Category: Inspiration and Prayers

Election 2020

Gosh… im on shaky ground here, as I’ve never wanted to put my prayer time or a Word from the Lord in writing… except in my private prayer journal. Sure, I’ve shared in person with friends and people i pray with and I have shared with you some of the images that the Holy Spirit has shown me when i paint the Saints, but even that is hard… and never in writing. If i could share this anonymously, i would, and i thought about saying… “got this from a friend” even my preference now would be to keep this tucked away, but, we have come to a place and a time when we must be courageous in any way that the Lord would call us. For me, as silly as it sounds here when i write it, it’s sharing these private encounters with the Lord. For who am i, that the Lord would make Himself known to me… to any of us? And yet He does.

God is love. And He loves us each uniquely, with a love that can not be duplicated for another. As His daughter, i want to receive His love so that i can offer it to others.

In sharing the below message, my only desire is to offer the Father’s hope, comfort and peace.

+++

For weeks, collectively the Holy Spirit has been moving in His people about a “VICTORY”. Many friends and prayer warriors have talked about this, saying “I sense a VICTORY” and I felt it too. In fact, i woke up each morning, as the days drew closer to the election with a victory song in my heart… “I’m gonna see a victory. For the battle belongs to You Lord” . (This song is embedded below) Last week, the Lord spoke to my heart and said, “ I finish what I start” and I applied that Word to this victory and believed that it meant the re-election of Trump, which i still hope for very much. I am a Catholic, i am obligated by my beliefs to vote for those who will uphold the sanctity of life and to protect the sacraments, like marriage.

Today, the day after the election, we now are seeing that this may draw out for days, weeks, and even months… I have started to wonder if this victory is much different than what I assumed, and so i asked myself just what would the ultimate victory be and what would it mean to win the war? The answer for us all is to cooperate with God’s grace so that we can overcome the evils of this world and be with God in heaven for eternity.

While in prayer yesterday, I had a strong wave of love come over me, and the Father spoke to my heart about what a great privilege it is to be united with Him in this particular time of salvation history, that He has chosen each and every soul alive today to atone for the sins of mankind and usher in the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, who will crush the head of satan.

I recalled this scripture which was the Sept. 20, 2020 gospel reading:

Gospel

MT 20:1-16A

Jesus told his disciples this parable:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner
who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard.
After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage,
he sent them into his vineyard.
Going out about nine o’clock,
the landowner saw others standing idle in the marketplace,
and he said to them, ‘You too go into my vineyard,
and I will give you what is just.’
So they went off.
And he went out again around noon,
and around three o’clock, and did likewise.
Going out about five o’clock,
the landowner found others standing around, and said to them,
‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’
They answered, ‘Because no one has hired us.’
He said to them, ‘You too go into my vineyard.’
When it was evening the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman,
‘Summon the laborers and give them their pay,
beginning with the last and ending with the first.’
When those who had started about five o’clock came,
each received the usual daily wage.
So when the first came, they thought that they would receive more,
but each of them also got the usual wage.
And on receiving it they grumbled against the landowner, saying,
‘These last ones worked only one hour,
and you have made them equal to us,
who bore the day’s burden and the heat.’
He said to one of them in reply,
‘My friend, I am not cheating you.
Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage?
Take what is yours and go.
What if I wish to give this last one the same as you?
Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money?
Are you envious because I am generous?’
Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/092020.cfm

My priest that Sunday preached about how many of us would be inclined to groin or complain about the treatment of the landowner, who of course is God, and how it wasn’t fair that the people showing up late receive the same payment. Then Father said, in all of salvation history, WE ARE THOSE PEOPLE, the last to the vineyard. We come late and yet, because of God’s great love and generosity, we receive the same payment. I thought about how the blood of the early martyrs have come down throughout the ages to continue to sanctify us, and how their perseverance has bestowed such incredible grace, and many miracles. And here we are, in this fine hour, late to the party, and God says… “So the last (that’s us) will be first, and the first (the saints) will be last.”

If the church is truly in the time of the crucifixion, and i believe we are, then we are all on the cross. Would now be the time to pull us down? Would God pull us away from our mission? Would we be able to accomplish our mission of atonement and bringing about the Triumph of Our Lady? The mission of Christ Jesus on the cross… the Father’s Beloved Son, was to atone for sin and give the world Our Lady. This is the mission of the Saints in heaven. This is our mission today.

There will be terrifying times in the last days. People will be self-centered and lovers of money, proud, haughty, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, irreligious, callous, implacable, slanderous, licentious, brutal, hating what is good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God (2 Tim 3:1-4) Oh how we have reached so far beyond this… i don’t have to tell you this. I can’t stand to look at it, yet just today i learned that there are symbols for pedophiles, showing what gender and age child they want to rape.

We must not turn away. We must not withhold our FIATS any longer to the things that the Lord is calling us to. We must stare down our demons, stand in the minority of truth and call persecution and suffer a gift, because it is a gift. This is the sifting and it will hurt. God is making us great saints, and He does not pull us down from our crosses.

Yesterday, my husband said… “just think, if we get 4 more years with Trump, he can hold back communism and the New World Order.” It caused me to pause because I knew there was no more holding back… the time has come for the crucifixion… the purification, the beautiful chastisement, which is our share of the vineyard. Though late, receiving the same reward.

When I woke up the morning, I believed 100% that Trump would be re-elected, that the victory had come. think with me for a second, about when Jesus was on the cross, and satan thought he had won. Was Jesus the hunted or the hunter in that moment? Was He a fish on the line? Well, so satan thought until God snatched the victory from his grip and satan realized he had lost the victory he had int he Garden. God had sent His beloved and He made a way for us again . I remember now the wave of love that washed over me yesterday, and I do believe that God finishes what He starts, that he makes a way for us, parts the seas and always wins!

This is the kind of Father we have, and He has chosen us to help Him save souls, because those who have been rescued, rescue others. so that Our Lady can be true Mother to all mankind, crush the head and bring about a new springtime.

United, let’s follow Our Lord Jesus, and all the saints after Him, to the will of our Father, so we can be with Him in Heaven. That is the ultimate victory.

+JMJ+

Nov. 4, 2020 let us meditate on today’s readings:

Reading 1

PHIL 2:12-18

My beloved, obedient as you have always been,
not only when I am present but all the more now when I am absent,
work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
For God is the one who, for his good purpose,
works in you both to desire and to work.
Do everything without grumbling or questioning,
that you may be blameless and innocent,
children of God without blemish
in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation,
among whom you shine like lights in the world,
as you hold on to the word of life,
so that my boast for the day of Christ may be
that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
But, even if I am poured out as a libation
upon the sacrificial service of your faith,
I rejoice and share my joy with all of you.
In the same way you also should rejoice and share your joy with me.

Responsorial Psalm

PS 27:1, 4, 13-14

(1a) The Lord is my light and my salvation.
The LORD is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The LORD is my life’s refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
R. The Lord is my light and my salvation.
One thing I ask of the LORD;
this I seek:
To dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the LORD
and contemplate his temple.
R. The Lord is my light and my salvation.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the LORD
in the land of the living.
Wait for the LORD with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the LORD.
R. The Lord is my light and my salvation.

Alleluia

1 PT 4:14

Alleluia, alleluia.
If you are insulted for the name of Christ, blessed are you,
for the Spirit of God rests upon you.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel

LK 14:25-33

Great crowds were traveling with Jesus,
and he turned and addressed them,
“If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother,
wife and children, brothers and sisters,
and even his own life,
he cannot be my disciple.
Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me
cannot be my disciple.
Which of you wishing to construct a tower
does not first sit down and calculate the cost
to see if there is enough for its completion?
Otherwise, after laying the foundation
and finding himself unable to finish the work
the onlookers should laugh at him and say,
‘This one began to build but did not have the resources to finish.’
Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down
and decide whether with ten thousand troops
he can successfully oppose another king
advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops?
But if not, while he is still far away,
he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms.
In the same way,
everyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions
cannot be my disciple.”

Here’s that victory song

Why I give Mary Everything part 1 Marian Consecration

In the late Summer of 2011, just over 2 years after coming into the Catholic Church, God asked me to meet His Mother…well not really asked me, it was more of a standoff. You see, I was like many new converts in the sense that I really wasn’t that attracted to Mary. My feeling was why go to Mary when I can go to Jesus and I often repeated that in my head anytime I felt any interest in learning more about Her. I prayed the Rosary only when we would have a visit from The Pilgrim Queen, which is a traveling Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe that visits different homes in a parish and you gather as a family to pray the Rosary and other prayers. But beyond that twice per month visit, I had no desire to recite the rosary and to be truthful, really didn’t look forward to the arrival of the Pilgrim Queen Shrine either.

Catholics that I knew who had a strong devotion to Mary were really the most faithful Catholics, but I didn’t recognize that Mary was the connection to their strong Faith. As a matter of fact, I thought just the opposite was true, “how sad they don’t feel they cant go directly to Jesus”. Im talking about the people who were praying the Rosary daily and a few of these faithful were doing all the decades! Don’t these people have something better to do with their time? They must have no life! Why go through a middle man when you can go straight to the boss?! I just couldn’t wrap my head around Mary, even though I could see the devotion in my most devout friends and I had many poor souls try and explain their love of Mary.

So basically, I was yet again a heathen. That rebel soul that didn’t need Mary. That was until I did need Her because She was to be my only connection to Jesus.

It was summer and I was really starting to feel a spiritual dryness for the first time after coming into The Church. I had been on this amazing journey of consolation and healing for 2 years . For such a long time after receiving Communion I would weep, and im not talking about the soft and gentle tears…Im talking full out sobbing with snot and snorts, it was the ugly cry. I decided at the time that God was trying to humble me through this, embracing Grace that He was giving me because I was always so embarrassed. Yet I knew it to be a grace so I dare not bring a tissue because that would mean I would expect the grace to come. So I would just slobber and wipe everything on my sleeve. I later realized that the bringing of a tissue would have been prudence and I was blessed to have a husband that is good at spotting trends so he later would quietly reach into his pocket and secretly hand me a tissue. I also just recently realized, after telling that story, that He was not trying to humble me, God was healing me. “ Why do you always tell that story as if your were bad and needed to be humbled. Dear child, I was healing you through all those tears for I love you so much.” Yep. Another perfect example of the mercy and love that God has for us. And another perfect example of how undeserving of His love I always felt.

But back to my spiritual high that crashed and burned into a spiritual nothing. All the graces were gone and I was too immature in my Faith to understand that everything is Grace. All I knew is I couldn’t see Him, hear Him, touch Him or feel Him. After communion, nothing. Sitting in adoration, nothing. Prayer time, nothing. So naturally I assumed I was bad so what did I do? More! I prayed more, served more and went to confession more. Still nothing, no consolation. Then what does one do when more doesn’t work? We do it more and we do it perfectly. I became very concerned with not only the amount of prayer but how perfectly I was to pray. Jesus must be angry with me so I would be more perfect. Needless to say that sent me in a tailspin of insecurity and doubt. I had decided that I wasn’t loving people well or enough and maybe I was right. I still fall often in trying to see others the way God sees them. But I had fixed my prayers on this “ Jesus show me how to love” meditation for about a week when one day in adoration Jesus finally spoke and He said 4 words, “Go ask My Mother”. WHAT!? “But Im asking You.” I said. But that was all.

“Jesus show me how to love” continued to be my prayer and Jesus continued to respond to me the same way, “Go ask My Mother.” You can understand how this just totally blew my go directly to Jesus theory. When Jesus says the only way your getting to me is through my mom, it kinda screws with your head. But through Gods patience with me, He redirected me to Jn 14:16 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” And I started to reflect on this and ask if this was true with our relationship with Jesus. Could it really be possible that to truly know and love Jesus, we also needed to know and love His Mother? Through His Grace, I started to embrace this person of Mary and of Her being the Mother of Jesus. I had access to Jesus but He wanted more…He wanted me to meet His Mother. He wanted me to understand how to love Him more, through Mary. All along I had been praying for the ability to love others more, when really all Jesus wanted was for me to love Him more. That’s how we love others, by loving Him so that our actions become the consequence of our love of Jesus.

So, again in adoration, I agreed to open my heart up to The Blessed Mother. I said a Hail Mary prayer and I left adoration to go an meet a friend for coffee. On the way out to my car a text pops up from a friend, actually she is every bit a mentor as she is friend and happens to be one of those people who pray the rosary on a daily basis. The text reads “I cant wait to talk to you about this new book study im doing with my Church called 33 Days to Morning Glory! Its amazing!” um, ok…I have no idea what she is talking about but I trust in her discernment so if she says it’s amazing, I know it is! Im happy for her and let her know I can’t wait to hear more. I show up to meet my friend who is actually discerning entering the Covent to become a nun. She is a young women of faith who has challenges like we all do, but really does the best she can to stay faithful. We chat about our relationship with Jesus and life in general. I share with her how God has been calling me to this relationship with Mary and quickly relay to her the accounts that have taken place the last few weeks. “Oh, well you must read 33 Days to Morning Glory!” What, wait…what? “Yes, it’s a new book on Marian Consecration and I think you would really like it.” So, in less than an hour after promising I would open my heart to this relationship that Jesus wants me to have with Mary, two people who I trust and respect tell me to read the same book! YES Lord! I hear You!

Next time, I will share more here about the when, why, how of Marian consecration, which by the way in not just for Catholics! Neither is the rosary just for Catholics, or making the sign of the cross, or Holy water, or the saints… ok. I’ll stop. Mary is the patron of all humanity… every soul on this planet, and She loves you. I hope my story with Mary will help you understand Her love for YOU! I pray that you will grow closer to loving Her back.

I’m dedicating the whole month of May with a series of posts to honoring Our Beautiful Mother. I hope you’ll join me!

Here’s a quick intro to Mary for all believers!

St Joseph, his time is now

Patron of Families and the Universal Church.

In March of this year, I began a work with my 29^th icon, St Joseph. I’m very blessed to pray with the Saints through art. The Holy Spirit and St Joseph took such a hold of me during the process of this painting that I actually had to step away from the prayer due to the weight and responsibility I was feeling in his message.

Here are some of the things that St Joseph spoke to my heart…

First, he talked about this immense joy he had. That when God called him, he felt so unworthy and sinful. He talked to me a lot about clay and making vessels and that Our Lord chose him, nothing but a broken vessel, to protect the treasure of salvation. Almost constant St Joseph showed me his hands in clay. When he began to walk in his mission with Our Lady and Jesus, the Lord poured out so much joy into their days together. Then he showed me how his time was coming in the Church, like never seen in the history of the Redemption. St Joseph would be coming to reclaim the family and the Church. He spoke to my heart about the coming days and the power of grace being poured out right now.

When I recently returned to this prayer with Saint Joseph in October, he spoke to me with a father’s heart… one of concern and protection. St Joseph said, “they ignore my son and hurt my dear Mary, now is my time.”

In the icon you will see dear Joseph cradling sweet Baby Jesus with his left hand and Jesus resting, relieved to be in His earthly father’s arms again. Jesus holds St Joseph’s lily… the biblical passage, “The just man shall blossom like the lily” is applied to St. Joseph in the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church. Yet it is Our Redeemer who holds this Lily now, and the stem of the Lily pierces though the Eucharist, which is setting like a sun over the Vatican, as a symbol of purification. In Joseph’s right hand, he hold out the Vatican, representative of the One True Church, marred, yet alive, and St Joseph is calling us to return to our Faith.

Notice the 3 circles in the Eucharist, Jesus halo and St Joseph’s halo, aligned perfectly with their faces. Three is the number of the Trinity, resurrection, divine wholeness, completeness and perfection. Isaiah 40:22 “It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.”

Jesus is wrapped in a red blanket, which represents His Most Precious Blood, and is pouring out through the Church, into the baptismal waves of His grace. The Family, are they going into the Church or going out? This is for the viewer to discern, as this should change as we go into the sacramental graces, we carry them out in our mission as priest, profit and king.

Saint Joseph…pray for us!

Our Lady of America

Our Lady of America came to me, through the Holy Spirit, while I worked in my art journal. This often happens when i set aside time to be open and explore with the Lord. While i painted her, many words of warning for our country were given and how the US is in a fragile place, due to our turning away from God and turning towards false idols, the evil of abortion and human sex trafficking. We have embraced a culture of death and lost our way to Truth.

I knew immediately that the city inside Mary’s mantle was New York and felt there will be a torrent of water wash over the city. The nest with the single egg in this torrent is very fragile, with just a short time remaining, yet protected by Our Lady, Herself. The wheat spikelet grows out of a rock, in the midst of this torrent, and represent the few faithful who hold back the justice of God by their prayers…pleading for His unfathomable mercy. The 4 stars represent the four regions of our country and the current President and Vice President, chosen by His people, ordained by God. The image of the eagle represents God, who comes to save us by Our Lady intercession. The eagle is found throughout the Bible but primarily in the Old Testament. It is a sign of strength and able to bear much weight, as Moses wrote, “You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself” (Ex 19:4). This is further symbolized when Moses said of God “Like an eagle that stirs up its nest, that flutters over its young, spreading out its wings, catching them, bearing them on its pinions” (Duet 32:11). The eagle can bear up the young eaglets on its pinions, which are the outer wings. This is basically what God did when He brought Israel out of captivity from Egypt and continued to bear her up in her wanderings in the wilderness.

And finally Our Lady of America overshadows The Statue of Liberty, whose artist was a Freemason and given by the Freemasons and is nothing but a demonic idol. As this work was revealed to me, it pointed me to much evil in the church and in the US, which i am still learning about and trying to wrap my head around. I encourage you to seek these answers for you self and ask Our Lady to guide you… only Truth can set us free.

This image of Our Lady is not a sign of despair, no, not at all. Our Lady of America offers us great hope for such a time as this!! She is an image of justice and reminds us that the victory will always be HIS!

Our Lady of America…. pray for us!

Want to learn more about Our Lady of America? Check here.

Radical Conversion

My heart has been totally inflamed recently by Kanye’s conversion! As a mom of 2 young adults, i get to hear and witness all kinds of pop culture stuff so i have known Kanye and his music for sometime. While I’m not a fan of his older music, due to lyrical content, i am a fan of people who are just full on, that is, they own their stuff and they are who they are. They don’t follow the crowd, they bring the crowd because people respond to authenticity. Kanye is authentic, he is a true original and a free thinker. I dig that.

So for the last 6 months, as I’ve been catching his interviews and seeing his new clothes lines come out, I thought…whoa, now he’s using God as the trend. When he first started having his Sunday services, i thought… oh my, he’s trying to BE God now! Shamefully, i just put him in that box of sin. And then i started to really listen to his music, i realized that God had a hold on him. He went from rapping about whoes’, to telling his wife it hurts him when she dressed promiscuously. This man was being transformed.

At the end of October, i caught this video…

And sure enough… just like that, Kanye has had a conversion!

As a Catholic convert, i know about conversion. Personally i have found that most people, myself included, are converted through lot’s of kicking and screaming. I wish i could claim it was an easy thing for me to die to self, but it’s been tough. I try and offer just a little bit more of myself to the Lord each day, and God faithfully stays with me. One thing He’s shown me is that it’s not my job to fulfill His purpose in my life, it’s just my job to surrender, He will do the fulfilling part.

Conversion is surrender.

When God opened a door for me to join my artist friend, Katie Sahm, in her studio, i wasn’t on board at first. I have my own home studio and just never had the desire to go someplace to show or create my work. I felt so blessed to be able to have this place in my home and a website for orders, this was mostly due to cost and convenience. But, when Katie invited me to join her in a studio she had, i immediately was reminded of a mission that the Lord had laid on my heart in March, “to go after the hardest of hearts.” He showed me right away, that this was a door to that mission and my Saint icons would lead the way to conversations about the faith and love of one another.

Last Friday was my 4th, First Friday event. First Friday is when all the artist in the complex open up their studios and welcome visitors with food, wine and conversation. It’s been so amazing to see God slowly at work in these monthly events.

The August opening was SLOOOW. Many people came into the building but most, due to the sacred art, would glimpse in and walk on by. Lord, i asked, what can i do? He said, you will serve the best wine and the best food. Ok…hospitality, YES! I can do that!

In September, just a week before First Friday, the Lord prompted me to walk around to each studio door with blessed salt, and ask Him to bless each studio. So i did and the day after i did, the entire first floor of the building had a water break and flooded and i realized i was right where i needed to be and the Lord was guiding me. That Friday, i had a nice array of food and wine and i stood outside the studio and invited people to come in for a glass of wine. Many did and my friend showed up with a box of 50 blessed Miraculous Medals, and we were able to pass some out and have good conversations w people about the Saints and God.

In October, using the same tactic of hospitality, my friends showed up to help me to evangelize and share the Good News to people who walked into the studio. Many more visitors started to came through and we were on a roll, so to speak. By the end of the night, the Lord sent a young man in who started to quote scripture and claimed we don’t need Jesus, we have God and can go straight to “the Man” . We patiently listened and, through the Holy Spirit, we challenged him on some key things he was missing the truth about. By the end of the night we all prayed with him and he shared that just 2 days ago, he asked God to show him if Jesus was real after an argument he had with his mother. Not only did he find the answers he needed, he came and shared his testimony ( talk about radical conversion, this dude had been through some stuff) to a room full of Catholics at our Wednesday night prayer group. Wow God. The Lord was fulfilling this mission He gave me!

Just days before the November first Friday, i catch Kanye’s video and my heart was truly inflamed! I quickly created the poster you see at the top of this post and knew that we needed to celebrate RADICAL CONVERSION as our monthly theme and reflection. I show up that Friday morning to set up the exhibit and i see this in the main exhibition hall…

This was their All Saints day exhibit! A real mockery of this holy day in the Church and a truly sad and confusing representation of what this day was all about, visually it wasn’t much to look at either.

The readings on this First Friday happened to be the Beatitudes… and the Holy Spirit rang His song in my ear, “Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” as we prepped for our monthly event in our studio, blaring christian music on our i-tunes.

Our gallery door sits only feet away from this featured exhibit, and the Kanye poster was plastered right by the exit sign. As people stopped to stare at the poster, i invited them in for a glass of wine. Gotta love that hospitality!

By the end of the night, the Lord sent another man who had lot’s of concerns and issues about Mary, Mother of God. We talked with him and prayed together and he took a miraculous medal and his heart was OPENED to get to know Mary more. Open hearts, open doors= conversion!

I don’t share all this with you to say, look at how great i am. Just the contrary, it’s look at how great HE IS! Only God can take a sinner and make Him a saint. Look at Saint Peter, Augustine, Angela of Foligno! Look at me… a sinner, truly nothing else. Yet, He loves!

When i started sharing my art and conversion story, many people fell away from my life. They just couldn’t believe that i had been transformed, they held me in my box of sin, much like i did Kanye.

Jesus, i pray i never hold someone in a place of sin, confined by their past and defined by their mistakes. I know the enemy is already doing that to them. Let me not be an instrument of evil, but rather, help me to lift up those who are being converted, and those hardest of hearts to YOUR RADICAL LOVE. Help me to see all with the potential of radical conversion and how their unique gifts contribute to the Kingdom here on earth. You leave no one behind! We are one in You and when i hold down my brother or sister, i hold down only myself. Forgive me. Amen.

Pray that Kanye becomes a great Saint… this guy’s conversion can influence millions and even change the course of history by helping a generation turn Pro-Life. Again, we are ONE and we belong to each other! Pray for him!

“sing til the power of the Lord comes down” Kanye West

Why does the world need sacred art more then ever?

Many years ago, before i even came into the Church, I joined a brand new parish community, which i am still a part of today. This parish started out meeting in peoples homes, then in a small single building, then a high school, and today, we are STILL building this Church. Something really special and sacred about sticking w a community though the growth of a new parish. Lot’s of grace is needed and offered for those who commit to His plan.

Within a few weeks of completing the first building, an anonymous donor gifted the parish w a beautiful Mary statue for our courtyard. It was powerfully beautiful, bright and greeted parishioners as they pulled up to our parish. Our parish priest, upon receiving it, decided to consecrate the entire parish community to Our Lady. He didn’t know that on the same day he dedicated our parish to the intercession and guidance of Our Blessed Mother, that someone would come in the night and desecrate and vandalize it so badly, that Her face would become marred with hate. This sent out a sad and angry ripple out into our parish. For many years, we continued to see this marring on Our Lady’s statue until recently, when she was restored to the beauty intended by the artist.

This hate for the beautiful, takes on many forms…pornography, self mutilation, and the desecration of our bodies though abuse are an example of this. God gives us our temples of the Holy Sprint, beautiful and chosen. Let’s look at marriage and family today… one of the most beautiful gifts from God, but torn apart by the enemy with division, perversion, and abandonment. We are children of God, beautiful, bright, and yet we let go of this identity and choose the dark. This sends a sad and angry ripple out into the world.

Pope John Paul II quoted the line in his Letter to Artists, under the heading “The Saving Power of Beauty”:

“People of today and tomorrow need this enthusiasm [of wonder] if they are to meet and master the crucial challenges which stand before us. Thanks to this enthusiasm, humanity, every time it loses its way, will be able to lift itself up and set out again on the right path. In this sense it has been said with profound insight that “beauty will save the world” (§16).

This quote, Beauty will save the World comes from a book titled The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky. At the beginning of the novel, the central character Prince Myshkin is shown a portrait of a young woman named Nastassya Filippovna by a Madame Yepanchin, his hostess. She holds Nastassya in contempt because her moral reputation is tarnished.

“So, you appreciate that kind of beauty?” she asks the prince.

“Yes. That kind—” the prince replies with an effort.

“Why?” she asks.

“In that face—there is much suffering,” he says, as though involuntarily, as though he is talking to himself.

“Beauty like that is strength,” one of the other women in the room angrily declares. “One could turn the world upside down with beauty like that.”

Dostoevsky once wrote in his Notebooks, “Suffering is the origin of consciousness.” A novel like The Idiot could only have been created as the fruit of the author’s personal sufferings. If you have heard my story, you know i know just a tad about suffering too. We have all suffered, yet do we join together in the victory of the suffering? Can there be a resurrection without the crucifixion?

The beauty that will save the world is the love of God. This love germinates, flowers, and comes to fruition only in a crucified heart. Only the heart united with Christ on the Cross is able to love another as himself, and as God loves him. “To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.” Isaiah 61:3 KJV

The fight for beauty is a true battleground of the soul and intimately linked to the crisis of faith. As an artist and speaker, i have a unique position on the battlefield. I not only share the art that healed me, i share the testimony of the One who heals.

Recently i have been painting Sacred Hearts for the beautification of this suffering and to help unite homes and families to +JMJ+ Sacred Hearts through home enthronements. Through these works, God continue to remind me that “you can’t create without dying.”

And the dying is so sweet when we do it here on earth! When we offer up our small sufferings to the Lord and for His use, they become a gift of love.

Taken from A Daily Pilgrimage to Purgatory….

“Holy Souls in Purgatory, is there anything you regret when you think of your life on earth? I deeply regret my neglect of acts of mortification. How easy they would have been on earth, but how difficult they are now in Purgatory. Here the smallest suffering is more poignant than the most cruel torments on earth. In the world it meant only patience and resignation in the hardships and adversities of my life; it meant only giving from my surplus to the poor, and devoting myself to works of atonement; it meant only gaining Indulgences and performing works of piety. Nothing could have been easier, and my Purgatory would have been shortened considerably. If God would but grant me the grace to exchange the years during which I must still remain in this place of sorrow for as many years of life on earth! No commands would be too severe for me; no pains could frighten me; the most difficult works of penance would be sweet and give me comfort at the thought of this consuming fire. You who now smart under the insignificant trials and hardships of this life! You who now earn your daily bread by the sweat of your brow, rejoice! The smallest suffering endured in the spirit of atonement and offered to the Sacred Heart in the spirit of expiation, will save you from a long and painful Purgatory.”

So will beauty save the world? When we suffer for the sake of it, it will. Just look at a crucifix.

New Things, New Day

A morning prayer…

” I make all things new! The only thing that never changes is My Love and Mercy. Why are you surprised when I, God, do new things? You are created to be made anew everyday. Struggle with change is really a sign that you are still holding on to control. I make all things work together for your good. Do you trust Me? Rise up in the new day and in the new thing that I’m doing in you.”

Lord I surrender to You and thank you for the gift of recreation and transformation. Help me to more deeply surrender the things, the circumstances or the people who i become enslaved by through my control. Remove any pride in me that says my way is better. It is You alone who i need! Never allow me to stray from Your Transfiguring Love. Amen

Mary Magdalene Convert and Sinner

Mary Magdalene

Mary Magdalene… the beloved sinner who experienced a profound conversion at the feet of Jesus. She is the patron saint of penitents and converts. She is a friend of women, she has been a friend to me.

When i painted Mary back in 2017, i was surprised by the love and care that the Holy Spirit took in my prayer with her. I felt a sense that the Lord protected Mary, and i was to protect her too by creating a work that would show the Spirit of who she was. The Lord kept insisting, “I want her to have a loving look of awe.” When i stated i didn’t know how to paint that, He simply repeated the request and i continued to fumbled around the canvas for many days and hours. I had not been painting icons very long, she was my 11th, and God was still working overtime on my trust issues. Mary was going to help me understand conversion in a new way! Yet i was more concerned with getting this “loving look of awe” thing down then worrying about my own conversion. Finally, The Voice inside my heart seemed satisfied w my efforts when It silenced. I must have painted her mouth 10 times over trying to quiet the Holy Spirit and i knew that His insistence came from a protective Father who was working on my obedience and perseverance. Who was working on my trust.

I have to be honest in saying i wanted to walk away a few times due to my inability to paint this icon. I could feel such a love that it left me astounded and feelings of unworthiness crept in often. After all, who was i to paint such a precious soul? and then my friend Mary spoke…” who was i to wash his feet? Who was i to be delivered? who was i to be the first at the tomb? ”

When i felt her words penetrate me, i knew her. and she knows me.

I think it’s in our unworthiness that we come to the truest mirror. and when we stare at that brokenness, that wound, that sin, we have a choice. Will we look up in with that loving look of awe at Our Redeemer, or will we sit in the defeat of our self worth? Do we stay in the pit, or rise in the Victory? No one is beyond the saving grace of God!

Many scholars believe that the 7 demons cast out of Mary represented the 7 deadly sins. This women knew sin. And where sin abounds, Grace abounds even more. So is it even a wonder to us why this sinner would be the first witness of the Resurrection? Of course she was! Because she rose in the Victory of Jesus long before He walked out of that tomb.

Saint Mary Magdalene, pray for us!

Beautiful Brokenness

Beautiful brokenness.

In a world where the broken are thrown away, our faith says something opposite. The Lord says He is close to the brokenhearted and He saves those who are crushed in spirit (Psalms34:18). There is something powerful about being brought to our personal breaking point or crushed. Sure, it’s a character builder but more so it’s where we learn surrender so that our hearts can truly be transformed. “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt so that you would no longer be slaves to the Egyptians; I broke the bars of your yoke and enabled you to walk with heads held high” Leviticus 26:13

True surrender demands we be broken. As I prepare my heart for Jesus throughout the Advent season, my prayer is the same every year. “Lord, break my heart for what breaks Yours, so that I may be truly transformed and wrecked by Your love. Amen.” (Lent prayer too!)

Loving all my broken friends today. What a beautiful time of year to be called to surrender! Xo

Just Chillin’

Being a parent for the last 19 years has taught me a TON about stress! But not in the way that you may think. Sure, being a parent is an overwhelming job sometimes, as the responsibilities of parenting and meeting the different needs of your children can be very hard to navigate. But, im a half glass full kinda girl and my outlook on situations is fairly optimistic. Not that I never feel stress, it’s just that I rarely feel it in such a way that causes me to become fixated or over run by it. Then my sweet daughter came along. This girl is smart, caring, creative and sensitive…and she’s also plagued by debilitating stress sometimes. She becomes anxious and often times can’t see beyond the challenge she’s facing. She’s the kid who after 3 days of vacation is ready to get home and into her own room. As I mom, I have said things like, “it’s no big deal”, “attitude is everything”, and the worst one… “suck it up!”. UGH! I wish I could get a re-do on some of those moments, but I can’t. Because of this dear sweet soul, I have learned that stress and anxiety is something that MANY children struggle with. Sometimes it’s due to overtaxed schedules, trauma of some kind, disorder, worldly influences (peer pressure, technology), academic pressures, over achievers who put too much pressure on themselves… the list doesn’t stop! Sometimes, they are just sensitive souls living in a suffering world and it scares them. Whatever the reason, I learned the hard way to acknowledge the stress and hold their hands in moving on. One of the mistakes I made would be to put my daughter in “time out”, leaving her to further fixate on her fears and stress. I just didn’t understand and 19 yrs ago “stressed out kids” was a joke. In her pre-teen and mid- teen days, we tried to get her counseling and that always left us with the question, “should we medicate?” Our answer was no, though I have to say that was our personal choice and every family has to discern what is right for them. Im not against meds and understand that often times they are needed and necessary for healing. What I’ve found, is when a child suffers from anxiety it shows up masked as other behavioral issues because a child doesn’t have the words to express how they are feeling.

So, this month enters St Pio! Among other things, St. Pio is the patron Saint of anxiety and since this topic is near and dear to my heart, I was excited to offer a creative option to children who may deal with stress and anxiety. Even if this is not an on-going issue, the back to school season always brings with it a fair share of stressed out families.

While looking for some good ideas in helping children handle stress, I came across this idea of a stress box. Teachers and educators are using this as another option for time-out and helping a child to re-group. I think it’s a loving and caring way to help a child self correct which builds self esteem.

So, here’s my little chill out box!

Items in the box include: prayer cards, a harmonica, a favorite stuffed animal, a looking glass ( fun to explore with ), a bouncy ball, a photo of a the child as a baby ( oh see how you’ve grown!) , gratitude journal, a rosary and a favorite picture book. Some other ideas I love are essential oils, rubrics cube puzzle, your pet, and chewing gum.

The idea of a chill box is that when I child (or adult) is feeling overwhelmed or anxious, they step back, take a brake to self comfort, by doing things that help them to feel peace and relaxation. A timer is a good idea so that a child doesn’t use this as a way to isolate and after the timer goes off, a conversation with the child is important so that they can learn how to articulate their feelings. Stress or worry boxes can also be effective for kiddos who deal with PTSD, sensory and anger issues.

Here are a few great resources I came across that may help you and your child prepare their box.

https://www.andnextcomesl.com/2016/04/what-to-put-in-a-calm-down-kit-for-kids.html

Create Your Own Anti-Anxiety Kit for Children

Having a child who suffers from anxiety is a great lesson for me in patience, compassion, perseverance and radical trust. I have many people in my life who deal with chronic anxiety and I have seen how this can led to physical issues down the road. St. Pio is really a Saint for such a time as this! Call on him to intercede and allow him to guide you to people who can help, places of healing, and radical prayers of trust and joy. God Bless you.

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