Today despite the weather and the fact that my wife and I had to attend a funeral it was a was beautiful day. The reason I say that is because we are alive in this moment to witness and help others and because more importantly the so called funeral that we attended is looked at us by my family and Maria’s family as a victory through Christ.
So, We atteneded today a beautiful mass of celebration of her life at Maria’s home parish of the Immaculate Conception Church in Everett Ma.
We were born to love and serve oneanother.
There was a beautiful song that Maria had told one of the singers time and time again that she wanted to be played at her funeral. She reminded the singer a short while back again . And they laughed. Well, who knew that today that would happen and the song would be sung.
I will try and find out the song, I found this one that sounds similar in the lyrics but is faster and a different beat. But beautiful anyway.
Wrap Me in Your Arms
After the mass of celebration for Maria, the family invited us all to a gathering. I met my sister in law at the table. My wife was busy getting me water etc. My sister arrived and there were still 4 or 5 empty seats at our table. I am always interested in seeing who God sits with us. He does things with purpose. Well, it was not long before a very kind gentleman approached and announced who he was and asked if they could join us at our table. We began to speak and I realized that they were connected to the full table of people beside us.
I had already said hello to that table and they were from the Friday night prayer group that Maria attended. We had such a beautiful sharing. You see, we all knew other people that are connected from different parishes etc. We are all connected. As we got up to leave, we were all so happy with our sence of community and fellowship in Christ. It is a very special gift to us . Maria had that so her life was one to be celebrated. Amen.
I said to one of the lovely women as we hugged. God is behind this gathering so that we could meet and it is a Miracle how God gets these things done.
Yes , so we will miss the presence of Maria in our daily lives but she is watching over everyone now waiting for her family and friends to join her .
After Wednesday’s events involving the loss of Maria I woke up and was thinking very reflectively on life. I spent yesterday in prayer and quiet thought.
As I have always said, it is not normal in my mind that a parent should lose their child and in Maria’s case that her kids lost their mom. I feel badly for her family and I feel badly for her children and siblings as well. They are a involved and loving family always helping one another .
This situation has just served as a reminder again of how fragile life really is.
May You Be Blessed by Kate Nowak
This morning as I showered I again offered it up as a reminder of my baptismal waters and continued my prayer. After I got out of the shower I was looking at a painting done by a friend for me back 10 or so years ago and it is beautiful. I studied it as I stood there and thought to myself, each brushstroke on the wall is insignificant on its own but all of the paint strokes together create a work of beauty,
That is the way that we need to address our lives. Some of the brush strokes on my canvas are dark and strained but without those heavier strokes the softer ones would not be noticeable.
When my lifes painting is completed It would be my deepest hope that people will look at it as a beautiful attempt at humanity and love. A painting that helped people who were part of the brush strokes of my life. Amen !
The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
Today I wanted to thank you for the prayers for Maria. Please keep them going.
I received a communication on Wednesday afternoon to please pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet for Maria. I said absolutely, what an honor.
I received word that Maria passed this evening Wednesday @5:30 p.m. surrounded by her family. She is with the Lord. Amen.
Maria and my family are related through marriage. As I said in my blog requesting prayers earlier today Maria was a very good person. She was human and had some real struggles. But she was real. She had a large heart that wanted everything to be perfect but her lifes struggles made that difficult. Maria was a mother of two wonderful kids and loved her family.
You know, my mom use to say all the time that we are alway’s toughest on those that we are closest to. We know somewhere inside that we trust that they will take it. That does not mean that it is right to be difficult with those that we love but thats what we do as humans because we are all imperfect from birth. We are called to learn, grow and love here. it is a life long process.
What I find as I am getting older and seeing these situations around me is this, I think some people are so big hearted that they cannot deal with life, its almost too painful. The highs of life give way to the lows of life and that fact can become devestating to them emotionally. When this happens they fall into a depression and other things that they think will help to stop the pain. She had a beautiful family and upbringing with tons of support from her family and church every inch of the way. God had angels in her life daily. As he does in ours. Maria had a great smile and great laugh. We shared some good laughs over the years.
Her struggle in life effected her family the same as our struggles effect our families.
bottom Line,
She was loved by her family and she loved them all too . And, due to the fact that she came from a family of faith, no matter what she lost due to her illness even with her mindset being what it was , she never lost sight of her God. She loved God. And I know, that he loves her too.
I know that when God greeted her that he saw that she was broken like us and that she was his loving child. When he saw her tears he wiped them away. Her heart was yearning for peace and awaiting an eternity with our Lord and Savior where all pain is gone. Amen.
I am sure that God is well pleased with her beautiful attempt to please him.
His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’
Please keep Maria’s family in your prayers. Thank you 🙂
Rest In Peace beautiful Maria. Amen
God Bless You .
Danny
✝ There Will Be A Day ✝ – ( Jeremy Camp )
P.S. Look at the reading of the day. How awesome is our God !!
Verse of the Day
Wednesday, November 12, 2014
Colossians 1:13-14 (NIV)
For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves,in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
In this life and during our journeys we meet so many people. My family has been Blessed with meeting Maria. Like us all she too has had her own lifes struggles.
Maria, is currently laying in the IC unit in a Boston area hospital in the fight for her life. With pneumonia and a heavy infection. Her organs are apparently failing now as well.
So please pray for her healing and if it is God’s will that he take her to himself. Please pray for her children and the entire family they are all so wonderful.
Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus, Psalm and Prayer for the Sick (HD)
It is the time of Miracles and if we look we will see them. This link below says it all. God and his Angels and Saints are as always working in our lives.
These stories do not get the air time that they should.
The next song is one of my mother in law Vera’ s favorite songs. She too was a walking Miracle for 16.5 years beyond her six months to live diagnosis. She had the medical field all scratching their heads but we weren’t , We knew it was God. Amen.
God bless all those who served past and present to protect us and others around the world who were under threat in many different ways.
May our government remember who they are serving as they deploy our young men and women all around the globe. They are after all, the true HERO’s Amen.
I thought that today I would touch on my/ our Blessed Mother as we begin to ready ourselves for the Christmas Season.
The link below the picture is an explanation of Marys life journey once The angel of God appeared to Mary. And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!”
And Mary said, “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.
Do I think this happened, you bet your life!
Fr. Angelo Homily on The Marys visit to see Elizabeth.
Because Mary was a human as are we God called upon her. The difference between Mary and me is that Mary was born very Holy and lived a very clean and loving life.
The virtues are identified as chastity, temperance, charity, diligence,patience, kindness, and humility. Practicing them is said to protect one against temptation from the seven deadly sins, each one having its counterpart. Due to this, they are sometimes referred to as the “contrary virtues”.
Thank God Mary was who she was and that she was in control of her free will choices. Thank God Mary was full of Faith and Love for her God. So God could call upon Mary for the most important job ever ! Being a Mother ! The Mother of our Lord and Savior!
Because My Blessed Mother said yes to God even though she did not know all the why’s This choice gave us all the chance to be redeemed and we now are given a chance to say Yes to God in our daily walk and to aspire to do Gods will and to effect a change in this world . We are the salt and light to eachother.
So I would say to each one of you women who are moms or are taking care of and teaching children, thank you! May you all guide your children as Mother Mary did. With love and grace. Amen.
What’s going on ? That’s my question . We all need to ask ourselves that question. I just arrived home from mass and sat down to look over this blog slated for publish tomorrow and again was amazed at how God and the Holy Spirit were in sinc with my blog and Fathers Homily today with one another, It is not the first time but I still find Gods workings so hard to grasp. God is magnificent.
With the Christmas Season coming watch the dirt fly about Christmas tree’s, Christmas anything. I for one do not take offense from someone who is celebrating their faith. And, if they were giving me a blessing ( Merry CHRISTMAS ) from their faith how beautiful is that? I am not offended. I will continue to wear my cross and celebrate my LORD’s birthday of Christmas where God’s only son is born of my Blessed Mother and a wonderful and holy Shepard named Joseph in order to take our sin to the cross for our salvation.
So, as a way of warming up those who are offended by Christmas let me say this. Have a happy, holly, jolly gift buying season.
Larry’s politically correct Christmas.
Because we need to laugh, even though it is a sad situation with what the evil one is trying to do.
To the rest of you out there, I am looking forward to the beautiful Christmas and Advent Season. May the lights of the season , the beautiful nativity story of Jesus bring you much joy and serve as a reminder of the reason of the Season.
THE bottom line is this,
Whatever your faith is embraced it and share it, that is what God would want you to do ,celebrate his love for us.
You know , I am so sick of the crappy news and when I see something beautiful I think why is this not on all of the news stations playing for a couple of days. We are in dark days right now and need these stories of love and hope to be more celebrated. These are our everyday hero’s. Some of these hero’s are current and some are so large that there lives are becons of love, and Godliness that serve to span time and gives us a bar to attempt to rise to personally.
Pittsburg detective adopts two brothers who have been neglected.
Today, I was thinking of some of my friends that I have lost due to cancer, drugs and accidents when I was young.
I remember them all in prayer to this day because I loved them. These kids that I met were very young and most of them did not have what I had as a young kid. Two parents, a lot of love and parents who were on the ball watching their movements.
You know, when we love someone or something like our pets and become seperated by death we feel the personal loss in our lives but the joy of that love and what they meant to us never leaves or dies. God would never give us something like love and make it so that it ends. God is love so that is impossible. We are merely 1 breathe and heartbeat to where they are. I believe we will be united with all of our loved ones and friends someday that includes our little furry friends too. That’s my belief anyway. 🙂
Josh Gorman to where you are.
The list that I will put down below are a few that died young friends that i have lost.
Buffy B. She had a cough that was masking cancer and she passed away in highschool. Buffy was a sweet heart.
Frank N. great kid who ended up contracting aides and passed away I guess he was in his early 20’s.
Johnny got mixed up with drugs and took a heart attack from the use of cocaine.
Kelly U. was 30 years old and was ironing her nurses uniform and dropped dead of a sudden heart attack. She had an undetected heart problem.
My brother had two friends who thumbed a ride to get home from a party on night and the person who was driving and picked them up saw a police car and decided to speed away from them and went off of the mystic valley parkway and my brothers friends were killed.
My youngest brother had a very good friend who came to visit my brother he acted normal but gave my brother a few of his small prized possessions and was acting like he was fine. He said goodbye. Later that day he was found dead at Walden Pond from a self inflicted gun shot wound. So sad.
A young neighborhood friend Bobby Mc. when college age went to a college party in Cambridge and went out onto the fire escape to get a beer out of the cooler and slipped on the ice Bobby fell 4-5 stories to his death.
We all no matter what generation we are from have had to face these terrible losses. Thats why when we see someone struggling in our lives we need to reach out to them and let them know that they count and that we loved them. It’s so hard to see anothers pain but speak the words of your heart. It really hurt my younger brother when his friend did this desperate act.
This list could go on if I think longer and harder but, I do not have to go through that process. I pray for everyone and their needs.
I was born with a gift of getting along, I will call it. Different groups, different people do not bother me. For example in my school years, I could jell with the so called nerds, jocks and rats if need be. My upbringing was such that we were not to engage and do things to people by word or action that was hurtful . We defended ourselves when we needed to in order to defend ourselves from bodily harm.
My parents always said sticks and stones may break your bones but names will never hurt you. You know we as kids deal with kids who sometimes do not have the life skills and say whatever stupid hurtful thought is in their mouths .
The bottom lines is this in my opinion, life is too short to harm each other. The friends that I lost early on were kind people which only made their passing so much more difficult.
You know, when I was younger all the kids on my bus were great, they were all scared about growing up and the kids that were the bullies were the most frightened of them all. They had an identity crisis and felt the need to pick on the quiet kids. It seemed like every year that I sat beside another kid who got picked on and road shot gun beside them to protect these innocent kids. You know one of my favorite memories of school was the fact that I could walk down the hall with anyone and sit at any table for lunch. Isn’t that what God wants anyway? What also helped me was the fact that my older brother was at the same school and he did not take the bus but they all knew that I was Ril’ s brother so I had an invisible shield around me and i had my ability to charm a snake if necessary. Lol 🙂
Growing up was hard for us all, but I had a beautiful family life with God and I was safe. God gave me a large group of friends that were only a phone call away. I have looked back over the years and really believe that I was in my friends lives that passed for a specific reason. i brought stability, I was grounded and would say to them I would not do this or do that. I know my mom talked to more than one of them and my dad would try not to step on toes and guide them as well.
I thank my friends all of them but am remembering the ones that have passed because after 30 years I still carry them with me daily and feel called to pray for them. I still thank them for being such great friends.
This ( song)was one of the first songs of its type that came out during this time in my life and was a massive hit! So, for all of those friends that are gone, this is for you thanks for the memories 🙂
This is another artist that passed too soon. I think alcohol and drugs are truely a terrible thing if in the hands of a person who is lost, hurting and does not feel like they are loved and fit into society.
Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody (Official Video)
The loss of anyone dear is difficult. My mom always said , you love big, you loose big. I will say this I am so happy for their love while they were here. I think for the most part I have had mainly healthy and authentic relationships with the people I call friends. No one is perfect but they have been sincere in who they have been to me. So, I thank God for each one.
Just Danny Speaks 