Pause+Pray

“Be strong, fear not! Here is your God” (Is 35:4). Today we choose joy and rejoice not in wishful thinking, but in the reality of God’s saving love.

Sometimes our faith can feel isolating. Yet its promise is that Jesus welcomes us all to the table as we rejoice in his love for us.

This month during a baptism in my parish, a toddler called out loudly, “I see the baby’s face!”, and we erupted into laughter. What image of the Christ Child comes to mind as the perfect face of a baby? 

St. Augustine hit the nail on the head when he famously said, “Love and then do as you please.” All the commandments align as we try to love God and love our neighbor.

We live in divided times. In this time of discordant rhetoric, it's crucial that we stand as a model for virtue and civility.

Full disclosure: I am kind of obsessed with sound and music. So when I recently reread the story of St. Juan Diego and his encounter with Mary in Mexico in 1531, my ears perked up—literally—when I discovered that he heard ...