I Have a Good Father

What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish? Or hand him a scorpion when he asks for an egg? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the holy Spirit to those who ask him? - Luke 11:11-13

I have a good father. But, I have not always appreciated nor shown my appreciation. I could go way back and talk about the things my father has done for me, but when you're that young you don't really notice or give much attention to them because you're little and it's what parents are supposed to do. But, when you get older, you figure well, for the most part them doing things to take care of you will mostly taper off. Not in my experience.

One of the biggest areas where my father has assisted me and my family has been in our cars (we've also lived with them for a while but this is about the cars). First of all, one of the cars I have now he purchased when I was in college without even telling me. I walked out and there it was. I was really confused. But since then, they've even supplied us with another car. When Erika's car went ca-put my father ended up turning his car over to her. He is a good father.

My father is a very diligent person and pays attention to detail. He takes care of the things he owns, especially his cars. I've learned a lot about cars from him. There have been times when something needed fixing or replacing on one of our cars and I'd know about it and plan to take care of it later, fix it later, save up for it, but my father would come in and purchase or fix what needed to be fixed without even telling me. At times this made me mad. Sometimes I wanted him to show me how/walk me through a process but he'd fix it without me. Other times I just felt like he was stepping in and not allowing me to be the man and take care of my things (seriously, how immature). But he is a good father.

My father is the kind of person that will bend over backwards for others. This is a little off topic, but he is always willing to lend a helping hand to others. Whether it be neighbors, people stuck on the side of the rode (my mom always fussed at him for that), or especially family. He and my mom are always going back and forth taking my grandmas to their doctor appointments, fixing things around the house, etc. On most Saturdays my father is working on Habitat for Humanity houses. Most recently, two Mondays ago, I was going to pick Erika up from the airport and my parents were watching the girls. I stopped to watch a one day event of the new Batman: The Killing Joke movie. As I left to pick up Erika, my car wouldn't start. I called me father to pick his brain about what it might be. In the end he was offering to drive all the way out to check it out or even pick Erika up. I'm talking 9/10:00 at night, 45 minutes away from home. I got a tow truck and he got it started by tapping on the starter so he didn't have to come out. I have a good father.

Back to our cars, both needed new tires. I knew the Honda needed them but I didn't realize how bad. And the Oldsmobile needed them. My father had already told me it needed them. A couple weeks ago we got the Honda tires replaced as well as a new alignment. I was planning on taking care of the Olds in the next couple weeks. But, one morning my father comes in my room and asks if he can take it to put tint on the windows. I was so groggy but I eventually understood what he was asking. How do you say no to that? But, then, a day later I walk outside...brand new tires! I was on my way to work so I texted my father asking if he had replaced the tires and this was his response:

"Life time alignment, two tires planned but had to buy a third because a nail was in a non repairable area. Car will need battery soon. Ordered new front rotors and brake pads. Was waiting to talk later."

What? Are you kidding me?! Honestly, this is a Godsend due to our next adventure in life as a missionary family. And, we're in the midst of fundraising which is going slow so this is a huge financial burden off our back, especially after taking care of the other car.

I know some will think I'm gloating. I know some will think I'm spoiled...maybe. I don't come from a lot of money. We aren't wealthy. I had a father who is smart and is a hard worker, doesn't talk much, but shows his abundance of love by serving. And I know I'm mainly talking about material things. Trust me, there is a ton more I could mention about how my father would spend tons of time with us after a few weeks offshore, how he took us all on fishing trips individually, how he wrote me letters over the years apologizing for all the time he spent away offshore when we were younger. But, honestly, that time away was never really a big factor because of the love he poured on us when he was home. I choose to mention these more recent things because these are things he doesn't have to do but chooses to do. These things I don't expect him to do. And I'm not saying that if other fathers don't do this, they aren't good fathers. Some aren't able to and some raise their kids differently. But, this is how my father serves. So yeah, maybe he does take away from me having to pay for or fix something (that's not the intention and is that really something to complain about), but I am being loved and given many lessons on how to love my wife, my children, and those around me. I have a good father who truly mirrors my good good Father in heaven. I hope I can do the same.

Joy Abounds...Just Not In Caves

This past week at our church vacation bible school was going on. Elanor, our oldest went all week and had a blast. This year's theme was Cave Quest. Because of the theme I figured hey lets go to a real cave. So, I took the girls to Natural Bridge Caverns.

I was so excited for this day trip. We went when we were young and I loved it. The formations of stalagmites and stalactites are dreamlike. It's hard to believe that there aren't any dwarves, trolls, or fairies living down there.

Everything seemed OK at the time. The girls were in a good mood and ready to go. We got in line to get the rules for going through the cave and the girls were climbing all over the stone wall we lined up by. As we made our way to the cave entrance you could feel the temperature getting cooler and cooler. Then we entered. I was not prepared.

This picture explains our trip under ground.

I know Elanor does not like the dark. This did not cross my mind as a factor in going to the cave. There were lights. I was with her. Well for the whole 70 minute tour Elanor complained about being scared, she did not like the cave, her feet hurt, she was hungry, and the water from the ceiling of the cave kept dropping on her. I kept calling her attention to the formations but nope, they weren't cool. Adeline on the other hand was enthralled with the railing she got to hold onto while on the path. But to top it off, as soon as we exited the cave, with a quarter mile left, Elanor had to pee. Oh man did she have to pee! Getting back to the visitor center for the restroom was torture.

As we finally got back into the car we started to make our way to the Gristmill to meet some friends
for dinner. What I didn't know was my friend had a previous engagement soon so there was not much time. As we parked and made our way there it turned out there was an hour wait for a table. I didn't think anything of it. I made it there, put my name down, found an open area, and the girls were playing. To my dismay my friend called to remind me about how they were pressed for time. They suggested another place so I gathered the girls, made my way back to the car, got the girls in the car, and found our way to the next stop, Newk's. We made our way inside and it was a whole new experience.

The girls were running around acting cute and goofy. They were so excited to see the Glaze's and baby Lily. They were on cloud 9. We ordered our food, got to our booth, and they climbed, jumped, giggled, and entertained. The girls were in heaven. Lily allowed us to bask in her cuteness. I got to catch up with my friends on their new adventure in a new home and new job. And after they left, we ended up ordering MORE food because the girls were still hungry. Elanor ate her whole kid sized pizza and half of the full sized pizza we ordered. I guess the cave took a lot out of her. And during this whole time they continued to jump, climb, and wrestle in our booth.

I had made plans to give them a great adventure in the cave, which failed. But joy was found elsewhere, among friends while breaking bread. We got back home after midnight and I got the girls to bed. That 6 hour round trip mainly for the caves was all worth it for the 30 minutes with friends, laughter, and food.

Check out my friends' YouTube channel: That Catholic Couple

Tolkien, Fiction, and a Willingness to Subdue Belief

I finally finished the biography I've been reading on J.R.R. Tolkien. It was a great read and Tolkien continues to be a fascinating person to me. I would love to have been a fly on the wall eavesdropping on the Inklings gatherings.

Tolkien coined the word "sub-creator". What he meant by this term is a person, an author, poet, writer, that has the ability to create such a world that it can be believe to be true and real. This world is a realm you can truly enter. Here's an excerpt from the biography:

"'What really happens', he wrote, 'is that the story-maker proves a successful "sub-creator". He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is "true": it accords with the laws of that world. you therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside'...
'Every writer making a secondary world,' he declared, 'wishes in some measure to be a real maker, or hopes that he is drawing on reality: hopes that the peculiar quality of this secondary world (if not all the details) are derived from Reality, or are flowing into it.'" - Humphrey Carpenter, J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography

The ability of the reader to enter into this secondary world is "the willing suspension of disbelief". I've actually come across Tolkien's "Sub-creator/sub-creation" before in a philosophy class I took on Tolkien. But, it wasn't until finishing this biography that I began to see a connection with faith.

As the truth about reality-about God, the world, and ourselves-is communicated to us in a wide variety of ways, we experience a progressive transformation. We not only think differently and act differently, but we actually begin to desire and feel differently. As we take on the "mind of Christ" we also take on His desires and participate in the dynamics of His active love. - Ralph Martin, The Fulfillment of All Desire: A Guidebook for the journey to God Based on the Wisdom of the Saints

Quite naturally everyone develops their own world view based on their upbringing, culture, religion, politics, entertainment, etc. But, as Christians, to best live out our call to holiness is to try to see the world through God's eyes. We are to strive to conform our wills to His. This makes me think of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit : wisdom, counsel, knowledge, piety, understanding, fortitude, fear of the Lord.

These gifts allow us to suspend our flawed world view and conform it to His to better live this life and spread and defend the faith. Fear of the Lord (awe and wonder) allows us to truly see our relationship to God, he is God and we aren't God. This is not a fear of punishment but a fear of ruining a relationship, the fear of creating a chasm between us and him. This leads to wisdom. Wisdom allows us to take the high ground as in chess or war, to get an eagle eye view of the spiritual realm of the world. Through this we come to see what is owed to God, praise and thanksgiving. Piety allows us to give him that which he is owed. By taking this position of praise and thanksgiving it humbles us to look to God and his Church for knowledge and understanding of things in the spiritual realm. Counsel allows us to used the knowledge and understanding we have to then realize and choose the right, true, and good in situations. Finally, fortitude allows us to then act when it isn't easy.

When reading fiction that gives us worlds we can truly enter we are willing to suspend our disbelief and abide by the rules and laws of these worlds. Works like The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter give us such terrain. We come to understand that magic, wizards, hobbits, elves, house elves, dwarves, dragons, ents, aurors, dementors, orcs, and balrogs, rings of power, horcruxes, and a dark lord truly exist. There truly is a wizarding world, Lothlorien, Azkaban, Rivendell, The Ministry of Magic, the Forbidden Forest, Mirkwood, The Shire, Hogwarts, Gondor, Mordor, and Mount Doom, and we know how to get there.

As we come to see this world as it truly is, through the eyes of it's Creator, we see that there is more to it than meets the eye, the seen and unseen. We are more than just creatures, we are adopted sons and daughters. God is more than a creator and clock maker, he is a bridegroom inviting us, his bride, to his wedding feast. There is a heaven, a hell, virtues, vices, graces, angels and demons, and there is a narrow path that is not easy but must be taken. Jesus came to live amongst us and die for our sins so that we could be with him in heaven for eternity. He left behind a Church and the Holy Spirit to help guide us.

If we have a willingness to suspend our belief that there is no rhyme or reason, that there is no purpose to our existence, that we become tree food at the end of our life and that's it, then we will be able to truly journey through this life because a journey has a destination.

Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. - Romans 12:2

I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. - John 14:6

Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole being, and with your whole strength. Take to heart these words which I command you today. Keep repeating them to your children. Recite them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up. Bind them on your arm as a sign and let them be as a pendant on your forehead. Write them on the doorposts of your houses and on your gates." - Deuteronomy 6:1-9

Here's a great video from Bishop Robert Barron on Confirmation and The Gifts of the Holy Spirit

Bishop Barron on Lord of the Rings: Part 1

Bishop Barron on Lord of the Rings: Part 2

There's Nothing New Under the Sun - But Did You Love?

It's kind of exhausting, the world we live in, where society is all about attention seeking and everyone narcissistically trying to 'be different". No one wants to look like everyone else but in turn looks like everyone they surround themselves with. In the age of social media everyone feels like they have to one up someone else because everyone else is living a better, happier, more exciting life. Everyone wants to become famous because that means they've made it, all eyes are looking on them.

Like I mentioned in a previous post I'm reading a biography about J.R.R Tolkien. In a short passage
it talks about how a man who has so impacted the world of literature and the imaginations of generations who lead what seems to be a simple boring life:

And after this you might say, nothing else really happened. Tolkien came back to Oxford, was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of English Language and Literature, went to live in a conventional Oxford suburb where he spent the first part of his retirement, moved to a nondescript seaside resort, came back to Oxford after his wife died, and himself died a peaceful death at the age of eighty-one. it was the ordinary unremarkable life led by countless other scholars; a life of academic brilliance, certainly, but only in a very narrow professional field that is really of little interest to laymen. And that would be that - apart from the strange fact that during these years when 'nothing happened' he wrote two books which have become world best-sellers, books that have captured the imagination and influenced the thinking of several million readers. It is a strange paradox, the fact that The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are the work of an obscure Oxford Professor whose specialization was the West Midland dialect of Middle English, and who lived an ordinary suburban life bringing up his children and tending his garden.

The following paragraph bears a great question:

Or is it? Is not the opposite precisely true? Should we not wonder instead at the fact that a mind of such brilliance and imagination should be happy to be contained in the petty routine of academic and domestic life; that man whose soul longed for the sound of the waves breaking against the Cornish coast should be content to talk to old ladies in the lounge of a hotel at a middle-class watering-place; that a poet in whom joy leapt up at the sight and smell of logs crackling in the grate of a country inn should be willing to sit in front of his own hearth warmed by an electric fire with simulated glowing coal? What do we make of that?

In the end, when death is on our doorstep, it's not about how we look or the things we've accumulated. It's about how we lived, how we spent our time. This man loved his wife beyond measure. In his first quest story and the center of The Silmarillion the two main lovers, Beren and Luthien, are in fact Tolkien and his wife, Edith. The story was inspired by a time the took a walk in some woods and he recalls, "Her hair was raven, her skin clear, her eyes bright, and she could sing - and dance." In a letter Tolkien wrote to his son 50 years after Edith's death he said, "She was (and knew she was) my Luthien."

I think the most powerful thing is not that Tolkien made his wife into a key character, not that he had Luthien written on her gravestone, not that she was Luthien, but that she KNEW she was his Luthien. Who cares what you look like, or what you have, or if you stand out. There's nothing new under the sun. This is coming from a guy with dreads and a beard (those aren't new, they've just been made trendy). How have you loved? Do the people in your life know they are loved?



Updated:
Watch Bishop Barron's video on The Great Divorce:
Bishop Barron on C.S. Lewis' "The Great Divorce"
In C.S. Lewis' The Great Divorce the narrator sees a great procession with a woman being praised and honored at the front. He thinks to himself that this must be Mary, the Mother of God, the Queen of Heaven. His guide tells him no, that Sarah Smith. She was a woman on earth of no great stature. She was an ordinary woman. She ran a boarding house. The people she met became part of her family and she even cared for animals. Yet, as Bishop Barron says, "In the eyes of heaven she's honored to the nth degree."

Rant from a Millennial

I’m tired of all this complaining about millennials. Maybe I’m just surrounded by great people from my generation (and I am) but I don’t know any of these complaining millennials everyone complains about expecting everything to be given to them. I know they exist but every generation has these types of people. The people I do know and the things I do see and hear constantly are people in older generations constantly doing the complaining. They’re the ones writing the articles and blogs and they are the talking heads on TV and radio that complain and moan.

It’s all a circle. The older generations complain that the younger generations aren’t exactly like them so something’s wrong. I read an article about how people are not happy with a statue put up in our town of two young girls taking a selfie. Among other statues the point is to have statues that reflect what normally happens in that area of town, Town Center. One lady commented “This is why we hate the younger generation.” Wow, strong words! Hate?  I think the amount that people are bothered by this statue is more of a reflection on some of the people in the community and not on the statue. Once someone leaves one age group they forget they were probably the same way and have a down casting eye instead of an eye and heart that says, “Let me lead them to something greater.” I  know people my age who have done this, they are older now and complain about the younger, as if things/they have changed that much.

(I just read in a biography on J. R. R. Tolkien that he recalls a memory while being sick with pneumonia and his grandfather was staying with them. He remembers him, " standing by my bedside, a tall thin black-clad figure, and looking at me and speaking to me in contempt-to the effect that I and my generation were degenerate weaklings." This was in 1923.)

I don’t think people stop and realize that SOMEONE raised the younger generation, and someone else raised the generation that is currently raising the young. And that someone, naturally, is the older generation doing the complaining. Things don’t just happen. It was the older generations that decided to stop having family meals. It was the older generation that decided to put sports, extracurricular activities, and school above faith and family. It was the older generation that decided to enact no fault divorce that started the divorce trend that is ravaging the western world (before you get sensitive I’m not saying all divorces are the same)(In my philosophy class my professor presented us with a study that showed the top 5 worse things that could happen to a person. Divorce was in that top 5 because of how far reaching and lasting the effects of it is). The younger generation is not the one that decided for themselves that they move too much and have too much energy for the older generation to try and have patience with and learn to work with and decided to put themselves on drugs that dull their senses and turn them into zombies thus starting the abuse of such drugs. It is the older generation that has so corrupted our economy that there is a lack of well-paying jobs and our cost of living is so high that so many millennials are living at home. It’s not the youth who are deciding that they need to be in all honors and AP classes even though they aren’t equipped for it, multiple sports and clubs and then end up with busted bodies by time they graduate and depressed and even suicidal deciding to cope with cutting and prescription drug use from their parent’s cabinets or the doctors they’re sent to. It’s not the youth who have made the porn industry so successful to gross more money than the NFL, MLB, and NBA combined, in turn encouraging the pornification of every other entertainment medium.

Our country did not end up the way it is over night. The younger generations are not the way they are on accident. As St. John Paul II said in a homily back in 1986, “As the family goes, so goes the nation, and so goes the world in which we live.” We all know it. I’ve met so many parents that complain about competition in schools, sports, band, etc, yet they continue to succumb to it and form their lives around those things. They complain about how they never see their kids, everyone is so busy, they miss so much church. Parents wonder why their kids are depressed and they have no idea why. No one knows what is going on in the other family members’ hearts and minds.

At our final Confirmation night I invited parents. Some came. I challenged the teens to really think about what the sacrament is about (being more closely bound to the Church, strengthened by the Spirit, and are more strongly obligated to spread and defend the faith with their actions and words). Then I challenged the parents by reminding them what they promised they’d do at their child’s Baptism (raise them in the faith). I asked them if that has been happening. If so, great. If not, it’s time to start because they are not done raising their kids in the faith until…well they are never done. Hopefully if they are in heaven they’ll continue praying for their children. I closed by having the families not just pray with each other but by praying OVER each other. They were to share something real about what they need prayer for and take turns praying over each other. The majority had never done this and this was uncomfortable and challenging.

Stop all the complaining and take responsibility for your family. Families are what will make real change. But what do I know. I’m just a complaining millennial. 

Check out:

The Importance of Family Dinners

St. John Bosco's Ten Tips for Helping Our Youth

Do You Trust Your Father?

The writer, Anais Nin, once said "We don't see things as they are; we see them as we are.” When Chris approached me two years ago asking what I thought of our family becoming missionaries with AdoreMinistries, I saw the idea as I was. Having recently been diagnosed with postpartum depression (PPD), a terrible anxiety gripped my life.  I saw missionary life as the surrendering of the only strings of security that I had left, which were Chris's steady paycheck and a life I've grown to love alongside his wonderful parents who have graciously shared their home with us. I saw our leaving the home where we had brought both our daughters from the hospital, and where I had come to know the sense of security and stability that was not present in my childhood. The voice of anxiety in me said that only a fool would give that up for a life in which we must depend on the kindness and generosity of others, and a life of unknowns. In short, I saw all of the truths of missionary life—less traditional security and having to move—through the lens of my own depression.

I would like to add here that PPD, which was soon followed by a diagnosis of major depressive disorder, has been one of the biggest gifts in my life. Brutal, dark, heavy, but a gift. You see, depression is not something that I can just get over, move past, or heal on my own. It has taken a village of people to lift me, support me, and most importantly restore my faith. I've learned that at some point in my life I determined that being self-sufficient and independent was what I needed in order to survive. I had no idea that this internal message bled over into every part of me including my spiritual life.  Fighting depression has, like the steady flow of river water, carved in me a place for trust to live and move. A few months into my counseling journey, I came across this passage from Magnificat that I would like to share with you. It has been one of most eye-opening and influential pieces of writing that I've come across in the last two years. This was in the Lenten edition this year, which was when I began praying about Adore missionary life.

“Too often the cause of our anxieties is a hidden trust in our own strength and understanding. We try to operate out of our own, false self-sufficiency. The anxiety that gets the better of us is the fear that we will not be taken care of. Anxiety of this sort stands as a deep mistrust of God’s Providence, of God’s Fatherly protection of us. Anxiety makes us doubt that love is enough; it makes us doubt God himself…”

I realized that I absolutely struggle with believing I will be taken care of and that God is a Good Father in whom I can place my trust. For as long as I can remember I've believed that if I don't take care of myself no one else will. I have a tendency to operate with an internal backup generator for when life's storms bring havoc rather than abandoning myself to the care of the one whose voice can calm the wind. Dealing with an illness that often feels greater than any strength I could ever summon has systematically broken down my desire to be self-sufficient. I know that I need help; I know I need people.

This realization stands in stark contrast to modern society’s insistence that we, especially women, should depend on nothing and no one to be happy and healthy. While I agree that happiness is primarily an interior work, I also deeply believe that the more we belong to each other the more loving a place our world can become. This is a draw of missionary life for me. I want to provide a childhood for my daughters in which they are encouraged first to love others and then to pursue their wildest dreams, for without love we are nothing and our trophies become obsessions.  

Also, in the last 5 years I have watched Chris, a truly exceptional human being, give his time and passion to youth ministry. There is no doubt he has a gift for it, and I have always supported that. But his true gift is an ability to be present to people. He can make others feel they have a steady, loving friend in their lives, and that is something for which our world has a dire need. That combined with his genuine love for all people, especially anyone that could be labeled as an outcast, make him a great youth minister. As the months passed and I began responding to treatment and improving, I came across the Adore Ministries name during morning prayer, and there was a lurch in my gut. I felt like I could begin to see our family stepping out in faith. Maybe. I decided to tell Chris I was praying about it only to discover he felt drawn to do the same. What drew me back to this opportunity over a year after I had dismissed it? Adore's heart is in loving those whom society has looked down upon or forgotten. I see our partnership with such a wonderful mission as a chance for that gift of presence Chris has to make a BIG Impact. And I see an opportunity to be a part of that too. Much of my battle with depression has consisted of figuring out how to survive, and I believe many of my gifts and talents have been buried in that process.  It is my hope that this new adventure will bring a new level of fulfillment to my life as a woman and mother, to our marriage, and in turn to our family  life.

There is a verse from Acts that Adore has in its mission statement: “Go tell the people everything about this life.” Those words capture the transparency and genuine nature that I've come to love about this group of missionaries. Tell them everything about this life? Even that I am a minister's wife who takes antidepressants and goes to therapy? Even that I have had anxiety so bad that I've missed Sunday mass? YES. Because behind the truth of my struggles is a GRACE so fierce and a love so deep and true that sharing one without the other would be false and empty. That verse comes from a passage in Acts in which an Angel frees the disciples from prison. How can we speak of freedom if we are ashamed to tell of our time in chains? What would I really have to offer anyone if all I want to share is the good in my life? My struggles forge a connection with the imperfection of this life, which I believe tethers me to others and draws us all closer to God.

“He had decided to continue down the winding, dangerous path indicated for him…to accept that he had not been told everything he wanted to know, but simply to trust. He had no desire to doubt again, he did not want to hear anything that would deflect him from his purpose.”  

—from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

So I have decided to trust. To believe in what we hope to do—beyond reason or doubt. I choose to trust that love IS enough, that it is everything, in fact. I am a work in progress who is learning to see God as a good, good Father. I have no idea what is in store for us, but I know that choosing to love others and choosing to give to those who can never repay you just can't be a mistake. It can't. That kind of faith waters the deepest roots of goodness in humanity. It breathes life into dusty bones. It heals and restores. It is the kind of faith I want behind everything I do, and it is the legacy I hope to give my daughters so that they may one day have the courage to believe in Love. With that desire to trust I walk hand in hand with my family into missionary life. I hope you'll walk with us in prayer, support, and encouragement.

We're Leaving. We're Moving. On to New Adventures.

We're leaving Sacred Heart. We're moving to Dickinson, TX area. We're excited to start new adventures as a full time missionary family with Adore Ministries.

This was not in our plans. Missionary life was definitely not on the radar. We've always supported Adore by supporting a missionary and their purpose. I remember when we moved back to Texas I asked Erika out of the blue what were her thoughts on just the idea of joining Adore. I got a "No way", which was in reference to missionary life/fundraising a salary and not Adore itself. A year later, Adore specifically popped into Erika's prayer but nothing came of it. It was noted and we moved on.

This past January I hired Ennie Hickman to come speak to our catechists at our catechist appreciation dinner. Afterwards we caught up since we hadn't seen each other in a good while. Out of sheer curiosity I asked him what it was like for a family to go from a church salary position to missionary life. Overall he expressed how much more whole and fulfilling his marriage and family life had become. We had a long talk about mission life and the mission of Adore. I then went home, told Erika about the conversation and she replied, "I'm open to it. Let's set up a meeting." Wuh?!

We met with Adore a few times and then got serious. We were given a month to discern. At that point I was ready to go. A month? A whole month?! Let's do this now! But one of their strengths is their slow moving in decision making. They are very prayerful and intentional about what they do, where they go, and who they bring in. But, this was a huge time of growth for me. I was forced to actually stop and discern. A good friend of Erika's gave us some great things to think about: What if we were really called to mission work but not Adore? Had we looked at other missionary groups? What if we weren't called to missionary life? Had we looked into anything/anywhere else? Good questions. We also had advice given to us to imagine for 3-4 days that we had decided to say yes/had already been received into Adore and then 3-4 vice versa, what if we didn't join. How would we feel?

In the end, it was our prayer experiences that were the final kickers to our decision (Erika will share her experience in a guest post). For myself, I was praying in our chapel and reading Ralph Martin's The Fulfillment of All Desire: A Guidebook for the Journey to God Based on the Wisdom of the Saints. I got to a point where it mentioned that St. Francis de Sales encouraged lay people to work up to an hour of prayer a day. I decided I was going to stay in there for an hour. Our church is Sacred Heart Catholic Church so naturally we had a Sacred Heart statue.This statue depicts Jesus with his exposed heart (no, his chest isn't busted open, his heart is just on the outside) and him pointing to it. I sat there and begged Jesus to tell me where he wanted me, where he wanted my family to be, what did he want us to do. I did not hear any voice but I had an overwhelming experience of Jesus telling me, "I want you right here, I want you where my heart is." Where's his heart? With the lost, down trodden and the poor. That is exactly where Adore's heart is. For the next couple weeks leading up to our decision date as far as I was concerned I was all in but I wanted to remain open so up until the second we were asked for our answer I was in discernment.

Since then I've been thinking about how I've arrived at this point and have been able to see how God has been grooming me for this. A large part of what Adore is about and does is community and living out Acts. I have been supported and have depended on others/community since college. When I was interning in Austin I lived with two families the two years I was there. When Erika started her masters degree we moved in with my parents so we wouldn't have to take out loans. When we moved to Colorado the parish I was at supplied our housing. We have been with my parents since moving back. And finally, and probably the most important has been the love and support of the Faith Formation Department staff at Sacred Heart. The three years we have been back in Texas have been very rewarding and very challenging. After our youngest daughter, Adeline, was born Erika was diagnosed with severe postpartum depression. There have been times where I have needed to head home to be with her. The staff has expressed with me over and over and has always followed through that if I ever needed to leave work, even in the middle of one of my own events, that I should and they would cover for me. The staff has been such a blessing and expression of real community and support.

It's bittersweet leaving Sacred Heart but we are very excited for our new adventure. Please, please, please keep us and the Sacred Heart youth ministry in prayer. If you'd like to learn more about Adore and where we'll be going and what we'll be doing and if you'd like to partner with us I'd love to get with you to talk about it.

Check out Adore Ministries !

"Go and take your place in the temple area, and tell the people everything about this life." - Acts 5:20