My journey to Catholicism began when I met a good-natured-looking fellow student seated next to me in my honors program at NYU 20 years ago. I was an only child from Connecticut, excited to finally be away from home and discover who I was in New York City.
“Truly, nothing is more beautiful than to know Christ and to make him known to others.” These words in Pope Benedict XVI’s “Sacramentum Caritatis” echoed in my mind when watching the recently released “Cabrini.” The film captures the indomitable spirit of America’s first citizen-saint, and viewers become well-acquainted with the diminutive nun’s spunk and determination.
Jesus’ entire existence was Eucharistic. If you and I are going to live as his disciples and respond wholeheartedly to the gift of his grace, our lives need to be marked by a Eucharistic dynamic.
This past weekend, side by side in the grocery store, lay both bags of salt to pour on icy sidewalks for winter’s last hurrahs and bags of topsoil to spread in flower beds to welcome spring’s first blooms. This juxtaposition perfectly represents the unique place of March in the cycle of the year.
I am attending a series of classes provided for catechists at St. Pius V in Jamaica, Queens, with Father Felix Sanchez. This particular class was part one of two parts on the sacraments. I prayed the Divine Praises and the Magnificat, to prepare myself for the class.
I had no initial understanding of why I was going to Mexico. My parish pastor, Father Christopher M. O’Connor kindly extended an invitation to Giselle Ladino (a member of the parish) and I, sometime in late October.
Gym class in the 90’s was a mix of adrenaline-pumping bliss and heart-stopping drama. Games like dodgeball tested your physical prowess and eagle-eye attention. Be agile enough, and you can clonk your class rival in the head with the ball to get him out. Be woefully inattentive, and your face gets slammed with the ball.
Since the suicide of his 29-year-old daughter Katie, who had bipolar disorder, Deacon Ed Shoener has made it his mission to reduce the stigma and misconceptions around mental illness in Church circles and to guide parishes in creating their own mental health ministries.
While studying to be a teacher at St. John’s University I was told the story about a classroom filled with energetic third graders. The teacher, attempting to teach a lesson on the virtues of patience, delicately explained the concept when a curious young boy raised his hand, his eyes sparkling with innocence.
Each year, the March for Life is an opportunity to bear witness to the unique dignity of each human being made in the image of God with an irreplaceable part in the human family. Thousands join me on the cold streets of the nation’s capital to remind our leaders of their sacred obligation to defend innocent human life.
