The POPE!

So, as I sat here avoiding my impending to do list, I thought, I'd write a post at the very least.

Alot has happened in the nearly nine months since I've started. I've learned a ton and I'm way more comfortable in my own skin. Perhaps one of the best moments as of late had to be taking kids to see the Pope at his mass at the Nationals' Stadium.

I had the ENORMOUS privilege of taking three kids to the papal mass with me in April. It was THE singular most transformative moment of my life. Just being there, seeing the stadium full of 46,000 made it totally amazing, besides the fact that the pope was there! Getting up at 3 am, was not the most fun, nor was organizing a bus full of almost 100 papal goers, but the whole experience was almost indescribable. My kids were amazing, were never too far from site and posed for every CHEESY picture that I made them pose for. They were dolls.

At first, I was having a little pity party for myself because I thought that the experience would have been way better if I didn't have kids there. I felt like I could have prayed more, listened better and had a much better time in general. Then the Holy Spirit gave me a slap on the face. During the procession of the gifts and leading into the Eucharistic prayer, one of my kids looked at me and said: "Thank you Em" and it was in that moment that I realized that I was watching these kids' lives be transformed, for that, I am most thankful and completely unworthy. I have had the privilege to watch three (we had another kid tag along with him mom...so really four) kids' lives be completely transformed. That has brought me to my knees a lot lately. I also think that God used it to help me process that I'll have to work through being at work while I'm world youth day and let the Holy Spirit in.

The pictures are us after the papal mass...look at those smiles and then the other one is Benny obviously.

Come Holy Spirit! Thank you for the opportunity to be able to have you work through me to bring teens to Christ. I am unworthy.