Deo gratias! My Seven-Year Anniversary!

Let your light then shine before men and women, that your Father in heaven may be glorified and his plan of making all things one in Christ come to perfection.  ~from the Homily in the Rite of Consecration to a Life of Virginity for Women Living in the World

Ave Maria! Seven years ago today I was blessed to receive the Consecration to a Life of Virginity for Women Living in the World from Archbishop Joseph Fiorenza here in the Galveston-Houston Archdiocese. The boundless joy of that glorious occasion has increased a hundredfold with each passing day as my Beloved Spouse, our Lord Jesus Christ, draws me ever closer to Him and makes me more and more His own.

The Prayer of Consecration, which Archbishop Fiorenza prayed with his hands extended over my head as I knelt before him, included these words: "Be yourself her glory, her joy, her whole desire. Be her comfort in sorrow, her wisdom in perplexity, her protection in the midst of injustice, her patience in adversity, her riches in poverty, her food in fasting, her remedy in time of sickness. She has chosen you above all things; may she find all things in possessing you." I often meditate upon and pray with these words because they express so perfectly and so fully the happy reality and the deepest truth of my life as the Bride of Christ.

Oh, yes, I've had my share of hardships and heartaches these past seven years. And I will experience many more before I pass from this earth to my everlasting home. Such is life in this valley of tears. But espoused as I am to my Crucified Lord, these things are my small but very real sharing in His Passion. And so I exult: "I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Galatians 2:20). As part of my preparation for consecration, Archbishop Fiorenza requested that I write my Rule of Life. I struggled for quite some time trying to put this into words. Finally I wrote down this Scripture verse at the beginning, and then everything just flowed onto the paper as if the Holy Spirit Himself was writing it – and He was, I'm convinced!

Dear ones, especially my family and friends who were with me at Mass in my parish on that happy, happy day of May 8, 2004, when, through God's most gracious and adorable will, today and always, I sing to you the words of the Psalmist:

O glorify the Lord with me!

Together let us praise His name!

~Psalm 34:3