Association Of Catholic Bloggers

While some may consider strange occurrences in the world as coincidence - I definitely prescribe to what I refer to as the GODCIDENCE mindset! Why wouldn't the God of the universe, who created me out of love, not also want to show himself to me -- especially when I am seeking!!   "Seek and ye shall find!" Today's godcidence is brought to you by the letter J for JOY!! Though when this all began to fall into place, one would have never seen joy as the end result. Late Saturday night I received a private message on Facebook to pray for a young man who had been in a serious accident. I prayed, but went rather quickly back to my reading - feeling confident that all would be fine.   The next morning I learned, sadly he did not make it. My heart ached for the family's great loss; but also within those emotions was great shame and guilt for not praying harder. If it had been my son; I would have gone to my knees to beg God's mercy - regardless of...

Humour, the ability to laugh and not take ourselves too seriously, puts the grueling process of inner transformation into perspective. If I am self-centered instead of God-centered, everything becomes intense and dramatic. When I take my eyes off myself,  my  faith,  my  religious practices,   my  spiritual ‘progress’,   my  sins and rather look at my Saviour, everything comes back into the proper perspective. I am filled with joy, the joy of the Lord.  Thomas Merton, a Trappist, was asked if  it was possible to tell if someone had truly undergone  inner purification, becoming transformed into the image of Christ. “It is very difficult to tell but usually it is accompanied by a wonderful sense of humour.” continue reading

Christians must have managed to transform God into a stern task master  who makes his slaves miserable because when I tried to find images of Christian monks or priests laughing, I could hardly find anything!  Yet, there are hundreds of images of Buddhist and Tibetan monks smiling, reflecting relaxed and joyful hearts.  . Don't we have even more to be joyful about? Christ himself lives within us! Thank goodness for Pope Francis, who lives in the joy of the Lord. Perhaps his example will help change our reputation in the media. It is interesting to note that truly holy people usually have a marvelous sense of humour. When my husband first visited a Trappist monastery about 30 years ago, it was the sound of loud, infectious, belly laughter echoing throughout the Abby that stuck with him  . Thomas Merton,(an American Trappist Monk) was once asked,  “How can you tell if a person has gone through inner, spiritual transformation?  Merton smiled,...