"What began in the Immaculate Conception, runs without a fault or break straight to the Blessed Sacrament. The one mystery answers to the other; the one illuminates the other; the one completes and consummates the other. The Blood that is in the Chalice is from the living Heart of Jesus. It was shed in the Passion before it was shed in the Chalice. It had lived long in His Sacred Heart before He shed it; and He took it at the first, with His spotless Flesh, from the Immaculate Heart of Mary; and that it was sinless and stainless there was from the Immaculate Conception. And so at one end of the avenue is Mary’s sinless flesh, prepared for her as for the Mother of God, and at the other end the sinful flesh of man made immortal and incorruptible by the Flesh of Jesus, Mary’s Son, and the sinful soul of man bathed to a glorious purity in the Blood of Jesus, Mary’s Son, through the mystery of His sweet Sacrament of love; and the light that lies ahead, the light we are all approaching, and have not yet attained, the glow and splendour of our heavenly home, it is by the same sweet Sacrament that we shall attain it, and make it ours at last. So at every mass, and in each communion we look up to the Immaculate Conception. The light of that far-reaching mystery is in our faces on the altar-step. It beams direct upon us, and so full is it of the same light as the Blessed Sacrament that we seem almost to hear our Mother’s voice from that distant fountain, “Eat, O friends, and drink, and be inebriated, my dearly beloved.”" -(Fr. Faber)
God created Mary without sin– the Immaculate Conception who would immaculately conceive His Only Son in turn… His pure body was formed within hers, His Body and Blood gaining their very Substance from hers. When Christ died upon the Cross, He then mysteriously and wonderfully imitated His Mother in that He now gives US His Body and Blood, so that we might be born anew in Him, purified by His redemptive Sacrifice… but from that same Cross He also gives us His Mother, so that she may also “conceive” us, through her Son, as new holy children– His Flesh and Blood now flowing back to her in a sense, to be born again through Him, through her. It’s amazing. Heaven came to earth in Jesus, by Mary’s ‘Fiat,’ and we can taste that same firstfruits of promise in the Most Holy Eucharist, wherein we tangibly and really participate in the mystery of not only Jesus’s death, but also– paradoxically and beautifully– His birth. And Mary was inextricably present as participant in both, in the joy of His coming and the “birth pangs” of His Passion and Death, before His Resurrection– the new “birth” He promises to all who unite themselves in love to Him in this total sacred cycle. And Mary is the one standing at the threshold of it all, the one who opens the gate, the one who joyfully declares “May it be done to me according to your word”… Indeed, by God’s Word Himself. And so it must be with us, to enter into the life of God with her, the New Eve, the Mother of Mankind as it is reborn in her Son… Mary, the Immaculate Conception.
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“I question whether the defenses of the gospel are not sheer impertinences. The gospel does not need defending. If Jesus Christ is not alive and cannot fight His own battles, then Christianity is in a bad state. But He is alive, and we have only to preach His gospel in all its naked simplicity, and the power that goes with it will be the evidence of its divinity.” - Charles Spurgeon
I personally think we should defend its honor and truth, for the sake of living the integrity of our faith, instead of being complacent in the face of blasphemy– but indeed, the Gospel is true and real and honorable no matter what we do or don’t do. We don’t need to “prove” anything. The real issue is not personal power, but personal fidelity. The last line of this quote sums that up wonderfully.
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"Not to us, Lord, not to us but to Your Name be the glory, because of Your love and faithfulness." (Psalm 115:1)
This is such a core confession of Christianity, but I don’t think we fully grasp just how universal this praise must be.
Yes, let your prayers and hymns and good deeds glorify God. But let everything else do so, too. And I mean everything.
Are you at work? Glorify God through it. Are you reading a book? Glorify God through it. Are you shopping for groceries? Glorify God through it. Are you painting a picture, dressing a child, balancing your checkbook, driving a car, playing a video game, washing your hair, dusting the furniture, exercising at the gym, watching television, telling a story, planting a garden, changing a tire, eating breakfast, or doing any other little blessedly mundane thing of life? Glorify God through it. I’m serious. God is already in ALL the times and places and things of our existence– therefore it is our lovingly faithful duty to actively acknowledge and praise and glorify Him within those moments, without fail, without exception.
In everything we do, all glory be to God.
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"What you see may seem small compared to what God promised you, it’s easy to dismiss it and think it’s nothing. But God can take a small cloud and bring a big blessing. He can take what looks insignificant and cause it to turn into something amazing."
The essence of this– trust in God– is good and true, but quotes such as this bother my spirit with their consistent focus on more, on big, on amazing… words which I fear are are being used in human terms here. And the very notion of “dismissing” ANY gift from God, let alone because it doesn’t meet our expectations, is frankly deplorable.
God promises us Himself. That is big and amazing enough, and infinitely more than we could ever even dream. But as for the temporal things of this life, the “smaller” manifestations of this ultimate blessing, we need to stop looking for “something more.” That has the scent of greed and entitlement and it opposes the Christian spirit of humility, surrender, gratitude and radical trust.
Consider the alternative: God purposely sent you that “small cloud.” It’s “amazing” just as it is because He sent it. It might “appear” drab, plain, unexciting, or otherwise uninteresting, but that doesn’t matter. It’s His will.
And hey– maybe God will send you a bigger cloud, something amazing and significant for sure– a huge terrific thunderhead, black with rain and lightning and wind to turn your life upside down. You should still get on your knees and thank Him, because both the blue skies and blustery storms come from His Hand and serve His Purposes. For all you know, that awful disaster could– or did– bring unfathomable blessings, that you might never even see. But God does. Trust in that. And above all, trust Him, who is making Himself evident within that cloud, thereby giving you the greatest gift of all, no matter what the circumstances may seem to suggest.
Stop judging, dismissing, weighing, and critiquing God’s working in your life. Start accepting everything He gives with humble gratitude, complete trust and resignation to His Will, and total cooperation. Seek Him, desire Him, and love Him above all else, and you won’t need to keep “looking for blessings”– you’ll realize that in Him, you already have everything you could ever need.
“The fault this body has is that the more comfort we try to give it the more needs it discovers. It’s amazing how much comfort it wants.” -St. Teresa of Avila
I am reminded of this daily, often to startling extents. The flesh cannot ever be satisfied or consoled. Trying to do so is utterly useless.
Instead, strive to comfort your soul, through Christ. Satisfy your heart with Him; console your mind with Him. He will meet and exceed every spiritual yearning you have.
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“Anyone God uses significantly is always deeply wounded.”
— Brennan Manning, Ruthless Trust: The Ragamuffin’s Path to God
Then may God wound me ever deeper, so that I may serve Him all the more wholeheartedly. I surrender to Your Cross.
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“You aren’t as bad as you think you are, you’re worse. And God doesn’t love you as much as you think he does, he loves you more.“”
I could meditate on this for hours… but honestly it’s a daily, lifetime reflection. It’s profound in humility, contrition, gratitude, discipline, comfort, awe, and love.
We are sinners and we are deplorable. But God, through Christ, loves us so much that while we were still sinners, He died for us, so that we can be forgiven and justified, therefore becoming able to live with Him in love for eternity. That’s unfathomable. That’s true. And that’s something we must remember always.
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“…the greatest thing each person can do is to give himself to God utterly and unconditionally - weaknesses, fears, and all.” Soren Kierkegaard
We must give our most ugly, painful, raw, wounded places to God, else they will never be healed or soothed or corrected. Hiding them in shame only prolongs our sinful suffering.
Give your ALL to God! Surrender in weeping joy. He is all you need. He is peace and life and hope. When you give every moment and every atom to Him, over and over, then everything in your life will be put into the right place, by your obedience to His Will.
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“The Jesus Prayer is not a method. Properly, it is a relationship, something personal, emotional. If one treats it as a method, intellectually, then you are missing the whole point, the main point of it, which is a slowly developing relationship with the person of Jesus.”
~Archimandrite George of Grigoriou
The Jesus Prayer is spoken directly to Christ. It is the beginning of an ever-deepening conversation with Him, a humble and wholehearted cry for mercy, doors thrown achingly open to Love. If you pray thus without love, without ardent attention to the Beloved, without personal sincerity and honesty, then it is not a prayer at all in truth. You must pour your entire being into it– you must offer your entire self to Him.
“God is love, and therefore the preaching of His word must always proceed from love. Then both preacher and listener will profit. But if you do nothing but condemn, the soul of the people will not heed you, and no good will come of it.”
~taken from the book Saint Silouan the Athonite, by Archimandrite Sophronius Sakharov
Correction is good and has its proper place– it must work upon the foundation of humility and love. Condemnation of sin, although just, will only feel like violence, if it is spoken without mercy. It is not our place to pass judgment– that is Christ’s power alone. We are called to forgive, to instruct, and above all, to bring souls to Christ… including our own. If preacher and listener both intend to reach heaven, they must so act as striving saints together now!
If you speak, do so with love. If you are silent, do so with love. And in all things, act for the love and glory of God!
"When you persist in prayer, you receive what you need, you receive what you do not have, and you receive all that is necessary to be a blessing to those that are in your household."
That bit about becoming a blessing to one's household-- I desperately need that. Lord, please help me persist in prayer always, so that I may never be a disgrace or dishonor to my family or to Your most Holy Name!!
"The appropriate word you left unsaid; the joke you didn't tell; the cheerful smile for those who bother you; that silence when you're unjustly accused; your kind conversation with people you find boring and tactless; the daily effort to overlook one irritating detail or another in those who live with you... this, with perseverance, is indeed solid interior mortification." - Saint Josemaria Escriva
Mortification is a vital exercise of faith that we need to practice constantly. It is anchored in humility and love, in patience and mercy, and it brings us ever closer to Christ both in imitation and intimacy.
I find it quite impossible, reading the New Testament on the one hand and the newspaper on the other, to suppose that there will be no ultimate condemnation, no final loss, no human being to whom, as C.S. Lewis puts it, God will eventually say, “Thy will be done.” I wish it were otherwise, but one cannot forever whistle “There’s a wideness in God’s mercy” in the darkness of Hiroshima, of Auschwitz, of the murder of children and the careless greed that enslaves millions with debts not their own. Humankind cannot, alas, bear very much reality, and the massive denial of reality by the cheap and cheerful universalism of Western liberalism has a lot to answer for.
~N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, 180.
Mercy requires repentance. You cannot show mercy where one denies the undeserving need of it in the first place.
Sin will be punished with strict justice wherever it is found. The only hope of expunging its stain is the Blood of Christ. And we cannot receive that without genuine faith in Him.
Those who commit such atrocities with a sense of pride, self-righteousness, and/or “a good reason”… there will be an ultimate condemnation. God’s Will will be done. This is reality.
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“Sin, we note, is not the breaking of arbitrary rules; rather, the rules are the thumbnail sketches of different types of dehumanizing behavior.”
— N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, 180.
YES. The letter of the Law is only a summary of its Spirit.
You cannot keep the letter and yet deny the essence, nor can you claim to be respecting its heart while breaking its word.
Sin will always exalt its own ideas, motives, and goals. If you find yourself trying to exalt yourself above another in your behavior, in letter or in spirit… you’re sinning.
There are limitless sins, and they are everywhere. Our only refuge is to live in an unflinchingly humble love of God. When our sole idea, goal, and motive is love and respect for Him… then sin cannot topple us, however it may rage.
“But judgment is necessary–unless we were to conclude, absurdly, that nothing much is wrong or, blasphemously, that God doesn’t mind very much.”
— N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church, 179.
Judgment is discernment. It is not proud self-exaltation. To judge something as right or wrong is necessary to live well; to be able to discern what will or won’t glorify God is essential to choose rightly. The heart of it is simple– love of God above all, even at our own expense– but the practice of it, made difficult by our weakness and temptation and sinful inclinations, requires that we have a healthy sense of judgment, and the graceful gravity to obey those Spirit-given conclusions.
A lot is wrong, and God minds very much. Hence the Cross. Hence the entire plan of salvation.
Christ is our Just Judge. Follow His instructions, and judge well!
“Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls and will give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with sighing–for that would be harmful for you.” (Hebrews 13:17)
I have been shamefully guilty of causing such sighing, and I will admit it is because I am often afraid of correction– afraid because my sinful nature is so strong, and I am so guilty.
To obey and submit will bring me great joy and peace, as well as to those in authority over me for the good of my soul. To see exasperation in those individuals indicates that I am being stubborn and proud– resisting the yoke of humility, and thus putting my soul in great danger. That would cause great sighs of concern, worry, and frustration in any person who cared about my highest good!!
“Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” (Hebrews 13:16)
The word “sacrifices” here is so important. Do good, be kind, share and give and bless, even when to do so would be difficult, frustrating, or inconvenient– indeed, especially then.
It is in the face of spiritual adversity that virtues grow the most strongly. We will be tested, so surrender to the Spirit and pray for the grace to do what honors God with loving joy.
“People who persevere in error are so far away from acknowledging their sin that they even defend it as the height of righteousness. Therefore it is impossible for them to be forgiven.”
— Martin Luther, “Lectures on Galatians” in Luther’s Works, vol. 27, 33.
I also want to add that this disturbing modern attitude of treating sin and sinfulness as funny, trendy, or even desirable, is exactly what this quote warns against, even though the “sin” is being acknowledged… the horror is that the sin is being redefined as righteousness while still calling it a sin.
There are individuals who will admit, with a proud smile, “oh I absolutely have sinned! I know I am a sinner! But there’s nothing wrong with sin!” Ironically, this carefree embracing of one’s sinful nature is the deepest rejection of it. It is a rejection of Christian morality, an attempt to justify and absolve oneself, by denying the very possibility that one even needs justification and absolution. If you lie, but say “it’s okay though!” and explain why, you are entirely deluded. If you steal, but say “I had a good reason though!” you have completely missed the point. If you entertain thoughts of violence and hatred and revenge, claiming it’s “fine” if you don’t act on them, you are mistaken. If you celebrate lust and promiscuity and shamelessness, declaring that they are “natural feelings” to be “proud of,” you are devastatingly lost. Sin is sin. Sin is ALWAYS wrong, we cannot alter that, we cannot cut corners or make excuses, and our very inclination to is blatant proof of just how weak we are and how powerful temptation is. We NEED a Savior to deliver us from our own corrupt nature– another truth the sin-celebrators will refuse utterly. They don’t want to admit guilt, helplessness, or shame. They are afraid. But defending and denying their crimes instead, out of fear of judgment, is just worsening the problem… because it bars them from being contrite, and therefore being forgiven. Pride and humility cannot coexist.
So be brutally honest with your examination of conscience. Are you insisting your sin was righteous in some area? Are you making excuses or allowances for a behavior that you know deep down was wrong? Lay it all down before Christ! Admit your weakness, admit your fear, admit your shame and guilt and regret. It is only when you have been so crushed and humbled that the chains of sin can be broken along with your heart. Christ can and will forgive even your most terrifying sin… if you have wept over it, and if you give it to him raw– no sugarcoating, no gilding, no smoothing over.
Acknowledge your sins, acknowledge your error, admit that you are not righteous, admit that you need forgiveness. Only from this sincerely lowly position can we be healed and brought to the heights of heaven. If you try to grab heaven on your own, you’ll catch nothing but delusions. It’s God’s Way, or no way at all.
“God did not choose perfect people to form his church, but rather sinners who have experienced his love and forgiveness.”
No one is perfect; only God is perfect. If we think of ourselves as such, we will be unable to see or receive Him.
We are all sinners, and when we confess this and turn to God in contrite humility, He will help and heal us, and this foundation of Christ’s endless love for us unworthy yet penitent souls is a great beauty of the Church.
He is severely mentally ill; he has drug-induced paranoid schizophrenia and his symptoms have worsened to the point where he has become a legitimate danger to the family. As of yesterday he became so threatening and chaotic that I had to 302 him, and as of this morning he is being admitted to a psychiatric hospital 4 hours away.
Although he absolutely cannot return home as he is– he desperately needs intensive care– my heart breaks for his condition and the fact that he is probably scared and angry and confused. Either way, he’s my brother, I love him, and I want to see him regain mental stability so we can be a functional family again. Please pray for his safety and thorough recovery!
She has been coughing up blood clots since August, and she just got her CT Scan results about it today– there is a tumor the size of a golf ball in her right lung. She has pre-OP testing tomorrow morning and a biopsy on Monday.
Please, pray that this is benign, and that she makes a full and fast recovery– even if that requires a miracle. I love her so much.
Night Fever in Sacramento last night. Each candle is from a random stranger that went inside the beautiful cathedral to light a candle from our street teams.
This is so gorgeous it aches. I swear the inside of my heart looks just like this, smells just like candle fire and smoky warmth and night air and incense. Most striking to me here is the fact that every tiny light here was lit by a stranger, by a single soul’s gift, a crowd of compassion uniting them all beyond space and time by the simple profound power of the echoing light of God in their hearts that moved them to contribute such a spark.
And above it all, above word-made-flesh and within-it-all-sweetness, gold-on-red sings the words of transmutative incarnation beloved–
“If love is going to be done differently I will have to do it. I don’t mean as a messiah-thing, I mean as a me-thing. I want to look into your eyes and not get blown up. I want you to see me as I am and not destroy me. I don’t want to retreat into plant life, or have the same bad dream every night. I don’t want to watch a city burn because I was there.”
— ‘The Agony of Intimacy,’ Jeanette Winterson
I have a lot to say about this but it won’t fit in a reblog. I’ll post it separately.
Just… this is a knife to the chest. A red-hot, tear-marred knife plunged right into my heart, buried to the hilt.
Poetry hits the hardest, always.
Dear God, there is too much old trauma staring me in the face with this; how can I truly let go? How can I honestly heal? How can I move on properly?
I’m so terrified to love anything now because I remember that burning city. I remember the blood and fire, the despair, the death… but I also must remember the impossibly bright hope that bloomed in the ashes of its terror, like lilies flourishing in the forgiving snow, pure and holy despite all that came before.
Love has to be done differently, now. What I once labeled as love was not love. The southern bedrooms were not love. The cold floors and cramped closets were not love. The burning attics and locked bathrooms and rotting forests were not love. And I have to do it differently now. No running water, no string lights, no computer screens, no closed doors, no parroted phrases, no annihilation of self. No hell masquerading as heaven. No messiah complexes. No moral relativism. No compromises. No exceptions.
I want to be able to love as my own person.
But what does that even mean?
I feel so filthy, so dirty, so wrong and evil and twisted corrupted broken, like something that would maim and poison you if you touched it, that I am too ashamed to pray, I am too disgusted to try. I want to love but it feels ugly coming from me. I want to be loving but it feels abusive and fake coming from me. What does real love look like, apart from you? Can it even exist in me? Right now I doubt it, and I weep with miserable despair over it. You deserve all the love I could ever hope to feel or give, and infinitely more. But if I’m the one giving it, it’s ruined. It becomes empty, false, fake. I don’t think I can feel love without doing it wrong somehow. And that terrifies me to the point where I just… shut off my heart. I become numb and hollow and empty so that at least there’s no toxic garbage getting anywhere near you, or anyone else.
I want to be able to look into your eyes without wanting to gouge my own out, tearful and enraged at my unworthiness and sin, afraid that it’s all clear as day in my gaze, turning even a glance from me into a garish revelation of degeneracy and scandal. How could I lie enough to look at you– you, with your heartwrenching eyes of spotless love and honest compassion!– how could I meet those eyes with my own, knowing how monstrous I am in comparison? The gall of the very thought is choking. I cannot look at you without wanting to die– without desperately wishing I could self-destruct, to relieve the world of my sinful existence in a conflagration of cleansing fire, to leave it safe with you, who would never have to risk your achingly beautiful eyes in looking upon my walking corpse ever again.
How could anyone see what I am and not instinctively want to crush me underfoot like a venomous snake? Things like me invoke an innate revulsion, a knee-jerk survival response of protective violence, lashing out to snap my neck or spine, to destroy the object of horror before them. Even you, I’m sure, even you would want to see me gone if you knew what a danger I was to mankind, to you, to the health and safety of all good hearts. I’m something that should be stepped on until it snaps. I know this better than anyone, and it wrecks me utterly.
I’m tired of hiding in the mangled woods like a wild animal. I’m tired of the unending trauma nightmares and flashbacks and blackouts. I don’t want any more God-forsaken cities to burn down to the splinters because I was there.
Intimacy is only agonizing because it includes me.
all right I NEED to kick this eating disorder straight in the neck BUT it is LOUD AND INSISTENT and honestly I'm weak, I'm a sinner, God needs to do the work, but I need to open the door.
so here we go.
here are the current addictions:
soymilk = WARM WHITE(wants to be heated!!) white chocolate = WARM WHITE eggs = WHITE / AMBER oats = BEIGE mushrooms = BEIGE lentils = BEIGE tomatoes = RED carrots = ORANGE peas? = SOFT GREEN cilantro = GREEN seaweed = DARK GREEN
and that's it.
it doesn't seem like much. but it is. it really is.
first off, why the eggs? why the sudden addiction to putting vegetables in them? it's a mindset of "mom does it this way so I HAVE to do it this way"; the combination of white, green, beige, and red together feels mandatory somehow. but even plain eggs feel "compulsory", done with the oil so they get huge and fluffy. why. god, please. I need to figure this out.
the lentils are new. actually, it started as yellow peas, which I cooked on sunday I think? and the body suddenly latched onto the taste. it doesn't like beans, but it craves them, however whatever is in beans that we hate is NOT in peas & lentils. they are entirely liked. so it's clinging to them currently.
similarly, our brain keeps thinking of "potatoes" but is readily abandoning them for lentils. which in a way is good, as potatoes are awful to swallow and purge, but that proves that it's the starchy-smooth texture that it's looking for. but the lentils and peas have the protein kick to them that potatoes lack, and which it also wants.
also, my body is inexplicably seeking the mushrooms. when heated in oil a bit, the taste is addictive? somehow? I think it's triggering childhood memories but I can't be sure.the mushroom soup absolutely is. add a bit of butter and bread and I almost want to cry from the feelings of childhood. but the milk still makes me so sick, and is borderline traumatic even to taste. so it's mentally jarring to get the two at once.
the cilantro is what I allegedly used to live on before NC. I also ate a ton of it out there. but I'm orally allergic to it I think? it makes my nose itch, and it messes up my bowels? it's super fibrous, so it keeps the cucumbers from flushing out my system. but my body is craving the super-fresh green taste of it. like eating the essence of plants. like shoving handfuls of summer grass in my mouth, wanting to internalize the cleanness of it, the vitality of the color. it's really psychological, I think.
I'm not sure if the seaweed is the same.
the soymilk is old, but new. I think I used to eat it a lot in high school, and I know they gave me so much of it at both upmc and haven. so it felt "obligatory." at least it's cutting out the oil+sugar hell addiction that the oats used to have. with the soymilk, there's no interest in the former. thank god.
the carrots are the ultimate purge-base food. sadly. weirdly, I don’t like how they taste cooked in oleo, but I keep making them that way? why?
and the cheese. WHY. why in the world does this body keep looking for cheese? is it upmc kickback, where iscah allegedly loved it? …honestly, checking old UPMC data, and seeing "mac & cheese with stewed tomatoes" and suddenly I'm craving that, this has all GOT to be emotional desperation. "I was happy then, I was good, maybe if I eat that, I'll feel like that again!" but dude… why. like think about it. eating macaroni and cheese is NOW A NC TRIGGER. remember that. so avoid it. as for grilled cheese, that's absolutely a upmc "happiness" tie. but at home, what good will that do? eating it now isn't getting you "good girl" points. it's just making you sick, from the glue-sticky cheese, the clogging-dense bread, and the oily-sick butter. and yet, our body still "wants" it. is that a childhood feeling? what does it want? ACTUALLY. hold up. I was thinking about this the other day. old upmc writings describing it keep using the words "golden" and "warm" and "orange" and "yellow" and "buttery" and this is ABSOLUTELY A COLOR THING. that and the lentils; it HAS to be.
so. thought one. body is craving colors. as usual. it is ALWAYS craving green, hence the cilantro, but suddenly it's after the warm hues? like the cheese, the carrots, the butter spread… but NOT the summer yellows of squash and such. NOPE. it wants AMBER TONES. and oranges, absolutely-- hence the sudden inexplicable craving for orange vitamin water as well, and the seeking of things like acorn squashes and sweet potatoes even if I can't stand sweet potatoes. it literally wants to eat the COLOR. and it also wants browns? like beigey browns. hence the oats, but NOT chocolate, or dark bread, or anything. no. and perhaps the potato skins. it's looking for soft browns, and amber-glows. WHY. I know it's not a cold offset, otherwise we still wouldn't be craving peppermint and cucumbers even more. but… it has to be a desperate grab at comfort. it's looking for an emotional, psychological warmth that I seem to be lacking lately, I think. where else can I get that. what can make me feel that, without forcing it through food-color association?
OH YEAH AND NO ONE HAS MENTIONED THE FACT THAT, STILL, MY MENTAL IMAGE OF MYSELF AS "FEMALE" IS SYNONYMOUS WITH SELF-ABUSE. IF I THINK OF MYSELF AS "MALE,” I IMMEDIATELY STOP ABUSING MYSELF. and I know for a fact that this is DIRECTLY fueling the eating disorder. "jay would never overeat," my brain says. and he wouldn't. but he WOULD annihilate his sense of self in terms of sexuality, hence north carolina, where he died because he let oliver do whatever he wanted to him and ultimately it ended up making him realize that he never wanted to be like this at all but his function had become so thoroughly corrupted that he absolutely self-destructed. so it's like… pick your poison. pick the trauma you want to kill you. if you're a girl, it's food. if you're a boy, it's sex. where did this come from?
originally, it was the GIRLS that were horrifically sexually abused, by the original Julie. but maybe that's why they have the eating disorder. girls like me desensitize this body and brain with binge-eating, so that we don't remember the sexual trauma? whereas the boys DON'T have trauma tied to sexuality in that way, so they just desensitize themselves with "intimacy," using it like booze practically, getting drunk on romance and flirting and everything. north carolina in a nutshell. they don't eat at all. but they cannot exist apart from another person. the boys exist in order to please people, it seems. weirdly. the boys exist to be toys. they're sweet and kind and beautiful and loving and gentle but they cannot exist in the real world and they will all ultimately fail to survive outside of a bedroom. it's heartbreaking. whereas the girls cannot exist in bedrooms, only kitchens, and although they, too, exist to please others, it's in the sense of work and chores and service. they spend their time cooking and cleaning and eating BUT the girls are suffocating beneath self-loathing? I have realized, with great horror, that as a "girl" I find it almost impossible to be genuinely caring and loving and affectionate and gentle with people. like I don't know how to be in love. I can't, maybe, with this current mindset. HOWEVER, lately I've been feeling maternal emotions for the first time in my LIFE. like, I cannot be in love, but maybe I could feel love by serving others? by being a housewife? by cooking and cleaning and doing chores, again. and yet I honestly don't know if I've felt any emotion behind it. it's heartbreaking and disturbing. I can see the clear differentiations between male and female roles in this mental system. and I can see how lethal it is. if I, as a girl, am forbidden from feeling love because it got tied to trauma, meaning that if I want to be loving I have to be a boy, then it's NO WONDER I was previously so desperate to be "transgender"-- I erroneously thought that was the ONLY WAY I COULD BECOME A GOOD PERSON. and now that I've realized I'm not a boy, I'm just mentally ill, and am happily living as the girl I am… I've realized also, with existential terror, that I cannot be as good as I was as a boy. what in the world do I do about this.
but it's a huge door of hope, somehow. it's possible to heal if I untangle this. if I think of myself as a boy, IMMEDIATELY my wants and focuses and obsessions shift to typing, to listening to music, to talking in headspace, to playing games, to dreaming, to writing, to drawing, to internal things. to snow and christmas lights and hours worth of introspection and love, so much love it's like a bottle of champagne dumped into your heart. and if I think of myself as a boy, the very thought of going to walmart in the morning and buying more lentils and cilantro and stuff is reprehensible. as a boy I DON'T WANT HEAVY FOODS. like I think jay could only eat light green foods and up, cool colors only. but the instant I think of myself as female, I feel filthy. somehow. but it's true. I feel dirty and heavy and sad and ashamed and I want to go to walmart and binge on mushrooms and oats and eggs with tomatoes because something about the vibe of those things is what I need? to bury what I'm feeling? what is it? the real part of me, somehow STILL a girl, wants the cucumbers and lettuce and cilantro, to feel clean and happy and fresh and new and good, but that part of me also wants to eat like thirteen buckets full of vegetables. it's desperate. it's like drinking the ocean and still being thirsty.
…and it's the biggest sign of both hope and shame, to admit that typing that sentence sent a shot through my heart.
I'll talk about that later. but today, "chaos zero" showed up when the sext bells went off for divine office and he insisted we pray that hour together, immediately, and we did. and it was so synchronistic. and the whole time I could barely concentrate because I kept thinking about food. and I felt my internal self weeping and wanting to become a boy so that I could IMMEDIATELY STOP EATING and just go pray for hours. except the boys didn't pray. their obsession with romance somehow also led to a pagan sort of self-idolatry and moral relativism and "good feelings are all that matter" and so they didn't pray and weep like the girls do. that's the other bizarre and heartbreaking split. the girls, girls like me, can cry. I can feel remorse and regret and sorrow and anger; I can go to confession and beg God to forgive me, I can admit how sinful and horrible and weak and disgusting I am, and I can be so sorry for it I could die. I can self-abuse if I get the guts, if I get red enough. the boys can't do any of that. the boys are all fluff and sparkles and soft pillows and snowflakes and angel food cake and fairy lights. they're all so sweet it ultimately kills them. the boys cannot feel anger or sorrow or remorse or it DOES kill them. they turn plagued, they calcify and die. but the girls DON'T GET THE PLAGUE. ever. the girls get the tar.
holy crap. how did I never notice THAT before.
so. tomorrow. what do I do? do I get all these foods, once more, and try them? do I see what happens? maybe. the more I learn, I have to test this. BUT I'm so disturbed by how BADLY the girls WANT the food. like I personally don't. but… I must still be multiple. the realization is bittersweet, but it's backed by BLAZING hope, like the nativity star itself. (CHRISTMAS ;____; I CAN'T WAIT) there's a dirty-haired, weeping, rumpled-clothes, fumbling self-hating sorrowful angry confused lost scared girl part of me, the one that still looks like my reflection, who wants to eat so badly and yet she HATES it? like, she still wants to eat those lentils, but… oh geez this is an alter situation. it has to be. let me feel this out.
WHO WANTS WHAT.
lentils = that sad brown girl. the warm heavy soft-protein texture of the lentils really comforts her somehow, as does their color. they are the epitome of comforting brown. like that's REALLY important. so I must get those tomorrow. "two of each," she says, sounding like a drug addict, desperate and scared and sad and a nervous wreck. seeking that fix just to feel safe. "not the soup, that… get one soup, actually," she adds, touching the memory, remembering the lentils at the bottom of the can. "just one." self-loathing spiking at the word "can," the thought of eating canned food filling her with a sense of filth that fuels the self-abusive binge drive even more, to numb it all, to lose herself in despairing to that ugly feeling, that hopeless judgment. "one can of soup." hatred at the word soup.
someone else, younger, suddenly LEAPING into utter blissful sparkling joy at the mention of SNOW on the radio, for thursday. "I hope she gets it," the dirty brown girl adds, genuinely, tears falling from her eyes. that love of others, without feeling it in herself. "I really hope she gets it. I hope it makes her happier than she can ever describe." and that weird warm glow of wanting her to be happy, that love of another, while still feeling utterly unworthy of love and ugly and wrong and bad herself.
so what about the lentils, I ask, gently. "two cans," she says. "one can of the… the soup." a wince, a tear, despair, surrender to the ugly feeling. I'm the kind of wretched pig that eats soup out of a can, she weeps, the emotion almost intolerable. "two, three cans… three cans of the actual lentils," she says, the word beans being another horrifically triggering thought. "two packages of dried lentils." bags is also awfully triggering, nauseating. tied to trauma in a screaming ammoniac sense. "one, two, and three." she smiles at this. "yeah. that's good." someone else, an OCD feeling, freaking out and demanding four of something. "four cilantro," someone else interjects. and five mushrooms, I think? or no? four mushrooms, split three and one. four cilantro, split three and one. okay, that's good. one soymilk. two oats. one eggs. one oleo. ones are always good, I hear. one carrots? someone cringing at the thought of more carrots. that's new. "yes," I hear. but just the one. how about the white chocolate? no decision on that, surprisingly. someone doesn't want it anymore. immediately I realize it's the word chocolate, which is hated. what about the peppermint truffles, I say. the white peppermint balls. that gets a yes. geez, wow. words are IMPORTANT with this. phrasing makes all the difference. (lots of self-hatred, vitriolic, at speaking this way; it sounds pretentious and asinine)
as for seaweed, what is that rooted to? is it because it's a sea vegetable, or because it's asian food, the latter of which is allegedly tied to our early teenage years? "no," I hear. "that's oliver's motivation and we HATE it. it's stupid." but there's a regret to it-- a regret at a rejection of something they weren't ready to reject yet, due to trauma ties. needing to feel out the "asian" draw before dropping it entirely. wanting to know why it has roots at all before taking them out of the garden, so to speak. "get some," a faceless voice says, greenish. "we'll figure it out realtime."
how about tomatoes. why are we suddenly wanting tomatoes anyway? "it's the red," someone says. "it's red without being traumatic," like tomato sauce, "and that's interesting. we want to figure it out." why. "because we keep resonating with the color and we don't know why. strawberries and cherries too. you know the compulsions. I want to understand this. red is such a dangerous color. I want to know what it feels like clear. so no canned tomatoes, please. that's a cheap way out but it's not what we're looking for. it's too orange and that's feeding the color addiction you mentioned earlier." geez this is complicated. "I know. but we're getting there. we're making progress, more tonight that we have in months. so thank you." genuine. gratitude and joyful warm deep affection. that's new. and thank God. I thought we had forgotten it. "never. not us. we'll never forget how to love. we're built on it." and yet no religious feeling. that murdered us before. we cannot have love without Christ and that NEEDS to be fully integrated, not just through me, but through everyone in the new system. no more selfishness. no more self-idolatry.
the last thing on the list is… soymilk. halfway we don't actually want it at all. both the words "soy" and "milk" are nauseating and frankly the taste kind of is too? sugar in general is. like right now our body does NOT want sugar at all, not even the white peppermint balls. (it wants CHRISTMAS, not candy!)
do we want to get peas? no, that's triggering? the word is, and so is the taste, somehow? it's giving me shivers.
I'm also getting brain burnout. I don't know how much longer I can type tonight. it's 8:20.
get what we need. figure it out. let it go.
good night ♥
detached from anyone that sentiment is genuine and pure and loving but it's too selfish somehow.
St. Paisios the Athonite says: “Christ must be the core of every human movement!”
And if our core is not in Christ, then it will in the world. Do not endanger your soul so!
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When you are praying alone, and your spirit is dejected, and you are wearied and oppressed by your loneliness, remember then, as always, that God the Trinity looks upon you with eyes brighter than the sun; also all the angels, your own Guardian Angel, and all the Saints of God. Truly they do; for they are all one in God, and where God is, there are they also. Where the sun is, thither also are directed all its rays. Try to understand what this means.
St. John of Kronstadt
…Honestly, my heart yearns to just reflect on this gorgeously humbling profundity for hours. It’s beyond the capacity of words to express. And yet… try to understand what this means. What a blessedly beautiful prayer that is too. Try. Try anyway, to grasp the ineffable glory of this truth, to touch the tender heart of it– because what is impossible for man is possible for God, and through His Spirit in you, and through the love of His Son, you are even less alone than you realize… you are bathed in light even in your deepest night.
Catholics don't worship Mary because Mary is not a goddess; she does not have any creative power or omniscience and/or omnipotence or anything of the sort. the important thing about Mary is that God created through her! Christ could have come in Great Power and glory and manifested himself as some wonderful thing and had people believe in Him because of that... but He wanted to be born in the most humble manner possible. He wanted to be born as a baby and to grow up as a human being with all of the struggles and pains and difficulties that involved. THIS is why people find it hard to believe in Him I guess. but this is important because it shows that Mary did not create Him. God created HER, but when Gabriel came to visit her he basically said you will conceive BY the Holy Spirit! but NO woman creates the soul of her child; her body is able to form a body, but how? by eating things that God gave her! by her body working in the way God made it to work! GOD is the One Who creates everything. and basically Mary was the doorway. she was the means BY which Jesus Christ entered the world, but she did not create Him. her body created His body, again through the grace of God. so when we pray to her she's the mediatrix of all grace-- as she's the door through which Jesus entered the world, so she is STILL a channel through which grace enters our world! and so we only pray to her. we're not saying "Hey, create this, do this, do that"-- she is simply a doorway through which GOD continues to work! she is the most powerful intercessor on our behalf because of this. so we're not asking her to do what God does! we're just asking her to continue to be this great mediatrix between God and man.
“St. Matthias: Apostle by chance; disciple by choice; saint by grace.”
I love how this highlights the three key elements of following Christ– He calls us seemingly by “chance,” against all odds, from the darkest depths, in defiance of despair and degradation… but it is our choice to follow that call, using our free will to strive to imitate Him, and in making that choice we are given the Grace to amend our lives and be reborn as Children of God.
We are chosen by God, we in turn choose to cooperate, and then we are carried further up by Him than we ever could alone. It’s a beautiful process, even with its crosses– perhaps especially with.
But it takes all three steps. It takes the Trinity, and we are profoundly blessed to be part of their plan of redemption. We just have to respond with our whole heart… and They will help us.
“A true opium of the people is a belief in nothingness after death - the huge solace of thinking that for our betrayals, greed, cowardice, murders we are not going to be judged.”
— Czeslaw Milosz
This false “solace” is no real comfort at all, especially not to any heart dedicated to both justice and mercy.
To hold such a selfish belief– to think, “I can commit any so-called ‘sin’ that I want; there’s no hell, I can get away with it! I’m living for me, doing what I want to be happy, and that’s all that matters.”– is to utterly and abominably reject the very humanity of your fellow man. To betray, to cheat, to harm, to offend another soul in any way “for your own good” and not to think of THEIR good… this is a demonic mindset. Worse still is to think that you can get away with it, that it can all be hand-waved away as “oh, I was just doing my best!” or “well it’s their fault if they were offended” or “what’s wrong for you is right for me” or some similar self-worshipping blasphemy.
I assure you, Satan laughs at such phrases as he stokes the fires of hell, ready to roast those people… unless they repent and turn to Christ, of course. But such a metanoia requires divine intervention. No self-righteousness will ever save anyone. And that is the key sin of this thought process: the totally false belief that after death, there’s nothing, and therefore, nothing matters. “I can do no wrong because 'wrong’ doesn’t exist,” they claim, but that argument inevitably collapses in on itself– ironically, usually when its believer becomes the receiver of their own cruelty from another. Steal from the thief, and suddenly it’s an intolerable act. But a sin is always a sin, no matter how you may sugarcoat it for yourself.
Truly, there is no solace in nothingness. It’s simply the only thing muting one’s conscience, and that tenuous silence, that buried sense of guilt and shame, is misinterpreted as “peace” by someone whose soul would otherwise be living in constant moral torment. Their “solace” is just a panicked wish that they can avoid looking at the big picture, forever– that they can torch the world around them and never have to so much as smell the smoke. But the fires will catch up to them, no matter how they run. It’s inevitable. For one who lives by the sword, even metaphorically, that same blade will bring their death as well.
There is justice. There is a judgment, there is a moral debt righteously demanded after death, and unless you admit, repent, and are absolved of that sentence now– through Christ alone; you could never pay that much blood back on your own– you will be utterly damned for your self-idolatry.
Hell exists. And if you make other’s lives into it while they’re alive, you’ll end up there for a lot longer once yours is over.
“If Christ isn’t sufficient, if He doesn’t make you valuable, then no one nor no thing ever will.”
Christ Jesus is God. He’s a member of the Holy Trinity itself. He is The Word through which all things were Spoken into Existence. He is our Lord, our Redeemer, our Savior, our Bridegroom, our Good Shepherd, our Brother, and our Friend. Christ is everything.
Therefore, if Christ isn’t sufficient to you, nothing else could ever be.
The good news is: He is. He is sufficient and He does make you valuable– in fact, you are so valuable to Him that He chose to die to pay the crushing debt of sin for you, personally, so that you could live with Him in heaven forever, loved by God Himself.
Whatever lack or loss you’re afraid of, it’s based on earthly suffering, and does not apply to God. Christ cannot betray you. Have faith in His steadfast love. He can and will deliver you if you let Him.
“Turn your eyes incessantly to the Blessed Virgin; she, who is the Mother of Sorrows and also the Mother of Consolation, can understand you completely and help you. Looking to her, praying to her, you will obtain that your tedium will become serenity, your anguish change into hope, and your grief into love. I accompany you with my blessing, which I willingly extend to all those who assist you.”
-Pope St. John Paul II
I don’t think many Catholics fully grasp the depth of this truth– I will admit that I sure didn’t.
Mary raised Christ Jesus from infancy. She carried Him– God incarnate!– in her womb. She adored Him, and loved Him like any good mother loves her child, except her love for The Child was greater and deeper that we can even imagine. His Presence sanctified her, filled her with complete joy, and stayed by her side for thirty-three years straight.
And then she personally watched her Child be tortured and crucified.
The amount of agony in her heart, standing below the Cross, meeting Him on the way to Calvary, seeing His blood spattered upon the soil… it is unfathomable, unbearable. Mary had a literal bond with our Savior that no other soul ever can or will have. She was His mother, tangibly so, and when she held His dead body in her aching arms… oh what a terrible final sword impaled her weeping heart! Mary experienced a Sorrow comparable only to that of Christ Crucified, whose Passion she united herself to, as intimately as He was once united to Her in the womb. She was not divine– she was not, and is not, God– and yet, God Himself shared both His earthly life and death with her, to an extent every saint has yearned to experience in turn.
Reflect on this. Realize the greatness of Mary’s Sorrow, sharing in and indeed flowing from Christ’s Sorrow. She knows more pain, more torment, and more anguish than any soul before or after her could or can ever know– because it was an agony of love, with no sin or fault attached to it whatsoever. Her misery was pure, motivated by love and endured through the same. And it is because of this purity that she can console us, her adopted children through Christ. We were baptized by His Blood, the same Blood she watched staining the wood of the Cross, Blood that He shed freely out of profound love– we, too, have been called to share His suffering, her suffering, in our new lives as Christians. We can only be resurrected to Life if we first die to Death, and when we feebly falter and struggle beneath our own splinters of the Cross, we, too, can meet our Mother on that bloody road, to receive a comfort and hope and understanding that only a Mother can give… that only the Mother of God-made-man can give to the men He calls to ultimately live with God, having become like Him through this sacred suffering and steadfast love.
It’s all so profound, so beautiful– words fail to fully express it. But our hearts know… and Mary’s Immaculate Heart will tell us, tenderly and truthfully, whenever we run to her as our loving Mother… just as the Christ Child did. Believe me– she understands.
One of the things "TBAS" said to me after I moved back home was that I "used to be compassionate/ creative/ etc." and that's been haunting me. Why has that allegedly changed now?
My old journal was very solipsistic. I gave very little thought to God at all-- well, at least after high school-- and I was honestly drowning in mental illness.
But now, I don't type at all. Why? Honestly it's because I just… feel no desire at all to type about myself anymore. I'd rather read the Bible, study it, learn from Scripture instead of babbling about my own personal experiences. What good has that honestly done?
I cleaned out the entire LC folder today. Deleted hundreds of files. And, listening to old audio files… it shocked me. How did I live like that? It's all, quite obviously now, self-worship.
(These are my personal reflections; I claim no authority or accuracy on these matters. I am no teacher; I only wish to share what I pray is spiritually sound insight.)
Abel being named "vanity" was ironic.
Cain was, according to many translations, initially seen as a Christ figure-- as the fulfillment of God's promise of deliverance to Eve, his mother. John Gill notes: "some render [her exclamation], "I have gotten a man, the Lord"; that promised seed that should break the serpents head; by which it would appear, that she took that seed to be a divine person"... So by this perspective, what good was a second male child to her? Abel was seen as useless, extra, vain. Contrasted against Cain's alleged significance, Abel was as insignificant as could be. Thus pride and humility were personified in the two sons.
Furthermore, we see here the unusual but noteworthy rashness of her hope-- a holy feeling damaged by sinful impulse. She wanted forgiveness and restoration so badly, she could not bear any further suffering, any further penance. So her first son became the focal point of all her desperate yearning. He was seen as a Lord himself, as an angel to deliver her, as her treasured possession and her most honored begotten one. Yet he was born in sin. Eve failed to consider the effects of such rashly placed hope in the first human being born without knowledge of prior innocence. Cain was doomed to fail from the beginning. He was no savior-- in truth, he was the anti-type. But Eve clung to hope in him, and in doing so, effectively repeated her damning sin, the first sin, the true seed that birthed Cain: she, in labeling him so, idolized him, and so chose the creature over the Creator yet again. Her hope should have been set in God alone to deliver her in due time, yet her pained impatience pushed her to seek relief elsewhere, in something more immediate, in someone she may have assumed would be more "merciful" to her plea. Surely her own son would not abandon her; surely he would revenge and restore his own mother to the purity she lost and lamented! But God, in His terrible true judgement, showed Cain's true nature in contrast to His Own. Cain sought revenge, yes, but that was never the right of man... and in so doing, brought more sorrow to his race. He destroyed the purity he saw, moved to wrath at its meekness, having never felt it himself, being incapable of understanding it. The child Eve judged to be "vain" was likewise judged as such by his twin, who slew him in envy, seeing him as worthless as opposed to himself. This self-serving pride was an echo of Eve's fallen choice, both seeking to exalt themselves over what God had placed above them, refusing to accept a lower position. Therefore now Cain was "Lord" only to himself... an empty title, having struck the wrong head.
A summary of the infamous crime: Cain murdered Abel when he was "inexplicably" favored above him-- above his elder brother, the honored firstborn, the inheritor, the assumed promised one! Yet Abel did not seek this favor, nor did he flaunt it. He quietly received God's blessing with humble joy. But Cain seethed with rage; he burned with humiliated envy, and in this slighted hatred, he murdered his innocent twin.
Hey there internets. I've been home now for a full year, and I'm honestly happier now than I have ever been. It's been quite a journey. I endured a lot of loss, and disturbances, and upsetting realizations about myself, et cetera, in the past 365 days or so. But, although most of my past has been burned up, taken, or otherwise released, I'm left in the present with very little and a huge sense of joy. Yes, truly. Even though life is still stressful, especially with my poor schizophrenic brother, God bless him... even though life will always have stress in it, I am just... so happy now.
Last year, I returned home after a very disturbing and disorienting year living in North Carolina with an old friend who, unfortunately, I realized that I never actually knew in the first place. (This was a pattern with me.) They had D.I.D., as I did, and as it turned out, my minimal awareness of their life via their online journals was based on the logs of an alter of theirs who no longer existed. And I did not know that. So the person I met upon moving out there was a total stranger, more or less, and whose personal life, morals, interests, obsessions, values, etc. were in stark contrast to mine, to an extent that was honestly caustic and killing me, and yet which I shoved aside and justified for the sake of making them happy, for the sake of "being a good friend." According to what I last heard from them, months ago, I failed miserably at the whole friend thing. This breaks my heart, but upon literally printing the evidence from both our online journals and presenting them to several therapists I have been repeatedly reassured that, like it or not, my friend was a big part of the problem. It wasn't just me. I refused to accept that my friend held any blame, to the point of compulsively murdering my own identity while I lived with them for their sake... because I loved them, and just wanted to be like them, so they would love me. Again, I failed miserably at this. But that's a story for another time. What I want to say here is that, although I deeply regret the time I spent with them, I did learn one huge lesson from it all-- I learned that the person I became for them was NOT who I was, or wanted to be. At all. And so, when I got home last October, I threw off that persona completely, and started over.
My friend took this as abandonment. They said that I "didn't have the guts to tell them it was over." But that's something they could never understand. It wasn't over. I didn't want it to be over. I DID lie about one thing, and I regret that, but I felt forced to do so-- when they asked me "when I would be coming back," I couldn't break their heart by telling them, "I don't want to come back here. I never wanted to stay. I always wanted to go home and I've been hinting at that for months but every time you got wind of it, you shattered. So I cannot tell you now, flat-out, that this is the last time you will see me in person. I want to go home. This is not my home. I'm sorry." And yet, I couldn't tell them it was over, either. Because for me, things never really end. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's just my affinity with time, thanks Celebi, that makes me feel like everything is happening forever all the time. Like beginnings and endings are both vaguely defined. And honestly, what if a few months into coming home, I wanted to go back and visit? Like in the summer, to go to the beach? If I had said "it was over," what would have happened to our friendship? No, it wasn't over. But it wasn't ever going to be how it was, either-- because that wasn't friendship. I had, quite honestly, lied about who I was, what I felt, what I wanted, et cetera. Everything I did, felt, said, and chose was anxiously crafted to "fit their liking," to the point when I couldn't remember who I was when they weren't around to appease. Once I had enough alone time TO remember, I started feeling some disturbingly intense rage at how much of myself I had annihilated, plus an absolutely lethal homesickness that had me begging my family for airplane tickets every time my friend left the house and I could safely use the phone. Regardless, I cared for them. Even if we were utterly incompatible, I cared for them, and I still do. Even if their lifestyle always was absolutely inhospitable to me, still is, and always will be unless they experience a dramatic metanoia, I still pray for them, and wish them well. They were a southern thunderstorm, and I was a northern blizzard. They were cornfields and broad horizons, while I was mossy valleys and ice-capped mountains. They were trumpets and chiptunes, yet I was cellos and choirs. They were cotton candy, I was peppermint. They were water, I was fire. And none of that was bad! There's beauty in all of it. We just... didn't jive. At all. And I kept shoving myself under the rug, forcing myself to like brass music and Y2K aesthetics and ice cream because they did, and I was just weeping inside the whole time, but telling myself "love is sacrifice, this sorrow is just personal death, it's better to live for them," not realizing that if living for someone means murdering yourself you're still breaking a commandment. And that's bad. The true fatal flaw was how we opposed each other in the serious ways. They were hypersexual, had a vulgar sense of humor, used profanity, often walked around naked, practiced witchcraft, praised revenge and spite, loved games and childish toys, et cetera. All things that jarred painfully with my own deep values. I am asexual, with a goofy sense of humor, clean language, traditionally feminine clothing, go to church at least three times a week, try to forgive and serve at all costs, spend my free time studying Scripture, et cetera. And this is not a "superiority" issue because God knows and can attest far more clearly than I how many good things my friend did, how kind and thoughtful and creative they were, as well as how stupid and foolish and ignorant and volatile I can be. I'm, quite frankly, a mess of a sinner, and in my friend all I saw was good. Even when I can point out the aspects of their life that I strongly believe are morally wrong, I know they aren't choosing to do those things because they are wrong, but because they believe they are right and cannot be mistaken. They are trying their best even if I'm afraid they're still headed down the entirely wrong road. But I know when I do something idiotic and I still end up being a moron most days. Nevertheless. I'm home now, with my family, and although I am honestly so happy now, it took some time to get here. And step one was cutting off all contact with my friend.
I have to thank the hospital, actually. I went to the ER within the first week of returning, to try and get my insurance issues fixed (long story), and get whatever medical help I could get in the meantime... and they put me in the psych ER, and they took my phone. And suddenly, for the first time in over a year, I was alone. I had no contact with my friend. I was able to sleep alone, and think alone, and BE somebody other than a mirror image for their sake, a pet for their pleasure, a toy for their entertainment-- all of my own appeasement panic, mind you. But... I spent that night happier than I had been in months. It was, frankly, life-changing. Suddenly I realized just how miserable I had been and how I had been lying to MYSELF about it more than anyone else. The security guard who walked me out the next morning was wearing a huge crucifix ring, and when I told him how beautiful it was, starting a small conversation about what had brought me to the ER, he-- suddenly and eloquently-- began telling me how God had given me a second chance at life, a new birth almost, and that I was morally obligated to live it to the fullest, for His sake. The words of the conversation have faded into time but the impact of them has been pressed upon my heart indelibly since then.
That was a year ago tonight. October 9th, into October 10th. Happy rebirthday. Thank you God.
So. Since then, I've had to heal, slowly but surely. At first it was hellish-- I had so many symptoms exploding at once, as my D.I.D. had utterly vanished after having been turned into the biggest trauma trigger of my life thanks to how it was linked to some terrifying appeasing/ miming experiences in North Carolina. But, now that it was suddenly gone, for the first time in over 10 years, I was alone in my head and although that was JOYOUSLY FREEING it was also AGONIZINGLY SADbecause it felt like all of my friends had suddenly been murdered. And in a sense, they were. They died, in the wake of that disastrous year. Lately, a few of them have come back. They came back different, and they are no longer "alters"-- they were never meant to be, truly, as my past clearly proves. North Carolina mutated and mangled their function and it destroyed them. But ironically, it allowed them to die to all that mental-illness nonsense, just like I did. So now, if anything comes back, it won't have anything to do with that. Even so. Recovery took a long time. It still is! It's a process. But at first, it was like... losing all my limbs, and having to learn how to use prosthetics. Like, I should know how to heal, what to do, how to fix myself... but somehow things just weren't working right. I was too deeply damaged on some level. Yet nothing is impossible with God. I realized, almost immediately upon leaving my friend's driveway last October, that the utter lack of religious freedom in their household-- something they couldn't understand and denied causing, as they couldn't see it, yet it gutted me-- had been the #1 factor in my suicidal depression. And the instant I left, I went right back to prayer, and Scripture, and Mass. And it saved my life. Now, a year later, I'm back to cantoring in church. I'm growing my hair back for the first time in ten years and wearing modest feminine clothing that I haven't worn in just as long and it is SO NICE. I'm speaking more modestly, I'm praying more than ever, I'm spending my ENTIRE weekends in church, I'm reading the Bible every single day... and I am, legitimately, happier than I have EVER been in my life. I've never been this close to God. And yet I'm still such a sinner. I'm still a mess. I'm still struggling with the last brutal vestiges of an eating disorder that I've been warring with for 15 years, and which exploded in North Carolina as a desperate anti-sexual coping method and suicide stand-in. I still have sudden bursts of unbridled rage and grief and violence that frighten me, but God is helping me release that pain, and truly forgive and be merciful. I'm still learning how not to treat myself like utter pond scum, learning how to see myself as something other than garbage, as filth, as a rejected failure of a human being, as a toxic sludge waste that deserves to burn in hell. God doesn't think like that, and neither should I. It's a process. But with prayer and hope and faith and love for God, I'm getting better every day, by His Grace.
I'm happy. I really, truly am, to the point where I could (and do) cry with the wonder of it all. I'm remembering how to love, how to be imaginative, how to be optimistic. I'm remembering how to write poetry, and paint, and play music. I had it all sucked out of me due to that year down south but I'm praying for it to be healed and restored in truth, no longer as a false mess cobbled together to entertain others. I'm doing this for God, and when I do that, the bliss just pours into it. It's wonderful. I love my family so much. We're ALL closer than ever, kinder than ever, and if my poor brother wasn't so utterly wrecked by schizophrenia things would be amazingly good. But it is how it is, and even this is teaching me patience and mercy and humility and prudence more than ANYTHING else could. Trials are a very powerful way to strengthen virtue, which I have been praying for. I just need to face it with God, because without Him I will and do fail miserably. Faith doesn't make things easy, it just makes them possible.
Tomorrow, I have choir practice, and I have to run errands with my grandmother, after I take her to get her hair done. I love these days. I truly do. Despite the stress, my life is honestly so good now. Even with legal and financial and physiological issues and all that. (Doc found several lesions in my brain and I have no idea what that's about!) I'm looking into convents for the future, still, but right now, I'm happy with my family here in the forests of Pennsylvania. Today I helped grandma cook dinner and bake dessert, and clean the kitchen, and make legal phone calls, and I even got to stop at Wegmans (which I left very quickly because hello residual trauma panic attacks) and smell the essential oils because I'm currently fascinated by aromachology and I want to "reclaim" it from the witchcrafty mess I keep finding it in online and use it for God's glory with the help of Scripture and my God-given blessing of imagination. It's fueling my hope, this creative gift, this broad and beautiful world, and the hope of heaven. Until then I must take it a day at a time, because tomorrow is never guaranteed, but I'm alive right now, and I thank God for this second chance, and I want to please Him with how I'm living it. God help me to do that ever the more, no matter how hard it is to release the pain of the past. I want God, nothing more. Easier said than done, or is it? I want to prove that it is the easiest thing in the world... to choose God and never look back, because all the joy and peace and love I could ever want or need is right there in Him. Such is my life now, and yes, it's the best it's ever been, and as long as I keep my heart fixed on the Lord it will continue to get better.
As for now, it's 10pm, and I must get some sleep, and set my heart with determination to do better tomorrow.
During Exposition & Adoration: offering up the pain of my earrings as a small sacrifice on my brother's behalf. Wondering about "uniting our sufferings to Christ's sufferings" as well as the idea of "take up thy cross," in light of the fact that "dual imputation" is HERETICAL. Jesus was INNOCENT when he died on our behalf. He did not "become sin" as that's impossible. This made me realize that THIS IS WHY WE MUST "TAKE UP OUR CROSS" or we cannot be His disciples, or be saved-- because WE MUST DIE WITH HIM TO BE FORGIVEN. Jesus opened the door for salvation, yes, by offering Himself up as the spotless Victim on our behalf to pay a debt we could NEVER pay ourselves… for sin is cosmically terrifying and its inevitable consequence is death… HOWEVER the Cross is not a free ride. We must also be willing to die with Him, in order to SHARE in that Atonement.
I have been praying to be cured of this eating disorder in time for Yom Kippur. It's scary, and today I realized why. When making breakfast, I suddenly noticed how much rage I was channeling into cutting the carrots. Grandma had told me to "cut down" and my mind reacted with an outburst of agonized pain that immediately became a force that went into the knife, chop chop chop, and suddenly I realized that in any other circumstance, that knife would have been going into my arm. Geez. No WONDER I'm afraid to stop making so much-- because the more I make, the more I can cut to pieces.
After church, I was brave, as I was praying, and I wanted to try to eat dinner. My body was weak and cold and tired and aching and sad, and I thought, "jeepers, if this keeps up all winter, I might not make it to Christmas. I need to learn how to eat again." Which is TERRIFYING. But if I don't try, I'll never see my prayers answered, because I won't be cooperating with them. I cut up three cucumbers, four carrots, two romaine hearts, and about a cup and a half of mom's green beans, then added 1/3 cup of oats, and sprinkled salt over it all. That was it. It took me a full hour to eat, I was slightly stuffed, and then the scary thing happened. My entire body felt like it was on fire.
I had this irresistible need to burn it off. So I got on the exercise bike for 20 minutes, listening to Body Language and Beirut and Chad Valley and all sorts of other retro tunes, and as I felt the muscles burning in my legs, I wondered, just how much of my life is spent trying to SEDATE myself?
I have this mania in me that is frankly terrifying and it feels like all of my time is spent trying to chain up this hysterical animal in me that is burning like a brushfire and exploding with pent-up force and if I don't keep this thing as weak and starved as possible, it's going to kill somebody.
First Day of Creation (from the 1493 Nuremberg Chronicle)
This. This is the sort of religious art that immediately reduces me to sobs. It’s so terrifyingly beautiful. It’s so simple, yet so incomprehensible in its vast meaning, in the cosmic significance of the Truth presented in it, a Truth that children can instinctively comprehend, and which centuries of scholars and philosophers struggle to grasp.
It’s gorgeous. It’s the Hand of God, it’s the waters of chaos, it’s the instant the Creator created– the moment He willed Light into being, moving over the surface of the water, hovering there like a dove, like a breath held in joyous anticipation. The circle, the formless world, the encompassment of everything that was and would soon Be… and all around, light, light, light. New and beautiful and true. The first Day of Creation.
"I was preaching in a secular university and a student stood up and said, "How can one man suffering for a few hours save a countless multitude of man?"
I said, "You want to know how one man dying alone for a few short hours on a tree can save a multitude of man from an eternity in hell?"
Because that one man is worth more than all things you can put together. You take mountains and mole hills, crickets and clouds. You take everything. Every planet, every star, every form of beauty. Everything that sings, everything that brings delight, and you put it all on the scale,
And you put Christ on the other side and He outweighs them all, He outweighs them all!
Brethren, this is the one we chase after!"
Paul Washer, Christ Outweighs Them All
He outweighs it all, because He created it all.
And He is the One Who loves us enough to die for us.
In heaven we praise and glorify God forever = true paradise = to glorify Him includes praising His good works = praising the TRUTH of Creation UNTOUCHED BY SIN.
This is why the saints freely sacrifice ALL earthly joys-- they know that they will experience the TRUTH of those joys in heaven WITH GOD AND FOR GOD. On earth all things carry the risk of sin.
“If there is a negative element in our lives, it will be eradicated only if we locate it within ourselves. Evil is born the moment somebody else is to blame.”
— Stelios Ramfos
We must be humble enough to openly admit our own sinfulness, and take full responsibility for it. Only then can we begin to repent in earnest, and so receive God’s forgiveness and healing.
"If we aspire in earnest to a genuine contemplation of God; - we must go, I say, to the Word, where the character of God, drawn from his works is described accurately and to the life; these works being estimated, not by our depraved judgement, but by the standard of eternal truth."
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion
Stop reading about Christ on Tumblr and read about Christ in the Bible. I’m serious. It’s good to share the faith online but you MUST go to the Source of your faith far more often. You must go to His Word first. Your opinions and feelings are not the truth– Scripture is. Only there will you find real rest and joy.
"The knowledge of God which we are invited to cultivate is not that which, resting satisfied with empty speculation, only flutters in the brain, but a knowledge which will prove substantial and fruitful wherever it is duly perceived, and rooted in the heart."
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion
Our knowledge of God must be rooted in the heart! Knowledge of the mind alone is fruitless and fatal to our souls. If we truly know Him, we will live for Him without reservation.
"No one, indeed, will voluntarily and willingly devote himself to the service of God unless he has previously tasted his paternal love, and been thereby allured to love and reverence Him."
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion
There are proofs of His love everywhere– clear and true, both in Scripture and in the world. Our hearts must be open to seeing and tasting His love, though. God offers us an endless banquet of it, but if someone figuratively covers their mouth, or spits out what they are fed, no amount of good things will do them any good. But if and when we do taste it… well, then our hearts sing with joy. Nothing else can ever compare; nothing but God’s love will ever appeal to us again. And praise be to Him for that!
"The truth is, you have never yet known real pleasure and will not until you come to Christ. For only in Christ are true pleasures to be found. A few moments with Christ are to be preferred to an eternity with the cursed pleasures of this world (Proverbs 3:13-18, Psalm 16:11)."
- John Owen
Every good thing created is but a shadow and fragment of the Good Creator. Remember this– and then also remember that God calls you to know Him now, through His Son. Run to Him, and rejoice in every moment with Him, for they are more blessed and beautiful than anything else you can experience in this life– and so when this life ends, your joy will be untouched, and indeed increased, for then you will be with Christ, your joy, for eternity.
“We need friends who are willing to risk wounding our ego in the moment for the long term good of our souls.”
— Marshall Segal
Honestly, that sort of friend is the only true friend… one who loves us so much, they will seek our salvation above all else, and at the cost and risk of all else. This is the sort of friend Christ calls is to be… to lay down our lives for each other.
“One of the essential and most obvious things about a Christian is that he is a man who lives always realizing that he is in the presence of God. The world does not live in this way; that is the big difference between the Christian and the non-Christian.”
— Martyn Lloyd-Jones
Once we truly realize this, and make it our heart’s constant reflection, our lives will change, dramatically and totally. That change requires that we die to this world. That change prepares us, in every moment, to meet our Lord. That change is what marks us as Christians.
“The Christian who has stopped repenting has stopped growing.”
— A.W. Pink
The humble truth is this: as feeble humans, we will always be tempted, tested, and tried, and we will falter and stumble and even fall at times. But grace means we can get back up, just as Christ did while carrying the Cross, and keep walking towards God. However, this recovery from the injuries of sin requires that we admit we sinned and repent from that sin! Otherwise, we give sin casual permission to keep us down in the dirt, insisting “I meant to do this” or “I like it better here” or even “Well, it’s sure easier than carrying that cross!”… pride never admits weakness; pride never considers it was mistaken. But if we don’t– or won’t– even see a problem with the behaviors and habits and thoughts keeping us stagnant and stuck in the mud of sin, then we end up stopping dead in a lethal sense… we never make it to Calvary, to die with our Lord.
Repentance gets us back on our feet over and over again. Repentance says “I see how I have offended you, Lord. I see how I have failed to live up to my name as a Christian. It breaks my heart because it breaks yours. I am sorry. By Your Grace, and for love of You, I will try again.” Repentance never wallows in the mud. Repentance never throws a pity party. Repentance never condemns itself to failure. Repentance is anchored in faith, and hope, and love. It trusts in Christ’s power to save, and heal, and guide, and transform. Repentance sees where it fell before, and vows to run a better race now, persevering to the end no matter how many more pitfalls it encounters. Repentance keeps our hearts humble, our minds focused, and our souls strong. Repentance is the fruit of the cross. It is growth in Christ, from old to new.
Repent and believe in the Gospel. The two go together.
“No matter with how many things we try to fill our lives, without Jesus, we will never be satisfied.”
This is so true. Ultimately, everything but Him falls short, empties out, dies away… and if we are wise, all that inevitable loss will lead us back to Him, to our loving Lord, in whom all our needs will be forever filled.
“O Jesus! Why can’t I tell all little souls how unspeakable Your condescension is? I feel that if You found a soul weaker and littler than mine, which is impossible, You would take pleasure in granting it still greater favors, provided it abandoned itself with total confidence to your infinite Mercy.”
St. Thérèse of Lisueux
Modern English often loses the true definition of condescension: it properly means "to put aside one’s dignity or superiority voluntarily and assume equality with one regarded as inferior.” It is when God makes gracious allowance for our human frailties. There is no haughtiness or disdain in this act; it is pure compassion and mercy. Thus for this dear Saint to describe our Lord as being “unspeakably” so, she highlights the absolute depths of His love for the most inferior, humble, small and simple soul there is. God never asks us to puff ourselves up, seeking to equal Him, and so meet Him AS an equal, for this is not only impossible but blasphemous. Unfortunately, many modern “religions” do attempt this. But an honest Christian will reject this proud arrogance, instead seeking the lowest place and position, keenly aware of its undeserving weakness before God… and it is there that God will stoop down to meet them, full of the most tender love. But we can only receive such graces from that same position of total childlike surrender and trust– if we ever start to promote or praise ourselves, we will lose those gifts, which are so importantly tied to humility.
Reflect on this profound humility of God Himself. It truly is beyond the capacity of words to express, but the heart knows.
“My daughter, let your heart be filled with joy. I, the Lord, am with you. Fear nothing. You are in my heart.”
— Jesus to Saint Faustina in her Diary, Divine Mercy in My Soul
My own heart weeps with hope to hear my Lord speak these same words to me. There is nothing I want more, than to be held in His Sacred Heart!
“I do not understand how it is possible not to trust in Him who can do all things. With him, everything; without him, nothing. He is Lord. He will not allow those who have placed all their trust in Him to be put to shame.”
— St. Faustina
When we trust wholeheartedly in God, humbly admitting our weakness and helplessness yet rejoicing in His omnipotent goodness, God is pleased to respond just as wholeheartedly to our total trust. This faithfulness is a huge aspect of Who God is; He keeps His promises, and His unfailing reliability brings honor to Him through those who rely on Him– through us, His children!
So trust in Him for all things, in all things. He will not put you to shame, for that would shame Him who you are trusting in. But be warned– if your trust is not genuine, if it is shallow or insincere, God will let it collapse, so that He is glorified through the unreliability of everything but Him. And this, too, is merciful– God doesn’t want your trust to be misplaced. He wants you to rely on Him so He can help you… and He will. So turn to Him– He is waiting!
“Let our judgment of souls cease, for God’s mercy upon them is extraordinary.”
— St. Faustina Kowalska, Diary 1684
“Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.””
We have no authority to condemn anyone, nor should we– for God alone knows all the evils in a heart, and He knows all of our sins and weaknesses… yet He is incomprehensibly merciful to us every day. So if He forgives us so profoundly, we must do the same for our brethren.
“‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’”
“When a soul extols My goodness, Satan trembles before it and flees to the very bottom of hell.”
— Jesus Christ, to Saint Faustina. (Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska, p. 172)
Truly, Satan can only persuade a soul to sin if that soul is shaky in their faith, hesitant in their trust in God, looking away from Christ for answers. Sin only occurs in the absence of love. So when we actively praise God in times of temptation, both feeling and proclaiming His Love echoed back to Him through us… then our hearts are re-tuned to Truth, the devil’s lies are exposed, and the Good Shepherd will rescue us and keep us from going astray. Even if we are afraid, we must turn to Him. He will save us, if we have faith in Him. Satan flees from such faith, as he is utterly powerless against it– utterly powerless against God, to Whom that soul clings.
“Love endures everything, love is stronger than death, love fears nothing.”
— St. Faustina
God is Love, and God is the conqueror of both death and fear. When we are united to Him in Love, then we, too, are lifted up in Him above those temporal terrors. Through the love of God alive in us, we can and will endure all the difficulties of this life, and be brought safely and joyously to Him in the next.
“The first fresh hour of every morning should be dedicated to the Lord, whose mercy gladdens it with golden light.” ~Charles Spurgeon
I like to wake up at 6am and say the Divine Office before even getting out of bed. It honestly changes the whole day for the better– and if I forget to do it, the consequences are miserable.
“He is Infinite Majesty; but at the same time He is Infinite Goodness, Infinite Love.”
— St. Alphonsus de Liguori
And that goodness and love is an integral part of His majesty; He could not be so without all three, which is deeply beautiful.
“All the goods of this world cannot content the heart of man, which has been created to love God, and can find no peace out of God.”
— St. Alphonsus de Liguori
Seek the Creator, not His mere echo in Creation. We, too, are Created things, and so we– and everything else– can only find fulfillment and joy in our Maker… in our beloved God and Father.
“Spiritual reading and meditation teach us our obligations, but prayer obtains grace to fulfill them. ‘Prayer,’ says St. Augustine, ‘is better than reading; by reading we learn what we ought to do, by prayer we receive what we ask.”
— St. Alphonsus de Liguori
We can read all the holy 'textbooks’ we want, but without turning to the Teacher, to the Source of all that holiness, we will not understand how to do it– nor will we even have the ability to, for holiness is no achievement of man. We need God’s help to turn words into works, and we must do the work of exchanging words with Him to get that help– help which He loves to give to His humble, loving, trusting student-children.
Learn, and then pray!
“Consider, you have no friend nor brother, nor father nor mother, nor spouse nor lover, who loves you more than your God. The Divine Grace is that great treasure whereby we vilest of creatures, we servants, become the dear friends of our Creator himself!”
— St. Alphonsus de Liguori
This truth of God’s Love is so staggering, it brings me to tears of shocked grateful humility and joyous adoration every time.
God’s love surpasses everything and everyone, even for us poor wretched sinners. When we feel utterly worthless and forgotten, when we cannot find love in this world, remember the Heart of God. You are always welcome there.
Keep praying for your family. God hears you. You may be the only person praying, so keep up those prayers.
God always hears us; His answers just might not fit our expectations. So surrender; be patient, and trust in God's perfect judgment and timing. He wants to help your family even more than you want them helped! Keep praying-- God honors faithful perseverance.
I, too, must keep praying for my family, no matter how fearful and desperate things may seem. God hears me, and whatever happens is in His hands.
Someone may say, “I am a Christian; I am on my way to heaven; I belong to Christ.” But if he doesn’t do what Christ tells him to, he is a liar. But those who do what Christ tells them to will learn to love God more and more. That is the way to know whether or not you are a Christian. Anyone who says he is a Christian should live as Christ did.
1 John 2
This is the simple but solemn truth. Loving God requires obedience to God. Christians are quite literally obligated to follow Christ’s commands. If we disobey and rebel, we cannot have fellowship with Him. So strive to be ever more obedient in love!!
What is the meaning of Memory Eternal?- “…‘to be remembered’ by the Lord is the same thing as 'to be in Paradise.’ 'To be in Paradise’ is to be in eternal memory and, consequently, to have eternal existence and therefore an eternal memory of God. Without remembrance of God we die, but our remembrance of God is possible only through God’s remembrance of us.” (quote from The Brothers Karamazov)
This is a profoundly moving truth… and yet it is so obvious, somehow– our hearts instinctively know this is right.
What is heaven, but to be forever held in God’s heart, and to hold Him in our own? What could be more beautiful than being remembered by our Father– for the fact of our existence to be cherished in His ineffable Mind? What, indeed, could even be eternal, but this?
I really, really love this.
How does Luke 11:23 relate to Luke 9:50: “Anyone who is not against you is for you”? In the earlier passage, Jesus was talking about a person who was driving out demons in Jesus’ name. Those who fight evil, he was saying, are on the same side as one driving out demons in Jesus’ name. Here, by contrast, he was talking about the conflict between God and the devil. In this battle, if a person is not on God’s side, he or she is on Satan’s. There is no neutral ground. Because God has already won the battle, why be on the losing side? If you aren’t actively for Christ, you are against him.
Many of us know the quote from Desmond Tutu: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” This also applies to our religion. In a world battered by spiritual warfare, in the constant conflict between Christ and Satan, where our own flesh is already fatally predisposed to evil inclinations– to choose “neutrality” in such a situation is not only morally lazy, but damnably reprehensible. No good soldier would ever make such an excuse, for he knows the cost and importance of the battle, and the unbearable consequences of abandoning it. And so we soldiers of Christ must follow suit; We must actively align our wills and efforts with God’s. If we do not, we are effectively proclaiming our indifference to His cause and Kingdom… and that will send us to hell.
If you spend just as much time writing the Word in your heart as you do reblogging, agreeing, nodding to God, retweeting, and liking Scriputres and inspired words of the Saints online while complaining and comparing yourself to others, I’d guarantee you’d be a fruit-bearer of God’s blessings rather than a fruit-luster.
This is SO IMPORTANT to discern and remember.
We can read, reblog, and reflect all we want, but if we do not LIVE according to the Word and Will of God, it is all empty show.
For all your publicizing of your faith, you MUST do far more internalizing. Your actions and speech must proclaim your Christianity more than your blog ever can.
Stop wishing and yearning for spiritual fruit, but never working in the garden of your soul. Roll up your sleeves and take action. No tree can grow without deep roots in Christ. And God will provide that growth, if you meet Him there.
““At first it may feel like freedom and fun to skimp on prayer and neglect the Word. But then we pay: shallowness, powerlessness, vulnerability to sin, preoccupation with trifles, superficial relationships, and a frightening loss of interest in worship and the things of the Spirit.””
— John Piper
And it happens fast. The devil wastes no time in attacking a soul that has abandoned the fortress of prayer and Scripture, no matter how temporarily. Any and all neglect of faith is potentially fatal. We live in a fallen world and if we aren’t constantly purifying our souls through communication with God, that dirt of sin builds up to blind us, and it gets progressively harder to remove. So stay with God. You’re safe with Him alone.
When anxiety is telling you to fight your own battles with all your strength, listen to the One who always goes before you.
The Lord is speaking over you today saying,
“I got this.”
Christ has it all under control, so leave it in His hands! Don’t fumble with it yourself. It’s okay to give it all to God– there’s no weakness or shame in admitting our powerlessness and confusion. Paradoxically, in this humble surrender lies true strength and honor.
So let Jesus have this– all of it. He’s already won the war, after all.
gingermuscles: This is the most comforting thing to read and to remember at any given time, no matter how awful and lonely it might feel. The Lord my God will be with me wherever I go ❤
God is eternal and infinite and He loves us. His awesome Presence is a comfort beyond comprehension because it is marked not only by truth and honor and sovereignty, but also by steadfast unfailing love. No matter what is happening in our lives or in the world, God is there, God is here, God is then and now and forever… and God is love itself. He IS, and that is indeed the deepest and only comfort we’ll ever need.
“Whenever your heart starts to be anxious about the future, preach to your heart and say, ‘Heart, who do you think you are to be afraid of the future and nullify the promise of God? No, heart, I will not exalt myself with anxiety. I will humble myself in peace and joy as I trust this precious and great promise of God—He cares for me.’”
— John Piper
This is a striking and humbling realization– that anxiety and its inevitable want of control is self-exaltation. It’s pride; it’s worshipping one’s ego instead of God! It may not seem like it, but if you feel it, that upsetting truth is evident. Anxiety puts your focus totally on yourself and what you can’t do, what you don’t have power over, what you are helpless about… and anxiety is terrified of helplessness. So how to conquer anxiety? Show it Who the Help is. Show it Who the Power is. Show it Who has control over All. Humble yourself before the sovereignty of the Almighty, and trust completely in His care. No matter what happens, He IS in charge, and the more your heart is anchored in that faith, the more you will see anxiety melt away, and peace take its place with grateful joy.
God loves you. Exalt Him by believing that, and giving Him the obedient surrender His sovereign Love deserves. He will take care of you.
Your future is entirely in His hands. Nothing else can secure or shatter it.
Rest in that faith.
“Lord, let me fail a thousand times if that’s Your means to make me stronger.”
Stronger in faith!
Lord, grace us with the radically surrendering humility, trust and love of You to pray this prayer in all circumstances. May we accept even the greatest losses with gratitude, knowing they are from Your hands, for Your purposes, for Your glory in us. Strengthen our faith so that every failure of self becomes a victory for Christ!
Sometimes you win, & sometimes you learn. And remember… in both cases, God wins.
If you align your will and heart with His Word, then you will share in His victory and you will learn without the shameful sting of sin. It’s the indisputable best option.
You only “lose” if you’re sticking with sin. Whenever you learn, it’s a warning signpost to that unfortunate fact. You’ve only got two options: obedience and disobedience. And if you’re not obeying the Victor Himself, you’re doomed to fail. Remember this!
We do not know the mind of God, but we do know His patient mercy, and His unconditional love. As His children, our duty is to strive to love others the same way, by His grace. No judging worth, no petty complaints, no whining or pointing fingers. Just love and mercy for our fellow human beings. Love your enemies, seek their highest good, be merciful and gentle, and leave the rest to God.
Anonymous asked: thoughts on spiritual attack? I feel like mentally and spiritually I feel so depressed and far away from God every single Saturday night. Then I wake up drained and don't want to go to church. Not sure if I'm reading too much into this or not
Spiritual attack is something that I think is downplayed a lot, but it is a very real thing. Based on what you’re saying it sounds like this could be a spiritual attack. The enemy will do whatever he can to get a firm hold on our thoughts, and make us believe lies. Start making declarations about who you are in Jesus and say them out loud, there is power in speaking his name. Declare that you are a child of God and that the enemy has no power over you. Ask for others to pray for you. I don’t know what kind of church you attend or how close you are to your church community, but having other believers lay hands on you and speak truths over you is such a powerful weapon against the enemy as well. Remember that our God is greater!! Praying that you experience this truth in such a profound way. God bless you.
I can humbly attest to the power and truth of this. The Holy Name of Jesus has immeasurable power, as does praying His Name with others in the faith. It’s both beautiful and terrifying how quickly a spiritual attack can be silenced by turning earnestly and helplessly to God… and how much angrier the attacks get in the wake of such an entreaty. But do not give up. The devil will fight God and His children until the day we die, but God will also be there to unfailingly support our faith until death and infinitely beyond. The devil cannot win against God... but he can destroy us apart from God. So cling to Christ and take courage!
Replace whatever lies you’re believing about your identity with the truth of who Jesus Christ is in you, and who He knows you to be. What you have done in the past does not get to tell you who you are. Jesus does. If you believe you are bad, worthless, hopeless, or a failure, you need to begin renewing your mind to truth. His Word is truth.
I struggle with this daily. My past is wracked with traumatic sin, which haunts me incessantly, and often drives me to despair… because I keep forgetting this truth in Jesus. I admit this with great shame, but therefore I also exalt Him with great hope and gratitude.
I do feel like I am inherently bad, filthy, wrong, ugly, ruined, broken, evil, worthless, etc. I feel I have failed at life and that my future is nonexistent as a result. But all of this comes from a worldly mindset! If I shift my focus, rightly, to Christ… suddenly I no longer feel defined by my horrific past. Suddenly I remember that Christ has put that evil past to death on the Cross, because He loves me and wants me to live free of that choking burden, free of the fear of sin’s death sentence, free of the chronic terror of hellfire that sin always carries with it. Christ knows I have sinned but He also knows I am heartily sorry, and that I cannot do better without Him.
So Christ died for me, to pay the debt of my sin FOR me, so that if I unite myself to Him in His atoning death, my past dies and I live.
The devil hates this. This is why he constantly tries to chain us TO our past: he wants to nullify the salvation of cross. But he cannot! Christ knows the truth because He IS the Truth. “I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life.“ (John 5:24) And of course… "When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, ‘Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?’ She said, 'No man, Lord.’ And Jesus said unto her, 'Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.’” (John 8: 10-11)
“The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10)
Which voice is your identity based on: the thief who destroys, or the Shepherd who heals?
Just… remember this. Read Scripture and live in this.
Public bathroom, Hispanic guys. Like muggers were. Shot me in head. Two huge holes, bleeding, dizzy, cant talk clearly (blood in mouth?) Immediately start praying and preaching. DONT DIE. People freaking because I'm gushing blood but evangelizing instead of keeling over. Walk to state of Christ holding young girl; gold. Snowy? Crawl into his arms and say I'm ready to die here. But I still dont.
Kids, books, school? People filming me? News. I get shot in the head AGAIN, still don't die. But worried now, is this going to be a thing? Will I ever be truly martyred? I didn't want to be giving testimony every time I was lethally wounded, but never dying. It'd become canned.
how someone looks when they think nobody can see them
the mannerisms of a stranger
real meanings behind spoken words
subtle facial expressions which last a second
the underlying flavours in food
emotions that a friend is trying to hide
little lights in a sleeping city
flowers growing through cracks in the pavement
the mixed colour palette in a piece of art
the melody of someone’s voice
Pay attention to the little hidden things.
God lives in the unseen and overlooked, really– in things that are hidden and forgotten. It is in these humble things that He can be specially found and honored. For He sees and loves all these things in life, and in us… after all, He is the One who brought them all into being. Every tiny flower, every moment of music, every minuscule detail of a face or hand or voice, every color or scent or flavor– it all first originated in the heart of God. And that’s deeply moving to realize.
Treasure the small beauties and joys in this life. Let them lift your heart higher, to the hope of heaven, where such beauties are magnified ineffably in their Creator forever.
The Cathedral of the Madeleine, Salt Lake City Interior designed 1917
I was here, once, on the Feast of the Assumption, the day after I moved into SLC for a while.
The mass changed my life. I wept from ineffable emotions the entire time, stricken by the beauty of the art and the air, the prayers and the psalms, the glory of the Gospel. I wanted to stay forever. In my heart, I truly think I have. Part of my soul will always remain there, kneeling alone and awestruck in those pews, pouring itself out to God.
That HAND in that kaleidoscopic color– that reduces me to trembling. That numinous surrealism, that impossible terrible beauty… That is how God’s divinity feels to me. And Moses, completely unclothed, his sandal in hand, his body language totally open, wonder clearly visible despite fear… that light above him. I adore this, I really do.
This is all I want in life; this is all my heart yearns for; this is what we are meant to live and die for.
Sweet Jesus, I beg of you, poor, weak and miserable sinner that I am– please, move my heart, change my heart, purify my will and thoughts so that this, this, You– are the very center and core and guiding light of my existence, the cornerstone of my soul, the joy and hope and love of my entire being. Dear Jesus, hear my fervent prayer! How I love you, and how desperately I wish to love you even more– more sincerely, more completely, more ardently, in this life and the next!
Your love is life itself. May I spend both my life and my love in constant honor of You.
There is so much delicately powerful emotion in this, spoken through silent body language. It’s beautiful.
The composition is utterly breathtaking, too– the central image of Christ, triumphantly resurrected, His arm gesturing towards His Mother, whose hand is humbly touched to her heart, “behold the handmaiden of the Lord”… echoing the upheld arm of the Archangel Gabriel, in a perfect diagonal across, linked by the figure of Christ, literally and figuratively… the banner He holds mirroring the Archangel’s greeting– “hail, full of grace!” – in both victorious function and declaration of birth… His life blossoming forth from both the Womb and the Tomb. Then on the bottom left we have Saints Nazarius and Celsus (with a donor), with Saints Sebastian and Roch in the bottom right… and for me, the meaning that sprung out was that they were all notably cared for by women: Celsus first by his mother, who introduced him to Nazarius to be taught and baptized; Sebastian by Saint Irene of Rome, who tended his wounds; and Roch also by his mother, who was sterile until she prayed to Mary for a child! Not only that, but Saint Roch is speaking to an angel… again making a diagonal connection to Gabriel, and linking Mary to him by association. Completing this compositional beauty is Nazarius, gesturing to Christ, the kneeling donor and attentive Celsus beside him echoing Mary’s position of prayerful humility… and reflecting, lastly, the awe of the soldiers falling before the resurrected Jesus, the dawning light around the one’s head perhaps symbolizing the awakening of Gentiles like us to faith, to beholding the glory of God in His Son, and to ultimately testifying to His Sovereignty with every detail of our lives… seeing Him in All, just like this painting.
Crucifixus etiam pro nobis.
He was crucified– even for us!
(That is the heart of the cross. He did it for us. This was no deserved punishment for Him; this was no obligation or sentence or force. This was no selfish act. Everything about the crucifixion was a choice, made in obedient love, to Love, for Love. Jesus Christ died for us. There is an entire universe of meaning in that simple profound truth.)
Christ is the King of all Creation, and the King of our very hearts. He is both the Just Judge of souls, and our Merciful Savior. All glory, honor, power, and praise are His– the Son of God, the Ruler of All!
These artworks are so beautiful. They portray the gorgeous compassion of Christ, as well as His stunning authority, in powerful truth. I especially love when His Wounds are visible alongside His Scepter and Crown– reminding us of what He suffered for our sake, through His Passion and Death, to redeem us from the sin He otherwise must punish… mercy and justice united in perfect love. It’s amazing.
Look at the love in every single face here. The gaze that the Christ Child is giving her is profound enough to move my heart to tears.
The perspective of this is astounding– and the translucency of the angels!! And God the Father at the very top, arms outstretched, radiant. That simple detail is magnificent, and makes my heart tremble.
I love the visible brushstrokes in this, how they are practically tangible light. Fitting for such a portrait of an angel, announcing the Light Incarnate! I also really love how Gabriel is portrayed– those worker’s arms, that notable nose, the tightly curled hair. To imagine how angels must choose a visible form for our sakes, it’s a dear thought to wonder over, what Gabriel would delight to be depicted with, in every artist’s eye.
Our Christian brethren from all ages, gathered all together at last, in eternal love and praise of our God– in wonder and joy before the Son and His Mother, the King and Queen of us all! Oh, to one day be a joyous member of that heavenly host!! Keep this image and its great hope in your heart. This is the community of saints we must strive to join, through living holy lives here on earth, by Christ’s grace. Let that dedication to honor Him motivate our every decision, until we leave this world for Paradise!
Oh I love the absolute friendly intimacy of this interaction. Look at the body language– Matthew’s almost casually crossed legs, the angel’s playfully graceful tilt, Matthew’s raptly focused hands gripping book and quill, the angel’s light but powerful touch guiding him, their other hand resting so simply… Matthew’s bright and inspired eyes, the angel’s utterly peaceful and playful gaze, that hint of a smile in their unheard direction.
The closeness evident in this, literally and figuratively, is so sweet and moving. May we, too, strive to have such a friendship with God and His angels (and saints!), that it permeates every moment of our everyday lives with faithful love.
Oh WHAT a sword!! How true that is, in its terrific pain!
And yet, look at her face. Despite inexpressible sorrows, Mary forever trusts in God. She feels no bitterness, no despair, no complaint. She weeps, as any loving heart would– she weeps more than any woman has ever wept– but her tears are all born of love for Her Divine Son.
Inexpressible love, and inexpressible sorrow. This is how she shares in Christ’s Passion and Death. This is that blessed sword.
The intricate elegance of this card itself is nothing compared to the fathomless beauty of His Sacred Heart.
I really love that juxtaposition, of worship offering sweetness to sweetness itself. It’s a very precious thing.
Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go yonder and pray.” And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.” And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.” – Mt 26:36-39
”[…]The world has no idea of all that Jesus suffered.[…]” —St. Faustina, Diary 1054
Jesus fell on His face and prayed. I forget that profound detail. His prayer was so fervent, so genuine, so anguished… indeed, we have no idea how severely our Savior suffered for us. No wonder He shook with sorrow in the garden. This fact should move us all to the deepest humility, love, gratitude, and contrition!
Saint Nicholas of Tolentino, Confessor - 10 September
The clouds look like roses– fitting, as the Rosary is a powerful aid to those in Purgatory.
I also love those angels above, mirroring the souls below. It’s like they’re joyfully watching Saint Nicholas, waiting with him to welcome those suffering brethren into the Kingdom at last.
Just… the angels, their expressions ineffable, showing our Lord scenes from His imminent Passion, carrying Veronica’s veil, even displaying His Sorrowful Mother’s heart pierced in Simeon’s prophetic fulfillment… how the angels nearest us are transparent, their testaments unknown… how our dear Savior Himself is lying on the ground in agonized prayer, yet His eyes are attentive, understanding, decisive even… how He looks up so in the direction of the seraph bearing the chalice He feared to drink, yet which is full of light before Him… and here there is no fear on His holy face, no distress, if only for a moment. Here, there is divine strength. Here, there is the first glimmer of the hope of The Resurrection.
“[He prayed,] ‘Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.’ And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him.” (Luke 22:42-43)
Bartolomeo Guidobono (Il Prete di Savona), The Intercession of the Virgin and Saint Nicholas of Tolentino for the Souls in Purgatory, 18th century
This is such a powerful image– both the desperate reaches & faces of the poor suffering souls in Purgatory towards heaven, towards Jesus and His Mother, and the contrastingly serene expressions of those divine figures, are so striking.
Mostly I am so moved by the angel. There is this totally calm yet solidly joyous smile on their face, and they are pulling a soul out of Purgatory with a grip that is firm but full of love. I’m not sure on the meaning of the belt in their other hand, but if I had to guess, if seems as if that instrument of bondage, too, was removed from the soul below.
And those skulls in the bottom left corner. Memento Mori. Pray for the souls in Purgatory– chances are that we, too, will join them one day, and that day may very well be tomorrow!!
A French print of the Mother of Sorrows holding some of the Arma Christi, the instruments Christ’s Passion.
I love how, even with tears in her eyes, there is this visible joy in her face. She has wept with bitter sorrow but this fact has not diminished her faith, hope, or love in the slightest. She holds these terribly blessed instruments with a genuine honor, displaying them to us with glory. She knows God is victorious. She knows her Son will rise. She knows that no amount of pain or misery can ever stand in the way of the Lord… but she also knows that pain and misery are real, and legitimate, and holy when felt by a tender heart.
Mary invites us to share her sorrows, so that we can truly share in her joy as well. Blessed Mother of Sorrows, pray for us!
Meanwhile in Rome…
Church of Santa Maria in campitelli
Oh WOW.
I love Catholic church architecture so much because it absolutely testifies to the GLORY of God! This is something you do not, and should not, see anywhere but in the House of God. It is a powerful visual testament to WHO we are worshipping.
I always remind others of this when they doubt the existence of relics from the Crucifixion… do you really think Mary would let those sacred objects go forgotten? Never. I am sure she preserved them with the utmost love and honor.
Oh blessed Mother, oh sorrowful Mother, pray for us poor sinners, that through the dear graces of your Son’s saving death, we may be made new and live lives worthy of receiving His promises!
Viktor Vasnetsov - Fatherhood (Detail); State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia; 1907
I’ve posted this one a few times before, but I never tire of looking at it
This is titled Fatherhood.
I’m honestly in tears. The beauty and power of this is a sword straight to the heart. This is our God– the Lord and Creator of all– our Father and Brother and Friend, Who loves us!!
Oh this absolutely rends my heart with its beauty.
Holy Thursday night is the most agonizingly sorrowful and most mysteriously gorgeous night of the entire year, for me. It is its own entire reality, outside of linear time somehow, eternally ancient and yet completely present, so real you feel it in every atom. The last night before the end… the first night of the beginning.
The ineffable love in this leaves me speechless and in tears. To think… Christ yearns to embrace all of us like that. That’s how dearly He loves us– that’s the ultimate heart of the Cross itself!
This is strikingly moving. What a devoted, loving mother, who would not rest until her son’s soul was delivered from deathly ways!
Dear Saint Monica, pray to God for all of us whose loved ones have ignored, rejected, or fallen away from Christ! May their souls be moved by God’s grace, through our loving and fervent intercessions, to convert and return to the Lord with their whole hearts!
Un Viático en el Baztan - Javier Ciga Echandi - 1917
A Viaticum in the Baztan.
“According to Fernández Oyaregui, ‘Un Viático en el Baztan’ is [Javier’s] masterpiece… "It narrates, with incalculable ethnographic and sociological value, with real characters of his time, a habitual religious custom at the time…” The scene, which takes place in the palace of Askoa in Elbete, reflects the moment in which a procession of mourning women provided with candles, preceded by Monsignor Mauricio Berekoetxea and the altar boy Juan Lasa, set out to enter the house of the patient to administer the last Sacraments.” (Source)
There is such a tangible sense of sacred solemnity here– a real blurring of the line between life and death. Here, the Monsignor and funeral procession testify not only to the reality of imminent death, of the end of a life… but even more strongly, bringing with them the Real Presence of Christ Himself, they testify to an imminent life after, to a greater truer life, the Way leading them in to the patient, and leading their patient onwards. You can feel that very threshold thrumming in the silent gravity of this painting.
I love the vibe of this so much. I can practically smell the crisp cold winter air, and the warm glow of morning sunlight, pouring from the stark blue skies… but loveliest of all is the luminous church itself, joyful and welcoming and bright, a safe haven for body and soul.
This is what winter feels like for me, in my heart always, and I love it so much.
The simple yet profound intimacy in this is stunningly gorgeous.
That is the hand of God, mind you. God as an infant, God as a human child, touching his human mother with divine tenderness and love. That detail alone is enough to move one to heartfelt contemplation.
I actually like how Christ is out of frame here– we only see His blessed Hands, crowning His Mother. That limited visibility highlights the mystery and divinity of this event, as it makes the Son appear in the same hidden way as the Father does in so many other ancient artworks: as hands alone, as the very instruments of power… as nothing personal, nothing too profound for mortal men. Now Mary, too, is an earthly being, no matter how holy she has been made, for her earthliness was a key part of her role in God’s plan. But she was the first mortal to see the face of God and live… the face of Jesus Christ. And now, here, she is made Queen of Heaven, raised up to a new way of being altogether, by the direct will and action of He Whose True Face no mortal being can see, let alone fathom.
And so, here we only see our Savior’s hands, but Mary sees infinitely more, sees what is hidden from us… she sees the Face of her Beloved Son.
I’m immediately struck by their eyes, though. Their gaze is pure intensity, blazing like fire, and yet there’s still this feeling of unshakable peace within it… a peace born of angelic faith, joyously immovable though the stars themselves be snuffed out. Terrible, beautiful, awe-inspiring faith. Faith that makes you tremble, for it inherently proclaims the all-surpassing glory of God, to Whom that faith is anchored fast.
Seraphim are the highest choir. They exist TO praise God, incessantly. No wonder this one radiates such incomprehensible holiness. Every angel is terrifying because they are so high above us, so much closer to God, and they carry that Divine Light with them. To fear them is a mark of humility– a vivid awareness of our own awful sinfulness in contrast– but their response to us, “do not be afraid,” proclaims God’s Goodness, which is infinitely above even theirs, in an even more staggering sense. The Creator of All, the One Who makes a seraph’s eyes look like that– He loves us, and calls us to Him, and sent His Own Son to save us… the same beloved Son Whom the angels adore and announce throughout Scripture, and throughout our own lives even now.
So, behold this seraph. See God working through them for His people. See His power and glory and love reflected in them. And do not be afraid.
Saints. Hours of Louis de Laval, France ~ ca.1480
That ocean of halos gives me so much hope. So many holy souls whose faces only God knows… unknown to the world, and blissfully so, for they are with God now, and lived for Him despite their anonymity, and that is all that matters.
Dear Lord, through Your grace and guidance, may I join this most blessed multitude one day, to adore you forever.
I love the details in this– the Arma Christi held by angels, including the pillar at which he was scourged… the skull and crowns at the foot of the cross… His Holy Family adoring together from Heaven… Veronica’s veil, the pelican perched on the top of the cross.
The Prodigal Son In Modern Life, the Fatted Calf, 1882, James Tissot
Oh wow, this is beautifully done. I absolutely love modern-day depictions of Jesus’s parables; it shows how they are still so absolutely relevant to our lives.
Foster father and dear cousin.
I love how Jesus has His eyes closed in both statues, a beautiful expression of trust and peace.
The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist Pier Francesco Mazzucchelli—ca. 1620
The composition of this is so powerful it brings me to tears.
There is such powerful testimony in all the paintings of John’s martyrdom. The very portrayal of his death speaks volumes as to the depth and devotion of his faith.
Saint Denis - bishop of Paris in the third century
He was martyred for his faith by decapitation together with his companions Rusticus and Eleutherius
prosperosfootnotes: Motion to have all cephalophore saints depicted with light-like heads from now on.
This makes me think of 2 Corinthians 4:16-18:
“Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (CSB)
So yes, I am absolutely here for luminous-souled cephalophores. That which is within cannot be cut off.
Oh WOW, look at the silhouette of God the Father!!
I’m actually in tears from the beauty of this. God bless His inspired artists.
German: “Jesus wird erhöhet u stirbt am Creuze.” = “Jesus is raised/ exalted and dies on the Cross.”
I am struck, though, by the object at the foot of the Cross, beside Mary Magdalene. Is that the spikenard from John 12:3? Is that the precious oil with which she anointed His feet “for burial,” and dried them with her hair? If so, what a gorgeously heartbreaking visual parallel this is!
THIS is why we must be absolutely reverent during Mass!! The divine, unseen truth occurring there, all around us, including us, is so magnificent that it would (and should) bring every parishioner to their knees in awestruck tears… if we but honestly realized it, if only for a moment!
Oh my goodness this is so beautiful it makes me cry. Look at the absolute love in their eyes… and realize that Christ is looking at us like that, even now. It’s enough to move any heart to heaven.
Saint Joseph, foster father of all Christians, pray for us, your children through the Son, that we, too, may always gaze upon Him with as much pure and ardent love as you do.
Oh this is staggering in its humbly stark simplicity.
This is what He endured for us– overwhelming pain, pierced through with countless lances of sin! And yet, see there, the precious drops of Divine Blood– unfathomable mercy, shed for our reconciliation even then.
O Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us poor sinners!
A German baroque miniatur of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, “heart of love and sorrow”.
This is really beautiful.
Her love and her sorrow are inseparable, really. They each strengthen and enable the other. One cannot feel true grief without knowing true compassion, and vice versa.
The lighting in this is magnificent. Truly our Blessed Mother is “clothed with the sun” here!
I also really love how Mary– portrayed here as Our Lady of Lourdes, the Immaculate Conception– is positioned directly above the Tabernacle… which she literally is in her own right, having also “immaculately conceived” our Savior, and carrying His Precious Body within hers. Not only that, but right above her is the Holy Spirit, who made that very fact possible!
In any case the symmetry and symbolism of this entire altar is gorgeous.
Oh my goodness where is this? That conjoined-wing design, especially superimposed upon the wheels, just screams “Ophanim” to me.
I love this. I love incomprehensible representations of divinity, God and His angels both. It’s a deeply awe-inspiring truth.
Antique Prayer Cards.
I tried my best to translate the four French+Latin cards; they’re very beautiful. If you can translate them more accurately please let me know!
1. “Voila ce Coeur, Qui a tem'aime les homme!” = “Here is this Heart, Who has loved (you) men!”
2. “Tendre Marie priez pour nous auprès de votre divin fils.” = “Tender Mary pray for us to your divine son.”
3. “Mater Divina Providencia” = “Mother of Divine Providence.” / “Auxilium Christianorum” = “Help of Christians.” / “Salut, ó Mère de misėricorde; notre vie, notre joie, et notre esperance.” (Salve Regina)“ = "Hail, Mother of mercy; our life, our joy, and our hope. (Hail (Holy) Queen)” / “Secours des Chrétiens, priez pour nous.” = “Help of Christians, pray for us.”
4. “Ce que c'est qu'aimer. Dėdié à la Garde l'honneur.” = “This is what it is to love. Dedicated to Guard (Keep) the honor.” (?) / “Une petit image des degrés de l'amour.” = “A small picture of the degrees of love.” / “Mon Dieu, faites pousser mes ailes!…” = “My God, Make my wings grow!” (literally “Grow my wings!”) / “C'est en aimant la Croix que l'on trouve son Coeur, Car le divin Amour ne vit pas sans douleur…” = “It is by loving the Cross that one finds his Heart, Because the divine Love does not exist without pain…”
The final card is absolutely gorgeous; it’s also striking because it appears to potray the Sacred Heart of Jesus, with Mary’s Immaculate Heart at its center, Saint Joseph’s Pure Heart to the right, and Saint John the Divine’s Heart to the left! I’ve never seen his heart portrayed before. But, remember, from the Cross, Jesus entrusted Mary to him as his Mother, making John her first adopted son among us Christians. Therefore, the entire “Holy Family” is upon the Cross with our Lord, all their hearts united in that suffering love… and at its foot, dozens of anonymous hearts fly, inflamed with the Holy Spirit, to join that Family, quite literally, as Christians. Those are OUR hearts. It’s profoundly moving, truly. But there is also a terrific warning– notice the heart that has lost its fire of love, and so blackened and wingless, falls to the ground! May we be prevented from ever suffering such a fate– instead, let us all pray to our Crucified Lord of Love to gather our hearts to His– we tiny winged things, more precious than many sparrows– that we, with His blessed Family, may grow in fiery ardor to ultimately join them in both name and nature, honoring and defending both His Heart and His Cross, affixed to it with Him through carrying our own with fidelity and love!
In his human weakness, he betrayed his Lord… but his Lord never took the keys back. Peter still knew Jesus was the Christ, and nothing could change his faith– not even his own sin. His heart was still devoted, and we see the immediate proof of that in his repentance here… seeking forgiveness upon a rock, for having denied his Rock, who had called him, too, to be such a rock.
And he still has the keys. I cannot get over that. Even then, with the cockerel crowing overhead. His sin happened in the night, but now, even now, the darkness is ending. There is hope, golden and true, greater than any sin. There is resurrection after death. The rock will be moved, has been moved, and love will triumph evermore.
Oh wow, this is such a tenderly loving image of Mary– and such an honestly striking picture of Jesus, so absolutely human here, so recognizable as a tiny infant, like we all were once. To imagine dear Mary cradling us like this, too, the blessedly adopted Children of her Blessed Child… she is, indeed, Our Good Mother.
What love and tenderness she beholds us with. We are indeed her children.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, Thy kingdom come!
God’s heart is aflame with love for us. He will ignite our hearts with that same love, for His sake! Trust in Him and do His work– He will support you in all of it.
In His Kingdom, our hearts in turn will burn like this for love of Him. And what love He has for us!! May our hearts be ignited even now, so that His will may be done upon earth!
Our Lady of Victory Basilica, Lackawanna, NY
Oh WOW, what a beautiful tabernacle!! All those reverent angels! One’s heart cannot help but be moved to feel the same.
Those thorns… that expression! There is such profundity and vulnerability in His face. I cannot take my eyes away from Him.
French reliquary pendant for the Holy Thorn circa 1340.
As someone with a strong devotion to Christ Crowned With Thorns, the reality of this absolutely hits me straight in the heart. Wow.
Honestly I’m speechlessly in tears; this is so ineffably beautiful and mysterious and holy. Looking at that Thorn… it makes me weak in the knees with reverent awe. Glory be to God.
Passage of the Jews through the Red Sea, 1891, Ivan Aivazovski
This is absolutely staggering in both beauty and affective power. Look how close the Egyptian army is! Look at those last-minute souls just barely pulling themselves out of the returning waters! Look at the light above, the darkness about, the divinely terrifying glow of the fiery cloud! And look at Moses– his hand outstretched, his faith unwavering, his people freed, his Lord and God unfailing.
The Old Testament (Tanakh) is honestly a gorgeous, humbling, magnificent, striking book, a true testament to the glory and goodness of God, which I have loved to read since childhood. This is a snapshot of why.
As children, it’s so easy to acknowledge our angels, to envision them at the foot of our beds. But how many of us, as adults, remember and realize that these heavenly guardians still watch over us so closely, so lovingly? Even now, grown up and struggling to sleep, there is a special angel sitting alongside us, their heart full of compassion. Let us thank them for their fidelity to God through us, and turn to them for aid so that we, too, may glorify God with them!
A Female Saint (Bridget of Sweden?) Holding a Crucifix and a Book unknown artist Wellcome Collection
I actually love that this dear saint is unidentified; whoever she is, she stands here humbly as a model of faith, seeking no recognition of self, but only proclaiming the love and honor due to God by her example… and so we modern Christian women can look to her here, and imagine ourselves in that same place.
If her name is unknown, what if it were ours? What would that feel like, to be the woman pictured here? What sort of blessed life, what trials and triumphs of faith, would we need to also live in order to truly inherit the title of Saint from our sister here?
If we can hold that ideal, that great hope, that very image in our hearts as we live our days, it shall certainly strengthen our devotion to God… and, with His guidance and blessing, we shall one day meet our anonymous sister here in heaven, saints among the saints.
Raphael, Madonna of the candelabra (detail), c.1513
He is the Light of the World; She is the candle that humbly brought His fire to us.
I love the delicacy of their halos, and the silent profundity of their eyes.
The most Holy Trinity.
I really love how they are all positioned within each other here; with that ineffable visual focus on the Father’s Heart uniting them all.
I love depictions of the Trinity in art. It always strikes me as so ineffably, mysteriously gorgeous– the humble but honorable human attempt to portray the unfathomable.
“Gaze upon him, consider him, contemplate him, as you desire to imitate him.” - Saint Clare of Assisi Sacred Icon of Christ Pantocrator
It is honestly so important to literally gaze on Jesus. The culture of death all around us fills our eyes with corruption and sin on a terrifyingly constant basis. We MUST refocus our sight on Christ, to wash away and overpower the negativity and lies of the world, and to train our poor battered subconscious to anchor itself on contemplating God as well. Gaze on Jesus, and let His beauty of visage, soul, and message fill your heart and mind so totally that all else is brought under His gentle yet powerful rule. As you ardently do this, seeking and loving and contemplating Him, you will indeed inevitably become more and more like Him. “The things that we love tell us what we are.”
Jesus will never give up on us. We just need to remember to never give up on Him! No matter how hopelessly far from sainthood we may feel, if we earnestly keep praying and keep trying to humbly but ardently obey Him, He will bring us to success. I’m sure of it. No one is too sinful to be saved, if they honestly allow God to rule in their lives more and more. Jesus can and will make us His saints. Don’t give up on Jesus!
Seriously, ASK YOURSELF these questions– daily, even. Be brutally honest. Wherever you are convicted by the Spirit– and He will never sugarcoat the truth– CONFESS AND REPENT! Pray for mercy and the grace to reform your life. The fate of your soul depends on it!
National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington, United States of America Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash
I visited this shrine twice in high school and it was immediately, indelibly impressed into my heart. It is achingly gorgeous; the sanctity is practically tangible. It is truly a place of God.
I miss it profoundly and plan to return as soon as God grants me the means. I’d honestly live there if it were possible.
We were just discussing this at church today, especially in light of Fatima and recent divine revelations in general.
We NEED to return to tradition, focusing strongly on continually strengthening and restoring virtues such as devotion, solemnity, humility, contrition, fear of God, and justice to our faith– showing it in our places of worship as well as within our parish communities.
The bright side of this constant concern: it keeps you focused on growing in God! Just don’t become obsessive. If nothing else, every inconvenience is an opportunity to practice patience, love, humility, gratitude, etc. And that is sufficient.
I literally started crying upon seeing this. Oh my heart. The beauty is staggering, the sanctity virtually tangible… this captures the exact numinous grandeur that I adore in places of worship. God deserves all the glory and gorgeousness we can offer Him in His holy houses, honestly.
The flower petals are so gorgeous, all red amidst the gold and white, the light and incense smoke. And that monstrance, the literal heart of it all, more beautiful than the temporal glory all around… how blessed we are to have our faith!!
Hey, I’ve been there!! This alterpiece is from the chapel in the motherhouse of the Franciscan Sisters T. O. R. of the Penance of the Sorrowful Mother in Toronto, OH. They’re a beautiful community.
That fact adds an even deeper meaning to the presence of Our Lady at the foot of the cross here; thank you for sharing!
From their website:
“Founded at Franciscan University in 1988, we, the Franciscan Sisters T.O.R. of Penance of the Sorrowful Mother, are a Franciscan religious community rooted in Christ Crucified, animated by the Holy Spirit, and modeled after Mary, our Mother. Our life flows from the Eucharist, the wellspring of love and mercy. Captured by the merciful love of Christ, the fulfillment and desire of every human heart, in whose light every other love pales, we cannot help but freely give our lives. We abandon all so that this impoverished world, unknowingly starving for His love, may be filled with knowledge of His merciful Heart, eternally beating and ferociously burning for every human person.”
I feel this beautiful description also beautifully demonstrates the quote above. These Sisters are indeed immersed in the Trinity, living their lives in constant remembrance and proclamation of God’s Love, and although they have completely given up all ties to this world, they have lost nothing, and indeed gained everything– for their joy, their wealth, their home, and even their very identity, are fulfilled in truth within that very Triune Love. May we, too, be so moved by that Love as to follow their humble example, and dedicate our lives– even outside of any formal vocation– entirely to God.
Lastly, I must confess that I am so deeply moved by that stained glass window above the Cross… the hands of God the Father, bestowing the Spirit upon us, which was only possible by the Son’s death (John 16:7)… hearkening back to Mary’s Fiat, her “Thy Will Be Done” echoing her Son’s, her “beginning” echoing this “ending”… her heart pierced with Our Lord’s just as Simeon foretold. God sent out His Spirit upon her then, as Jesus entered the world, and now as He leaves it, we remember that same hope, and look forward to Pentecost. It’s all just this deeply beautiful feeling in my heart, seeing that, those numinous hands and that sacred dove, that fire of incomprehensible Love. Indeed, one cannot help but be immersed in it.
Images of the Most Holy Trinity always move my heart like an earthquake. Yes, we cannot really “see” God, in any of His Persons, but… this is our reverent attempt to at least invoke honor and devoted love towards that Great Mystery, and boy, does it ever succeed! I want to fall, speechless and trembling with fearful joy, to my knees. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages, Amen!!
This– the Infant Jesus appearing to Saint Anthony of Padua– is gorgeously portrayed. Look at how lovingly Mary gives the Child to him– at the mandorla surrounding both Her and Christ, showing how this sacred moment transcends space and time! Look at the lilies, for Anthony’s humble devotion and Mary’s purity, at the putti, for God’s Presence with Our Lady, at the candle, for the light of Truth in God’s Word, and at that very Word present in not only the holy Bible open before the Saint– as open as His heart– but also in the Incarnate Word to whom he lifts up his heart and hands to receive!
Statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in procession; Nervion, Seville, Spain
I really love how Jesus’s robe is open here, exposing his Sacred Heart quite literally. So many statues of our Lord just superimpose it onto His garment. But this, this vulnerability, this openness and tender power, is so striking, and– if I may be so bold– so true to our Lord’s character. Paired with His expression, we see not only his exquisite pain, but his equally vast mercy and love. Nothing is hidden from those who seek Him, who honor His Most Sacred Wounded Heart.
The tenderness and agony both in this painting are stunning. And that red, stretched out behind them, that funereal black sky… this captures the feeling of that Friday so clearly. Good, true, for we all know what it accomplished, but oh, how terribly it did so!
willow-s-linda: I wanted to draw something for Pentecost. Interestingly, it seems to be an exclusively European holiday? Still, it’s one of my favourite parts about the New Testament. It makes me remember how close and powerful God is, not only to the apostles, but also in this life, today, to me.
It’s a big deal indeed for Christians in general– today is the birthday of our Church in the world, by the Grace of God!
This illustration is so deeply moving and beautiful, and portrays the message of today’s holy day with simple profundity. The miracle of Pentecost still occurs today, in the hearts of all the faithful who are open and waiting in hope to receive Him, just like the Apostles.
Our Lord Jesus indeed promised to be with us always, and Pentecost is the glorious, loving manifestation of its fulfillment through all ages. No matter when or where we are, God is with us!
Come, Holy Spirit, and so enlighten our hearts with your divine Love, that we may carry your compassion to all the world!
This is, truly, what it means and feels like to be a Christian. We have been called to such a great, glorious purpose for His sake, and through love of Him. Christianity is a religion of ardent devotion to the Lord God and Pentecost was the first earthly expression of that– the birthday of the Church!
Our Lady was the first human to be touched by the Holy Spirit, at the Annunciation, when it was first proclaimed that God was coming into the world in a new way… as the Second Person of the Trinity. It is only fitting that here, at Pentecost, when the Third Person is finally to arrive for the rest of faithful humanity, Mary would again be at the heart of it, the gateway of the Spirit’s divine Grace for her Son’s friends, the Father’s adopted children.
Oh I love this. The imagery of the Seraphim, bearing the Gifts, is especially striking– those angels are the closest of the Choirs to the Presence of God, and by His grace, through His Spirit, those Gifts are brought down into our hearts for His glory! What a miraculous, humbling privilege of faith! May we all pray for the openness, meekness, and trust of heart to receive those Gifts today.
Q. 428. How did the Holy Ghost come down upon the Apostles?
A. The Holy Ghost came down upon the Apostles in the form of tongues of fire.
Q. 429. What did the form of tongues of fire denote?
A. The form of tongues of fire denoted the sacred character and divine authority of the preaching and teaching of the Apostles, by whose words and fervor all men were to be converted to the love of God.
This is such a beautiful illustration for that world-changing event. What divine love, what wonder and awe, what works of power and grace! May we all respond like these blessed converts to the voice of the Holy Spirit in our lives– and may we, too, like the blessed Apostles, be His mouthpiece and kindling flames of love to others in such a wholly trusting, self-emptying, God-honoring way!
I am always so deeply moved by the realization that God became a Child.
I am also struck by not only the tenderness and purity of this image, but also the ultimate implications of Christ’s title as the Lamb of God. He is the ultimate sacrificial offering, blameless and spotless, the offering of Love that would have the power to truly expiate all the sins He brought to that altar of the Cross.
In this Child is our Crucified Lord, our Good Shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep, and I daresay that profundity of love and power both is met in His Eyes here.
“Santa Veronica con il velo” by Mattia Preti
Oh, what aching beauty– her tears, her face; His face, His love!
This makes me think of the light within a confessional. It’s one of the most deeply, achingly comforting sights in the world.
All things were created Good; all things fell and were condemned to death. Both the falling and the rising of creation were wrought upon trees. Death is now a door. The fallen fruit now carries a fertile seed. There is a sunrise, there is a spring. There is hope.
“…If Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.” (Romans 8:10-11)
I also am moved by the solitary portrayal of the three acts of salvation here. Judas’s betrayal, with the condemning crowd, is presented as a public event, as part of the world, as a work of this worlds people. But although Jesus was surrounded by the same people as he carried His Cross, and died upon it, and rose from the dead on the third day… here, the focus is on Him alone, pun intended. We see the two thieves also dying in the background, but even that speaks only to highlight the nature of what is occurring front and center– God delivering Himself up to death, so that we who are doomed to die like those thieves now have another way, The Way– that by crucifying our worldly selves in faith, uniting our symbolic death to His literal salvific one, we allow Jesus Christ to take our place in death– as He so willed for His faithful– and we can follow Him out of the grave… instead of being crucified for our sins and dying an ignominious deserved death. But, again, the focus is on Jesus. Not on us. This is the distilled, focused presentation of Salvation’s victory over the World.
Christ alone carries the burden of our sins, Christ alone dies for the just punishment of our sins… and Christ alone conquers death and opens the tomb free from our sins. And so He calls us to follow– not to do the same, not literally, as It Is Finished, and the glory is His alone… but in loving compassion and faith, imitating Him, carrying our crosses and dying to sin and being reborn In His Grace.
In short, the pinpoint focus on Christ here, the Light in the darkness, the Only Source of Salvation, speaks volumes as to what was done, and why, and by Whom. It’s all Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God!
I was just thinking about this looking outside at the turning leaves and breathing the chilly fresh air. It’s such a blessing to be alive, to experience God’s wonders and beauty in the world. His Goodness is tangible in all of it– in every special detail of every season.
So yes, the next time you enjoy your pumpkin spice coffee, thank the Good Lord for having created all three of those things! 😄 (I happen to be eating cucumbers like a total loon, making myself even colder. 😆 But I wait all year for this weather so you won’t hear me complaining! I joyfully thank God for the cold too.)
“Easter Pink Slip,” by Miriam Migliazzi & Mart Klein. To quote the source page, “When it comes to Easter, God is pretty much fired…”
This absolutely breaks my heart, and gives me serious pause as a Catholic. If the secular world really does feel this way– effectively “firing” God from His very masterpiece of salvation, the holiest holiday of the year, because “no one believes in [that] anymore”– then we Christians need to do everything we possibly can to defend His Kingdom, and proclaim His authority, and let Him remain the beloved boss of our lives, even if those around us are showing Him the door.
Anunciación. Faccini Pietro.
She’s holding the blue of divinity against her womb! What a striking detail.
St. Cecilia (The Angels Announcing her Coming Martyrdom), 1897, Gustave Moreau
Oh this strikes straight to my heart. Dear Patron Saint! Look at the serenity upon her face! Look at the splendor of the holy angels, bringing tidings of her holy sacrifice! Look at the light of the moon above, reflecting the light of the sun in the night, just as she reflects the light of God’s Love in this night of her life!
O Lord, for whom my spiritual sister gladly died, may I keep this image of her faith impressed upon my heart!
Dear Saint Cecilia is my Confirmation Saint, as music has been a sacred and integral part of my life since infancy, and one of my biggest talents from God.
This morning, I found my old violin when doing spring cleaning and, even just by tuning it, what joy it brought to my beloved grandmother!
Music is such a blessing from God. May we always use it for His glory and honor, whether we are performing, composing, or listening. May our hearts always sing in harmony with His, in all His Creation, for it and we are part of His Song. Saint Cecilia, pray for us!
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ at my church.
I weep with heartbroken agony and contrite gratitude every time I see Him here, every Good Friday.
He is there because of me. He is there because of all of us. The amount of love in this is incomprehensible, and yet, it speaks to our hearts in perfect understanding.
I immediately started sobbing. The look in His eyes…!
That is what true love looks like. That is true mercy, true joy, true hope… oh, what blessed wonder, to recognize every heartfelt need fulfilled in That Holy Face!
“Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
Jesus Walking on the Sea of Galilee, Paul Bril and Frederik van Valckenborch, 1590s
I am so moved by the composition of this. Here we have Galilee, and its fishermen, and its shepherds, the trees and clouds and cliffs… and right in the heart of it all, almost just another part of the scenery, we have the very Son of God, we have Peter’s faith and fear, we have a miracle and remembered thousands of years later. But notice how humble it is! Glory is framed by lesser glory, and yet none are diminished in beauty, all of it proclaiming the wonder of God. Jesus stands as a single pink figure, lit by contrasting blues, the wind and the waves, soft and gentle and powerful and terrible all at once– and Peter himself is the same hue as the grass, as the leaves, as the stones and the shoreline. Through color and movement, our eyes are ultimately led to the Son of God, and yet there is no force to it, no aggressive pointing-out. He simply walks on the water, amid everything else in the world, His humility and power both perfectly expressed.
Religious art is so gorgeous. Thank God for these blessed painters!
St. James Brought to Martyrdom - Giovanni Battista Piazzetta (1683-1754)
“According to a tradition, which, as we learn from Eusebius… was received from Clement of Alexandria… the accuser who led the Apostle to judgment, moved by his confession, became himself a Christian, and they were beheaded together.”
I swear you can feel the power of God’s grace in this; in James’s upturned face, in the look of wonder on his accuser’s own countenance, in how James himself seems pulled forwards, into some unseen light, seeking to serve his God more than to save his earthly life. May we all mercifully receive such grace of devotion.
There is so, so much aching terrible sorrowful beauty in both Christ and His Mother in their sacred sufferings. I think that alone speaks mysterious volumes of Truth to our hearts.
Mater Dolorosa
I literally gasped when I saw this. What unspeakable sorrow; what heartbreaking beauty!
That little altar gate adds such a numinous gravity.
There is such a quiet yet profound sanctity to this. The crucifix, the tabernacle… what divine glories wrapped in such humble yet beautiful appearance!
Wooden Chapel constructed with 61 Doug Fir logs, conceived by John Pawson in the Bavarian village of Unterliezheim.
A small path leads to the chapel’s entrance, located at the transitional point between woodland and open ground. The architecture is framed as the simplest of gestures. From certain perspectives its mass appears as a pile of logs stacked up to dry; from others the considered placement of the elements on a concrete plinth creates a more formal impression of a piece of sculpture emerging from the forest. The purposefully narrow entry maintains the sense of physical proximity encountered as one moves through the dense trees, adding visceral and visual theatre to the exhilarating experience of passing into an attenuated space over seven metres high and nearly nine metres long.
I have honestly dreamed of building a chapel like this in my woods. I could never match the absolute beauty of this, though.
It’s staggeringly intimate in its rawness, its simplicity, its solitude. There is a grandeur to its stark humility that truly reflects the soul of religion– an absolute unfettered focus on Christ, on the ineffable reality of the Cross, held deeply and indelibly in the secret places of our hearts… and the infinity of Him within such a small space.
I adore this. I would love to pray here one day.
I can attest to this! It's a scary feeling at first, but honestly, God deserves His due. The first thing I do now with my monthly check is give 10% directly to the Church and if I don't, it drives my conscience crazy. To spend that God-given money on myself first is abominable. It all came from God-- He can take it away just as fast. And it was given for His glory no matter how I use it specifically; whether it's bills or groceries or medicine or gifts, my financial choices must honor my Lord. This, too, can be difficult, but it's the only proper way, and the only option that brings peace and keeps me close to Christ.
Something else I need to emphasize: yes, God will provide for those who trust in Him, but His providence might not be in the way you expect. Even if He wills that you do go without much food for a while, or you can't afford your meds this week, there WILL be a God-given Good Reason for it all that you will be shown if you still trust in Him, actively. Again, I can attest to this. I have never gone without what I need when I put it in his hands. That time when I was starving? My church friends gave me plenty of food. That time I couldn't afford medicine? My family unexpectedly bought it for me. And I ever was to truly go without... there's a reason. Believe me. Another time I was forced to stop a medication because it was OTC and out of stock for weeks (they ultimately stopped carrying it). Turns out that med was badly exacerbating other symptoms, and my doctor told me to stop it anyway. I had no clue and was quite humbled. Another time I had to limit my diet for a while due to similar reasons. And again, later I discovered that those items had been aggravating my allergies-- something I only learned from doctors during that temporary shortage. I know these sound like silly examples but honestly I cannot understate how unfailingly faithful God has always been to me, a wretched sinner, when I flee to Him in terrified but trusting honesty. He is merciful. He also deserves all the honor and gratitude we can possibly give Him.
In short: tithe! God is the Source of all abundance-- so trust and honor Him as such! The power is in Him, not the money.
I struggle with this a lot, what with my mental illness. My sense of "is this wrong?" can be skewed by trauma, delusions, and compulsions, and mangled by fear & survival impulses. I want to do what is right, but the Bible doesn't list every possible quandary in the world... because ultimately moral discernment comes from the Holy Spirit, not logical obsession or terrified guessing. Seeking "signs" won't help when your mind is a mess.
In the end, Jesus is our truest friend, our greatest need, and our brightest joy. He is everything, and He is always there for us.
Life has been full of fear, misery, stress, and despair for me lately. But every time I step back from it all, even for a moment, and turn to Jesus… I find a peace, a hope, a love that infinitely surpasses every worry and pain of this life, and which sets my heart back towards heaven, where He is waiting for me at the end of it all. No matter what happens here, Jesus is the final destination. And that is the most beautiful reassurance I can ever imagine.
I needed to see this tonight. Thank you. ❤
“It may be objected: ‘Our Lord is enough for me. I have no need of her.’ But He needed her, whether we do or not.
And what is more important, Our Blessed Lord gave us His Mother as our Mother.”
God’s Incarnation is all about love shown through humility. The Creator of all did need a human woman, a mother, to both enter and live in this world among us… and He wanted to need her; God delighted in needing her to birth Him and raise Him and care for Him during His childhood. Christ, was fed and bathed and comforted and taught by this gracefully humble and loving woman. Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, became utterly dependenton her for His own physical existence as a helpless baby boy. The sheer amount of surrendering love in that is incomprehensibly profound… and it’s at the very heart of this Christmas season.
Jesus needed Mary, and He loved to need her. To claim that we don’t need her is to completely miss the point. And that’s why Jesus gave her to us, just as the Father gave her to Him… as a mother, as someone we will always need, because we love her.
| c r o s s |
I draw closer, anticipating the familiar pang of loneliness and rejection. Yes his gaze is unwavering and he offers his Word as proof of his love for the meager, weak, and wounded (…) Gently and slowly, I am urged to leave the comfortable stillness of the hill and approach the knoll. I discover that which I am drawn to is not a shiny, idealistic, ornate symbol to kneel in front of and offer rote prayers. That which I ponder is knotted wood, jagged and splintering, a tool intended to ridicule and destroy and one on which he was willing to be lifted and hung. In this rawness is my answer: he does not flinch and does not flee. He gathers me in the shadow of his love and soothes the bruises and gashes my cross has delivered. He urges open clenched fists and assures me I am capable, loved, and worthy. For it is in the shadow of his cross on the knoll that he claims me || Jennifer Hubbard
Blessed Feast of the Triumph of the Cross ➕
“He has no stately form or majesty that we should look upon Him, nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him… But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:2,5; NASB)
I think about this a lot, when I see crucifixes and other depictions of Our Lord that many may consider “ugly,” “poor,” or otherwise “nothing special.” It’s still Our Lord. When He was dying on the Cross, He looked incomparably worse than any artwork could portray Him, trust me… and that very awfulness of appearance, all blood and wounds and spittle and dust, is what accompanied the work of salvation. It was an integral part of it, in fact.
“That which I ponder is knotted wood, jagged and splintering, a tool intended to ridicule and destroy, and one on which he was willing to be lifted and hung. In this rawness is my answer: he does not flinch and does not flee.”
Let us never despise the ugliness of the Cross, physically or otherwise, for it has been transmuted into the greatest beauty, by the hidden yet ineffable glory of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
theriu: But the most important question of all, I think, is: What will I let Christ do through me?
Everything good in us comes from God. Everything we can do, will do, are doing, and have done for Him is only by the gift of His grace. Nevertheless, this is a gift of profound love, a sign of divine relationship, and so our hearts must always respond like this.
How can I use this gift of grace to glorify the Giver? How can I live more completely in love of God? How can I let Christ continue His work through me? How can I love Him today?
“It’s not about us earning His salvation, but about being a part of the great work He is already doing. He has set works out for us to do, and He is with us through them all.”
march 7th 2018: the day after we were mugged. the day we finally realized we weren't actually living after all.
THE REASON WHY WE CAME HOME SO FAST AFTER VISITING GRANDPA IS BECAUSE OLIVER MADE US LEAVE ALL OUR ARTWORK THERE WITH HIM. AS A "PROMISE" THAT WE WOULD COME BACK.
…
I want to sob forever at how stupid we were. But, finally, finally, I can forgive myself for leaving.
