Needless to say, when I’m in these kinds of situations, I don’t tend to make great decisions. For example, I have this stupid sinus infection that I (and Augmentin) can’t seem to kick, and the presence of constant pain in my left cheek combined with a baby who wakes me up many times per night has left me in a not-great mental state. (Yeah, I have a neti pot. Hasn’t helped, but I use it anyway because I look so glamorous doing it.) It’s easy to let times like this trigger the beginning of a downward spiral in which I decline opportunities I should probably take, give up on activities that were good and fruitful, and open up my calendar and CANCEL ALL THE THINGS.

To inject some much-needed sanity into my decision making process during these times, I often go through a checklist of questions that my old spiritual director would ask. This post is kind of a rerun since I posted this list a couple of years ago (and I also have a new and wonderful spiritual director now who also asks great questions), but I thought I’d put it up again since these ideas are helping me keep the crazy-think at bay.

6 Questions My Spiritual Director Would Ask When
I Had a Tough Decision to Make and Was Being Crazy About It:

1. Have you prayed about it?

It’s hard to believe that this question is even necessary, but with me it usually is. With embarrassing frequency I’d come to my old spiritual director, Christie, and pour out my angst about some conundrum, ending with shaking my fist at the heavens and wondering why God wasn’t helping me. There were more than a few awkward moments the resulted from her gently asking, “Have you prayed about it?”, and I had to find a way to avoid seeming like a spiritual vegetable while offering the honest answer of “no.”

2. How does it impact your primary vocation?

I can’t overstate the importance of this question. It’s brought more peace to my life than any other thought exercise. The Catholic idea of vocation is that the meaning of life is to serve others, and your vocation (e.g. married life, religious life, priesthood, etc.) is the main way that God intends for you to serve. It’s his primary path for you to find peace and fulfillment — therefore, no legitimate call from God would negatively impact your vocation. God would never call a parish priest to do something that made him feel burdened and resentful of offering the Mass on Sunday, he would never call a father to something that made him feel tied down and frustrated by his wife and kids, etc. It doesn’t mean that the only things you ever do are directly related to the duties of your vocation, but that those duties are your top priority.

Whenever I’ve started going down a path that introduced tension, resentment, or other bad vibes into the family, it’s always turned out to be the wrong decision. This isn’t to be confused with short-term sacrifices that may be difficult, like when Joe was studying for the CPA exam and it was super stressful at times but we were both ultimately on the same page about it; it’s more about choices that fundamentally put you at odds with your spouse or your kids. Over and over again, I’ve found that if a call you hear is really from God (and not just your own selfish desires doing their best imitation of the Holy Spirit), one sure sign is that it will ultimately end up strengthening your work in your primary vocation.

3. What does your spouse think?

Like with #1, I often get so caught up in analyzing things that I forget to ask for Joe’s input, especially if it’s a small matter. My spiritual director would always hone in on this question too, since the Holy Spirit often speaks through our spouses, especially when we’re not doing a good job of listening to him ourselves. (For people who are not married, an alternative might be to ask your parents, siblings, or a trusted friend.)

4. Are you taking care of yourself?

At one point I’d been in a rut and was trying to figure out how to get my life back on track, but it felt like my discernment process was going nowhere. My prayer life was nonexistence, and, worse, I found that I didn’t even really care about praying. When I came to Christie to complain about it, and she immediately asked if I was taking care of myself. I explained that if tearing through entire bags of junk food at a time, drinking too much wine, never exercising, and staying up past midnight to surf the web could be considered “taking care of myself,” then yes, I was doing a fantastic job.

She paused for a moment, then said, “I think we’ve found at least part of the problem.” Experiences of suffering can be amazing times of closeness to God…but if your suffering is self-inflicted due to obsessive attachments to the things of the world, it’s probably not going to lead you to any super spiritual experiences. Christie said that before I began looking into any deeper causes for my spiritual dryness, I needed to start taking care of myself first. Sure enough, once I started eating a better diet and getting some sleep I was able to take the first steps toward getting my prayer life back on track, which helped me in every area of life.

5. Are you making decisions based on fear?

If you hear an inner voice telling you that you need to do something because you’ll be a big huge loser failure and everyone will hate you if you don’t, it’s pretty safe to say that that is not the voice of the Holy Spirit.

Christie always had to remind me of this. For example, at one point I was discerning whether or not to homeschool, but all of my thinking was fear-based: I was tempted to homeschool because I was freaked out about something I’d heard about the local school and I had images of my kids getting bullied playing in my head over and over again. On the other hand, I thought I should send them to school because I was sure I would screw everything up and end up with teenagers who couldn’t read and had mostly imaginary friends.

Christie encouraged me to stop living in fear and start boldly asking what God wanted our family to do, to make a conscious effort to trust that he would give us what we needed when we needed it if we just followed his path. It took a while to silence all the trains of thought that were filled with fear and anxiousness, but once I did the discernment process went much more smoothly, and I quickly came to a decision that brought me a lot of peace.

6. Which path would bring you the most peace?

Similar to the above, Christie would sometimes ask me to imagine myself going through each of the various options that were before me in some dilemma, and to consider which one would bring me the most peace. Fairly often, I would find that when I actually took the time to do this, I was filled with anxiety when I thought of going the route that looked best on paper, and felt a perfect sense of peace when I considered taking the route that seemed a little crazy — and the peace-filled option always ended up being the right path.

More info

I usually get a lot of great questions when I bring up the subject of spiritual direction, so here are some additional resources:

• How to find a spiritual director.
• This spiritual direction blog is a wealth of information on discernment and the spiritual life. Definitely worth bookmarking and reading regularly.
• This post called 9 Things to Do When Needing Direction has some great tips on this topic.

My kids attend public school right now, and so they get less faith formation than I’d hope for. But I still try to integrate our faith into their life with activities outside of school that will help them learn and grow in their faith.

For us Catholic Christians the month of May is full of tradition and activity that is done in remembrance of Our Lord’s mother, Mary. She’s a shining example of how to serve God. During this month we honor her and use her examples of faith and service to help us grow in those areas of our own life as well.

Often times I can’t find crafts activities that I imagine being great teaching tools, so I make my own. This is one I made for my kids this month.

This diorama is really simple to put together and you don’t need much to get it started! There are many things you could add to it to make it as embellished as you like (glitter, ribbon, etc), but I’m going to show you the basics. So here we go!

You have a few options to print out Mary and her flower garden. You can right-click and save this next image. Or you canclick this link and it will take you to a printable PDF. I will suggest printing it on a cardstock type paper if you can. If not, it will work still, but the pieces may be a little more floppy.

Next have your kids color the images and cut them out. You can be as detailed or simple as you’d like both with coloring, and with cutting.

When you are done coloring and cutting, the next thing you are going to want to do is help the kids cut some little strips to fold and tape to the back of their flower garden pieces and to the back of the image of Mary. I simply used some of the scraps of paper that were left after all the pieces were cut out. Cut small strips and fold them in half to form an L shape. Tape one side to the back of the colored images, and fold a small circle of tape so that it can be attached to the underside of the L and stick securely to the shoe box.

For my shoe box, I attached Mary first to some decorative card stock. Cut it to fit the bottom of your box by tracing around the edges of your box onto your paper and cut it out. You could also have your children color or paint the inside of the box, or cover it completely with pretty paper or glitter, or even moss might be pretty!

I attached Mary to the cardstock, and then taped the cardstock with double-sided tape to the inside of the box.

Your finished project will look something like this!

The Magnificat

Luke 1:46-55

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,

my spirit rejoices in God my Savior

for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.

From this day all generations will call me blessed:

the Almighty has done great things for me,

and holy is his Name.

He has mercy on those who fear him

in every generation.

He has shown the strength of his arm,

he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,

and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things,

and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel

for he has remembered his promise of mercy,

the promise he made to our fathers,

to Abraham and his children for ever.

 

If you try out this project be sure to come back and let me know how it went for you! I’d love to see your own dioramas!

::Originally from California’s wine country, Celeste Bowen is a military wife, mother of three, artist, blogger and small business owner at Doodle La. Inspired by the world around her, she uses her artistic background to share one of a kind artwork, handmade diapers, clothing and do-it-yourself projects on her blog and via her online store. Trained in the culinary arts and experienced in the restaurant industry, Celeste enjoys coming up with new, resourceful recipes and baked goods to share with her family and readers. You can follow her creative journey by visiting Doodle La’s website, Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook page.::

The post Mary Diorama appeared first on Catholic Sistas.

As you might be aware of the Dominican Sisters of Mary have been contestants on this season’s “The American Bible Challenge” and will be appearing in the final at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT Thursday, May 23 on The Game Show Network. We had the opportunity to ask Sr. Maria Suso some questions about her and her follow Sister’s time on the show and are happy to share that interview with y’all.

Q: Catholics aren’t known for reading the Bible; what’s the best way to get started?

No matter what Maria sings in the Sound of Music, the beginning isn’t always “a very good place to start.” If you want to begin reading the Bible, I would recommend starting with the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Not only are they “easy reads,” but they contain the core of God’s selfrevelation to us. They focus on Jesus, and isn’t He the reason we want to read the Bible in the first place? Also, Jesus is the Key Who unlocks the true meaning of everything else we encounter in the Scriptures.

After the Gospels, I recommend reading Acts of the Apostles, which tells the story of the early Church, and the letters of the New Testament, which are beautiful, inspiring, and instructive. Also, the book of Psalms is a great place to find ready-made prayers for every possible occasion or emotion. A good Catholic study Bible or book of biblical commentary can help you understand difficult passages. Most study Bibles also include reading plans that will take you through the most important parts of the Bible, sometimes in chronological order (surprisingly, the Bible is not in chronological order). Similar reading plans can also be found online. These can especially help you as you delve into the unfamiliar territory of the Old Testament. They give the books a context and show how God’s loving plan for us unfolds over time.

A final word: no one ever masters the Bible, but if we let it, the Bible can master us. The Scriptures are meant to be read daily; the same passages can be read over and over again because they are a “living word,” the Word of God, our God Who is always speaking to us. Never be discouraged if you don’t understand, but keep seeking. Through His Word, Jesus is calling you to himself.

Q: The Bible is such a dense collection of stories, was it easier to have each player focus on, say, one part of the Old Testament while the others focused on another part and the last the New Testament?

As you might guess, it’s next to impossible to “cram” for a test on the Bible! That said, we knew we needed heavy review if we were going to be competitive on the show. We decided that each book of the Bible should be “covered” by one or two sisters. We each had different strategies for “covering” books: sometimes we just read them through, sometimes we took notes, and sometimes we used reference books or atlases to help us focus on key people, places, and events.

Since two of us have a special love for the Old Testament, we both covered everything up to the Wisdom books (like Psalms, Proverbs, Wisdom, etc.). Then we divided the Wisdom books and the Prophets between us. The third Sister focused on the New Testament, and she and I both covered Acts and Revelation. All of us were supposed to be experts on the Gospels.

Though all this may seem complicated, it was, for the most part, a joyful and prayerful experience to prepare for The American Bible Challenge. Our preparations challenged me to pay more attention to the details in the Scriptures and helped me realize more deeply that nothing in the Scriptures is wasted – everyone matters, even the wicked Israelite kings who only get a few lines in 2 Chronicles. They are, in some mysterious way, part of God’s providential plan to save mankind from our sins and shower His mercy upon us.

Q: How confident were you going into the final round focusing on the Miracles of Jesus?

We felt very confident going into the Final Revelation of the semi-finals for two reasons. First, we knew that God was in charge of everything and that we were doing God’s will. Because we live a life of obedience, we knew that God, through our superiors, had brought us to that moment and was taking care of everything. We had a deep peace.

Second, the Gospels are extremely familiar to us. As religious sisters, we take a vow of chastity: Jesus is our Spouse. We love to read and savor the Gospels while we spend time with Him. As a community, we make a half-hour meditation each day, usually during our daily Eucharistic holy hour. Often that mediation is based on a passage from the Gospels. If you add that to daily Mass readings, daily spiritual reading, mediation during the Rosary, and all our other ways of encountering Scripture, the sum is a strong familiarity with Jesus and His miracles.

Let me give you some background information. I attended a Christian university in Texas with deep roots to Baptist traditions. Last week, I was on Facebook and looked at a page that posts confessions anonymously from the university. These anonymous confessions range from the tame to the risque.

I scrolled down and saw something that nearly broke my heart.

What followed the confession were more than 30 comments of criticism, judgement and advice to seek an abortion at the local Planned Parenthood clinic in town. I did see a few not-so-popular comments suggesting that the girl keep her child and even a referral to the Care Net if it was “a serious confession” on the page.

But those few comments don’t drown out the overwhelmingly critical response.

Now, there’s really no way of knowing if this student is telling the truth. Confessions are submitted to an anonymous Gmail account or through a survey to maintain complete anonymity. But does it really matter? If it’s not real now for this woman, it could be real in a few weeks, during the next semester or in the upcoming year.

What message does this send? In a world where we’re quick to turn to search engines, online forums and social media, what happens when the response to a problem you are unsure of how to handle is negative?

The pro-life movement has the information to win this war against the culture of death, quick fixes and a disregard for the sanctity of life. The movement has the volunteers who tireless pray outside of abortion clinics, the sidewalk counselors who will urge women to seek life-affirming care and those who work to share messages of hope in the media.

But we need to ensure that our every day habits, our actions, and activity online. So, what can we do everyday to spread the importance of being for life, from conception to natural death?

1. Be a pro-life advocate and be an uplifting example for LIFE. Imagine if the woman who posted that confession on the Facebook page had received an overwhelming response of love and encouragement rather than criticism and judgement.

You can do something things like volunteer at a pro-life organization, collect supplies for a pregnancy resource center’s baby boutique or even purchase Choose Life plates for you car. The more and more we can share with the mainstream culture that life is sacred and important, the better chance we have of changing hearts.

2. Support the local pro-life organizations in your are. From pregnancy resource centers, political groups and to media companies, there are so many organizations fighting for life. Just in the central Texas area alone we have Texas Alliance for Life, Agape Pregnancy Center, Austin Pregnancy Resource Center, the John Paul II Life Center, the Gabriel Project Life Center, Central Texas Coalition for Life, And Then There were None, Heroic Media and so many other.

All of these organizations need your support, even if it’s just keeping their efforts in your daily prayers, which brings us to the last, and most important thing, you can do.

3. Pray, pray, pray. There are hearts and minds being changed everyday. Did you know that nine of the 12 jurors at the Gosnell trial in Pittsburgh identified themselves as pro-choice? There was even a reporter who declared that he could no longer support abortion after covering the trial.

That’s just half of the story. There are women who are making appointments and are choosing life after seeing the ultrasound of their unborn children. There are lawyers, lobbyists and politicians debating pro-life legislation. There are clinic workers choosing to leave their jobs at abortion clinics because they cannot stomach what they do anymore.

These are real life powerful results of the power of prayer.

Above all, there is one thing, out of many, that I’ve come to realize. You can never truly underestimate the effect that even the smallest action can have on someone. You may one day find out you saved a life.

In his book, Immaculate Conception and the Holy Spirit, Fr. H.M. Manteau-Bonamy, OP, explains the importance of Mary as the Church. The aforementioned book is a text based on the Marian teachings of the great saint – Maximilian Kolbe. St. Maximilian Kolbe is famous for being martyred in a concentration camp under the Nazi Regime. He is also the founder of the Militia Immaculata.

In Chapter Six – The Immaculata and the Church, Fr. Manteau-Bonamy says, “Mary is already the Church on Pentecost, when after having prayed along with the Apostles, “calling down by her prayers also the gift of the Spirit who, in the Annunciation had already overshadowed her” (Lumen Gentium, n. 59) [Emphasis mine], she became “the Mother of the Shepherds and of the faithful, in a word, Mother of the entire Church” (Paul VI, November 21, 1964). Almost a quarter century before this pronouncement made during Vatican II, Father Kolbe had said:

Whoever does not wish to have Mary Immaculate as his Mother will not have Christ as his Brother either; the Father will not send his Son to him; the Son will not descend into his soul; the Holy Spirit will not make him a member of the mystical body of Christ; for all these mysteries of grace take place in Mary full of grace, and in her alone. No other creature is or will ever be immaculate like her, or full of grace, or capable of being so intimately united to the Lord as was the Immaculate Virgin. And since the first-born Son, the Man-God, was conceived only through the specific consent of the Most Blessed Virgin, the same holds true of all other humans, who must imitate in all things their primary model, Christ. (Sketch, 1940)”

During this week of Pentecost, let us strengthen our relationship with the Blessed Mother so our friendship with Jesus Christ can stand against the sin we encounter each day of our lives. Let us ask for Mary’s intercession to guide us and help us know Jesus better each day. Let us pray that the fire of Pentecost can enkindle our hearts so that we renew the face of the Earth and share the love of Christ and fire of the Holy Spirit with whomever we encounter.

]]> http://tomperna.org/2013/05/20/mondays-with-mary-mary-is-the-church-on-pentecost/feed/ 0 Theology Yesterday was Pentecost Sunday – the day we celebrate the Holy Spirit descending upon Mary and the Apostles. This day also commemorates the birth of the Catholic Church. It’s a joyful time of the year when we rekindle the fire of the Holy Spirit in our... Yesterday was Pentecost Sunday – the day we celebrate the Holy Spirit descending upon Mary and the Apostles. This day also commemorates the birth of the Catholic Church. It’s a joyful time of the year when we rekindle the fire of the Holy Spirit in our hearts as He came upon the Apostles and Mary […] Austin CNM no http://teamwhitaker.org/2013/05/9451/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=every-child-should-be-an-altar-server-5-reasons-why http://teamwhitaker.org/2013/05/9451/#comments Mon, 20 May 2013 12:30:33 +0000 Kathryn Whitaker http://teamwhitaker.org/?p=9451

Today, over at Catholic Mothers Online, I’m sharing why I think every child should be an altar server. The reasons may just surprise you.

Where we live now we have to cross over train tracks every day to get to town.  As it happens we are often stopped by trains on a frequent basis.  When we first moved to our home it bothered me a lot.  I was busy.  I had things to do.  I needed to get places.  Sitting and waiting on a freight train, especially the super long ones, was not in my daily plans.  I would be frustrated when I’d get close to the crossing only to see the train lights start flashing and the arms descending to block my way.

Back in the days before I had children old enough to stay home and babysit younger children I took all the kids with me everywhere I went.  They were often excited to see that a train was coming and would yell, “Roll down the windows, Mama!”  We would roll down the windows and listen to the whistle as the train drew nearer.  Then we would hear the thunderous sound of the train wheels clanking along the tracks.  They would wonder aloud who was on the train, where it was going, and why was it going there.

I began to ponder why there was such a huge difference in how we viewed waiting on the train.  I viewed it as a burden- something interrupting my day, wasting my time.  My children saw it as wondrous- this huge mechanical beast traveling to who knows where but definitely off on an adventure.  I found that I liked their view better.

I decided to change my outlook regarding the wait I knew I would have to endure over and over again.  Instead of being impatient and frustrated I would take that time to reflect.  As I sat waiting the next time at the train stop I suddenly understood what I couldn’t see before.   God was blessing me when I would have to stop for that never-ending train.  He was giving me a quick break from my busy day; a time to sit quietly, to pray a prayer or two, a time to just stop and look out my window to see the beauty that surrounded me.  He also was giving me time to enjoy the wonder in my children’s eyes as they discussed who might be on the train and where they might be going.  I suddenly felt silly for all the other times I muttered under my breath, “Really God?” as I was stopped by the train.

There are times that I still occasionally get frustrated when I’m in a hurry and I see those arms lowering to stop me from crossing the tracks.  The difference now is that I can re-center myself to think about why God might be slowing me down.  I trust that He has a reason and I take that time to thank Him for everything He has given me, especially for the opportunity to wait on the train headed anywhere.

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