and my heart is full and my head is spinning with all that lies ahead for me, and our family as we grow larger in size, but foremost in love and those precious family times we share!
I loved to see him fit in so beautifully! More love to share!
Jesus, how we love you and long to reach heaven forever with you, Mary and all the Saints along with all those loved ones we pray for without ceasing. We are so blessed to have you in Sacrament and Word to help us down the narrow path as we carry/drag our Most Cherished Cross and follow after you. My lifeline - my rosary and your Mother with me each day along with your amazing Saints! May I become the Saint that is just me and die so self so that it is all YOU and not this weak lowly woman. Jesus, we trust in you. Amen and Hallelujah
"There is my Aunt, who loves me and Jesus! I love her prayers for me from the moment she knew I was growing in mom."
Marie Jean sharing how touched she was to be asked to pray for George while we were in France for Hallel's vows - they had just discovered his pregnancy after two losses. "Now to hold him here and so beautiful after praying for him from the beginning is so powerful!" Yes!!!
The chapel of The LIGHT of Mary, the Mother of God/the Little Brothers new Monastery in the heart of our country/Kansas City, Kansas! Her light is so needed to reveal the Truth that is being hidden by the darkness of the culture of death. Lord, hear our prayers! Bless-bless, Barbara Mary Luke
Singing a blessing over baby George, and he is pondering the LOVE all around him as he holds onto her Lamb, which marks her as a bride of Jesus.. the Lamb, who died for us!
This woman is a champion in her fighting the lies of Satan and for The True Church!
Yes!!! Finding faith through brain cancer, and the prayers of his future wife!
Danielle Rose - The saint that is just me
Newsboys - God's not dead
"Of all devotions, that of adoring Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament
is the greatest after the sacraments, the one dearest to God and
the one most helpful to us.' - St Alphonsus Ligouri
Hours of amazing times adoring the Lord!!! The BEST!
Both Fridays I was given the gift of hours with Jesus in the Adoration chapel in Nancy's church. I am in love with being one of the 7 sisters praying for my friend, Father Denny, each Friday! So powerful to sit at His feet!
"He makes it ever clearer to me
that He wants me to burn with love for Him
in devotion to the Blessed Sacrament.
Every time I receive Him
I must feel renewed that longing
which stirs within me to live for Jesus only and
to obtain thegrace of preservation from so many sins
My hero for LIFE and bringing The Community of the Lamb into the heart of our country! Now Hallel has been here for 2 of her 10 years!!!! So grateful to this man!
