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!
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!
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...
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.
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...
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.
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!https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/naumann-praises-federal-rule-that-will-strip-60m-from-planned-parenthood-82261?fbclid=IwAR13ysGiOrWY__QiKGRNnToN00fsS1eiHFnZxXn-V6ne_U3vY5kvgMoHRXQ
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