Love that moves the heart

"An eight-year-old child heard her parents talking about her little brother. All she knew was that he was very sick and they had no money left. They were moving to a smaller house because they could not afford to stay in the present house after paying the doctor's bills. Only a very costly surgery could save him now and there was no one to loan them the money. 
When she heard her daddy say to her tearful mother with whispered desperation, 'Only a miracle can save him now', the little girl went to her bedroom and pulled her piggy bank from its hiding place in the closet. She poured all the change out on the floor and counted it

carefully. 
Clutching the precious piggy bank tightly, she slipped out the back door and made her way six blocks to the local drugstore. She took a quarter from her bank and placed it on the glass counter. 
"And what do you want?" asked the pharmacist. 
"It's for my little brother," the girl answered back. "He's really very sick and I want to buy a miracle." 
"I beg your pardon?" said the pharmacist. 
"His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my daddy says only a miracle can save him. So how much does a miracle cost?" 
"We don't sell miracles here, child. I'm sorry," the pharmacist said, smiling sadly at the little girl. 
"Listen, I have the money to pay for it. If it isn't enough, I can try and get some more. Just tell me how much it costs."
In the shop was a well-dressed customer. He stooped down and asked the little girl, "What kind of a miracle does you brother need?" 
"I don't know," she replied with her eyes welling up. "He's really sick and mommy says he needs an operation. But my daddy can't pay for it, so I have brought my savings". 
"How much do you have?" asked the man. 
"One dollar and eleven cents; but I can try and get some more", she answered barely audibly. 
"Well, what a coincidence," smiled the man, "A dollar and eleven cents - the exact price of a miracle for little brothers." 
He took her money in one hand and held her hand with the other. He said, "Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the kind of miracle you need." 
That well-dressed man was Dr Carlton Armstrong, a neurosurgeon. The operation was completed without charge and it wasn't long before Andrew was home again and doing well. 
"That surgery," her mom whispered, "was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost." 
The little girl smiled. She knew exactly how much the miracle cost ... one dollar and eleven cents ... plus the faith of a little child. 
Perseverance can make miracles happen! Miracle can come in various forms - as a doctor, as a lawyer, as a teacher, as a police and many others..
A river cuts the rock not because of its power, but because of its consistency.
Never lose your hope; keep walking towards your vision."‎
If this blesses you, please share too to bless others..

FIVE RULES FOR NEW CATHOLICS

You think you know what’s going on. You’ve done all the prep, made the big decision to enter the Church, and now you’re a Catholic. But — haha! — you don’t know squat.

It’s what pretty much all converts do, especially the bookish ones who read themselves into the Church. Some of us, the bookish ones, always think we know more than we do. I know, because I was one of them.

The tricky thing is that even the humbler among us can’t possibly know what we don’t know. I think we imagine Catholic knowledge as like the times tables. You know what you don’t know and how to find out. You know the elevens but not the twelves, so you memorize the twelves. All very simple. The new Catholic tends to think very question has a propositional answer, probably found in the Catechism or some encyclical.

Living the Catholic life is much more like a marriage. The most important knowledge can’t be put into propositions.

You bind yourself to someone very complicated and more different from you than you realize, someone you can’t read like a book even if you think you can. You know in a general way two or three or four of the thousand reasons she’ll respond the way she does. Those two or three or four reasons may lead you to expect a very different response from the one you get. You’re perfectly logical, but ignorant. You reason beyond your data.

You’ll never get all the data, even as you get to know each other better. This is important: Notice how you learn what you do know. You learn by being there, by making a life together, by patience and self-sacrifice, by forgiveness (asked for and received) and gratitude. You gather a thousand facts daily without knowing it because you’re looking closely. You learn, in other words, by loving.

Five rules

Let me offer five tips for new Catholics. My family and I entered the Church 16 years ago and I know something now about what I didn’t know then.

First, accept that you’re a newbie with lots to learn. Think of yourself as a bright 4th grader who’s heard of calculus but has years of study before he takes it.

Don’t think you know more than you do because you’ve studied so much, and for heaven’s sake don’t lecture your new fellow Catholics. You’ll keep yourself from learning what you can and you’ll annoy them. A lose-lose. Don’t worry that you can’t make any sense of so many things Catholics take for granted. You’ll get it eventually. It’s calculus and you’re the 4th grader.

Second, use the tools the Church gives you. Many converts configure their Catholic life along the lines of their previous life. That’s what they know. The formerly religious ones go to Mass the same way they went to church on Sundays. They avoid anything that looks Italian.

Stay after Mass to light a candle and pray. Pray to Our Lady or St. Joseph at their altars or to the saints at their statues. Drop by the church when you’re in town to sit with Jesus in the Tabernacle. Sign up for a slot at Adoration. Go to confession on the spur of the moment. Put up crucifixes and holy pictures at home (even if that looks Italian). Collect holy cards and say the prayers on the back. Carry a rosary. Wear a crucifix or a Miraculous Medal or a scapular, or what the heck, all three.

Read more: It takes practice to be a practicing Catholic

Do it even if it feels weird. (Or Italian.) Soon it won’t and you’ll have tools for holiness you didn’t have before. The tools themselves will teach you something about the reality to which they point. You’ll wonder how you got along without them.

Third, jump into the extracurricular life of your parish. For example, if you’re a man, join the Knights of Columbus. Don’t just do the comfortable things, the things you did in your old life, like join the parish pro-life group or the finance committee. Join the distinctively Catholic things and get to know the cradle Catholics who aren’t like you or maybe anyone you knew in your former life. They’ll teach you a lot by speaking a different kind of religious language. We didn’t do this — no one ever suggested it — and I regret that a lot.

Fourth, don’t tell Catholics what to do. Remember you’re a 4th grader. Even the people who’ve never read the Catechism or a single encyclical know more than you do. Their instincts are better trained than yours, they see many things more clearly, even if they can’t articulate things the way you can. And any great new plan you can think of has almost been thought of and tried hundreds of times over the years.

Finally, remember that you know because you love and you learn by loving, and that loving well takes commitment and time. Live the life the Church gives you. Think of her as a spouse you do not want to hurt or disappoint. Just keep at it. You’ll learn, lots.

DID GOD EVER LIE TO YOU?

Did God ever lie to you?” How would you answer that question? That question was asked recently by a brokenhearted child to her father, whom I know well. I have been wrestling with that question ever since.

My philosophical training can offer arguments explaining why God cannot lie. That’s pertinent and true, but it wasn’t what she needed in that moment. She’s struggling with crushing disappointment, seeing that what she’s been waiting for and has set her heart upon hasn’t arrived, and appears unlikely to do so. The truths of philosophy might bring her clarity later, but she wouldn’t now be able to see them through her tears.

Her father might have succumbed to the temptation to blunt the sharp point of her question with the flat end of a platitude: “Everything is going to be OK! After all, the Bible says, ‘Nothing is impossible with God!’” True—nothing is impossible with God—but that assertion wouldn’t help her if it were offered merely to silence her. That’s the trouble with platitudes: they can be a disservice to the truths they contain and to those who ask, because they can be used to stifle the voices and pains of those who raise uncomfortable and unwelcome questions. The father didn’t resort to platitudes because he has too much respect for his daughter’s intelligence and God’s majesty to do so.

And still we’re faced with her difficult situation: “I sought God’s will and acted accordingly. I waited to receive what God told me to wait for. And nothing’s happened. Worse than nothing’s happened—because the window of opportunity for me to receive what God directed me to wait for is starting to close. Has God lied to me?”

Here we can see the limitations of the consolation of philosophy and the truths of pious platitudes. Neither leads a confused and brokenhearted person to the cross of Christ. It is to that terrifying place, where evil tried to crush and erase faithful love that the wounded must go. It is there that we must behold the cost of absolute trust in God’s goodness. And it is only from there that we can find the power of the resurrected Christ.

At the foot of the cross, let’s echo the haunting words of long-suffering Job: “Though he slay me, I will hope in him.” (Job 13:15) Job will not settle for pat answers or platitudes. He seeks an audience with God. We should do the same—but we must know, in a way that Job could not—that confronting God means confronting the crucified and resurrected Christ. We go to the Suffering Servant of God who surrendered everything, was plundered by evil, and was, after a time of darkness, vindicated by God. We must understand that if we brokenhearted turn to Christ, we mustn’t expect “Chicken Soup for the Soul.” No! Turning to Christ in our pain is to step on a dark road of blood and glory.

We can begin our embrace of Christ crucified-and-risen by echoing Job: “I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted.” (Job 42:2) God’s ultimate purpose is to unite us to Himself for eternity. Our temporary pains and joys in this life must be measured in light of the eternal glory God offers us.

We earthly pilgrims on the way to Heaven inevitably suffer, and finally die. Some of us may be martyred. Some of us may die while looking back on a pleasant life—most of us won’t. Along the way, none of us have the wisdom to understand fully how God’s grace and providence work with human free will, disappointment and dumb luck.

We have, however, the Church teaching us that if our hope in God rests upon what we may grasp in this passing world, we will be disappointed. Our hope in God can only rest upon the obedience of Christ crucified and the fidelity of Our Heavenly Father Who raised Christ to sovereignty and glory.

Poet John Keats spoke of this world as “The Vale of Soulmaking.” This finite, fallen and passing world, with its real and temporary joys and sorrows, can be used by God and the docile disciple of Christ to prepare a soul ready for eternal union with God. Grief and disappointments, though agonizing at the time, needn’t be thought of as “wasted” but can be redemptively used in purifying a soul for the happiness of Heaven.

So, how might that father have answered his daughter’s question? He might say, “No, God has never lied to me. And I know that He is faithful and loving, because what He has done for Christ, He wants to do for you and me.”

When I write next, I will speak of optimism, wishful thinking, and hope. Until then, let’s keep each other in prayer.

IN THE WOMB TWO BABIES DEBATE MATTERS OF FAITH AND LIFE

In a mother’s womb were two babies. The first baby asked the other: “Do you believe in life after delivery?”

The second baby replied, “Why, of course. There has to be something after delivery. Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later.”

“Nonsense,” said the first. “There is no life after delivery. What would that life be?”

“I don’t know, but there will be more light than here. Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths.”

The doubting baby laughed. “This is absurd! Walking is impossible. And eat with our mouths? Ridiculous. The umbilical cord supplies nutrition. Life after delivery is to be excluded. The umbilical cord is too short.”

The second baby held his ground. “I think there is something and maybe it’s different than it is here.”

The first baby replied, “No one has ever come back from there. Delivery is the end of life, and in the after-delivery it is nothing but darkness and anxiety and it takes us nowhere.”

“Well, I don’t know,” said the twin, “but certainly we will see mother and she will take care of us.”

“Mother?” The first baby guffawed. “You believe in mother? Where is she now?”

The second baby calmly and patiently tried to explain. “She is all around us. It is in her that we live. Without her there would not be this world.”

“Ha. I don’t see her, so it’s only logical that she doesn’t exist.”

To which the other replied, “Sometimes when you’re in silence you can hear her, you can perceive her. I believe there is a reality after delivery and we are here to prepare ourselves for that reality when it comes….”

The Church needs your holiness and never your opinion

A fool takes no pleasure in understanding,  but only in expressing his opinion.
—Proverbs 18:2

We live in a world full of opinions. And the internet has amplified the number of opinions we hear each day. People who used to grouse about life to their best friend or next-door neighbors now have websites, blogs, and social media accounts through which they can announce their opinions on any given subject to the world.

“I can be silent no more!” This sentiment is widespread, as if typing out our grievances will somehow solve the world’s problems. The democratizing force of the internet makes us all feel like our opinions are much more valuable than they really are.
It sounds harsh but most of our opinions don’t really matter. The only thing that matters is truth and action, and that is not the same as opinion. Of course, the problem is that we often confuse having an opinion with knowing the truth. We step onto our soapboxes and pontificate as if we have a full and comprehensive understanding of the truth. But we don’t.

The closest we can get to knowing and understanding truth is to enter and live within the Church. Like a mother, the Church takes us close to her breast and feeds us the milk of truth. But this truth is not given to us to wield against others like a whip. Rather, as Saint Paul tells us, we are called to speak “the truth in love” so that we may “grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ” (Eph 4:15).

Paul’s image of “growing up” is right on target. We remain as children if we do not learn the art of speaking boldly both truth and love. If we emphasize one rather than the other, we are still being called to a greater maturity in Christ. And most of us will admit that we do not speak the truth in love perfectly. As humans, we almost never speak a full truth to another person, at least not the Truth that is a person, Jesus Christ.
Instead, we speak a mishmash of opinion, truth, lies, and love all at once. We often don’t realize it. But once in a while, God reveals to us how little we actually know. It is a mercy when he does this because we are revealed to ourselves in our nakedness. For “no creature is concealed from him, but everything is naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must render an account” (Heb 4:13). Only when we realize our nakedness can we cling more closely to Christ in the Church and trust in his guidance.

Though it is woefully unpopular to say, the Church does not need our opinion in matters of faith and morals. She is not a democracy. Even if some of us find ourselves in disagreement with Church teaching or we disapprove of something a pope has said, we often can find maturity and truth in doing something our egoistic, self-centered world disdains: remaining silent. As the book of Sirach tells us, “There is a man who keeps silent but is wise” (20:1).
The Church needs us to speak the truth in love, but She does not need our correction in matters of faith and morals. The Holy Spirit corrects the Church, and he taps people like Saint Paul, Saint Catherine of Siena, and Saint Athanasius to play the part. But it is doubtful that the Holy Spirit needs the voice of every Catholic with a blog and a Twitter account to set things straight. In fact, it seems likely that the devil uses our obsession with such matters to distract us from what really matters.

What the Church does need is our holiness. She needs us to preach the Gospel to all creatures (Mk 16:15). She needs us to pull our eyes away from the internal politics of the Church and focus our eyes on spreading the Gospel and the Body of Christ. The Church needs us to desire and thirst for sanctity.
In the words of Saint Paul, the Church needs us to “increase and abound in love [for] one another…so that he may establish your hearts unblamable in holiness before our God” (1 Thess 3:12-13).

In defence of human life

In short, the mercy of God is not an abstract ideal but a concrete reality with which he reveals his love as that of a father or a mother, moved to the very depths out of the love for their child.

—Pope Francis, Miseracordiae Vultus, para. 6.

The only desire I had when I boarded the plane was to power down, enjoy some silence and read Bishop Robert Barron’s Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith, newly downloaded to my iPhone. It had been a very busy weekend of nonstop talking, which included giving two one-hour presentations at a Marian conference.
But when a 20ish-looking blonde woman sat next to me, something told me to put down the phone and tune in to her. “Where are you coming from?” she asked.
“I spoke at a Catholic conference in St. Louis,” I replied. “I’m headed home to New Orleans.”

Introducing herself as Paige, she shared that she was getting married in May, and that she and her Jewish fiancé had recently traveled to Israel for a month-long visit to attend a friend’s bar mitzvah. She disclosed her horror over routine violence that is part and parcel of life there, especially as Muslim extremists increasingly engage in random stabbings of Jewish people.

“A man was stabbed right by our hotel,” she lamented. “And it didn’t even make the news. It’s incredible!”

We both agreed that the world needs much less hatred and violence and much more love.
Paige shared that her parents had raised her without faith, even though they’d sent her to Catholic schools her whole life.
The conversation somehow turned to abortion. “I know you’re Catholic,” she said unapologetically, “but I’m totally pro-choice. One of my best friends is an ob-gyn who wants to learn how to do late-term abortions. She feels so bad for people who really want to be parents, really want a baby, and then find out their child has some unsurvivable abnormality. They’re totally stuck, you know, because Louisiana law prevents them from having a late-term abortion.”

“Well,” I offered gingerly, making every effort to use my kindest voice, “it would indeed be a horrible suffering to learn that your baby was going to die within hours of its birth. But what would be even worse is being stuck for the rest of your life with the knowledge that you had caused their death.”

Paige’s eyes grew bigger.
“I know of people who have lived through this,” I continued, sharing the story of presidential candidate Rick Santorum and his wife, Karen. “They were able to welcome their son, Gabriel, into the world, baptize him, hold him in their arms and shower him with love for at least a few hours. That was a very merciful way of dealing with both themselves and the child.”

By this time, Paige’s big, beautiful blue eyes were locked into mine.

“Here’s the thing,” I went on while I had her attention. “We both agree that we need more love in the world. And that’s precisely why I’m against capital punishment, war and violence against Jews, women and babies in the womb. Abortion is a very violent act against both the woman and the baby. We could use so much more love across the board in the world.”
Paige continued to fix her eyes on mine, and I finally laughed a bit nervously and said, “You must think I’m crazy telling you all of this on a plane.”

“No,” she said slowly. “I’m listening … I’m listening to what you’re saying.”

The plane touched down. “It was really nice talking to you,” Paige offered with a smile. “I like Judys. I’m going to buy your book.”

“It was really nice talking to you too, Paige.” I smiled back. “God bless you.”
With that, an hour plane ride from Dallas to New Orleans had offered the unexpected gift of a mile-high defense of human life. Because while Paige was raised without faith, she was raised with love. And anyone can understand the logic of love, including someone who’s “totally pro-choice.”

BUY APPROACHES CAR TO ASK FOR MONEY :but what he saw moved him to cry..

A lot of well-off people look at poor people with mistrust. They assume that people asking for money on the streets are delinquents or thieves on the lookout for anything they can get their hands on.

But in truth, people living in poverty often turn out to be more generous and empathic than those who live comfortable lives.

An example of this is a little boy named John Thuo. He lives in Nairobi, Kenya, where like many other poor kids, he used to beg for money on the streets.

John Thou used to spend his days on the streets of Nairobi, Kenya begging for money. It's something that irrates many drivers, because they assume that the beggers are most likely thieves.
However, John Thuo proved that he's not only not a thief, but he also has a heart of gold.

One day, the boy was out begging when he approached a car to ask for money. But when he looked inside, John was struck by something unusual he saw.
The driver of the car was hooked up to tubes and breathing oxygen out of a tank. The woman's name is Gladys Kamande. She's 32 years old, and she explained to John that her lungs had collapsed, so she couldn't breathe properly and had to carry the oxygen tanks with her in order to stay alive.

John was shocked to realize that in spite of his poverty, there are people in the world who are worse off than he is—because they don't even have their health.

Moved to tears, John offered Gladys all the money that he'd taken in that day and held her hand through the window.

A passerby noticed the incident, took some photos, and told the story on the internet. And within a few days, the story had gone viral and triggered a chain of events that would change both John and Gladys' lives forever.

After Gladys' story spread, thousands of donations poured in. In total, kindhearted strangers contributed $80,000 to enable her to travel to India and receive treatment.

And how is John doing? Well, after all of the attention he received on social media, he was finally rescued from the streets and adopted into a loving home.

The woman who adopted him, Nissy Wambugu, also gave him the opportunity to start studying!

In the end, John's gesture of kindness helped not just Gladys—but also gave him a mother and a home.

Please share this touching story with your friends and family. And let them know that sometimes all it takes for a miracle to happen is a little human kindness.

FIVE STAGES OF LOVE:ARE YOU STUCK AT STAGE THREE?

Have you ever been told that your relationship is “going through a phase” by people who seem dismissive?

After 40 years as a marriage and family counselor, psychotherapist Jed Diamond claims that “going through a phase” might be exactly the case — five phases, actually — and that bearing patiently through these phases is what makes a relationship real and lasting.

Phase 1: Falling In Love
Phase 2: Becoming a Couple
Phase 3: Disillusionment
Phase 4: Creating Real, Lasting Love
Phase 5: Using the Power of Two to Change the World

Diamond notes that many marriages fall apart at Phase 3, and most couples feel blindsided by it. “They mistakenly believe they chose the wrong partner. After going through the mourning process, they start looking again.”

In fact, Diamond suggests that they are looking for love, as the song goes, in all the wrong places. Couples do not understand that the disillusionment of Stage 3 “Is not the end, but the true beginning to achieve real and lasting love.”

Stage by stage, Diamond offers advice:

PHASE # 1: PASSION IN LOVE
This stage is feels wonderful, the psychotherapist explains. It’s a kind of “better living through chemistry” — as the saying goes — because when we fall in love, we are inundated with hormones like dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, testosterone and estrogen. This is the point where we project all of our hopes and dreams into the other person.

We believe that all the promises that our previous relationships have failed to deliver will ultimately be met. “We are sure to remain in love forever,” he says, because this person seems so perfect, so true, so right — like the answer to our dreams.

PHASE # 2: BECOMING A COUPLE
Here love deepens and develops and the two come together as a couple, and this is a moment of unity and joy: “We learn what the other person likes and we expand our individual lives to start developing a ‘we two’ life.”

We feel more connected with the loved one, safe and protected. Many times we think that this is the maximum level of love and we expect that it should continue like this forever. But then Phase 3 inevitably arrives.

PHASE # 3: DISILLUSIONMENT
It is at this stage where a relationship will find new strength or will falter. The first glow of love is wearing away; the perfect ideal begins to show human faults, unreasonableness, unattractive behavior. Little things begin to irritate us. People feel less loved and cared for and more responsible. “Trapped” is a word some use.

At this stage, says Diamond, “We can get busy with work or family, but dissatisfaction accumulates.” The inevitable question arises: “What happened to that fun, giving, loving person I thought I knew?” The break-up looms; do we just give up or should we try to persist?

“There’s an old saying, ‘When you’re going through hell, don’t stop.’ This seems relevant to Stage 3. The positive side of Stage 3 is that the heat burns away a lot of our illusions about ourselves and our partner. We have an opportunity to become more loving and appreciate the person we are with, not the projections we had placed on them as our ‘ideal mate.’”

PHASE # 4: CREATION OF REAL AND LASTING LOVE
“One of the gifts of facing unhappiness in Phase 3 is that we can get to the heart of what causes pain and conflict,” Diamond says. After “walking through the fire” the two learn to be allies by learning to console each other in their failings, and helping to understand that human faults can exist amid real love. That understanding can help a couple heal each other’s wounds. We come to learn that if our dreams are “broken,” the one you love is someone who is capable of loving you for being exactly who you are.

“There is nothing more satisfying than being with a partner who sees you and loves you for who you are. They understand that your harmful behavior is not because you are bad or loveless, but because you have been hurt in the past and the past still lives with you. As we better understand and accept our partner, we can learn to love ourselves more and more deeply. ”

PHASE # 5: USING THE POWER OF TWO TO CHANGE THE WORLD
This is the stage where differences and doubts have been overcome, trust and companionship are so strengthened that the two can cause differences in the world from their real and lasting love.

“If we can learn to overcome our differences and find real and lasting love in our relationships, who knows, we can work together to find real and lasting love in the world.” This is an opportunity, says Diamond, to together use the “power of two” to direct a purpose of life together, in a way that can positively impact the world. A couple that has learned to see each other fully, to accept each other, and love each other in all their imperfections is a couple who, having traveled through these “phases” has a solid foundation for seeing, accepting and loving others, too.

A single phrase helped save this marriage

On paper, Richard Paul Evans seemed like he should be one of the happiest men on earth. A father of five, the wildly successful fiction writer, whose name is often atop the New York Times bestseller list, seemed to have it all. Yet despite the impressively loyal readers, the lovely kids, and the nice house in Utah, Evans was miserable, and it stemmed from unhappiness in his marriage — something he recently shared on his official website.

“My oldest daughter, Jenna, recently said to me, ‘My greatest fear as a child was that you and mom would get divorced. Then, when I was twelve, I decided that you fought so much that maybe it would be better if you did.’ Then she added with a smile. ‘I’m glad you guys figured things out.’”

It wasn’t easy. Evans and his wife, Keri, had seemed mismatched from their earliest days, and doomed to struggle almost from the start of their marriage.

“For years my wife Keri and I struggled. Looking back, I’m not exactly sure what initially drew us together, but our personalities didn’t quite match up. And the longer we were married the more extreme the differences seemed. Encountering ‘fame and fortune’ didn’t make our marriage any easier. In fact, it exacerbated our problems.”
The couple was fighting so much that Evans began to look forward to traveling book tours that would take him away from home, but the fights continued over the phone, and the couple’s moods became “perpetually defensive.” During one particularly passionate long-distance fight, Keri slammed down the phone on Evans in mid-yell. It was like an exclamation point that signaled an abrupt end.

“That’s when I turned to God. Or turned on God,” writes Evans on his website. “I don’t know if you could call it prayer–maybe shouting at God isn’t prayer, maybe it is–but whatever I was engaged in I’ll never forget it. I was standing in the shower of the Buckhead Atlanta Ritz-Carlton yelling at God… Deep down I knew that Keri was a good person. And I was a good person. So why couldn’t we get along? Why had I married someone so different than me? Why wouldn’t she change?”
Finally, hoarse and broken, I sat down in the shower and began to cry. In the depths of my despair powerful inspiration came to me. You can’t change her, Rick. You can only change yourself. At that moment I began to pray. If I can’t change her, God, then change me. I prayed late into the night. I prayed the next day on the flight home. I prayed as I walked in the door to a cold wife who barely even acknowledged me. That night, as we lay in our bed, inches from each other yet miles apart, the inspiration came. I knew what I had to do.
  use I mean it,” I said. “I just want to know what I can do to make your day better.”

   She looked at me cynically. “You want to do something? Go clean the kitchen.”

   The next day, Evans greeted Keri with the same phrase, at which she narrowed her eyes, and sent him to cleaning the garage.

   It went on like that. Each morning, Evans would ask his wife, “What can I do to make your day better?” Each morning, Keri would say in exasperation, “You can’t,” often followed by “Please stop saying that.”
“I can’t,” Evans said. I made a commitment to myself. What can I do to make your day better?”

   “Why are you doing this?”
   “Because I care about you,” I said. “And our marriage.”

After two weeks of gently harassing his wife into letting him do things to make her happy, Keri broke down, sobbing. “Please stop asking me that. You’re not the problem. I am. I’m hard to live with. I don’t know why you stay with me.”
 I gently lifted her chin until she was looking in my eyes. “It’s because I love you,” I said. “What can I do to make your day better?”

   “I should be asking you that.”

   “You should,” I said. “But not now. Right now, I need to be the change. You need to know how much you mean to me.”
It was a moment of recognition and connection, full of the real intimacy that comes when apologies are made and accepted, though words, and actions, and simple presence. When Evans then asked Keri what he could do to make her day better, she said, “Can we spend time together, maybe?”

“I would love to,” he replied.
It was the needed breakthrough. Evans and Keri had moved from wanting to be away from each other, to desiring each other’s company and companionship.

Evans kept asking his ritual question for more than a month. The fights stopped, and soon Keri began asking, “What do you need from me?”
“The walls between us fell.” Evans writes. “We began having meaningful discussions on what we wanted from life and how we could make each other happier. No, we didn’t solve all our problems. I can’t even say that we never fought again. But the nature of our fights changed. Not only were they becoming more and more rare, they lacked the energy they’d once had. We’d deprived them of oxygen. We just didn’t have it in us to hurt each other anymore.”

Marriage is difficult. It is the rare couple that does not find it so, and Evans acknowledges that, but he concludes: “To have a partner in life is a remarkable gift. I’ve also learned that the institution of marriage can help heal us of our most unlovable parts. And we all have unlovable parts.”

Evans’ phrase is a good one. Often as couples become bogged down in their roles amid family, career, and church obligations, it becomes surprisingly easy to lose sight of others and their needs, even when they are lying right next to you. “What can I do to make your life better,” asked seriously and attentively is – or should be – the fundamental question of love, one that actively and intentionally clears a path away from self-interest, opening us up to others.

“Real love is not to desire a person, but to truly desire their happiness–sometimes, even, at the expense of our own happiness….I am incredibly grateful for the inspiration that came to me that day so long ago.”

Inspired is the word for it. The insight given to Evans – that real love desires the happiness of the other, even at one’s own expense – came as the answer to the prayer, and in the end it pointed precisely to Christ, as yet another means of explaining to a man, and to all of us, that love, in the end, always has a connection to the Cross.

A CONVERSION BEGINS AT THE CRIB

A man who was wandering in a town, accidentally he fixed his eyes on the tower of the Cathedral Church. He saw many people entering and going out and he decided to enter and see what is there in the building even though he was not a member of any Church. As he entered, he was shocked to see the body of a man hanging on the cross in the middle of the Church. He had seen and read about the people who are crucified during the wars who make heinous crimes. What was the mistake of this man and why is he kept in the centre of the place? He had many more questions in his heart. As the tourists were going around the Church seeing the beauty of the Church, he decided to go around. He reached in front of a crib and noticed a child in the Crib. Who is this child and why is he here? He really felt that the place was strange.
He wanted to know why the place is so strange. So he decided to ask a small girl who was standing next to the Crib, who is this child? She said He is Jesus. He asked why he is here in the manger. She replied they did not have a place in the inn and again his mother was so poor as well. What happened to this child, the man continued his question. He died on the cross. And where is he now? You know nothing of my Jesus, she continued. He rose from the dead on the third day and now he is in Heaven. Even us after our death will rise and go to heaven if we live well.
He wanted to tell her that some people had deceived her. But he could not tell her because of the conviction with which she gave the replies. Then he thought to himself, this little girl, at an younger age, has conviction in her life and still am wandering and looking for meaning and conviction. Then when he looked around and he found that those people who are silently praying in the Church have a sense of conviction and peace in their faces. If I could be silent and be like them then I too will have the conviction just like the girl. Then slowly he sat down on a bench and closed his eyes. Slowly he began to feel his heart being filled with peace and love of God. He looked at the Child in the manger and he felt that the Child in the manger is looking smiling at him.

“Brothers, If any one of you strays far away from the truth and another person brings him back to, be sure of this: he who bring the sinner from wrong way will save his soul from death and win forgiveness for many sins”
James 5: 19-20

GIVING SELF FOR OTHERS TO LIVE

Many years ago, when I worked as a volunteer at a hospital, I got to know a little girl named Liz who was suffering from a rare and serious disease. Her only chance of recovery appeared to be a blood transfusion from her 5-year-old brother, who had miraculously survived the same disease and had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness. The doctor explained the situation to her little brother, and asked the little boy if he would be willing to give his blood to his sister. I saw him hesitate for only a moment before taking a deep breath and saying, ‘Yes, I’ll do it if it will save her.’

As the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed next to his sister and smiled, as we all did, seeing the color returning to her cheeks. Then his face grew pale and his smile faded. He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, ‘Will I start to die right away?’.

Being young, the little boy had misunderstood the doctor; he thought he was going to have to give his sister all of his blood in order to save her.

There is no greater love than this: that a person would lay down his life for the sake of his friends.

(John 15:13)

Pope Francis gives his "Top New Year's Resolutions

– “Take care of your spiritual life, your relationship with God, because this is the backbone of everything we do and everything we are.”

– “Take care of your family life, giving your children and loved ones not just money, but most of all your time, attention and love.”

– “Take care of your relationships with others, transforming your faith into life and your words into good works, especially on behalf of the needy.”

– “Be careful how you speak, purify your tongue of offensive words, vulgarity and worldly decadence.”

– “Heal wounds of the heart with the oil of forgiveness, forgiving those who have hurt us and medicating the wounds we have caused others.”

– “Look after your work, doing it with enthusiasm, humility, competence, passion and with a spirit that knows how to thank the Lord.”

– “Be careful of envy, lust, hatred and negative feelings that devour our interior peace and transform us into destroyed and destructive people.”

– “Watch out for anger that can lead to vengeance; for laziness that leads to existential euthanasia; for pointing the finger at others, which leads to pride; and for complaining continually, which leads to desperation.”

– “Take care of brothers and sisters who are weaker … the elderly, the sick, the hungry, the homeless and strangers, because we will be judged on this.”

BEFORE HE BECAME A PRIEST ,HE HAD GREAT LOVE

            Before he was a priest, he had a great love

He became a priest thanks to her -- and their story is beautiful

Once, I fell in love.

It was a long time ago, before I became a priest, before I went to the seminary. Her name was Valentina. She had long black hair, down to her shoulders, that she always wore tied back or adorned with something. Her big green eyes were the window to her soul; they revealed the most beautiful secrets. If she was beautiful on the outside, she was more so on the inside. Perhaps that’s why I fell in love.

I still remember the first time I saw her. I was an altar boy at the parish of St. Joseph. It was a small church and we all knew each other. So it was to be expected that someone new would draw attention. And there was Valentina, with her father and her sister. Mr. Bernini had just moved to town with his two daughters, having been left a widower.

Even today, I can’t describe the sensation that Valentina’s sweet, irresistible smile caused in me. I can only say that it was enough to distract me during Mass, obviously costing me a good confession. I was 15.

Even though I was a little gangly, I was a good kid. I think she saw that and that’s why she fell in love with me. Valentina’s beauty was a reflection of divine beauty, making me feel that when I was beside her I was in Heaven. If you’ve found someone that allows you to live Heaven on earth, don’t take it for granted.

Valentina was the great love of my life. Allow me to explain. I was sure that I had beside me the most beautiful girl in the world. She lived smiling. And I had won her smile. I felt that above all, we were becoming friends. Mass each morning, the rosary at the end of the afternoon, kisses on the cheek, the blessing of Father George and even of Mr. Bernini. Everything was working in our favor. I was certain of one thing: I was the happiest 15-year-old in the world.

And yet, I felt incomplete and I didn’t understand how that could be possible. If Valentina wasn’t enough to “fulfill” me, what could possibly be enough? God. The powerful and irresistible call of God resonated in me and I understood everything: He was the ideal to whom I’d give my life completely, the only reality capable of calming my thirst.

I will be eternally grateful to Valentina. God worked through her to show me that not even the greatest earthly beauty could compare to His. With sorrow and tears, we parted ways. I went to minor seminary.

I confess that for some time, I thought about how my future could have been beside her: how many children we would have had, what we would have named them, what our house would have been like, if she would still have smiled at my bad jokes or if at some moment, I would have done something to make her cry.

But these thoughts would vanish quickly when I’d think of how I am happy as a priest. I’ve been a priest for 19 years now.

She also was happy. She got married and had four children — among them a Carmelite and a seminarian — she was a fantastic mother and had a devoted and noble husband.

It’s 7:42. I’m getting ready to leave the rectory. I was awakened at 6:30 by a phone call giving me bad news. Valentina had died. Valentina the fighter, who battled breast cancer, had chosen to rest.

I sat down to write, fearing that in leaving, she would take with her all of my memories of our holy friendship. I am a priest thanks to Valentina, and I am sure that my priestly ministry will be strengthened with her intercession from heaven.