Catholics who are well-versed in our Mass (worship) and our catechism (teaching) understand that Jesus and His sacrifice for our sins is central to our worship.  But Christians of other faith traditions stumble over our statues in our churches and even more so if they see us kneel in prayer in front of a statue. They believe that statues of saints are are graven images and idols, forbidden by God. Catholics believe not all graven images are idols, and our statues of saints aren’t idols because we don’t worship them. We honor saints and worship God.  So let’s examine more closely what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, and let’s try help our other brothers and sisters understand where we’re coming from, using the Bible as our common ground. We can read what the Bible says about graven images being idols in Exodus 20:3-5 , Psalm 115 , Isaiah 44:9-20 , Daniel 3 . But we can also read where God commanded the Israelites to make graven images— cherubim in Exodus 25:18-20 and se...

Several of you kids have told me, at one time or another “Mom, you should write a book.” Having friends who are authors and seeing the immense amount of work that goes into such an undertaking…no way. Lol  But with all the hospitalizations the past couple years, I did start feeling like I should write some things down, and that “feeling” grew into an unmistakable, persistent nudge, which I recognize from a whole life of listening for it.  I see too many people leaving our beautiful faith because they never fully understood it. There are so many distractions in this world– a game to go to! A movie to watch! Friends to see! With all these distractions, you aren’t necessarily taking to heart what your Momma is trying to teach you about faith. You think “yeah yeah, I’ll get to that later.” When you are young, eternity seems very far away. I don’t think you fully understand yet that this world, everything we see around us, is not what we were made for. When you become adults, espe...

In honor of our Blessed Mother’s Nativity on September 8, I wanted to share why I love Mary.  Because I grew up without motherly love, I had a harder time relating to Mary as an evangelical-turned-Catholic. (I’ll share my conversion story later. I’m trying to write stuff down as it comes up.) Even after I understood why it was right to honor her and ask for her prayers, even as I understood how powerful the rosary is, I never felt gushy about Mary as a lot of Catholics do.  The love has come over time and with personal experiences. Loving Mary is not idolatry.  An idol is something that takes the place of God. Something that has greater importance in someone’s life than God. You can make anything an idol. Sunday sports. Work. Another person. Whatever  gets in the way of worshipping God. We Catholics don’t love Mary instead of Jesus or more than Jesus. If you think we worship Mary, you might be surprised to attend a Catholic Mass (worship service) and hear her mentio...