We Are All Called to Lives of Holiness
My daughter looks almost entirely like my husband, except for the shape of her eyes and the freckles that dot across her cheeks and nose. She isn't a fan of the freckles because no one else in her class has them, but I told her she got them from me and that God made her …
Continue reading "Teaching My Daughter Why Charity is Worth the Fight"
For the past month, I've been struggling mightily with the failures of priests in the Church, not just the abusers and our leaders, but the fact that times like these often lead to more collateral damage because the Enemy seeks to divide and wound even more in the aftermath of such revelations. He likes to …
Continue reading "In a Time of Great Scandal, Remember God Works in the Quiet Places"
The entire litmus test for this life is the very one we don't want. It's love or charity (caritas). It is the very meaning of our lives. It is what grounds every moment of every day, but even as we say it's what we want, we are also repelled by it. Why? Love always costs …
Continue reading "The Cross: The Answer We Don’t Really Want"
I have received quite a few emails and comments from readers encouraging me to keep writing. I've read every single one of them even if I didn't get a chance to respond to you personally. I greatly appreciate your messages! The past few months have been a time of rather intense and immense spiritual growth …
Continue reading "The Struggle to Write as God Intensifies My Spiritual Life"
The self-help industry has made billions of dollars convincing people that they simply need to believe in their goodness to succeed. Much of what is marketed by self-help gurus is called moral therapeutic deism. It’s a belief system that says that God is all loving and merciful and He loves you just the way you …
Continue reading "Catholic Exchange: The Good We Have Within Us is Because of God Alone"
A little over four years ago a friend of mine called enlisting my help with an unlikely and unexpected project. Her parish priest had just died and she was the executor of his estate. Upon his passing, he left his estate over 70 holy relics and artifacts from our Catholic tradition. The will was complicated …
Continue reading "Catholic Exchange: What I Learned by Caring for Holy Relics"
**I'm sharing this piece that I wrote for The Federalist 2 years ago as we remember the 17th anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks.** In summer 2005, I visited the Smithsonian’s American History museum in Washington DC with a couple of Marine friends. All of us were stationed in DC at the time. We …
Continue reading "Re-visit: I’ll Never Forget What I Saw at the Pentagon After 9/11"
I have not been writing a lot the last couple of weeks. I've started various posts, but been unable to find the words to finish them. I hit a rather intense period spiritually in which I found myself taking assaults on all sides. I even ended up having two of the most horrifying demonic nightmares …
Continue reading "When the Enemy Comes for Us and the Need for One Another"
As happens to all of us at various times in the spiritual life, I temporarily took my eyes off of Christ and started staring in horror at the storms waging around me in my own life and in the life of the Church. Saturday I found myself dazed after the initial shock wore off of …
Continue reading "Numb From the Scandals? Practical Spiritual Tips on How We Can Respond"
My husband quietly pulled me aside this morning and asked me to walk with him to our van. He needed to tell me that he had been coughing up blood again, but that he didn't want our daughter to know about it at this point in time. He was about to leave for the ER. …
Continue reading "The Constant Powerlessness of Serious Chronic Illness"
Swimming the Depths 