Dive In; Those Glorious Nuptials

Recently I was at a wonderful, beautiful wedding with some of the people I find most dear in the world. You, our dear readers, might recognize the groom as the one who writes some of these posts. This wedding week and weekend was filled with everything you'd want: sunshine, friends, good food, great conversations, classic jokes, reunions of people who'd been apart for far too long, and everything else you might think of when you think of a wedding. 

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I am writing this summer for Lighthouse Catholic Media's Youth Department as a part of a Summer Project called Dive In, where we will be discussing various ways to actively grow in the faith over the summer instead of burning out or just going through the motions. Subscribe over at lighthousecatholicyouth.com to get updates everytime a new one of these posts goes up!

Note: This post originally went up on Lighthouse Catholic Media over 1 week ago, but I have been out of town and hadn't had a chance to link to it on here! 

Overflowing

This past week one of my very best friends got married. All of us groomsmen were staying at a house with him, and most of our evenings we eventually ended up sitting around the back porch talking about life. For us, these conversations will inevitably turn to our faith every time. We absolutely are the sort of guys who talk sports and tell funny stories, but we are also the kind of guys who then turn to theology and philosophy and try to make sense out of the things of this world through a little bit of arguing and a lot discussion.

On one particular night, we turned to a discussion of the ideas of St. Theresa of Avila (that picture to the right is a famous image of her experience with the Lord) and others like her, including Thomas Aquinas, where they like to talk about our disposition to receiving the Lord's grace in terms of us being vessels of various sizes. While this was a fun conversation that went in a bunch of different directions, there was one specific comment I've been reflecting on.

When talking about ourselves as thistles or steins (smaller or larger containers), one of my friends commented that sometimes he's happy that he's only a thistle, because then he gets the feeling of overflowing with the Lord's love, which he would have to work a lot harder to feel if he was converted enough to be like a stein. If this is confusing, let me lay it out a little bit more: many saints talk about how we all have a capacity to receive grace, and as we become more and more converted to the Lord our capacity grows and grows, mostly because we have undergone penance and converted ourselves more to the Lord. What that means, then, is that for someone who is still only a thistle in the spiritual life, they will experience God in an overwhelming sense more easily than someone who is now a stein or a large bucket, who has to work much harder because small consolations from God are not what they seek anymore.

With that explanation, then, you can see what my friend was saying: why would I want to stop being a thistle? I'd much rather just feel the Lord overflow very often out of my thistle. If I convert, if I step away from sin more, than I'm going to realize how much more I need to convert, and it's going to be much harder for me to be consoled and feel that overflow. It's great that the saints are so holy, we might say, but I really like just being happy in my faith as I am. Because I have often felt the very exact thing my friend was feeling at that moment, I probably responded quite harshly.

"That's garbage," I think I said.

You see, if we remain as a thistle when the Lord wants us to be a cup (or a stein or a bucket or an ocean), than we are not living the way we are supposed to. If God wants to give us abundant life (John 10:10--He does), then who are we to settle for just a small overflow of a small vessel? Abundance doesn't ever mean stopping with what is enough; abundance means stepping out to seek more.

Since my friend usually reads this blog, I find it important to state something really quickly here-this man is one of the holiest that I know, and this blog isn't about how he sucks and we all need to be better. This blog is about how each of us struggles with wanting to be comfortable with the Lord, and with not growing in our faith simply because the place we're at right now feels pretty good. Our God doesn't want us to be pretty good. Our God wants us to overflow with His love so much that we can't stop until live for Him more, until we know Him more, until we accept Him more, until we turn away from sin more, until we're converted more, and until we're able to give our entire lives to the Lord. When we have been more converted, we'll have to work harder to experience His love as overflowing, but the overflow will be a much more wonderful experience than when we overflowed from our small vessel.

All of this happened because some friends and I were sipping on some bourbon on a back porch and discussing our love for the Lord (I mean it when I say sipping-we're quite responsible, but also very much enjoy bourbon). I hope I don't settle for being a thistle, and I hope you don't either. Let's allow our God to convert us into the ocean of His love and mercy that we were made to be.

If you have any thoughts, leave a comment! If you liked this, hit one of those share buttons. 

Dive In; That One Moment

I spent the last week being involved with a Steubenville Youth Conference. If you haven’t heard of these, I’m sure you’ve heard of something similar: a whole bunch of people coming together for a time of fun and fellowship centered around the faith.

I am certain this isn’t true for everyone, but in many cases the conversion moment in life (that one moment when all of a sudden things clicked and the Lord became real and present) happens at an event just like this. Maybe this happened for you at a conference, maybe a mission trip, or maybe it was some other experience where everything not of God became less important and life started to make sense....

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I am writing this summer for Lighthouse Catholic Media's Youth Department as a part of a Summer Project called Dive In, where we will be discussing various ways to actively grow in the faith over the summer instead of burning out or just going through the motions. Subscribe over at lighthousecatholicyouth.com to get updates every time a new one of these posts goes up!

[Coffee with the Saints]: Blessed Jose Sanchez del Rio

It's been awhile since I did one of these, and instead of trying to come up with sweet information you might never have heard about a saint you've heard of, I thought I'd pick a saint that many people haven't heard of and introduce him to more people. Blessed Jose was born in 1913 in Mexico and died there at the age of only 15 in 1928. Here is his story as I understand it:

At the start of the 20th Century, the Catholics in Mexico were being heavily persecuted by the government. Calles, the Mexican president at the time, was a freemason and a devout atheist, and had issued a Constitution in 1917 which said that the Roman Catholic Church was to be persecuted. In response to this harsh persecution, a war broke out in 1926 where the Cristeros, a group of Catholic citizens, launched a revolution against this government in order to fight for the ability to practice their Catholic faith freely.

In 1926, when this started, Jose was still just a 13 year old boy. He had a desire at the time to go out and fight because he was a devout and on fire Catholic even at such a young age, but his family would not let him fight. One time, during the course of this war, Jose saw that the the army was desecrating the Eucharist, the very Body and Blood of Jesus which he held so dear, and he went out to protect it. Due to this, the army arrested him and one of his friends and threw them in jail because they were a part of this resistance.

This is where the story gets tough to read since it'll be graphic. I'm not doing that for the sake of being graphic, but because it's what happened, and it's powerful to see what this young man did in the face of such challenges.

While in jail, the army took Jose's friend and were going to kill him. Since they really wanted to get Jose to turn his back on his faith, they put a gun to his friend's head and told Jose that they would shoot his friend unless he yelled "Death to Christ the King, long live the government," and if he did his friend would live. The army did this because the battle cry of the cristeros, "Viva Cristo Rey" meant "Long live Christ the King" and they wanted to stop the power of this cry. Jose, in his amazing faith, smiled at his friend and said "prepare a spot for me in heaven, tell Christ the King that I will come to see Him soon."

After the army killed Jose's friend, they then turned their attention to him. After much torture, they decided that they knew the way to do it: [warning, graphic] they took the soles of Jose's feet and shaved them so that there was almost nothing left, and then they marched him through town, making him walk on the cobblestone streets. While walking on these streets, they continually offered Jose an out: say what we want you to say, and we'll carry you, we'll feed you, we'll take care of. When Jose continued to ignore them, they took him to a field, where they were going to kill him. With a gun to his head, they gave him one more chance. Instead of giving in, Jose made a cross in the dirt, kissed it, and shouted "Long live Christ the King! Long live Our Lady of Guadalupe!" They killed him.

It's hard to know how accurate all of these details are, but we know for a fact that this 15 year old boy witnessed to his faith and died as a martyr. We know that He is Blessed because the Church believes that he lived as a courageous and outstanding witness to the faith and that the Lord has rewarded him by allowing him to gain entrance into heaven. When we're faced with challenges and difficulties, let us look to the example of this boy, and saints like him, who at a young age faced extreme difficulty but refused to renounce their faith.

Blessed Jose Sanchez del Rio, pray for us!

If you like this post (or think it's dumb) comment and let me know! This coffee with the saints is a series that I am doing to reflect on the lives of the saints; if you want to read more about it or see other saint posts, you can click the tab on the top of this page or click this link Saints. 

Sweet, Sweet Summer

This summer, I am very excited to be taking part in a series over at lighthousecatholicyouth.com to talk about the experience of living one's faith during the summer. Most of us who have been living the journey of faith have had some good experiences in our summers and probably some not so good moments. The goal with this project is simple: grow in our spiritual lives through the everyday activities of summer. Since I'm going to be writing over there, I probably won't do as much blogging here; hit up lighthouse catholic youth and give them a follow to stay up to date! 

Without further ado, I would like to share with you the first post of this series from my good friend JW Beatovich which introduces what we are doing! Check it out and leave us some comments; we look forward to journeying with you this summer in our faith! Here it is: Dive In