GOD's will be done

May we all be the "Blue-Print" God desires us to be even if another person thinks we are crazy for what we are doing, where we are going, how we are fulfilling our vocation. If it is God's call and we are listening to Him, optics do not matter. People even thought Jesus was crazy for fulfilling the Father's will. Maybe in our Lenten sacrifices we can offer these in prayer and love for those who lay down barriers and cast others aside, particularly because their will, idea of the future for us, etc., is not "fulfilled." When we desire God's will in each person's life, we can be sure and be peaceful and really happy instead of tense, distraught, and bitter. Lord, please let us all let go of our own wills and our "plans" for others' lives, so that it may be YOU Who lives and speaks through them in their lives, that are YOUR creations. Not our wills, but YOURS be done. But for the grace of God go I....

 

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And when we experience falls during Lent..."..even sins, from which God by His goodness defends us, are reduced by Divine Providence to good for those who belong to Him.  Never would David have been so full of humility had he not sinned, nor would Mary Magdalene have been so full of love for her Lord if He had not remitted so many of her sins if she had not committed them. You see, my daughter, this great architect of mercy: He converts our miseries into grace and makes salutary medicine for our souls from the venom of iniquities.....If God makes you fall, as He did with Saint Paul, whom He threw to the ground, it is to raise you up to His glory." - Fr Jacques Phillipe, "Searching for and Maintaining Peace", p.90-91.

Quiet Triduum

A quiet Triduum at home:

We have enjoyed just being with each little one of ours and incorporating these quiet times into ourselves so that we go through our own metamorphosis. How good God is to give us a real example of this spiritual-physical-emotional-psychological change that can take place any day, any hour, any minute, but so focused in this time of Lent.  Here in Brasilia is the time of the caterpillars-- so many are out and about. But, they must soon change. And so, they are. We are grateful to watch this change, in this season of Lent, as the caterpillars wrap themselves into their cocoons for a while, before becoming the "blue-print" versions God created them to be: beautiful butterflies (see Fulton Sheen's The World's First Love, excerpt below). They have created their cocoons around our home, and we await their exit. These past weeks have been fruitful. Thankfully, God's grace goes beyond our biggest desires and plans and puts us where we need to be. All thanks to His mercy, constant love, and total selflessness.

            

You are dust and to dust you shall return...

Penny received ashes too yesterday. It was her second Lent, but the first outside-the-womb. Humbling to see a little innocent soul with ashes marked on her forehead.