Cath-Lit Live: Simple Mercies

“Cath-Lit Live!” features brief interviews with Catholic authors who are releasing new books. Hosted by Catholic author and speaker Amy J. Cattapan, “Cath-Lit Live!” gives viewers a glimpse into the latest Catholic books while getting to know a bit about the author as well.

Simple Mercies

 

Simple Mercies: How the Works of Mercy Bring Peace and Fulfillment by Lara Patangan

Written with humor and insight, Simple Mercies is for anyone who has every questioned their contribution to the world or struggled with finding God’s purpose for them. Every day in countless ways, the world communicates that we need to do more to measure up or even just keep up. Too many of us feel like we don’t make a difference or that our service is too mundane to matter. Simple Mercies encourages readers to realize that their acts of kindness make a difference in exponential ways and can surprisingly be a source of peace in their own lives. (Our Sunday Visitor)

 

Lara Patangan

About the author: Lara Patangan is a freelance writer and inspirational speaker. A wife and mother of two boys, Patangan spent a year doing works of mercy. She writes about the life-changing power of mercy at comin a way that is humorous, relatable, and rife with humility. Her book, Simple Mercies: How the Works of Mercy Bring Peace and Fulfillment, is available for purchase wherever books are sold.

You can catch “Cath-Lit Live” three times a month live on A.J. Cattapan’s author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.


Copyright 2021 Amy J. Cattapan

Cath-Lit Live: Parents of the Saints

“Cath-Lit Live!” features brief interviews with Catholic authors who are releasing new books. Hosted by Catholic author and speaker Amy J. Cattapan, “Cath-Lit Live!” gives viewers a glimpse into the latest Catholic books while getting to know a bit about the author as well.

Parents of the Saints: The Hidden Heroes Behind Our Favorite Saints
by Patrick O’Hearn

Discover the hidden heroes behind Sts. Faustina, Giana Molla, Josemaría Escrivá, Pope John Paul II, Maximilian Kolbe, Padre Pio, Thérèse, and countless others. Learn how over 100 parents formed their children into great saints by way of their virtuous lives, namely their seven hallmarks: sacramental life, surrender, sacrificial love, suffering, simplicity, solitude, and the sacredness of life. Each chapter of this book examines a particular hallmark in depth.

Patrick O'Hearn

About the author: Patrick O’Hearn grew up in the Midwest and spent close to three years in a Benedictine Monastery before discerning the call to marriage. He graduated with a master’s in education from Franciscan University of Steubenville and a bachelor’s in marketing from St. Ambrose University. He founded Contemplative Heart Press to lead readers to a deeper union with God.

You can catch “Cath-Lit Live” three times a month live on A.J. Cattapan’s author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.


Copyright 2021 Amy J. Cattapan

Cath-Lit Live: ‘A Love Affair with God’

A Love Affair with God by Mary Kathleen Glavich, SND

G.K. Chesterton said, “Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair.” Humans exhibit certain characteristics toward a loved one, for example, constantly thinking of them and delighting in being together. When you are involved in an intimate relationship with God, these characteristics hold true for God and you. In A Love Affair with God, twelve of them are explained. Each chapter presents how God shows one trait toward you and how you reciprocate if you are love God. It is a goldmine of ways to express love for God. Scripture verses, quotations, and stories are woven through the book. Questions for reflection are included. This book promises to make you more aware of the immense love God has for you and to stir you to love God back with all your heart. This love affair is for time and eternity. It makes life worth living.

About the author:

Mary Kathleen Glavich is a Sister of Notre Dame from Chardon, Ohio. She is the author of more than eighty books on spirituality and religious education for children and adults. Formerly, she taught every grade from first to twelfth and served as a vocation director for the Diocese of Cleveland. She enjoys giving talks and retreats, playing the piano, and crocheting baby blankets.

You can catch “Cath-Lit Live” three times a month live on A.J. Cattapan’s author Facebook page. Recorded versions of the show will also be available to watch later on her YouTube channel and Instagram.


Copyright 2020 Amy J. Cattapan

The Gift of Red

2008-11-16 021Advent and Christmas were always bright and happy times in my childhood home.  While focus was on preparing for the coming of Christ, mixed in with that anticipation was the fun of decorating.  Red was everywhere and in every room.  My mother made sure our home reflected the joy heralded by the angels of peace on earth and goodwill to all men, with the manger scene a focal point.  We had red plaid table cloths in the dining room and playful elves hanging from every conceivable perch. I came to love the significance of all these bright red and green decorating traditions.

Several years ago, a cardinal perched outside my window one morning. He was a magnificent contrast against the small oak tree in my backyard, and reminded me of my father who faithfully put out black sunflower seeds (the best kind) for the cardinals gracing our home. My mother has kept a stained-glass cardinal on her bedroom window along with a myriad of colored-glass crucifixes, chalices, and other professions of her enduring faith.  She believes that my dad, long gone, signals to her when the cardinals come and visit.

So, my mind wandered the trail of how much the color red permeates our world and how God created so many variations for our delight.  Do you know how many names there are for this color called red?  I didn’t, and so I looked it up and daydreamed about the marvelous range of reds in existence.  But it was the deep scarlet of the cardinal that led me on a path to remember our Savior, not at His birth but at His redemptive sacrifice – and through my father – His teachings from the Sermon on the Mount.  At the end of the trail, one thing was crystal clear to me, one realization that I needed at the time; Jesus loves me , all of us, beyond our imagining, beyond all else in this created world.  I marvel at God’s wisdom in creating a small bird with such power to move the human heart, to lift our spirits toward heaven, and to give me memories of my devout parents.

The following poem was born from the gift of red given to me through inspiring parents.  What memories bring  warmth and comfort to you?  Feel free to share special holiday memories or traditions.

Cardinal Red

More than poinsettias and red curly-ribboned Christmas gifts,
more than glossy lacquered lines of red candy apples in the window,
more than clumsy Crayola-red shapes on a toddler’s first piece of art,
more than sumptuous strawberry-red berries begging to be tasted,
more than the competent clarity of fire engine reds racing to rescue,
the deep scarlet cardinal captures me
in the fleeting seconds of his landing,
in the sound of his song,
in the almost imperceptible rising and falling of his splendid chest.
He breathes life and bleeds red,
as red as the drops of blood2008-11-16 022
falling from our Savior’s wounds
and causes me to remember my father
quoting Matthew 6:26 from his red Douay-Rheims
“ Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow,
nor do they reap, nor gather into barns;
and your heavenly Father feedeth them.
Are not you of much more value than they?”
In this cardinal red moment,
the two hundred and eighty four other shades
referenced in books
cannot compare.

 

 

It’s Perfect – Not!

By Janice Lane Palko

It was Father’s Day weekend thirty-one years ago. Married only a couple of years, my husband and I had moved into our first house that previous January. We’d spent that spring painting, wallpapering—the things you do to get a home into shape. On Saturday of that weekend, I’d cleaned the whole house while my husband had spent the day outside trimming hedges, weeding, and cutting grass in anticipation of a Father’s Day picnic for both sides of our family—the first event in our first home.

As we called it a day, I remember looking at our neatly manicured lawn and gleaming house and thinking, “Everything is perfect.”

Then the phone rang at 7:04 a.m. Who calls that early on a Sunday morning? I thought as my husband rolled over and answered it. When I saw the color drain from his face, I knew something was terribly wrong. He hung up and stared blankly at me, too stunned to show any emotion. “That was my mom. Tommy’s been killed in a motorcycle accident.” Tommy was his twenty-three-year-old little brother.

We’d anticipated a Father’s Day picnic filled with fun and laughter. Instead, we were now faced with death, identifying a body at the morgue, and making funeral arrangements.

So much for perfection.

Flash forward to June seven years later. I’m sitting in a counselor’s office after suffering for months with panic attacks. “From what I’ve observed,” the kind therapist said, “You are very hard on yourself. You need to allow yourself to be human. You think you have to be perfect.”

As you can see, my dance with perfection has been filled with missteps. From Tommy’s death, I learned that life is not perfect and never will be, and through my joust with anxiety, I learned that I am not perfect and never will be.

So, how does someone who’s had these types of reality checks with perfection square them with Jesus’s words in Matthew’s Gospel where He instructs us to “Be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

To a perfectionist, His words area a recipe for disaster. You may have heard the adage “Perfection is the enemy of the good.” Well, when we perfectionists get rolling, we tend to discount anything, however good, that does not meet our level of perfection. We get tangled up in being immaculate. I’ve worked hard not to be a perfectionist, so when I came across that bit of scripture again recently, I, once again, reacted to it with disregard and confusion—not a good way to react to scripture.

I know perfection is impossible and shouldn’t even be pursued lest I become paralyzed in my quest to be flawless. There is no perfection on this side of eternity. I know I cannot be perfect, I made myself sick trying. Why would Jesus impose such an impossible directive on those He loves?

Ah, but I’ve also come to learn that when Jesus commands us to do something, He always promises to provide us with the grace to achieve it. His words in John’s Gospel provide the key. “Apart from me you can do nothing.” Apart from Him, I cannot reach perfection. Apart from Him, the world wallows in sin and destruction. Perfection in the way Jesus means is a work of transformation and something for me not to achieve but to surrender to. Through Jesus and His act of redemption, we reach perfection. Paul in his letter to Philippians gives us this assurance: “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”

I’ve learned that Jesus is working on me, and that sounds absolutely perfect to me.