My prayer is that your love for each other may increase more and more and never stop improving your knowledge and deepening your perception so that you can always recognize what is best.
It is Fall at last!
We had a long hot Summer and I have been enjoying the cool breezes of Fall in the Northern Hemisphere. My friends in Australia are in Spring. Nonetheless, it is always the season to give thanks to God and to those who have directed our faith journey to where we are today. God isn’t done with us, because we are still learning, praying and doing the good works that we are able to do.
My seventh-grade nun, Sister Mary Fatima (aka Sister Caroline) SSND was the daughter of an Irish Milwaukee Policeman. She was amazing. She and my parents had a great deal to do with my faith formation. My aunts and uncles had much to do as well. My parents and uncles taught me to work hard and also to volunteer hard and with gusto. Most are not alive today, but I still try to remember them in prayer and give thanks for what they taught me.
I don’t remember often enough which is my main point today!
My wife, Anna, had similar experiences, but on one occasion she almost got into a fight with the nun who was the principal at her grade school. Because Anna was left-handed, she was considered by some to have a defect, and the nun tided her left hand to her desk and made her write with her right hand. When her mother, Rita, found out why Anna’s grades were slipping she confronted the principal. The principal told her to go to class and her mother told her to stay. Either way Anna figured she would either be going to hell or grounded until she was thirty. Rita pulled her out of that school and into public school. Anna learned different things there. She learned to appreciate fine arts and learned to sew and appreciate the difference between a shoddy garment and one that was made well.
Humans are not perfect. Like Saint Paul we succeed even with the bad judgement of others. My prayer is that your love for each other may increase more and more and never stop improving your knowledge and deepening your perception so that you can always recognize what is best. Saints made mistakes to and Saint Paul would have realized this on the Road to Damascus.
‘Which of you here, if his son falls into a well, or his ox, will not pull him out on a sabbath day without hesitation?’ And to this they could find no answer. God is the God of making lemons into lemonade. He can turn our bad decisions into gold. We learn from the good we do and the bad we do. We sleep get up the next day and try to do more of the good than the bad.
My prayer today is for all the saints that have helped me in the past. I thank them for the good and the bad decisions of their lives and mine, that made me a good husband, Catholic, Christian and human being today. Yes, I will still make mistakes and with the help of Jesus turn them into lemonade.
God Love You Always
Bob Burford
PS: Please Pray for Cancer victims and their caregivers. Pray for those in Hospice. Pray for the conversion of Russia and the salvation of the Ukrainian and Russian people and their soldiers. Pray for the Holy Land. The impossible could and can happen. (Saint Rita) Never deny God! Pray for justice for all victims of human trafficking and immigrants! Pray for justice for our President and all government officials! Pray for Peace!
