Writer's Dream Comes True!

“If you follow your dreams, the money will come. Follow the money, and you’ll lose your dreams.” Michael Collopy

Friday was cleaning day. I vacuumed and dusted every room, corner and shelf. On Friday, temperatures were in the mid 90s, coupled with high humidity. It wasn’t hard to work up a sweat in the mugginess, but I was determined to clean the house thoroughly, and I did!

I opened the front door to attack the dirt between the doors, when to my surprise I heard a package bang against the other door. A package for me? It had my name on it from a printing house. I didn’t know what it could it be!

I dropped the vacuum cleaner and rushed to open it (secretly thankful for the respite from work!). There before me were three author’s copies of Faith & Family magazine!

When I found my name on the inside list of “Contributing Writers,” my heart leapt within me! Though small, my entertainment review in the Fall issue was my first baby step into Faith & Family magazine. I have been basking in joy ever since because of my dream-come-true to be published in Faith & Family, my favorite magazine of all time! To see my name in print next to other writers I’ve always admired and with my music review of Seasons is the best gift anyone could ask for! Those copies of the magazine on my doorstep were a gift, truly heaven sent.

This past week has been disappointing as I lost a job I had applied for and was hoping to pursue. In the midst of discouragement and anxiety, God answers me with blessings. I am constantly astonished to find my dreams coming true, day by day, sneaking up on me and surprising me! It is a reassurance that I am in the right place at the right time.

Even so, the temptation is there to be lost in the busyness and business of life and thereby miss out on being thankful. I regret to say how easy it can be to take our blessings for granted, because I get caught up in thinking “but it isn’t enough.” For some reason, we think we’d be happier with more work, more money, more make-up, more haircuts, more anything. There always will be more. Yet maybe it’s not so bad “to do with less” than “to want with more.”

It’s a lesson in gratitude. Thank you, God. What have I to fear? That You won’t continue to make a way for me?

“Oh ye of little faith, why did you doubt?” ~ Jesus

After 50 Years of the Pill, “Let’s Be Proud to Be Women”

Good news! The out-of-date, rhythm method is not the Catholic Church’s only morally acceptable means of spacing births. There is another, better way that upholds the truth of sexuality and saves women from the physical and spiritual dangers of the Pill.

Natural Family Planning incorporates modern knowledge of the woman’s cycle and scientific signs to determine when she is fertile. If there is a good reason to avoid pregnancy, couples may abstain from intercourse during the fertile times. NFP is 99% effective and 100% risk-free.

The Church’s teachings on sex (including opposition to contraception) have always been to uphold the two ends of sexual intercourse: unity and procreation. Couples that are open to life are speaking the language of sexual love that says, “I give myself to you: freely, totally, faithfully, and fruitfully.”

While many Catholics disregard Church teachings and foster a contraceptive mentality, I know many young, married couples who use NFP successfully and as a result share deeper intimacy, communication, and commitment. Is that not what every woman wants?

The divorce rate for NFP couples is under 5%. Maybe the Church knows something.

My heart goes out to all women wounded and crippled by the sexual revolution and effects of the Pill. My heart goes out to lost motherhood, to women grown up believing fertility is a disease needed to be treated by a pill, and those enslaved by sexual addictions yearning for freedom to be treated not as an object of use and end of man’s pleasure, but as a subject worthy of love.

Has the Pill cheated women to think that feminine liberation means becoming like a male? The three things that in essence define a woman and which a man can never do are: menstruate, conceive, and bear a child.

Let’s be proud to be women. Here’s a tribute to those who want to reclaim a new feminism of responsibility and the freedom to be intricately women in our very beings: to be nurturers, mothers, and lovers who uphold our dignity and call men on to love, not use us.

A version of this entry was published as a letter to the editor of the Fond du Lac Reporter. Click here to read.