NaPoWriMo #23: A poem about someone who wishes to be something else

Prayer to the Creator

Sculptor of mountains Turn my stony heart to clay Let Your hand shape me Into a vessel pure and holy For the water of Your grace

Painter of sunrises Wash my soul with Light Strip away what's dull and gray Cover me with countless colors To blaze your Beauty in our blinded world

Maker of mosaics Shatter what I am Make of me a million shards of gold and glass Your hands can set in pleasing patterns To catch Your Light in Holy Fire

Keeper of the Garden Tend my tangled roots Prune away what's dead in me and Train me toward the Light So I may burst in brilliant bloom

Weaver of worlds Make my life a brilliant thread Vital to the masterpiece You've woven since the world's beginning, and will show us at the end of days.

Creator of all Make my life a work of art Refined always by Your master hand Until at last You deem me worthy To display in Your eternal hall.

Christ Meeting His Mother on the Way to Calvary, William Adolphe Bouguereau

Alright, I’m gonna be that one person and state the fact that No, Mina was not deserted by God, and no, she wasn’t punished for any uncommitted sin either! That is not what the novel tells. 

Do you really think that bad things only ever happen to bad people? In our real world, you really think that tragic accidents, events or illnesses only come upon people who deserve them? No! You can be as prepared in life as you want for any possibility and still things may come that beat you down. Van Helsing thought excluding Mina from further vampire-investigations would prevent her becoming Dracula’s next target, turns out it happened anyway! That has nothing to do with “God´s Will”, it’s all upon Dracula because the monster he is.

Speaking of Dracula, it’s not like he represents the Devil himself in the novel, he is more like an agent of the Devil here on earth, not the Lord of Hell himself. He is a willing instrument who gave into darkness and eagerly attempts to spread it. You know what our heroes are? Agents of Light, they are literary instruments of God´s love on earth fighting Darkness. Neither God nor the Devil interact personally in this story (or irl for that matter) but it’s up to the mere humans to know what path to choose. 

It’s kinda like in Lord of the Rings. In that universe you do have powerful God-like beings, but after the first battles they decided never to interact personally anymore because continents literary go under their powers. Thats why in the actual story we have ordinary people doing the work, humans, dwarfs, hobbits. Do you know how many times Frodo, a good and kind Hobbit, wonders why this heavy burden came upon him? How did he deserve such suffering and pain? His whole body is becoming marked by the power of the Ring, he is afraid his soul may slipp too. (Seems familiar? Well, Mina is going through the exact same thing!) In this story, they are not battling Morgoth (the Devil) himself, no, they are fighting Sauron, who simply put to use all that he learned from his Dark Master.

On Oct 4th in Jonathan’s diary he mentions Mina saying “perhaps we are all the instruments of ultimate good”- God acts through us (like the Devil may too), so isn’t it wonderful what power we have with love&faith?

Dracula has superpowers? So do our heroes in the form of Love and Faith.

God is Love, and they have Love in abundance.

Happy Solemnity of St. Joseph one and all!!!!

Me: going to bible study by day 😌

Also me: reading absolute filth by night 😈

I wanna buy the universalis app because the people running it are literally the greatest ever but I love their website translations so much and I can’t ever go back to normal nunc dimittis

Credit: me

The interesting thing about being Catholic is that you always sort of have the backup plan of joining the priesthood/sisterhood. Like, when things are just not working out, you get this thought in the back of your mind: “Should I just go and be priest?”

Though, this also can be exaggerated to hilarious points (jokingly), where at the slightest inconvenience, you just go (in the most dramatic way possible), “ That’s it. I’m letting go of all earthly possessions and joining the priesthood. The world needs more of them.”

All joking aside, though, this is an actual thought I’ve had over the years, and I respect those that achieve it and take it seriously and have a passion for it.

Remember it's a Holy Day of Obligation get your butt to Mass XD

🔫🫲🏼JOJO RN

RN RN

JOJO MY BABY

we’ve talked about other newsie names A Lot, so ofc we’re going to talk about his.

jojo is a nickname for josephino jorgelino de la guerra (and I want you all to know that I literally copy and pasted that because I’ll be damned if I sit here trying to spell that out for five fucking minutes), because clearly, no one has the time for that whole name. it’s clearly a mouthful, and was probably given to him before he lived with the nuns who raised him (he’s an orphan, and grew up in a harlem cathedral) (think of the nuns in carrying the banner). this doesn’t tell us much about his parents, except that they were probably immigrants.

jojo became a manhattan newsie, and damn, if he wasn’t good at it. he was persistent, and stubborn, but would persuade you with a smile. and then he’d somehow manage to get more money than everyone else doing it? like there were kids crying, pretending to be sick, and faking limps and broken bones, and there’s jojo. tipping his hat at you and grinning while his pockets were FULL.

not only that, sir keeps his money. he doesn’t spend it on the races, or games, or debts. no, no, jojo is planning on being RICH. does he know what his occupation will be? no. how he’ll make more money? nope. if he’ll have to provide for other people? nah. either way, he’s going to be loaded, and anything less is a failure.

another thing is that jojo’s kind of known for saying the most out of pocket things with absolutely zero context provided. obviously, this makes sense considering who he’s friends with. but when you look at him, your first thought is not about the time he decided to inform everyone that he once stole everyone’s rosaries at the cathedral during mass because he was bored. no, you think this man is one of the normal ones.

and oh, how wrong you’d be.

also, he totally flirts with morris just to get into his head. just saying.

Can you please pray for me? I'm trying to enter society and find a place for myself in the world after decades wasted on depression and every day it's harder to hope it's gonna be possible or to hold on to a belief in my existence being justified.

I will absolutely pray for you.

Just the other day, I went to a talk by one of the Sisters of Life, who gave one of those "God loves you" talks, but it felt real, because it wasn't just a fluffy feel-good affirmation--they work with people in the most desperate situations, sometimes twisted by some terrible choices, and they know that God loves every single one of those people and created them for a purpose and is always waiting to welcome them back with love.

So, anyway, I'm just going to attach an image of a sticker I got from them, because it's a reminder we all need sometimes, and it's not just a saying--it's absolutely true.

The devil knows my name but calls me by my sin. My Father knows my sin but calls me by my name.

Something the guest on Trending With Timmerie on Relevant Radio said today that literally reset my brain chemistry.

It's the disco ball that really ties it all together.

What's a confirmation saint? I saw you mentioning it on the notes and I've never heard of that before.

Thanks for asking!

Confirmation is one of the 7 Sacraments in the Catholic church. These are symbolic holy ceremonies that show God's grace that include Baptism and the Eucharist as well. Confirmation is a 1 time thing, usually done when a person is in 8th or 9th grade, and its when you become an adult in the Church, confirming that you intend to follow the faith and take it as your own. Even if you were raised Catholic and your parents took you to church before now, Confirmation is when you take ownership of your own spiritual life and receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Anyhow, part of the sacrament is picking an older Catholic person to be your Sponsor/mentor, picking a new name and choosing a Saint to be your personal patron. We don't worship the Saints - they're more like a cool older sibling you can ask for help and advice and look to as a role model. I picked St. Catherine of Alexandria because she had to defend the faith in front of the Emperor and was martyred for her beliefs, but not before she converted 200 members of the royal household. At the time, I was the token Catholic in a very secular and aggressively protestant high school and had to defend my beliefs a whole lot, so she was (and is) a very good person to intercede for me.

She was also one of the holy helpers who appeared in St. Joan of Arc's visions as a mentor. This worked out in a really cool way because one of my younger friends picked St. Joan as her confirmation saint and asked me to be her sponsor. We didn't coordinate that at all and only realized it afterwards at her party. God moment.

Me: You do not need another statue of the Virgin Mary Me to me: It’s rose quartz tho that’s fucking sick