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When we feel cut off from God, battling a losing war with ingrained sin, the only viable solution to our dilemma is to call out to Christ to save us. Instead, most of us strive to be perfect through self-discipline. It was a shock to me when my Spiritual Director challenged this tendency by saying, "You are stealing Christ's job!" What he meant by this startling statement was, even though I thought I was a committed Catholic, I was actually ignoring the Good News of our Lord Jesus Christ and the core teachings of the Church. The Problem of Ingrained Sin Mark 7:14-23  focuses on the problem of evil. It would be a depressing Scripture passage if it were not for the reality and power of the Cross because evil is so deeply ingrained in our being, that we really do not have a clue how to eliminate it from our lives on our own. continue reading

I vividly recall the first really negative review I received on a book. It was for a particular title in the All Things Girl series and the young person who wrote it was fairly scathing in what she said. She identified herself as one of three sisters who ranged in age from 10 to 15. She went on to post her review on all the books. I will freely admit that her words brought tears to my eyes. Two months later, BAM! Another terrible review. I was reeling from it all. To make matters worse, scores of people were saying how helpful the two terrible reviews were. No one was coming to my defense. Words can’t explain how alone I felt—and utterly defeated in my attempt at serving God’s precious daughters. And confused…I had prayed each and every time that I had worked on the books. Throughout long days and nights my prayers stormed heaven; I prayed to the Father that every young girl who read the books would be blessed by them; that these books would be instruments of God’s love for...

I posted this article at my own site but thought I would share it here, also. It's the second part of a two part post on the dignity of the human person and the everyday means that God uses to sanctify people. In the first post I joked about some of the funnier moments in life that God uses to teach and sanctify us but, life, despite its more humorous moments, is preparing us for eternity: All joking aside for a moment - my last post on how God makes saints out of "regular" people contains an element of truth to it. More than an element, actually. I use the term "regular" people loosely. In truth...there is no such thing as a "regular" person. That bald, chubby, man that you stood next to in the grocery store yesterday is a saint-in-the making. If you were to see his soul with the glorious indwelling of the Trinity you just might fall to your knees in wonder. We are, each and every one, children of the King. And the glory of God surrounds us. It...