We are Called to Love Each other, Not be Besties

I have not been writing very much lately for so many reasons. One of them being my new radio show which has taken up a lot of my time and energy. And also because life has been rough and I have really been working hard on trying to find my way in this life as a Catholic. I had a lot of my blog posts attacked recently and I began to fear putting myself out there in this space because it seems like there is always someone trying to say something negative about me as if they know anything about my life, my faith or who I am.

It is impossible for anyone to know all there is to know about me just by reading a blog post. I don’t even know everything about myself. Part of my walk with Christ is learning who I am. Who God made me. That takes a lot of shedding of sins and healing of wounds. It also takes a lot of courage because I always fear that I am going to say something that will get me kicked out of the Catholic Church. It took a long time for me to feel at Home here and there are still so many times when I think that maybe I don’t. I don’t belong here because I am a certain kind of person. I belong here because I belong to Christ and this is His Church. Regardless of what kind of music I listen to, TV shows I watch, celebrities I like, how I talk, if I read or not, if I like Christian music or not or anything else, I belong here because Jesus died for me.

I do not need the approval of anyone to be here. Not one person. I am a sinner and have a lot of short comings but I love Jesus. And I was Baptized, Confirmed and Married in the Catholic Church. This is my Home and nobody is going to kick me out of it. I have a right to my struggles, my writing about those struggles, my freedom to listen to Lil Wayne and to have dance parties with other Catholic women or have my nose stuck in a book. I refuse to get put into any kind of box. I am not a nerd or a cool kid. I am a Catholic woman.

I am so in love with who I have become in the last 38 years of my life. All the good times, all the bad times, all the tears, heartbreak and dance parties are all part of this beautiful tragic life of mine. All of it is part of the light that Christ gives me to shine in the darkness that is so common in this world. He gave it to me, nobody else.

I love my kids who are each their own light and bring me such happiness that I had the Grace to bring them each into this world and my grand-daughter who is the sunshine who makes everything else in this world disappear when she smiles at me and gives me a kiss. And my husband. My marriage has been so hard. I have never suffered for another human being the way that I have suffered for this man who I married. Because of that suffering I have come to look at Christ hanging from a Cross is a whole different way. There is no love like the love that someone has for the ones they will suffer for. It is powerful and it is full of Grace that I can’t even explain. I love my husband more than I ever thought that I could love another human being.

I am not a theologian. Nothing said on this blog should ever be taken as having any kind of authority, everyone needs to read the Church’s documents and teachings before every taking the word of anyone on anything. My only intention is to write things that someone else can read and see that someone else is going through the same thing. I am not the only one who struggles with things and maybe my writing can help others see that neither are they.

At the end of the day, I am a sinner who loves Jesus and is scared to death of what He is going to ask of me to be one of His saints. That is my greatest struggle and that is what I work at every single day of my life. God is good. God’s plans are greater than any I could come up with. I do not have to be everyone’s cup of tea and they don’t have to be mine. We are called to love one another, not be besties.