Advent
Day 5: Generations
Editor’s Note: On this fifth day of our Advent blog series “Hidden Joys,” Overseas Lay Missioner Victor Artaiz reflects on generations of faith in his family. As I leave the Thanksgiving holiday celebrations with family and friends, I carry cherished feelings of gratitude, faith, hope, and love into the spirit and season of Advent. We…
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Day 4: Embrace
Editor’s Note: On this fourth day of our Advent blog series “Hidden Joys,” Anna Fluharty reflects on what it means to embrace Advent as a DC Service Corps volunteer serving at Don Bosco Cristo Rey High School. To embrace is to hold someone close or to conceive and radically support a motion. There’s a difference…
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Day 3: Blessed
Editor’s Note: On this third day of our Advent blog series “Hidden Joys,” Sr. Meg Earsley FSPA, who recently completed her formation with FMS and will be serving with the Tertiary Sisters of Saint Francis in Bolivia, shares a reflection on her experience of “blessed leavings” as she said goodbye to the Casa community. Oh, only…
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Day 2: Meeting
Editor’s Note: On this second day of our Advent blog series “Hidden Joys,” Associate Director Meghan Meros shares how a reunion with a long-distance friend in Scotland inspired new reflections about Mary and Elizabeth’s meeting in the Visitation. Through the drizzle of a wet night in Glasgow, Scotland, a familiar face emerged from a hotel…
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Day 1: Hidden Joys
Editor’s Note: We invite you to join the FMS family as we journey toward Christmas with a new Advent blog series, “Hidden Joys.” In this first post of the series, DC Service Corps volunteer Emily Putzke reflects on the hidden joys of Mary’s visit to Elizabeth, along with the hidden joys of being in the…
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Day 33: Wisdom
Editor’s Note: To close out this Advent Blog series, Programs Director Emily Norton reflects on the gift of wisdom in the context of the Magi come Epiphany. She shares from her own experiences on how she has found this “sacred wisdom” throughout her past year. The Wise Magi of 2020 “Sacred wisdom.” These are the…
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Day 32: Wonder & Awe
Editor’s Note: DCSC volunteer and Programs Associate, Fatima Godfrey, reflects on this gift of the Holy Spirit in this Christmas time. She shares how wonder and awe are ever-present should we actively choose to accept their call. Sitting around the dinner table on Christmas day with the Casa Christmas crew, I mentioned to my housemates,…
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Day 31: Courage
Editor’s Note: Former DCSC volunteer Nayeli Garcia reflects on having the courage to recognize your full self, the sum of all that makes up who you are in this moment, and being able to grow in your faith through it. As individuals, we strive to be our true selves. We want to feel invincible, undefeated,…
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Day 30: Knowledge
Editor’s Note: Former DCSC volunteer Julia Pinto reexamines the gift of repeated and applied knowledge to her faith life, especially during this yearly season of Advent. She shares this through her lens as a teacher, while conversely contemplating and reflecting as a student who still has much to learn. There is a common phrase about there being a vast…
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Day 29: Right Judgement
Editor’s Note: Newly-commissioned Lay Missioner Jenny Tsui shares her journey of acquainting herself with the gift of Right Judgement. With being one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, she continues to see how He has been using this gift and working through her. To preface this, I had to do a little research to…
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Day 28: Call to Holiness
Editor’s Note: Fr. Brad Milunski, OFM Conv. serves as Chair of the FMS Board of Directors and as Postulancy Director for the Our Lady of the Angels Province in Chicago. Reflecting on the meaning of holiness, Fr. Brad considers how Jesus’ life serves as a roadmap for our own lives and how baptism helps us…
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Day 27: Gifts
Editor’s Note: Communications Associate Bekah Galucki dives into what “gifts” and how we can offer them back to God by recalling the Presentation of the Gifts within the context of Mass. She shares how her own personal experience of bringing gifts to the altar has been transformed. When I think of gifts, my mind immediately…
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Day 26: Light
Editor’s Note: Executive Director Elizabeth Hughes discusses the light that has contrasted the darkness of this past year. On this Christmas Day, she reflects on the power of Christ’s light within us. One of my favorite websites is NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day. Each day, NASA features a different image of the cosmos, along…
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Day 25: Truth
Editor’s Note: Margaret Carney, OSF, is a member of the FMS Board of Directors and served as the 20th President of St. Bonaventure University, a position she held from 2004 until 2016. Speaking to the difficult realities of a pandemic Christmastide, Sr. Margaret invites readers to find truth and goodness in the heroic acts of…
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Day 24: Gather
Editor’s Note: Fr. Jim Gardiner, SA is a member of the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement. Based in Washington, DC at the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land, Fr. Jim has served on the FMS Board of the Directors and is a friend of the FMS community. In this blog, Fr. Jim encourages readers to…
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Day 23: Movement
Editor’s Note: DCSC volunteer Emily Dold shares her experience with learning yoga and the meaning of “peace” within movement. I would like to begin this blog by saying how wonderfully sneaky the Lord is in how He has led me to reflect on movement and has helped me connect it to His Divine plan. I…
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Day 22: Preparation
Editor’s Note: DCSC volunteer Airianna Beitler reflects on the impact of preparation, in its many forms. She invites us into introspection as we prepare ourselves in this time of Advent. The big day is almost here and I can’t wait to spend Christmas morning with my family. We have been prepping for dinner all day,…
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Day 21: Pilgrimage
Editor’s Note: Overseas Lay Missioner Anna Metzger reflects on the meaning of “pilgrimage” and how it has been lived during this new transition of returning to mission in Cochabamba, Bolivia. Many often think of a journey to a new place with a religious purpose when they think of a pilgrimage. In one way, that…
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Day 20: Humility
Editor’s Note: Second-year missioner Megan Hamilton writes from the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany convent in Kingston, Jamaica. One of her current ministries–with elderly sisters–becomes a springboard for looking back at a life-changing process of embracing humility. Drunks, Dentures & Humility My recent thoughts on humility started with Sister Goretti’s dentures, which didn’t return from the…
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Day 19: Accompaniment
Editor’s Note: Missioner Hannah Hagarty, serving in Kingston, Jamaica, reflects on the the various meanings of “accompaniment” and how her own understanding of the word has grown during her time in mission. Accompaniment is the reason I was drawn to FMS. When choosing which organization to serve abroad with, I came across FMS and read…
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Day 18: Transition
Editor’s Note: Lay Missioner Rhonda Eckerman reflects on the impact of trust amidst transition. She walks us through the process of transitioning from one familiar identity to a calling for another new identity serving with FMS at the US-Mexico border. The loss of my mom was a difficult time and a major transition in my…
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Day 17: Process
Editor’s Note: Darleen Pryds is a professor history and spirituality at the Franciscan School of Theology in San Diego. She researches and writes on the role of lay women and men in the Franciscan tradition. In this blog, Darleen reflects on the prayerful process of preparing for the Incarnation and how it often nudges us…
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Day 16: Dwelling
Editor’s Note: Communications Associate Bekah Galucki reflects on spiritually dwelling in the Lord, despite where you may find yourself. In an overarching metaphor, she relates this idea of dwelling to the workings of nourishing a plant to its fullness of life. When thinking about life’s major themes, especially in reflecting on what it means to…
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Day 15: Open/Closed Doors
Editor’s Note: Development and Operations Associate Madeline McKissick reflects on accepting Jesus’ invitation to walk a path of trust. Looking back on doors that God closed to different opportunities, Madeline shares the sense of purpose she found in the door that opened to join DC Service Corps. I’ve always heard that when God closes a…
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Day 14: Joy
Editor’s Note: Sister Cathy Cahill, OSF, shares in excitement for this great joy that comes with the season. She reflects on the truth of His joy, how we can encounter it, and offers a prayer for us to each share the joy we’ve received with others, as joy itself only multiplies. Joy to This World!…
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Day 13: Family
Editor’s note: Erin Brown, DCSC volunteer in ministry with the Father McKenna Center, discusses the Holy Family in all their extraordinary qualities and more-relatably ordinary ways. As Catholics, Joseph and Mary and Jesus are the family we look up to. Although they are the extraordinary Holy Family, they were also just an ordinary family. In…
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Day 12: Walk
Editor’s Note: Former DCSC volunteer, Matthew Fichter, reflects on the gift of a walk, taking a moment to pause and slow down. He shares of the simple, yet often overlooked, act of walking can help us to grow closer to the Lord in slowing down and trusting His steady guiding hand. Perhaps for some, life…
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Day 11: Food
Editor’s Note: Domonique Thompson, Lay Missioner and new DCSC volunteer, shares her relationship with food and how it’s encompassing nature blends so naturally into community for her. During quarantine many people picked up new hobbies or skills to fill those endless hours in their homes. Some took up an instrument, challenge, or even a language.…
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Day 10: Tradition
Editor’s note: Teresa Redder is a Secular Franciscan and a member of the FMS Board of Directors. She also serves as the secretary for St. Katharine Drexel Region (OFS) and her local fraternity’s formation director. She is married and has four children and six grandchildren. In this blog, Teresa reflects on the richness of Polish…
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Day 9: Music
Editor’s Note: DCSC Volunteer Airianna Beitler shares the power of music this time of year and the uniting joy it brings. This Advent is very different than we all expected it to be due to COVID-19. As I am reflecting on everything that brings me joy during this season, I can’t help but remember all…
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Day 8: Community
Editor’s Note: Newly commissioned lay missioner, Domonique Thompson, reflects on her experience living within the intentional community of Casa San Salvador. In her brief hiatus between Formation this fall and returning as a DCSC volunteer in January, she highlights some of the best parts of community life in anticipation for coming back to the Casa…
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Day 7: Journey
Editor’s note: As part of FMS’ Advent blog series, Nora McMahon, a recently-commissioned missioner, reflects on what it means to prayerfully journey through life in a world that values destinations. A journey is a funny thing, one I am quite sure that few people do nowadays. Yes, people take trips, travel, and go on adventures,…
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Day 6: “Carrying that too”
Editor’s Note: Former DCSC volunteer and House Manager, Amanda Saunders, takes part in FMS’ Advent blog series by looking introspectively into the question, “What am I carrying?” and how to bear the weight of those answers. Throughout the Bible, we are given many images of carrying. We see in the Old Testament with the carrying…
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Day 5: Brotherhood
Editor’s note: Guest blogger Jeff Redder is a Secular Franciscan who currently serves as the minister of his local fraternity and as the JPIC Animator for St. Katharine Drexel Region. He is married, has four adult children, and six grandchildren. As part of our FMS’ Advent blog series, Jeff reflects on different faces of brotherhood,…
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Day 4: Wandering
Editor’s note: Newly-commissioned missioner, Joleen Johnson, shares some insight with societal connotations with wandering and getting lost as part of FMS’ Advent blog series. “Not all those who wander are lost.” This quote, as recited in Lord of the Rings, brings to light a distinction between those who wander and those who are lost. I…
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Day 3: “Fiat”
Editor’s Note: On Day 3 of FMS’ Advent blog series., DCSC volunteer, Madeline McKissick, reflects on Mary’s fiat and how she can aspire to that great act of trust in the Lord. “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. Let it be done to me according to your word.” Luke 1:38 I learned the meaning…
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Day 2: Unknown
Editor’s Note: In the second day of our Advent blog series, DCSC Volunteer Fede Wettstein embraces the Unknown, contemplating the beauty of God’s grace beyond our sight or knowledge. We find comfort in knowledge. As the saying goes, “knowledge is power.” There are things that we are aware that we know, the known knowns, and…
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Day 1: Invitation
Editor’s note: During Advent, we invite you to join the FMS family as we journey toward Christmas with a new blog series: “¡Miren cuántas luces! Look at all the lights!” In this first post of the series, Associate Director Meghan Meros invites readers to try a kind of spiritual stargazing that views darkness–rather than light–as…
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