Ama Nesciri

2008-11-21T22:53:00.001-08:00

2008-11-17T21:19:00.000-08:00

She's back! And after over four months of not blogging, it's about time. I had no idea how busy college would keep me this semester. One of my english classes has been giving so much grief that I have been driven to tears on multiple occasions. Today, not being an exception. Some teachers can never be pleased, no matter how much help and hours of effort you put into your work. Remember that. It will never be enough. I just have to survive the next 3 weeks of this GPA-killing class, and I will be free of her and her funky grading schemes. On the plus side, I think my writing is improving. I think. You would never know from the grades she gives me. On several occasions she has even made me want to find another major other than English with an emphasis in Creative Writing. Ha! I've found the hardest things to give letter grades to are essays. I mean, seriously, how can you be objective with something like that? Especially with a low-level english class, designed to teach college students to write college-worthy essays? Really.

Four less teeth to worry about

2008-07-10T21:57:00.000-07:00

I had my wisdom teeth removed today so you can expect the future posts to be a little less intelligent. ;) I do plan on writing a new post complete with reflections and recent religious reflections that I have made in the last week or so. I hope I can get it written up for my readers before the week is over. We'll see how the gums are feeling in the morning, though. The mouth is a funny thing. Though God is so good.

I'm much better than I deserve. Wow. That's a really great answer to the common question "How are you?" the thing is, when you give that answer, most of the time you get weird looks and hesitant smiles from most people. :)

Give me some water...please...

2008-06-30T10:59:00.000-07:00

I am so so thirsty. So thirsty for the real Catholicism. I feel like I'm slipping down the hill. I still feel like I converted yesterday and I don't know anything at all about the beauty of being a Catholic. Of course I have learned some things since five years ago, but I need more. I'm a withering plant. *Goes to read the catechism or something*

An Excuse for my long absence...

2008-06-30T10:55:00.000-07:00

I just found a really nice full-time job after weeks and weeks of searching, and working really fast and hard in a fast food restaurant leaves me drained of all creative writing juices. It's really sad because I really wanted to get some serious book-writing done--even just serious blog writing. But alas, with the gas prices today, I need this money before school.

Prince Caspian

2008-05-24T11:57:00.000-07:00

WARNING: Spoilers to the movie, Prince Caspian, are contained within this post.

I went to see the new Narnia movie that came out on the 16th: Prince Caspian. I must say it was a good movie, but it was a little disappointing at times. The big thing that bugged me most was the little romance between Caspian and Susan. Hollywood just could not keep their hands off the opportunity to include a little "kissy" scene. C. S. Lewis, I'm sure, would not have approved. But the fact that C. S. Lewis would not approve didn't bug me as much that Susan was so forward as to kiss Caspian when she knew full well it would only cause more damage to the situation. Sure, it's okay that she had a crush on him, but to act upon it is only going to bring more pain between them. She should just have let enough alone--they both acknowledged the fact that it could never work--so why, Susan, did you tease Caspian with a kiss? But that's Hollywood for you--bringing in the sins of this culture into a beautiful children's story.

Blessing from Tonight's Evening Prayer

2008-05-17T21:04:00.000-07:00

Hebrews 13:20-21

May the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep by the blood of the eternal covenant, Jesus our Lord, furnish you with all that is good, that you may do His will. Through Jesus Christ may He carry out in you all that is pleasing to Him. To Christ be glory forever! Amen.

I came across this blessing in the readings of tonight's evening prayer and it just struck me how beautiful this blessing is. We should always be praying to have Jesus Christ carry out His will through each of us every day and furnish us with all that is good; and recently I've been trying to incorporate this into my daily morning prayers as well as asking Him to help me keep my heart, mind, and tongue in line each day. So often I find myself saying things before I think about whether they will cause other people harm, and I always regret it afterwards. I really need divine help keeping myself in line. :P

Happy Mother's Day!

2008-05-11T18:00:00.001-07:00

Happy Mother's Day all you wonderful mothers out there!

These zebras really do bite!

2008-05-10T15:03:00.000-07:00

One precocious little zebra came right up to our car window and as we scrambled to roll up the window, he began to lick the window (which I captured a picture of in the post before this one) and then began scraping the paint on the car with his teeth! What do they feed these creatures? Not enough of whatever it is, I guess!

The Zebras...

2008-05-08T22:05:00.000-07:00

Pictures soon

2008-05-08T16:46:00.001-07:00

I have just returned from a wonderful trip to Dallas and will be uploading pictures of the Fossil Rim animals I met there.

Mixed Definitions

2008-05-01T12:34:00.000-07:00

As I was studying some definitions for the Biology test I have to take today, I came across this one:

Cohesion: the phenomenon that occurs when individual molecules are so strongly attracted to each other that they tend to stay together, even when exposed to tension.*

Sounds like a good friendship between two people, no?

*From Exploring Creation with Biology by Dr. Jay L. Wile and Marilyn F. Durnell

What would you answer?

2008-04-26T13:35:00.000-07:00

Apparently this is question that many pro-life people don't think about. Since Pro-life T-Shirt day is coming up on April 29th, I recommend you think of an answer in case you get asked this question.

What a Smack in the Face...

2008-04-26T12:59:00.000-07:00

...not all this sappy "it's okay because God loves you!" stuff in the confessional. The confessional experience I remember the most was when a priest really reprimanded me and helped me to realize that I need to change. Now. I would confess to him again, if I had the opportunity. Unfortunately, he was transferred to a different parish, and since he was never in my diocese to begin with he will probably never make it to my parish. I don't grow spiritually very well under the shower of "feel-good" lectures I get from the priests around here. There is hope, however, that in the next couple years we may get a nice young priest who is on fire for Christ and who has the same spirit as the priest that I mentioned before, since the two priests who govern the parishes in my town are retiring very soon. So please pray that we get a good and holy priest to govern this starving sheep.

Cuteness

2008-03-16T10:29:00.000-07:00

One of the children I babysit every week wrote this for me (she is in fifth grade):

I’ve got a babysitter who is so sweet,
There have been others but she can’t be beat.
I’ve got a babysitter who is awesome,
She is like a flower that is just about to blossom.
I’ve got a babysitter who is super duper,
Plus she is the greatest ice cream scooper.
I’ve got a babysitter who is cool
In order to fix something, I doubt she’d need a tool.
I’ve got a babysitter who is the best,
When she tells us stories, she takes us on a quest.
I’ve got a babysitter who is all of these things,
Amanda Nesciri is just amazing!

They are the sweetest kids I have ever met. They are one of the many beautiful blessings in my life. Their family has fallen away from the Church right after we joined. They occasionally visit our parish when their parents are in town, but they always attend a protestant church every Sunday. It's really sad. They left because the progressives here are just way too overbearing! Instead of trying to be "inclusive" and more "community-oriented" to keep people in the Church, they are just creating fair-weather Catholics and driving away the serious ones. It really is a shame what happened to this family. They are trying to be faithful to God, trying to love Him more and more...but they've been led astray because of this heresy of modernism.

The Image of God

2008-03-14T22:49:00.000-07:00

In Lent this year I have been reading a section or two in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (usually about a page or two). I have instructed myself to reflect on the passages I read from it. Today I read about “Ways of Coming to Know God” and the sections that led up to the final article I read, “How Can We Speak About God?” The particular paragraph that caught my eye was this:

“God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, imagebound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God—‘the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable’—with our human representations. Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God.”

I so often have to break down these sentences into the bare bones for my tiny little brain to digest. I get so bogged down with those juicy words that I completely lose the whole point the passage is trying to tell me. So here goes with the chopping: We must continually purify our language of everything that is limited, imagebound or imperfect if we are not to confuse the image of God. (We’ll stop there just examine this piece first.) At first, without a lot of thinking, I thought we were supposed to purify our language of everything limited, imagebound or imperfect for everyday speech or conversation…but then I realized I was misunderstanding it completely. I was thoroughly misinterpreting the words. So I had to go back and look at just one word at a time. What does limited mean? Well, in this context, it means not fulfilling the full meaning or description. In that case, I’m toast. There is not a single word in this English language that can describe God or even His awesomeness. However the next paragraph says that although our descriptions of God always fall short of the true portrayal of God Himself, they do reflect His attributes even if they are tiny slivers of the true Being.

What did I take away from this passage? That I have been “confusing the image of God” by thinking that these measly words can in anyway define who God is. They are only a mere shadow of His Excellence, His Goodness, His Beauty. I am utterly speechless when it comes to my God. I cannot even find an adequate adjective to affix before His name. Now I do understand why he is called, I Am Who I Am.

Catholic Vs. Orthodox

2008-03-10T20:33:00.000-07:00

What is so attractive about Orthodoxy? I have an Orthodox friend who was raised Baptist, converted to Catholicism and then Orthodoxy (all in a relatively short time). Seems to me that he's a very mixed up person, but how does a Catholic approach him and try to bring him home again? Well, before I try anything, I'm definitely going to have to dig up some old Thomas Aquinas and the Catechism of the Catholic Church because in no way am I fully educated in my faith as a Catholic. Ah, to be a cradle Catholic raised in a heavily catechized family...

No Complaining...even when it's not Sunday

2008-03-10T20:27:00.000-07:00

Even after more musing, I think the complaining post needs to go in the trash bin. All the ranting on and on about how my parish is declining and how much I hate liturgical dancing--excuse me, liturgical movement--really doesn't help anyone. It doesn't serve the purpose of sympathizing with other traditional Catholics because anyone can read about the atrocities in the US dioceses in just about any Catholic blog. I have decided to go beyond that...mainly because it's already been done, but also because as I said earlier, it is not healthy to dwell on miserable, but rather on the joyous things.

Sundays are for Rejoicing, Not Complaining

2008-03-09T08:59:00.000-07:00

So often I am disgruntled by the obscenities that occur during masses on Sunday. I started out this morning writing a post in which I was complaining and whining about the abuses we have to put up with in our parish. I reflected on what I had just written and the little voice inside my head retorted, "You sure are complaining a lot. Is that the attitude you want to have right before mass? Is that even healthy for your soul?" Well, how can you argue with your conscience when he puts it that way? So I relented, and saved the post without publishing it so that later I can go back and rephrase my disgruntled comments into nicer phrases. This is good advice coming from my little voice. What if I had gone to mass with all those complaints in my head? One thing's for sure; I know I would be one distracted gal. Instead, say a prayer and meditate on a passage from the Bible to prepare yourselves for meeting our Most Holy Savior, Jesus Christ.

May God bless you all,

K.A.N.