I have rules because I love you; because I love you, I have rules.
All in motherhood
To Become Like a Child
For who can overlook the wonder, joy, order and beauty of their simple world?
Holiday Anxiety
Our anxiety often surges and peaks just before Christmas. So much to do, so much to do, the panic insists, growing visible by the day...
The Divine Maternity
Before Jesus poured Himself out for the world, Mary poured herself out for Him—drop by drop—as a loving and faithful mother does…
Thoughts on Love in an Age of Imitation
We like to think that we Love.
But apart from God, we are utterly incapable of Love’s exchange. Only Jesus on the cross shows us Love, in its complete, unfiltered reality…
Caring for a Child’s Spiritual Needs (Part 2): WONDER + AWE
I sometimes forget how readily children can enter into the spiritual mysteries. It is much easier for children to connect with God than it is for us adults.
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Mothers: Closer to Christ (Part 3)
We are not Christ, we do not love perfectly. We drop, avoid, offload and resent the cross of motherhood. We choose self—over service, over child, over Christ. We “play the martyr” mother, lacking the right interior disposition or loving attitude, and so our sacrifice comes out sideways. We do our share of wounding, even unintentionally.
Mothers: Closer to Christ (Part 2)
Pregnancy is a mother’s first cross, first opportunity to unite herself to Christ by way of His Passion. For in pregnancy, we—like Christ—are called to give our very own flesh and blood for the sake of the stranger who is also our beloved child.
Mothers: Closer to Christ (Part 1)
God has made us mothers a juncture between heaven and earth. From our very bodies, the tunnel of life extends. For a sacred second, a mother is permitted to house the presence of God the Creator—the Author and Owner of all human life…
Thoughts on the Holy Family
Jesus, Mary and Joseph served God perfectly by serving each other. They were so fixated on doing what was best for each other that they forgot to arrange things to their own preference.
Caring for a Child’s Spiritual Needs (Part 1): BAPTISM
As a mother, I cannot imagine not feeding, bathing, dressing, protecting, hugging or educating my children. In the same way, I can’t imagine not baptizing them, or caring for their greater spiritual needs…
Faith Like My 4-Year-Old
The simple faith of my 4-year-old son continues to humble me. I aspire to it. I’ve always been convinced that children—in their loving, earnest innocence—are inherently closer to Jesus than most adults. It’s something about their simple trust, the way they lack the barrier of logic that adults so often use to shut Him out…
Running Away
Yesterday, my 4-year-old ran away from me at the park.
In the horror that only a mother knows, I watched as he suddenly bolted over the grass, toward a side street and parking lot. It was a ways off, but he wasn’t slowing down. I know my son. I could tell he wasn't stopping.