Another New Friend

Blessed be God in His Angels and in His Saints!

I started reading the Diary of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska on Sunday and every day of reading has been endless fun:

"One day, tired out from all these uncertainties, I asked Jesus, "Jesus are You my God or some kind of phantom? Because my superiors say that there are all sorts of illusions and phantoms. If you are my Lord, I beg you to bless me." Then Jesus made a big sign of the cross over me and I, too, signed myself. When I asked pardon of Jesus for this question, He replied that I had in no way displeased Him by this question and that my confidence pleased Him very much" (54)

The way St. Faustina talks reminds me so much of myself- I always used to bother myself with writing pretty prose or prayers- or just being really formal- in my journal to Jesus (He has since told me that He wants to hear what I say to Him...who woulda thought)- starting a sentence with "because" just seems to me to be a really 6th grade girl thing to do- I do it all the time when I'm rambling- but I love that she does it too! Not that she doesn't write beautifully, but it's so very human!

"O life so dull and monotonous, how many treasures you contain! When I look at everything with the eyes of faith, no two hours are alike, and the dullness and monotony disappear. The grace which is given this hour will not be repeated in the next. It may be given me again, but it will not be the same grace. Time goes on, never to return again. Whatever is enclosed in it will never change; it seals with a seal for eternity" (62)

No Limits

"Your Holy Will is the life of my soul"

-St. Maria Faustina

Blessed be God forever!

I've been struggling these past few weeks with the kind of trials that leave a bad taste in your mouth. They're like when you wake up all hot with that moist feeling behind your ears and for some reason you can't take a shower- it's that type of feeling. Something you feel like you should just ignore but feels gross. Some of these are feelings like 'God won't love me unless I pick up every scrap of paper that I see and do all the dishes even when it's time to go to bed'- and the feeling that I don't deserve to be happy and in fact I shouldn't be happy, if I'm happy there's something wrong with me and something that I should be giving up so that I'm miserable. I shouldn't sit in the SUN and read, I should sit on the floor and mortify my weak flesh for wanting to be warm and comfortable and my weak mind for wanting to enjoy something.

Obviously, these are faulty lines of thinking.

As a side note to what I'm about to say, I've noticed that on Sundays I always go through some sort of depression, anger or some other form of having a "bad day"- does this happen to you? In college it was every Sunday- really got triggered by our house dinners too. It's become very VERY clear to me over the past few years and months that the devil REALLY hates God. He hates everything about God- he hates everything God made- he hates me and wants me to hate God and hates you and wants to make you suffer in torment for all of eternity. HATE!!! He's spent a long time festering in hate looking for every possible opportunity there might be to make us hate God or at least make us indifferent to Him so that we have no chance of being happy or fulfilled in life. Consequently, the devil hates Sundays because it's the Lord's day. So next time you feel grumpy on Sunday or think that you're supposed to be miserable or that you don't deserve to be loved (when I say that out loud it sounds so ridiculous... how could God want us to be miserable and unloved?) REMEMBER THIS:

GOD HAS NO LIMITS!!!

In less than a poof the devil is absolutely powerless against God. We humans are very humble creatures, but that just shows us that we ALREADY depend on God so much for everything so why do we not let Him lavish His love on us? Why do we insist on taking care of our problems ourselves? God is crazy- absolutely crazy- and crazy about you! Can you even conceive of infinite love? I can't. That's why I resist it I suppose- I'm so used to being hurt, why wouldn't God hurt me? Well, because He loves you so much that he SWOONS at every hair on your neck, He gives you millions of nerves so that you can feel AIR MOVING, He will more than bend over backwards to fix your stupid problem that you created and you really regret. And yes, He still loves you when you're imperfect. Sigh. Big one for me. I don't get it but I guess I don't have to. God doesn't limit how much love we get, only we do. God doesn't limit how much forgiveness we receive, only we do. God doesn't limit His mercy or His gifts- even in the Bible He didn't do many miracles in places that had little faith. It wasn't that they weren't worth doing miracles for- I mean those people still had babies (SUPER MIRACLE!) and scads of other everyday miracles, but they limited Him by their lack of faith.

So pray for me, and pray for your friends, that we would not place limits on God- we have Him in amazing ways (cough, the EUCHARIST) and we have every reason to die out of sheer excitement for what He's done. So let yourself! Lord open us up!

Oh, and this is what lent is all about, by the way.

Why Christians always know what to do...

"I am troubled now. Yet what should I say?

'Father, save me from this hour'?

But it was for this purpose that I came to this hour.

Father, glorify your name."

Ash Wednesday

This year I received a Magnificat Lenten Companion free from church and I've been aching to read it. The Ash Wednesday reflection began this way:

"'Brothers,' said Bernard of Clairvaux to his quarreling monks 'there are more enjoyable ways of going to hell'"

What a way to kick off lent! What an encouragement to really just live it. You might as well. It's so silly to damn yourself by rending your garments and not your heart- "Debauchery and gluttony would at least be more lively" as the reflection goes on to say. It's foolish not to believe in God, but it's more foolish to know hes there and ignore him.

"As your fellow workers we beg you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says 'In an acceptable time I have heard you, on the day of salvation I have helped you.' Now is the acceptable time! Now is the day of salvation!"
-Cor. 6:2