Category: Weekly Newsletter

The Mom Weekly, Volume 118: November 11, 2025

You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

Notes:

I am writing this note early Saturday morning, before I go to the second day of a local retreat. I want to get this out before the retreat content actually begins later this morning. That’s because I want to clarify that I am not giving away any confidences or any privileged information. Often on retreats people can really share from their hearts, so I want to confirm that I would never share any of that, because I am writing this before the retreat actually begins.

The first evening, everyone got a chance to introduce themselves and talk about what they hoped to get out of the retreat. One man talked about how on this retreat we need to be like Mary (of Mary & Martha), because she “sat at the feet of Jesus” and “she said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” 

Internally, I got more than a little annoyed on behalf of St. Martha. Martha was the one who had the profession of faith at the death of Lazarus! Martha, who is a saint! Martha, who had her very own feast day—July 29—until 2021, and she now has to share the feast day with her two siblings, Lazarus and Mary! (Perhaps Martha can also be the patron of siblings?)

Anyway, when the time came for me to introduce myself, I said, “I don’t mean to disagree with you, but I’m Team Martha, because she was also great, and she loved our Lord.” I was kind of proud of holding back from correcting the very sincere and nice man about who said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” I didn’t think that would be the best way to start off a retreat!

Anyway, it reminded me of my portion of a talk that Dad and I gave during a retreat for young people many years ago. I was really proud of my defense of St. Martha then, and so I’m going to include it here (edited to include only the Mary/Martha parts) and title it “Team Martha.”

Team Martha (From the Vault, 2019)

I identify strongly with one of the people in this Scripture passage, and I am going to let you consider/guess which one:

The Gospel of Luke, Chapter 10: 

As they continued their journey he entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him. She had a sister named Mary who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak. 

Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” 

 The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”

…..One of my takeaways for you today is:

Love is … and love does.

In case you didn’t know, I identify almost 100 percent with Martha. And this is true in all aspects of my life, but in my spiritual life. 

I prefer to DO. 

Daily Mass? Check. Rosary? Check. Adoration hour weekly? Check.

Now, this can be good, because the structure of the “doing” helps me to devote time to my relationship with Jesus. But it’s not how everyone experiences their faith.

There’s a great quote from a book I’ve been reading recently in adoration. It’s called Live Today Well by Fr. Thomas Dailey, and it’s about the spirituality of St. Francis de Sales.

“With so many things calling for our attention, we often run the risk of doing more than being.”

I can fall into this trap, so I need to branch out in my spiritual life to contemplation more. But I also realize that God wants me to love him in many different ways.

Did you know that the last word on Martha was not Jesus giving her a rebuke for “doing too much?” Let’s turn to John Chapter 11, the raising of Lazarus. Recall that Lazarus had died, and Jesus was not there. It was days later when he finally went to Bethany. 

And note that Martha—MARTHA!— is the one who has an amazing act of faith in Jesus and his work.

When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary sat at home. 

Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here my brother would have not died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give to you.” 

Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise.”  Martha said to him, “I know he will rise, in the resurrection on the last day.”

Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe that?”

She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”

I always feel vindicated when I read or hear this Scripture. And if I’m reading that passage aloud, I have trouble getting through Martha’s response to Jesus without crying. Martha was the one who went out to meet Jesus, and Mary stayed at home. Yay for all Marthas!

But Mary was also part of this, and even poor Lazarus. Everyone has his or her role to play, and everyone has a different way to love Jesus. 

That is one big thing that I have learned, and I would leave with you. Whatever your vocation, whether it is to married life, or to religious life, as you live as a single person, everyone will not be like you, and that is okay. 

You may be like me, a Martha, and the people closest to you may be like like a John, the beloved disciple, or a Mary, or a St. Peter, or a St. Therese, or a St. Francis. 

And of course no one is exactly like one of these saints from the past. Recognizing the differences in each other, and trying to love each other in both the way we feel more comfortable, and the way the people around you receive love best, will be a gift to them, and to your relationship.

An Action Item: Consider the Christ the King Novena

The end of the liturgical year is drawing near, and that means one of Dad’s favorite feast days in the year—Christ the King, is upon us! It is November 23 this year— before Thanksgiving. 

There is a novena to Christ the King that is traditional around this time of year. This year, the novena starts November 14, and runs through November 22. Here is a link to the novena on the USCCB website. Consider praying it!

(Also related: I am trying to encourage many to pray the St. John Paul II Novena for Healing for the upcoming surgery in our family. It starts today, November 11, and runs through November 19, the day before the surgery. Here is that novena in case you want to join in.)

The Mom Weekly Volume 115: October 21, 2025

You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.

Notes

Your Mom’s Birthday Week is well underway! I am happy to be celebrating all week long, and so grateful for all of you and what a full life I have because you are part of it.

I love this “Frrom the Vault” because I still hold these views about confession, and these views about raising spiritually healthy kids.

Remember how much I love you,

Mom

Moments of Grace (From the Vault, December 2009)

The girls and I decided to go to confession Saturday after Sir told us that he had gone to a downtown parish for confession and Mass earlier that week. It was so nice to hear that Sir had gone because it gave me an opening to suggest it to the girls, and they readily agreed. Ideagirl reported that in Atrium they had talked about how Advent was a good time to go to confession. I was so glad for that reinforcement, too.

I still would like to have a regular time for confession. I go regularly-ish, but getting the kids there on a regular basis is not a part of the schedule, and I am frustrated by it. I used to take the girls bike-riding to Church for first Saturday and the confession that was offered after Mass, but the confession time is no longer offered.

I know that confession is such a personal thing, and I don’t want to force it. Yet I want to inspire in our kids when they are young that it is normal and usual to go regularly, so they will hopefully have that habit when they are on their own. We also talk about how sometimes we feel good when we come out, and sometimes we don’t, but we do always have the graces of the sacrament. 

I don’t want anyone have an experience like I know some people have had, of going to a bad confession (confessor or whatever) and then not going back to the sacrament for a long time.

I try to tell kids that you can have a good or bad experience sometimes, but that keeping going in the important thing. That’s also the same for Mass. This is actually part of my much larger theory of trying to raise spiritually healthy Catholics, a theory very much in flux but in avid conversation with Sir.

Anyway, before we left on Saturday, we were all having a quick cup of tea, we were talking about how long it had been for the girls (we were thinking about 2 months), and then trying to encourage an examination of conscience. And I was moved, almost to tears, by our casual banter about confession. 

There was much lighthearted joking about the lists we had all made for each other of our sins. Ideagirl was laughing as she said that my list was so large she had to store it in the attic, but she would be happy to go and get it for me. I know it may not seem like a moment of grace—some people may be offended by joking about sins or confession—but it was all lighthearted and loving, and I felt it as a moment of grace.

At church more moments of grace—Ideagirl and Homegirl starting to bicker because of who would go after me (both wanted me to go first), and Ideagirl deferring to Homegirl. It was so big girl of her, I was just touched again.

When Homegirl came out of confession, after she said her penance she immediately turned to me to whisper, “What did you get (for your penance)?” Her eyes went wide because mine was 40 percent larger than hers, but we both recognized that was probably because I was a Mommy.

As we walked back to the van, (too cold for bike riding, or even walking that day), we chatted about confession and starting to talk about their first Confessions and how much better we feel after we go to Confession.

All grace.

An Action Item: Consider Going to Confession

As I request every year around my birthday, I’d like you to consider going to confession. It’s really a birthday tradition for me, both going to confession, and asking others to go.

I paused before requesting this this year, as some of us this summer had a long discussion about scrupulosity and how a tendency toward that can make confession fraught. But reading what I wrote above made me realize that I did have a good perspective all those years ago about wanting to raise spiritually healthy Catholics. 

Also, it’s been a pretty consistent desire of mine, to want people to have a healthy relationship with confession, and go often. So I’m sticking with it! 

Interesting/Notable: 

Jane Austen Loved Music. What Was on Her Playlist?

We’ll just keep October as a month of Jane Austen. Dad shared this with me.

This is not how this works—Claire the Catholic Feminist

Most of this is behind the paywall, but it’s honestly worth subscribing just to read. This article was published in the week after Charlie Kirk’s murder, but I find it still highly relevant.

One quote:

If you are a person with a big heart who cares about the world, as I know most of you are, events like the murder of Charlie Kirk will quickly make you feel utterly unhinged if you are not moving carefully through the world with your eyes on Jesus, doing intentional work to be in charge of your own emotional responses.