Our Marriage Is Stronger Because My Husband Isn’t My Best Friend

Several years ago I attended my best friend’s wedding. She and her husband shared their first dance to the tune of “Lucky” by Jason Mraz and Colbie Calliat. You know, the one that goes, “Lucky I’m in love with my best friend . . .” We hear that sentiment all the time—that marrying your best friend is the ultimate goal. But I find the ideal of my husband being my best friend a romantic notion that sells the love between spouses short.

I did not marry my best friend. My best friend is married, has two children, and is currently visiting Poland with her family. My husband, Will, on the other hand, is the best man I know, the love of my life, and the father of our two daughters. We support each other, discuss the mundane and the extraordinary, play games, work out, have fun, enjoy each other’s company, share everything, and respect each other. But at the end of the day, he is still not my best friend; he is much more.

There is an important distinction between the role of best friend and the role of spouse, and I would be minimizing my husband’s role in my life if I called him anything else. I believe that a spouse and a best friend are analogous but not the same. It may sound nitpicky, but “best friend” can never do justice to the far more intimate calling of the marital relationship.

Monica Mendez Leahy, who has more than twenty years of experience counseling couples, believes that the modern terms we associate with our spouse, such as soulmate or BFF, directly result from a lack of married role models. Many couples these days go the route of living together without being married. “Therefore, younger couples aren't seeing as many examples of marriage and are left to speculate on what a marital partnership consists of,” Leahy says. “The closest thing we come up with is best friends with benefits, plus a legal piece of paper?”

I don’t deny that friendship is critical between spouses. In Leahy’s book, she says, “If you analyze long-lasting, happy marriages, you will see a solid friendship at the root of each one.” She calls it the Friendship Factor. “They treat each other as if their partner was their dearest and best friend in the world,” Leahy says. “And in most cases, that’s exactly what they are.”

If friendship is an important foundation for marriage, shouldn’t married couples strive toward best friendship? Leahy’s answer is no. “If a couple strives to be best friends, they’re aiming too low. The relationship between spouses is so special, sacred even, that there are laws to protect and reward individuals who choose this maximum level of togetherness. The bond between spouses is so highly sought after and rewarding when reached, why get married if you’re aiming to shortchange your relationship?”

The truth is, the partnership of marriage is stronger and more intimate than the decades of history you might have with even your closest friend. In Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage, Elizabeth Gilbert writes, “To be fully seen by somebody, then, and be loved anyhow—this is a human offering that can border on miraculous.” I agree with Gilbert. A loving marriage produces a bond that I know I’ll never have with just a best friend.

During our marriage prep, when my husband and I were prompted to share one instance where we were proud of the other person, we got a glimpse of this kind of miraculousness that Gilbert describes. Will said he was proud of me when I left my desk job for a very different, active job. He was proud of me for taking the risk and trusting myself. His unrelenting support of me—in whatever I choose to do—is what keeps me in awe of him, and I give him the same support.

When I call my best friend to talk, we are sharing our life, thoughts, and feelings with each other. When Will and I share our days, we are talking about our life—the one we are building together. Our marriage is an exercise in trust, but this is not an esoteric exercise; we share real responsibilities and goals. A year and a half ago, our oldest daughter was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. I told Will I was scared, and he helped me summon my inner strength. His calmness, my optimism, and our love for each other have carried us through all the trials we’ve faced.

In my experience, the marriage vows of “for better or worse” are literal; the commitment that spouses make goes beyond any friendship possible. Marriage is a lifelong commitment. This person shouldn’t just know you, accept you, and laugh at your jokes—they are obligated to you financially, legally, and personally. No matter how loyal I am to my best friends, we still have separate lives—and I like that. My husband and I, however, are committed to the life we are building together—career ambitions, children, each other.

We may have moved away from marriages of prudence in favor of marriages of love, but this has not diminished the expectations and responsibilities that come from two people dedicating their lives to one another. We may relate our romantic relationships to friendship because we understand that kind of bond and therefore elevate it. But in marriage, we shouldn’t want another shade of friendship. There is a magic to marriage. Marriage gives us a noble purpose, a relationship to protect and nurture, and new responsibilities to contend with together. That’s why my spouse isn’t my best friend; he’s my husband, and that’s so much better.

Originally published at Verily Magazine

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In Thanks: Dr. Daniel Sundahl

One of my most favorite professors is retiring... and since I may have cried writing this e-mail/ letter to him earlier this week, I share part of it in honor of a man whose lectures had a profound influence on my life. He taught me in three classes over three years. Thanks for your 30+ years of service, Dr. Sundahl: here's to going fishing and laughing forever with Ellen!

“If you gather apples in the sunshine… and shut your eyes, you shall see the apples hanging in the bright light.” ("Intellect", Ralph Waldo Emerson)

I can still see myself in your classes, thinking more than talking; scribbling notes; absorbing. The synesthesia of education; the poetry of life. Even now, my one year old is crawling under my desk - she hands me a button. She is calling out for her Dad, whose office she just crawled from to my hole, filled with boxes of notes and old papers and letters from friends. Grace doesn’t know about weeping phoebes or Neibuhr’s “The Children of the Light and the Children of Darkness” (though she thinks it has to do with nap time), and she has yet to recognize what being American is culturally.

But I like to read her Frost’s poems as I combat the weaknesses of my own nature to feel sad. The hurt and bitterness that my baby had an unexplained stroke when she was in utero, and the want for her individuality to always define her - not her struggles. How her triumphs in crawling, pulling up, and now, beginning to try to walk come from her inner drive and potential. I thrive knowing she is part of a wider story.

When she was first diagnosed at 8 months, it was scary. She didn’t show the symptoms of a bad stroke - and I kept my fears holed up for a few months, until I began to write about them, and more about Grace, and share the grandeur of my little baby. To preserve the memories, and allow myself to feel deeply and develop my poetical consciousness in order to better tell our family’s journey through cerebral palsy, through residency, through my own teaching now (in U.S. History), and through life; “And of course there must be something wrong/ In wanting to silence any song.” ("A Minor Bird", Robert Frost)

Thank you for teaching me the importance of a story, of a song, of a poem. Thank you for being my teacher.

I Am What I Repeatedly Do: Why I Blog

I don't remember reading about this ring in Purgatory, but reading students' papers must be penance for all the bad papers I've written in my life.

I remember, freshman year, I wrote a bad paper. More accurately, a poorly edited paper. Ug, to think of it now! I just ran out of time! Time management has never been my strong suit. My professor asked me to stop by his office and told me that he's read my other papers, and he's read my articles in the school papers I wrote for - and I can do better. I have a way with words, and this paper was not up to par with my abilities.

Ouch, is all I remember. Oh, the shame. The shame. I needed that dose of reality. Hillsdale College gave me repeated doses of reality, all four years, and I became a better student because of them.

Now, I'm teaching writing to those young students of history. I'm teaching them the five paragraph format, thesis, body, analysis, and an original conclusion. It's made me think a lot about writing and my own journey.

The essay is, arguably, my favorite type of writing. It is also one of the hardest, due to its style and length. Which brings me to blogging.

I'll never understand all the existential crises I've had in regards to my blog. The WHY DO I BLOG misgivings and continuing the write here years after the willy-nilly start of this blog during college: the pull is still strong. I wrote through a Washington, D.C. internship, senior year of college, my first three jobs, friendships, and my entire relationship with my husband.

Sometimes, my blogging is about what I omit too - I've never wrote about the depth of my spiritual battles in college, heartaches again and again, the loneliness and hurt that cut deeper when you live in a snow globe, or dyslexia suspicions. But writing my blog - writing about my small victories, what I'm reading, what I'm trying, and what I love - gives me courage to write more publicly about the harder subjects, the ones I keep much closer to my shy heart.

When I was in college, I wrote letters to a few friends regularly. Most didn't reply back often in letter (gchat or a a text confirmed they were appreciated and read), but forging our friendship deeper helped me open up myself as an acceptable voice worth listening to. I loved writing letters in college, and today, as I struggle to finish Grace's birthday Thank You notes still, this blog is my new way of writing letters to friends I know are still reading.

I do write letters - I'm still pen-pals with a former professor of mine, a high school friend of mine, and a few college friends, including a sister-in-formation. I love the postcards that arrive in the mail now from travels; the baby announcements; and soon, the Christmas cards. For now, however, the blog reigns as my short essay; a kind of memoir, maybe, and a place where I can always publish, and even when I don't - where I can always write and don't have to worry about finding a stamp.

writing/ studying on the drive up to Michigan with our family pup

I never grappled with the term "writer" - I am one, ever since I was in the third grade and decided what I wanted to be while writing about Leprechauns. I do grapple with the word "blogger" though because, eh, it seems so informal. It brings out my worst fear that I am "wasting my talents" {unquote} and that what I write is unimportant... which brings me to you, dear readers: thanks for all the feedback.

Your feedback really brings out my Winston Churchill side to never, never, never, never give up writing. Some days, I'm too anxious to post -- what am I writing about?! For all the struggles and woe writing can bring, it is words that soothe the mind and warm the heart. Blogging gives that to me, and it gives back to those who needed to hear those words - it is too often to be a coincidence that I write substance people need to hear. This blog has the Holy Spirit racing through, and I feel it. My blog is beginning to feel like a mission, a purposeful outlet.

Then again, this is exactly what I try to capture in writing my blog - the extraordinary of the ordinary. The blog is such a normal medium, and my life isn't so special - except that it's mine. And as the leading lady of my own life, I have that responsibility to enjoy it.

And that is why I blog: I enjoy it. I don't blog for the numbers; I blog for the community that has grown around me and The Corner with a View. I don't always blog my best work; my best work comes out because of the writing I publish on this blog. I blog for the love of it, and that is really the only way to pursue passions. People are attracted to the genuine, to the beautiful and to love, and that is what I hope to give to my readers here.


Do you blog? Or why do you read blogs? What are your Aristotelian pursuits of the day?

Happy Monday! Thanks for reading, as my younger set like to write upon the conclusion of their essays... {We're working on that!}

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Falling and Flying

Today might have just been one of those days when you whoosh your To-Do list off the table. It started out normally... Grace wakes up; I trudge in and nurse her on the raspberry couch until she is done, and watch her play until Will comes in before his shower. I whoosh her downstairs to fix coffee and a breakfast sandwich for Will before he goes to the hospital library to study for a few hours before journal club and then his shift. I feed her breakfast, try to eat breakfast too, make a few phone calls and then... derailed.

We ended up taking a trip to the pediatrician for a minor (but worrisome to me) ailment, which took way longer than expected, and resulted in both Grace and I taking a 2+ hour nap once we got home.

<< Insert random activities: fixing dinner, play time, cleaning up/ moving piles somewhere else. >>

Grace's day ended with a walk to the ER to drop off her Dad's dinner (and bring a smile to two ladies' faces!), an extended bath time, dancing to Disney Pandora, reading extra books, night prayers and kisses.

It felt good. It felt like such a full day, even though I only accomplished one thing on my To-Do list. Just one.

Perhaps the most important lesson I learned when I was single, and then re-learned when I got married, is the art of being content.

Being is a passive word, but it is not a passive state. One must work on "being" - being yourself, being content.

I've become more content with the reality that I am a slow cook writer (vs. a microwave). I was thinking back to college, when I wrote so many papers a semester, all the newspaper articles, and at least 3 letters a week (plus e-mails!). And as the years pass from writing with a point to writing with a purpose, I am more satisfied with longer stretches between publishing publicly. Less pressure to perform, and thus, more time to experience.

I still have goals! Oh yes. And I still overextend myself and say "Yes!" when I should say "No!", but the magic still carries me with hope and possibility.

I start by asking what is non-negotiable to me and what is negotiable. Non-negotiables, for example, the ability to take care of Grace and Will. The willingness to practice my faith. Keeping in touch with family and friends, and writing as a ministry and as a passion.

Negotiables include where I work, what we spend our money on, how I spend my time.

I am a firm believer that boredness is an unwillingness to engage the world. How can one be bored when there is something to learn or read or try? I believe even stronger than comparison of our one life to many people's photographs or success can do worse than ruin an appetite. It can ruin a life.

People ask if Grace is always smiling. The answer is no.

But I record her joy most of the time because it brings me joy. She is my niche. She is an integral part of my vocation, and I want to continue to teach her joy, and to strive, and to be content with who she is.

Insecurity preys on the discontent. But you're the only You in the whole world. You're on a mission from God. Your worth is not how many assets you have, or where you've traveled, or the clothes you wear. Your character is determined by truthfulness, kindness, goodness, and prudence more than how many people "like" your posts or read your blog or call you on the phone.

We all fall into the trap of wondering, What if...? When we should be thinking, What's next? How am I going to be the best version of myself? Am I working towards Heaven or am I scrolling the internet at 2 a.m. mindlessly? Am I using my gifts? Am I developing my talents? Am I helping others? What can I do better for the glory of God?

And when I re-align my life to a purpose, I find that contentment: to be the best wife to Will; the most loving mother to Grace; a good and kind daughter, sister and friend; a lover of life and appreciator of struggles and triumphs.

Life is not easier as a married person - there are different trials. Your marital status does not change your mindset. If you want the joy of kids but dread the late nights, crying, crumbs and heart ache, you miss the opportunities to experience life. Life is purpose: life is worth loving. Did I like spending Will's day off cleaning the house? No. Heck no! But we did it together because an orderly, tidy house is worth seeking. 

Let us clean house internally - the cobwebs of old hurts, the wishing for a different life, the wondering if you missed your one chance (which you did not, because life is not so linear). We must see ourselves through and love ourselves. 

We must fly to God with our struggles, and fly through life without the boggles of over-worrying and over-emphasis on the things we cannot change. We must try to find happiness during hard days. We must laugh more, forgive more, and think less about what we want. We must pray more for others - we must decrease so that Christ will increase. We must read more Scripture and more literature. Cultivate love and friendship. Think less and less about what others think, and get to know yourself.

Be happy with who you are, wonderful you. Life is too meaningful to want to be anyone else. Write your own adventure.

Source

Darlings, we must fly!

Knowing Your Limits

I'm truly terrible at writing under expectation. I used to think it was pressure, but it turns out, I can write 10+ papers a semester and a thesis and only truly lament that if I had backed up my computer better, I wouldn't have had to re-write a 20+ page one my senior year (and... three my junior year so... I guess I sort of learned my lesson times a million, or am a total glutton for punishment).

Writing after college, I did fine until I quit being a reporter and my now-somewhere-else mentor told me I needed to hop back on the horse and stop wasting my talent. I told another mentor, a trusted friend, and he asked me what else was I going to do besides write?

Never had I felt so cornered. Like my worth was in my words.

So, I decided to keep working for our family business. I started writing for fun, and sometimes money. But those jobs and I were not a good fit, and when I do not engage in them, I am happier. I'm relieved. That's not usually the emotion one should feel, I think. It's also a bad attitude, but I'm going more for intellectual honesty here and less about pride.

The couple weeks before Grace was born, I took a creative writing e-class on narration and storytelling. But it comes down to that new trigger - you are your words, make them roar. Even when I feel like a big sigh? So I'm taking a break from freelance, and I'm going to write what I want, and start teaching in the fall - my new adventure.

Adventure. I like to say the word, tasting it. Everything is so different from what I imagined my life to be. I saw my twenties in a big city with a big writing job and, and, and... not a husband, or a baby, or worrying about where we're going to end up for residency, or wondering how close we'll be to family, or planning bedtime nap time and wake-up time around a little monster with long eyelashes and the happiest-to-see-you-mom! smile.

We all have our tough days. We all have our lonely days. Just because I have a husband and a baby doesn't mean I don't get lonely. It's the kind of void only I can fill; the void of my life, and living for me. I cannot be myself if I do not take care of me.

My limits are not set - I can push them, I can lower them, I can accept them. I've been trying to exercise more than my body is sooo not having it. That's really hard for me.

Fine, I'm a toaster oven more than a microwave. You can't wish a crockpot to be an oven - they have different purposes and methods. So, I persevere, and try again. That's what I do! And that's how I do. Now, back to those book reviews.

The Hard Thing

Story 101 prompt - Today's challenge: think back over this week. What do you feel is your hard thing? How do you feel about it? What is the purpose in you writing it? I believe when He asks us to write something difficult - to share that which we are most afraid of - it's because He has a reason and a purpose in those words. What are you fighting?

My hard thing is forgiveness, which could also be argued as my easy thing. When someone hurts my feelings, when someone is thoughtless in their interactions with me - I can usually push it aside, see their motivation, hear their apology (if there is one), and forgive them in my heart. It is forgotten!

But... to the person who violated our friendship, to the person who should be more supportive when I need it most, and to the two mentor figures who treated me like disposable talent, I have a hard time with my Grudge. 

My capital-G grudge is what keeps forgiveness at bay. They all haunt me, because the root of the blame is usually myself, and the mistakes I've made. If you had only... echoes down the hall. I try to sleep at night. I tell myself I won't shy away from reconciling myself to the Lord. To forgive others heals me, and I am afraid to keep asking for all the grace and forgiveness I really, truly need. Like a child who has tasted the water from the well, I keep asking: Please God. Please God, be with me. Help me Lord. Help me!

In the readings on Sunday, the theme was, God listens to those who persist. Abraham talked to God about lowering the numbers of good men, so as to save Sodom and Gomorrah (from 50 to 10, so I would say he was persistent). In the Gospel, Jesus said, "And I tell you, Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened" (Luke 11:9-10).

I ask, I seek, I knock in my writing. My purpose in writing this is simply to vocalize my hurt. My purpose in writing anything is to vocalize words in a different order than the way they appear in my head - rushed, jumbled, excited. It's why I love the sacrament of Confession so much - it's more than silently making my peace with the Lord, more than crying and being repentant. It's physically saying the words out loud to the priest, who is acting in the person of Christ. It's saying I'm sorry to the person who loves me so much, he would suffer death again, just for me. It's knowing I am forgiven, when I struggle to forgive myself. I need that verbal affirmation from the only person who will never disappoint me.

I am fighting against how scared I am; how I have been hurt, over and over and over again. I've been betrayed. I've felt broken. I'm struggling to heal. And I wonder how truly, truly hurt Jesus was - emotionally - when Judas kissed him, killed him with the kindness.

Elora, the "Story101 midwife" as Shelby (fellow workshop-er) dubbed her, issued this additional challenge: Consider what Bradbury asks. When was the last time your real love or real hatred showed itself in your writing?

Ray Bradbury, in the Zen in the Art of Writing, wrote:

How long has it been since you wrote a story where your real love or your real hatred somehow got onto the paper? When was the last time you dared release a cherished prejudice so it slammed the page like a lightning bolt? What are the best things and the worst things in your life, and when are you going to to get around to whispering or shouting them?

I know I've written of love, real love: the way Christ has utterly transformed my heart; the way my family misses me and loves me; the way my husband cares for me and tells me so, the way he says, "I love us"; the way my baby moves and grooves; the way I'm learning to create a home, and not merely living to establish myself-- but real hatred? I shudder. Hate is so dark, so ugly. Perhaps, however, hate is what I think I feel towards those few people, and it's hard for me to admit that. I prefer "a very strong dislike." I don't hate the people, either - I hate their actions. I hate the way they don't see how they hurt me. I hate the way they live their lives without a second thought to how they hurt me. I hate that, even though I've tried to vocalize my hurt, I've been drowned into silence. And so I sit by the dark water and dip my toes in, afraid of the hate monsters that lurk beneath.

Blessed Mother Teresa said,

“People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway. For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.”

And so, yes, ultimately, that earthly, human, prideful hurt is unresolved. That's hard too. My life is not consumed by this hurt, though - only colored. I hope it will grow more pale in the days and years to come. To dwell is to feed the hate monsters. To be hateful is to lessen your own humanity, and to give less to one's fellow man than what is due to him or her: respect, love as an action, and forgiveness. Life is too short for anything else.

In Memory of a Sister: Sally Giauque

Fall 2007

Last week, a woman died at 85 years old. Her name was Sally, and I met her when I was a sophomore in college and "went Kappa" - that is, joined Kappa Kappa Gamma, a woman's fraternity. Sally was one of the chapter advisers at Hillsdale College. An alumna of the college and chapter, she dedicated herself to our house and its members. She would arrive every Monday, in time for dinner and meeting, and stay in the guest room. She was stylish, smart, and was always reminding us of standards and how to be ladies.

I had a tough time being a Kappa the first few semesters; perhaps it is my penchant for not being told by other people who I am, and people like to label "sorority girls." Or maybe I never thought that I quite fit in, though I met a few of my best friends in that house. Or maybe I was just overwhelmed; I never seemed to have enough time to join in the more fun activities, as I prioritized school and the newspaper, accepting only required duties as my service and standard. Kappa wasn't what I expected of her, but maybe, as I thought later, I wasn't what Kappa expected either.

While I struggled with my collegiate career at Kappa, I always looked to Sally. She was a lady. She told us chewing gum made us look like cows. If we were late to meeting, she kindly informed us that it was better form to use the back door. How we dressed was important - and not for fashionable or keeping up appearances reasons (which I rebelled against): but because we were Kappas, and that was something to be proud of, and our dress reflected the care we took in our appearance, in our house, and in ourselves. This I could embrace, understand, and welcome.

Kappa Sal, as we called her

She married her college sweetheart (who died in 1981), and she would talk so fondly about him. You just knew their love was special. She just wanted the make the world beautiful, and that is the most important thing I learned from her: to do your little perfectly. Pick your battles, make peace, do good.

I always bit off more than I could chew, and that is why I struggled. When I started to let go of what I wanted, and started giving back more to the house, Kappa's beauty burst forth in front of me. Kappa is made up of many, many women, but none of them define her - she defines them. She guides them. She teaches them - through education, ritual, service and love.

Sally embodied all these things, and she gave me one more sisterly lesson: how to be a lady, and how to be a woman. This is something we females are not taught enough, I think, or have many proper examples of in our formative years. She was old-fashioned, and in the best ways possible.

There is no clear-cut recipe for how to be a lady and a woman, but it starts with humility, graciousness, asking for help, willing to help, saying the (sometimes) unwanted sentiment, and reminding others how proud you are of them and what good they bring to this world. When Sally stood up and talked, everyone listened. It was because of Sally's example that I wanted to give more back to Kappa, and I began writing book reviews for The Key, Kappa's magazine, after graduation. Writing is something I do, something I love, and something I can give back to Kappa. It is my little, and I strive to do it perfectly.

Kappa Kappa Gamma chapter house at Hillsdale College, circa 2010

Dream a while of Kappa ever true 
Dream of her and she will be with you 
Dream of friendships through the years 
Dream of days their joys and tears 
Now it's time that you and I must part 
So take this dream and place it in your heart 
Keep it dear until the time we will meet again. 

Readers, who has touched your life profoundly, and in ways you did not expect? I did not realize how much of an example Sally had set for me until she passed away on July 23, 2013, and I really began to think of her again. My consolation is that I know I made her proud, and I intend to give more back to Kappa in her memory - and make the world a more beautiful place than I found it, too.

Published in The Mirror Magazine

Pro-Life Compassion

In the 2011 film Friends With Kids, two platonic friends decide to have a child together without the entanglements of marriage (which they saw as tearing their other friends's relationships apart). A year or so after their child is born, Jason (the father) meets "The One" and at their initial meeting, he explains that yes, he has a kid, but no, he is not in a relationship. She, in turn, asks he knocked up a Catholic girl.

 It's possibly my favorite part of the movie, which is not saying much. Friends With Kids was a very bleak look at having kids, and the lack of proper communication between the adults was surely everyone's downfall. But it was a strangely pro-life film. Even with the adults crying and getting their knickers into a twist, there were kids running around everywhere. I think they were supposed to seem annoying and unruly, but I enjoyed their vibrancy and the liveliness they offered to the  film.

Kids!

Moreover, all the parents had their kids on purpose. All the children were "wanted". By the end of the film, the very character who had been criticizing kids being brought to fancy restaurants at the beginning was now staring at them with doe-eyes and compassion, and asking the parents how old they were. For the first time in the whole movie, a character showed real compassion toward the lives of children.

 The main characters, who avidly hate organized religion (their words, not mine), would more than likely be contemptuous of the pro-life movement, and really, any one who did not wholly support their decision-making process. But would they really have been as rabid as what we saw in Texas? The yelling, the signs, and the insinuations that "my body, my decision" means that fellow women cannot plead and pray, men have no say in the decision-making process, and the child inside is not its own autonomy.

As Mary C. Tillotson wrote in "Disabled Babies, Moms, and Men: Can We Please Love Them All?", " If we really need to turn men into straw men and tear them down, we’re buying into the (false) idea that men really are superior and all we can do is mope about it and resent everything. If we honestly believe that men and women really are equal in worth and dignity, we won’t feel threatened when a man speaks with kindness or offers to help." As this is the end of NFP Awareness Week, I wanted to make suggestions for a more fruitful and successful pro-life attitude and movement. It starts small, with every person.

1. Pray

 It is more than praying ceaselessly (1 Thessalonians 5:17), and adding "the unborn" to prayer intentions - we must earnestly pray for women (especially those in domestic violence situations, and victims of sexual assault and rape); pray for people's hearts to be open to life, to understand its sanctity, and to uphold human dignity; for men; for all families affected. We must broaden our understanding of what it means to be "pro-life" to include the care and love of every single human being - especially those we disagree with, and who cause us frustration and anger.

2. Watch your thoughts, curb your words 

Never, ever, ever say "baby killer" to a person who is pro-choice. First of all, they do not see their decision as killing a baby. They see it as preventing a baby from being born. The difference may seem "tomato/ tomatoe" but it is that sliver of mercy that justifies their actions. Empathy is what these mothers need; it is called a "difficult decision" for a reason. They are not debating that. These women need healing too, and just as often, so do the men. It is too easy to look at people who use contraception, have abortions, are pro-choice and think, They are taking the easy way out. They are not taking responsibility for their actions. But you too are doing that if you allow yourself to think this way: you are guiding your thoughts to not be loving. You are not actively seeking their best interests if you so easily dismiss people. Do not let other people's mistakes be your downfall.

3. No yelling, ever.

Who likes being yelled at? Does that make you listen better to other people's arguments? I don't think so. (This includes yelling over social media, peeps.)

4. No judging why a person is pregnant, no matter how old or the circumstances around it

Can you imagine becoming pregnant when you were not trying, and not in a supportive environment? That sounds terrifying to me. I can't imagine how I'd react if my husband did not want our child, or my family shunned me. These are realities many, many, many people face. If we truly believe every baby is a gift, then we must act respectful and supportive to all moms, and let them know they are "wanted" as well as their child. Many women and men are not blessed with having excellent chastity education (or any at all!) which teaches them to value their bodies (and others). Instead, many retaliate against any feelings of unjust shame or curiosity by "taking control of their sexuality" by being sexuality active. This is different than understanding one's fertility, and both are important to learn.

  Be merciful, then, as your Father is merciful. Judge nobody, and you will not be judged; condemn nobody, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and gifts will be yours; good measure, pressed down and shaken up and running over, will be poured into your lap; the measure you award to others is the measure that will be awarded to you. (Luke 6:36-38)

  5. Helping and befriending the moms

These moms are scared. Bringing a baby into the world is a huge responsibility, whether or not the mother chooses to raise it or offer it for adoption. Heck, I was scared when I first realized I was pregnant, and I was married and in a stable, loving relationship with a supportive family. My parish priest told me that it was okay to be scared - Mary was certainly frightened when the angel came to her with the message that she had been chosen to carry the Son of God. This is why he said, "Be not afraid!" This is why her "Yes!" to the Lord is so significant - she was taking on another human life to nourish and love and bring into this world. This is no small feat.

 Helping and befriending these moms means supporting them emotionally and physically (hello diapers and wipes!), and hopefully, spiritually. If the mom decides to keep her child, she is making a life sacrifice. If a mom decides to give her baby up for adoption, she is making another sacrifice - after carrying her baby to term, she may never see that child again, but always wonder what he/she is up to in the world. This is an ache no water can quench.

 Volunteering at crisis pregnancy centers is an excellent way to support mothers: and if counseling is not your strong suit, there is still plenty of work to do in sorting, office management, answering phones, and helping the other workers.

 The most important thing we can do in this world is love our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ - this is not a suggestion either, but a command. We love and learn humility, learn meekness, learn sacrifice. Let us help each other get to Heaven, especially those who need God the most.  

Any more suggestions, dear readers?

[Originally posted at Ignitum Today]

What Makes Me Cringe

Story 101 - week 3 prompt: Whatever you do, write outside your comfort zone and see what happens.

"What Makes Me Cringe"

Free verse poetry, to start.
I cringe when I see people write write write
No form. No rhyme. Just rhythm.
I love writing but in doing so, I leave myself open for comment
Those confrontational comments, challenging: no mercy, all out.
I could make a list of people I'd like to apologize to me;
Then apologize, too, cringing through the litany of humility.

I try not to think of all the mistakes I make, I've made.
I try not to dwell, I try to remember, I'm not dead. I'm stronger
Than I believe, and smarter than I think (to paraphrase
Christopher Robin to Winnie-the-Pooh)
I'm worthy, I'm a daughter of the Lord
and Steve and Gigi; daughter-in-law too--
Granddaughter, sister, niece, cousin, wife.

What really makes me cringe is the thought of losing hope.
But I've walked through the spiritual desert; I still drink the water
I still bleed. Bleed because I am alive - alive enough to suffer,
Alive because I love another more than myself, lay down my life
Hold a child in my womb and can't-believe-how-blessed-I-am
Maybe life lacks rhyme, and the rhythm is off,
but nothing to cringe over: life, my life, is enough. Is Beautiful.

Dream Good

Week 1, Prompt 2 :: what is it that keeps you up at night? What could you talk about every single day for the rest of your life? What do you want to shout from the rooftops so everyone will know? What runs electric through your veins?

I have started and re-started this post so many times. I've read my classmates' posts, as they bravely poor their heart out and speak truthfully; and I, I have finished a post and cannot yet click 'publish' - for whatever reason is holding me back. Or reasons. So I'm starting over.

At this point, there are two things keeping me up at night. The first is my bladder. As I enter my third trimester, I have to pee all the time, which is annoying because I also have to drink water all the time so as to not dehydrate myself and suffer headaches/ stomach aches/ the whole gauntlet of pregnancy nausea that I've been trying to offer up to Jesus in moments of sanity. Otherwise, a pity party commences and I don't invite anyone, although my husband tries to come and make it all better. He's the one who usually does make it all better, and lets me cry into his shoulder as I continue to not understand why I feel sick, and why this nausea has never really ceased over six going on seven months. Seven motherloving months. July, August, September to go.

The second thing that keeps me up at night are nightmares: memories that remind me of horrible life moments; a rewind of all the things I have not done during this pregnancy to prepare myself for labor or motherhood; falling uncontrollably; failing in everything; the monsters of myself. I can be my own worst enemy, and when I'm lucid and awake, I can rationally turn these thoughts around and banish them. But in the darkness, when I'm exhausted and trying to sleep and trying not to guess what time it is in relation to when the sun will be up in the morning, all I can whisper is "Be gone, Devil!" and "Be with me, Jesus!" Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, I whimper into my pillow. I am so tired.

After first semester of college; sleeping with Heidi

But I don't wish this life away. I could talk about my life every single day. I could shout from the rooftops that I have the best husband, best family, best friends. And it runs electric in my veins that my God is an awesome God, a merciful God, a sanctifying God that let me trip and stumble and fall and break and pick myself up again and again. My God is awesome. My God, oh my God.

I've only enjoyed my pregnancy because I know the life I am nourishing is mine and my husband's child. I go to sleep at night only because I am tired and I have things to do: more to write, boxes to unpack, errands to run, chores to finish. I do it all because this is my life - this is the life that has been given to me, and I am going to be a survivor of the worst in life so that I can continue to enjoy the best.

It's  too easy, sometimes, to be sad. It's too easy to have regrets or play the Blame Game or wish life went in a different direction. Mistakes are made, decisions and choices from the past catch up to the present, and what can you do? React, and react positively.

In Man’s Search for Meaning, Dr. Viktor Frankl wrote about his experiences in the concentration camp; the differences between those who had lived and those who had died was meaning. “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing, the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way,” wrote Frankl. (As quoted in Emily Esfahani Smith's "There's More to Life Than Being Happy" piece; The Atlantic, January 9, 2013)

I'm at that lovely point in life where I've achieved 25 years. I haven't always lived to the fullest, but I also have not wasted that time. It's in the life scares -- nothing is going to be the same, I'm giving myself fully to my husband and child(ren), I'm out of my parents' house, we're living on a tight budget, we still need to get into residency for after the Masters' program, I need to be more disciplined -- that truly show me that I'm an adult. Not a boring person, but an adult, with more responsibilities and joys. And I am truly happy being so. I have my reasons, and I know my meaning and purpose.

There's nothing easy about life, except what you make it into; there is nothing definite, nothing permanent. But there is love and laughter, smiles, good conversation, the best company, a cold glass of beer, picnics, Christ in the Eucharist, the Holy Spirit and God the Father, family gatherings, sunrises and sunsets, walks outside, and good sleeps.

As Woody Guthrie says, "Dream good", y'all.

O Come, Holy Spirit!

Story 101 - week 3, prompt 1: The Holy Spirit as my prompt and source for writing.

In an age of beauty and technology and words, words, words at our disposal, there is nothing more freeing than letting go of acceptable ways of saying something, of being tame, and, instead, letting that comma be out of place so that I can let the Holy Spirit guide me in writing.

Why do you write? Yes, you. Anyone can write, blog, be a journalist or novelist. Not all those people are good writers, top quality, but they often have the same motivation: they have a voice, and they feel called to write. Write about their feelings and their family, their food recipes and their travels, their theories and their intellectual quarrels.

I know I have hashed out a lot of beliefs within writing. My husband tells me that I always need a reason to believe something. That I should not believe "just because". I agree with him on most levels, but I think that is the scientist in him talking out loud. The doctor who has to always give a reason to his patients and their family of why he is suggesting this way or that. I am no doctor.

This does not lessen my accountability, nor does it take away any legitimacy over why I feel beliefs. Because I have reasons, but sometimes, they're not hashed out all the way. They're not iron-clad. They might not convince him or my readers, but I'm not talking to them anyways. I'm talking out loud, through my writing. I'm talking with the Holy Spirit, who is urging me and talking to me and suggesting to me and feeding into my curiosity and endless knowledgelust.

Must know more. Must keep writing. Excavate.

Take a Load off, Fanny

Yesterday was an unceremoniously sad day. I mourned that my family had really left me in New Orleans to unpack the rest of my boxes and figure out how much of our budget could go towards more storage drawers for my inordinate amount of "important and can't-part-with" belongings, and cried over entering my third trimester without even noticing. Pregnancy hormones, the stuff champions are made of!

End of my second trimester, showing off the belly button bump

I woke up to a new day determined to tackle part of my long list and officially start my Story101 writer's workshop. The prompt for this week asks what may inhibit our writing goals in the next 10 weeks and how can we manage them ahead of time.

The intro week is focused on finding your voice. I signed up for this e-course so as to find my narrative voice. That voice where I can tell a story and not trail off in the middle because I realize I am sharing too many details before I've even hit the punch line. The voice where saying what happened is true, only it hits a funny note or a poignant note or a thought-provoking note. The kind of note you want to re-read, not only because a good friend sent it, but because they had something to say.

Writing itself has become an obstacle, mostly because I don't know why I'm writing anymore. Am I writing because I enjoy it, or because it is the only way I know how to talk to people? My husband likes to tease me about my tendency to start talking to him about something, and then I'll trail off mid-thought. It's because I'm thinking, and when I speak out loud, my words get jumbled because my thoughts get clearer. It would be nice, sometimes, if English was more like Latin: it doesn't matter the order of the words as long as the endings are right. It's the endings that connect the words together, and help translate the author's meaning.

My first obstacle is purpose. Why am I writing? To what end?

My second obstacle is meaning. Why do I write about this story? What do I want people to take away?

My third obstacle is discipline. Write, damnit! Then edit. Stop editing your story before the words have even breathed. Stop unpacking that box. Stop meal planning. Stop nesting. Write. Write more. Write it again!

The only way to manage my obstacles is to answer their question, even if it is a smaller goal than I usually have for my writing. The purpose of my writing is this course; the meaning of my writing is to narrate the prompts given to me; the discipline must be every day. I'll probably set a timer on my phone and then GO! type-type-type, because the only kind of panic I know is the deadline kind. The kind where editors e-mail you and you try to be a microwave writer even though you were made like a crock pot.

So here goes! After having a Last Waltz kind of day, I see myself hopping in a lonely canoe, paddling up Cripple Creek: If I spring a leak, she'll mend me.



Only, I've got 30 other canoes next to me. How wonderful is that? Not so lonely as many writers imagine life to be, at least when faced by all that white space horizon.

Les Poissons Are Friends, Not Food

Happy Friday, y'all! Thanks to Jen for hosting!!

ONE

Instead of blogging, I should be chopping heads off five fish my Father so grandly left me to deal with this morning, as well as de-scale and de-bone.

By myself.

I'm taking a break and letting them cool down. Forever.

When I was in South Korea visiting a friend, we went to a fish restaurant and accidentally ordered a meal with fish eyes in it. Never again, I pledged.

That's an eyeball. Look closer if you don't see it.

The most famous fish model in Korea.

What I ate instead of fish eyes.

My friend just ate a sea slug by accident. Whoops.

Then, a month later, Will and his family took me out for a day on the Cumberland. It was delightful.

I caught my first two fishes ever-ever:

Numero uno!

Second one bled on me. I was really roughing it.

I learned how to "net" a fish:

Then, prepare said fish for cooking:

Then, eat it. Eating it was less traumatizing than the fish parts we tried to eat in Korea:

It was very satisfying, and then I was glad to go home to the Real World.

But the Real World is a hard master, and there are five fully scaled fish with eye balls waiting for me to chop them off like the Chef Louis in Little Mermaid:

TWO

I watched Finding Nemo yesterday. Best decision of my day! So full of laughs and life lessons. Favorite scene:

Marlin: I promised I'd never let anything happen to him.
Dory: Hmm. That's a funny thing to promise.
Marlin: What?
Dory: Well, you can't never let anything happen to him. Then nothing would ever happen to him. Not much fun for little Harpo.

THREE

As of yesterday, Will and I have been married for three months! I wrote about it here.

FOUR

Here is an awesome article from FEE on the welfare state. Lawrence Reed mentions my second favorite president too. FEE is an amazing organization, especially if you are more interested in learning about economics and American history. They host free seminars too!

FIVE

I should also be cleaning my room and changing my sheets. Do y'all have any secrets for keeping organized when you feel like life has chopped off your head and you're just flapping your wings to get work done?

After I chop fish heads off, I have more work-work to do. Is it better to split time and multi-task or do one thing at a time? What about errands? Grown-up life has such a learning curve.

SIX

To go with the above theme, I play the Disney (children's) Radio on Pandora when I need a mood pick-me-up. Runners-up: Talking Heads, Mumford and Sons, Adele, The Chieftains and RUSH. Gregorian Chant for my cool-down, and Coldplay or Ray LaMontange for in-between times.

SEVEN

Reading anything awesome lately? My friend Betsy introduced me to Carrots for Michaelmas after I showed her Small Notebook. Now I am loving on A Holy Experience. My favorite daily read is Best of the Web Today at WSJ.

 Oh happy day! Have a wonderful weekend, dear readers.

Creating Order, Or Working in Order?

Today at the Austrian Economics and Literature blog:

"However, writers are wrong to think this. First, language is not chaos. The language they use evolved in a spontaneous order. That language follows the rules of grammar and syntax -- a deep grammar which is instinctual and, thus, genetically inherited; an evolving surface grammar and syntax which evolves more quickly in the linguistic order."

--Troy Camplin, "Creating Order, Or Working in Order?" 

Not Even Wrong

Wolfgang Pauli, a physicist who pioneered the field of quantum physics, is famous for the critique, "Das ist nicht nur nicht richtig, es ist nicht einmal falsch!" Or, "Not only is it not right, it's not even wrong!"

Pauli reserved this most severe criticism for papers whose theories or theses were so unstable and not within the realm of evaluable science that they could not even be proved wrong. This, of course, coming from a man who created the Pauli principle, in which no two electrons in an atom can have the same quantum numbers. (Obviously.)

Stacy Trasancos wrote a beautiful piece today entitled "The Unity of Charity" and it prompted me to think beyond Catholic to Catholic relations, or even Catholic to Anti-Catholic relations, and into Catholic to Protestant relationships.

The "I Hate Religion But I Love Jesus" sentiment is beyond the video that went viral. Are you religious or are you redeemed?, asked a college friend of mine in seminary on Facebook. I listened to Pastor Mark Driscoll speak and I did not recognize such a religion as my own. My friend said he was speaking to Evangelicals; but such words translate into a disdain for all organized religion, especially the Roman Catholic Church.

Moreover, that kind of rhetoric has no substantial place in Christendom. It does not advance the conversation. It does not lead to unity between Christians.

Read More at IGNITUM TODAY >>>>>>>

Baptism In Your Bones

"When I write a novel in which the central action is a baptism, I am very well aware that for a majority of my readers, baptism is a meaningless rite, and so in my novel I have to see that this baptism carries enough awe and mystery to jar the reader into some kind of emotional recognition of its significance. To this end I have to bend the whole novel--its language, its structure, its action. I have to make the reader feel, in his bones if nowhere else, that something is going on here that counts."

--Flannery O'Connor, from "Novelist & Believer"

Sitting on O'Connor's porch

Christmas Beyond Commercialism

We Catholics are still in the Christmas season, so I thought I would share the full text of Pope Benedict's Christmas Eve homily. These addresses are traditional "Urbi et Orbi" speeches-- to the City and to the World!

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

The reading from Saint Paul’s Letter to Titus that we have just heard begins solemnly with the word “apparuit,” which then comes back again in the reading at the Dawn Mass: apparuit, "there has appeared."

This is a programmatic word, by which the Church seeks to express synthetically the essence of Christmas. Formerly, people had spoken of God and formed human images of him in all sorts of different ways. God himself had spoken in many and various ways to mankind (cf. Heb 1:1 Mass during the Day).

But now something new has happened: he has appeared. He has revealed himself. He has emerged from the inaccessible light in which he dwells. He himself has come into our midst. This was the great joy of Christmas for the early Church: God has appeared. No longer is he merely an idea, no longer do we have to form a picture of him on the basis of mere words. He has “appeared”. But now we ask: how has he appeared? Who is he in reality?

The reading at the Dawn Mass goes on to say: “the kindness and love of God our Savior for mankind were revealed” (Tit 3:4). For the people of pre-Christian times, whose response to the terrors and contradictions of the world was to fear that God himself might not be good either, that he too might well be cruel and arbitrary, this was a real “epiphany,” the great light that has appeared to us: God is pure goodness.

Today too, people who are no longer able to recognize God through faith are asking whether the ultimate power that underpins and sustains the world is truly good, or whether evil is just as powerful and primordial as the good and the beautiful which we encounter in radiant moments in our world.

“The kindness and love of God our Savior for mankind were revealed:” this is the new, consoling certainty that is granted to us at Christmas. In all three Christmas Masses, the liturgy quotes a passage from the Prophet Isaiah, which describes the epiphany that took place at Christmas in greater detail: “A child is born for us, a son given to us and dominion is laid on his shoulders; and this is the name they give him: Wonder-Counsellor, Mighty-God, Eternal-Father, Prince-of-Peace. Wide is his dominion in a peace that has no end” (Is 9:5f.).

Whether the prophet had a particular child in mind, born during his own period of history, we do not know. But it seems impossible. This is the only text in the Old Testament in which it is said of a child, of a human being: his name will be Mighty-God, Eternal-Father.

We are presented with a vision that extends far beyond the historical moment into the mysterious, into the future. A child, in all its weakness, is Mighty God. A child, in all its neediness and dependence, is Eternal Father. And his peace “has no end.”

The prophet had previously described the child as “a great light” and had said of the peace he would usher in that the rod of the oppressor, the footgear of battle, every cloak rolled in blood would be burned (Is 9:1, 3-4). God has appeared as a child. It is in this guise that he pits himself against all violence and brings a message that is peace.

At this hour, when the world is continually threatened by violence in so many places and in so many different ways, when over and over again there are oppressors’ rods and bloodstained cloaks, we cry out to the Lord: O mighty God, you have appeared as a child and you have revealed yourself to us as the One who loves us, the One through whom love will triumph. And you have shown us that we must be peacemakers with you. We love your childish estate, your powerlessness, but we suffer from the continuing presence of violence in the world, and so we also ask you: manifest your power, O God. In this time of ours, in this world of ours, cause the oppressors’ rods, the cloaks rolled in blood and the footgear of battle to be burned, so that your peace may triumph in this world of ours.

Christmas is an epiphany the appearing of God and of his great light in a child that is born for us. Born in a stable in Bethlehem, not in the palaces of kings. In 1223, when Saint Francis of Assisi celebrated Christmas in Greccio with an ox and an ass and a manger full of hay, a new dimension of the mystery of Christmas came to light. Saint Francis of Assisi called Christmas “the feast of feasts” above all other feasts and he celebrated it with “unutterable devotion” (2 Celano 199; Fonti Francescane, 787). He kissed images of the Christ-child with great devotion and he stammered tender words such as children say, so Thomas of Celano tells us (ibid.).

For the early Church, the feast of feasts was Easter: in the Resurrection Christ had flung open the doors of death and in so doing had radically changed the world: he had made a place for man in God himself. Now, Francis neither changed nor intended to change this objective order of precedence among the feasts, the inner structure of the faith centered on the Paschal Mystery. And yet through him and the character of his faith, something new took place: Francis discovered Jesus’ humanity in an entirely new depth.

This human existence of God became most visible to him at the moment when God’s Son, born of the Virgin Mary, was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. The Resurrection presupposes the Incarnation. For God’s Son to take the form of a child, a truly human child, made a profound impression on the heart of the Saint of Assisi, transforming faith into love.

“The kindness and love of God our Savior for mankind were revealed” this phrase of Saint Paul now acquired an entirely new depth. In the child born in the stable at Bethlehem, we can as it were touch and caress God. And so the liturgical year acquired a second focus in a feast that is above all a feast of the heart.

This has nothing to do with sentimentality. It is right here, in this new experience of the reality of Jesus’ humanity that the great mystery of faith is revealed. Francis loved the child Jesus, because for him it was in this childish estate that God’s humility shone forth. God became poor. His Son was born in the poverty of the stable. In the child Jesus, God made himself dependent, in need of human love, he put himself in the position of asking for human love our love.

Today Christmas has become a commercial celebration, whose bright lights hide the mystery of God’s humility, which in turn calls us to humility and simplicity. Let us ask the Lord to help us see through the superficial glitter of this season, and to discover behind it the child in the stable in Bethlehem, so as to find true joy and true light. Francis arranged for Mass to be celebrated on the manger that stood between the ox and the ass (cf. 1 Celano 85; Fonti 469).

Later, an altar was built over this manger, so that where animals had once fed on hay, men could now receive the flesh of the spotless lamb Jesus Christ, for the salvation of soul and body, as Thomas of Celano tells us (cf. 1 Celano 87; Fonti 471). Francis himself, as a deacon, had sung the Christmas Gospel on the holy night in Greccio with resounding voice. Through the friars’ radiant Christmas singing, the whole celebration seemed to be a great outburst of joy (1 Celano 85.86; Fonti 469, 470).

It was the encounter with God’s humility that caused this joy his goodness creates the true feast. Today, anyone wishing to enter the Church of Jesus’ Nativity in Bethlehem will find that the doorway five and a half meters high, through which emperors and caliphs used to enter the building, is now largely walled up. Only a low opening of one and a half meters has remained. The intention was probably to provide the church with better protection from attack, but above all to prevent people from entering God’s house on horseback. Anyone wishing to enter the place of Jesus’ birth has to bend down.

It seems to me that a deeper truth is revealed here, which should touch our hearts on this holy night: if we want to find the God who appeared as a child, then we must dismount from the high horse of our “enlightened” reason. We must set aside our false certainties, our intellectual pride, which prevents us from recognizing God’s closeness. We must follow the interior path of Saint Francis the path leading to that ultimate outward and inward simplicity which enables the heart to see. We must bend down, spiritually we must as it were go on foot, in order to pass through the portal of faith and encounter the God who is so different from our prejudices and opinions the God who conceals himself in the humility of a newborn baby.

In this spirit let us celebrate the liturgy of the holy night, let us strip away our fixation on what is material, on what can be measured and grasped. Let us allow ourselves to be made simple by the God who reveals himself to the simple of heart. And let us also pray especially at this hour for all who have to celebrate Christmas in poverty, in suffering, as migrants, that a ray of God’s kindness may shine upon them, that they and we may be touched by the kindness that God chose to bring into the world through the birth of his Son in a stable. Amen.