Our Lady of Mount Carmel

I was pondering intimacy and how one acquires intimacy in prayer. How do I go from the intimate union of Jesus in the Eucharist to deeply living out an intimate relationship?
Put another way, how do we Catholics go from our rote prayers for example to intimacy, to a passionate love of God?

It seems to me there is a difference between Catholics who show up for mass and Catholics who live their faith. I'm not talking about evangelical Catholics, Charismatic Catholics or those who are more Catholic than the pope but the ones who accept others for who they are (sin and all - mind you that accepting someone for being a child of God deserving of love is completely different than approving of someone's sin. We can accept the person but disapprove of the sin.), who live a life imbued with joy, peace and tranquility. It seems to me these people have a strong interior life. This interior life flows into their very being and the fruit of this interior life is seen in the fruits of grace: joy, peace, tranquility, love. Some of these Catholics might very well be charismatic, evangelical or whatever label you want to give them but the hallmark of a strong interior life will be manifest in the fruits of grace.

So I don't have to beat someone over the head with my rosary beads. My devotion to the rosary is meant to foster a deeper union to Christ through she who held God inside her very self, who nurtured him, who taught him and who waits upon us to draw nearer to her so she can bring us closer to Him. Mary's greatest desire is that we enter fully into the mystery of God. So perhaps on this feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, you too might consider renewing your commitment to a deeper devotion to the Blessed Mother.

Our Lady of the Perpetual Shakedown, take 3

When we lived in Texas, we happened to frequent (I use that word loosely) a church that seemed to be in the middle of capital campaign developments so we were being encouraged to support this or that endeavor. It became so frequent that my husband nicknamed (This is one of his greatest talents!) the church.... Our Lady of the Perpetual Shakedown. I've always loved that name.

Honestly, Our Lady is tenacious. She won't give up on you and I don't think she'd be offended at that title. I need to be perpetually encouraged to give, to give up, to share. I can't hear it enough.

Our Lady is a mother

This photo is of Juan Diego's tilma or apron upon which our Lady miraculously appeared. It is framed and hangs above the altar at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City. What strikes me as just hilarious of the miraculous story which you can read from iBrievary (from the report of Don Antonio) is that after Juan Diego had met with our Lady a few times, he found himself in a hurry on his next occasion because he was on an errand to find a priest for his ailing uncle. The story continues with: "Juan Diego set out on Tuesday, but he went around the hill and passed on the other side, toward the east, so as to arrive quickly in Mexico City and to avoid being detained by the Heavenly Lady."

Wow, me too buddy. Haven't we all tried to avoid our mothers at one time or another or those women who act like mothers in our life? Don't we dread being detained too or being taken care of when we can do it on our own? I know I do. Women have this henlike characteristic to take care of things for those they love. I despise it, but sometimes I can't avoid doing it. So it's reassuring to me that Our Lady is a nagging mother who won't stop looking out for her children even when her children don't want to have anything to do with her.