Have you ever been in one of those arguments where you get sucked into the back and forth, like a frenzied game of tug-a-war? Except no one is playing, and in fact the whole emotional environment feels weighty and overly serious, like we’re arguing about way more than the dishwasher all of a sudden. Sometimes… [Read More]
Who is Mary as Mediatrix?
So I know it’s not May anymore, but I’d like to share a post that was planned for May, but providentially is being published today. What does a name for Mary have to do with the incredible suffering happening now in Orlando? The following is my humble reflection in answer to that question. I had been… [Read More]
Presentation: Mary and the New Evangelization
This presentation was given at the ATX Catholic Day of Reflection at Our Lady of Schoenstatt Shrine on April 30, 2016. The slideshow below was part of the presentation.
Parents & Teens, Freedom & Boundaries
Here at ATXCatholic I don’t often write about my job as a therapist, but today I’d like to delve a little bit into it, through the lens of good theology and a Christian understanding of the human person. I’d like to delve into the concept of boundaries in relationships, specifically between parents and teens. Tricky for… [Read More]
For Catholic Bloggers (ATX Catholic Reflection Day Quick Takes)
For bloggers, as people who are often plugged in, absorbing information, writing and interacting online, etc – how blessed a day of reflection can be! I think this was a common sentiment for all of us that attended the ATX Catholic Day of Reflection last weekend. Speaking for myself, it was a great gift to… [Read More]
The Healing Path of Catholic Psychotherapy – Quick takes
These are my take-a-ways from the annual Catholic Psychotherapy Association Conference, The Face of Mercy: The Healing Path of Catholic Psychotherapy, which happened in Austin this past weekend. I’d like to distill a bit of the core message I experienced, and at the end, I’ll also share a few of the great resources we were given (Disclaimer – these… [Read More]
A Litany of Mercies
If there is one way that we let Divine Mercy Sunday impact our daily lives, let it be this: a litany of mercies! Let us learn to lift up each night before bed, a litany of mercies! So often when we climb into bed, we are proclaiming a litany of worries. All that we didn’t get done… [Read More]
Keep Worship Weird
You might say that the speed at which “Keep Austin Weird” took off says something about how innate this motto is to the nature of our city. It captures in a just few words one essential part of that “something else” about the this town that keeps native here and draws new neighbors in droves…. [Read More]
The Mystery of Iniquity – Rejoicing in weakness
Each Lent it seems I come back to this theme – how do we think about sin and weakness? It’s been helpful for me to examine my own understanding – I can’t make much sense of redemption if I have a distorted view of the sin and weakness that necessitated such a Savior. And an unhealthy view… [Read More]
Longhorns Forging a Culture of Encounter In Our Own Backyard – CARITAS 2016
The week before classes started at UT this January, nearly 80 Longhorn Catholics came back to town early – to go out in mission. This is the 4th year of Austin CARITAS (Catholics Answering the Redeemer’s Invitation to Authentic Sanctity), where UT students give up a week of their winter break to serve those in need… [Read More]
Humility Alone Conceives the Truth – a poem
I hope you are all having a restful and blessed Christmas season! Pope Francis invites us to contemplate what God teaches us in coming as a child: “He makes himself small, he becomes a child, to attract us with love, to touch our hearts with his humble goodness,” and also”Pope Francis said the creche reminds us that… [Read More]
The Door to Mercy – Knowing We Are Loved
For the opening of the Year of Mercy, I was late to mass. Late to mass! Imagine, this great event, once in a Jubilee, and I had even planned ahead to get out of work early – and still I was late to mass, and very late. Walking up to the mass-in-progress, I slid into… [Read More]
Advent: The longing in our hearts for Love Incarnate
“May the Lord make you increase and abound in love, for one another and for all, just as we have for you, so as to strengthen your hearts, to be blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones. Amen” (1 Thes 3:12) We heard… [Read More]
Is it possible entitlement & individualism go hand in hand? (On the parable of the attitude of a servant)
Last Tuesday I was at St William’s in Round Rock for daily mass, and Fr Dean’s homily got me thinking. That day the gospel was from Luke, on the servant who comes in from the field: “Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the… [Read More]
Bubble-wrapped Saints
Bubble-wrapped saints? Let’s take in that image…bubble-wrapped saints! How ridiculous, right? Saints are brave, tough, warriors and queens who sweat through struggle and shed blood fulfilling the will of God, steadfast and stouthearted no matter how difficult the task! But wrapped in insulating bubble wrap…? But, if you think about it, if we carried our… [Read More]
Family, Faith and the Fall College App Craze
There are some big things happening right now in the world of the family in our culture. And as much as we are sons and daughters of God, we are also children of our time, swimming in the atmosphere of our every day environments. That’s not a call to move to the mountains and become… [Read More]
Something Greater Than Ourselves
In a little less than 2 weeks, on October 11, Bishop Joe Vasquez will celebrate Mass at the Marian Shrine of Our Lady of Schoenstatt, in honor of the Feast of Our Lady of Schoenstatt, and to give thanks for the first year anniversary of the Shrine. What might inspire us to go? What might… [Read More]
Spit, Mercy and the Human Spiritual Life
What is it about Jesus spitting, putting his fingers in the deaf man’s ear? It hits on something within us, pulls on something. Some inner notion of cleanliness, of boundaries, of unworthiness. It’s uncomfortable. Unusual. Certainly not how we would expect the God-man to act. Now – to bow at his feet, to stand at… [Read More]
Back to Busy – Inspiration for Fall 2015
Fall is in the air! Well not actually in the air weather-wise – I wish! But despite Texas’ insistence outdoors that summer persists, this week kiddos are loading back into school buses, parents are cheering, teachers are groaning, and the boost of energy and activity seems to pervade many realms of economic and social life…. [Read More]
“Everything is Connected” – The Ecological Spirituality of Laudato Si
“Everything is connected.” This phrase of Pope Francis could be the link that ties the whole of “Laudato Si” together and also communicates the core of his message. “Everything is connected,” he says, in such a way that as humans and the earth are a part of the same ecological fabric, our actions in one part of… [Read More]
An Open Letter to Sr. Simone Campbell (of the Nuns on the Bus)
This blog is in response to an interview aired by the radio program On Being, hosted by Krista Tippett, on June 11, 2015. I invite you to listen to the interview before reading this post, and would especially point your attention to the unedited version of the interview. The time stamps I’ve included are from the… [Read More]
The Heart
This past weekend the wisdom of the Church invited us to experience a beautiful truth – the unity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Church led us into this discovery of this union by celebrating the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart on Friday that leads us into the Memorial of… [Read More]
Signs of the Times
As I was walking through Hobby Lobby last week to buy material to make a gift, I was struck by the number of cute little plaques with words on them – tons of displays for any occasion – teacher gifts, inspirational Bible verses, kitchen signs, man-cave signs – words for everyone.They also had the material to… [Read More]
El Hombre-Masa, el Nuevo-Media y la Reina de la Media
Recién he estado hablando con varia gente sobre nuestro uso los medíos sociales como Católicas. Ya todo estamos de acuerdo que la comunicación ha pasado por una revolución en los dos o tres decades pasados, ya no podemos volver para atrás. ¿Pero sabés que ya hacía tres decades, nuestra Madre Iglesia estaba contemplando como íbamos… [Read More]
The Radio-Man, New Media & The New Man (Vatican II & Social Communication, Part II)
Social media & technology have been coming up recently in several conversations with friends of mine. The other night at a group of us were talking about youth and smart phones. I mentioned I’d been doing some substitute teaching lately, and experienced a little culture shock in seeing how nearly every high school student and… [Read More]
What Are You Ordering for Lent?
What are you ordering for Lent? The blue-plate Friday special with a big t-bone steak! Ha, just kidding! That’s not the kind of order I meant, but I couldn’t resist the silly pun. What are you ordering for Lent – in your life? In my last post I wrote about how changeful my Lenten season is… [Read More]
Changes
Right now my life is going through many changes. I have a new job that signifies a new phase of my professional career. I moved into a new home in a new part of town, and there is a lot yet to be settled and figured out. It’s a whirlwind of a Lenten season, with… [Read More]
Let Yourself be Surprised and Transformed!
I started this year in a different way: going on a mission trip with a group of Schoenstatt girl’s youth in a small, humble town in the countryside of Chile. Now I am convinced that there is no better way to have begun 2015! I am deeply grateful for all that happened; the experience was a… [Read More]
Dejarte Sorprender y Transformar
Empecé este año de manera diferente: yendo a misiones con un grupo de jóvenes de Schoenstatt en un pueblito del campo en Chile. Ahora estoy convencido que no hay mejor manera de haber empezado 2015. Estoy profundamente agradecida por todo lo que pasó y todo lo que Dios me hizo experimentar, regalar y sacrificar… [Read More]
To All Adults, at Christmas
I would like to give you, dear reader, this poem as a gift, in the spirit of the 12 days of Christmas and traveling with the Magi towards Epiphany, to give our humble gifts to the Christ Child. Many Christmas blessings to you all, and a joyful New Year! My dear Adult, ‘tis Christmas time,… [Read More]
Austin CARITAS Mission 2015!
Dear readers! We are in the Third Week of Advent, with Gaudete Sunday! How are you going to share the joy of Christ? This is my Advent Challenge, simply put – how you will go out, as Pope Francis as said so many times, to the periphery to share the joy of the Gospel, to… [Read More]
The Advent of Our Mission
I spent this Thanksgiving looking into our country from the outside, since right now I’m doing a bit of traveling in South America. So naturally, I had to explain to lots of curious friends and strangers what exactly we were celebrating last Thursday. And being the typical American that I am, I had to research… [Read More]
I don’t want to be rescued – I want to be redeemed.
“I don’t want to be rescued. I want to be redeemed.” When I first heard JJ Heller sing these words (listen here) I didn’t quite understand the difference. Why not rescued? Don’t I want God to rescue me? What is the difference between being rescued and being redeemed? I listened to the song again and… [Read More]
La Media Social, la Familia: el Papa Francisco habla sobre una cultura de alianza
Momentos después de la audiencia del Papa Francisco con el Movimiento de Schoenstatt en Roma, sus palabras ya estaban repitiendo por twitter y la media social. ¿Cuales palabras? Las palabras que el Papa dijo sobre el estado del matrimonio y la familia hoy en día. Estas palabras fuertes y claras se tomaron rápido y las… [Read More]
New Media and the Family: Pope Francis speaking on Covenant Culture
Just moments after the Pope’s audience with the Schoenstatt Movement in Rome, his words were reverberating in twitter and in blogs. Which words? The Pope’s strong words about the state of marriage today. These clear and straightforward words were picked up quickly and passed on. The world of the media heard them. “Marriage has never… [Read More]
Called to Life
Today I really can’t write about anything other than the crazy huge party that happened all over the world this past weekend! The Schoenstatt Movement celebrated 100 years since it’s foundation, on October 18th, 1914, when a group of boys and Fr Joseph Kentenich sealed the original Covenant of Love with the Blessed Mother. Rather than go into… [Read More]
Satisfaction Guaranteed or Taste and See
In our consumer culture, we’re used to investigating products before we purchase them. We want our satisfaction guaranteed before we commit to spending the money. Makes perfect sense from a market standpoint. It is safe and healthy to be a bit critical (and very healthy to practice daily discernment), but this structure of trying to guarantee satisfaction first… [Read More]
Come and You Will See
The tents are packed up; the rented chairs have been stacked and taken away. The land is empty and yet not quiet. Mulch covers large patches where grass will need to be planted. Bricklayers come each morning and work on finishing the main walkway. You can usually see the builder around finishing this or… [Read More]
Austin will have a Marian Shrine – Tomorrow!
It’s really happening – tomorrow, Bishop Joe Vasquez will dedicate the first Marian Shrine in the Diocese of Austin! And you’re invited to come! For all information about the Shrine Dedication, including event schedule and off-site parking, please see the website! (And if you can’t come, watch it on live streaming!) God is doing something amazing… [Read More]
Late Have I Loved You
Yesterday I found myself bringing St Augustine’s Feast Day to a close by reciting passages from his writings with a small gathering of friends; we raised a glass to the Doctor and Saint, and celebrated this man who was so dearly human. The passage I recited had been had been reverberating in my mind since that… [Read More]
