Lent begins tomorrow. Have you considered what your Lent is going to look like? Will you give something up? Will you take something up?
Tag Archives: lent
The heart of our mission
“Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? The moment your greeting sounded in my ears the baby leapt in my womb for joy. Blest is she who trusted that the Lord’s words to her would be fulfilled.” -Luke 1:26-45
May is the month that we celebrate mothers and spiritual mothers. This role of spiritual maternity is very close to the heart of our mission to transform the world one woman at a time.
I remember a women’s retreat I conducted some years ago. In addition to the many laywomen present, there were a few religious. In one of my talks, I addressed the mission of Catholic women. When the talk was over, one of the sisters came up to me with a glow on her face and tears in her eyes. She told me she had been a religious for more than thirty years, and only that day had come to a full understanding of her vocation.
This religious sister is not alone. Many of us have questioned what it means to be a woman, and a Catholic woman at that. We know there is something dynamic and unique about it, but just what it seems to evade us. What is more, deep inside we sense that true fulfillment and happiness is somehow inextricably linked to our femininity. Where do we go to get the answer? To whom do we turn to find the way?
We need not look far. When we look to the mission of the Catholic woman, we look to our Blessed Mother. Luke 1:26-45 presents Our Lady’s Annunciation and her visitation to her cousin Elizabeth. When Mary arrives at the house of her elderly cousin Elizabeth, who is pregnant with her first child, Elizabeth cries out in greeting, “Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? The moment your greeting sounded in my ears the baby leapt in my womb for joy. Blest is she who trusted that the Lord’s words to her would be fulfilled.”
These lines tell us much. The leap of the Baptist and the assertion of Elizabeth proclaim that the fruit of Mary’s womb is the long-awaited Messiah and Redeemer. Mary, pregnant with Divine Life, carries that life to others. She is the Christ-bearer who brings salvation by her very presence. As the physical mother of the Savior, Mary is the spiritual mother of the elect (CCC #969).
As Catholic women, our call is to emulate the spiritual motherhood of Mary. Some of us will be physical mothers, but each of us is called to spiritual motherhood. Through receptivity, trust, and surrender, “women impregnated with a spirit of the Gospel can do so much to aid humanity in not falling” (“Letter to Women,” Vatican Council II). Imbued with the Divine Life and fortified by prayer, fervent reception of the sacraments, and virtuous living, Catholic women who assume their God-given call to spiritual motherhood will do great things for the Kingdom of God – we can indeed become the healers of the world.
This month, please join us in celebrating the gift of woman and her call to spiritual motherhood. Let us encourage women to embrace the truth of their identity and to be lights shining in the darkness of the day. Finally, let us share with them the exemplar of the true Woman of Grace, the Blessed Virgin Mary, whose “fiat” brought salvation to the world. May Mary, our spiritual mother, inspire the “yes” of our lives as we seek to be the women of grace God intends us to be.
May the abundant life of Jesus Christ be yours and may God bless you!
I faithfully remain…
Your sister in Christ,
Johnnette Benkovic Williams
Founder and President
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: Easter Sunday
Easter Sunday
Most glorious Lord of life that on this day
Didst make Thy triumph over death and sin,
And having harrowed hell didst bring away
Captivity thence captive us to win;
This joyous day, dear Lord, with joy begin
And grant that we, for whom Thou didst die
Being with Thy dear blood clean washed from sin,
May live forever in felicity.
And that Thy love we weighing worthily,
May likewise love Thee for the same again;
And for Thy sake that all like dear didst buy,
With love may one another entertain.
So let us love, dear love, like as we ought,
Love is the lesson which the Lord us taught.
–“Easter”, Edmund Spenser (1553-1598)
Today’s Reflection
JESUS LIVES! How am I experiencing His life in me on this glorious day?
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: Holy Saturday
Holy Saturday
I am not moved to love Thee, O my Lord,
By any longing for Thy Promised Land;
Nor by the fear of hell am I unmanned
To cease from my transgressing deed or word.
‘Tis Thou Thyself dost move me, — Thy blood poured
Upon the cross from nailed foot and hand;
And all the wounds that did Thy body brand;
And all Thy shame and bitter death’s award.
Yea, to Thy heart am I so deeply stirred
That I would love Thee were no heaven on high,
That I would fear, were hell a tale absurd!
Such my desire, all questioning grows vain;
Though hope deny me hope I still should sigh,
And as my love is now, it should remain.
-To Christ Crucified (16th or 17th C.),
Translated from the Spanish by Thomas Walsh
Today’s Reflection
On this Holy Saturday I enter into the tomb with Jesus. What one area of my life is most in need of resurrection? How is Jesus showing me He wants to bring this part of me “back to life?”
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: Good Friday
Good Friday
Jesus:
O Mother dear, didst thou but hear
My plaint of desolation,
Thy tender heart would burst apart
With grief of separation!
I am not stone, yet all alone
I hush My soul’s outcrying, —
Alone to tread the wine-press red,
To bear the pain of dying.
My lips are dumb, the night has come;
Ah! Solace I might borrow
Had I but thee to bide with Me
In this wild waste of sorrow.
Mary:
“Gentle moon and start of midnight,
Golden apples born of sunshine,
Precious pearls and jewels rare, —
All things glorious, all things shining,”
Thus the sorrowing Mother spake;
“E’en ye bright, transfigured faces,
Mourn with me for Jesus’ sake.
“Sparkle, gleam, and glow no longer:
Only moan and mourn for Him.
Shine not, shine not, weep forever,
Till your thousand eyes are dim;
For the mighty One has fallen,
And my Beautiful is slain;
In the dense wood pierced, my Shepherd, —
Weep ye, weep ye for my pain!
O most oppressed of all oppressed,
Heart of my heart, my all, my Son!
Grief’s keenest sword doth pierce my breast:
I die with Thee, my only one!
Alas! the pain is all too great,
Since, living, still I share Thy fate.
“Yes, mine Thou wert to bear and rear
Through life and light, and pain and loss;
And now, ten thousand times more dear,
I yield Thee to the cruel cross!”
-“Dialogue at the Cross,” Frederick Spee, S. J. (1591-1635)
translated from the German by Mary E. Mannix
Today’s Reflection
Today I stand at the foot of the Cross with Mary my mother. What pain, sorrow, suffering, trial, and contradiction do I yield to the “cruel cross”? How does Mary give me guidance in this surrender?
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: Holy Thursday
Holy Thursday
Prone in Gethsemene upon His face,
His eyelids closed, — lay Christ of all our world,
The winds with endless sorrows seemed enswirled;
A little fountain murmured of its pain
Reflecting the pale sickle of the moon;
Then was the hour when the Angel brought
From God’s high throne the Cup of bitter horn,
While on His hands tears trembling fell like rain.
Before the Christ a cross arose on high;
He saw His own young body hanging there
Mangled, distorted; knotted ropes half-tear
The sinews from their sockets; saw He nigh
The jagged nails’ hot rage, the direful Crown
Upon His head, and every dripping thorn
Red-laden, as in fury of its scorn
The thunder battered all kind voices down.
He heard the pattering drops, as from the cross
A piteous sobbing whispered and grew still.
Then Jesus sighed, and every pore did spill
A bloody sweat.
-From Gethsemene
by Annette Von Droste-Hulshoff (1797-1848)
Today’s Reflection
Take this poem into your prayer time meditation as you consider the great gift of our redemption. How is Jesus speaking to me in it?
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: April 8
April 8
“Confess what you have done in word or deed, by night or day. Confess in an acceptable time, and in the day of salvation receive the heavenly treasure.”
-St. Cyril of Jerusalem
Today’s Reflection
As we enter into the Holy Triduum, how does this quote speak to me specifically today?
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: April 7
April 7
“Who can measure the extent of My goodness? For you I descended from heaven to earth; for you I allowed Myself to be nailed to the Cross; for you I let My Sacred Heart be pierced with a lance, thus opening wide the source of mercy for you. Come, then, with trust to draw graces from this fountain.”
-Jesus to St. Faustina Kowalska
Today’s Reflection
What is Jesus saying directly to you through these words? What do you say back to Him? As we enter the season of Easter and Divine Mercy, trust that you will draw from the fountain of the Sacred Heart the very grace you most need.
Dear Women of Grace family,
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With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: April 6
April 6
One of the Twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot,
went to the chief priests and said,
“What are you willing to give me
if I hand him over to you?”
They paid him thirty pieces of silver,
and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.
On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread,
the disciples approached Jesus and said,
“Where do you want us to prepare
for you to eat the Passover?”
He said,
“Go into the city to a certain man and tell him,
‘The teacher says, “My appointed time draws near;
in your house I shall celebrate the Passover with my disciples.”‘”
The disciples then did as Jesus had ordered,
and prepared the Passover.
When it was evening,
he reclined at table with the Twelve.
And while they were eating, he said,
“Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me.”
Deeply distressed at this,
they began to say to him one after another,
“Surely it is not I, Lord?”
He said in reply,
“He who has dipped his hand into the dish with me
is the one who will betray me.
The Son of Man indeed goes, as it is written of him,
but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.
It would be better for that man if he had never been born.”
Then Judas, his betrayer, said in reply,
“Surely it is not I, Rabbi?”
He answered, “You have said so.”
-Matthew 26:14-25
Today’s Reflection
Meditate on the ways we have been betrayed and the ways
you have betrayed others.
God is ever-loving. We can break our relationship with Him but He never stops loving us. Even if we trade Him in for thirty pieces of silver, He continues to love and extend mercy to us. Mentally submit these betrayals into His unfathomable ocean of divine mercy and receive His peace.
Dear Women of Grace family,
As a means of daily support and inspiration, we will temporarily be sharing our Daily Gracelines with our entire email audience. We hope it is a source of daily encouragement for you as we walk through these challenging times together. We are praying for you. If you are not a subscriber, click here to subscribe.
With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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Lenten Journey with the Saints: April 5
April 5
Palm Sunday
Simon Peter said to him, “Master, where are you going?”
Jesus answered him,
“Where I am going, you cannot follow me now,
though you will follow later.”
Peter said to him,
“Master, why can I not follow you now?
I will lay down my life for you.”
Jesus answered, “Will you lay down your life for me?
Amen, amen, I say to you, the cock will not crow
before you deny me three times.”
-John 13:36-38
Today’s Reflection
Have you ever been filled with so much zeal for the Lord that you would do anything for Him? Even die for Him? And then, only minutes later, when things got a little inconvenient, you changed your mind, or even betrayed Him?
The passage above shows us that even the apostle, Peter, who spent three years walking side-by-side with Him, turned his back on Jesus when the going got tough. As we come to the close of Lent and anticipate the Triduum and Easter, let us renew our fervor to stand
with the Lord at any cost.
Dear Women of Grace family,
As a means of daily support and inspiration, we will temporarily be sharing our Daily Gracelines with our entire email audience. We hope it is a source of daily encouragement for you as we walk through these challenging times together. We are praying for you. If you are not a subscriber, click here to subscribe.
With love and prayers,
Your Women of Grace Family
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