Let the Year of Faith Begin!

Well, it's been over a week since I've updated on where life is at. Just goes to show how crazy the past week has been. After a fun weekend attempting to surprise my college sisters in the Twin Cities, I've been running around Duluth like crazy. Why you ask? Well, it's time to send out newsletters (which I finally got in the mail today!), plan some fun events to promote SEEK2013 (our national conference, check it out seek2013.com), prepare a talk for tonight's night with the student missionaries on campus, fill out my missions application, and do all my usual missionary fun!

But, I figured before heading over to campus to hang out with our student missionaries, I just had to write about some new graces God has blessed me with in the past week. It's been really amazing.

Picture of St. Peter's from my 2011 pilgrimage

Yesterday (Oct 11) began the Year of Faith, proclaimed by Pope Benedict XVI. It was incredible to kick this off here at Newman with our Thursday Mass & Meal! We had a special musical guest, Danielle Rose, for Mass last night and the chapel was overflowing! As we began Mass with the song "How Great is our God", I could just feel the Holy Spirit present with us. During Mass, I just kept thinking of how incredibly blessed I am to be a part of the Catholic Church at this exciting moment in history. And even more crazy, to be called to be a missionary with FOCUS right now. In a very real and tangible way, God has called me to help others develop a relationship with Him and be equipped to help their peers do the same. Sometimes I seriously wonder if this is really my job.

This week, I was able to witness 2 of my bible study members express their desire to grow closer to God. One even told me that she recently started reading the Bible before bed each night. I have 2 members of my athletes bible study who have officially signed up for SEEK2013, and some other girls who are really thinking about it (please pray for their yes).

God has just really shown me that my role as a missionary is to be the one to provide students with the opportunity to choose Him. What an honor! I had amazing discipleship with both Kelly and Shannon, these two girls are truly living their lives for Jesus and I love being a part of it! I've also realized how much I love being a part of FOCUS and being in Duluth specifically. I'm starting to feel like I really belong here.

At Mass the past couple days, Fr. Mike has talked about what faith entails. Faith means acting on Jesus' promises. It means being all in for love of Him. And I'm slowly realizing how being a missionary provides me with such a concrete way to do this and to see how much God loves me and wants to take care of me. As I write this, my heart is just overflowing in thankfulness for how good God is. He really desires to use my "yes" to FOCUS to help me grow and become a saint!

Which leads to a final comment. Part of the Year of Faith is looking back at Vatican Council II, which was held 50 years ago. It was then that the Church encouraged all the faithful to recognize and embrace the Universal Call to Holiness. What does that mean? Each and every one of us is ultimately called to be a saint! So sometime this weekend, take a moment and think about those ways that God is molding you into a saint, into the best version of yourself. Because even when we fail to realize it, that is what He wants to do for us.