This morning began with a good cry in my heavenly Father’s lap. I headed to work and realized one great benefit of working at the parish is having the adoration chapel within walking distance. Just thinking about entering the doors to the chapel caused my throat to tighten up. The ‘unsettledness’ hadn’t dissipated and I knew if I could just purge all that was bubbled up inside I would be OK. It is in moment’s like this that I can imagine God’s physical love wrapping around my shoulders in a warm embrace.
My next gift came when Seth’s was invited to play at a friend’s house which lent me to getting a few more hours in at the office. Why is this a gift? I think a part of my turmoil is being out of my comfort zone of structure. I like the school year because the hours can be compartmentalized. Sad, isn’t it? 🙂
The final gift of the day was taking some young adults to Cafe Catholica at St. Vincent de Paul downtown. Cardinal Daniel DiNardo was the presenter at Mass and the keynote for the program. Cardinal DiNardo is truly anointed and every chance I get to learn from him I make sure I’m available. Plus, being that I’m next week’s keynote, I thought it might be nice to make sure I can correlate what I’m talking about with what he has given. They asked him to speak on the ‘I Believe’ part of the Creed. He began by making a point. We can believe when we say ‘My car is outside.’ We believe that to be true because we know we parked our car outside. We can easily say ‘I believe in God,’ and most will say it with the same conviction. They believe God is God as surely as they know their car is parked outside. But the belief that the Creed is calling us to is far more intimate. Being that ‘God is simultaneously closer to you than you are to your own self’ Cardinal DiNardo asked, ‘Do you live the belief?’ I’m Called. I’m Chosen. This is the response to the act of gift of faith. (I believe)
I wish I could give you his entire talk…it was obviously much more theological and inspiring. 😉
One funny incident happened on my way into the church’s family life center. I was with about six of our young adults from St. Martha’s and the young man that was holding the door open for the 600+ attendees was doing small talk to us as we all waited in line to sign in. He asked what parish we were from and I told him and then he asked if we knew a few people that I did know…and then he said, “Oh, and Shannon Deitz is coming next week!” 😉 It honestly caught me off guard (I didn’t expect him to know me but I didn’t expect him to say that either and I didn’t want to make him feel awkward) so I just smiled and said, “Really?” and thankfully the lined moved at that very moment so I was able to walk away. The young adults got a kick out of my embarrassment.
Being that I wanted to record my accomplishments as well I do want to tell you about some really cool news I received. Barnes & Noble at Deerbrook Mall has informed me they have ordered either 5 or 10 copies of my book. They are going to display it in the middle of the store and if those copies sell then they want me to come in for a book signing. If they sell at this store then that is an open door to get it sold at other locations in store. YEAH!! Also, Best Wishes Gifts (located in Kingwood, on Northpark Dr.) is carrying it NOW. I have a book signing scheduled with them on August 14th from 2-4pm.
It was a new day and it ended well. 🙂
Blessings
Shannon