Out of uncertainty, a Way unfolds. Jesus consistently receives my mysterious desires and prepares places carefully designed for me. Authentic friendships, joyful community, work that draws on my unique gifts. Glorifying God in my body means saying ‘yes’ to my life. It means throwing myself into the tasks and relationships I have been given instead of lamenting the ones I haven't.
Read MoreFor every woman who is stuck between two worlds, two cultures, understand that the Catholic Church is universal. There should never be a division between your identities. We accept all, we love all, and we are all one body in Christ.
Read More(I) encourage you to not be so quick to categorize the crosses in your life as just suffering you’ll need to buckle up and deal with. Allow yourself the space in your spiritual imagination to envision how something really hard in your life could actually be a wildly massive gift.
Read MoreLike you, I was given a skin colour. But, unlike many of my sisters, or if you can relate, like many of my sisters, my skin colour either became a determinant for who I was perceived to be, or my skin colour was not considered valuable enough to even be acknowledged. My skin colour either gave people a right to accept their own preconceived ideas about me or it was just dismissed all together.
Read MoreThe love I first felt pulling my son out of my womb, bringing him to my breast, singing him to sleep, it had been a mere taste of this heavenly love.
Read MoreSurrender trying to live up to everyone’s expectations of you as a woman, daughter, friend, co-worker, wife, mother and Christian. Ask God what He wants from you, what He expects of you in any given situation and that will be enough.
Read MoreI want to share a snippet of this journey of overcoming self-doubt and embracing my role as an artist with you. I also want to encourage other women to recognize in themselves their creative capacity, and explore how spiritual and physical motherhood reflect the role of the Creator in the deepest way.
Read More“I just don’t think I’ll ever be happy.” Saying these words out loud to my spiritual director changed my life, and I want to reach out to you with some hope if you’ve ever found yourself in a similar situation.
Read More(Photo by Jennifer Burk) My eating disorder took hold of my life. I was so drained and numb, like a walking zombie. I was just trying to get by, and I only prayed when I was laying in bed with no energy to move. I had been to a few on-campus counselors while I was in college, who tried to tell me to “just eat” or just believe that my body was a temple of the Holy Spirit. That was the last thing I could believe.
Read MoreAs I stared transfixed at what I instantly understood to be a symbol for the Holy Trinity, I realized that long before I had even been aware of Him, I had unwittingly branded myself as His; I belong to God and He calls me beautiful.
Read MoreI find myself overwhelmed by the many endeavors I want to pursue, the vastness of improvement that I can still make in so many areas of my life, and the restlessness of my longing in general to find lasting and satisfying happiness in my current walk of life.
Read MoreDear Ladies, I have desired to be a wife and mother for as long as I can remember. Can you relate?
Read MoreIt seems that no matter how much we try, loving ourselves and the physical bodies God gave us can be a never ending cycle of good days and bad days. Everywhere we look, we see other women to whom we compare ourselves, always finding something wrong with what we have and something beautiful with what they have. I should know. I was born with one breast.
Read MoreDorothy Day once said, “Don’t call me a Saint. I don’t want to be dismissed so easily.” I know what she meant there.
Read MoreAt the age of 32, this is my best handwriting. Close to ten years ago, four other Catholic campus missionaries and I were T-boned by a Mack Truck while driving to an end-of-the-semester retreat. I don’t remember a single day from the month that followed.
Read MoreDuring the very first Mass I attended in Afghanistan, this was all I could think about. I looked around the small chapel with tears in my eyes thinking 'this is the universal Church.' I may be on the other side of the world but, during that hour of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, my soul is at home.
Read MoreSometimes I would wake up in strange places. Sometimes I would wake up on the bathroom floor. Once I woke up in a bus station downtown after a baseball game, escorted by a kindly police officer to his waiting cruiser and delivered unceremoniously to a detox center in the next city over where I attended college.
Read MoreGod had invited me to this specific place at this specific time. He had uniquely situated me to build bridges and instead I had built a wall around myself.
Read MoreLast November before my 20th birthday, I planned on killing myself. I felt I was worth nothing and had no purpose. I didn’t know what to do anymore. I felt as if I were a robot. I was working 80 hours a week and sleeping the rest. I was so lost that I dug myself into a deep well of depression.
Read MoreAt a young age, sporting soccer shorts and a mullet, all I cared about was climbing the next tree and wondering when the new issue of LEGO magazine would arrive at my door. I asked for hot wheels for Christmas and role-played as the boy character for all our childhood adventures. I looked around me, saw my friends and sisters and knew I didn’t fit the mold. My (little) heart ached and wondered, “why am I so different?”, “am I good?”
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