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World at Prayer blog
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
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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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
I have a vivid memory of my grandmother sitting in the front seat of my car while my husband drove. It was early evening, and I can still hear her east Texas twang as she said, “How can you see a sunset like that and not believe in God?” I Forgot to Notice Sunsets While I can’t remember the colors of the sunset that day, my husband and I have often quoted her question over the last twenty years. But even then, I forgot to notice sunsets. A few years ago, our family hosted a foreign exchange student for a year, and she marveled at the sight of the pink, red, and orange sunsets from our house. She’d stop what she was doing and run outside to watch it and take pictures. It seemed so normal, a sunset. But I would stop what I was doing and go with her. My Instagram feed was full of sunsets that year.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
There are moments when we recognize God’s subtle but sure action in our lives. It may be an encouraging sign unexpectedly received, a word of encouragement at just the right time, or a long-awaited answer to prayer. Sometimes, it can be sensed in a gentle whispering in our hearts — an inner prompting from the Holy Spirit that challenges or convicts us. At these moments, we often clearly recognize the hand of God instructing and encouraging us. A Moment of Reckoning Among many such experiences in my own life, one memory stands out as a turning point in my life. It was a Sunday evening, and I was attending Mass as a college student at our campus church. Distracted by football games, parties, and social events, I thankfully managed to continue to go to Mass every weekend, though my faith and devotion were lukewarm.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
According to FIFA, the organization that sponsors the World Cup, the 2022 final in Qatar when Argentina beat France had 1.5 billion viewers. In comparison, Super Bowl LVI had less than 200 million viewers worldwide. Full disclosure: I love soccer. Watching Liverpool with my sons is my idea of a great morning, so those numbers don’t surprise me. They do cause me to wonder, though. Why has the beautiful sport not taken off more in America? Why do we choose to spend three hours and 12 minutes on average watching 60 minutes of play in football when we can watch 90 to 100 minutes of play in soccer in under two hours? People tell me soccer is boring. There may only be one or two goals in a game. But here’s what they are missing. Soccer is a game of hope.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
Praying the Rosary was not something I grew up with in my family. Today, I would like to share how I came to learn and pray the Rosary and how praying with our Blessed Mother always brings me great hope! Early in 2020, our lives were all turned upside-down. My husband’s uncle, whom we were both close to, suddenly passed away. I also had to accept not seeing my parents in Florida for quite a while due to lockdowns. This was not an easy time for anyone. During this time, I also felt a strong and loving nudge to pray the Rosary. I know that this was our Blessed Mother guiding me to the protection of her mantle. It was a time when I was very much in need of hope.
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Faith Reflection | Hope-2025 | Jubilee of Hope | power of prayer
As I was driving, following the ambulance with my husband inside, my car became a sanctuary for praying to God to heal him. I can still see the yellow line on the machine move up and down like on a Richter scale, then stretching out to a flat line. This took about a minute, but in those seconds, I prayed with all my heart in the hope that the line would move again to signal life had returned to the body of my beloved. My hope was gone, and my husband was dead. Whether a loved one dies in an instant, days, months, or years, you hope for healing throughout the period that life hangs in the balance. I have heard the anecdote that sometimes the answer to a prayer is yes, no, or not now. The “No” for me triggered a deep hope that my husband was on his way to Heaven. So many people requested a Mass intention for the repose of my husband’s soul immediately. As I attended those Masses, I would hear his name as part of the prayer of the faithful. It consoled me, but didn’t restore my hope.
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