Journeying With The Saints

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1433-1436. Is God allowed to be angry? I have heard numerous people over the years talk about how it's wrong for God to ever be angry. "The Old Testament God is just an angry God." Sister Faustina is going to write a lot about God's anger in our readings today and she spells out exactly what God gets angry about. Hint: It's sin.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1428-1432. You are going to feel for Sister Faustina today. She is suffering greatly and the other Sisters around her are not being very compassionate or understanding. We will be talking about how we are not privy to all that is going on in someone's life. We need to realize that there may be inner turmoil going on that may explain why someone is acti...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1423-1427. I think one of the hardest things about being a Catholic today is when you have to hold the line and defend the teachings of the Catholic Church. They are not popular with the culture and even with some Catholics. It can be hard to be the only one, it seems, not relishing in everyone else's sin, as many in the culture do. Sister Faustina sha...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1417-1422. Christians are often accused of being all faith and no science. Which is ridiculous seeing as hundreds of scientific discoveries have been found by people of faith. As Christians, we are free to follow both faith and science. Science is a tool given to us by God to understand the material world. However, Christ today is going to talk about t...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1412-1416. Can you imagine saying the "Hail Mary" one thousand times each day for nine days? Today, we are going to read about how Sister Faustina does, in fact, just that. Count me as impressed. Our topics for today will be about Mary's Immaculate Conception and the Rosary.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1406-1411. Have you ever felt abandoned by God? I'm willing to bet that many of us have felt that way. Even Christ, Himself, cries out from the Cross, "My God, My God, why have You abandoned me?" The very human side of Him felt the weight of the suffering and sin and He felt abandoned. But, the important thing to remember is that God never abandons us....

This week we are reading from the 41st number from "Way to Inner Peace." This week's reading is dense. As we read through it together, we are just going to talk about it on the other end. I would encourage you to give it a second reading as I think it will give you a ton to pray about and meditate on. It's so packed full of really great thoughts, I think we need to spend some more time with it. We...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1401-1405. Do you have the patience of Sister Faustina to carry on work for so many years, knowing the you may never see the fruits of your labor? She realizes that she will never see the fullness of all the work she has done. Yet, she still wants to do God's Will because she knows it will bless others. God often does not let us see the fruits of our l...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1394-1400. Congratulations on making it through another 100 numbers! So, we are getting closer and closer to the end, so after today's readings, I'm going to talk about what's in store for next year. We are going to go over some "business" issues. Also, I'll discuss why it's important to read the writings of the saints.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1388-1393. The Catholic Church has seven sacraments. They are more than just nice symbolic ceremonies. They affect an actual change within us. The most perfect of all the sacraments is the Eucharist because it not only imparts grace but it is the actual communing with Christ in a physical way. Sister Faustina understands this completely.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1382-1387. Another ten days down! Congrats! We will have more interesting scenes from the convent today. Sister Faustina is visited by a deceased sister in need of prayers. What we are going to focus most, though, are Christ's words. He comments that souls don't pay attention to Him and treat Him like "a dead object." 

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1375-1381. I am the absolute worst at conversing with people when they are hot and angry. I just end up getting hot and angry, too. Sister Faustina, today, is going to have all kinds of things going on in the convent. She gets a visit from five angry men at the gate and she handles the situation very well. It's a good lesson in how to respond to people...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1370-1374. Sister Faustina shares with us that from her earliest years she wanted to become a saint. I think sometimes we set the bar too low for our young people--meaning teenagers. We don't expect hardly anything from them and, yet, there is so much greatness and potential sitting inside them--especially at a time when they have so much energy and yo...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1365-1369. One of the things I love reading in this diary is how devoted Sister Faustina is to Christ. She tries so hard, she prays so hard, and she is always looking for ways to be better. Because of this, Christ has created a new life within her. It's tempting to look at her and say, "She seems like she's always been a saint. She doesn't struggle lik...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1360-1364. My son asked me the other day if I would want to live here on earth for a million years if I could. I told him that I wouldn't want to and he asked why. I told him that our goal is to get to Heaven someday. Sister Faustina talks today about what her destiny is and she knows it's to reach Heaven and become a saint. That is our destiny, too. ...

This week we are reading the 40th number from "Way to Inner Peace." Our topic is patience and I'm not sure I'm the best gal for reflections on this topic as I'm fairly certain I'm one of the most impatient people on the planet. I thought I'd give a funny story--funny story now--on a time when I completely failed in practicing the virtue of patience. Three Key Points: Submission, self-possession, r...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1352-1359. I was once having a conversation with someone and they said to me, "Nobody is going to tell me how to live out Christianity. I decide for myself." That comment begged the question, "Nobody? Not even Christ?" In contrast, Sister Faustina gives the most perfect and appropriate response to our Christian Faith.    

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1345-1351. What happens in our life if all we see is our misery and never the mercy and love of Christ. Well, it makes for a very sad life. I had an interaction with a guy online about three years ago for an extended period of time. All he could see was his great misery and great sins. Try as I might, I could not get him to recognize Christ's mercy. He...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1341-1344. Sister Faustina is going to talk about sickness and death. She's even going to envision her own death as she meditates on death. It got me thinking a lot of sickness and death and our absolute fear of both.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1335-1340. I recently finished reading the "Scarlet Letter" with my daughter and when I went to do my podcast, part of our readings reminded me of the book. Struggling against our sins is not the problem. What is the problem is when we lack courage to confess our sins and fail to even try to struggle against them. It is not failure to struggle against...

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1330-1334. Let's talk about one of my favorite topics in Christianity--Angels! Two years back, I did a study on angels and shared a lot of my newfound knowledge with my followers. Sister Faustina is going to ask Christ a question about angels. So, I thought it would be fun to talk about them.     

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1325-1329. Another ten days down! We will talk about sainthood today. Sister Faustina is going to talk about her desire to be a saint. I know that most of think that sainthood is for other people to do and not us. We don't see ourselves as saint material. But, that's just not true.   

Today's readings are from Notebook 5, numbers 1322-1324. We start Notebook 5 today and so, as is our usual custom when we start a new notebook, our day will be shorter. We will say the prayers at the beginning and then leave it at that.   

This week we are reading from the 39th number from "Way to Inner Peace." Our topic is the sensitiveness of the innocent. I think a lot of times when we hear the word innocent we think of children or happy little lambs. It has a negative connotation when the word is attached to an adult. We view them as someone who is "too sheltered" or hasn't really lived. Bishop Sheen is talking about Divine Inno...

Today's readings are from Notebook 4, numbers 1318-1321. Milestone Day! We will finish up Notebook 4 today.  Christ wants for us to hand our misery over to Him. When we do, we will be transformed and God will create good out of that misery. It doesn't sound possible but it truly is.