Oh, What a Beautiful Morning!

You know, I love my "days off" on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the children are at school and I'm alone for 7 hours.  Not to mention car time, but we don't really count that.  ;-)  I'm rarely relaxing and eating bonbons during that time.  The best I can say is that I work hard on the laundry and then fold 3-4 loads while watching something on Netflix.  (oh!  They emailed me to let me know that Season 2 of Call the Midwife is now available.  yay!)

Anyhooo....Today has not been one of those "productive" days.  It's 11:45 a.m. and I haven't done a lick of work.

It's been better than that.

I took the children to school, and sat in the car for 30 minutes praying the rosary along with the Mary Undoer of Knots novena.  Then we were treated to a meditation given by one of priests of the Archdiocese that I really like.  He's so gentle, warm, and loving.  And gives great advice.  I thought I would share what I got from his talk this morning in hopes that you might benefit from it as well.  I'm sure it's not exactly as he gave it, because I took only a few notes, but it's what I heard as translated by the Holy Spirit.

First, he said he was given a gift last night and this morning of understanding mothers, because he spent time he didn't really have cleaning up minor disasters that occurred, and he pointed out that it is still possible to be holy during trying circumstances or phases of life.  God has his cloistered nuns who spend their time praying, not distracted by the needs of children, but that's not who we are called to be.  In fact, we can actually sin by putting God before the real needs of a child!  His example was abandoning a sick child to go to Mass on a holy day of obligation.

~Jesus spent 30 years living a hidden, small life, and that's what we're called to.  If it had value for Him, it certainly has value for us!

~Don't judge other people.  You don't know where someone else is in their walk with Christ, and you really don't know what's in their heart.  Leave that for God.

~Here's the BIG takeaway from today:  We are not solely responsible for our children getting to heaven!!  There are many other people and circumstances in their lives along with (cue: Jaws music)....Free Will.  So, relax, do your best, and trust in the Lord.

~Prayers may be answered in ways you don't expect because God still respects the free will of each of us.  It's very likely that you won't ever find out your prayers were answered, but trust that they will be.  Finding out is like a second miracle.

~Make sure you spend time with Jesus.  If you can, schedule that morning prayer time; if you can't, take advantage of times when you can squeeze it in.  Especially those times you're awake in the middle of the night and can't sleep!

~Again, trust in Providence.  God loves you and wants everyone with Him in paradise.  Keep praying.

~Don't focus on the negative or things that steal your peace.

In the end, it was a reiteration of the same message I have been getting for the past couple of years (God must think I'm not getting the message or acting on it properly!):

We can't change other people, or the world, all we can do is focus on our own holiness (and I don't mean by ignoring everything and praying constantly [you know, to the detriment of your family], but by praying and doing God's will in each moment.)  It's His job, through the Holy Spirit, to convert hearts, but by living out our faith the best we can, we can be that light in the world that spreads and vanquishes the darkness.

~~~~

I hope you get something out of that.  I think I'll go see what work I can accomplish in the next couple of hours.  Hugs!