Soldiers for Christ

Any St. Paul fans out there?  I LOVE St. Paul!  He's so passionate and on fire for Christ!  He's also very, very flawed and he's the first to admit it.  He "does what he hates", he says, despite his conversion and the fact that Jesus chose him to come to and reveal these truths so he would no longer tear down Christ's church but build it up by evangelizing to the gentiles.  Have you ever felt like a St. Paul in that aspect?  Doing what you hate?  Committing that same sin over and over again?  I know I have.  I think that's why I love him so much.  He's so flawed like me and yet his heart burns with the love for our Lord.

Today's first reading was another spectacular St. Paul moment in his letter to the Ephesians (6:10-20) when he wrote the following in blue italics:

"Brothers and sisters: Draw your strength from the Lord and from his mighty power."  Do we do this?  Do we look to God for our entire source of strength?  Or are we looking for strength, emotional support or even validation from others?  

St. Paul goes on to say:  "Put on the armor of God so that you may be able to stand firm against the tactics of the Devil." Isn't that FANTASTIC?!  The "armor of God"!  Do we put on our armor of God daily?  Do we pray?  Do we spend time in the presence of our Lord?  St. Padre Pio said the rosary is "a weapon".  Are we yielding our weapon daily?

"For our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens." Our battle is NOT natural but supernatural.  Yes we may see other humans as our enemies but the truth is, they are doing the work of only one, the evil one!  This is why the Lord asks us to pray for our enemies, because they are lost sheep as well.  Are we doing this? Are we praying for our enemies, for our adversaries, for those who disagree with us, mock us, or even (gasp!) de-friend us on social media outlets over our beliefs?

"Therefore, put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist on the evil day and, having done everything, to hold your ground.  So stand fast with your loins girded in truth, clothed with righteousness as a breastplate, and your feet shod in readiness for the Gospel of peace.  In all circumstances, hold faith as a shield, to quench all the flaming arrows of the Evil One.  And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God."  What beautiful imagery St. Paul gives us!  Let us gear up daily!

To gird our loins, means to strengthen ourselves for what is to come and Truth is not a thing but a being: Truth is Christ.  So when St. Paul asks us to gird our loins in Truth after saying "draw strength from the Lord", he's asking us to do the daily work of learning about Christ, who is the Way, the Truth, the Life.  He's asking us to have a relationship with Truth, with Jesus.  He goes on to say we should wear a breastplate of righteousness, meaning in ALL things we do, we must act morally just.  This is how we don our breastplate of righteousness.

St. Paul requests he wear our shoes of the Gospel of peace, so when we do encounter another, we can evangelize with our actions and words; we can share the "Good News" of Christ to all people.  He tells us to carry our shield of faith so we do not get hit by the "flaming arrows" of deception and distortion of truth with which the evil one continually pelts us.  Our shield of faith must be polished daily, renewed in the Spirit through prayer and frequent participation in the sacraments Reconciliation and Holy Eucharist.

Finally, St. Paul reminds us not to forget our helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit.  Think about a helmet for a minute. What is it's job?  To keep our head from injury when we fall.  If we wear the helmet of salvation, we are keeping our head, more importantly our thoughts on Christ our Savior and blocking out the "stinking thinking", the muddles thoughts, the doubts, fears and anxieties the evil one tries to make us believe.  Thus, when we fall, there is no head injury, rather we can see clearly the mercy and love awaiting our return to Christ.  I like to think of this helmet of salvation as a mixture between the Holy Spirit's mental inspirations and my Guardian Angels pokes and prods to keep me on the straight and narrow.  I especially ask my Guardian Angel to help me daily to not fall prey to negative thoughts, discouragement, and the emotional lies of the evil one.  My Angel is there to help me AND to protect me.  With him, I can don my helmet of salvation each day.

The "sword of the Spirit" is such amazing imagery for the word of the Lord.  This means the Bible, the WHOLE Bible, not just the New Testament.  We cannot understand the new covenant, if we do not understand the old covenant.  We cannot trace the roots of certain traditions if we do not read from whence they came.  So let us think of our bibles as our swords of the Spirit, as the Spirit inspired the word of God to be written by men.

Here's a little side note which I think is pretty amazing.  Bishop Oliver Dashe Doeme had a vision when praying for an end to Boko Haram in Nigeria.  Christ appeared and handed him a sword which immediately turned into a rosary.  Let's think about this for a moment.  The rosary, "the weapon for our time" St. Padre Pio lovingly referred to it, is the same weapon Christ gave to Bishop Doeme.  But why?  When we devoutly pray the rosary, what are we doing?  We are meditating on the Gospels, on the events in Jesus' life from conception through the Ascension and the beginning of Mother Church.  So going back to St. Paul's description of the "sword of the Spirit" being the word of God, it makes sense that the rosary can be such a weapon!  How fantastic is that?!  There are no coincidences with God.  

St. Paul concludes:  "With all prayer and supplication, pray at every opportunity in the Spirit.  To that end, be watchful with all perseverance and supplication for all the holy ones and also for me, that speech may be given me to open my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the Gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains, so that I may have the courage to speak as I must."

St. Paul tell us it's not enough to just pray, we should beg humbly at every opportunity and me must persevere.  Only through prayer and the Holy Spirit's gift of supernatural perseverance can we "stand fast" and "hold our ground".

How much do we love when St. Paul asks others to pray for him to have the courage to speak of Christ?  I think of the world today and how many, many people are being persecuted throughout the the world who have that very same courage to speak the name of our Lord, Jesus.  What beautiful witnesses!  Those who live St. Paul's words and wear their armor of God despite the very real dangers they encounter.  May we join them in this spiritual battle and become soldiers for Christ.

Many blessings to you and yours,

Boasting in the Lord!

Boasting in the Lord. St. Paul tells us to do it (1 Cor in thins 1:31). In fact, it's a good thing. Yet he reminds us not to boast in leaders of the world (1 Corinthians 3:21). Ok Paul, I gotcha. Boast in the Lord, my God, my Savior not in flawed sinful men. Yes! I want to. Some days I want to shout with JOY screaming at the top of my lungs sharing all the good things the Lord has done for me. But when does this boasting become just bragging? When does it become "look at me, I'm favored because God has done so much for me"?

This is something with which I struggle a great deal. Some days I am so excited about receiving the Eucharist that morning in Mass, I just want to dance. In fact, (ok I know this is weird but), I do dance "in my head". Walking back from the Communion reception line, here I am in my brain dancing down the aisle singing the only word that ever comes to mind (or maybe the only word that really comes from my heart, who knows), "Yes! Yes! YES! YES! YES!!!". So yes, I WANT to boast in my Lord. I want everyone I meet to get that feeling of pure happiness, that almost uncontainable joy, when receiving our Lord, when participating in the perpetual sacrifice, when taking part in the ONLY moments where Heaven ACTUALLY meets earth.

Have you ever really thought about that? The Mass is the ONLY time in our lives we will be able to experience a bit of Heaven here, in our mortal lifetimes! We know for certain, our gardian angels are there as they come everywhere with us. But have you thought about the fact that there are other angles present as well according to Paul (1 Corinthians 11:10). And what about the saints? We even mention the saints in our Eucharistic prayer. Could it also be possible they are present too? Honoring our Lord at His great table of plenty? Of course it is! And if so, then why AREN'T we flocking to the churches on Sunday, Holy days and every other chance we get? Why AREN'T we boasting in the Lord our God?

Here's what I think. At least for me, it's all about vanity. Curse my stupid pride! I don't want that person to think I believe I'm holier than them. If I say, "Listen to how great God is to me...." I don't want that person I'm speaking with to think of me as a braggart, like the pious Sadducees and the fake Pharisees who thought of themselves above others. No, I would never want someone to think that about me. And so I keep my mouth shut. I choose not to share my great joy in Christ because, heaven forbid (pun intended), someone might think ill of me.

Well no more. The time is NOW. Pride, be gone with you! I happily, loudly, and joyfully boast in Jesus Christ, my Lord, my Savior, and my great, great love.  Today, I shout it from the laptop (not a mountaintop but it will do)!  I stand steadfast in my love and joy of my merciful Lord.  I will not deny Him and my happiness will NOT be contained!

So next time you see me, I just might be dancing down the aisles at Mass unable to contain this great happiness.  And don't stop me outside of church or you just might hear "Hey, guess how good God is to me?".  Because from this day forward you cannot STOP me from boasting in the greatness that we call our Lord and our God.

My prayer for you, my friends, is that you too will find the strength, peace and joy of boasting in Jesus too (whether it be through words or deeds).

Blessings to you and yours,

Homeschooling: Supplementing Religious Ed with Bible Stories

Ok I know this should be obvious but I think, at least for myself, I know there is SO MUCH to learn about our AMAZING, rich, historic religion that I sometimes focus more on those things (Catechism, 7 sacraments, 10 Commandments, the rosary and other prayers, etc.) and less on the Bible itself.  However, I really wanted my religious education to be as complete as I can possibly make it.  Therefore, I decided to add "Breakfast with the Bible" to our daily lessons.  

As Pickle is still so young I began with what I had readily available to me, Little Golden Book: Bible Favorites.  This is a combination of three books in one:  Bible Heroes, Bible Stories for Boys and Girls, and Miracles of Jesus.

A word of caution when using non-Catholic approved Bible stories:  remember to read through them first prior to educating your children.  Be sure there is nothing contrary to Mother Church's teaching. If you find something contrary, you can make the decision to either present it with the Catholic teachings or choose not to present that story/book at all.  You'll know fairly quickly if you can use that resource or not so trust your gut!

The pros using this book (Little Golden Book: Bible Favorites):  

• The stories are written in a kid friendly manner.
• The stories are a VERY simplified version of their bible counterparts and hit on the very basics children would need to know initially about these bible characters.
• These stories provide, what I think, is a nice, brief, first introduction to these bible characters.
• This book is found in large commercial stores easily available.

The cons using this book:

• It cannot possibly fit all bible characters we would want our children to know about.
• The simplified versions of these stories still are missing some very important pieces of the story.  I find myself simply adding in the extra information as I am talking about each character.

I knew I needed to find something more age-appropriate but also Catholic based for my children so I went searching online and found....

Since beginning "Breakfast with the Bible", I have discovered another FANTASTIC bible resource for children.  The New Catholic Picture Bible offered via Catholic Heritage Curriculum is an wonderful resource!  It provides 74 bible stories presented from a Catholic perspective for children sold for only (are you sitting down) $10!  AMAZING!  Each story has a beautiful illustration followed by a fairly concise synopsis of that particular bible story!

How we do "Breakfast with the Bible":

1.  Read bible story:  I spend one whole school week on each story.  So, the first day of the week, we spend time reading and discussing the bible story during breakfast.  

2.  Coloring Page(s):  The second day of the week, I print out a coloring page (or pages) from a simple search on the internet, representing the bible story.    While Pickle colors in the page(s) we discuss the story once again.  It's a nice way to recap the bible story in order to help commit it to memory. 

3.  Extension activites: (rest of the school week) 

      a.  Discuss the Lesson:  We spend time discussing one lesson (or several) we have learned from this bible story.

      b.  Lesson learning activity:  I will try to take one lesson the bible story teaches and create some very simple type of extension activity for it.  Below is an example of what I used for Cain and Able's story.  

We discussed how Cain was not being a good brother to Able and that there are many, many ways we can be good brothers/sisters to our siblings.  Then I had Pickle color this picture and complete this writing prompt.  How easy it was to target written language and handwriting in this simple activity!

I have to admit, I am liking Breakfast with the Bible and am praying we can make this a family tradition!

So this is what we are using to supplement religious education at this time.

In the future, I am planning on purchasing the below curriculum to expand upon our study of scripture:

 Simon Peter School Scripture Study: This is a VERY affordable scripture study program for 3rd-8th grade. I am hoping to use this as a supplement once Pickle gets to third grade!

Now we all know what God does when we plan but this is what I'm thinking right now.  We shall see over the years how this goes!  Do you use a scripture study program with your children?  Please share!  And remember, even if you are not homeschooling, you can always supplement your child's religious education with whatever resources you feel are appropriate!!!!  It's not an ALL or NOTHING thing! I think that's what I love the most about homeschooling.  It's all about what works for you and your family!

Blessings to you and yours,