Where is Christ today?

Witnesses to Hope

This is the day when everything is silent.  We can go about the day not giving much of a thought to it–just seeing it as the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Yet monumental things were happening in the spiritual realm.  Christ descended to hell to set captives free.

This still has meaning for us.  So often we think nothing is happening in our own spiritual lives, yet God is about monumental things.  Have hope in the Unseen.

Christ descended into “Hell” and is therefore close to those cast into it, transforming their darkness into light.  Suffering and torment is still terrible and well-nigh unbearable.  Yet the star of hope has risen–the anchor of the heart reaches the very throne of God.  Instead of evil becoming unleashed within man, the light shines victorious: suffering–without ceasing to be suffering–becomes, despite everything, a hymn of praise. (Pope Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi

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Mustard seed

Today’s gospel speaks about the power of having faith the size of a mustard seed. My reflection on that as I am dealing with some major fear in my life–sometimes in my relationship with the Lord and how well I am really responding to him. Hope it brings you hope.

You’re Still God

He is always and ever still God.

A story of grace

You’re still God, even on the days when I can’t understand how in the world this could possibly be good for me.
You’re still God, even in the middle of my overwhelm.
You’re still God, even when I can’t find You.
Even when You feel a million miles away.
Even when I wonder if deliverance will ever come.
You’re still God.

I won’t listen to the lies from the enemy that You’ve abandoned me, or that I’m on my own.
Self-dependence is something I fight against. As a Christian I can’t rely on myself, no matter how tempting it might be, but as someone who has been let down in many different ways, my natural instinct is to trust in myself alone.
So on the days when I look around at my circumstance and wonder, “What on earth are You doing?” I will choose to look back.
I will remember…

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Punishing with a kiss

I am working on a talk I’m giving this week to a bunch of Santas at the St. Nicholas Institute–look it up–and this is one of the stories I want to share with them. Thought you might like to re-read it yourself. Let yourself be punished with a kiss!

Witnesses to Hope

This morning I was pondering my failings and starting to move to discouragement–as I am too often prone to do–when the Lord in His mercy brought to mind a section of a letter from St. Thérèse to Fr. Bellière in which she describes the ideal way for us to come to our heavenly Father when we realize our faults.  Reading it always brings me great hope–and I hope it does the same for you:

I would like to try to make you understand by means of a very simple comparison how much Jesus loves even imperfect souls who confide in Him:
I picture a father who has two children, mischievous and disobedient, and when he comes to punish them, he sees one of them who trembles and gets away from him in terror, having, however, in the bottom of his heart the feeling that he deserves to be punished; and his…

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