Holy Hour

Normally on Tuesdays after class I go to Mass then stay on campus to get my homework done, then stay for sip and sign. This past Tuesday I went to Mass in the morning and wasn't going to be staying for sip and sign so I came home right after class and forgot to get my homework done. So I had to go to the library yesterday to get it done because it's due today. I was standing outside waiting for my ride and one of my friends walked by. We started talking and after a while she said to me "I don't know if you know this, but there's a group that has a Holy Hour every Wednesday night at 7:00 at the cathedral if you want to come. Father Steve is speaking." I really wanted to go because I love Father Steve and he moved recently and I hadn't seen him in a while. I was able to make it and it was amazing! There was a reason I was meant to be there.
It was very peaceful and relaxing. Everything that Father said and all the music was really what I needed right now. Father's meditation was about feeling the longing for intimacy and how each one of us longs for intimacy with another. He talked about how if we are dealing with unrequited love we should think about how much love God gives that is unrequited and we should unite that suffering to His suffering. One thing that he said that really stuck was that God doesn't want us to pretend anymore. To me this whole meditation really spoke to me about having to wait to enter the convent. Not directly but in a lot of ways I took it in relation to that. For instance, I feel sometimes like I'm not loving God enough here or that I can't do enough here. How often does God feel like He can't do anything in the lives of the people here on earth?
I guess it just really opened my heart more to being willing to suffer for those in the world. Of course if won't be easy, but I know that God has given me this for a reason and all I need to do is let Him use me.
I've also been struggling a lot still with having to wait, as much as I've come to accept it and be fine with it, it is still very hard. I was very convicted when Father said that God doesn't want us to pretend any more. I think I finally realized that I have been pretending for the past six months that everything is fine and you know what? It's really not. I am having a hard time with everything that happened, and I'm not dealing with it perfectly, but that's okay. I don't need to be perfect, I just need God. God living in me is the only thing that will get me through this all.
After Adoration we hung out for a while in the parish hall. I had a ton of fun, met a lot of new people and felt like I really fit in for the first time. There were three women who remembered me from Nov. retreat with the Dominicans and one of them was wearing her SMME shirt that she won in white elephant on retreat! It was really good to be around people the same age as me who are just as passionate as me about their faith. Plus, the group is called Totus Tuus and I found them the day I started my total consecration to Mary! How amazing is that?

JMJ+

Totus tuus Maria! Let's see what the good God wills.