Awe-some and Awe-struck

Ya know, a lot of friends and family members have asked me how I’ve been and what life as a missionary has been like since I’ve graduated college and taken on this crazy role trying my best to share the Gospel on the college campus. It’s funny because this simple question always encourages me to ponder. To ponder on what the Lord has so graciously given me this semester that I haven’t set the time aside to think about and actually give thanks for. To ponder how much He’s loving me through certain circumstances. And to ponder His goodness, beauty, and truth. But this question everyone asks is surprisingly difficult to answer. Not because I don’t have an answer… but because the answer in my head seems to be a much longer explanation than people might be expecting. And to be honest, it’s hard to find someone in this world who wants to listen to more than a 5-minute response about how life REALLY is. So taking this into account, I decided to answer this question in its fullest, most simple way. This semester as a FOCUS missionary has been AWESOME. Let me tell ya why:

Having the hardest most challenging summer of my life. That was AWESOME. It helped teach me that I can’t rely on myself but seeing as that’s a reality, I can rely on someone greater than myself to do the heavy lifting.

Throwing pieces of watermelon at other FOCUS teams during summer training. AWESOME. Living life on the edge. It’s a fun thing to do.

Feeling alone in a foreign place with no friends, no family, and no idea what I’m doing. AWESOME. Sometimes being fulfilled completely to know God and your purpose in what He’s trying to tell you requires first being stripped of everything you’ve ever been familiar with. Forever grateful for being pruned the way that I was this semester.

Talking to hundreds of individuals and families who were willing to financially and prayerfully invest in the mission I’m striving to live out. AWESOME. People who support helping humanity be better was so encouraging to see! Praise God for those people. Beyond grateful.

Watching sorority skits during rush week (my first week on campus). AWESOME. Helped expose me to the great opportunity there was in the Greek System at A&M and it helped me meet the women I would be working with through the semester.

Owning a popcorn machine. AWESOME. Endless entertainment.

Meeting Mary at move-in day, a girl who tried to find every excuse to escape her parents. AWESOME. Mary went on to later join a FOCUS bible study and form community there. Thank God for rebellion in the best way.

For phone calls with best friends when you really need to talk to someone who knows your heart the best. AWESOME. Talk about comfort when you feel isolated and clueless. Thanks Jesus.

Getting coffee with strangers who you’ve never met but who you’ve prayed for for months. AWESOME. You are too good to me, Lord. These women are rockstars.

Getting into a movie at the theatre for $4.75 because they think you’re a student. AWESOME.

When a sorority woman who is busy 24/7 makes time for discipleship and holy mass at 7am every week. AWESOME. Who does that?! Saints do! Saints, I tell you! Thanks for the holy witness 24/7 my 24/7 stud.

Being told you’re leading a mission trip to Peru with 20 students and 5 other leaders. AWESOME. Let’s climb Machu Picchu and serve like never before.

Starting bible studies and having some weeks where only 1 of 10 women showed up. AWESOME. Why? Because those conversations were life-changing. Thank you Holy Spirit.

Having meetings with my team director and being reminded that I am a daughter of God and that having me-time is in fact crucial (and not selfish) to being happy, fulfilled, and joyful. AWESOME. ‘Nuff said.

Letters from high school and college friends. AWESOME. A constant reminder to never forget where you came from.

For team nights drinking beer and watching “Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken.” AWESOME. My teammates love me so well and I am eternally grateful for their constant affirmation. They’ve taught me that community is vital to living as a part of the Body of Christ.

Watching a disciple gain the courage to attend an Interview Weekend with FOCUS and submitting to God’s will the entire way through. AWESOME. What a witness of willingness to follow Jesus Christ.

Driving 12 hours to celebrate a sorority sister’s wedding in Kansas. AWESOME. Young people making commitments and not being fearful of decisiveness makes me HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY!

Receiving picture texts from spiritual directors. AWESOME. Super holy people who help me get to Heaven every day through their advice, direction, and prayers for my poor soul. Thank God for them.

Having a roommate who teaches me that people are far more important than things… especially when she refused all semester to upgrade from her cheap flip phone. AWESOME. She taught me how to live against the gradient of the world.

Answering hard questions and recognizing I don’t know everything when a disciple asks questions about truth. AWESOME. Thankful for the humility check and recognition that I’m never finished learning.

When a girl from bible study cries tears straight from her heart and shows me the most vulnerability any human has ever shown to me. AWESOME.

Learning Aggie Traditions. AWESOME. They’re weird, but sure are cool! Gig ‘Em!

Falling in love with praying the rosary and growing closer to Jesus with Mary holding my hand on my way there. AWESOME. Moms are so wonderful. They also send you cool packages like my earthly mom did 3X this semester. Thanks for loving me so well, mom.

Getting the flu. AWESOME. Ok… this one sounds weird. But it’s the only way Jesus could make me slow down. And that was awesome. What a stubborn human I am.

For a friendship with a human who loves potatoes as much as I do. AWESOME. So many life chats and challenging each other in virtue. Beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful.

Onesies, hot chocolate, and reading scripture in front of Christmas trees. AWESOME. Holy friendship speaks a unique language to my heart. What unity Jesus gives to us!

Missionary summits that allow you to bond with other first year missionaries about the struggles of missionary life. AWESOME. I learned really quickly how important it is to remember the people who are in my same shoes across the country. These people get me through the hard things. Praise!

The holy hours every day that were difficult to not press the snooze button for. AWESOME. What used to feel like a century of prayer in holy hour is oftentimes filled with me asking for more time there now.

Going to confession accompanied by women who hadn’t been in years. AWESOME. Talk about heroic courage. Bring on the virtue!

Watching a teammate get engaged in the choir loft of the church. AWESOME. Yes vocations. Yes holy relationships. Yes yes yes!

Halloween costumes. AWESOME. Creativity is best depicted on Oct. 31.

Pumpkin Carving. AWESOME. I’m not good at it. Nor do I make very cool designs. But hey, it’s still fun to try to make cool pictures on a veggie and cook the seeds with girly gals who don’t judge me.

When your twin comes to visit you and meets 2,313,567,235 students (ok… maybe not that many) and acts as chipper as ever! AWESOME. What a gift and her true showing of having a missionary heart.

Falling into the ocean while trying to get into a kayak on team offsite. AWESOME. Water was 50 degrees but I think I’m gonna live an extra 20 years because of how long I laughed.

Missing flights to your friends’ wedding over Thanksgiving but having the time to talk to 2 priest friends and a seminarian bestie. AWESOME. God’s timing wins every time, not mine.

Hugs, snuggles, and Chipotle with a disciple who wants to make disciples and evangelize with everything she has. AWESOME. So cool to see the vision of the women I’m fortunate to work with. What a gift.

Spontaneous phone conversations with my mentor to hear the words, “Fallon… how are you?” after already once asking the question “how are you…” knowing that I’ve filtered my answer. AWESOME. Teaching me the art of vulnerability.

Giving blood for the first time and fighting the fear of needles with a dear friend by my side. AWESOME. Led to the craziest discipleship ask I’ve ever had. Thank you Lord for giving me souls who help me live life on the edge!

Being a FOCUS missionary and striving (emphasis on this word) to live life in the smallest of ways as a disciple of Jesus Christ, even after failing time and time again. AWESOME. What a privilege it is to live mission in this life on earth. GOSH JESUS YOU LOVE ME SO MUCH. Life isn’t perfect but You are. Thankful for Your abounding mercy, forgiveness, and for smothering me with lots of love. Pure awesomeness.

Until next time…

+JMJ+

Jesus Is the Ultimate Flirt

When I’m ever asked about my favorite (and most embarrassing) memories, my mind goes straight to the experiences in my past with the most tangible moments – walking the Great Wall of China, going head over handle bars on my bike riding down a seemingly huge hill at the golf course, remembering the smoke smell after a huge firework show in my backyard on July 4, cheering my dad on at his basketball games. There’s a million memories that I could recount in the short 22 years I’ve lived on this beautiful planet, but the ones that stick out the most are those that involved things I correlate with my senses. I’m no biology or anatomy expert (I actually somehow skipped taking any sciences in college #WIN), but I guess that assumption seems pretty basic for most people.  

It wasn’t until I was snuggling with a sweet Chi Omega this past weekend at a girls night that it dawned on me how aware God is of this reality. Seeing as He created us humans, He would obviously know how to best connect with us into the depths of our soul, right? Yep. That Creator Guy… He’s a sneaky one! And He knows how to love us best, even when it might not seem like it.

Until a few years (4) ago, I HATED talking about love. I loved the idea of love… because it’s what I received such joy from when I was around my friends. But I for some reason hated talking about it. It made sense in my head that I could share that with others but it confused me a lot when it came to the concept of someone loving me. Because of that reason, God’s love was something I struggled with for a longgggg time. So let’s just say when I had someone in college say, “Let’s figure out our love languages!”… I wasn’t her biggest fan. But I took the stupid test anyway and it told me that I best received love through physical touch and quality time. Psh – how could a test on the internet think it has ANY idea how I best receive love?

As I was sitting in mass this weekend, reflecting on the idea of the way I best receive love, I couldn’t help but think how incredibly good God is at knowing my love language. Disclaimer: I LOVE talking about love now… primarily for this reason. I receive love best in ways that involve physical expression of that; for instance, I’m a HUGE FAN of hugs, snuggles, and everything in between. If you’ve known me for 1 day… you would probably know that about me. But I was praying in preparation for communion this Sunday, and I thought, “Wow, God… you nailed it.” What a gift God has given us to receive Jesus’ body, blood, soul, and divinity in the Eucharist! Jesus is SUCH a flirt in this way. He gets me. And I’d venture to say there’s other ways He has connected with me to show me His love, but this is a biggy. And I know He’s trying to flirt with you too. Now the question is… do we flirt back in response?

The Trap that Seems to be Snatching Us All

With so many people leaving the Catholic Church in the past decade, I've noticed more and more reasons people are giving to this seemingly intriguing reality. Coming back home to New Mexico is always a treat – seeing family that I’m usually 12 hours from, going to restaurants that I grew up eating in, and seeing all my neighbors and high school friends at the hometown Walmart. They’re all among the many joys I receive from coming home. But in the Church (and really, across the board in and throughout all religions), I've noticed there’s an increasing desire to do the exact opposite… to not come home, but rather, embracing the choice to run away.

I've realized over this Christmas break a reoccurring phrase: “I’m loving college, but I just can’t find a church that I like…. So I’m struggling with that,” or “Well, we've been church hopping for a while now… but no luck.”  I think I've heard these statements about 15 times in the past 4 weeks when I’m catching up with friends, and even with parents who are describing their kids’ college experiences. At first, I simply thought, “Darn, that’s a really important part of living community in such a crucial time in their lives, so I hope they find one,” but after a while, I started to reflect on the reasons why this is such a problem.

Looking at our culture today, especially millennials (and I’m guilty of it too), is that if we don’t like something, we immediately dispose of it (for me, I see this in my shopping habits haha). Our self-centered motives lead us to something that gives us satisfaction, which I assume is somewhat natural in parts of life – like choosing between fruits or vegetables, or picking out a shirt to wear on a Wednesday morning—naturally, we are going to choose the one that we like better or that looks best. The diversity is essentially limitless for food and clothing, and I’ve noticed that our generation has transferred this mentality to everything else in our lives (i.e. our religion, family, beliefs, and convictions). Everything seems to have become a disposable now. Some of the most sacred traditions of our lives have even become that way. Marriages are now disposable with divorce, children have become disposable by many through abortion, and it’s as easy as a simple phone call to change a credit card account that contains all your savings. The list seems to go on and on and grows as we continue to place ourselves at the center of every decision we make as people.

I've noticed a similar effect happening with this “church hopping” predicament that many of my friends are struggling with. But here’s my initial question…When has attending church shifted from being about God to being about us? If we don’t like the pastor or priest of the church, we switch. If we don’t like the music, we leave. If we think the service or mass is too long, we try a different church the next week (or worse… stop going). The amount of variables in a church service are countless, from the choir to the pastor to the physical space to so many other things, even a robot could find a reason or excuse to leave a church. This self-satisfaction that we strive to find in attending church seems to be the opposite of what Jesus wanted when He created the Church. One of my favorite parts when sharing my reversion back to the Catholic (or ‘Universal’) Church is the beauty in celebrating and focusing on Christ the entire mass – the way it was created for. See, the Church isn't like making a decision between mustard, mayonnaise, and ketchup. It’s not something we as humans do to ‘feel’ good or based on which one fits our own individual tastes. If it was, there would be no reason for truth. People would be able to define who Jesus is for themselves, they would be able to define morality for themselves, they would be able to interpret scripture for themselves, they would be able to leave if they felt like it, etc. You can probably see where I’m going with this.

Those of you reading this post are 1 of 2 people right now – you’re thinking “Woah, that actually makes sense,” or you’re saying “this is making me really angry, I can’t believe she’s telling me how to live my life. I can make my own decisions. She can make her own.” First of all, thank you for reading this blog post. Second, I’m not here to try to tell you how to live your life…. But I do think it’s interesting to dig deep with Jesus’ teachings to see how he laid it out to be from the very beginning, yet how we've switched it all around to cater to our own desires, wants, and needs. John Paul expressed it really well when he said, “People inevitably reach the point of rejecting one another. Everyone else is considered an enemy from whom one has to defend oneself. Thus, society becomes a mass of individuals placed side by side, but without any mutual bonds. Each one wishes to assert himself independently of the other and in fact intends to make his own interest prevail” (no. 20, Evangelium Vitae).

I’m gonna take a big step out there and venture to say that if this focus was changed, our college students, parents, and grandparents wouldn't find a problem finding a home in a church community. I would also venture to say that there wouldn't be a high volume of people leaving the Church, but rather, returning home to it. In reality, we were all meant to live in community with each other from the very beginning. Let’s start looking at ourselves to see how each of us can come to recognize truth – not by our own standards, but rather, from the One who came to create them. It might come as a surprise to some, but the One who created them actually did so in a way to make us all happy. And that’s what we’re all searching for, right? To satisfy our own desires. Well, that’s convenient! Let’s go home…. Together.

God Bless!