Joy and Strength

Two of the most common complaints among Christians are "Why aren't I happy?" and "Why am I so weak?" We always ask God for strength and happiness. We have a hard time understanding why we have to face so much sacrifice and pain. Yet we always find a way to comfort ourselves, reminding ourselves that God has a plan and just have faith. However, sometimes that's easier said than done.

I always refer to my growing up as being very cliché. I was raised Catholic, always went to church, etc. Everybody at my church thought I was the picture perfect Catholic youth. There was always that pressure on me to be perfect. If I had any problems, I couldn't talk about them. "Just deal with it and be better," is what I'd always tell myself. Soon enough, those problems that I ignored and kept hidden took over my life. The feelings I kept buried inside me soon began to push everything else away, including my relationship with God. There was just such a pressure to be perfect. How could I be perfect and have problems at the same time? It got to the point where I just couldn't deal anymore. I didn't want to live anymore. Nothing was ever good enough. Nothing. There was an emptiness in my heart where I had gotten rid of God. I had lost all faith. Why would he make life so difficult? Why couldn't I make perfect grades and be super pretty and just be happy? Soon I began trying to fill the hole in my heart with comforts other than what should have been Christ's love. I tried physical self harm, attention from boys because if I didn't have a boyfriend, then I wasn't being perfect, but soon even that wasn't enough and the road I was traveling down kept getting darker and narrower (believe it or not, i'm not even going into very much detail about how very dark this time was for me). I began to hate myself and life. I started doing drugs, because I didn't even want to be in my own state of mind. What was the point if who I was wasn't perfect?

Then, the summer after my Sophomore year, I went back to the Pines Catholic Camp. This was my 5th year at the camp, so it was nothing new. I figured I'd just go through the motions and try to make the week go by as quickly as possible. Halfway through the week we had Adoration and during Adoration, we were given the opportunity to go to confession. Now, at this point in my life, sitting in front of the Holy Eucharist, knowing all the sins on my heart, I felt truly embarrassed. I began to sob. I just started apologizing over and over again to God for everything I'd done to offend him, but I knew that wasn't enough, so I went to confession. I didn't leave a single detail out. I just took all my sins and laid them down at the Lord's feet, and said "This is it God. This is all I have to offer. This is all that's left of me. I'm broken. I'm empty. I'm imperfect. Guide me." I had an awesome priest help me confess too. And he told me some of the best advice ever. Some of his words still stick with me: "God suffered enough for you. You don't need to suffer anymore." And it was so simple, what he said. It made so much sense, like DUH! But it was exactly what I needed to hear. So as I walked back into the chapel, I stared straight into God's face on the crucifix and smiled. I was overwhelmed with joy! I couldn't cry, anymore! I didn't want to! I just wanted to laugh and be joyful. It was definitely a life changing moment.

Now, returning home after that though, of course, wasn't so easy. My past still haunted me, and I hadn't quite forgiven myself, which made the healing process very difficult. I hadn't quite "cleaned up my act" (for lack of a better phrase) until about halfway through the year when I realized that this person I was, this person that I struggled to change from, was not who God wanted me to be, and I knew that in the summer I'd be returning to the Pines and I would want to be as guilt free as possible.

So back at the Pines a year later, I went to confession and cleared my mind of every guilt that I had. But I still struggled with wanting to be perfect. What college should I go to? What should I major in? What's my vocation? I was stressed out beyond believe. Now this year at camp, I was a CIT (Counselor in Training), which meant I was supposed to be a role model for all these other campers, and on top of that, I had my own cabin of campers. Twelve middle school girls in specific that were going to lean on me for guidance for an entire week! So at Adoration, I knelt before God and asked him "How am I supposed to be strong enough to care for and support these girls, when I can barely take care of myself?" and He answered to me: There is joy in sacrifice and there is strength in weakness.
I prayed on those words for a minute and then felt compelled to look up at the crucifix and when I did, it was like BAM! There's your proof. God sacrificed is only son for us! Jesus sacrificed His life for us. For sinners. But He did not despair over it. He was willing. He is joy! He is strength! He suffered through complete weakness, so that He may be our strength and our rock.
"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." 2 Corinthians 12:9

My friends, you are never alone. You are never so low, that God cannot pick you back up. We are His children and His love for us is without boundaries. We will endure hard times, but that's just it. We will endure. I know that sometimes it feels as if we have strayed so far from Christ's path, that we will never find our way back, but Christ is our light. You are never so lost, that He cannot find you. All God wants, is for us to love him. If we just open our hearts to Him and let Him take control, He will guide us.

"The LORD will fight for you, you have only to keep still." Exodus 14:14

God bless,
Becca Jane Hughes

Wholehearted Prayer

Jesus said to them in reply, "Have faith in God. Amen, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it shall be done for him. Therefore I tell you, all that you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it and it shall be yours. When you stand to pray, forgive anyone against whom you have grievance, so that your heavenly Father may in turn forgive you your transgressions."

- Mark 11:22-26

I was recently enlightened on the topic of prayer as I sat through a sermon at the Austin Stone, a worship service for all Christian faiths, earlier this summer. After the insightful experience, I changed the way in which I converse with God, and, as a result,  the power of prayer and its work in my life have become more evident to me. Today, I would like to share with you some of my realizations and convey some of the information that was once given to me.

As I have pondered my prayer life, I have come to the realization that prayer is an extraordinary gift from God. We could be left in desolation, left to figure out life and interpret God's word on our own, but the Lord allows us to actually speak with Him and He responds to our prayers, helping to illuminate the path that He has laid out for us in what sometimes seems like total darkness, total confusion. Think about that for a minute: an almighty God helping and listening to his unworthy creation. If we do not utilize this gift, we are just scratching the surface of what God has in store for us.

Wholehearted prayer is to God, through Jesus, and by faith. First, I would like to focus on "to God". We may, often times, think about our problems to ourselves and consider those thoughts and self-reflections to be prayers to God, but they are not prayers at all. When we forget to pray TO GOD (a seemingly obvious detail) we are missing out on the grace of his response to us.

The second major aspect of wholehearted prayer is "through Jesus".

Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father. And whatever you ask in my name, I will do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything of me in my name, I will do it.

- John 14:12-14

Jesus tells us here that we have the same access to God that He does. Jesus tells us here that when God sees us, He views us in the same way that He sees Jesus: as a son or daughter that He loves. Jesus tells us here that if we pray through Him, He will give us what we ask for. Now, in order to pray through Jesus, we all have to define ourselves through His works rather than through our own. However, when we base our days on the works of Jesus, on religion, if we have a good day, we tend to pray less because we feel that we do not require it, and if we have a bad day, we tend to pray less because we hate ourselves for falling to sin. It is important to remember that we are loved and that we should be using the gift of prayer on both the spiritually strong and weak days.

The third and final aspect of wholehearted prayer is "in faith".

But if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God who gives all generously and ungrudgingly, and he will be given it. But he should ask in faith, not doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed about by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord, since he is a man of two minds, unstable in all his ways.

-James 1:5-8

Praying in faith is essential. God does not want to hear requests from doubting hearts, and our lack of faith can be seen in a variety of ways when we pray. Our lack of faith is seen when we pray for things that we don't want, but it can also be seen when we don't pray for things that we do want. We can place the right requests, ask God to let us do his will, but not truly desire them. When we don't pray for things that we do want or when we pray general prayers exclusively, we are worried that, if we request things too specifically, the Lord will repudiate our requests; we are worried that He will let us down. Wholehearted prayer is being candid with the Lord, putting it all out there.

James 4:2 tells us that "[we] do not have because [we] do not ask". You may have prayed wholeheartedly before and wondered where your response was. Well I think that, at this point, it is of utmost importance to address the ways in which God can respond to prayers. Everyone knows the cliché that "God works in mysterious ways", but it is true. The Lord may have granted you what you requested of him, but it may take time for you to realize it and it may be in the most unprecedented, most peculiar way. Now, I know many of these quotes seem to portray God as someone who gives us what we ask for no matter what, but I think that many of us know that God does not always have to say "yes", not even to a wholehearted prayer. How do we know this? He said "no" to Jesus when He begged for a way out of his imminent and immense suffering in the garden of Gethsemane (Mark 14:35-36).

Our prayers can bring the Lord to do the impossible. Our prayers can bring change. Through wholehearted prayer, God starts to shape our hearts to want Him more than our request. He makes us want to do anything for Him.

I know this post is already getting lengthy, and you are probably bored by now, but I would like to take this time to briefly describe an instance in my own life in which I have seen the power of wholehearted prayer.

Upon returning home from the Pines Catholic Camp this year, my mother had told me that  my sister was going through some hard times. I do not wish to go into the specifics at this time as I do not fully understand them myself, but part of the predicament was that she felt like nobody heard her, she felt as if she was praying to no one; she was losing faith in God. I immediately started praying for her as wholeheartedly as I knew how to, and I later asked my fellow Counselors in Training to pray for her as well. So I do not consider it a coincidence that, a day or two later, in one of the camp's biggest years ever, days before her departure would be, before the last week of the summer, my mother received an email saying that a spot had just become available for my sister to go to the Pines this year.

Our late registration had left her on the waiting list and her desire to go was at an all time low. As we heard the news at dinner that night, I was so excited for her! I simply could not contain my smiles and joy at this amazing opportunity! It was this joy that I displayed, when describing how ecstatic I was, when describing how awesome her first year of fire village was going to be, that changed her mind and actually caused her excitement to grow as well (for those of you that do not know, fire village is the group of cabins with the eldest kids and it is, in my opinion, the most spiritually powerful). The night before, she could not even sleep because of her excitement, and she returned a much brighter, happier person. I still think back in awe and amazement. This is what wholehearted prayer to God, through Jesus, and in faith can do.

God Bless,
Caleb Blackerby

CROSSed Up

Carrying Your Cross

 "As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth.  His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes.  “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing."

John 9:1-8

A cross. Two pieces of wood connected together. Such a simple creation with yet such a  complex, rich, meaning. Yet for the longest time I felt as if the cross was just that simple definition, those two beams that Jesus lumbered up the hill to die on, those two sticks knotted together around people's necks, those two pieces of psalms that I used to connect on that special Sunday, those shapes that my mom collected to put in our living room. To me, the cross was an overused mascot of the Christian faith, a spiritual makeup if you will, that people threw on to cover up their religious shortcomings.

 This view of the cross stayed pretty stagnant for me until a retreat I attended to with my school. During the retreat A lot of focus was paid onto the symbol of the cross, yet the way it was described was in a way that abolished pre-conceived notions. He talked about how everybody has a cross to bear, and no one is given a cross to heavy to carry. Now when one thinks of bearing a cross, instantly modifiers of suffering flow through the cerebral cortex ( fancy word for your mind), however this priest talked about the positivity and pleasure in bearing a cross. He said these words which still stick with me, "you don't HAVE to carry your cross, you GET to carry his cross." Now I don't know about you, but lugging a 100 pound wood specimen up a steep hill (metaphorically) isn't exactly my idea of a good time, so this saying made about as much sense to me as the popularity of that crazy Korean song Gangnam Style (no idea how people like that song). However as I began to meditate and pray about those words, I came to realize the joy in bearing my own cross.

August 15, 1999, the date God blessed me with the best cross anyone could ask for, my little brother Joseph Allen Lucido. Joseph was my first sibling, so naturally I was ecstatic when hearing I was going to be a big brother. However that joy was short lived, as early in Joseph's life we realized that he had some serious health problems. As an infant he failed his hearing test, as the doctors declared he had some hearing issues, he then failed to start crawling or walking, while also continuously crying in his early years. My parents knew something was seriously wrong with him, so they took him to numerous doctors. Finally they received a diagnosis: encephalopathy, which basically means that his muscles don't properly connect to his brain, his brain will send a message through the nervous system to the muscles, yet the muscles will never receive it. He can't eat through his mouth, can only see outlines, can't speak, has limited hearing, can't talk, can't walk, can't get up, can't even control his muscles. All these "can't's" produced a huge can for my parents, "Can we take care of him?" With God as their strength my parents have done everything for him for all of his 13 almost 14 years of life, talk about sacrificial love. To me their actions are the nearest imitations of Christ's sacrificial love for us, Christ dictates his agape (fancy word meaning love) by dying on the CROSS, while my parents dictate their's through their CROSS, my brother.

But what I really wanted to talk about was the incredible effect of my brother on me. At first, I thought of Joseph like I thought of Jesus's cross, a burden, a cause for suffering, something to almost be ashamed of. When we would take him out in public, people would stare, people would always ask what happened to him, why he couldn't talk, why he couldn't walk, and those reactions really hurt me, just as the initial pain of the cross hurt Jesus. I would not like spending time with him, and get angry when my parents would talk to me about him, I shied away from the cross, and Peter and the rest of his Jesus' disciples did. However as I grew older, as my understanding of the symbolic nature of the cross transformed, my understanding of my brother transformed. I figured out how happy and content he is, by his huge smiles and loud belly laughs, I learned how brave he is, having to go to the hospital all the time, I learned how pure he is, (if you think about it since he can't talk or control his muscles he pretty much has never committed a sin) but most importantly I learned how much I love him, and how much he loves me.

That's what brings me to the bible verse at the top of the page. Ever since I can remember I have loved this story from the gospel of John, because it really does hit close to home for me and family. Sometimes when it comes to my brother, people are like Jesus' disciples who asked which one sinned, the parents or the son: they just don't understand the situation. But for me, my brother is that light that Jesus talks about in the passage, he is that inspiration I can always lean on when I'm forsaken. The line that hits me the most is "but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him".  Joseph who never has spoken a word, has become a true source of words for me to express my deepest conviction as a Christian. Joseph who is so vulnerable has become a source of strength for me to help announce the mystery of Christ. Joseph who cannot eat by himself, has shown me the importance of nourishing myself in the everlasting bread of the Eucharist. He who cannot expressly visually recognize me, has helped me clearly recognize God's blessing in my life. Joseph, whose life seems so simple, has helped me realize the unbelievable complexity  of living in today's society. Truly the works of God have been displayed through him.

As teenagers in Christ, I think a lot of times our relationship with Jesus can be like my relationship with my brother. Since my brother can't talk, conversations with him are heavily one sided, just like our prayers with God sometimes, we feel like we are doing all the talking. Also Joseph's condition is largely unknown, we don't know exactly what he can or can't do, just like how God can be completely unknown to us sometimes, not knowing how he is going to touch our lives next. Also I love my brother, and he loves me   while he has never told me that, I know that he loves me cause he is my brother. Same goes with our relationship with Christ, while he has never texted you saying "I love you", ( if he has then I would love the number please), but we still know and feel his infinite love and mercy for us.

For your reflection: try to think about what cross God has placed in your life: maybe that's a call to the religious life, maybe it's a kid who you just can't stand at your school, maybe it's a friend who has gone off the wrong path. Reflect on that cross, maybe the weight of that cross feels overwhelming to you, remember even Jesus himself had a little help in the form of Simon helping carry the cross. If that is a case find a Simon, someone who can hell you bear that cross, a youth minister, a friend, a parent, a spiritual director.  Then try to think of how you can take this cross of suffering and turn it into a cross of resurrection, of joy, something to be praised. Then pray about it, ask The Lord for strength, cause remember God doesn't give us anything you can't handle.

If you have any questions, comments about what a handsome strapping young man I seem to be, concerns, or just need someone to talk to, I would be happy to hear from you. You can reach me at 214-934-8707 or email me at lucido.john@yahoo.com.


Gig 'Em and God Bless

John Michael Lucido

Have Faith

As much as it (occasionally) ticks me off, I have to accept that the entire library of human knowledge and experience can't be held by one person. In other words, if I'm ever gonna have a chance at, you know, figuring it all out, I'm gonna have to borrow. A lot. What I write isn't completely my own; it's an amalgam of anything and everything I've read, heard, thought, or otherwise stumbled across.

What if we're wrong and the atheists are right? What if none of this is real? What if when we die nothing happens? I'd always looked at death as the final moment of truth. When I die, that's when I'd know for sure that Catholicism was "real," because my soul would leave my body and go to Purgatory and then heaven. At that point I considered myself to be an agnostic (Catholic) theist. But before even then, I had considered the whole atheist agnostic theist self descriptors to be on a linear scale. Atheism = don't believe in gods, agnosticism = not sure either way, and theism = believe in god. But then I found this chart. 

It separates belief and knowledge into two dimensions instead of keeping them in one. That made a whole lot more sense to me, especially because at that point I had pretty much accepted it's impossible to scientifically prove that God exists. So that's where I was. I believed but didn't know. 

I'm ditching the chronological narration at this point because it makes what I'm trying to say even more difficult. 

That chart needs to be scrapped, done away with, destroyed, with fire preferably. Lots of fire. It trivializes belief by creating a false separation between it and reason. The words say that they're axes of knowledge and belief, but they implicate that they're axes of rationality and irrationality. And this right here is the big problem in the dialogue between atheism and religion. The misconception that our set of beliefs, our faith, is irrational. From here is where all the nasty criticisms of religion stem. That faith is for the stupid and unenlightened. That to have faith is to throw reason out the window and shut your eyes to the world around you. That it’s a Bronze age understanding of life that has no place in the modern world. We don’t need faith anymore because we have science.

I freaking love science, the whole STEM shebang really. Science, despite its difficulty, despite its seeming convolutedness (cough cough AP Physics B), is beautiful. Science allows us to interact with the world on new and profound levels. We can create food more efficiently, communicate at the speed of light, control disease and make life better. Theoretical science goes even farther, describing phenomena from the micro to macroscopic with incredible precision and completeness, precision and completeness that some interpret as enough to replace God.

If we believed in a God who was just an explanation for things we couldn’t explain, then I’m fairly certain that Christianity would have disappeared just like all the other “gods of the gaps,” you know, Zeus, Thor, Ra, the works. The reason science can never replace God is because science itself is incredibly limited. Science only has one domain in which it can operate, the world of empiricism, the world of the senses. The idea behind the scientific paradigm is that it provides a coherent explanation for all observed phenomena and provides a framework for looking for new problems to solve and then solving them. Sciences is finite but we crave the infinite. That’s why science can never provide the same satisfaction that religion does. It’s good but not good enough. Life is too much trouble, too full strangeness and beauty to arrive at the end and have empirical science as the best explanation. 

You are a subject, an individual, unique perspective of the cosmos, experiencing life in a way that only you will ever know and that no one else will ever be able to replicate, because to do so would mean that they were you. In fact, because it can’t be replicated, how am I supposed to know that you are having the same deep and intensely personal experience I am having? Sure, I can learn things about you on my own, what you look like, where you go to school or work, who your friends are. Yet compile all those together and at the very most, you’re nothing but a cardboard cutout compared to the three dimensional, fully real person that I know myself to be. That is, until we begin to communicate and interact, and suddenly, through your words and actions, a common thread appears between us. I begin to see that you, like me, have desires that drive you, fears that haunt you, experiences that shape you and ideas that define you. Through what you revealed to me, I can come to know that you are also a subject, like me. But these revelations were made by you, not me, I did not come to them on my own. If I am to replace cardboard you with the three dimensional you, I have to trust you and these revelations you made. 

Just as I can use reason to learn about you, I can use reason to learn about God. I can determine that God exists, that God is good, and that God created the universe (I wanna say this as un-hypocritically as possible, but I’d rather not get into the details of these claims - in the interest of not having to preface what I want to say with a few books). But the God we believe in,  the God I believe in, is more than this, just like you are more than your looks and where you go to school. And that is because God, in a way that is similar (and at the same time, as far removed as possible) to the way you reveal yourself to me, has revealed Himself to us. And THAT is where faith, actual faith comes in, as the free assent to the whole truth that a God has revealed  (CCC 150). The Unmoved Mover, the Almighty, the great I AM has revealed itself to be more than an it, as a Father who knew us before we existed (Jer 1:5), who called us by name claimed us as belonging to Him (Is 43:1), who so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life (Jn 3:16).

Exposed to this incredible Truth by the One who can neither deceive nor be deceived, it seems we have no choice but to respond with an act if faith, not because we are being forced, but because anything less than a full commitment if mind, heart, and soul would be inadequate and irrational. Faith opens up to us a new life, a life infused with the love of Love Himself, and thus faith becomes more than a leap into the darkness. It becomes a light. A light shining out of the past from the memory of the perfect life of the Word made flesh. A perfect life that ended with the perfect sacrifice, throwing open the doors of death so that faith not only shines out of the past but radiates from the future as the memory of the promise of eternal life. 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

- John 1:1-5

 

We Are Called

Blogs and blogging, what are they and what are they for? I could care less. I post this "Blog" with a story and a message that I would like to share to all who mainly struggle about their purpose in life. So without further ado let us begin with The Sign of The Cross, In the name of The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit, Amen.

What I'm about to tell you here in this "Blog" is technically my witness with a message about The Lord touching my heart, giving me faith, and that he has called me to take action in my faith. Now before I tell my witness I would like to give you a brief experience of my past faith life.

As usual I was born into a Catholic family and from deep within I appreciate what The Lord has granted me. Although being born into a Catholic family I had my ups and downs. Ever since I started to learn who God was I've never taken my faith seriously. To me it was like a simple game of belief. I would go through the motions every time I go to mass and I would feel like it was pointless for me to be at church because I thought only the faithful really go to mass and I wasn't that kind of person.

Years go on and nothing changes within me. I started to wonder what is my life's purpose in this world. I've started to ask God what is the benefits of being me. All my life so far I've just been going with the flow, not caring much about what goes on in the world and soon I started to think Catholicism is lame. And when times come when I try to express my faith, I fear of doing it because I fear of others judging me. At that moment, I took into consideration to find out  what is God calling me to do with my life and that he could give me courage to stand firm with my faith. But taking into considerations wasn't enough.

As I started to close into Confirmation I begin to understand my Faith a little bit better than in the past. Although I was improving, I was only improving very little. Like I said it wasn't enough for me. I start to go into the motions over and over again and it just went down hill from there, until the confirmation retreat came. The retreat, at first it didn't impact me at all. All the teachings they were giving us, it didn't sync into me at all. Then at the end there was a teen speaker who shared basically her witness to us. At that point, I was completely slapped with inspiration. I can't specify exactly what her story was, but what really hit me was the commitment, the passion she had that she wanted us to know how great our God is and that he will do great things for all of us if we all acknowledge him.

From there I sincerely started to search for answers about my faith.

 From this point, I've taken the crucial step into the journey that will change my life forever. Everything started to unravel when I entered summer break of 2013.

It all started when I asked my youth minister what's going on this summer and she mentioned this retreat. From there I said go ahead and sign me up because I had nothing to do during the summer and partially to find some answers about my faith, like how can I get a better prayer life?

So it came to that day and I arrive at the retreat center in Alexandria, Louisiana. At first, I didn't know what to expect because this was a huge step for me in my faith (I usually don't sign up for these kind of things). As I went through the first two days with talks about prayer, and the Holy Spirit, and etc., I felt like I wasn't absorbing anything in and that it was pointless of me coming here. Then came an adoration session that we have at the end of everyday, specifically the evening of Wednesday, I was regularly praying to The Lord and all of the sudden at a random moment I started to tremble. I started to cry and as I was shedding tears I noticed that these tears weren't from sadness and grief, but from joy. It was the joy feeling that I experienced that God has touched my heart (and I tell you, I've never felt so open to The Lord). This experience somehow made my faith level from an inch from the ground to six feet from the ground, I was completely moved. As this was happening to me I started to endlessly thanking The Lord for what he has done. Now you think about it, God has chosen me at a strange moment and you would be right. But you've also heard from other catholic friends or families that "God works in strange and mysterious ways in which we do not understand." I was thinking that and I thought to myself, "yeah, that was kind of strange." So I thought about this and I started to realize that if God has done this for me, he must have something planned for me in the future. From there I was thanking him with all my heart and that I made a promise, a covenant, that I will do my best and dedicate everything that I do is good to God and not to fear to express my faith towards others.

Now confession was also being held during this adoration session. This would be considered as my TRUE confession, because my past confessions there are times where you hold back a few sins because they were so bad you didn't want to tell. That was me, but what had happened to me that Wednesday evening gave me the courage to fully confess to The Lord. So I confessed fully and at the end I shared my recent witness with the priest named Fr. Remi. When I shared it with him he helped me notice that God has touched my heart and he gave me a bible verse to read and that it connects to my recent experience, it was Matthew 11:28-30. He has given that bible verse to me as my penance and also told me to look at the story of St. Jose Sanchez Del Rio. He said the story and the bible verse resembles with me a little bit. At the end I thanked him and I walked out crying and then I went back to the Eucharist, God, and before I did my penance I knelt down and then I went prostrate on the ground and I went on thanking God over and over for this magnificent experience. From there my life was changed, faithfully.

Now when I was touched by God I felt I was being called. Called to take action, specifically in my faith. The few days or weeks after the retreat I felt that I needed to share the glory of God to all I knew. God has given me courage. Courage to express my faith. I started to evangelize in my own little way with my witness to my family and to my friends. I believe though that this is just my first calling to the next ones I have in the near future.

I share all of this with you, because we all struggle to find out what The Lord has planned for us. This witness I've shared with you gives you the idea what I've gone through to find out if God has any plans for me. You may have a stronger, more serious story than mine or you could have a smaller, less serious story than mine. It doesn't matter, that's besides the point. The fact is that if you're struggling with what God has in store for you and you start feeling lost that your life isn't beneficial in any way, don't lose hope. That's my advice to you, don't lose hope in God. Everyone has their time. Some may have their calling sooner than others. But the key is to never lose hope in The Lord. In my life I've learned that we are called since we were born, but we didn't notice it because we are not listening. That society has kept us from hearing what God has to say to us. Keep praying to him. Ask him what is it that you need to do and I promise you that before you die you will be "Called By Name"(Isaiah 43:1). The Lord shall redeem you and then lead you on the right path in your life.

The Lord has blessed me, but he has not given me all the answers to life.

Still if you would like to ask me a question, I will gladly answer it to the best of my knowledge. (:

My email: aznboy217@gmail.com

My cell number: 281-734-5941

Hopefully what I wrote here is all to your understanding.

God bless you all

Never lose hope!

Mark Le

Rooted

First off I have no clue how to blog so excuse me for my lack of blogger etiquette. (:

                This summer has been one of the craziest experiences I’ve ever had. Being exposed to some intense retreats and conferences, I realized that the Lord must be an active part of my everyday life, and that I can no longer ignore him. Knowing this I prepared to embark on my journey and I lived happily ever after.

Well that is what I thought it was going to be like and now about a month later I found that this journey was a lot harder than I thought. The part of this journey that I was truly struggling with was having the strength and trust to be able to allow myself to really let the Lord work in my life. Knowing this I took my struggles and placed it at the feet of the Lord by going to adoration. In adoration I read the story of how Jesus cursed the fig tree. If you guys don’t know the story it was basically when Jesus was like HEY FIG “TREE I’M HUNGRY! WHY DON’T YOU HAVE ANY FRUIT?!?! THAT’S IT YOU WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO HAVE ANYMORE FRUIT!”  And then the fig tree died… yup that is our Lord just having a typical day.  Anyways reading that story Jesus tells us that if our faith is so deeply rooted then our prayers will be able to do anything include making a fig tree died. I sat there and at the moment I really was not aware of what I just read; to me I felt that Jesus had just told me a story about how he had a fight with a tree and won.  I realized that there was a deeper meaning here and after meditating on it I realized that what the Lord was doing was giving me the answer I had been longing for. I had been struggling to figure out how to really invest myself in this journey that the Lord was taking me on and how I would be able to have the strength to endure all that would happen on this path. Through scripture and through just looking into his face (the most Blessed Sacrament) for the first I really understood what he was trying to tell me. He told me that to be able to make it through this journey that I must trust him and that I must have continuous faith in where he is guiding me because without that rooted faith and trust I would fall prey to all the corruptions of the world; that those who are so firm in their faith will be able to do anything through prayer and be able to truly speak with him.

 Brothers and sisters, all of us are a faith journey of our own and through this journey we will have to endure many hardships and pressures from the outside world, but if we stay rooted in our faith and endless in our trust there is nothing we will not be able to do because the Lord is our strength.

Your Brother In Christ,

Trong Do 

Coming Down the Mountain

      Before I begin, I would like to make one thing clear. I am seventeen years old. I don't have all the answers. I have not throughly studied Catholic doctrine or theology. This blog contains my opinion, thoughts, and experiences, and does not constitute as Church teaching. I say this because I cannot guarantee that what I will say in this blog will be in line with the truth of church teaching, no matter how much I wish it did.   

  

      Alright let's begin.

      

      "After the retreat, I was on a spiritual high, but then after being back at home for a while, I fell off the high, and into my usual routine."

      If I had a nickel for every time I've heard this, I could probably buy a new pair of offbrand Crocs. The truth is, I've been guilty of getting on the same spiritual rollercoaster. When Adoration or Mass is no longer a part of an assigned schedule, and the responsibility to engage in the Sacraments and in prayer rest solely in our hands, it's easy to revert back to our normal routine, where daily Mass, frequent trips to confession, and praying the rosary are activities that are considered more of prizes to be redeemed when we have free time, rather than moments which hold priority in our daily lives. 

      

      When Peter encountered the glory of God during the Transfiguration, he immediately wanted to pitch tents and stay up on the mountain. Peter is a lot like us in that, after having an amazing experience with Christ, he wanted to stay there forever. But realistically speaking, you have to come down the mountain at some point. So how are you going to let your experience at the peak affect how you live your life in the valley? 

      Typically, profound spiritual emotional experiences with God do not occur on a daily basis. Ouch. That means that living for God outside of retreats may involve us praying and engaging in the Sacraments without sure promise that your going to physically feel God's presence in your life. Can we persevere through desolation and have faith that God is still working as much in our lives now as he did on the retreat? 

      I hear all the time about people "falling off the spiritual high." Several years ago, while I was at a Catholic summer camp, I decided to break my own spiritual cycle. I decided not to let go of God again. Little did I know, that meant letting go of the spiritual high. Since then, I have grown exponentially in my spirituality and  I have centered my life more around Christ. I still fell down, and sinned, but when I did, I did not stop praying, or going to mass and confession. In my darkest moments, I walked confidently through the night,  trusting that God held the reins, simply because I let Him do so. 

      

      All that to say this: If you feel yourself falling into your normal routines, remember that God is always persistent in His love for you. Your spiritual life might feel like a roller coaster but if you continue to pray and receive grace in the Sacraments, God will not fail to work in your life. 

      Here's a practical suggestion that has worked for me. If your trying to cope with returning home from a retreat, try to find a time when you can sit before Jesus in adoration or the tabernacle and pray for the Holy Spirit to come into your heart. The Holy Spirit is the foundation for a relationship with our Lord, Jesus. 

      I hope and pray something I wrote may have helped you in some way. I would love to hear how the Lord may be working though this blog. 

Here's my contact information:

Cell: 972-825-3477

Email: walexfry@sbcglobal.net

If you have any questions of concerns, I would love to hear those as well. 

Thank you.