video – Daily Graces

Third Sunday of Easter 2023 – Road to Emmaus

Published on April 21, 2023April 21, 2023 by Kate2 Comments

I’ll be honest, I was a little stumped by this week’s Gospel reading. Maybe not stumped, but unable to hone in on a single idea for the brief video reflection that I wanted to create. So, I ended up merging two ideas, more or less successfully.

First, I mentioned the invitation of the disciples to Jesus into the house where they were going to spend the evening. More on that in a moment. Secondly, I spent the rest of the video talking about how this story is a type of analogy for the Mass. I was inspired by a homily given by Bishop Robert Barron, and I wanted to take the opportunity to share it in full for anyone interested. You can find it here.

For this accompanying blog post, I think I want to spend a little more time with the first point I made. Jesus is the master of the invitation. He calls, He doesn’t command, His disciples to come follow Him. In the Gospel of John, two of John the Baptist’s disciples begin to follow Jesus. He asks them, “What are you looking for?” They ask Him where He is staying. In the perfect one-liner, Jesus responds: “Come and see” (John 1:38-39).

Again and again, Jesus invites people into His circle. In the Gospel today, the disciples do not recognize Jesus on the road. Even as He opens their eyes to the Scriptures He fulfilled, and as they reflected afterward they realized their hearts were burning within them in Jesus’ presence, still they do not recognize Him. They would have missed Him entirely if they hadn’t extended the simple offer of hospitality. Jesus made to go on, but they stopped Him.

But they urged him, “Stay with us,
for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.”
Luke 24:29

They led Jesus inside, and it was in the breaking of the bread that they finally recognized who He was.

We have the same choice before us every single day. Do we invite Jesus in, or do we go about our day without opening the door of our hearts to Him?

Here are a few ideas for consciously and concretely inviting Jesus into your daily life:

Morning Offering Prayer – there are many versions of this prayer, some are short and simple, others more complex. The basic structure of this prayer is to offer your day to Jesus, in all it’s ups and downs, to unite yourself with Jesus throughout the day, to seek His assistance in your day, and to proclaim your love for Him. When we homeschooled, we began each day with this prayer: Dear Jesus, I offer you this day, my works, my joys, my sorrows, and my play. Please help me to be good today. I love you Jesus, Amen. That’s it, it doesn’t need to be fancy. This site has a whole bunch of Morning Offerings if this one isn’t a good fit for you.
Setting daily check in prayer times – maybe you pray an Angelus at noon. Maybe you say a rosary while you walk every day. Setting up specific, routine, prayer times is a great way to reconnect with Jesus throughout your day. The Hallow app is great for this. You can set reminders within the app and have the prayers or reflections you want to utilize queued up and ready to go. (The link provided will give you a 3-month free trial of the full version of the app if you haven’t made an account already. This works best on a computer. I do not gain anything monetary or otherwise if you choose to use my link).
Frequent the sacraments. When was the last time you went to a daily Mass? What about Adoration, Confession, or other liturgical celebration offered by your parish? Invite Jesus into your schedule by prioritizing these opportunities.
Coming from Chiara Lubich and the Focolare Movement, be intentional about recognizing Jesus in your neighbor. When you are in the presence of others, see Jesus in them. Jesus can be encountered in every single person you come in contact with each day. Even if they aren’t your favorite person, Jesus invites us to love them as He does. For more on this, check out my Catholicmom.com post about the Cube of Love.
Find some inspirational saint quotes and Scripture verses. I have a friend who loves to be reminded of the things she has read, so she puts post-it notes everywhere. One over the kitchen sink, one or two on the bathroom mirror, the visor of her car. Anyplace that catches her eye or where she spends a lot of time. She changes them up also, which I think is so wise. We can start to glaze over things we see on a highly regular basis. Either changing the quotes around, or switching up the color of paper they are written on, can help avoid this.
Add your own ideas in the comments. It would be great to hear your ideas about how to invite Jesus into your everyday life. What works for you? What do you want to try?

Second Sunday of Lent 2023

Published on March 2, 2023 by Kate2 Comments

It’s about the be the second week of Lent already if you can believe it. For some of us, perhaps it feels like Lent has been dragging on as we struggle to persevere in our chosen fast. I have had up and down days for sure. It is insightful to take last week’s message about fruits and see how the Holy Spirit is working in my life. For one of my fasts, I’m choosing to do a full fast on all the Fridays of Lent (as in the Ash Wednesday and Good Friday fasts of one regular meal and two smaller ones that don’t equal the larger). I have never been good at fasting, and I was rather nervous about it this year since for nearly 11 years I have always been either pregnant or nursing.

I was surprised to find I wasn’t struggling all that much with hunger. I figured my kids would be begging me to eat something by 3pm because I was getting so hangry (hungry/angry). This doesn’t mean I wasn’t struggling. On the contrary, I was struggling immensely because I couldn’t control my thoughts about food. When will I eat next? What should I eat? How long has it been since I’ve eaten? I wonder why I’m not more hungry than I feel? The Holy Spirit’s work seems to be twofold – detachment from food and disciplining my thoughts. It’s only been 2 fasting days so far and I can already see progress in both of these areas.

Speaking of progress, it’s funny (and not so funny) how sometimes we have to learn the same lesson a few times before it really sinks in. Take Peter, who we are looking more closely at in this week’s video. I mentioned the show, The Chosen, and how it beautifully displays the scene of Jesus walking on the water. Peter, too, walks but only when he keeps his attention fixed on Jesus. When he looks around at the waves and wind he becomes scared and begins to sink. Again at the Transfiguration, Peter beholds the most incredible sight as he witnesses Jesus’ full divinity on display. And then he looks down, back to earthly things. God literally interrupts Peter to draw his eyes back heavenward.

I also brought up a passage from the book of Exodus regarding the Israelites Red Sea crossing. They had not crossed yet, but had turned to see the chariots of Pharaoh closing in on them. With the sea at their back, they felt trapped and began to panic. Being still was the farthest thing from their minds. And yet, this is the command of God through Moses.

Do not fear! Stand your ground and see the victory the LORD will win for you today. For these Egyptians whom you see today you will never see again. The LORD will fight for you; you have only to keep still.
Exodus 14:13-14

Stillness is hard. For some of us, we aren’t even still in our sleep as our mind wrestles with the problems of the day and the worries of tomorrow. Restless, busy, anxious, worried, full, overwhelmed. We spin on our hamster wheels day after day without seeing any real progress. What’s the point of it all?

The hard truth is that our life isn’t about us. It’s about God. We were made not for ourselves, but to give God glory and praise. We were made for relationship with Him, not with the world. When we recognize that fact, we take our first step off the merry-go-round. Fear not – let go of what you are afraid of. Are you busy because you are afraid to be seen as lazy? Are you anxious because you want to be in control of everything? Are you restless because time shouldn’t be wasted or seen an unproductive? Are you overwhelmed because you want to please everyone so you don’t say no?

Letting go of fear means we can look beyond ourselves and see what God is waiting to give us. Have you ever tried to give something to someone while they are running away from you (you with toddlers, you know what I mean). It’s hard! It’s messy, uncoordinated and usually doesn’t go well. God isn’t going to shove His blessings upon you while you run in the other direction. He waits, He is waiting. He is waiting for you to let go of fear and to be still so that He can fill you with His love and grace.

Be Still.

If you need more encouragement, look again to Peter. Peter, who clung so strongly to fear that he denied even knowing Jesus during Jesus’ trial, is who Jesus chose to be our first Pope. Peter was too scared to say he was a follower of Jesus to a few people. And yet at Pentecost, he preached a speech so moving more than 3,000 people were baptized in a single day. The same Spirit that filled Peter fills each of us who are baptized.

There is much the Holy Spirit would like to work in your life. Are you ready to let go of fear? Be still before God, release your fears to Him and watch His wonders unfold.

First Sunday of Lent 2023

Published on February 23, 2023 by Kate1 Comment

I cannot thank you all enough for the warm reception I’ve received since joining the YouTube community. This is a new thing for me and I am definitely not comfortable yet. But, two videos down and I’m happy to say I don’t hate it, so that’s a good start!

Without going into exactly what’s in the video – you’ll have to go watch it yourself for the full reflection AND, it’s under 6 minutes, whoot! – I wanted to share a little bit more about times of preparation.

If you stop and really think about it, we are always preparing for something. It can be big things, like how childhood is preparation for adulthood, or super small, ordinary things, like preparing onions for tonight’s stew, or any number of in-between things. Preparing for a presentation at work, preparing for seasonal changes, preparing lesson plans, preparing for that potentially confrontational phone call. Some part of our mind is in preparation mode. Always.

We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
Romans 8:28

If God is working all things for good, then even our back of the mind preparations can be used for His purposes.

How?

There is always an end goal in mind when it comes to preparations. Even if the event fails to take place, there was still something driving the preparations. You don’t prepare for nothing, there’s always something. You get to a specific point and can look back and discern if your preparations were enough, worth the time, could have gone better, etc.

We are in the season of Lent, a season of preparation. Ah, you see how it connects now. What is the event we are preparing for? Easter, of course. But more than just this Easter my friends. A lifetime of Easters. For the eternal Easter in heaven. Each Lent, we should be farther along in our preparations to our ultimate goal – heaven. How is this Lent bringing you closer to that heavenly reality of endless Easter?

I was sharing about this week’s video with my kids. They are loving this whole new “YouTuber” status they think I have. In the video, I offer the Fruits of the Spirit as a lens through which we can look at our Lenten fast to see what God is cultivating in our lives. As I explained it to them, I was quickly interrupted: “Oh, like temperance? That’s a virtue people can grow in by fasting.” and “What about modesty or forbearance?” and “I bet people grow in patience over Lent.”

Yes! Yes! Yes! I should have talked to them before recording because a thousand times, YES! The virtues they have been striving to live as a school community would have fit perfectly alongside the Fruits of the Holy Spirit. Quick shout out to our wonderful school, St. Mary’s in Derby, KS, which takes the time to look closely at a specific virtue each quarter as a whole school. It’s a small thing, but it’s not so small at all when an 8, 10, and 11 year old can hear me speak about God working in people’s lives and be able to specifically identify virtues which can help someone grow closer to God. You are amazing St. Mary’s, we love you!

So, if after watching the video, you find you want to look even more closely at how God is using this season of Lent to prepare you for whatever He wills for your life, consider the following list of virtues to be an excellent addition to the Fruits of the Holy Spirit:

Four Cardinal Virtues (Catechism of the Catholic Church #1804-1809)

Prudence
Justice
Fortitude
Temperance

Seven Cardinal or Heavenly Virtues which Counteract the Seven Deadly Sins

Chastity counteracts Lust
Good Works (also known as Charity) counteracts Greed
Temperance counteracts Gluttony
Diligence counteracts Sloth
Patience counteracts Envy
Kindness counteracts Wrath
Humility counteracts Pride

I hope these lists, along with the reflection video for this Sunday, are helpful for getting a conversation started with God in prayer about where He is taking you and what He wants you to be preparing for.

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