Miracle Moments

As I walked around the park early yesterday morning the bright and beautiful sun radiated through the clouds, beckoning me to look skyward...I watched in wonder as the pulsating hues of rose and blue and gold waves...spread out before my eyes...while the center disc merrily rotated in a circular dance. It was miraculously beautiful! Eventually I'd look away-smiling to myself at the wonder of God's generous gift...and then suddenly there it was again, pulsating right in front of me...As if urging me to watch again and again...And so I did and it was then that I knew this promised to be a special day...And it was-Thank you Lord! Later that afternoon unexpected kindness came a calling...Cradling my family in the loving warmth of my circle of prayer warriors. They delivered a generous surprise gift, wrapped in the bountiful Love which always flows from the heavens into their hearts and then straight into our home. They knew the boys and I had experienced a rough several days, wo...

Our family received an early Christmas present...A seven page letter from my oldest son Johnny. He is living in a convent in Borgaro Italy, just five minutes from Turin...which is home to the Shroud of Turin. Johnny is learning Italian and landscaping and the fundamentals of a God centered life. Johnny is an excellent writer and he paints a beautiful picture of the day to day activities of his unique life behind the convent walls-which by the way-are lined with barbed wire. "Not to keep us in," he writes, "but to keep the outsiders from getting in. We are always free to leave." He is living with the Sisters of Charity, an order founded by a French nun, St. Jeanne Antide and with ten other young men. They are a mixed group-Dutch, Italian, Irish, Slovakian and American. He says they all get along pretty well and even though most of them speak English, he prefers speaking Italian. The house is called "Gioia" which means joy and there is a small grotto w...

I woke up this week at 3:30a.m. and as I laid their thinking and praying...the thought suddenly occurred to me, "What was I thinking. What would possess me to agree to share the insanity of my sinfulness so openly in a public setting." Of course I wasn't thinking-about me. I was thinking about how I could respond to the call that God had put on my heart to help others who might be in as much pain as I had been in. Tomorrow, Friday December 10Th, I'll be telling the faithful about my fall into the darkness of addiction and explaining how God has redeemed me through the power of his unconditional Love. My testimony is part of an Advent Day of Renewal at St. Francis Xavier Church in Metairie La. It's a day of praise and worship, hope and renewal...A time to remember that the reason for the season is the birth of Jesus Christ who came to this earth to liberate us from the pervasive power of evil that is clearly keeping so many humans in bondage to sin. It's ...

High atop a hill in Hanceville Alabama, broken hearts are being healed and hope is being restored. Our Lady of Joyful Hope is a community of young men who are finding new freedom through a life of authentic truth. Once lost in the darkness of addiction they are now living in the light of Christ who is transforming them from the inside out...And their families, if they are open and willing, are being transformed right alongside them. Recently, I spent three days with this community, listening to the young men, their parents and to the foundress, Mother Elvira, who flew in from Italy for the anointing of the new community house and the celebration that followed. Mother Elvira's life story is on par with Mother Teresa. She is an Italian nun who heard the call from God to snatch souls from Satan by delivering young men and women from the demonic grip of addiction. She gave up everything familiar, walked straight into the wilderness and wound up becoming a living legacy for desperate fa...