As many of you know, our pilgrimage this past summer to the Holy Land was a graced experience. Like many pilgrims before us, we experienced incredible sites, stood on the ground of profound events and walked the Via Dolorosa, the Way of the Cross, remembering the last journey of Jesus. But for me the place that deepened my faith the most was the quiet visit to the Shepherds’ Field in Bethlehem. There were no grand churches there. No gift shops or guides. There were rolling fields and a cave marked with a star. We celebrated Mass in a primitive structure seated on rocks and simple wooden benches.

I was moved to look upon the land and wonder about the shepherds. Though they were considered of the lowest status of their time, it was to the shepherds the angel appeared and told them to go to a child, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. “So, they went in haste and found Mary and Joseph and the infant lying in a manger… and they went away praising God for what the angel had told them, that the child was the long waited for savior, the Messiah, the Lord.”

As I gathered with a group of moms reading our Bibles, in a faith sharing group recently, I was reflecting on God sending a savior, his Son, to redeem us, to forgive humanity, to promise us eternal life. How could this event of such significance have begun in this absolutely remote place? How could this story have survived throughout centuries?

At that time in those barren fields in Bethlehem there would be no way to effectively communicate this news to the nearest town, let alone around the world! There was no printed word for centuries, no mass communication, no university educated tellers of this story. How is it that I am sitting here in the lower level of our church with these sweet women in 2023, and we are contemplating this story?

This Christmas I hope you will share my awe of that small cave, in that remote place, where the child Jesus was born. It is a wonder that generations have continually passed down the truth of that story of the first Christmas. God so loved us to send his very son so we would know Emmanuel, that God is with us. 

I wish you always will have a heart of hope knowing God can do great things, impossible things. God chose to come to us in the most tender, humble and real way. We must continue to be tellers of the story of how God wanted to be close to us, so we know how loved we are!



Christmas blessings to each of you. May you ponder, as Mary did, all these things in your heart.

We recently celebrated our annual Memorial Mass for those who lost loved ones this year.

I often think that when we experience significant loss of any kind, we can feel disoriented. The usual landmarks of our life can be lost: relationships we count on, how we spend our time, and the rituals that mark the habits of our life. The image of something (maybe of ourself!) falling or coming apart comes to mind. But, upon further reflection, my experience has been that those of us left to continue in the face of loss have benefited greatly from a caring community of others trusting in God’s benevolence and care for us. It seems:

• There is great power in coming together. We have seen the gift it is to share, in words and even tears, with others who understand at this time of loss. It can be comforting and healing.
• Grief is a journey, and willingness to be in relationship with others, to see others who have not only survived but have thrived, who never stop missing their loved one, but learn how to find continued meaning in their life, is a powerful witness to the resilience of the human spirit.
• As we gather, we borrow and share strength from each other. Some days you have it together and I am falling apart and vice versa. I was one of seven children, and my mom would say, “You can all fall apart but just not all on the same day.” This perspective gives us companions who understand and care on the days we are handling things and are there for us those days we need a friend.
• Healing has many layers. We have learned those who travel through loss with others often achieve a deeper healing of heart and soul.

Upon further reflection, a part of life is to love, and a part is to lose those we love. Love is the best in life. Loss may be our most profound challenge. We are in this together, in loving and in losing. It is a blessing to travel this road with others who care and put their trust in our good God who walks with us, and who “wipes away every tear from our eyes.”

I think of myself as optimistic and grateful for most everything in my life. But the war in Israel feels like a weight in my heart. Perhaps because of our recent pilgrimage there, the space between war and peace seems very narrow. I think of the people we met, Christians, Jews and Muslims, who we came to know and whose stories we carried back with us.

I think of our beautiful hotel on the West Bank and the Muslim call to prayer, blaring out of a loudspeaker you could hear from our balcony each night. I think of the most gracious Palestinian owner of our hotel, Nabil, who went out for special treats for us so they were there when we got back from a day of prayer and experiencing the sites. He and his family evidenced extraordinary hospitality.

I think of Fr. Garrett, the young Jesuit priest we met, originally from Milwaukee, currently serving in Bethlehem teaching Muslim women. He lives with an 80-year-old priest in a dwelling with only basic needs. When you meet him, you can only wish for what he has, as he radiated such joy and goodness.

And I carry our guide, Nasser, in heart and mind with fondness and concern. He exemplified faith with such intelligence, kindness, strength, and compassion! I worry and wonder how this war will affect his livelihood, his family, and his new granddaughter.

So, the grateful part of me is amazed that our timing allowed us to be in the Holy Land when we were. But I am so sad for all the people who are hurt, suffering, displaced and living in this land at war. I am just so sad for our world.

I postponed writing this, hoping to find something uplifting to share. But I decided, sometimes, though we feel woeful for the world, we should remember our good God can, as Teresa of Avila said, “write straight with the crooked lines” of our humanity. Sometimes we just must pray from where we are, even if it is discouraged, sorrowful or feels heartbreaking. When our heart is heavy for whatever reason we just may need to trust God who, though we don’t understand how, can make “all things new.”

We know Mary, the mother of God, from a relationship of prayer with her, from her apparitions but perhaps it is from Scripture we learn of who she is and what God wants us to know about her. These are some lessons I take into my life:

The Visitation. Mary was visited by the angel Gabriel asking her to allow God to come to her, as her child. Mary gave her Fiat, her “yes” to this request/invitation/call, though she didn’t have any idea how that would happen or what it would do to her life. I call this my lesson of WHOLEHEARTEDNESS. Mary teaches it is wholehearted openness to God’s callings in life that leads to our true heart, our truest path.

The Nativity. I have long pondered God’s decision to come to us on this earth as a baby. Why not full-grown and powerful, a superhero wowing us, a king ruling us, rich, famous, beautiful- with all the things that give worldly status? Why a vulnerable, helpless baby?

I have wondered, did even God want to know a mother’s love? A mother’s love creates the most fierce and tender human relationship. Mary teaches UNCONDITIONAL LOVE to all God wants to give birth to in our life. We only need to trust we can bring Christ’s love unconditionally into the world to find the meaning and purpose we all yearn for.

The Wedding at Cana. Few words of Mary were recorded in Scripture. And so those words must be very important. When Jesus, who didn’t seem to have a miracle that day as his Plan A, was asked to help the wedding family caught short on the wine, Mary said to the stewards, “DO WHATEVER HE TELLS YOU.” Mary teaches us, to let Christ lead and trust God will do remarkable things with the simple gifts we are willing to give, our time, our humble talents, our heart.

Standing at the Foot of the Cross. There are many more lessons, obviously too great for this little column. But one last image is Mary teaching us to be willing to STAND AT THE FOOT OF THE CROSS with others on hard days. There are times when we can’t help another in their suffering. But it makes a difference if we stand with them through it or walk away. It makes a difference for them and for who we become. Never be afraid to love those who suffer. Don’t leave them standing alone.

May God kindly and richly bless all of you moms who are doing the hard work of raising children to be good people and love God. And may God bless all of you who have raised children, and have learned, though the physical work is completed, there is nothing about the connection that diminishes. It is a bond forever.

And to all friends, may Mary, Mother of God, continue to lead us to the Divine by the path of wholehearted, unconditional love.

My husband recently had some health issues that involved a medical procedure that was supposed to take an hour but instead took three. I am sure you have had moments like this when you just don’t know if things are going to turn out OK. You pray differently under such circumstances. My coping mechanism was to read Scripture. You hear Scripture differently under such circumstances. God’s Word sounds more personal when we are frightened, suffering, alone, anxious. Maybe in our vulnerability we have ears to hear.

Honestly, it is the same way I feel about the Sacraments. I most often look forward to being at Mass but when I feel scared or sad or anxious, I don’t go to Mass, I run to Mass. I have found it is the routine of prayer or Scripture or participating in the Sacraments that, over time, forms some kind of cocoon of intimacy of relationship with God that feels protective, comforting, and powerful.

This is what I wish I could communicate to the younger people in my life, but I don’t know how to do that without fearing I will sound preachy. I want to share with those I love that it is in the practice of faith, the routine, the everydayness of it, when something will imperceptibly deepen in your heart and mind that will protect you on the sad days and the scary days, on the worst days.

It sounds too transactional, too practical. Too simple. Just show up. Participate. Be there. Be present. Yet, that relationship with God forged in the everyday practices of faith can make the difference in the spiritual experience of having an occasional encounter with God and dwelling in the secure place of trust we feel in the shelter of someone we know loves us for who we really are. There were those who taught this to me in my life. Though I realize, as I look back, they may never have known they led me toward a path of faith and mattered so much to me.  

This is what I long for those of you I love that you will have guides that lead you to the practices that strengthen your spirit and witness God’s love. May the Presence in the Eucharist and The Word nourish your soul. May you be blessed with a heart of prayer and time to invest in it.

Pay attention to others … pay attention to those near you … pay attention to the saints in your lives, there are many of them. Pay attention. (Rev. Craig Butters)

I don’t know how prayer works but I know it works. By that I mean, prayer changes things. Does it change God’s mind? I doubt it. But it changes our hearts. It changes the understanding of the meaning and purpose of our lives.

It somehow (and I really don’t know how this happens) aligns our heart and mind with God’s plan… now that is a phrase that deserves more contemplation… I don’t mean to imply some prescribed preordained blueprint. I don’t envision God with a book about each of us, stored in heaven’s library with God the only cardholder. That implies we have no efficacy about the trajectory or purpose of our own life. So, I have always preferred the phrase God’s design of our life. That describes something more complex and beautiful that resonates with the value of the choices we make in the little span of time we each get to live on this earth. Putting our trust in God’s design requires we live with humility. God is God and we are not.

So, prayer is opening our mind and heart to change our soul to accept the gift of peace that comes when we trust God is caring for us, guiding and moving in and through us and our relationships, to order our life with what is best for us.

Recently, I have been in several important circumstances that have reminded me why prayer is so important, why it is the foundation of relationships. “I am praying for you” is not a phrase we should underestimate. When we say that, it is a pledge to unite whoever we are, with whatever we have, to will good for them and whatever is God’s design for them. So, sometimes it looks like what we pray for doesn’t happen. It is in these moments that we learn to lean into our trust of God’s love for us, even though that love may not, at that time, be apparent.

St. Therese of Lisieux said, “For me prayer is a surge of the heart; it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy.”

I think it is helpful to remember to glance to heaven often. I also believe prayer is a turning toward each other, uniting us together in that “surge of the heart”. It is the act of surrender that brings the peace that only God can give even in the most difficult of times. Lent is a good time to trust that prayer is the practice that changes everything for us and the gift we can give each other.

Is this a phrase you have heard often? It seems it is the final sentence of news stories when reporting on a famous person who has died.

I have thought often recently about this expression, “a life well lived” as we have experienced multiple funerals in a short time. Each person mattered to others. Each one, I could say, was a life well lived, though in different ways. Walking with families through this time, I feel deeply grateful for all they teach me. In each opportunity of sitting with the loved ones of one of our friends that has passed on, I understand there are so many ways to live the life we are given, well.

We may have a long life, a short life or something in between. Our culture focuses a lot of energy on the length of our life. Much less on the quality of the time we have. So many things are put into perspective when we lose someone we love. 

These lessons stand out to me: 

• Accomplishments are great but unless we cured cancer or prevented a war, our accomplishments often, ultimately, aren’t the most important things of our life.
  
• Service to others is more important than most of us think. This may be serving others in our family, or a friend, or devoting our life in a profession that serves others, or clearly living the works of mercy. Serving others seems to matter.
  
• Who we loved matters very much. “These things endure, faith, hope and love and the greatest of these is love.” (1 Cor 13:13) This may be the easiest scripture to quote, but I have come to believe it may be the hardest to live and matters the most.
  
• It is good to care for ourselves during our life, to be healthy in body and mind. But having our priorities clear might be as important. We chase after so many things in the time we have. How we look. What we have. Power. Beauty. Achievements. I once heard a story of how sad it would be to spend our life climbing up a ladder only to find it was leaning against the wrong wall. 

What does your life, lived well, look like? It doesn’t matter as much how long or short a life is. It matters more how we live it, what we prioritize, who we love during it and that we make the difference only we, personally, can make in others’ lives.

We need to be angels to each other, to give each other strength and consolation.  

(Henri Nouwen)

This Advent has had a different focus- I have spent a lot of time visiting a rehab center caring for an elderly relative. Each person I pass makes me sad. My heart and mind have been centered on my friend who had the kind of health scare that switches off your sense of security and the illusion we carry that life will go on forever. I have been in prayer vigil with my friend whose child is not being treated for cancer, as we long for a miracle. We just had a program for the grieving who may be figuring how to “celebrate” when the love of their life isn’t there.

Advent is the season of hope. It calls us to beautiful anticipation of the enigmatic love of our God who chose to be with us in flesh and blood, to share in the incredible elation and despair of life, the Messiah disguised as a vulnerable child come to save us.

Advent always goes too fast for me because I want to savor its lights, sounds, smells, and sense of shared hope with which it transforms the world in songs sung in only this season, family traditions of wreaths with four candles and ordinary trees transformed with lights. I want to watch A Christmas Carol to recover my ten-year-old sense of trust in the goodness of humanity as Scrooge gets his priorities straightened out each year.

Instead of moving quickly doing things: decorating, cooking, preparing for company, I have mostly been standing still, listening, trying to find the right words of comfort and hope. I have had to be very quiet. Waiting in prayer listening for God’s whispers of love.

I have been pondering to find an inspirational thought to share but I find I am standing in the crossroads of Advent hope and winter darkness as this week’s shortest day of light approaches. Sometimes in the dark, the heart must choose the wonder of believing.

Mr. Rogers said when you are in trouble look for the helpers. Henri Nouwen reminded me to look for angels and to remember the possibility that we can be the angels to each other. My faith assures me that angels will herald the saving child who IS hope, Immanuel, God with us, who will always bring light into the dark, hope into the confusion and love where it is most needed. Faith is expressed in the trust angels will appear in the night sky and in our life.

November is a month dripping with spirituality. How can it not? It begins with All Saints Day and All Souls Day and, at our parish, is followed by our beautiful Memorial Mass where families gather to remember all our loved ones whose funerals we celebrated this past year.

November holds the most thought-provoking holiday of the year- Thanksgiving. Though, not a religious holiday, it celebrates gratefulness, the hallmark of the spiritual life.

For me, it is especially introspective as it is the month of my parents and younger sister’s birthdays, all of whom are no longer with me in this world. And to cap off my personal gratitude, it is the month of my husband’s birthday. He is my rock and the most tangible sign of God’s love in my life.

All this led me to reflect on the Communion of Saints who we mention each time we pray the Creed… I believe in the communion of saints… the teaching that we are united to both the living and the dead because in Christ we are one Body. We live in a communion that encompasses the blessed in heaven and pilgrims on earth. (CCC962)

The communion of saints went from theory to prayer when I thought of my loved ones who surround me like my husband and my grandchildren but also my deceased parents and grandparents. Then I thought of my colleagues, and the intangible bond that ministry forges in the nights and weekends serving God’s Church. And then I thought of the canonized saints who inspire me to faith beyond what I will ever achieve, who I personally draw strength from, St. Theresa of Avila, St. Catherine of Sienna, and Mary. That led me to gratitude for all of you, friends in this parish, with whom I worship, and pray and who are faith community to me. You contribute to the meaning and purpose of my every day.

For you, I hope this November is an opportunity for reflection and gratitude. In doing so, I believe you will find your communion of saints and the spirituality of Thanksgiving.