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Reflections of Family and Faith
"The family that prays together stays together." - Venerable Patrick Peyton
Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
Prayer is such a personal experience and different for everyone. We may be saying the same prayers out loud, but the words are being absorbed into our hearts and minds in different ways. Even as individuals, the same prayer or Bible passage can hit us in completely different ways depending on the season of life we are in or whatever situation we are working through. The prayer that brings me hope is the Seven Sorrows of Mary. Mary suffered so much over the course of her life. Because of her experiences, we can be assured that we have a Heavenly Mother who understands our own painful life circumstances and who longs to pour consolation into our hurting hearts. Learning about the Seven Sorrows of Mary was a grace for me when our daughter, Therese, was born with a fatal genetic disorder and passed away at sixteen days old 27 years ago. Mary’s Seven Sorrows gave me a way to connect some of the most sorrowful moments of my life during Therese’s 16-day journey to each of her own sorrows. In the time of some of my deepest grief, Mary’s experiences helped me to feel understood and less alone in my pain.
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Holy lives of inspiration | Learn more about our faith
How much do we trust God in adversity? I guess it all depends. Moses’ people trusted God when given the chance to flee slavery in Egypt, but then, when Pharaoh changed his mind and sent his whole army after them, they doubted God. Their fear and frustration were vented upon Moses as they sarcastically asked, “Why did you bring us out of Egypt…it’s far better to be slaves of the Egyptians than to die in the desert.” Two points came to mind. The first was, do we ever find ourselves making the calculations that the Jewish people did when faced with impending loss? Do we rationalize and settle for something wrong to keep afloat or not to upset the apple cart of life and family?
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Brief and contemporary inspiration focused on hope and family prayer will be delivered to your inbox! Articles include live video, written word, and links to resources that will lead you and your family deeper into faith.
Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
When I was growing up, I attended our local Catholic elementary school. During music class, Sister Cecilia taught us to sing this prayer, which she called the “Day by Day” prayer: Day by day, o dear Lord Three things I pray! To see you more clearly, Love you more dearly, Follow you more nearly, Day by day. It wasn’t until I was quite a bit older that I learned the melody we sang this song to is from the musical Godspell, first performed in 1970. It’s a catchy tune and certainly helped us to learn and remember this prayer. But I did a little research and discovered that this prayer predates the '70s by a lot — by several hundred years, in fact. It is attributed to Richard of Chichester, an English bishop and saint who lived in the early 13th century. It comes down to us today because it was transcribed from Latin by Saint Richard’s confessor and later published in the Acta Sanctorum, an early encyclopedia-like text on the lives of the saints. The prayer, in just a few short lines, expresses so well the reason for our hope: to be conformed to Jesus in our minds, in our hearts, and in our souls, seen in our actions, little by little, day by day.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
As a Catholic daughter, sister, wife, mother, and friend, I have had many moments in my life where Hope is what held me together; dragging Faith and Charity along with her into the future with great expectations and keeping her eyes set upon the One Who was surprised at this little girl, Hope, in me.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
When Pope Francis declared this to be the Jubilee Year of Hope, I was struck by the different connotations the word has. In our family, “Hope” is my beautiful niece, full of determination and confidence and grace and love. We often “hope” for a good grade, an athletic win, a part in a play. The theological virtue of hope, though, is more nuanced. The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines hope as our “desire [for] the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit” (Section 1817). When I think about my own journey toward true hope, I go back to college and the first time I noticed my husband’s seizure activity. We were on our way to study at a local greasy diner, and as I chattered away at him about everything and nothing, his right arm flew up over his head and then his hand rested back on the steering wheel. Weird.
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Celebrating family life | Strengthening family unity
"This little Band-Aid doesn't just cover scraped knees—it's a sign of God's mercy in your home. When Mom kisses a boo-boo, when Dad stays up late helping with homework instead of scolding over bad grades, when a sister shares her favorite toy without being asked—that's spiritual first aid. These are the moments when your family becomes a living Gospel." The Messy Holiness of Family Life A woman recently wept in my office: "Father, I love my 93-year-old mother, but I'm so tired. The constant care, the lack of gratitude—I don't know how much longer I can do this." I told her about Mother Teresa cleaning the wounds of lepers who sometimes spat at her. When asked why she did it, she'd count on her fingers: "I – do – it – for – Jesus."
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