Category: Eternal Life

Redemption

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, Gospel, healing, spiritualityLeave a comment

Holy Thursday
April 2, 2026

The whole neighborhood remembered the day Pete Nichols finally came home from the war. He was five years late, lost in a mystery of silence even to his own family.

Like most 1950s neighborhoods, we had poured into the streets that Saturday morning to sweep pavements, scrub marble steps, and wash the one or two cars along the curb. Pete jumped off the number 5 trolley, carrying a tattered duffel bag. He stood looking up the sunlit street as if considering a purchase. Slowly, his identity dawned on the scattered neighbors like a cloudy sunrise. Finally, carried by an astonished buzz, it reached his mother whose back had been turned from his approach.

She didn’t erupt, as might have been expected. She turned and walked to him as if he had just returned from a short errand. Like lava across wilderness, they moved in the timeless motion toward redemption. They were two people standing on the empty blotter of the intervening years. With every step, the ink of her forgiveness poured into the void. Pete was a man coming home to the truth that he was loved.

Two such men sat at Jesus’s table on Holy Thursday night. One was also named Peter, the other Judas. It would take just a night, not years, for them to wander from their true home. In just one night, each would deny or betray Love. Each would face the void of having turned from God. One would be swallowed by it and one would repent.

The journey to self-forgiveness is long and treacherous, no matter the time it takes. Nothing frightens us more than our own fragile humanity, which can err and injure and pretend. But courage can help us face the cold precise truth of our vulnerability. It can still our souls to feel the enduring presence of love and forgiveness. It can turn our hearts to God’s knowing gaze that heals rather than shames.

The neighbors never learned where Pete had been in those lost years. We never heard his mother rehearse the magnanimity of her endurance. What we did learn from them was the courage to come home and the strength to forgive. What we learned from them was Easter.

Music: I’m Coming Home – Skylar Grey

Consider this adapted version of Scripture:

Then Jesus said, “There was once a widow who had just two children – grown twins. One said to his mother, ‘Mother, I demand what’s coming to me.’

“So the mother divided the property between them. It wasn’t long before the boy packed his bags and left for a distant country. There, undisciplined and reckless, he wasted everything he had. After he had gone through all his money, a severe famine swept that country, and he began to feel the hunger. He took a job with a local citizen who sent him into the fields to feed the pigs. He was so hungry he would have eaten the husks in the pig slop, but no one gave him anything.

“That brought him to his senses. He said, ‘All those hired workers of my mother have more than enough to eat, and here I am starving to death! I’m going back home. I’ll say to her, ‘Mother, I’ve sinned against God and against you; I don’t deserve to be called your son. Take me on as one of your hired hands.’ So he got up and went home to his mother.

“While he was still a long way off, his mother saw him. Her heart pounding, she ran to him, embraced him, and kissed him. The son began his speech: ‘Mother, I’ve sinned against God and against you; I don’t deserve to be called your son any longer.’ But the mother wasn’t listening. She was remembering the day he was born. She felt like he was being born again!

She called to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Then bring the fattened calf and prepare it. We’re going to celebrate with a feast! My son is here—he was as good as dead and is alive again! He was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate with great joy.

“Meanwhile, her daughter was in the dairy. When she came near the house, she heard music and dancing. She called one of the servants and asked what was happening. The servant told her, ‘Your brother has come home, and your mother has prepared a feast because he has returned safe and sound.’

“The young woman became angry and refused to go in. Her mother came out and pleaded with her, but she would not listen. She said, ‘All these years I’ve worked for you and never disobeyed you, yet you never gave me even a small celebration with my friends. But when this rascal of yours comes back—after wasting your money—now you throw a feast for him!’

“Taking her daughter’s face in her hands, the mother said, ‘My precious daughter, you are my image and my heart, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because your brother was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

I will keep my covenant with you …

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Eternal Life, Faith, Lent, spirituality, Virtue2 Comments

Fifth Sunday of Lent
March 22, 2026

I will keep my covenant with you … to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.
Genesis 17:7

Understanding is a Gift of the Holy Spirit which allows us
to grasp, at least in a limited way,
the essence of the truths of our faith.
Through understanding, we gain a trust in God
that moves beyond circumstances,
enabling us to find meaning and peace in our lives.

The fifth week of Lent is filled with high drama. Impossible things happen at the hand of God: Lazarus comes back from the dead; both innocent Suzanna and the adulterous woman are saved; three men pass unharmed through Nebuchadnezzar’s fire; and Jesus proclaims he is the Son of God. It is a week when the truth of God’s power confronts the security of human conventions. From what symbolic graves is God asking me to rise?

(This story is a repeat for those of you who are familiar with the blog. But I choose to include it again because I love it so much. These two individuals were very precious to me and taught me so much. I hope I have been able to share some of that learning with you, my readers.)

The golden morning had broken bright and warm through the hospital windows. With its breaking, the attending physician and chaplain had received a page. Dorothy had taken an unexpected turn. She was struggling both to live and to die. 
As they attended and comforted her, Dorothy managed to whisper,” … wait for Henry.” Henry, her husband of fifty-eight years, had arrived promptly at 7:00 a.m. daily for all the weeks of Dorothy’s hospitalization. Glancing at her watch, the chaplain saw that it was just 6:50 AM. 

When, after ten prolonged minutes, Henry appeared at the door, he carried a small bouquet of yellow roses from their beloved garden. Quickly comprehending the changed situation, he laid the roses aside and hurried to hold Dorothy for the last few minutes of her life. In the loving, covenanted presence Dorothy had waited for, she finally embraced a peaceful death.

It had not been easy for Dorothy to die nor, from then on, had it been easy for Henry to live. Still, through many bereavement visits, the chaplain watched their long, honest love arise to heal Henry. Through prayer and the benediction of memories, Henry understood that their love, like the roses still blooming in their garden, was both fragile and perpetual.
In this week’s readings, God again calls us to such a love.

As God brought Lazarus, Suzanna and Shadrack out of darkness and death, so God promises to bring us. “I will keep my covenant with you,” God says. “Whoever keeps my word will never die.”

Accompanying Jesus, as he nears Jerusalem, let us trust and cherish these promises in our own darknesses and bereavements.

Music: Surrexit Dominus

Latin Lyrics & English Translation:
Latin:
Surrexit Dominus vere,
Alleluia, alleluia.
Victimae paschali laudes,
Immolent Christiani.

Mors et vita duello,
Conflixere mirando:
Dux vitae mortuus,
Regnat vivus.

Surrexit Christus spes mea,
Praecedet vos in Galilaeam.
Credamus cum Maria,
Et gaudeamus cum Ecclesia.

English:
The Lord is truly risen,
Alleluia, alleluia.
To the Paschal Victim, let Christians offer praise.

Death and life contended
In wondrous conflict:
The Prince of Life, once slain,
Now lives and reigns.

Christ, my hope, has risen,
He goes before you into Galilee.
Let us believe with Mary,
And rejoice with the Church.

Suggested Scripture: John 11:1-45

Click for Scripture

For your reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

I Am the Truth …

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Cross, Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, Lent, spirituality, TruthLeave a comment

Fourth Sunday of Lent
March 15, 2026

Veracity is the virtue of being truthful in all things.

Recently, I heard our culture referred to as “The Post-Truth Age”. I found that statement to be both accurate and frightening. In a world completely entangled in lies, veracity is a lonely virtue. Jesus knew that. As he nears Jerusalem, it becomes increasingly apparent that those who live by the Lie will seek to exterminate him. But, in Jesus, Truth is eternal. Through his Resurrection, we are welcomed into that infinite Veracity.

Throughout this week, the Word of God is leading us – out of darkness, out of blindness, out of fear, out of all that inhibits the eternal life of grace within us. Time is drawing close to Calvary, when our faith will be tested. Jesus wants us to remember the miracles and words of this week so that our faith will not be shaken by the days to come.

Like Antonia, in the story below, Jesus wants us to find the Truth that supersedes circumstances. It is a Truth that rests in full and honest relationship with him.

“End stage melanoma,” the doctor pronounced, after Antonia requested complete honesty.

It seemed unfair to those who knew her: an ebony spot, unnoticed on her back, soon would bleed its ink across her death certificate. For Antonia, though, the irony lay not in her diagnosis, but in the thought that so few people really knew her or would care.

An unmarried, retired teacher, Antonia was an only child. With only distant cousins, she had made the parish her family. She was a daily communicant, a generous contributor, and a respected neighbor. Antonia knew this. But, for decades, she had still gone home each night to a lonely house and a solitary life.

How surprised she was when, during her final weeks in hospice, visitors came in waves to comfort her. Students spoke of her steady influence; neighbors of her charity. Colleagues remembered her patience. When one visitor lamented Antonia’s situation, she stopped him, mid-sentence. “I have never been happier,” she said. “I had no idea so many people loved me.”

Life’s circumstances can conspire to convince us that we are unimportant, unloved, even useless. Sometimes, these perceptions are self-imposed. At other times, they are pressed on us by hostile forces, as they were on Jesus at the end of his life. But Jesus assures us in this week’s readings: “The one who believes in me will never die.” He touches the blind man with light and the royal official’s son with resurrection. Jesus calls us to trust that we are infinitely loved. Believing it, we have the strength – even the joy- to go with him to Calvary.

Music: Jerusalem, My Destiny – Rory Cooney

Suggested Reading: Ephesians 5:8-14

Click for scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Joel’s Invitation

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, Hope, Lent, spirituality5 Comments

Ash Wednesday
February 18, 2026

Contrition is an act of the will, not just an emotion,
involving grief for past sins and a desire to regain God’s friendship.
There are two types:
perfect contrition, motivated by a love for God, and
imperfect contrition, motivated by a fear of punishment or hatred of sin.

“Even now,” declares the LORD, “return to me with all your heart,
with fasting and weeping and mourning.”
Rend your heart and not your garments.
Return to the LORD your God Who is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in love, Who relents from overwhelming us.

Joel 2:12-13

“Even now…” – two of the most powerful words in scripture. Picture yourself saying them to a long-lost friend, or that friend to you. Even now – after all these years, after all you took for granted, after all your ingratitude, forgetfulness, pretense, indifference. Even now, I love and forgive you.

With the touch of sacred ashes, God reiterates that assurance to us … Even now, God waits and wants to restore us to wholeness, as in this story where you might even find yourself.

She had arranged to visit with an old college friend. They had been separated too long by the distancing choices that life often demands. She wanted to reconnect to that rare experience of shared transparency found just once or twice in a lifetime – the gift of a real friend.

They sat on a porch overlooking a gentle pond. The day was bright, the coffee hot, the chairs comfortable. But the magic was gone. Only half her friend had arrived for the cherished conversation. The other half – joy, adventure and the excess of youthful hope – had been lost. Somewhere in the intervening years, her friend had suffered a wound she did not share. This one afternoon would be too short a time to give that wound a name.

The ministry of healing requires time, whether it is to our own soul or to another’s that we bring the sweet ointment of restoration. It requires the quiet listening of a loving spirit. It requires the honest naming of wounds and the ardent desire to be made new.

As we begin our Lenten experience, God is waiting to receive us. God already knows the wounds we will bring to the conversation, already sees where our heart’s light has dimmed. God holds our half-heartedness next to his own heart and yearns to heal us.

Can we hear God’s unique invitation to us in this Lenten season? Can we confidently expose to the Divine gaze the depth of our need for grace and transformation? Can we journey with Christ, through his passion and death, to the wholeness we are called to?

Music: Parce Domine – 6th-century Latin antiphony sung here by A Capella Catholic Choir

Suggested Reading: Joel 2:12-17

Click for Scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Candlemas: A Seasonal Anchor

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Christmastide, Courage, Creation, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, Jesus, Mary, Seasons, spiritualityLeave a comment

Feast of the Presentation
February 2, 2026

Candlemas,
also known as the Feast of the Presentation of Jesus Christ,
the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary,
or the Feast of the Holy Encounter,
is a Christian feast day commemorating
the presentation of Jesus
at the Temple by Joseph and Mary.
It is based upon the account in
Luke 2:22–40.

How do the great trees die and come to life again? It’s a question we might ponder every winter as the bare, black branches fill with ice. Their stark emptiness seems a place from which there is no return. But we know otherwise. In the relentless cold of every February, our experience whispers the hope for April. Our liturgical year is filled with lynchpins to stabilize and orient us in this hope.

The Feast of Candlemas (February 2), an ancient celebration of hope, is one of the seasonal anchors Medieval people used to ground their faith through its various seasons. The Feast commemorates Mary’s Purification and the Presentation of Christ to the world – thus the candles!

Other ancient and seasonal feasts were:

May 3: Roodmas – celebrating the discovery and veneration of the True Cross (called “Rood” in Middle English)
Aug 1: Lammas – Originating from the Old English hlafmaesse (“loaf-mass”), it involved blessing loaves made from the new crop, signifying gratitude for the summer’s bounty and preparation for the coming winter.
Sept 29 Michealmas – Festival of St. Michael the Archangel, known as the protector against evil and leader of heaven’s armies
Nov 11 Martinmas – a festival celebrated on November 11th, marking the end of the harvest and the start of winter, honoring St. Martin of Tours, a soldier famous for sharing his cloak with a beggar, symbolizing light and charity as days grow shorter
Dec 25 Christmas – the ultimate celebration of hope in the Light of Jesus Christ

Like nature, each one of us has our seasons. Our lives contain the cycles of our youth and aging, birth and death. Our daily experiences turn in both the warm and the chilly intervals of our lives.

  • We have blossomed with the expectant life of spring: a new job, relationship, adventure.
  • We have cultivated love over warm summers of dedication and growth – our faith, families, friends, and ministries.
  • We have reaped the autumnal returns of our efforts, walking away from a red and golden field carrying a well-earned harvest – graduations, anniversaries, promotions, retirements.
  • Certainly, each of us has known our own winters, when cold has threatened and dark has isolated – and yet, like the trees – we have survived.

As we experience the depths of “Winter 2026”, Candlemas seems an opportune time to review the lessons of the season – especially the chapters on deep roots, inner quiet, and a hidden spiritual warmth that defies freezing.

In the winters of our lives, we learn what truly sustains us. We are called to delve into the power of endurance, resilience, forgiveness, honesty, loyalty, and faithfulness. These are the winter virtues that preserve life deep under the surface of any paralyzing storm. These are the salts that keep life’s highways passable, allowing us to stay connected to all that keeps us vibrant.

On any given day of the year, we can experience “winter”. Think of the times you have received (or given) the “cold shoulder”. Remember when your explanations have been given an icy reception? Haven’t there been conversations where you were frozen out? Can’t you still see the frosty stare you got from someone who thought you were beneath them? We have all known some sub-zero responses when we were really looking for a warm word. We have all received some chilly greetings when we needed not to feel like an isolated stranger.

Hospitality is not listed as a Fruit of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, it is the melding of many of them. Hospitality is a radical welcome rooted in God’s love. It is the perfect antidote to all our methods of freezing one another out. It is the human anti-freeze that reminds us that we need one another’s warmth to survive the treacheries of life. It is a virtue to be deeply pondered in this societal age of frigid inhumanity to those we judge to be “alien”.

If there is someone in your life that you have exiled to the Arctic, consider reaching out in hospitality, care, forgiveness, or honesty. This winter, let go of the glacial grudges, silences, and harbored hurts that sometimes freeze our souls and kill our hope of returning life. Listen to the voice of the dark February nights. It is telling us how to move toward spring.

Music: We Are Called to Welcome Strangers – Jubilate

Suggested Scripture: 1 Peter 4:7-11

Click for Scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Celebrate Epiphany!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Eternal Life, Faith, Holy Spirit, spirituality3 Comments

January 4, 2026

Fear of the Lord – A Gift of the Holy Spirit

God wants us to recognize God’s glory,
to experience the awe and wonder
of One Who loves us in our lowliness.
That’s why, perhaps, “awe and wonder”
might better capture what this gift is about.
– from an article by Dr. John M. Grondelski

Remember your Confirmation Day? Maybe not. Maybe you were like me when I was confirmed – about eight years old, covered with Mercurochrome from a recent scuffle, and totally oblivious as to how I would need the Holy Spirit to survive in life!

But as oblivious as I was, I managed to memorize those 7 Gifts, and for a long time was a little troubled about why I needed to “fear the Lord”. My little brain wondered if I was wrong about the Lord always loving me! But, praise God, I wasn’t wrong!

As eight decades have passed, God has continually demonstrated that unfailing love. Especially when one of life’s opaque curtains falls, that love will peek through, a star of hope – an Epiphany. Eventually, we may come to understand “fear” more as astonishment and awe at God’s generosity. Like the Three Wise Royals, we may find ourselves in silent, confident, and grateful worship before such a mystery.

Look at your life today – the present and the past. Count the times God has broken through the darkness for you. Let the remembrance, or perhaps the new awareness, convince you that there is nothing to “fear”. There is only awesome Love.

Music: This Ancient Love – Carolyn McDade

I realize that I frequently suggest this song. That’s because I just love it and hope you do too. It captures everything, don’t you think?

Suggested Scripture: Isaiah 60: 1-6

Click for Scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Don’t Read This!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Courage, Eternal Life, Faith, Seasons, spirituality5 Comments

December 31, 2026
Happy New Year’s Eve

You know what? Don’t read this! It’s only all advice, and who needs advice anyway!

Oh, OK. You’re going to read it anyway? Thanks! Here goes:

Have you ever driven on a long road with no visible signposts? Maybe in a driving rain or snowstorm? Maybe on a moonless night? Your passengers constantly ask, “Are we there yet?” You keep saying, “Almost”, as you think, “Please Lord, I hope so!”

Well, life is a long road, and sometimes there are no directions on how to navigate it. The celebration of the New Year can be our human attempt to mark the road with milestones that help us keep going.

No matter where the journey takes me in 2026, I have come to trust the following road markers:

Mile Marker One: YOU WILL CHANGE.

We know this so well! We want the change to be an improvement, not a downgrade. That’s why we make New Year’s resolutions. Here’s a New Year’s resolution worth trying:
Never resist a generous impulse. I remake this particular resolution every year. To the degree that I keep it, it improves everything about my life. I recommend it highly.

Mile Marker Two: YOU WILL STAY THE SAME

In other words, you will survive. Those basic gifts of guts, determination and resilience, which have brought you through challenges you never imagined, will continue to do so. You will make it — no matter how sad, sick, tired or overwhelmed you feel. There is always a new day and a new year. So believe in yourself, have faith, and move with courage through your pain or doubt — because you are a unique and unrepeatable expression of God that nothing can destroy.

Mile Marker Three: YOUR WORLD WILL CHANGE

The New Year reminds us of how passing life is. Take a look in the mirror!
Jobs change. Kids grow up and leave home. Friendships fade. Investments fluctuate. Buildings fall. And people die. So love and cherish all that the present moment offers you: yourself, your family, your friends, your work. Use your resources wisely and generously — the return never diminishes. Build places of love and mutuality — they do not fall. Love unselfishly — death cannot break such bonds.

Mile Marker Four: YOUR WORLD WILL STAY THE SAME

You know it will! The same aches and pains; the same unappreciative boss or uninvested coworker; the same demanding kids, spouse, or in-laws; the same rattle-trap car, horrendous traffic, unbearably excessive weather, and scarcity of downtime. But since so many things really won’t change, why don’t you change?
Here’s how. Live gratefully. That aching body is still alive! You have family and friends when many are alone or abandoned. A dear old friend put it this way when asked how he was: “I woke up on this side of the grass!”
You get the drift! Appreciate. Be positive. Give good energy and ask for it in return. It can turn a resistant world into putty in your hands!

Mile Marker Five: GOD NEVER CHANGES

God’s love for each one of us is complete, unconditional, and constant — and as the Hebrew Scriptures (Lamentations) tell us, it is renewed each morning, not just each year! God thinks you’re the greatest thing that ever happened because God knows your potential: you are made in God’s own image — creative, beautiful, generous, holy and powerful for good. When you look in the mirror all year– every morning, remember that! When you look at every other human being, remember that!
It is a New Year. May you be renewed, blessed and happy.

Thought: St. Augustine’s Ever New and Changeless God

Music: This Ancient Love – Carolyn McDade

The Invitation – It is almost time!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Advent, Eternal Life, Hope, spirituality2 Comments

Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 21, 2025

Have you ever been told not to get your hopes too high? The kind admonisher is trying to protect you. But you, like all human beings, still hope for everything, no matter the odds!

What would it be like if someone told us instead, “Hope for everything! The fulfillment of your hope is guaranteed!”

This is the jubilant assurance carried to us by the Word of God in the fourth week of Advent.
• Luke tells us that God has indeed remembered his promise of mercy.
• The eloquent Song of Songs guarantees us that the winter is past; that the rains are over and gone.
• The psalmist encourages us to lift up our heads and see. Our salvation is near at hand.

After our prayerful Advent, we now stand at the threshold of the sacred, transforming Nativity. As we lift our eyes to behold this glorious God, what shall we see – a miracle, a change in the world around us?

Marianne Williamson, spiritual teacher and author, says this: “A miracle is just a shift in perception from fear to love.” The transformative change is within us, not around us.

As we open our hearts for the coming of Jesus, might we be surprised to see that nothing, yet everything is changed? Will we see Him now in the beggar we bypassed just a month ago? Will we sit gratefully beside Him now in the church where we had ignored our neighbors? Will we recognize Him fully now in an aging parent, a distressed spouse, a demanding child? Will we meet him now in our own peaceful silence where before we had obliterated him in a flurry of distractions?

“Behold your God!” is clearly an invitation to bask – awestruck – in Christ, the fulfillment of our hope. It is also a profound invitation to free ourselves of any graceless complacency which hides the ever-incarnate God from our daily sight.

Music: O Come – The Porter’s Gate

[Verse 1]
For those who walk in darkness
The sun is rising… rising, rising
The shadow dies
Our anguish flies
From dawn on high
Oh, Lord Jesus, come!

Oh, come!
Oh, come!

[Verse 2]
The yoke upon our shoulders
Is finally breaking… breaking, breaking
Our burdens gone
In that bright dawn
When He has come
Oh, Lord Jesus, come!

Oh, come!
Oh, come!
Oh, come!

[Verse 3]
The Son to us is given
And we are waiting… waiting, waiting
Emmanuel
Oh Wonderful!
Your peace to tell
Oh, Lord Jesus, come!

For Your Reflection

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Suggested Scripture:

Click for Scripture

On That Day …

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Advent, Courage, Eternal Life, Scripture, spirituality5 Comments

First Sunday of Advent
November 30, 2025

On that day, the Lord will bind up the wounds of His People.
Isaiah 30:26

Today, we will begin the sacred season of Advent. It is a time of miracles, and we do not want to miss them because of our Yuletide distractions. Let me tell you a story about someone who longs for such miracles.

Christine is a beautiful woman, inside and out. She is as vital as fresh air or summer sun. She is successful, strong, sincere and faith-filled. But her heart is a fragile hidden glass, ready to break at any moment, because her beloved son is a heroine addict. Johnny lives in a tidal darkness beyond the shore of her sustaining light. Like spilled ink, that darkness regularly invades her joy and conspires to steal her hope.

Spiritual darkness holds a profound contradiction. It is the place where we may be deeply lost but even more deeply found. It is an interior tunnel through which every person walks at least once in her life, the deep chasm from which Isaiah pointed to the distant mountaintop.

During the thrilling season of Advent, we step out into the land of promises and prophets. The language of hope unfurls in a galaxy across the heavens, calling us out of darkness toward an Infinite and Incarnate Light. In this first week’s glorious readings, the prophet Isaiah points to our salvation, star by prophetic star:
• There is a Day coming, he tells us, and on that Day, the Lord will bind up the wounds of his people.
• In a very little while, he tells us, Lebanon will be changed. A shoot shall sprout from the tree we had thought to be withered.
• On this very mountain, he tells us, we will behold our God.

For all of us who, like Christine, carry human sorrow in the shadowed valleys of our spirits, there is healing on the near horizon. The Daystar of Jesus Christ is about to dawn through the darkness. God is about to put on the very humanness that is our burden and transform it into glory. Let us begin, with an eager faith, to enter the divine mystery being sung among the stars.

Music: Darkness and Light – Harald Hauser

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Suggested Scripture: Readings for the First Sunday of Advent

Click for Scripture

Our Saints

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Courage, Discipleship, dying, Eternal Life, Faith, spirituality9 Comments

November 1, 2025

Often, we see someone more clearly in death than we do in life.

One Sunday, nearly 25 years ago, our religious community gathered to commemorate the precious life of our Sister Germaine Donohue. Germaine, who was more familiarly called Mercedes (Mercy), was one of our missionaries in Peru. She was vivacious, compassionate, holy, and too young to die. While ministering in our remote mountain home village of Pacaipampa, Peru, this marathon runner who loved to dance suffered an unexpected heart attack. By the time the neighboring villagers brought her down the eight-hour descent to Lima, she lived only a few more hours. It was All Saints Day.

At her funeral liturgy, the legacy of love she had quietly planted throughout her life blossomed like a field of vibrant wildflowers. Listening to stories that spanned the 40 years of her religious life, it was easy to see how consistently she chose to be with others in simplicity, honesty, and joy. It became clear that everything in her life had led her to a remote mountain village among the poor, who perfectly mirrored her deepest values. They were her heart’s companions.

Just like producing a prize-winning garden, bringing one’s life to such a degree of simplicity and beauty is no easy task. As human beings, we are constantly battling the weeds of self-interest and the complexity it breeds. But when, like Germaine, we choose to learn from those who are poor, we can grow in our capacity to trust a Power greater than ourselves to sustain our lives. We thus become freer to celebrate the beauty of others and of life around us.

For their first ten years in Pacaipampa, our Mercy community had been laboring — without success – to bloom roses in their tiny garden. When the sisters returned from Lima with Sister Germaine’s body to bury her among her beloved poor, they were greeted with the miracle of the first Pacaipampa rose. It blossomed there, a new life among the simple “pueblos jóvenes”. Perhaps they named that rose “Mercedes”.

I share the story of Sister Germaine’s passing because I hope it will offer you the gift it gave to me. The slow, daily, and sometimes frustrating work of building our lives around truly important values will — in the long run — transform and bless us. In everyday decisions, it is difficult to get enough perspective always to realize that. But when our lives are gathered someday in the story-telling of our children, our friends, and our communities, may we be fortunate enough to have left a legacy of beauty — our own miracle “rose”.

Music: El Condor Pasa

This song, popularized by Simon and Garfunkel, is actually drawn from a Peruvian folk song.

For Your Reflection

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Suggested Scripture: Proverbs 31 (Adaptation)

Who can find a merciful woman?
She is worth far more than rubies.
Her community has full confidence in her
and lacks nothing of value.
She brings them good, not harm,
all the days of her life.
She gets up while it is still night;
she provides food for her neighbors
and portions for the very poor.
She considers a field and buys it;
out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.
She sets about her work vigorously;
her arms are strong for her tasks.
She sees that her work is fruitful,
and her lamp does not go out at night.
In her hand she holds the distaff
and grasps the spindle with her fingers.
She opens her arms to the poor
and extends her hands to the needy.
When it snows, she has no fear for her household;
for all of them are clothed in scarlet.
She is clothed with strength and dignity;
she can laugh at the days to come.
She speaks with wisdom,
and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
She watches over the affairs of her beloved community
and does not eat the bread of idleness.
Her neighbors arise and call her blessed;
her family also praises her:
“Many women do noble things,
but you surpass them all.”
Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting;
but a woman of mercy is to be praised.
Honor her for all that her hands have done,
and let her works bring her praise at the heavenly gate.