Saturday, December 26, 2009

Merry Christmas!


I hope you all had a beautiful Christmas yesterday. I was so busy yesterday that I didn't get a chance to post a message. My Christmas day began with a beautiful Mass on Christmas Eve and my Christmas day was filled with prayers, laughter, fun, conversation, sharing, cooking, baking, visiting with family and friends (over the phone too), hard work to get everything done, and collapsing at the end of the day in the living room, finally, to then top off the wonderful day playing a fun game with the family.

I hope that your Christmas was holy, beautiful and memorable - creating memories for future generations! Imagine that!

God bless and hugs!

Donna-Marie

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Meeting Jesus at the Post Office!

Here is a segment from a past Christmas segment in which I chat with Teresa Tomeo about meeting Jesus in the Post Office. Just click here to listen to it as well as some other Christmas reflections we talk about.

The recipe for the Overnight Christmas Bread coming up!

Friday, December 18, 2009

Mother Teresa and the Poor in our midst


"What struck me the most about Mother Teresa when I saw her for the first time was her diminutive size. There stood the world renowned peacemaker, lover of the world’s poor and a Nobel Peace Prize recipient — a giant — but in the body of someone not much taller than my young daughter!

I first caught sight of Blessed Teresa in the flesh a little more than twenty years ago in the Missionary of Charity convent chapel as she came in for daily Mass. I had been visiting..." (Continued at Catholic Exchange today)

Interview at Faith & Family Live today!

The interview of me by Lisa Hendey for Faith & Family Live is now up at the website. You can listen in by clicking here.

There's also a contest going on over there to win my book: Mother Teresa and Me: Ten Years of Friendship.

God bless your Friday!

God bless and hugs!

Donna-Marie

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Contest for my book at Faith & Family!


Go on over to Faith & Family Live to see how you can win a copy of my newest book: Mother Teresa and Me: Ten Years of Friendship by clicking here.

Also, very soon the podcast will be posted of Lisa Hendey interviewing me today about the book. Stay tuned or keep checking the Faith & Family website (link above) for the podcast.

I hope you win a book! Go over and take a look to see how you can win. It's very easy but the deadline is fast approaching.

Autographed copies of my new book are still available from my website: www.donnacooperoboyle.com and I will be including a Miraculous medal blessed by Pope Benedict while I was in Rome recently while supplies last. I am doing my very best to fill all orders and get them right out so you may have them in time for Christmas, God willing!

God bless and hugs!

Donna-Marie

More Radio Tomorrow...


Join me tomorrow (Friday) on Sacred Heart Radio with Brian Patrick. I'll be chatting with him at 8:50 AM Eastern time. You can tune in here. Just click on the "listen online" button at the top of the page.

We'll be talking about my new book: Mother Teresa and Me: Ten Years of Friendship.

Talk to you soon!

God bless!

Donna-Marie

Join me: Radio today!

This morning (on Thursday, December 17th), I will be a guest on Gus Lloyd's show: Seize the Day!. We'll be chatting about my new book. This show will be LIVE. You can tune in at 9:35 AM Eastern time. I won't have a link to give you to listen in until the end of December in case you can't tune to this morning.

Also today, at I will be doing a chat with a dear friend, Lisa Hendey who will be interviewing me for a Faith & Family podcast. I will let you know when it will air or you can check later on today on the Faith & Family Live website.

Talk to you later!

God bless and hugs!

Donna-Marie

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

How's your Advent season going?


How is your Advent season going? Have you tried to cut back on some activities to pause and pray and spend time with your family and loved ones? This holy time seems to speed by, doesn't it? We are already into the third week of Advent. which is hard to believe. What kinds of things are you doing with your family to make this season sprcial? Are you forming new traditions or reviving some old ones? Please feel to share in the comment section. I'll be doing some LIVE radio tomorrow and Monday (schedule here) about this season and about my new book just released: Mother Teresa and Me: Ten Years of Friendship, so please feel free to let me know what kinds of things you'd like to hear about.

Talk to you soon!
God bless you!

Donna-Marie

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Esther recommends places to do your Christmas shopping


How nice of Esther to give us some recommendations for Christmas shopping. I was very much surprised and delighted as well to see my name on her list! Check it out here Which reminds me - I had better finish making my list and then check it twice!

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Happy Feast Day!


Today the Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, the solemn dogma defined by Blessed Pope Pius IX in 1854. As Our Lady Immaculately Conceived is the patroness of the United States of America, this is a holy day of obligation in the United States.

Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, "full of grace" through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Blessed Pope Pius IX proclaimed on December 8, 1854: "The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin."

~ Catechism of the Catholic Church
(From Witchita Catholic Examiner)

Feast of the Immaculate Conception

Feast of the Immaculate Conception

Posted using ShareThis

Saturday, December 5, 2009

A Reflection on the Saints


Although this refection is from last month, it may still serve us today...

Saints Surround Us
By Donna-Marie Cooper O’Boyle



My third grade student raised her hand and seemed bursting to share something with our religious education class recently when we were discussing the saints. I called on her and she quickly blurted out, “I know who the next saint will be!”

“Who?” I asked.

“I don’t know her name,” she answered, “but she’s a teacher at my sister’s school and someone said she only needs to complete one more course before she becomes a saint!”

I smiled and mused about what might have been expressed and overheard at school to cause this misunderstanding. It was very cute, no question about it.

I answered my student, “We don’t have to take any courses to become a saint. There could be a very poor person living on the other side of the world who has never gone to school ever. This person has no education, no courses, yet he can love God with all his heart and love others too. That person can become a saint, same as someone who learns more about the faith,” I told the class.

During the month of November we have the saints on our minds. We celebrate the saints and pray for all of the deceased on All Saints Day and All Souls day and throughout the month. As part of the Communion of Saints, we are formally called the Church Militant because we are busy working out our salvation. We most likely are not involved in any wars, but we encounter spiritual warfare on a daily basis as we tread through each day. The Communion of Saints supports one another in prayer. The souls in Purgatory, called the Church Suffering needs our prayers. The Church Triumphant consisting of the saints in Heaven will pray for us and also wait for our requests for their intercession. We are all linked together in the family of the Communion of Saints in the beautiful Body of the Church.

Pope Urban VIII put the formal process of canonization in place in 1634. When the Church formally canonizes saints she solemnly proclaims that they lived lives in fidelity to God’s grace and have practiced heroic virtues. We can invoke the saints for the most pressing or the most trivial of needs. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us, “We can and should ask [the saints] to intercede for us and the whole world” (CCC # 2683).

What makes a Saint a Saint?

We can think of the saints as people to emulate. But what makes a saint a saint? What’s the stuff that saints are made of? We know that saints are people just like you and me – from differing walks of life, races, eras and temperaments. What sets them apart? They all had in common a shared communal faith in God and His promises. The saints are people who all choose to become holy. They are united in the love of God and the love for their neighbor. They were all challenged in many ways and became saints despite of, and actually more accurately, because of the struggles. They rose above the trials and persecutions with their eyes set on the goal – eternal life! Their example speaks volumes to us.

I find it amusing when in talking with people about striving for holiness, I have been told, “Oh, I know I can be holy if I wasn’t sick” or “If I had more time” or “If I had a different boss” or even “If I had a different spouse!” I smile and say, “My husband tells me with a twinkle in his eyes that God put him on this earth to make me a saint!”

God knows just what each of us needs to become a saint. It’s when we decide to respond in love to all of the little details of life we are immersed in that we are heading in the right direction. A trying child, a grumpy spouse, an angry co-worker; all can contribute to our sanctity and theirs – imagine that! This gives us a better perspective and also a whole lot of hope for the future when we recognize that we are where we are for a reason. God is calling us to holiness in the here and now of our lives.

How to Become a Saint

Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta said time and time again, “Holiness is not a luxury of a few, but a duty for us all.” Jesus tells how to become a saint—how to inherit eternal life. He asks us, rather, He instructs us implicitly to live the Gospel of Matthew:

“When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory.

"All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate people from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and He will put the sheep at His right hand and the goats on the left.

"Then the King will say to those at His right hand, 'Come, you that are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world;

'For I was hungry, and you gave Me food, I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink, I was a stranger, and you welcomed Me,

I was naked, and you gave me clothing, I was sick, and you took care of Me; I was in prison, and you visited Me.'

"Then the righteous will answer Him, 'Lord, when was it when we saw You hungry and gave You food, or thirsty and gave You something to drink? And when was it that we saw You a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave You clothing?

“And when was it that we saw You sick or in prison and visited You?

"And the King will answer them, 'Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least who are members of my family, you did it to Me.”

"Then He will say to those at His left, 'You that are accursed, depart from me into eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink;

I was a stranger, and you did not welcome Me, naked, and you did not give Me clothing, sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.'

"Then they also will answer, 'Lord, when was it that we saw You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not take care of You?'

"Then He will answer them, 'Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.'

"And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life" (Matthew 25: 31-46).

Opportunities Surround Us

We live this Gospel every time we bring a glass of water to our child in the night or clothe our family, and when we visit the lonely and take care of the lonely in our own families. Do we have a lonely relative in need of a visit? We can put aside some time on Sundays for practicing the Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy. Friday is another good day to give to others. Fridays are days meant for exercising penance and offering service to others. Amazing things will happen when we give of our time and love. Hearts are transformed!

Our Lord is asking us to see Him in others and serve Him in them. We have umpteen opportunities in our daily lives to live out the call to holiness; we just need to be attentive to the call. Perhaps we need to unplug from some of the technology and spend some time in quiet contemplation to hear Our Lord’s voice. And when there’s no time to be quiet and we are busy with the care of the family, right in the midst of changing diapers, keeping up with overflowing hampers of dirty laundry and all of the constant demands that call for our immediate attention - God speaks to us there too – even more clearly sometimes because we know we are serving Him as we tend to the needs of our families.

Blessed Teresa has told us: “The Church of God needs saints today. This imposes a great responsibility on us. We must become holy, not because we want to feel holy, but because Christ must be able to live his life fully in us.” We certainly live in an era when we are in need of saints to light the way to Heaven. God in His goodness has given us many holy people in our time—some have gone before us and are now in Heaven—some are here in our midst, humbling living out their lives of love and holiness.

No, we don’t need to take a course in sanctity to become a saint one day– it’s all mapped out for us and right under our noses. We only need to live out our lives faithfully, paying close attention to all of the tiny details while living in all of the present moments of our lives – surrendering everything over to God with great love. He’ll take care of it all if we allow Him to so that one day we will be rejoicing in Heaven – not just because we made it there, but because we lived out our lives with great love and service to others, and along with God’s abundant graces, we will have paved the road to Heaven for countless other souls!

Thank you dear Lord for Your love! Please teach me how to love with YOUR love and draw others to You so that we may all enjoy the eternal happiness of Heaven with You! Blessed Mother Mary, be a Mother to me and watch over and protect my family. All of you Angels and Saints, pray for us and guide us, please. Amen.

[This article originally appeared on the TORCH website (www.torchhomeschooling.org). Traditions of Roman Catholic Homes (TORCH) is an association of lay faithful established to promote homeschooling among Catholic families and to support those families who are engaged in providing their children’s primary education at home.]

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Message from "Spiritual Motherhood for Priests"

"Don't forget tomorrow on the 1st Thursday of the Month you can receive a plenary indulgence (under the usual conditions) if you offer the Mass tomorrow for Priests, through Christ the Eternal high Priest.

“During the Year for Priests a Plenary Indulgence is granted on the first Thursday of the month to all the faithful who are truly repentant who attend the divine Sacrifice of Mass under the ordinary conditions and offer prayers to Jesus Christ the Eternal High Priest, for the priests of the Church… accordance with the Supreme Pontiff's intentions’. (Vatican City, May 12, 2009)

Happy Advent to all!!
He is coming!"