1.  The ease of listening to music online without having to pay a dime.  OK, I realize a lot of YouTube songs are probably pirated, but I sure enjoy listening to them, and I recently discovered the ability to create a mix so you have continuous play.  You can listen to my mix if you’d like.

2.  Popcorn pan popped in coconut oil and slathered with butter and a bit of sea salt.

3.  A new blender and the renewed ability to make smoothies that comes with it.

4.  The days are getting longer!

5.  The freedom we have in the US to pretty much do whatever we want, especially live out and express our faith in God.  I’m not sure how much longer it will last, but I am thankful for it today.

The story got me thinking about the many things we Catholics have come to know not directly through Sacred Scripture, but in the 1600 years since the Canon of Scripture was determined, and even before that through writings that didn’t make it into the Canon.  I recently finished St. Louis the Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary, which is considered by many popes to be the authoritative work on what devotion to Mary is and what it isn’t.  In other words, if you want to know what devotion to Mary is as I did, that’s the book to read.  St. Louis wrote True Devotion to Mary sometime in the 1700s but the work was not discovered until the 1840s by a monk who was cleaning out the attic.

The ongoing role of Mary in the Church is one of those truths that isn’t spoken of directly in Sacred Scripture.  It’s very clear in Scripture that Mary was a virgin at the time she gave birth to Jesus; it takes more understanding of the culture and the way the original languages of the Gospels were used to get from Scripture that Mary remained a virgin for the rest of her life.  Bible scholars may be able to figure this out from the text.  The rest of us learn it through Catholic teaching.  The Catholic Church has had that particular teaching of Mary’s perpetual virginity handed down from the Early Church Fathers–Sacred Tradition.  I don’t personally know the history of this doctrine that well, but I’m guessing the information probably originated from the Apostle John reporting on conversations he’d had with Mary while she was under his care where she flat out told him.

What exactly is Sacred Tradition?  It’s a deposit of truth derived from God continuing to communicate with His people after Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, and after the Book of Revelation was penned.  The Holy Spirit has communicated through Church councils, theologians (often referred to as Doctors of the Church), Divine revelation to mystics (people such as St. Bridget who see visions) and the experience of people living out the faith and sharing about it.

What is the purpose of Sacred Tradition?  It is a fleshing out of the truths of Sacred Scripture, a development and maturing of the Faith as God reveals more to us over time, and also a more in-depth analysis of the consequences of holding to the truths laid out in Sacred Scripture, for example, the more technical aspects of how the virgin birth took place.  Sacred Tradition will never, can never, contradict Sacred Scripture.  However, Sacred Tradition does teach truths that are not explicitly found in Sacred Scripture.  Often those truths are foreshadowed in types and symbols, but you wouldn’t automatically conclude the type or symbol referenced a particular doctrine.

It’s that “not explicitly found in Sacred Scripture” part that is the rub for the Protestants in my life.  My husband will listen to me talk about some aspect of Catholic doctrine that inspires me.  He’s actually a very good listener and makes a true and usually successful attempt to understand where I’m coming from and what it means to me and Catholics in general.  But as soon as I start suggesting that it’s true in a universal sense, he’ll say there’s no basis for it in Scripture so it’s wrong for anyone to impose that belief on another.

Protestant Christians stick to what is clear in Scripture.  There are certain things that all Christians must believe, such as Jesus being the Way, the Truth and the Life and the need for Him to have suffered and died so that we could have salvation.  Those truths are repeated over and over in Sacred Scripture.  But a belief like the Immaculate Conception (Mary being conceived without original sin)?  Well, that’s fine for me to believe, but since the Immaculate Conception is not mentioned in Scripture, then I can’t make him believe it and I (or my Church) has no right to withhold the most intimate form of fellowship (Communion) on the basis of rejection of that and other Catholic doctrines.

The reason I hear most often for not venturing outside the bounds of “explicitly found in Sacred Scripture” in forming and accepting doctrine is the danger of adding unnecessary things onto the Gospel and burdening people with the traditions of man rather than sticking to the Word of God.  In other words, it’s a safeguard.  We all agree on the fundamentals found in the Bible and then develop our own views as we see fit on the more nebulous stuff and respect what others believe if it’s different.  Let Sacred Scripture be authoritative and Sacred Tradition optional.

That view has always bothered me.  On one hand I totally like the safeguard aspect of it, and I certainly do not want to burden people with carnally-derived traditions.  Jesus and later St. Paul came down hard on people who did just that.  On the other hand, I don’t believe that Sacred Tradition is carnal–it’s not a bunch of traditions of men that we’ve added to the pure Gospel.  I actually believe that Sacred Tradition is a deposit of truth that God Himself has revealed to us through various means.

Now Sacred Tradition doesn’t just absorb everything that people over the ages happened to write or teach about the things of God.  Just because I am writing this blog post about spiritual matters does not mean that as soon as I hit the publish button I have now added my voice to Sacred Tradition.  Let’s suppose I receive a vision where Jesus appears to me and tells me various things.  Even that does not automatically go into the deposit of faith.  Jesus may have a message just for me, and that’s as far as it will go.  But let’s suppose Jesus had a message for me to give to the world–one that is absolutely intended to become part of Sacred Tradition.  In that case my parish priest and then the bishop of my diocese would get very interested in the message.  They’d want to make sure it was completely in line with Church teaching up to that point.  They’d want to make sure that it was authentic–that I truly was seeing and hearing Jesus.  They’d want to make sure that I’d accurately transmitted His words.  To that end I’d be subject to hours and hours of questioning and a number of psychological tests and who knows what else.  Based on the experiences of other visionaries, that process is grueling and unpleasant but very important because God’s word is not something to be trifled with.

Authentic mystics and visionaries such as St. Bridget, St. Faustina, St. Catherine Laboure, St. Dominic and others throughout the centuries have had their messages probed and tested and discerned by the Church authorities, and those messages have made it into the Deposit of Faith.

The Catholic Church takes visions seriously and goes through a lot of trouble to discern their authenticity.  Same with writings of eminent theologians such as St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Louis de Montfort.  After thorough review the Church has approved their writings either in part or in whole (I know a few things St. Augustine wrote about have been rejected but most of his work has been approved) and they now form part of Sacred Tradition.  We Catholics believe the Holy Spirit guides all parts of that discernment process according to the promise Jesus made to the Apostles during the Last Supper that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all truth.  The Church authorities (or Magisterium) discern and then pronounce the worthiness of the message, mainly whether it comes from God or not.

And if God has spoken to us about the truths handed down through Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium has discerned that God has indeed spoken, then we have to conclude that whatever God said is authoritative.  Otherwise, we have to believe God speaks in order to hear His head roar, or for us to say it’s not clearly spelled out in Scripture so I don’t have to accept it.  Considering that Sacred Scripture does say that God’s Word that goes forth from His mouth does not return to Him empty without first accomplishing the purpose for which He intended, I cannot accept the possibility of God’s Word in whatever way He chooses to speak ever being void or without purpose, or not authoritative.

One could potentially conclude that a mistake had been made in the discernment process and reject the message for that reason, but to accept that God does indeed continue to speak, that He has spoken and that His message was accurately transmitted, but not authoritative, poses a problem.  There is really no room for “It’s okay for you to believe that, but don’t insist that I believe it” if God did indeed declare.  You don’t just ignore something God says.

The Catholic Church has been around for 2000 years and throughout that time, the Holy Spirit has been true to Jesus’ promise and continued to reveal truth to and guide His people throughout that time until now.  Rather than take the attitude of “I don’t have to believe it since I don’t see it in Scripture,” I think it would be more prudent (not to mention humble) to explore and consider first of all whether the Holy Spirit has actually done this, and if so, what has He revealed to His people?  Our God has not remained silent and He does not speak empty words.

1.  The vacation we just got back from visiting my husband Erik’s folks.  We got to travel in real style too, as Erik’s parents generously rented an RV for us.  Not only that, the 25 ft. RV we were supposed to get was having mechanical difficulties so we had to settle for the 30 ft RV.  It was a nice ride, and the best part of having the RV was being able to spend the night in four different places without having to pack and unpack suitcases.

2.  Meeting my little nephew Nesta for the first time.  Darn cutest one year old I’ve seen in a while!

3.  A whole pile of gifts waiting for us when we got home, almost all from an anonymous donor at St. Mary’s, the school where Erik teaches, who wanted us to have a real special Christmas.

4.  A part time gig teaching an evening biology class at Front Range Community College for Erik and the extra income that will bring us.

5.  The downside of Erik’s teaching gig is that I will no longer be able to attend RCIA classes at my church.  But over Christmas, my friend Kelly who I only know through Facebook asked me if I wanted to borrow her DVD set on the Catholic Church–ten hours of catechesis.  She was recently gifted with the set and wanted to bless me with it.  All I have to do is return it when I’m done.  I can hardly wait!

2.  A song

3.  The book Spirit and Forms of Protestantism which clarified and confirmed a lot of things for me

4.  My nice warm bed

5.  The sleeper, complete with feet, that my kids and husband gave me for my birthday

1.  The amazing positive power of music.

2.  My mom and dad who raised me to know and love Jesus.

3.  Edith’s one day a week school.

4.  A warm house during a major cold snap.

5.  Facebook birthday wishes from friends near and far.

It all started innocently enough, though with a hint of controversy.  It was my turn to lead my children’s preschool coop session the day before Valentine’s Day.  I figured that was an easy one–have them make valentines for each other out of construction paper.

The only problem was one of the coop moms has a real issue with that holiday, which she refers to as V-Day.  It almost sounds like a dirty word now.  We’re a very tolerant, respectful group, so we nixed the red and pink hearts and did a brief little lesson on friendship and how friends show their love for each other.  You can’t remind preschoolers too often that this involves sharing toys, talking kindly to each other, and refraining from hitting and other forms of violence.

My children made valentines at home, and I delighted them by making a cheesecake sporting a large red heart made out of strawberries.

Less than a week later, unbeknownst to me, the state of Missouri issued a report indicating people with certain political views were likely to get involved in dangerous militia movements and should therefore be carefully watched by law enforcement.  Those involved in subverting Valentine’s Day (in this economy that could be downright harmful to someone’s bottom line) were not mentioned.  However, the report did specifically indicate people who supported Chuck Baldwin, Bob Barr or Ron Paul for president, as well as those opposed to abortion, illegal immigration, the New World Order, the North American Union, the Income Tax, and the United Nations as being potential domestic terrorists.

I voted for one of those three for President, and I do oppose more than one of the items on that list.  Unbeknownst to me I underwent this transformation from somewhat frazzled stay-at-home mom to potential domestic terrorist.  So what did I do with my new identity?

I learned of this report, along with everyone else, towards the middle of March when an anonymous Missouri law enforcement officer leaked the report to Alex Jones and from there it traveled around the Internet.  By this point I’ve spent more time with those sweet preschoolers at coop, and I’ve had my midwife over to my home to check things out for the upcoming birth of my third child.  She wants to make sure I have all my birth supplies together, and that she’s familiar with my home to be able to most effectively assist me when the time comes.

These days I don’t move around too quickly.  I’m less patient with my children than I’d like to be, and all my innards feel incredibly squished by this growing little person while the rest of me feels rather whale-like and sedentary.  I’m a perfect choice for some subversive activity because looking at me, who would suspect anything?  I can just see the neighbors (with the charred remains of some once stately building in the background) sadly nodding their heads and speaking in shocked, soft tones:  “She seemed like such a nice person…”

On my last day of preschool coop duty, one of the moms developed an appendicitis and got emergency surgery.  Coop lasted several hours longer than usual that day.  Fortunately it was a gorgeous spring day, and the kids played outside while we referreed their squabbles.  “Please use your words!” was an oft-repeated recitation.  Got to teach these little ones early that diplomacy is a better first choice for conflict resolution than all-out war.

My family picks up our shares of raw milk, along with butter, cream and eggs from our local dairy once a week.  Some of the milk gets turned into yogurt.  It’s a simple process, really.  If you check my eBay shopping records you will notice a Very Suspicious Purchase from around six months ago:  a laboratory-grade water bath, the kind used to incubate microorganisms.  Aha, you say.  Just because I’m not too limber doesn’t make me any less dangerous.  I could be one of those bioterrorists.

Once a week I culture Lactobacillus acidophilus and whatever else happens to be in the innoculant yogurt.  I put a generous tablespoon of yogurt into several quart jars of milk, mix them up, and place them in the water bath to incubate overnight.  The next morning I have a fresh batch of yogurt.  Once it’s cooled off in the fridge, it goes into smoothies and other delicious treats.  Today, yogurt, tomorrow… well never mind.  You just never can tell with those crazies who vote for third party candiates.

The most harmful thing I did this past week was to in my mommy-brain fog, feed my child some forbidden foods not once, but twice.  Like just about every parent these days, I have a child with certain dietary restrictions.  In addition to my infractions against her diet, she also got into a few other problem foods on her own.  This week her body was reeling from the extra challenges, and it reflected in among other things, cravings for raw liver and butter oil, which I happily gave her.  She appears to have made a full recovery, and we will all be more careful from now on.

We got a surprise spring snow, and that gave us the opportunity to finally try out the sled my girls received for Christmas.  We bundled them up in their snowsuits, put them on the sled, and my husband pulled them all around this vacant lot across the street.  They wanted to build a snowman and have a snowball fight.  It’s rare that snow in Colorado is sticky enough to make snowballs, but this particular snow was perfect.  The girls built a snowman almost as tall as them and threw snowballs at each other and us.  I carefully documented the procedings with our digital camera.  We went home for a cup of hot chai and my husband got back to work.  I tried to clean up or organize some part of the house but didn’t get very far.  It’s much more fun plotting the next operation.

I do have one major failed operation to confess.  It’s now Lent and I very much wanted to do a meaningful daily devotion with my family.  I had both my girls stand on a piece of paper while I traced their feet.  Then I cut out their footprints out of their favorite color construction paper.  Each girl had 40 footprints, one for each day of Lent.  The plan was to each day read a Bible story about something that happened in a desert and the girls would each put up a footprint to symbolize them drawing closer and closer to Jesus as Easter approached.  The problem was the masking tape I was using absolutely would not stick to the wall for longer than a couple hours.  The footprints fell to the floor and spent most of their time there.  We also were rather sporadic about reading the Bible stories.  I tried several times to retape the footprints, to no avail.  Finally, my husband put us all out of our misery by throwing the maimed footprints away and that ended it.  I still think it’s a great idea, but I’ll have to think it through a bit more next year.

On the writing front, I’ve been writing a series of stories on how universities can conserve energy through various engineering changes and educational programs.  Although I do enjoy learning about how people are doing their part to take good care of the environment and use our resources more efficiently, there’s a part of me that can’t get over what’s now considered to be the biggest pollutant:  carbon.  Carbon?  As in, what all living things are mostly made up of, along with water.  Carbon?  As in the carbon cycle where in its simplest model animals take in oxygen and give off carbon dioxide and plants take in carbon dioxide and give off oxygen, and everyone is happy.  Now, it’s all about reducing your carbon footprint.

I did manage to read one provocative book, called Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins.  He was an economist who would go to these third world countries and make these wildly optimistic projections about how their economies would just grow sky high once American corporations complete some very lucrative infrastructure projects, which the country had to borrow money to fund.  The whole point was to use the projections and projects to run the countries into so much debt that the US would always be able to hold the debt over their head and get what it wanted from the countries.  The other purpose was to provide a way for those corporations to make boatloads of profit.  I swear I don’t know this guy and never did.  Oh wait, his recruiter was the US Government, so I guess it wouldn’t matter much if I did.

Meanwhile, the report which would have profiled me already had its days numbered.  Baldwin, Barr, and Paul wrote a joint letter lambasting the ridiculousness of the report and demanding it get retracted.  Officials in Missouri quickly issued an apology for including their names in the report, but intended to keep the rest of the report as is.  It didn’t take long for the public outcry to become too much for the Missouri government, and they retracted the entire report on Friday, March 27.  They either learned their lesson or their next report will be classified (in which case let’s hope we can count on those whistleblowers).  A summary of the debacle can be found here, along with links to more pertinent information.

So now I’m back to being just a mom, writer, and whatever other hats I normally wear.  I might as well strike “potential domestic terrorist” from my resume.  After all, it was only for five weeks, and three of those weeks I had no idea.  Besides, it was only the state of Missouri that thought so, and I’ve been in Colorado all this time.

The threat of true terrorism is something we’ve all been conditioned to fear since 9/11.  Today, what I fear even more is the damage that can be done by ridiculous profiling and surveilance of ordinary people.  This particular report is just the latest in a rather long and disturbing series of incidents indicating that the so-called War on Terror has little to do with bringing actual terrorists to justice and much more to do with curtailing the freedoms of Americans, gaining our cooperation in this endeavor by holding the threat of another 9/11 over our heads.

1.  InterLibrary Loan, which allows me to read all sorts of not too common books at no charge.  I’m currently working through Spirit and Forms of Protestantism by Louis Bouyer and just requested True Devotion to Mary by St. Louis de Montfort.  Oh yeah, and The Passion of the Christ just arrived at my local library.

2.  Chickens in my backyard who lay eggs.

3.  A great and affordable dance studio for my daughters to learn ballet.

4.  Friends to visit and friends who will watch my kids when I need or want to do strictly grownup stuff.

5.  Hot running water that allows me to take a shower as often as I want to.

Like many seasons in the Liturgical year, Advent has more than one meaning.  It is first a remembrance of the great anticipation our spiritual ancestors had for the Messiah to arrive.  The prophets spoke of the coming Messiah for centuries before He actually came, and they and all His people longed for Him so badly it hurt.  God promised one prophet named Simeon that he would not die until he saw the Messiah.  When Jesus was born and his parents brought Him to the temple to be consecrated, Simeon recognized Him and greeted Him with great joy.  After holding the baby, he was finally ready to die in peace–a lifelong longing fulfilled.

I taught a catechism class on Advent and I explained to the children that longing means wanting something really badly.  Anticipation means really looking forward to something.

Advent is next a time of preparation for Christ to reign in our hearts.  Although Jesus was born and lived in humble circumstances He is and remains a King–our King.  Christ is the King and we are His subjects.  That means that He is in charge and we must live in submission and obedience to Him.  Even our lives are not our own.

This is a time we can consciously invite Jesus to dwell more deeply within us, and surrender yet more to Him.

Along with that Advent is a time of repentance–turning away from sin.  Sin is when we defy God, when we try to be in charge of our own lives, when we refuse to obey Him.  Sin drags us down, destroys and ultimately damns us.  It is something to flee and abhor.  Advent reminds us to do that and to invite the Holy Spirit to come in and refine and discipline us–do whatever it takes to make us righteous.

Finally Advent is a time to express the deep longing and anticipation we have for Jesus’ second coming.  We don’t know when He will come again but we sure want to be ready.  When He comes again it will not be as a helpless baby, but as a Glorious King and Just Judge.  This is when He will judge all of us and the entire world.  This is when He will abolish evil forever and restore all that is corrupted and broken by that evil.  This is when He will make a new Heaven and a new earth.  This is when we will finally be able to be with Him forever.

During Advent worship at my Church is somewhat more solemn, the dominant color is purple–symbolizing repentance.  While the rest of the world is out going crazy over the hustle and bustle of Christmas, decorating in red, white and green, shopping and parties, I join my Church in observing a time of longing, anticipation and deep repentance.  This is one time of the year when my Church is so obviously challenging the worldly culture.  As a nonconformist, I feel right at home.

But as one who feels things deeply, I wouldn’t want to miss this time for the world.  It’s hard to explain how emotions like longing, anticipation and repentance can also be joyous and precious, but they are to me.  Advent brings to the surface and celebrates what I feel most of the rest of the year.  I know that the world is not really where I belong, and each day that goes by my longing for my home in Heaven with Jesus increases.  And each day the sin that remains in my life alarms me all the more, and the turning away from it is deeper and with more sorrow.  During Advent I feel the most in my element, the most harmony between how I feel on the inside and what my Church celebrates externally.  I feel greater peace during this season than at any other time, and it goes by all so quickly.  It’s not that I don’t enjoy Christmas–I most definitely do.  But Advent is definitely my favorite season of the year.

I deliberately copied one word wrong in the above Scripture passage.  Can you guess which one?

It struck me this morning that there is a monumental difference between noble character and noble sentiment.

I am full of noble sentiment.  You can throw just about any hypothetical gut wrenching situation at me and I bet you I will know what the most noble/heroic course of action to take is.  Not only that, I think there’s at least a chance that if I were in said hypothetical gut wrenching situation, I would even take the noble/heroic course of action and do the right thing.

We all have a touch of the heroic within us and it’s amazing how often people really do rise to the occasion.

Just don’t ask me about the daily grind of my life.

That’s where my noble sentiment lets me down every time!  There’s just nothing heroic about loading or unloading the dishwasher, folding a basket of laundry, vacuuming the floor, playing a silly game with my children or any of the other countless things a mother does just to get through the day.  Translation:  It’s boring!  It doesn’t make for a good epic novel or movie, know what I mean?

A woman of noble character does those things as often and for as long as she needs to, and she does them with a prayer and a smile.  A woman of mere noble sentiment balks.  It is the faithfulness in the little things that builds that noble character we all want–that character that comes through with flying colors in times of adversity.

I think about Mary, Jesus’ mother.  She did some amazing things with her life, most importantly, bearing and raising the Messiah.  The times she’s mentioned in Scripture make it sound like she had quite the interesting life.  She spoke to an angel at a young age, was the only virgin to have ever gotten pregnant, married Joseph, had a natural childbirth in a cave or stable following a long journey to her home town, had some shepherds and magi visit them to pay homage to the baby, fled to Egypt to escape a cruel king who was after her child, moved back to the home country (but a different place) after said cruel king died, had a harrowing three day search for her twelve year old son and about 18 years later asked him to work his first miracle.  She was present at the important events of Jesus’ ministry, passion, and death, was in the upper room with the disciples during Pentecost.  We Catholics believe that at the time of her death she was taken up body and soul into heaven and then crowned Queen.

But what did she do in between all the exciting events?  She raised her son and managed her home.  She nursed, changed diapers, weaned, potty trained, played with, fed and bathed her child.  She washed dishes and clothes, swept floors, cooked meals, hung out with her family.  She attended synagogue meetings and large family gatherings and trekked to Jerusalem once a year to celebrate the Passover.  And she probably was the one who made sure Jesus and Joseph had all their things packed for the trip.

In other words, a whole bunch of boring little things that never got chronicled anywhere on earth.  And yet she did them day in and day out.  She never complained or sought to be praised for any of it, but did it out of love for God and for her family.

We honor Mary for a lot of reasons.  She submitted to God’s will for her life at an early age, she raised up the Messiah and then watched him die.  She quietly pondered her experiences in her heart.  She nurtured the early Church with her prayers and presence.  She was definitely an amazing woman, but how did she get to be that way?

She didn’t just submit to God’s will in that one epic moment when the angel appeared to her.  She submitted to His will in all those little things in her life.  Every moment that she chose to serve her family rather than looking out for her own interests or comforts was a moment that she surrendered to God’s will.  Every moment she lived both demonstrated and built her noble character.

I’m faced with a lot of similar choices in my own life.  To serve my family or myself?  To live for myself or surrendered to God’s will?  And these decisions are rarely played out in any sort of epic way.  They are made and solidified, and my character along with it, in the little moments of each day.

My struggle with the little moments is not so much that no one is around to see how I handle them or praise me for them.  It’s just that those moments are often mindnumbingly boring!  It really is difficult to believe that something as mundane and repetitive as sweeping the floor or changing a diaper could be eternally significant!  It’s obvious how a brave martyr dying for the faith is eternally significant, or a firefighter rescuing a child but himself getting seriously injured in the process has consequences that reverberate down through the centuries.  But changing a diaper that the baby is only going to poop in again?  Fixing a meal that the kids will pick at or scarf down in a matter of minutes.  Soothing to sleep the baby who has already woken up three times in the same night?  There are many days I’d like to skip all of that and go off and do something heroic, if only in my fantasy–my noble sentiment fuels that desire.  The noble character lets go of the fantasy and takes hold of the moment and lives in it, with an attitude of humility, surrender, prayer and service.

In the end it’s the noble character that’s going to matter.  Sentiment is little more than a fantasy, an illusion.  Character is real and lasting.  Character is the sort of thing that could one day stand up under God’s judgment.  Sentiment would be the first to burn up under His gaze.

What I really want is the noble character.  Can I handle the often boring slog I have to go through to get it?  It will take a lot of grace from God, and if I can keep the big picture in mind, I know it’s well worth the effort.

Without further ado, here are five things I’m grateful for.

1.  My husband currently has a full time job with a regular paycheck.

2.  The Neighbor to Neighbor Sharehouse in my community.  This is a food bank and thrift store, but everything is free and the only personal information you have to provide is your name and phone number.  This ministry has given me two things.  The first is much needed provision of food for my family.  The second is an opportunity to actually live out the calling on all Christians to feed the hungry.  I serve as the volunteer coordinator for the Sharehouse as well as volunteer there myself.

3.  Jars and jars of canned vegetables and bags and bags of frozen vegetables helping us to further save money we would otherwise need to spend on food.

4.  Two of my utility companies are locally owned, meaning the people who run them know me and have the freedom to extend extra grace.

5.  My oldest daughter has the opportunity to attend a Catholic school this year.