Ash Wednesday - some basics

I hope you have a blessed Lent, in preparation for the coming Easter Season. Here's a few links that might be helpful.  Let us pray for one another!

USCCB's links for the season

The Holy Father's Lenten message

Why 40 Days of Lent? This explains it well:


Prepare for Sunday Masses by listening to podcasts by Fr. Robert Barron.

Here Fr. Barron comments on Lent:


Here's something about St. Therese of Lisieux from Catholic TV, as I re-read her autobiography this Lent.

Oh, and over at EWTN, be on the lookout for this, starting March 11th: The Catholic View for Women. Too bad they've only scheduled it for a monthly airing... pretty hard to build a viewership that way imho.

Articles from my archives that are Lent-worthy:

• Temptations, Jesus and Us
• Pilgrim Feet (On "going on pilgrimage" with the Lord during Lent)
• The Church as Mother and Teacher (On the Precepts of the Church - a good review for Lent)
• News of My Death (On getting in touch with our mortality)
• Turning Lent into Thanksgiving
• Spiritual 911 (On getting to confession)
• 25 Phrases from the Catechism Worth Memorizing
• Three Expressions of Prayer
• Entering More Deeply into Holy Week

And finally, there ain't nothin' like a red-hot linkfest administered by The Anchoress. Do tell her I told ya to drop by. 

If our heart seeks God in prayer, then prayer becomes the life of the heart.

I'm over at Catholic Exchange today, with some ideas from the Catechism of the Catholic Church on prayer... here's a snippet:

Christian tradition teaches widely about three forms of prayer: vocal prayer, meditation, and contemplation.  The Catechism says that all three have one basic trait in common: “composure of heart.” (CCC 2699).

Composure is the emotional make-up of the heart; it is largely the calmness or serenity that exists in our heart. Composure includes recollection of the heart – it’s memories. And what does the Catechism say best influences the composure our hearts? “Keeping the Word and dwelling in the presence of God.”(CCC 2699).

If our heart seeks God in prayer, then prayer becomes the life of the heart. It is where God renews our heart. It is a personal encounter with God, the One Who made our heart, mends our heart and expands our heart. But we have to be willing to be led, and receive his presence.

Each form of prayer, from vocal prayer to meditation to contemplation, yields a heart more open to God: an ever-deepening encounter with God, a deeper reception of the Word and Presence.

Read it all. 

More on the Beatitudes...

Been doing some thinking about the beatitudes... and how we might one day learn to become blessed. Find my column, Embracing the Catechism at Catholic Exchange here.

The Church as My Mother & Teacher

Like most of my better lessons in life, taking the Church as my Mother and Teacher was something that grew over time...

My best memories of my mother and my favorite teachers are what shaped my understanding of the Catholic Church as my Mother and Teacher. Sure, in my younger years, I lacked a real appreciation for the richness and wisdom that She was trying to impart to me.  But once I got a taste of real forgiveness and grace – the home cooking of what every soul is hungry for – I never wanted another Mother or Teacher again. Over the course of my young adult years, there were moments of on- going conversion. And since that time, I’ve found a sense of fulfillment within the Church like no place on earth because Jesus was there. 

Read the rest over at my column today at Catholic Exchange.

25 Phrases from the CCC Worth Memorizing -- Can you learn 3?

To start the New Year right, why not make a small resolution to memorize just 3 lines of the Catechism of the Catholic Church?  Surely everyone can memorize three lines or phrases right?

Here's a few suggestions from my latest on Catholic Exchange:

CCC 27 The desire for God is written in the human heart.

CCC 68  By love, God has revealed himself and given himself to man. He has thus provided the definitive, superabundant answer to the questions that man asks himself about the meaning and purpose of his life.

CCC 70 The Son is his Father's definitive Word; so there will be no further Revelation after him. 

CCC 435 The name of Jesus is at the heart of Christian prayer. 

CCC 658 Christ, "the first-born from the dead" (Col 1:18), is the principle of our own resurrection, even now by the justification of our souls (cf. Rom 6:4), and one day by the new life he will impart to our bodies (cf.: Rom 8:11). 

CCC 682 When he comes at the end of time to judge the living and the dead, the glorious Christ will reveal the secret disposition of hearts and will render to each man according to his works, and according to his acceptance or refusal of grace. 

CCC 780 The Church in this world is the sacrament of salvation, the sign and the instrument of the communion of God and men. 

CCC 826 Charity is the soul of the holiness to which all are called: it "governs, shapes, and perfects all the means of sanctification [Lumen Gentium, 42].” 

CCC 982 There is no offense, however serious, that the Church cannot forgive.

Go read the rest!

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I'm over at Catholic Exchange today... "His Name is John,"

Writing about St. John the Baptist, the forerunner to Christ, in this latest entry in the Catechism series.

This might also be good background material as you prepare to hear this Sunday's Gospel,

The Perfect Thanksgiving Has Nothing to Do with Turkey

My latest article over at Catholic Exchange's "Grow" channel gives me a chance to share a few reflections about thanksgiving in my own life, and what it means for the Church.  Here's a teaser from my on-going column, "Embracing the Catechism":

Every single offering of the Eucharist is a time to count our blessings and to praise and thank God for his gifts.

It really defines Catholics as a thanksgiving people.  The Eucharist perfects our expression of it, as a kind of gratitude par excellence.

Thanksgiving itself has held a few watershed events for me, moments that have been intensely personal, and yet full of God’s bounty for me, for which I have returned the gift of my gratitude many times over through the years.

One Thanksgiving morning in the mid-90s, I learned what it means to be a walking answer to someone else’s prayer. In the aftermath of surviving breast cancer and a veritable rebuilding of my torso and my life, a friend looked me in the eye through happy-tears saying she was thanking God for my life that day. Her words reminded me that God is still in the business of answering prayers. Every. Single. Day. And so it must be with our thanks. Every. Single. Day.

Another Thanksgiving, my husband and I found out we were expecting a child.

And still another, I attended a very large dinner celebration with our extended family, celebrating my in-laws’ 50^th wedding anniversary. How wonderful that they were married on Thanksgiving! Their love is a happy reminder each year that thanksgiving in marriage ought to be a way of life. 

Of course, there's more... 

Yet another great reason to read the Catechism...

"Of Saints and Sound Bites", by yours truly, over at the new Catholic Exchange!

Looky Looky! Catholic Exchange's new & improved portal is up!

Check it out today!

Yours truly is now writing for "Grow"

Find me here.

Today marks my 100th Article on Catholic Exchange!

This article is a "Best Of" Edition!

Find the full article here!

Embracing the Catechism - The Back of the Book

My latest article at Today's Catholic Woman on Catholic Exchange is a primer on how to find one's way through the 200+ pages at the back of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

Its waay more than just a general subject index. There are actually 4 sections.

The first is the Index of Citations that summarizes all the quotes taken from Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition. Everyone who ever has a reason to study the Catholic faith, or teach it, should familiarize themselves with it.

The citations index is followed by the comprehensive general Index, the Abbreviations pages (very helpful in doping out the primary sources of many church documents), and the ever-popular Glossary.

Learn more here.

This Sunday, Thomas has a Divine Mercy encounter with a Glorified Body...

Divine Mercy Sunday and the doubting Thomas are the subject of my latest installment of "Embracing the Catechism" over at Catholic Exchange.  Find out what the Glorified Body of the Risen Lord means for us! Its more than just a cool story, its a amazing reality that should transform our thinking about eternity.

Conversion Story: from Jehovah's witness to Catholic

Mary Kochan, senior editor over at Catholic Exchange, reveals a portion of her testimony in this article.

Here's a snippet:

This is my 16^th Easter.

For the first 38 years of my life I did not celebrate Easter because I was one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, a pseudo- Christian group with a very strange economy of salvation. It is not easy to describe life in a cult like Jehovah’s Witnesses. It is very dark. Even their light is darkness.

Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe in the Trinity, so they do not believe in the deity of Christ.  They believe that Jesus was Michael the Archangel before he came to earth, and that after he was resurrected, he went back to being Michael the Archangel — but with the name “Jesus.”  They do believe Jesus died (but not on a cross) to save mankind from sin and death by atoning for the disobedience of Adam.  Jesus had to be a perfect man, to match Adam in every respect, and thus he takes Adam’s place as our father.  I know this is weird — not to mention the whole ontological problem of how he is an angel, then a human, and then an angel again — but I’m telling you about it because I want you to know that I had an idea that I could call myself a Christian and believe Jesus died for me, without conceiving of Jesus as God.

Most of you reading this are like my grandchildren who have heard all their lives that Jesus died for you and that Jesus is God the Son –- true God from true God.  It has never dawned on you, because it was always the light that you lived in.

But it dawned on me.

Read the rest, here.

Confidential to Mary: enjoy a "sweet 16!" ~Peace & joy,  Pat

Pondering The Temple of the Holy Spirit -- another way of describing the Church

Pondering begins here. (It's my latest offering on Catholic Exchange's women's channel - Today's Catholic Woman.)

How the Church is both Human and Divine

Check out my latest series on "The Church" over at Today's Catholic Woman on Catholic Exchange. Today's installment is focuses the how the Church is both human and divine.

St Joseph -- always right where you need him!

Mary Kochan at Catholic Exchange thinks so too!  Check out her latest article here.