Here's Your Sneak Peek at the Full Story!

Coming Home Network runs Denise Bossert's Journey Home!
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Ms. Bossert is available to share her conversion story with your parish*. Contact her at denise.bossert@centurytel.net

Topics Include:
The Conversion Story of Denise Bossert (from Preacher's Kid to Roman Catholic)
The Call to Catholic Freelance Writing
Mary, My Mother (from bias to bliss)
Be Sealed With The Spirit (for Confirmation classes)
Dear John (Praying for a spouse's conversion)

*speaking fee ($50 to $100) and travel expenses

Catholic by Grace in Print - June 2010 article

http://www.diocesealex.org/Portals/1/CT%206-21-10small.pdf

(See page 5)

Interesting Dream Last Night

I woke up this morning and remembered a dream I'd had just before waking. Jesus was telling me that one great way to understand the Blessed Trinity is one-to-the-third-power. 1 times 1 times 1 is still ONE.

I like that.

It kind of makes sense.

From Minnesota With Love

We're visiting my oldest daughter and her husband in Eagan, Minnesota! We will be praying the Mass with the Faithful in St. Paul on Sunday. See you at the Cathedral for 8:00 A.M. Mass!

Vatican Splendors - it's worth your time!

Last week, I took my daughter to the History Museum in St. Louis, Missouri. We experienced the exhibit Vatican Splendors.

How can one explain 2000 years of Church history and art? Is it possible to do it justice?

A student in one of my classes said she has a summer job at the exhibit. She told me to get the audio tour. I did, and it was worth every penny.

My 11 year-old daughter loves art. (She wants to be an artist when she grows up.) I purchased the audio tour for each of us. She would point out the number on the wall and tell me to get my tech-toy ready. "Press." She would tell me when to hit the green button so that our headsets would be in sync.

If I started walking away from an exhibit before she was finished soaking it in, she would motion me back with her hand. "Not yet," she'd say.

Her favorite part was the Chalice used by JPII.

My favorite part was the work by Michelangelo. Or the other paintings. Or maybe it was the iconography. Actually, I think it was the papal chairs. No. It was one image of Our Lady. Yes. I think that was my favorite piece.

I know that the exhibit is slated to hit a number of U.S. cities. If it is coming to your city, be sure to go.

And take your friends -- especially your non-Catholic friends. Really, there are few better ways to evangelize. How can anyone say that the early Church wasn't Catholic after this tour? Of course it was Catholic -- and we have 2000 years of art to prove it.

As Cardinal Newman said, "To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant."

Oh, I just remembered what was my favorite! It was this gold image of two eyes and a cross on the forehead. You have to go to the exhibit to figure out why it was my take-away memory.

For more information on the exhibit and a list of cities to host Vatican Splendors, click here: http://vaticansplendors.net/

You've Got Mail!

Many years ago, when my husband and I were dating, one of my favorite things to do was to log on to America On Line and hear those familiar words, "You've Got Mail!" Christ says something very much like that throughout the Gospels. He had a message for anyone who would listen.

Zacchaeus, I'm going to your house.

Woman at the well, let's have a chat.

Martha, Martha, Martha, come here a minute, and let's talk about this.

Woman, why are you crying? Enough of that. I have something to tell you.

While Jesus Christ doesn't physically walk up to people today and say there's something I want to tell you, He does still talk to us, and His words are soft, yet incredibly direct. I've found a message just waiting for me while driving the car, sitting beside my dying grandmother, kneeling in prayer in the Adoration Chapel . . . or beside my bed, crying in the dead of night. He's answered back through another person's words, through my husband, my priest, my parent, my child. He's lifted my spirits through a song, a prayer, a sunrise. He's touched me through another's hug, another's tears, another's letter.

He's stopped me in my tracks while reading a saint's book and whispered to me that the author's holiness, which I had been admiring, was borne in the embrace of the Catholic Church.

And I dropped everything at His call, and claimed His 2000 year old Church as my own. Nobody in my family line had done that - from the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.

And that's what it's like when the Lord delivers His mail.

Things I would never do, I have done. Places I would never go, I have gone. Words I would never have said, I now say. All because He still speaks. And life is never the same again.

There is mail every time I "log on" to the Call of Christ. And the words are always life-giving and life-changing.

Listen. Do you hear that?

You've Got Mail!

Guidelines for Catholic bloggers

Read in full here: http://usccbmedia.blogspot.com/2010/06/bishop-zavala-on-catholic-media.html

"To sharpen our focus, let me start by saying what a faithful Catholic media is not. Today's secular media culture is often competitive and can have little regard for the damage done to people's lives and reputations. There is a tendency to be mean-spirited and engage in personal attacks. Many times the secular media present only a superficial rendering of a story, often choosing what is sensationalist over in-depth reporting.

"While I think we can all agree that we do not want to see any of these qualities in our own publications, programs or Web sites, I think we have to admit that at times they are present. Avoiding them requires ongoing vigilance, since secular media and its influence are vast.

"I also do not think that we should go to the other extreme and simply say that faithful Catholic media organizations are those who engage in apologetics to defend bishops at all costs. That is too simplistic and does not respect the intelligence of Catholics in North America. They deserve a Catholic media that takes a more nuanced perspective.Lastly, I do not believe that faithful Catholic media organizations should present themselves as speaking for the Magisterium. Only the Magisterium can speak for the Magisterium. While this sounds self-evident, it bears saying because there appear to be some organizations who do not see this point."

Dr. Peter Kreeft - on discernment (This is great!)

http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics/discernment.htm

Catholic by Grace Hits 40!

Thanks to The Dialog in Wilmington, DE, we have reached our 40th publication!