"I do will it. Be made clean." Luke 5:12-16

Just as there are so many precious pictures for me of the recent journey called truamatic birth/born dead/reborn/healing/thriving-healthy of our 3 month old grandson, Patrick Joseph... there are precious photos that are of our journey called cancer/healing/seminary of our son, John Patrick 3 1/2 years ago!   Such a powerful gift to discover that the Mayo Clinic was founded with deep roots in the Catholic Church.  Our first stop in St Mary's - we soon discovered the glorious chapel, where we fell on our knees as they had to do a biopsy of our son's brain to discover just what the tumors were in his brain.  We were terrified, and truly the storm was raging at this time... "Mom, this is the storm and Jesus is in control."  Hearing this from our daughter, Hallel, in France on the Father's Day we had taken him in to have a CT scan and hear the news that there was something in his brain.  As we were clinging to our Faith - the boat - we saw Jesus rise and rebuke the winds and the sea became calm!  Then our Bishop wrote us and reminded us that at difficult and impossible times to repeat the words - "Jesus, I trust in you."  Yes!  This has been my constant source of HOPE and TRUST and FAITH since!  The journey just has no end!!!!  Now this summer John told us that he was going to enter the seminary to discern and the doors just flew open!!!!  I still just marvel at the thought!

Just before the biopsy with the points on his head that would guide the surgeon!  Why am I revisiting this today?  Today is the 3 year anniversary of when John and I moved to Rochester to begin the process towards his stem cell transplant!  We had finished up the radiation, and had a few weeks to recover enough to have the strength and health he needed to face the total killing of his immune system and then the replanting of his own seeds - stem cells that were harvested in one day!   As usual his young age and health in every other way made him a young David in the face of Goliath or as they called him on the transplant floor - "a rock star." 

Here is a very precious picture of John being annointed by Fr Craig!  We had the total shocking JOY of finding this picture in the midst of a powerful Utube video!  There is no wonder why we find our Church to be so crazy amazing when you look at this view of the Sacraments and the ability we have to be in the presence of our Lord and to receive HIM into ourselves through the Sacraments!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGmK8rIX8H0  Adoramus Te!!!!  We Adore you, Lord!

After his biopsy John couldn't balance or sit upright without falling to his left or back... Here his dad and sister hold him up so that he can eat! 

His shorter wider dad had to help him walk under his left arm - he had ataxia due to the passing of the needle through the back of his brain.  He continues to this day to have a slight ataxia on that side in his hand and his foot!  He is the new humble and better John in that he found his faith - such a beautiful story in this year of FAITH!

http://dnu.org/news/documents/JAN.2013MASTERISSUE.pdf

If you haven't had a chance to read this... John's perspective on the whole experience is quite wonderful to read!    For the article they thought to use a picture taken just recently outside the chapel at St John Vianey Seminary with his sister and Fr Paul Timmerman, but John really want to have the picture of his family taken just in the first week of his journey as we were all brought together - even Susan came to be with him from France! 

I love these pictures of the two sibs together for support and a few laughs in the midst of the unbelievable happening - our 20 year old son with brain cancer.  How can there be any hope, O Lord?  Well, with all the sacraments, the Word, the angels and the Saints, and Our Lady, Queen of Heaven and earth - along with a virtual army of prayer warriors and FAMILY... the cancer had no chance of winning.  Jesus looked at "the man full of leprosy- he fell prostate and pleaded with him, and said, 'Lord, if you wish you can make me clean.' " From the Gospel today in Luke 5!  If you have read John's story - you know that he had lack of faith and his life was unclean - sin separated him from the knowledge and LOVE of God - Faith!  But when he half-heartedly asked for Faith and in a week the cancer struck!  Suddenly... weak, terrified and the control of his life taken away - he realized - "this is what I asked for, and Lord, I do believe in YOU!  Now Lord, save me and make me clean! "  It took a long month after month journey with twists and turns in terrifying directions as we climbed the mountain pass with a sheer drop off the side at any moment to finally reach the summit of Complete Responce - Christ Rules!  Then we dropped the bomb with the stem cell transplant and John was killed and raised to newness of LIFE with a second birthday - the day his seeds were planted in his now clean soil!  The weeds/cancer had been obliterated once and for all!  "I do will it!  Be made clean."  Thank you, Lord!  No wonder that John now has the burning question in his heart, mind and soul - "Why did you spare me Lord?  Am I to be your priest?"  

Jesus, we are filled with so much wonder and gratitude when we look at the way you answered the prayers of so many... they "fell prostrate, and pleaded" with You, O my loving and forgiving Jesus!  John continues to have so much support on this journey!  So many tell him of their prayers for him as he walks down this new and beautiful path called seminary/discernment of the call!  He asked for Faith and found it in the Cross!  We all find LIFE through the Cross in our lives and in dying to self we are able to then find the True Happiness as a Disciple of YOU, Jesus! 

Jesus, I trust in you.  Amen and Halelluia 

Bless-bless, Barb

"Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes the Jesus in the Son of God?... God gave us eternal LIFE, and this LIFE is in the Son.  Whoever possesses the Son has LIFE!"  I John 5 - the first reading at mass today!  Jesus, we are yours and want to be totally cleansed and then use that new LIFE and health to serve you and follow after YOU carrying our Most Cherished Cross!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaCR24-tkWI  - If I touch HIM by Danielle Rose!  May we touch the hem of your garment, Lord and be healed!  We touch YOU, O Lord, in your Eucharist!!! 

Happy 3 month birthday, Patrick Joseph!

Yes, I borrowed this from Maria's blog. She just updated it, and it has been a whole month!  I wonder why she isn't more like her mom?  She called me on my day away to tell me about his picture, and it is a gift!  Patrick just had his 3 month birthday yesterday on 1-9-13!  So it is such a joy to have this great picture to celebrate once again the miracle he is!  Thank you, Lord! 

I borrowed a couple others of David Joseph, who just had his 3rd birthday on Dec 21! Looking daper in his big boy tie, and loving it so much that he wears it as often as he can manage!  Looking so great Dave! Then...

This one really made me smile with great delight!  Jesus, we trust in you.  Bless-bless, Barb

Prayer- cows

The times on the road are my best times for prayer!  Today we head out on two trips with cattle to market... one bunch towards the Cities to Buffalo Lake, and the other to Pipestone, and then Sioux Falls from there.  It will be a long day in the pickup with my farmer husband, and we pray and talk a lot!  Even when we are visiting the rosary will be going through my fingers and the prayers will be prayed for family, and those that have asked for prayers.  The intentions change and it just is as the every breath that I take and every beat of my heart!  I feel that we will be on the road with Jesus and his Mother, Mary Most Holy...and we are! 

Bullseye is easy to spot and was out in the front again yesterday as I watched the gate!  David would have liked to see him, but he was at school.  Jesus, it is so wonderful that we can have this day together with my Most Cherished Cross.  Give us safety and growth in the knowledge and LOVE of YOU!  Jesus, we trust in you.  Amen and Halleluia

Bless-bless, Barb

"Jesus, this night I choose to forgive ________.

Please take this judgement away. 

Take a deep breath, hold it, and let it go."  Deacon Ralph Poyo

Lacy Oval/heartshaped Velvety Ever/sweet and good lasting versus Laborious Organic/dirty Violent Earth-shattering

Maria admires the big hand and feet prints of her son, as he lies recovering in NICU about 3 months ago now!  This morning I am going back there in my soul and heart.  The first reading from I John is about LOVE, and isn't he the doctor of LOVE in both his Gospel and his books in the Bible?  Pondering that this morning I looked for some acronyms which could help us visualize the difference between the sugar sweet phony idea of love, and the Real LOVE which we see in the Cross of Christ!

Lacy Oval/heart-shaped Velvety Ever-sweet-and-good-lasting

Vs

Laborious/Hard Organic/dirty/sweaty/bloody Violent Earth-shattering

If given the choice is it any wonder that we would choose the easy and bunny cute one?  Yet, it is the later type of LOVE that leads us to LIFE everlasting, and is what we need to put our selfishness to death!  Real honest and True LOVE is not all sweetness and light, we all have seen time and time again that it is the hard times that we turn to Jesus and embrace our Cross which brings us to LIFE!

Joseph had just returned from the horrors of war to face the critical condition of this son, who had been born dead after being without oxygen for 20 minutes!  "He is the sickest baby in here!"  We were told to our shock by the doctors.  This tiny helpless newborn baby was the image of the little Lamb - spotless lamb on the Cross!  "God is LOVE, and whoever remains in his love remains in God and God in him."  I John 4:11-18  And how did God Truly and in Reality show HIS LOVE for us? - Yes, by coming to dwell with us as a baby and then a man, and then to sacrifice himself - the spotless Lamb for us!  So how do we in turn love one another?  By being Real about LOVE and dying to self so that we can give without counting the cost to those in first of all our domestic Church/family and then to all those that we come in contact with. 

Little David Joseph is so proud of his dad and missed him terribly while he was gone.  Daily prayer and mass was necessary for them to keep Joseph safe in a very dangerous and hard place.   He lost men just days after he arrived there... can you imagine looking for body parts of 6 men after a vehicle was blown up by a bomb?  Horrible and leaving scars within!  Now to prayerfully keep vigil beside his son in the NICU!  Yet, prayers were answered, and Patrick recovered with each and every day!  Tests were done on his brain and they showed no damage.  The EEG showed some little connection issues and so he continues to be on siezure meds until he is 12 months, but otherwise he is thriving!  Prayer at work without a doubt, and we give thanks where thanks is due - Jesus!!!

Mother and son after sharing the Cross!  I can see Mary kissing the nailscarred hand of her Son, when he appears to her resurrected on the 3rd day!  We all know that he went to her first!  The same Mother's LOVE - never dying, always faithful, filled with constant praying without ceasing!  Deacon Ralph spoke last night that if we call upon Christ to rid the demonic possession and harrasment in our lives - they leave, but also if we invoke the name of Mary his Mother - She is the Mother of God! 

O Jesus, today in the Gospel after you had gone off to the Mountain to pray... you saw that the disciples were struggling and walked across the water but not to them - you intended to pass them by, until they cried out in terror at the sight of YOU.  Lord, why do we not realize that you can do anything if we just Trust in YOU, and leave the fear and shame behind us?  We are so weak and want to find the easy way out of this world, but when we fall for the fake and phony love we find that it is impossible to sustain.  It leads to broken homes, and broken marriages, and broken people.  It leads to following false gods of all that is selfish.  We find True LOVE in the Cross, O Lord.  It is Hard, Bloody, Agonizing and kills all that is not YOU in us!  We need it to find True Happiness in LIFE and LOVE!  May we go down the narrow path carrying our Most Cherished Cross - LOVE!  Laborious/hard Organic/dirty/sweaty/bloody Violent Earth-shattering!  Chase the devil out of our lives, O Lord!  Jesus, we trust in you.  Amen and Halleluia

Bless-bless, Barb

Dear Family and Friends-

"Our family has had some dynamic experiences in the last months.  These have been saturated with suffering, deep sadness, and moments of near despair.  Yet, they have led us to a single, all-convicting conclusion: Life is about one thing, and one thing only: LOVE.  It is love that is worth doing, being, having. Period.  And it's not the 'good feeling' part.  It's the real stuff - the dirty stuff - the fighting stuff - the life-transforming stuff.  Why is this?  Because it is our very nature.  God is love.  Not in the cheesy sense of a fly-by-night Sunday school session, but in the real sense of gift,of sacrifice, of service- of death-to-self.  God's nature compels Him to want good things for us - and He infused this construction in us at our creation - and continues to grow it by grace.  No matter the suffering, no matter the evil to be had, there is nothing more powerful.  There is no power in hell, no device of man that can overcome this.  The extreme anxiety had over a newborn's traumatic birth or the horror of the battlefields of Afghanistan can only be authentically engaged by a single act of LOVE.  This is the most beautiful reality."

Christmas 2012

So many blessings!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVjxmOzsgp8  Watch the Lamb by Ray Boltz

Thank you, Lord, for your death to LIFE everlasting! 

Share the LIFE with others - my JOY

We had the opportunity to share with the visiting Mission deacon about our daughter, Little Sister Hallel and the amazing community of the Lamb she is a part of!  How we love to inform others of her wonderful LIFE and here JOY in that LIFE!  It is such pure blessing that our little ones can have her for their aunt Little Sister Hallel, and not even realize just how special that is.  To them it is just ordinary and nothing out of the ordinary to have a nun for a aunt!  Just like Mary has no idea that she has a heifer for a pet and can walk out into the pasture to pet her and spend time with her... doesn't every 6 year old have a cow for a pet?  Doesn't every 4 year old have an aunt, who wears a habit and has a big beaming smile on her face and is the Bride of Christ?  So special and so unaware of just how special they are! 

Hallel brings little 6 month old Rose over to touch and hang out with Our Lady of Guadalupe!  Rose also likes to get her new teeth into Hallel's cross that shows that she is in formation in the Community - taken her first vows.  Final vows will happen in about another 5 years or so, and then she will wear a Lamb around her neck.

"This is my spouse, Rose, I have given HIM my all, and He has given me great JOY and PEACE and LOVE - all the fruits of the Spirit!  I want that for you too little Rose Ida!"

"You make me happy too, Aunt Hallel!"

"I will ask Jesus if he wants me to wear the Cross of the Lamb someday too."  It is a life that all young people should consider as a possible call of our Lord to them.  In order to find happiness we need to give up our lives and allow Christ to LIVE in us and our LIGHT will shine for all to see!  Jesus, we trust in you.  Bless-bless, Barb

"sent His Son as expiation for our sins." I John 4:7-10

Pat came home from the mission last night filled with the Truth!  "He really gave it to us straight that Satan is alive and that he is influencing us in ways that we don't even know."  "He told parents that we need to get our children to confession monthly or even weekly.  He said that only 3% of Catholics use the sacrament of reconcilliation, and that it is the most underutilized sacrament!"  Pat and I both are so glad that the two retreats we are actively involved in use so powerfully the sacrament of reconcilliation.  We have both seen such powerful changes in people, and they all are having to do with coming to this sacrament for the first time ever or after a very long time away!  I have a brother, who made TEC 13 years ago and made his first ever confession.  He was so transformed and filled with the Spirit - meeting his loving and forgiving Savior up close and personal for the first time... He was higher than a kite for months!  Imagine carrying such a heavy load of sin after years of living away from Faith and the Church... then coming face to face with Christ in the confessional through the priest... laying all those burdens at His feet and "seeing" with the eyes of our heart the unconditional forgiveness Jesus has for us.   I can still hear my 8 year old grandson, Simon, in his sweet clear voice say this while we were praying together before bed.  He recently had his first ever reconcilliation as he is now in 2nd grade in Catholic School here in town!  He has since been greatly aware of his need to keep "washed clean" to be always close to Jesus!
"My God,


I am sorry for my sins with all my heart.

In choosing to do wrong and failing to do good,

I have sinned against you

whom I should love above all things.

I firmly intend, with your help,

to do penance, to sin no more,

and to avoid whatever leads me to sin.

Our Saviour Jesus Christ suffered and died for us.

In His Name, my God, have mercy.
Amen. "

Simon is leading the way for his younger siblings - “If you are not living for Jesus, you are living for Satan.” was a quote from Deacon Ralph last over the last few nights!  Simon just cried and cried after he realized the day after he had gone to his first confession that he had sinned by getting mad and pushing away his younger brother..."I've sinned, I've sinned, I am not washed clean!"  Lord, how we need to keep that clear vision on YOU, and how we need to keep all that keeps us apart from you out of our lives!  Pat was sharing with our daughter, Nancy, about last night and how Deacon shared that in Christ alone we have great JOY in our lives.  "It reminded me of Hallel and her community and how they are always so joyful and happy.  They have taken all those distractions out of their lives - TV, reading, what we are to wear or how we look, so many things that take our time and attention are just not there for them to concern themselves with .  Plus they have daily mass, prayers and the time in front of Jesus in adoration... Wow, it is understandable to see how they can be so close to their spouse, Jesus Christ!"

Lord, today in the Gospel you feed the 5,000 with 5 loaves and 2 fish!  Sitting there on the hillside in groups of 50-100 in the green grass.... seeing the doubt filling the faces of the disciples as they tell us to sit and be fed... looking up to see Jesus lift the loaves to heaven and break them and break them over and over and over... then we are given a piece of bread and fish as the disciples handed it out to us.  We eat and are filled with food after a long day of watching with great awe as he healed me, and all those that were "sick with various diseases and racked with pain, those who were possessed, lunatics, and paralytics, and he cured them."  Jesus, you heal me over and over in the confessional, and at mass, and my times on my knees in your presence in the monstrance in Adoration!  I yearn to be YOURS and to walk away from all the distractions of LIFE, and LOVE, and LIGHT!  The miraculous meal from your LOVE for us - "His heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd."  Mark 6 - the Gospel today

Lord, I love you, and need you, and want to serve YOU with all that I have!  Jesus, I trust in you.  Amen and Halleluia

Bless-bless, Barb

"We are asked to see beyond the visible world with our eyes, but with Christ's vision, and he is light.  We must see with Christ's eyes, hear with Christ's ears, heal with Christ's hands, speak with Christ's words, live with Christ's life.  Above all we must love with Christ's heart. 

 Only love can give life.

Only Christ's love can redeem and forgive and illumine.  Only Christ's love can waken the world from apathy to wonder.

Only Christ's love can quicken the world with new life.  Love is given only in man's gift to himself.  There is no other way.

Christ had only himself.  He has given to us, that we may love the world with his love and that the world may live."  Caryll Houselander (1954)