My First Year

The Party is Over

This is a re-post.  I wrote it after my first year of teaching, and six years later it still rings true.  The end of the year is rough.  There is a flurry of activity and then total stillness.  The feeling is intensified this year--my son is graduating from high school.  The excitement about achieving milestones is amplified, so is the worry and regret... Did I do enough?  Did I do it right?... 

I'm taking my very last Master's class and the Professor mentioned that she says a prayer after the class is over...something along the lines of "Lord, make it right."  Amen and Alleluia.

Originally posted June 11, 2010:

The students are gone, the desks sit empty and textbooks are stacked like 3D bar graphs around the room.  After a flurry of noise and activity the hallways are still and quiet. Locker doors lay open in neat rows, standing sentinel as if patiently awaiting the arrival of owners who won't be back.

It's a weird feeling, a mixture of mismatched emotions. Enormous amounts of relief, excitement and accomplishment are paired uncomfortably with twinges of disappointment, regret and remorse. Somehow something about it all feels... undone... like a painting that's been packaged up and shipped off before it was completed.  I feel a nagging desire to snatch the school year back for a few last minute modifications. Yet if the students were to march back in one more time I think I'd collapse in a puddle on the blue and white checkered linoleum, I simply couldn't stand another minute!

It's My First Year, so I have nothing to compare it to, but I suspect it feels this way every year. Remember that feeling when your wedding was over? After an insane amount of planning, work, worry and anticipation the music simply stopped, the guests were gone and you found yourself standing at the threshold of endings and beginnings wondering:

 What just happened?...

Mrs. Welch
Blessed and bewildered

Me and my baby at his graduation party:

Happy Sprint (Uh, I Mean Spring)

Hi Y'all!  Happy spring!  When I first typed the word 'spring' I accidentally typed 'sprint' and I had to laugh to myself.  Sprint indeed.  I'm in my LAST course of my Masters degree program.  Can you say ALLELUIA?!  Four long (year round, no stopping), ironically very fasst years.  I have two more weeks of school left (the teaching kind), and then I'm off.  Literally.  

My high school girlfriend and I are going on a pilgrimage that we promised ourselves for our thirtieth birthdays.  That was twenty years ago (but whose counting).  So, after my last day at work, I'm hopping in the car, popping The Interior Castle audio book in the CD player and driving to my girlfriend's house seven hours away.

Then we're boarding a plane to Portugal for an eleven day ROCK STAR woman's Saint tour.  We're going to Fatima (Our Lady), Avila (St. Teresa), Loyola (how did he get in there?), Lourdes (Our Lady again), Nevers (St. Bernadette), Paris (St. Catherine Labouret) and Lisieux (St. Terese the Little Flower).  Wow.  Doesn't feel real yet.  So excited to share with you our experiences.  Please keep us in your prayers.

In the MEANtime, here's a re-post.  It's strawberry season and my prayer for you is that you too experience God's abundant love as you bite into those scrumptious strawberries.  Know: YOU.  ARE.  LOVED.

The craziest thing happened the other day... 

On Tuesdays parents provide snacks in the teachers lounge.  I can't tell you what a blessing it is.  I have lunch duty on Tuesdays so I can't go home to eat.  Most days my husband is waiting for me there, where he works from home-- 2.5 minutes from school. The deal is that I save him from the solitude of working alone and in return he rescues me from the madness of too many teens. But on Tuesdays we push through the day on our own.

Usually I forget to pack a lunch that day. So when I walk in the lounge and see the spread of food every Tuesday I'm overwhelmed with gratitude. My daily bread. Again!

Sometimes I'm struck by the boldness of the Lord's prayer, "give us this day our daily bread." I wouldn't talk to a waitress that way, not to mention the Creator of the Universe! But I've come to understand it as a humble request. Please God, help me to live simply. No storing up, no relying on my own ability. Help me to recognize that every good thing comes from You. Help me to trust that You will provide anything and everything I need... 

So the other day there was a tray of strawberries in the teachers lounge. I grabbed a few and popped one in my mouth as I walked down the hallway.  Come to think of it I was approaching the chapel when I did this. The strawberry burst in my mouth and there really aren't words to describe the sensation. It's strawberry season in the south and they're so incredibly sweet, fragrant and juicy right now -- so fresh! It was the perfect strawberry, and in an instant--quicker than it takes for a thought to occur--I knew--as in beyond a shadow of a doubt, in the core of my being--that God loves me.

How 'bout them berries? 

Now I don't know if it will catch on like "Jesus Love Me" but try this one on for size: "Father loves me this I know, for a berry told me so..."

"God also said: 'See, I give you every seed-bearing plant all over the earth'" Gen 1:29

Mrs. Welch
Loving Summer Already 

Homework:

• Ask God to remind you how much He loves you. Let me know what He says.

 

Catholic 365

I am very excited to be participating in a Catholic forum!  Please check out my most recent article at Catholic365 -- "Everything Gets Better."  It was a long Lent, but I learned a valuable lesson -- everything gets better.

 Bonus points for all who read the blog:

Watch this TedTalk (same theme as theme of most recent Catholic365 article).  I promise you'll be glad you did. It is fascinating stuff!  Are you feeling depressed about the state of affairs in the world?  This is good news from the secular world! (When was the last time that happened?)  Included within it are 4 general rules that will help dispel the darkness.

http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_and_ola_rosling_how_not_to_be_ignorant_about_the_world 

 

Palm Sunday Activity

This is a re-post of an article written three years ago.  We are still doing this activity at school and very much enjoying it.  Before we go outside we read the Scripture of Jesus coming into Jerusalem and students are encouraged to close their eyes and imagine themselves in the scene.  Then we talk about how and why we move so quickly from praising to condemning.  I pray you have a blessed Holy Week.

 

“Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand.”   Ancient chinese proverb.

I was always so confused about how we went from waving palms and singing, "The King of Glory comes..." on Palm Sunday, to shouting "Crucify Him!" -- all within a matter of minutes.  What just happened here?  (It's a feeling I often have!)

Last year there were a lot of palms left over after Mass so I grabbed a large handful and brought them to school for our get together with our prayer buddies. What we ended up doing has become a fun tradition, an object lesson that involves the students and helps us all to understand what happens on Palm Sunday and how it applies to our everyday lives...

First, we talked about Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and how excited everyone was that the Savior they had been anticipating for centuries had finally arrived.  We explained how Jesus is alive in each one of us today. Then we went outside and the upper school students were arranged in two rows and waved their palms, making a tunnel for the lower school students to run through. The lower school students were thrilled to be recognized this way and you could feel the joy and celebration of the moment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then the prayer buddies paired up, and the upper school students helped teach the lower school students how to turn the palms into crosses.  We talked about how Jesus didn't turn out to be the kind of King the people expected, the kind of King they wanted him to be and how this, this is how we go from singing praise to shouting condemnation!

When people, situations, even God Himself don't fit into our plans, don't match our expectations, we turn away from God and fall from grace. But even then, He has created a plan for us to return to Him, to allow Him to turn our mistakes into something good. Students were left with a lovely reminder that when we surrender our lives--especially our messes--to an all-powerful God, He can transform them into something beautiful!

 

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Mrs. Welch
Loving being involved 

Homework:

• Surrender your expectations--aka: invitations to disappointment. (In the words of CS Lewis' demon Screwtape: "Whatever men expect they soon come to think they have a right to: the sense of disappointment can, with very little skill on our part, be turned into a sense of injury...to produce the best results you must feed them with false hopes.")
• Live fully in the present moment (Screwtape: "We have trained them to think of the Future as a promised land which favored heroes attain--not as something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.")
• Trust in a good and loving Father who has a beautiful plan. 
• In all things give thanksgiving for "We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose." Rom 8:28.
• It's still the Easter season so it's not to late to talk about it...
  A video appropriate for lower school students (Love those Skit Guys!)

A thought provoking video appropriate for upper school students --"Were you there...?"

Sacrifice Beads

Looking for something to do for Lent? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How about ten little things per day?!

One of my favorite activities to do with our Prayer Buddies (Lower School students) is to create sacrifice beads.  It's cheap and easy, and it is loaded with spiritual truth.  United with Christ's suffering, our sacrifices on earth help bring in the Kingdom.  It is at the core of Christianity: suffering is redemptive.

So during this season of Lent we practice love the way Christ witnessed to it: willing the good of another as other.  For forty days we go out into the desert in solidarity with Him, denying our desires in an effort to strengthen our spirits so we too can accept our mission to bring the Kingdom into clearer focus.  This Lent, in the spirit of St. Therese do little things, ten sacrifices per day. 

Be sure to use this opportunity to introduce the beautiful Little Flower to others.  I LOVE her!  Young students will appreciate that the church has given a 24 year old the distinguished and rare title of Doctor of the Church.  

Next year I'm going to bring in some flower petals for the visual affect of sprinkling the world with "little flowers" of good deeds.  If you make the beads with youth, bring along one good deed (like signing a card from someone in the community) so they can slide the first bead.  Then encourage them to put the sacrifice beads on their key chain and remind each other to slide a bead when they see someone doing a good deed.  Good begets good.

That is how we change the world.  Each one of us can do it each and every day just by doing little things with great love.  Bring it on!

Here's a link to instructions on how to make them. Now let's GO! (It's two-thirds of GOd :-)  

Happy Lent!

 

 

 

 

 

Remember Who You Are

"Remember who you are," her mother's words ran after her everytime she left the houe. Brilliant.  A simple seed planted in the comfort and safety of home; a tiny germ that will, when worn down with time and nourished with God's light and living water, transform into a new creation.  Remember who you are. The words slap your soul like the proverbial screen door, demanding that you acknowledge the threshold beneath your feet. I love how it resonates inside, reverberating in the interior being, begging the question: Who am I?  Repeated often enough, the words fall away and the memory returns, reminding us of our true identity.

"But who do you say that I am?", Jesus asks his disciples... 

It is Simon, on the cusp of becoming Peter, who acknowledges the mystery: The Son of Man is the Son of God!  This always baffled me as a child.  Which is it?  Make up your mind.  Is he the Son of Man or the Son of God, why do they refer to him as both?  I can almost imagine the look of surprise on Peter's face as the truth of this mystery emerges from somewhere deep inside him, a truth so big it could never be contained or explained.   The son of man IS the Son of God. 

Startled at his own admission, Simon must have stood dumbstruck in the face of the mystery of the incarnation; the paradox of an infinite, ineffable God facing him in human flesh. Talk about a life defining moment.  What are we to do when faced with accepting the incredible (aka - the not believable)?  Believe!  That's what makes it faith, and it necessitates surrender.  "You are the messiah," Simon says, his shoulders folding in on themselves as he is grounded in humility.  I don't understand, I couldn't possibly.  And I don't need to.  You are the Lord.  Of my life, of all that is, was and will ever be.

I can imagine the smile creeping across Jesus' face as he humbly accepts this universe shattering confession, "Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah."  The words must have gripped Simon's drooping shoulders forcing him to look Jesus in the eyes.  Can you imagine?!  Like a cosmic game of hide-and-seek, Simon says, "I see you Jesus, I know who you are and where you come from", and in return God replies to his child, "I see you too and I know where you come from."  What must it be like to see God smile?...

But it is what happens next that really excites me.  "And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church,^* and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it."  Stand up straight, Simon, I've got a job for you.  You are a new creation.  You are Peter and I have plans for you.  I will help you accomplish them and NOTHING can prevent my plans for you from being fulfilled.  Rest in that.

It's so comforting.  We contain everything we need to become who God created us to be. All we need to do is open our minds and our hearts to accept the unbelievable.  There is a plan, a purpose, and it will be accomplished come hell or highwater.  I am not responsible for creating the plan or even for seeing it to fruition; my job is to follow--to listen and obey.  And when, inevitably, I mess up, He will make it good. This is the steadfast faith,  the irrepressible joy and the incomprehensible peace that we, as Christians are called to bring to life in the world.  Life. Is. Very. Good.

Remember?...

Mrs. Welch
Forgetful

 

Homework:

• Please pray for our youth as they navigate the brackish waters between where they are and where they are called to be.  May they walk on water!    Especially the Class of 2015 and those students participating in this weekend's Discovery Retreat...
• We cannot know who we are until we know the one who created us (have you ever tried to assemble something very complex without following the manufacturer's directions?! )  It is in and through a personal relationship with God (translation: Jesus) that we begin to understand who we are. Take time daily in worship and prayer to surrender to something grander than you and your plans (Oh what a relief it is!)  Warning: If this step is foregone, you will eventually find yourself in a proverbial pile of unassembled parts on the livingroom floor. 
• Cliff notes to Remembering Who You Are:  You are the servant, not the savior.  You are His.  And you are loved. Unconditionally.

 

Walking On Water

We always start class with prayer.  On the rare occasion that someone has to remind me then everyone gets a lollipop.  That'll keep me honest.  Nothing gathers the class' focus like the sign of the cross.   BAM.  In a loud clear voice I begin, "In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit."  AMEN.  It never fails.  I've told myself that when this mini-creed no longer gathers us at the foot of the mountain it's my sign that it's someone else's turn to lead them into the Promised Land.  

My favorite devotional and theirs, is a book named Jesus Calling by Sarah Young.  I can't count how many times the words have leapt off the page and met us EXACTLY where we are.  It is truly uncanny.  What the author has done is bold.  She's reworded Scripture, and if that weren't daunting enough, she's written the devotions in the first person, in the voice of God!  Who does that?  Can you imagine speaking or writing as though you were God?  She did it, and no doubt with the help of the Holy Spirit.  Other than the Bible itself, and another devotional called My Utmost For His Highest, I have never experienced words coming alive like that, running after me, grabbing hold of me.  Very cool.

Since singing is praying twice we often start with a song.  And NO, I don't sing to them.  Ewww.  Thank God for YouTube.  Very often students will recommend a song that I haven't heard before and I will check out the lyrics and the video before sharing it with the class.  Don't EVER show a video without previewing it!  I've been burned on that not once, but twice, and of course it was with the same class.  After the second time I held my breath waiting for phone calls from parents...  Grace, gotta love it.  

Recently students started asking for the same song.  The first time I heard it, it rushed passed me, never touching me.  The second time I heard it, it tickled my toes as I waded into its message and melody.  The third time I heard it, my spirit swam in it.  In one particular class I KNOW that I felt the Holy Spirit moving through the room.  It is a supernatural stillness not often experienced, most especially in a room full of teens.

I hope you enjoy it.  I recommend starting with the sign of the cross of course, and then reading Matthew 14:22-33:

Then he made the disciples get into the boat and precede him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds.  After doing so, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When it was evening he was there alone.  Meanwhile the boat, already a few miles offshore, was being tossed about by the waves, for the wind was against it.  During the fourth watch of the night,^* he came toward them, walking on the sea.  When the disciples saw him walking on the sea they were terrified. “It is a ghost,” they said, and they cried out in fear.  At once [Jesus] spoke to them, “Take courage, it is I;^* do not be afraid.”  Peter said to him in reply, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.”  He said, “Come.” Peter got out of the boat and began to walk on the water toward Jesus.  But when he saw how [strong] the wind was he became frightened; and, beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!”  Immediately Jesus stretched out his hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith,^* why did you doubt?”  After they got into the boat, the wind died down.  Those who were in the boat did him homage, saying, “Truly, you are the Son of God.”

If you're a teacher, or a student, I recommend writing a reflection at this point.  What are the waves in your world?  What threatens to drown you?  What scares you?  What keeps you from living the miraculous life God has planned for you?  Empty it all on paper.  Purge it.  Then pray this song:

 

 

Jesus is Calling... Can you hear him?  Call on his hame and you too will walk on water. 

Mrs. Welch
His

My Substitute

It's how I got started.  The High School Theology teacher ruptured her appendix and I got a phone call at 10pm on a Sunday night.  "Any chance you can fill a long-term sub position?"  I should have asked what they meant by a long-term!  Six years later I am still a sub of sorts.

Someday I hope to write a book about my experiences teaching theology, religion and morality to teenagers.  And I have stories to tell.  The good kind, the bad kind and the just plain ugly.  I plan on calling the book "My Life as a Substitute".  That's how I think about what I do, and not just in the classroom.  I am a substitute for Jesus.  I am called to be his arms and legs, his eyes, his ears and his mouth.  They are HUGE sandals to fill.  More accurately I put my tiny little feet on his and we dance through the day like I did with my mother in the kitchen as a child.  Sometimes I slip and fall, but often, and more often the longer I do it, it is joyful.

Today I am very excited because I have a substitute of my own.  I often get tired of the sound of my own voice and I'm sure the students get tired of hearing me too.  So today, by the grace of a good God, Lia Mills will be coming into my classroom to talk about her own "Yes" to God.  It is a dramatic and inspiring story about what God can do when we surrender our will to him.  It is not without costs, but the heavenly rewards always far outweigh any earthly efforts.

Please go check out her story and watch the video that started it all six years ago.  Six years ago God radically altered the trajectory of Lia and my lives, a trajectory that intersects today.  Her video has 2.5 million views and I consider it my personal goal to help it reach 50 million -- one view for every life, every priceless gift that God has intended for us that we have sent back "return to sender".  Won't you help me acknowledge the love lost?

Read all about it and watch the viral video.  You will be AMAZED at the gift she has to share.  Do you ever get discouraged about the future?  Feel hopeless about the state of things?  This is the enthusiasm and the energy the next generation is bringing.  I can't wait to have her in my classroom!!

Check it out!

 

 

 

Back-to-School Lessons

Whether you're a parent, a student or a teacher (and aren't we all at least one of those?), I hope you've had a great start to the school year!  As the stars aligned I had a ten page paper for my Masters class due during the first week of school.  For those of you who are teachers out there you know what I'm talking about when I say the start to the school year is just plain crazy.

On of my favorite back-to-school stories from My First Year was when I came home from school one night, dropped by bags by the door, stumbled a few steps into the bedroom and fell face first onto the unmade bed...  I have NEVER been more exhausted. In my life. Including the first few weeks of motherhood! As the stars had aligned my husband was away on a business trip and for some reason I had stripped the bed to wash the sheets that morning (stupidity). I do not remember moving again until morning. Twelve hours, face first on a stripped bed, in my clothes. Exhausted.

In my Masters class I have learned a fancy word for it: kenosis, from the Greek word for "emptying". Teaching is a pouring out of self.  Kenotic, it is.  The cool thing about it is that's when and where we meet God. When we're empty.  That's the only time and place there is room for Him.  Then we can be filled to overflowing, then we experience theosis, or divinization. Divinization, now doesn't that sound cool? It's much more fun than the emptying part to be sure.

I'd like to pass on one of the graces I have received already this school year. When you start feeling overwhelmed, when there are too many things happening at the same time, when you're feeling scattered and stressed there is a tendency to get frazzled, so you to try to keep up, am I right? Life moves fast, you move faster, right? Wrong. I think I've discovered the secret: when life moves faster - you slow down. I'm talking glacier paces here. Imagine the film creeping along in super-slow-mo.  Think of someone you know who moves through the world with a supernatural grace and calmness. My model is Fr. Miller. Unflappable he is. Grace in motion. May everyone have a Fr. Miller in their life.

Another lesson I've learned (because teaching really is more about learning than anything else) is this: When something doesn't go the way you planned and you are frustrated, maybe even heartbroken, trust in a divine plan that sees a bigger picture.  Here's how I learned that lesson (again):  In the spring I had a brilliant flash of an idea for a fundraiser for the Pro-Life Club. We're not talking just a lightbulb moment but a why-hasn't-anyone-ever-thought-of-this-before, my-name-is-going-to-be-in-neon-lights-moment. In the fall we would cover books for students for a small fee.  Over the summer we would collect cool bags from local businesses and the first week of school we would set up a booth to provide a much needed service that benefits students, teachers, parents and a non-profit! Win, win, win, did I say win?!

Well imagine my surprise when the week before school starts I get an email from the school secratary (the school WOULD come screeching to a halt without her).  The email has gone out to all of parents in the school and it reads something like this: "This year Key Club will be covering textbooks for fee of $1/book. Please leave your textbooks in Mrs. So-and-so's room..." Can you hear the sound of my dream crashing to the ground? It wasn't pretty. I totally went into a tailspin. You know the kind -- where one good turn deserves another and before you know it you're lower than dirt. Your mind starts spinning until you're positively paranoid. Someone stole my idea...The student I had told my plan to in the spring took it to another teacher she respects more...My department chair isn't supportive or responsive enough to my ideas...I get no respect...

Ugh.

And that was before school even started.

Then the first week hit. H.I.T. Three new preps, two new textbooks, one new curriculum and a ten page paper. Construction kept me out of my classroom until the day before school started and a new computer system meant we didn't know our schedules until right before the students arrived.  I don't know that I've ever come so close to psychologically snapping. Then I passed by the Key Club teacher's classroom (the one in the new part of the school that didn't need renovation over the summer)...  Books were stacked knee deep around the perimeter of the room.  Bags were spilling over on the desks and the normally totally together (taught the same thing for decades) Key Club teacher was pulling at her hair. Literally. Can you even imagine if that task was heaped on my plate on top of everything else? Thank you, God.

Covering the books was a great idea. For someone else. Congratulations to the Key Club -- they have nearly met their annual fundraising goal of $600 within the first two weeks of school.  And I still have my hair.  The Pro-Life Club meets on Tuesday to discern God's plan for us this year.  Say a prayer for us please.  

God gives. God takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Job 1:21

Mrs. Welch
Practicing Paradox

Homework

• Thank God for whatever it is that didn't go as you planned.  There is a better plan. Promise.
• When life speeds up SLOW DOWN. Walk slowly, breath slowly, talk slowly. Take a time-out. When we all apply the brakes, the universe will slow down. Hurrying is for amateurs.
• Watch this adorable video and ask yourself - What am I teaching the world? Because whether you realize it or not, you are a teacher!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Ball That Was Dropped

There are many.

One day when I was in the teachers' lounge (yes, I go there now), someone was describing a feeling we could all relate to:  It's not possible to keep all the balls in the air. I set one down for a while then I pick it back up and put a different one down.  Yes, that's it! That's exactly how I feel.  No matter how much I am able to juggle, the feeling of failure lays heavy at my feet.

The relentless grading and lesson planning alone will crush you under their weight. Somehow "balls" like laundry (now a GIANT ball!), and grocery shopping, not to mention taking time to call a friend, sit alone and abandoned. I am left to wonder if it is possible to be a good teacher and a good wife, mother, friend...  Teaching tends to be a profession that is all consuming.  

You won't be surprised to hear that one of the "balls" I kicked to the curb this year was writing.  The Blogging Ball was dropped. So now that summer is here, this is one of the highlights from this school year, a project I would have blogged about if I had been willing to put one of the other balls down...

Several years ago I saw this magazine at an airport and I admit that it continues to fly in the face of all I hold dear and know to be true.  I keep a copy of it in my classroom and often pick it up to warn my students that the best lies are rooted in truth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's tempting isn't it?  Leave the hypocritical, instutional church behind and simply follow Jesus. Ahhh, just me and Jesus.... Here's the rub: You can't separate love of God from love of people. (Yes, even the imperfect, hypocritical ones.) The enemy of all that is good knows this, and wants nothing more than to separate the sheep from the flock. How better to attack them? If you want to put a fire out you separate the coals. Enemy's objective: Forget church.

The fact remains that we ARE the church, and that as God's family we are called to "gather together." The scripture word for it is "ekklesia" - an assembly. We are not alone on the road following Jesus! Ridiculous. To forget the church is to forget who we are. And even if we manage to "forget church," we can be assured Jesus never will. It is his bride and he will return for her and make her "spotless".

So as a visual reminder that we are church my 8th grade class created a church out of "living stones."  We looked to those who have traveled the road before us and we created an image of church from their examples.  It turned out great!

 I got this next idea from a bumper sticker that said, "Don't go to church, be church."  So close, yet so far...  With a slight modification it reads right:

 

One of the most commonly used tools of the enemy is the "false dichotomy" (for example: you can EITHER: have the baby and be poor and miserable, OR: abort the baby and all of your problems will be gone).  Anytime I hear something boiled down to two alternatives that I must choose between, a red flag is raised for me. I belong to an abundant God.  I reject an either/or existence in favor of embracing a life of both/and. In the words of St. Therese of Liseux "I choose all."

We need both: to go to church AND to be church.

The church is the bride of Christ and he loves her like His own body.  She is divine in that He is her head and she is human in that we are His body. He has promised to return for her in the fullness of time and we need to share the message with others that without "U," the body is incomplete.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Summer!

Mrs. Welch

Homework:

• Practice balance. All things in moderation. Even sunshine burns if you get too much.
• Look out for the false dichotomy.  It's everywhere, it's everywhere!
• Go to church
• BE church.