Just for Me (From Our Daily Bread Mass Journal Blog)

Sometimes I go to Mass and I hear something that makes me wonder, "God, did You put that in there just for me??" This doesn't always happen, but when it does, I'm pretty flattered to say the least. 

Recently, I accepted a new job. I felt guilty about leaving my current job knowing I hadn't been there long in relation to the fairly large amount of time and training that was invested in me. Couple this with the determination of my employers to improve themselves after I spoke with them about my concerns, I felt like I was punishing them for doing their best to change for me. I also would be breaking a rental contract to move to the new job's location and therefore having to leave my new-found Church family that I was just starting to become really active in--and I wanted to continue to be active in! But I was torn because at the same time I am very excited to be going where I felt God is leading me: to a new job, a new place to live, and even a new Church family that He apparently thought I should become a part of. But I still felt bad for ditching all I had been committed to. God had plans and words of comfort for me.

In the homily, Father Kill said "When we celebrate a new job or house or anything like that, we are fittingly celebrating the involvement of God in our lives and in our victories." Wow, we are fittingly celebrating. God wants us to be happy with His plans, even when the way appears dark and mysterious because we don't yet know what it holds. He wants us to trust Him, His plans, His Will, His love for us. He wants us to celebrate with Him in Faith that He is guiding us to where we will be the best version of ourselves; to where we will be most happy. Thank you, God, in advance for where my road will lead next!

"The Lord has done great things for us, we are filled with Joy!" Psalm 126:3

Fellowship of the Unashamed

I am a part of the Fellowship of the Unashamed.

The die has been cast. The decision has been made. I have stepped over the line. I won’t look back, let up, slow down, back away or be still.

My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, and my future is in God’s hands. I am finished and done with low living, sight walking, small planning, the bare minimum, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, mundane talking, frivolous living, selfish giving, and dwarfed goals.

I no longer need preeminence, prosperity, position, promotions, applause, or popularity. I don’t have to be right, first, the best, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by faith. I lean on Christ’s presence. I love with patience, live by prayer, and labor with the power of God’s grace.

My face is set. My gait is fast, my goal is heaven. My road is narrow, my way is rough, my companions are few, my Guide is reliable, and my mission is clear.

I cannot be bought, compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back, deluded, or delayed. I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate in the presence of adversity, negotiate at the table of the enemy, ponder at the pool of popularity, or meander in the maze of mediocrity.

I won't give up, shut up, let up or slow up until I have stayed up, stored up, prayed up, paid up, and spoken up for the cause of Christ.

I am a disciple of Jesus. I am a Catholic. I must go until He comes, give until I drop, speak out until all know, and work until He stops me. And when He returns for His own, He will have no difficulty recognizing me. My banner is clear: I am a part of the Fellowship of the Unashamed.

~Adapted from the original (author unknown) by Patrick Madrid

How Exciting Should Life Be?

I watched the movie, Bourne Legacy, again tonight and I couldn’t help but put myself in the movie and have that feeling I am sure many people have had: that they wish they were in the movie too. Wouldn’t that be exciting? Maybe not the whole getting shot at part, but all of the excitement, for girls: having a guy fighting on her behalf and putting his life on the line to save her, and for guys the excitement of having a mission so important it’s worth dying for—and chicks dig you for who you are and what you do. Wouldn’t life just be so much better if we had that? If our lives were action movies with another almost unconquerable danger around the corner and raw emotions we can really feel and know? Ones that we don’t have to update, figure out how to prolong, or just try to bury? Simply excitement. Ok, so we probably have all wanted that even if just for a moment before reality set in and we realize maybe being shot at, beat up, or almost dying for something isn’t quite such a thrill, but we still wish it could be, don’t we?

So what should reality be? Dead and duller existence on earth wondering if we ever get to be the super-stars we dream of being? Or do we have to just cater to a goody-goody-two-shoes life that Christians are “supposed” to embrace: “love, everybody love...and NO violence, excitement, or passion about anything other than just being so happy about God you can’t explain it to anyone.”

The fact is, we’ve forgotten the facts. In a culture so inundated with staying shallow, living on feeling, and rushing headlong into the unknown, as fast as you can, so you can experience it just for the sheer experience of it, we have forgotten what it is that we really crave and how we are meant to be a part of it.

I feel especially empathetic for the men out there in this world when girls have been so negatively influenced by the culture to only want to be around the tallest, most muscled, tough, but simultaneously sensitive and flirtatious guys out there. Everyone else just doesn’t measure up. After all, how would a fat, bald guy with a lisp and glasses fit into an action movie? Isn’t he supposed to be the guy that taps on his computer, in a room full of other guys just like him, all trying to keep a single high tech tracking device up to speed with the “super-man,” right? Not exactly a picture of manly prowess and unmatched superiority as an alpha male, is it?

And how about girls? What are the ladies supposed to be: always available, ever beautiful, with a perfectly tan, slim body, and the lighting just right so that her eyes sparkle with the light of the sun from beneath that perfectly manicured hair-do that would never in a million years stay that way in real life? All together seductive, alluring, and perfect. But perfect for exactly what? And what about the girl who is overweight, has acne, or isn’t the right size to fit just perfectly under her man’s chin so that he can be “masculine” dominant and she can be “feminine” seductive? Yeah, look close in the movies, because that “imperfect” girl is probably spilling coffee somewhere as a low-pay waitress or tappity typing on those computers following the “perfect” girl who’s clinging to the "super" man.

                Why?

Why are we being geared to establish our value by how attractive we look or how supremely-exciting and out-of-the-ordinary our lives are? And why are we so drawn into these movies? What in us makes us want to be that guy or be that girl? Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a sucker for a good action flick or even a well-written romantic, but if God had a plan when He gave us the initial desires we have been ingrained with deep in our very beings, what did He have in mind?

Let’s go back to the facts. Reality is, God made us, and as St. Therese of Lisieux so boldly says: “the good God never gives desires that He cannot fulfill.” So what desires are from God? We can’t go be super-beings can we? Yet every man still wants a mission; still wants something to be able to conquer where he can “be the man” and every woman wants a strong man who can conquer the task at hand and who will love her and provide for her. The problem is, we’ve been sold a lie: that men should dominate women and women should get even by manipulating him to do what she wants. I’ve heard it said that “man’s greatest fear is inadequacy while his greatest desire is to be adequate, and woman’s greatest fear is insecurity, while her greatest desire is to be secure.” Yet, what is all the mainstream pointing at? Make men feel inadequate by super-imposing an unrealistic standard upon the physical aspects of their being while making women feel insecure by painting an unattainable picture of how they “should” be in order to be acceptable. Shallow. Shallow. Shallow. This is all skin deep, but we are more than that! Addressing the skin deep part, however: Guys, real-life girls don’t have an endless wardrobe or a lighting crew to make them look perfect at every moment and every angle. Ladies, sorry, do you really want your man to be on some sort of hormone steroids to look like Captain America? Let’s be real here and true to ourselves, despite what the media claims can be our personal truth if we but strive for it.

So what is it that runs deeper? What is it that this social-lie is trying to cover up with all of these shallow, misguided desires? What about the desire to be a real man and the desire to be a real woman? Like Pope John Paul II often did in his writings on The Theology of the Body, let’s go back to the beginning; let’s go back to Who made the man and woman in the first place. God isn’t just sitting in heaven peeling an orange and waiting for all of us to “realize” that He just creates random things and sets them free on the earth. Neither is the devil taking a break and just watching it burn. God makes everything for a specific reason with an indescribable purpose, while the devil is doing his best to make it burn through certain focal points. A good strategist aims to wipe out his opponent’s greatest asset. In the case of the devil, that’d be us. 

How does one do this without the target realizing the evil plan and doing something constructive about it? Answer: preoccupy them enough to make them think it was their own plan; their own desire. By turning men against women and women against men, and fueling it with their own fears and their own desires with a sick twist, no one is asking the right questions. We have ceased to ask why we do what we do and feel what we feel. We have stopped trying to figure out where all of this is coming from and we have occupied our whole beings with just being enough to pass standard; to fulfill our earthly desires that spring from the very depths of our soul! But we were not made to be completely fulfilled on earth. We are not staying here; we were made for something more. (Curtis Martin—author of Made for More).

So that’s where we are coming from, now, where are we going and how does our desire to be our own super-being fit into that? Where does God’s plan come in? The answer: we are all super in our own ways. Now don’t write that off as cushy-mushy "lets-all-feel-good," seriously, God doesn’t make junk. He made man alone, and then He made a woman to complete His great vision for them and THEN called it—them together—very good. (Genesis 1:31) They are equals, though different; and they were made to stand on the same side of the battle ground helping each other. So where’s the super-ness in that? Well, what is the battle?

Think about it, God made something so good as to be the crown of His creation of the entire world (that makes you pretty darn special) and you think the devil is flicking his cigarette and saying I don’t care? No! He’s out to get you and me and he wants you dead, separated from God, separated from each other; separated from happiness. Being a Christian isn’t goody-goody-two-shoes, its knowing who to fight and how, so we can ride into the Kingdom with our victorious battle scars as conquerors of our fears, of our wayward passions, of our shortcomings, our inabilities, the lies we have bought, the untruths we have thought, and to then lay it all down before the throne of the King. You want passion? Now there is something to be passionate about! There’s a war out there to be won. Men are called to a mission worth dying for and no matter their stature, status, or skin-deep appearance, they are called to work in unison with the women God put in their lives and to uphold and protect them. And women, they are called to be secure. Even more than just “acceptable,” they are to be a desired help-mate; held tight in the palm of God’s hand and fortified by His masculine creations. Who better, than a woman, to captivate and motivate a man and strengthen him with her words of praise and trust? We were made to work in unison to get to the ultimate goal: heaven—everlasting joy with the God who thought of us; created us, and gave us every joy we have ever known. We were meant to get there alive and free although there will be narrow misses as temptations rage, and some will fall prey to their misguided passions as the devil sweeps in and sews lies into their hearts. There will be traitors turned white knights and white knights who will fall and become traitors. There will be harlots who will become princesses and princesses who will stoop to being harlots. There will be confusion, and raw emotion, as well as depth and true meaning; and undeniable purpose. What greater purpose could there be than to partake in what we were made for?

There is a battle to be won and a beast to be slain. A damsel in distress who waits for someone brave enough to stand up and thwart the dragon so she can uphold him as a worthy man; knowing her warrior’s heart and treasuring it. So that, together, after fighting in their unique but equally important ways in this epic battle of battles, they can both, together, enter heaven, be gathered into the arms of their Creator and Father and finally hear those sweet words: “Well done my good and faithful servants.”

To GOD be the glory forever and ever amen!He did