Endurance

02-26-2023The Pastor's PenFr. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.

Dear Friend,

We need to possess an enduring love. Endurance: the power to withstand hardship or stress, to keep on going despite all setbacks.

I recently heard of a Catholic woman who, after having four children, started running and then entered marathons. This year, she is running the London Marathon, but before she does, she will run four other marathons each day before the London Marathon. So she will be running 26 miles every day for five days. It will take great endurance to complete, but on British TV she said she is committed to enduring all that she will have to face to complete the marathons set before her.

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Prayer Habits

02-19-2023The Pastor's PenFr. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.

Dear Friend,

Pope Saint John XXIII often reminded people, "Do not forget your prayers. These may be as short as you wish if you find long prayers too hard, but do not forget them. Even a sign can be a prayer."

We all have our routine and we don't always want to change it. Never-the-less we can find more time for prayer, if we just look at our daily routine.

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Live a Life of Service

02-12-2023The Pastor's PenFr. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.

Dear Friend,

C. S. Lewis once provided a powerful image of the difference between heaven and hell.

He described hungry people sitting at a huge banquet loaded with delicious food. Every person had a meter-long fork and knife attached to their hands (that’s about three feet long).

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Jesus was crying for me.

02-05-2023The Pastor's PenFr. Matthew R. Paratore, S.T.L., J.C.L.

Dear Friend,

Yvette, who is a young mother in Washington D.C., recently told me her remarkable story, she wrote:

“It was the end. I knew it. I could no longer fight. I sat here emotionless. I was totally alone. Others had tried to help - doctors, nurses, parents, husband, children. But they were gone. Hours earlier I had come into the hospital on an emergency basis. I had back pain so severe that at times, it dropped me to my knees. This was not my first hospital stay. I had been sick for a long time it seemed...

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Coached By Joan of Arc: Lessons in Virtuous Leadership by Alexandre Havard

02-01-2023Book Recommendations

Coached by Joan of Arc book is a dialogue between the reader and Joan of Arc, the woman Mark Twain called “easily and by far the most extraordinary person the human race has ever produced.”

As we explore her virtue-infused life, this astonishingly modern woman takes us by the hand, coaches us, whispers wise advice and lessons in noble leadership in our ear. Far from being anachronistic, her way of life and virtuous example is eternally new, for she follows precepts that are above human weakness.

Joan is for all of us – men and women of today, living and working in the midst of the world. She is for us all a coach, a mother, and an excellent teacher of the elevated, virtuous, and courageous life.