Wow!

     First of all I want to apologize for not posting this past Tuesday. I wasn't feeling very well due in part to being anxious about my certification test results and consequently not sleeping well.
On that note I finally found out, after four months, that I passed my test! I am officially an American Sign Language Interpreter in the states of Michigan, Texas and Illinois.
     I honestly cannot express the joy I have been feeling all afternoon. God is so good to me! It's been so wonderful to know that all the tears of frustration, anger, lack of sleep, and stress that I cried last year were worth it. It was a really tough year for me but knowing that I can now do things like interpret the Catholic young adult conference in my state, which I'll be doing next month, makes it worth every tear and sleepless nights. I cannot wait to see what God has in store!
     I really need to head to bed now as it's getting late but I will post more in depth this coming Tuesday.
JMJ+ <3

Hot Coal

JMJ+

In his homily on Sunday Father made an interesting point I thought I'd share with you.  He started out talking about Saint Peter, who has always been one of my favorite Saints for this exact reason, and how he messed up quite a few times, he almost drowned when walking on water, he denied Christ, and after Christ died he just went back to fishing as if nothing had changed. Yet in spite of all that, God still called him to be the first Pope. 

He then spoke about his own experiences living in community and how challenging that can be at times. He said sometimes it would be really hard to not lose his temper at others but that eventually he realized that those times of feeling angry at another person are opportunities for growth in holiness. The thing that stood out to me the most was when he said that eventually he was able to say "Thank You God for the hot coals that draw me closer to You."  He also said a number of times, and really the main point of his homily was, that like a hot coal would really hurt when it touches you so does becoming holy.

I think the reason that this concept of holiness hurting but being able to thank God for the pain really hit me is that I'm in the midst of experiencing a  hot coal for myself. In August I graduated from an American Sign Language Interpreting program and in October took my state certification test. Four months later I still don't have my results due to a staff person departing the office about a month or so after I took my test. It's been really hard for me for me and has really been an opporunity to grow in holiness and patience. I'm not quite to the point of being able to thank Him for it but I think it's a really good goal to have. 

I pray that you have a blessed Lenten journey and that God will give you hot coals to draw you closer to Him this year. 

God bless you! 

Please Pray

JMJ+

I have been unemployed and looking for work since September and have not been able to find anything. I have a job interview tomorrow at four and would appreciate prayers. They will be returned! 

Hello!

Hello world!
This is probably the fourth or fifth blog I've tried to keep up on over the past few years. Somehow it always seems to slip through the cracks. I'm hoping to change that with this one. The reason I decided to try again is that in the past little while I've come across a few blogs that women kept prior to entering religious life and they spoke very strongly to the struggles I've experienced in the past few years. I thought it would be good to pass it on by sharing my own experiences in the hopes that they will help women in the future.
I can tell you right now that I'm not an expert on discernment by any means, I'm more of an expert on how not to discern and have probably made most of the mistakes in the book, but I hope that my experiences will help others.
I decided for Lent that I'm going to update this at least once a week. I really hope that I can keep it up this time.
JMJ+