Carla Mae's Blog

We are living in the glow of the fifty days; yes – fifty to top the forty days of lent. We live in the fifty days of wild joy. The words of the Easter Entrance Song still ring in our ears: “I am risen and still with you.” The One our hearts seek was not kidding. He will suffer, and then after three days, he will rise. Yes, and so will we. Why is it that in the midst of the wild joy of the fifty days of Easter, we wake up with the same pandemic limiting us, the same bills, the same laundry to be done? We are Christians, and as such we are pilgrims. We walk betwee n the now and the “not yet.” We live simultaneously in the struggles and ordinariness of time/space, and in the promises of the gospel. Sometimes we wonder what is really “real.” The answer to that is a simple “yes,” for they both are “real.” That is why the daily immersion in the Word is so important. It helps us “walk on water.” We don’t want to so sink into the pandemic, the bills, and the laundry that we d...

We have been reflecting these past months, on the power of hope in our lives, and especially as a Racine Dominican community ‘Rooted’ in hope. Francis, our present Catholic Shepherd, has much to say about this theological virtue. It is given us in baptism as a special power from our Father/Mother-God. Hope is a longing…it is a longing born of religious love, for something we do not yet see. It is an ache of the soul, a longing for the face of the God who is hidden, for our Father/Mother-God’s face is hidden from us. Faith is the gift of the Word, for it is a form of knowing, and Charity is the merciful and compassionate active love of God in us, a gift of the Spirit. But little hope just keeps vigil. It watches for the dawn it knows will come. It manifests a holy stubbornness, for it is the waiting that is so hard. This year, at the Saturday Easter Vigil in Rome, in the midst of a world pandemic and in the midst of the absence of a congregation before him, Pope Francis ha...