More Than an Idea

Prayer is precisely this “vital and personal relationship with the living and true God” ( Catechism of the Catholic Church 2558). Our capacity and our willingness to enter into relationship, into union with God, with the Most Holy Trinity—Father, Son, and Spirit—defines the peak and purpose of Christian prayer. Mary’s Annunciation in Luke’s Gospel provides a bold and practical exploration of this prayer. Mary’s prayer begins as the Angel Gabriel is “sent from God” (Luke 1:26). God initiates and Mary participates. She enters into the life of the Holy Trinity as she receives the very of Life of the Son of God in her womb. “The Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28). This means God the Father dwells with Mary; His favor, His grace, rests upon her. This implies that Mary recognizes, or grows to recognize her dignity and identity as one who is loved, by God whose deepest identity is Love (1 John 4:8). Christian prayer begins with this recognition: God is Father, I am Son, I am Daughter—

“If ever there was a time when humanity needed followers of Christ and fewer fence-sitters, that time is now.” (Doherty, Catherine: The Gospel Without Compromise, 76). Catherine Doherty’s words—written nearly 40 years ago—still speak to my heart. Humanity’s heart is wounded; we are witnesses to abuse and abortion, pornography and power-hungry politicians. The list can, and does, go on. Humanity needs followers of Christ, those who share in His prophetic mission to “bring glad tidings to the poor,” to set the captives—prisoners to injustice, addiction, and especially sin—free! And most importantly to proclaim a “year acceptable to the Lord,” to announce in boldness and charity that now is the time of Mercy (Luke 4:18-19); that Jesus Christ has come to reconcile us, not to condemn us (cf. John 3:17). The Gospel is the battle cry on behalf of the Kingdom of God—a message fulfilled in Christ, which must take root in us. Earlier this year, one of the professed friars that I live

“I cannot think of anything more important for us than to work at establishing the conviction that God is Father.” What does it mean for me to call God my Father? Often I imagine some of us may cringe at the idea of “overemphasizing” the fatherhood of God. Whether we gawk at this statement because of our wounded relationships within our families, our religious convictions, or our political persuasions, Christians must work to boldly proclaim this scriptural reality: that to Jesus, and unto us, God is Father. As Creator, God is Father. The Father begets. God “fathers” creation. It is from God that all earthly men become fathers. Often we are afraid or resistant to call God by this beautiful, bold name because we see Him in light of our warped relationships with famished and fallen fathers. God is the first and the last, the beginning and the end—the first and the final Father for us all. To cry out to Him in faith, in abandonment and trust, is to be a true child. And this Advent

“Advent is the season of the seed… Advent is the season of the secret…” ( The Reed of God, Caryll Houselander 27-28). Advent is a time of preparation for the birth of Jesus Christ. Jesus “arrives,” “comes,” ( advenire) unto us in the flesh, born of the Virgin Mary of Nazareth. The Church’s season of Advent awaits this birth. We celebrate this coming, this sowing of the word, of the seed of God. This is the seed that has been sown in secret before the dawn of our creation. That God would come to us as “Emmanuel” –as one who is “with us”—in Christ, in the flesh, as man, truly a “God who is with us” (Matthew 1:22-23). This Advent season I have been struck by the constant reminder of what this season is… that it is a time where seeds are sown. This is a time where secrets are made manifest. This is a time of waiting, a time of longing, a time of not only trimming a tree but moreover trimming the grist and grime that surrounds my interior life—my heart, the core and seat o

"What can one say to the person who says: “I would like to, but I can’t!” Nothing more than to say that one must want to want to! That is the first step. I want to means that I am using all the means thereto, while I’d want to means that I am afraid to use them all for some may cost me too dearly in matters of self-love." If we do not have a desire for holiness, we must pray to desire holiness. If we do not have a desire to even want to desire holiness, then we must let our prayer begin there. "God is at work in you, to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Phil 2:13). The Holy Spirit will work in us in so far as we avail ourselves to these actions and movements of grace... Come Holy Spirit ...  "Such souls still are possessed by a great deal of self-love, egoism and even spiritual self-conceit. Must one want to be a saint? Of course, and firmly." To desire to become a saint is not selfish. In fact, if grounded upon the

The Moral of the Story is...  I’m a sorry and sour excuse for an English major. Before coming into college, I would not have described myself as a reader. I admit—much to my chagrin—that in my AP Literature class in high school I couldn’t finish (or was too lazy to finish) T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral. More so, I struggled to start and even persevere through William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying —so much so that I gave up on it after the first few sections… I’m sorry Mrs. Healey! (And yes, two years later, after committing to studying English at Duke, I picked up Faulkner’s book to read it in full…) Evidently, prose, drama, and poetry, the very bare bones composition of a degree in literature, have been a stumbling block for me. However, something changed, something clicked, once I began studying literature in college. While studying Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, I realized that I had been reading for a moral, a point. What happens? Is Hester, the woman branded wi