Monday, March 17, 2008

St. Patrick's Day, St. Teresa of Avila: Her Autobiography and a Dream, St. Benedict.

I hope everyone had a good St. Patrick's Day today (hey, it's technically still Monday here in California.) I know today wasn't exactly celebrated since it did fall during Lent but that didn't stop the t.v. stations from airing different St. Patrick's related things. I watched part of the parade that went on in New York City and the Ireland episodes of the shows "Trip of a Lifetime" and "Passport to Europe" on the Travel Channel. I watched part of the history of the holiday on the National Geographic channel. I watched Celtic Thunder perform on a rerun on station much like PBS. I have to say, I became a fan of Celtic Thunder after watching them performing. All have outstanding voices and the songs were awesome. I also caught them during the beginning of the St. Patrick's Day parade -- that's actually what made me tune into their concert. I am definitely getting their album and DVD of that particular performance. Whoo! :)

While watching all the festivities, I managed to read a good chunk of St. Teresa of Avila's autobiography. I have to admit, I struggled getting through it. Not because it was hard to understand -- I found it very well written and easy to follow. I think it was because I had promised a certain amount of pages to Our Lady of Guadalupe and I encountered A LOT of temptations to quit. The good thing is that, though it took me nearly all day to finish those pages, I did and stuck to my word. I have never felt so sleepy or tired reading a book (that wasn't for a class) before so I looked at it as a test that I had to complete to show that I was strong enough to keep my word. It was hard! I kept feeling like I was going to just fall fast asleep on the bed or go completely insane (seriously, I would get images of myself going nuts) but I stuck it out. I also got these really rude images in my head while reading so I asked St. Michael Archangel to please put those images out of my head. All that struggle was completely worth it, though! What a wonderful book to read. I can see why I was told it would be a great book to read during Lent. It's really changing a number of my habits for the better. And, I keep on finding more and more in common with her.

I actually had a dream that involved me falling to my knees and praying, asking St. Teresa and St. Benedict of Nursia to help me because the devil was trying to take me away with him. It was pretty intense. Maybe, and this is me just thinking/writing out loud here, it was a warning that I was going to struggle with the book today with a lot of temptations. I know we're not supposed to read into dreams (and I know I've said this before) but I can't help but make the connections. I've also been dreaming about asking St. Benedict to save me lately so I am going to actually look more into his life. I know he's the patron against witchcraft and temptations. Ah, temptations... okay... I see the connection more clearly now. :D I definitely want to get a Prayer/Holy Card of him (I have a thing about collecting Holy Cards of saints) to have with me.

Alright, well, sorry for such a short entry but I really am pretty tired. I want to get some sleep and get myself ready for my chat with Fr. Leo. I have a lot I want to talk to him about. I want to prepare because if I don't get my thoughts collected beforehand, I will forget. Boo for my forgetful mind, which I never had before. :D Okay, I am starting to ramble on. I will stop. lol. As always, thanks for reading and God Bless.

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