Category: reviews

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Review: Becoming Holy, One Virtue at a Time

Journals and workbooks have long fascinated me. Empty journals beckon me to fill them with all the crazy in my head as a way to sort out my thoughts, and workbooks help rein-in those thoughts and give them a direction. That’s why I love books that have questions at the end of the chapters or study guides to accompany my reading. Cue the nerdy student in me.

This lovely series, Stay Connected Journals for Catholic Women, provides prayer, insightful teachings, and scripture, followed by guided reflections in a journaling section.

Becoming Holy, One Virtue at a Time: A Guide to Living the Theological and Cardinal Virtues by Sara Estabrooks has been my companion in my weekly Adoration hour. Each chapter is filled with readings and workspace that inspire thoughtful reflection. Sara beautifully covers the theological and cardinal virtues and encourages the reader to pursue holiness by perfecting those virtues in our lives.

My favorite sections are the connections to scripture. I read with my Bible next to me, reading the suggested passages and then connecting them to chapter’s virtue. I’ve loved incorporating this approach into my spiritual reading!

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Review: Living Memento Mori

I first met Emily DeArdo in 2015 at a conference in Charleston, SC. Jennifer Fulwiler was broadcasting her Sirius XM radio show live from a meeting room in the conference hotel, and we were sitting in the audience laughing and enjoying the excitement leading up to the wacky and inspiring Edel Gathering.

As far as first impressions go, I liked Emily on the spot. Her joie de vivre was as contagious as her smile. This gregarious young woman was delightful, and we exchanged pleasantries.

Here was a woman who was alive and loving life. And then I heard her story and I knew she couldn’t be any other way but joyful. Joy, a fruit of the Holy Spirit that brings us close to God. A love of life that comes from having faced death.

Living Memento Mori: My Journey Through the Stations of the Cross invites the reader to journey with Christ, as Emily has, by contemplating suffering through the Stations of the Cross. It sounds like a heavy book with a deep subject, and it is undeniably so. But it is much more.

It is a lesson in the power of vulnerability.

Emily shares her hardships of living with cystic fibrosis, and subsequently, a double lung transplant. She shares how this challenge and suffering informs her relationship with Jesus Christ, and what that means to her mortality. Her story is one of hope, not despair.

Emily invites us to walk the Via Dolorosa with Christ. We see in Emily a model for bearing our own crosses with gratitude and joy. In contemplating our deaths, we come to appreciate our lives. I recommend this book for anytime, but it’s a perfect book for Lent.

Pre-order yours now — it releases on January 24th!

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Review: The Art of Loving God

Blessed Sacrament Chapel

The Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration chapel in town has been open just over a month, and I’m blessed to be holding two holy hours. I had originally signed up as a guardian for one hour, but added an additional hour because no adorers had committed to that time.

I thought I’d drop the hour when others signed up. Now, a month later, I regularly see three or four people during this bonus hour. Meanwhile, I’m in no hurry to drop it.

No one familiar with Adoration is surprised by this revelation, right?

Building relationship with the Lord

There’s no prescribed way to “do” Adoration. It’s a visit with Jesus, so I’m of the humble opinion that “come as you are” is the best advice to give to someone new to this practice of adoring Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament.

There's no prescribed way to "do" Adoration. It's a visit with Jesus. Share on X

In the fifteen or so years I’ve been going to to Adoration, I have kept silence, prayed, wept, laughed (quietly!), read, stared blankly, breathed deeply, rested, nodded off, written books, made lists, and worshiped, adored, and loved the Lord.

I’ve been focused and distracted, and everything in-between.

I have sometimes had a hard heart, and other times had my heart broken, remade, and refreshed.

God, however, has been constant.

Bring a book

These days I take a prayer journal and some spiritual reading. Sometimes I get to those items, sometimes I don’t, but it’s a good place to start if you’re new to Adoration.

I just finished reading The Art of Loving God: Simple Virtues for the Christian Life by St Francis de Sales. It’s a collection of teachings he gave to the nuns at the Visitation convent in Annecy, the teachings are timeless — perfect for meditating on one virtue a week. I often cycle back and reread this inspiring collection of wisdom from one of my go-to saints.

Do you take spiritual reading to Adoration? What do you recommend?

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