Author: LisaMarie McNally

This author has written 60 articles
Read more about the article The Communion of Saints

The Communion of Saints

Why do Catholics pray to saints? “Love one another even as I have loved you.” (Jn 13:34)  These were Jesus’s words at the Last Supper to His beloved apostles.  He calls us to love as He loves.  He has given His example for us to follow: He washed feet, cared for the sick, showed compassion for those who mourned, and prayed unceasingly for His apostles.  All these things we are called to do as He did them.  When we pray for one another, we are doing as Jesus commanded.  Often at the end of our prayer we include the words “in Jesus’s name, Amen” because Jesus told us “whatever you ask in My name I will do it .” (Jn 14:13) Jesus further said,  “Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me.” (Jn 15:4)  Apart from Jesus we can do nothing, but this scripture also reveals to us something of the mystery of the Body of Christ: we are all “members of the Body of Christ” (1 Cor 12:27) and all the works and prayers we offer are done for His glory.  As beings given the gift of eternal life (Jn 6:40), we abide continually in Jesus whether we are here on earth or in Heaven. Thus, in Heaven we continue our prayers for one another for His glory. The Apostles’ Creed, which is the statement of faith professed by all Christians, contains the phrase “communion of saints.”  As members of the Body of Christ, those “branches” in Heaven as still connected to the vine.  Those in Heaven, in fact, are more perfectly connected to the Divine Will of God than those of us here on earth.  On earth, we still struggle between doing our will and doing God’s Will.  In Heaven that struggle has ceased; all in Heaven are perfect. They love perfectly. They offer praise perfectly. They are in perfect alignment with God’s Divine Will. They pray perfectly.  As Christians we pray for one another.  We often ask our friends to pray for us.  But do we ask the friends who have no relationship with God, or do we ask the friends who love God?  If we ask those who love God, then why wouldn’t we ask those who love God perfectly? Just as the prayers of our believing friends are far more efficacious than the prayers of those with no relationship with God, aren’t the prayers of those perfectly in line with God’s Divine Will even more efficacious?  As Catholics, we do not worship angels and saints, but we do know that they love us and desire to help us.  Our human friendships do not end at death, but continue into eternity. We do not go to Heaven to exist on our own little islands; we go to Heaven and are united as one.  In Heaven, Jesus’s prayer “that they may be one” (Jn 17:20) is…

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Read more about the article I Am the Way, the Truth, and the Life

I Am the Way, the Truth, and the Life

The past two years of isolation has caused us to turn inward and the constant fear surrounding us has tempted us to focus on ourselves and our own needs and wants to the exclusion of seeing the suffering and loneliness and despair of others.  This fear is not from God; this fear from the enemy who seeks to separate us from our brothers and sisters when we most need to come together as the family of God.  Jesus offers us a way out of this cycle of fear: “Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” (Jn 14: 27) I AM the Way Jesus calls us to focus on Him, not on the chaos surrounding us.  He calls us to focus on following the Divine Will of the Father.  This is difficult because we have been following our own wills for so long.  Even after choosing to follow Jesus, we constantly backslide because we are human and our will is weak.  We get tempted to follow our will because we think we know what will make us happy.  We often treat God as a vending machine, praying for exactly what we want, determined to get Him to give it to us.  While we may want good things, we do not have the long term perspective to see what obstacles are around the bend or the long term consequences of our plans, so we become filled with anxiety as we struggle to control the outcomes.  Our loving Father truly desires the highest good for us; trusting Him means allowing Him to navigate the way for us.  If we allow ourselves to become like children, trusting in our parents to drive us safely to our destination, how much more can we enjoy the scenery as we live in the present moment in peace instead of anxiety? I AM the Truth At Jesus’s trial, Pilate asked “Truth? What is Truth?”  Although he meant it sarcastically, each of us has to discern how we know what is truth.  Many times young people say “I am speaking my truth.”  My truth? Really?  I can voice my opinion, share my perspective, and explain my point of view, but The Truth belongs to Jesus.  None of us have the Truth apart from God Who is the eternal, unchanging truth.  Seeking this Truth in the world today is a challenge.  Russia and Ukraine are currently locked in conflict and rumors on all sides abound.  Before any shots were fired, truth was the first casualty.  In any war, all sides mount propaganda in an effort to persuade others to their point of view, but the danger of propaganda is that it causes us to divide into enemy camps and regard our enemy as less than human.  When we allow hatred to cloud our judgement, we give ourselves the excuse to commit horrible atrocities against one another.  While claiming the moral high ground for ourselves in justifying these acts, we damage our own souls in the process. …

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Read more about the article This Is My Body

This Is My Body

Today is Easter Sunday, one of my favorite days of the year.  For Catholics, we celebrate the Resurrection every Sunday, but Easter is especially joyful.  After preparing during Lent with sacrifices, fasting, almsgiving, repentance, forgiveness, and prayer, we experience a deeper connection with each other, with Our Lord, and with the Mass.  As our pastor explained in his homily how we are all connected to “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” I felt such gratitude for the gift of faith.  Then I thought about what I have not done to share this gift with others. A few weeks ago I returned a phone call to a friend.  When I mentioned that my phone is silenced when I am in church, she responded, “You went to church on a Thursday? To pray?”  When I responded that I went to Mass, she said, “Your church has services every day?”  I started thinking deeply about what we had said and I realized that my shortcomings were staring me right in the face.  Each conversation we have at some point turns to Scripture and she always shares her love for Jesus.  I leave the conversation feeling elevated, my burden of the day lifted.  I have known my friend Myrna all my life and she has the gift of joy which she readily shares with me and everyone she meets.  How is it that I have been such a poor friend that I have never shared my witness, my testimony, with her? Why have I never told her why I go to Mass? As Catholics, we use the shorthand – “going to Mass.”  We say it so casually, we ourselves often forget that we are “going to participate in The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.”  Yes, we are active participants and yes, it is a sacrifice.  In every Mass, Jesus is on the altar offering Himself to the Father for us.  We begin the Mass with Scripture (the Liturgy of The Word), which always includes at least one passage from the Old or New Testament, a Psalm, and a Gospel reading.  We then follow with the Liturgy of the Eucharist, in which the gifts of bread and wine are presented to the Father.  The angels who sang the Hosanna announcing to the shepherds the birth of Christ, are again present with us when we sing Hosanna right before Jesus comes again to be physically present.  The priest acting in the person of Christ says “This is My Body” and “This is My Blood.”  At this moment, the miracle of transubstantiation (change of substance) takes place.  While the appearance remains bread and wine, the Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Jesus.  Jesus Himself is re-presenting His sacrifice on the Cross to the Father.  Every day.  Immediately after, the priest offers Jesus’s sacrifice in prayer for the whole world.  When we are at Mass, we participate by joining our prayers to Jesus’s prayers in interceding for the whole world. It is this daily offering of Jesus to…

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Read more about the article Return to Me with Your Whole Heart

Return to Me with Your Whole Heart

Even now, says the LORD,            return to me with your whole heart,            with fasting, and weeping, and mourning;Rend your hearts, not your garments,            and return to the LORD, your God.For gracious and merciful is he,            slow to anger, rich in kindness,            and relenting in punishment. (Joel 2:12-13) This was the first reading for Ash Wednesday. God speaks to us through Scripture and also through the natural world.  It is no coincidence that Lent begins in the winter and yields to Easter in the Spring.  God uses these cycles to call us back to Him, to deepen our connection to Him.  If we approach Lent the way we approach a garden, we can yield beautiful flowers in the garden of our hearts. First, we begin with weeding.  The biggest weed is gossip. Weeding needs to continually be looked after just as we need to continually mind what comes out of our mouths. This is difficult for all of us, but we can ask St. Joseph for help with this.  St. Joseph had a major secret – his betrothed was pregnant and the baby wasn’t his.  He was devastated by this, but instead of telling anyone, he kept it to himself, preserving Mary’s reputation.  In the end he found out that he had misjudged the situation, but he had caused no harm to Mary in the process.  Gossip is difficult to overcome, especially when we think we are in the right, but St. Joseph can teach us how to receive the gift of silence. Second, we must get rid of all the large rocks in our garden.  Some of them are quite big and heavy because as we carry resentment for past wrongs the rocks grow larger and heavier with each passing year.  Forgiveness cannot be achieved alone, so St. Theresa of Calcutta is there to help.  She would often beg for food for the poor.  One day she brought a child into a bakery and asked for bread.  The shopkeeper spit in her face.  She calmly said, “Thank you for that gift for me. Now how about some bread for this child?”  The child received the bread. She understands well how to react with humility and forgiveness in the face of wrongdoing and she can help us get rid of those rocks. We must then add amendments to our soil so it will be a healthy place for our plants.  Even after forgiving others, some wounds are very deep and still need healing.  Psychologists say that the greatest thing they do for their patients is listening to them.  In our culture listening is a lost art.  How often have we tried to have a meaningful conversation with someone who was constantly checking every alert on their cell phone?  How often have we done that to others?  To heal these deep wounds, we need to take them to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.  Spending time with Him in the silence, pouring our hearts out to Him and giving Him time to speak…

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