Special

I would like to share about my day yesterday.

One of the joys of living here is knowing the men who are becoming or have become priests. To be formed for a priestly vocation, here, in Rome is truly a remarkable gift. It is a reality that plays out before my eyes in the men that I meet. THEY are remarkable and will lay down every ounce of their lives for Christ, for the Church until their last breath. They already do. It is beauty.

These relationships bear fruit in remarkable, personal, unique ways. They LOVE to exercise their ministry. They LOVE to bring us to Jesus. Knowing priests and deacons in Rome, means private Masses at the alters in St. Peter's, access to hidden treasures (little nuns who safeguard tucked away treasures love a kind face in a collar...), the Sacraments, blessings...

Yesterday, after a morning brunch and fellowship with several women, four friends of mine: a priest, a deacon and two seminarians came to the house where we were gathered. There, Father offered Mass for about 12 of us. The seminarians had prepared music, one even played the drums. I sang the responsorial Psalm. Following this beautiful Mass, the men prepared the alter and we had adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and a time of worship. As we neared the end of our time of Adoration and prayer, Father came around and stood before each one of us individually with the monstrance. He held the Lord inches from our eyes and prayed for each of us individually, blessing each and every one of us.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

In his homily, speaking directly to us women about how we witness in a unique way to the beauty of faith, he charged us with a task, in the words of St. Gianna Beretta Molla, "Be living witnesses of the greatness and beauty of Christianity."

Truly, it is through such offerings, such gifts... through brothers such as these who give up their whole day to minister to us so personally and to stand with us in prayer, in worship... that we are strengthened, supported, nourished, loved and thus enabled to be those witnesses.

The Lord told me during my preparations to come here, that he would begin to teach me about beauty. As I read Aristotle in the Eternal City, down the road from the Holy Father, in the company of the holy ones of God, in the shadow of St. Peter's... I can only begin to grasp what beauty might mean. I do know one thing: the Lord himself is beauty. He is the most beautiful.

"Every realm of nature is marvelous... for each and all will reveal to us something natural and something beautiful." ~ Aristotle