A doggie and Our Lady of Fatima

On Friday morning, my sister-in-law's parents' doggie ran away and was missing.  Here is a picture and description of the pup that had been posted in the hopes of locating Jake:



Posted 5/11/13
Lost - Myerstown, PA (Jackson Township) - English Cocker Spaniel

Jake is a black and white English Cocker, lost near Rosebud Rd/Houtztown Rd intersection. He is a bit of a scardy cat but doesn't usually run off.
 

 

For three long days, Jake's family worried about his whereabouts.  As of 7:30pm on Monday night, the above post had been shared on Facebook 322 times.  Moments ago, tonight, on the Feast Day of Our Lady of Fatima, Jake came home.  His family reports he is tired, hungry, and sore but overall is doing well!  Thank God!

I can't even imagine going through the worry and feelings of helplessness for three whole days.  Last summer, Dusty Shamrock ran away when we were in Dover, DE.  Those 45 minutes once I realized he was missing were the longest moments of my life.  I had never felt so much relief yet anger upon finding him in a local resident's garage after the people had kindly caught him and kept him there until they saw me canvassing their neighborhood.  I'm so happy Jake has come home!!

For those who may not be familiar with the story of Our Lady of Fatima, here is one version of it (taken from AmericanCatholic.org):

Between May 13 and October 13, 1917, three Portuguese children received apparitions of Our Lady at Cova da Iria, near Fatima, a city 110 miles north of Lisbon. Mary asked the children to pray the rosary for world peace, for the end of World War I, for sinners and for the conversion of Russia. The third visionary, Lucia dos Santos, became a Carmelite nun and died in 2005 at the age of 97.

Mary gave the children three secrets. Since Francisco died in 1919 and Jacinta the following year, Lucia revealed the first secret in 1927, concerning devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The second secret was a vision of hell.

Pope John Paul II directed the Holy See's Secretary of State to reveal the third secret in 2000; it spoke of a "bishop in white" who was shot by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows into him. Many people linked this to the assassination attempt against Blessed John Paul II in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981.

The feast of Our Lady of Fatima was approved by the local bishop in 1930; it was added to the Church's worldwide calendar in 2002.


The website further states:  The message of Fatima is simple: Pray. Unfortunately, some people—not Sister Lucia—have distorted these revelations, making them into an apocalyptic event for which they are now the only reliable interpreters. They have, for example, claimed that Mary's request that the world be consecrated to her has been ignored. Sister Lucia agreed that Pope John Paul II's public consecration in St. Peter's Square on March 25, 1984, fulfilled Mary's request. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith prepared a June 26, 2000 document explaining the “third secret” (available at www.vatican.va).  Mary is perfectly honored when people generously imitate her response “Let it be done to me as you say” (Luke 1:38). Mary can never be seen as a rival to Jesus or to the Church's teaching authority, as exercised by the college of bishops united with the bishop of Rome.

I know a lot of people were praying for the safety of Jake and for him to make his way home the last few days, myself included.  May Jake and his family have a good night's rest tonight!   


Small Encouragements

 Yesterday was a long day of three meetings held one after the other after having had trouble sleeping that night before and by the time I pulled into the driveway, I was dragging my feet. I knew I wouldn't be home for long as I was on the schedule to cover my group's shared holy hour that evening. I had even debated driving straight from campus to the chapel but had 25 minutes before my scheduled time so I opted to still go home even for just a few minutes so I could see Adam and Charlotte. 

As soon as I entered the door, I could tell Charlotte had a lot of pent up energy. A few minutes later, when it was time to go back out to the car, she asked if she could come with me. I hesitated because the last time I had taken her to that particular Adoration Chapel, she was just an infant. 

Since those baby days, she has gone to family-friendly Holy Hours, participated in Adoration with her peers at school and in Girls GIFT, recently attended Praise and Worship during a Divine Mercy Holy Hour at the local Sisters' motherhouse, and has popped in and out of chapels with me during trips and on adventures. However, she had not participated in a full one-hour silent time of devotion with me since moving out of the carseat days. In this post, from when she turned three months old, I had written about those early days in the Adoration Chapel with her. 

These were all reasons that gave me pause last night when she asked if she could come with me. Partly because I wanted to try to cultivate in her a posture of silent prayer and partly because I was exhausted from work, I gave in to her requests and said yes. In the car we went and drove the two minutes to the chapel. Upon entering the chapel, every seat was taken and she and I patiently stood in the back as we waited for the family who had the hour before us to finish their scheduled time. Within five minutes, the other individuals had filed out of the chapel and it was just Charlotte Annie, Mr. Snuggles (a large teddy bear gifted to her from some classmates after her recent accident), and me in the chapel for about ten minutes. She began getting antsy about eight minutes in so I asked if she would like some praise and worship music played. A girl after my own heart, she said yes. We were about halfway through listenting to a song when someone arrived in the chapel. I quickly turned off the praise & worship music and we settled back into silence with the third adorer.

You can spot Mr. Snuggles in the bottom right hand corner because at this point, both Charlotte and he were snuggled up on my lap in the first row of the chapel as close to the Eucharist as we could get.

A few other people came and went for the remainder of the hour and, while settled on my lap, Charlotte wound up falling asleep in my arms. I felt the stressors of the day, the worries about the unknown, and feelings of unrest I had been battling slip away as I felt her warm body curled up on my lap. God knows what He is doing. Usually, I read while in the Chapel but my arms and hands were occupied. Other times, I listen to the daily Gospel reading but I left my phone on the table next to me. I just sat and was still as I held Charlotte and let myself be held. I likely wouldn't have experienced these things had I told Charlotte she needed to stay home. 

Shortly before our hour was up, someone slid the below note into my view. I didn't get a glimpse of who it was or even if it was a male or female given I was in the front row. 

Thank you, Lord, for the small encouragements and for the way You encounter each of us right where we are. Today is the Feast Day of Our Lady of Fatima. Fun fact:  the school I attended for 1st grade was named after her. Then, in 2nd grade, the school I attended had a beautiful larger than life mural painting of her in the main hallway of the school. One of my favorite pictures with Charlotte was taken with her at the foot of the mural when I took her to my old elementary school when she was a baby. 

God may show up in big ways like the encounters of the three small children with Our Lady in Fatima or He may do it through a stranger's note but He is always there. 

Spend some time looking for the ways He is working in your life today! 

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.

Fully both

I was promoted to full professor today.  ✔ 🎓🍎

For those outside of higher education, there are typically three levels or professorship. A first year or beginning professor is often categorized as assistant professor. This does not mean this sort of professor is a teaching assistant or has not completed his or her training/schooling as many erroneously believe. It's just the title or category of being at the start of your career as a professor aka a beginning professor or a junior faculty member.

The next level or rank is to achieve the associate professor rank. This occurs after a predetermined number of years working at the assistant professor level, evaluations, and contributions of service, scholarship, and teaching within the discipline.  These same requirements are often applied to move on up to the next level or rank of full professor.

Honestly, I had no desire to go up for full professor when I first began this part of my teaching career. I've had my doctorate (PhD) since 2014 and this is the conclusion of my ninth year working at the institution where I am currently employed. Over time, though, the desire to see if I could achieve full professorship was planted. I think after so many doors closing in recent years and encountering "no" so often, I was fueled in my desire to see if I could make it to full professorship.  ❓

In writing this piece, I looked up what does full professorship mean and saw this blurb online:

Full professor is the highest rank that a professor can achieve (other than in a named position) and is seldom achieved before a person reaches his or her mid-40s. The rank of full professor carries additional administrative responsibilities associated with membership on committees that are restricted to full professors.

Reading the above description, it seems that I beat one goal...of earning this accomplishment before I reach my mid-40s. 🙌 😂 Reading the description, I don't think I can stand to take on any additional responsibilities at the moment though. This last year has been one of slowly letting go of commitments and responsibilities I've held over the last several years that have been near and dear to my heart. It's been a bit of a pruning year as I dig in and focus on departmental and accreditation duties that are calling my name. Our Lord never runs out of opportunities to allow us to practice humble obedience. This is a lifelong lesson for me...to discern what is of His will and to accept it. Give me the grace, Lord!  🙏

So, today was momentous in so many ways. 🎆

It represents overcoming hurdles. It represents hard work, blood, sweat, and tears. Oh, so many tears....It represents throwing myself into work when all was falling apart around me. 

It represents persevering even when others did not believe in me. It represents getting up day after day even on the darkest of mornings and when the only small success that day was putting one foot in front of the other.  

It also represents a support system of my husband and daughter unfailingly believing in me. 💕

It represents my mom and dad, my first and biggest fans, and my brothers being proud of their sister the teacher. It represents my spiritual mothers and advisors who have taught me so well - I will never get used to hearing my name said alongside Dr. Klein and Dr. Compton even after being called doctor the last nine years.  💗

Looking back on the last 20+ years of teaching, soooo many students come to mind. 

I think of 3rd grader Daniel who couldn't wait for me to come to his classroom to co-teach with his classroom teacher. 

I think of Brianna, struggling her way through elementary school amidst a tumultous home life, who just wanted someone to listen to her and to really see her and know her. 

I think of Gregory, a 4th grader who had one of the happiest dispositions I've encountered, who needed assistance with spelling and needed strategies to be successful in his classes. 

I remember Andrew getting in trouble as a new teen driver when he threw his trash out of the driver's side window and our talking about the consequences of our actions on the second floor of the Vo-Tech library. 

I also remember Faith running to see me with happy tears streaming down her face, as a high school senior, when she passed her cosmetology exam we had studied so hard for and I remember Brandon sharing all about his game-winning hit at the previous night's high school baseball game. 

I think of the homebound students I worked with and the tutoring sessions I provided after school for those who had been cast aside and seemingly forgotten. I was the link connecting them from their in-home situations to school life.

Later, I recall the gasps of concern when I literally stood up to come crashing down on the floor in front of a class of 42 college students, and a supervisor who was observing my teaching in the class, at UNCG when the high heel of my shoe got caught in the ribbon decoration of the other shoe.  That was the day I stopped wearing cute high heels when teaching.

Moments of advising pre-service teachers and helping them to discern if they want to be teachers rise to the top of the memories as I reflect on my time in higher education. Hard conversations and lightbulb moments are some of my favorites as I remember these college students recognizing what their true vocations/callings were. 

Student leaders, student researchers, and interactions with students inside and outside the classroom, bubble up to the surface as I reflect on all the "kids" I've had the chance to teach, mentor, and accompany on their own journeys. Some had disabilities - those seen and unseen. Some were young and others were older. Some went on to become teachers. Others dropped out of school. All have made a mark on the teacher, and person, I am today. 

Back in 2019, when I was promoted from assistant to associate professor, I wasn't in the country. So I watched the graduation ceremony from the Kartause in Austria. I remember sitting at the long table in the front room of the apartment where we were staying and pulling up the graduation ceremony on the livestream link. It took but a few moments to hear them say my name and that they were presenting to me in absentia due to currently teaching in the study abroad program. When all was said and done, it was a rather unceremonious moment on the other side of the world for me. I remember, closing the laptop, getting up from the table, and turning my attention back to grading for my summer online class that had already started. It was a surreal feeling knowing the fieldhouse was packed full of people on campus celebrating these moments with the soon to be graduates. So, fast forward to today, and it was nice to physically be there for this promotion this time and to experience it "live" and in person. I'm so thankful for the family and friends who were able to attend and join me in celebrating as well!

Professionally speaking, since that other promotion in 2019 to now, many losses occurred but so did many successes. You can't revel in the glory of Jesus unless you also unite in His suffering. As I look back at all that has occurred since May 2019, in addition to teaching, the below is what I've accomplished out of the research aspect of my job:

* wrote a book

* wrote a textbook with colleagues

* wrote three book chapters

* published nine articles

* was invited to write nine publications

* created a website with a colleague

* gave 79 presentations (!!!)

* secured $213,644 worth of grants alongside colleagues

I can't even begin to put a number to or try to quantify the service opportunities or collaborations with other colleagues. Admittedly, that is where my heart is when it's not with my family. It is probably what I'm more known for in this community. I see the work that is done out of this arena of service as a tangible way of being the hands and feet of Christ and living out the vocation of spiritual motherhood. I always have...even long before I entered higher education where a premium is placed on the service aspect to working. My early days of volunteering in my Mom's 2nd grade classroom or coaching cheerleading  point to this desire to give to others the way others have given to me.

However, what is not counted in the above quantifiable information, is also all the nos that come with the yeses. The qualitative aspects of sleepless nights, early mornings, and the stretching to do all the things and trying to be all the things for multple individuals is not reflected in the above numbers. Sacrificing time spent with family and friends, feeling excluded from social gatherings, and skipping out on small moments of respite/recreation are hard to quantify. 

Not counted in the above list, are the hours spent away from my family or equally the guilt felt when carving out time for family that eventually leads to falling behind with work. 

What a swinging pendulum...We can't have Easter Sunday without having Good Friday....how to be fully both....in this case:  wife/mother and professor? That is the million dollar question. How to turn off the racing thoughts when trying to be present to loved ones? How to share your gifts and skillset in the way God wants you to use them with others? How to feel as if you're meeting the needs and demands of both roles?

What I do know is the work accomplishments would mean absolutely nothing without Adam and Charlotte. 

Yet Adam and Charlotte would not be receiving the best of me if I denied the teacher part of me. 

The work I do inside the home, as well as outside the home, contribute to all aspects of who I am.

You can have joy amidst sorrow. 

Pain will seep in and settle among the happy times, too. 

To be fully alive is to experience both emotions. Henry David Thoreau and Oscar Wilde, among many others, have penned their thoughts on this juxtaposition of experiencing both extremes in daily encounters. We all have crosses to bear. They have been personally fashioned for each one of us and our unique situations...they are not plucked out of thin air and tossed on to our backs at random. This past weekend's gospel reading reminds us that God is in us and we're in Him. 

Gospel, John 14:1-12

1 Do not let your hearts be troubled. You trust in God, trust also in me.

2 In my Father's house there are many places to live in; otherwise I would have told you. I am going now to prepare a place for you,

3 and after I have gone and prepared you a place, I shall return to take you to myself, so that you may be with me where I am.

4 You know the way to the place where I am going.

5 Thomas said, 'Lord, we do not know where you are going, so how can we know the way?'

6 Jesus said: I am the Way; I am Truth and Life. No one can come to the Father except through me.

7 If you know me, you will know my Father too. From this moment you know him and have seen him.

8 Philip said, 'Lord, show us the Father and then we shall be satisfied.' Jesus said to him,

9 'Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? 'Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father, so how can you say, "Show us the Father"?

10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? What I say to you I do not speak of my own accord: it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his works.

11 You must believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe it on the evidence of these works.

12 In all truth I tell you, whoever believes in me will perform the same works as I do myself, and will perform even greater works, because I am going to the Father.

Yes, we have hardships, but we also have joys. 

We absolutely can't lose sight of this. 

We struggle but we also have times of ease at times. God is with us through it all. How can we lean into these truths? How can we face the hard along with experiencing the good? How can we open our hands and say, "Give it all to me, Lord, all for the glory of You!" and truly mean it? 

How do we continue doing the works set before us? 

In reflecting on this particular professional milestone, and goal that was five years in the making, the below has helped me. Daily, we can strive to do the following within our own circumstances:

- Grow in humility. We can ask forgiveness of one another instead of standing in pride or operating out of fear. Trust the Lord will provide.

- Be kind to others and pray for others...always. This is easier said than done at times. We are all human and tend to go into self-preservation mode. There will be times you will feel discarded, not chosen, left out, or be in situations in which you were obviously not thought of - but be kind anyway. Give others the benefit of the doubt and get out of our own worldview. In other words, try to not take things personally and control only what you can - your way of dealing with disappointment or these feelings.

- Decrease so that He may increase. Seek always to be a conduit of God's love and grace to pour out of you and spill over on to others. Shift the focus from your needs to meet the needs of others. In the story of Rainbow Fish, he desires at first to keep all his beautiful sparkly scales. He gains true happiness, however, when he gives them away to his friends. Share what you have with others. Rather than store up treasures for yourself, share! 

- Carve out time for prayer and spending time with God's Word....no matter how overpacked the schedule is or other commitments clamorning for your attention. Give God your time and He will multiply it! Draw inspiration from scripture.

- Finally, be willing to share your struggles. This one is huge...for me anyway. Rather than closing yourself off, be open with others. Be vulnerable and honest. It is okay to hurt, to fail, and to admit trials...but then get up and keep going...one step at a time. One way I have tried to do this, recently, is to be open to the struggles of living with secondary infertility. Over the last three months, I've taken huge leaps of faith in putting our story out there and being a bit more vocal about the pain and blessings of walking this journey. The hope is that it can help at least one person who may be walking a similar path in his or her own life.

Last week, I completed a weekly women's group book study in which we read St. John Paul II's Letter to Women. In it, he closes the letter by reminding the reader the ordinary everyday tasks and acts we engage in during our encounters with others matter. We have each been given graces and gifts to be workers in the vineyard. God calls us to work our way through our areas of weakness, to rely on Him, and to be truly ourselves in the way He designed us. This has had me pondering lately how my struggles fit in to the grand scheme of things and how I am being called to use and move through them. 

So, as I wrap up this reflection on being fully both, at this point in my life, and documenting this move to full professor, I admit there were moments when I doubted this day would come. Getting to this point, professionally speaking has not been without challenges. I'm thankful for all who lifted me up on the days I couldn't stand and for those who joined me for the adventures and said yes to my wild propositions/ideas/collaborations over the years thus far. 

I'm so thankful for this vocation of teaching and for the supports (inside the home and outside the home) that helped me to get to this point. Thank you, God, for this gift and vocation. Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us on this feast day of yours and during which, this promotion happened. 

Also, what an amazing detail God has woven into this story! I attended first grade at Our Lady of Fatima Grade School in Hopewell Twp, Pennsylvania. A few weekends ago, I was able to take my current first grader there! 😍

Another beautiful detail is that literally on back to back days, my family gets to celebrate two huge parts of what makes me who I am. Today, on Saturday, the focus is on the professional with this promotion then 24 hours later on Sunday, it is Mother's Day in honoring Charlotte and how she calls me my favorite title. Nine years (and four days) ago, I changed my title by walking across the stage in the Greensboro Coliseum by getting hooded by a spirtual mother and mentor. Less than a decade later, I was able to move up a rank and do this literally in front of Adam & Charlotte who had snagged a seat in the front with my mom, brother, and his four kids who had driven through the night to witness this special event.

Thank you, Lord, for these opportunities. I can't wait to see what the next 20 years hold....both personally & professionally! 

“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” ~ William Butler Yeats

"For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." ~ Matthew 18:20

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. ~ Jeremiah 29:11

"The entire educational process must be carried out with love which is perceptible in every disciplinary measure and which does not instill any fear...and the most effective educational method is not the word of instruction but the living example without which all words remain useless." - - - St. Edith Stein