NOW!!!

I don't know if anybody has been reading this blog since the start, but if you have you may remember my first couple of posts, recapping the Dallas Catholic Youth Conference. If not, please have mercy when you read them - they are not the most well written posts I have. It was actually the thing that made me decide to start blogging. ANYWAYS.......

I never really finished my recaps, I don't plan on giving a full play by play now, but rather explain WHY it was such an amazing weekend.

First off, I got much closer to one of my best friends, Kassidy. We go waaayyyyy back to the VBS days and have danced together for a while but after we shared a bed and stayed up watching Miranda Sings videos all night at DCYC we now have a pretty unbreakable bond. I got to serve as her confirmation sponsor this year, which was an honor and an incredible journey in my own faith as well as hers. If we had never gone to DCYC, who knows if we would be the Miranda Sings loving-dumb roller coaster picture taking - church boy stalking girls we are today?
DCYC pretty much confirmed my dream of becoming an evangelist/ youth minister when I grow up. I was so touched by the stories the speakers shared. I still hold the words "His will and my will are the same" close every day of my life. I will always remember that it was Mike Hoffman who spoke those words, and Naomi Lehew's talk on Blessed Chiara Badano that made them true to me. I probably say this in every single post but... I want to be somebody who can do that for other people - give them truths, help them understand God just a little bit more.
Lastly, and most importantly, I'm gonna be cliche and say that it was an inspiring weekend. The whole conference emphasized how you don't have to be an adult to make a difference. Blessed Chiara was only 18 years old when she died, and that was only 23 years ago, and she was beatified in 2010. The time is now! Now is the time to be holy, not tomorrow not in 30 years - Jesus doesn't care if you're 13 or 83, you are part of His family and it is your responsibility to be active in it. So pray! Volunteer! Go to church! There's no point in waiting on something that is available to you this instant. I guess what I'm trying to say is that, I have big dreams and DCYC made me believe that they are achievable, not in ten years but in the near future. Now here I am, almost a year later, a part of the first ever Epi-Pro dance company, being blessed with the incredible opportunity to give Him glory and to bring people from all over the country closer to Him through dance! And I know that this is only the beginning of what God has in store for me!

Dallas Catholic Youth Conference gave me a retreat high that I don't ever plan on getting off of but now I bear bad news.........
This past week I recieved an e-mail from my youth minister saying that we had to cancel our DCYC trip this summer because of low registration. First of all, I think it is ridiculous that one of the largest Catholic youth groups in the nation had to pull out because not enough people signed up, and it saddens me that so many teens from my parish don't know what they're missing out on. Seeing as Kassidy and I have been counting down the days until DCYC all summer, devastated is an understatement. PLEASE pray that we can work out a way to still get to go!!!

Sorry for being a downer in the last paragraph but it is what it is. You might be thinking, "Didn't you say 'His will and my will are the same?'" Well yes, but I highly doubt that God's will is to keep a group of teens away from a place where they can grow deeper in their faith with Him. I'm praying for the best but unfortunately, preparing for the worst.

                                                                      In His Name, 

Meredith 

questions, comments or prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

 

**PRAYER REQUESTS** 

The kids at SAY Summer, VBS & all of the volunteers this coming week @ St. Ann

My friend, Evana and her mom that got in a car accident the other day

Here's the DCYC promo... I make an appearance around 50 seconds :-)


DCYC Promo from Dallas DCYC on Vimeo.
https://vimeo.com/77081896

"The decisions we make, and how we respond to The Lord's invitation, can affect the entire direction of our future, can affect people we do not yet know, can affect entire generations after us" - Naomi Lehew

"The future of the Church depends on you, well let me tell you all - that future is here now and you're required, not in a couple years' time but right now, you must be filled with The Holy Spirit" - Bishop Kevin Ferrell.

"Live in a way that those who know you but don't know God, will come to know God because they know you" - wooden plaque thingy in my house

hanging up my hat

Hellllloooo ok for those of you who don't know, I decided not to do drill team again. Why, you ask, well keep reading this post.... 

My decision to quit Lariettes had nothing to do with the fact that a group of girls made me feel left out. It had nothing to do with the early morning practices and freezing walks from the parking lot. It had nothing to do with hot and sweaty band practices. It had nothing to do with seniority or ugly costumes. It just isn't the kind of dance I want to be doing. This is the hardest decision I've ever had to make because there are a lot of things I love about Lariettes. I love the fringe. I love football games. I love having the locker room as a safe place. I love my directors and I love my team mates. But for the dancer I want to be, drill team is just not the right place to learn and grow. I want to be an artist, and on drill team everybody is told to be exactly alike. I definitely grew tremendously as a dancer on JV, and was pushed to work my tail off to prove myself. But now it’s time to hang up my hat and move on. I went back and forth between quitting and trying out for officer about five times spanning from November to February before I finally made up my mind. It's just that when I see dances at competitions and conventions I always say, "Wow I wish I could dance like that." and I realize that where I am now won't get me there. I finally accepted that I can't just keep the things I love about Lariettes, it's all or nothing. And I'm going to have to take nothing if I plan on being the dancer I want to be. I would give anything to put on the fringe and shake it with the drum line one last time. But in our lives we have to make sacrifices and we can only have faith that we are making the right decision. 

I am one of the few dancers that doesn't consider dance to be a sport. To me it is so much more than scoring points. Dance is art and dancers are not only athletes, but artists. Sure, you can channel emotions into a game of soccer or basketball, but dance is different. Each piece, each step, has a meaning. Dances tell stories, or at least they should. Dance is personal and it is emotionally taxing. Through this year I’ve realized how wrong it is to compare one piece to another. 

The first time I thought about quitting Lariettes and pursuing dance more seriously was actually before I even tried out. It was at Showbiz competition and two of the best studios in the metroplex (Next Step & Prodigy) were competing there. I felt something real when I watched them dance, and I knew that the dancers also felt something and were pouring their heart into the dance. I wanted to be able to dance like that. I seriously considered moving to Next Step even though it is half an hour away. However I decided to try Lariettes because that's where my all my friends were. 

All throughout football season I worked my "derrière" (French for butt) off. Besides being without a bus buddy, football season was incredibly fun. Some of my best memories definitely took place during that time. Then in November I attended Dance Revolution (the dance convention, not the video game). It is an amazing organization that I hope to become more involved in in years to come. The dancing I did that weekend was so different from the drill team field dances I’d been doing for the past couple of months and it felt amazing. I realized that I could be dancing like that every day and decided to start asking God if Lariettes was really the place for me. My parents were supportive of me not coming back to Lariettes as a junior but at the time we didn’t know what else there was for me to do. You can’t just walk into a new studio and join their company right away and since I was already committed to Lariettes and my studio company there was not time to go try out different places so eventually I shifted back to being content with drill team.

When we started our money themed production in Lariettes, I knew again that I wanted to quit. Being part of a group that glorifies worldly things like that was and still is unnerving to me. I remember being super angry after learning that choreography and being given a fluff part. I drove myself to the grocery store and bought three boxes of toaster strudels because that’s what I do when I’m ticked off. I declared once again to my parents that I was quitting, once and for all. Then a week later I melted back into Lariettes and this time was fully committed to becoming an officer so I didn't have to do fluff.

The week of my first blog post back was when I made the final decision to quit. Although it wasn't really me, but God. I was in the studio working on my solo and I just could not seem to do anything right. I couldn't spot my turns. I couldn't balance in a double pirouette. My turnout was non-existent. It was basically God saying, “Look, you developed these bad habits on drill team and it isn't where I want you to be. I have bigger plans for you.” I prayed and prayed, talked about quitting with my parents, changed the concept of my solo and two days later when I worked on it in the studio again I was on fire. The moves were flowing naturally through me and I felt His presence in the room with me. I knew that it was His way of letting me know I was making the right decision.

The day after my last drill team competition I went to my dance teacher’s wedding. She was part of Dance Revolution’s professional company, “Ingredients” and the company danced in her wedding. Watching them dance, I realized what was missing in my dance – purpose. They were dancing for the Lord and you could see it in their bodies and faces. I’d been doing high kicks and aimless reaches for months, never knowing what I was missing. It was then that I knew once and for all that God was pushing me in the right direction.

Our Creator created this beautiful thing we call dance. He gave us music, He gave us agile bodies and amazing choreographers. I want to use my dance to glorify Him and Him alone.

So that my friends, is why I quit drill team. I will definitely still be an active supporter of the organization, but I’ll be cheering the Lariettes on from the student section next year. I had two goals going in to Lariettes. 1) Be in the front line for a field kick dance & 2) Make all of the contest dances. I accomplished both of those goals so I'm not too disappointed with my time on drill team. I made lots of great friends and great memories in my year on Lariettes and plan on doing a highlight post later, but as we approach banquet - my last hoorah with the team, this has all been on my mind so I felt like sharing. I am excited about what my future as a dancer holds and I don't want to spill just yet, but I trust that it's where the Lord wants me to be. I'm preparing for the long road ahead and praying for the strength to fight any battle that arises during this journey. 

In His Name, 

Meredith 

questions, comments or prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

**PRAYER REQUESTS** 

The 8th & 9th grade confirmants at St. Ann, especially the beautiful young woman I am sponsoring, Kassidy. 

This is one of my favorite Ingredients dances. It's cool too because I can connect with crying out to the Lord and hearing His voice guide you. 

"Jesus, I did this to you" - sin & the crucifixion

It's Holy Week y'all! Only a few more days of Lent and then He is risen!!! For those of you who don't know what Holy Week is, it's the last week of Lent and during this week we celebrate/ reflect on the passion of Jesus Christ. It starts on Palm Sunday then Holy Thursday is the last supper, Good Friday is the day Jesus was crucified and died on the cross, and Holy Saturday is the day Jesus's body was laid in the tomb. Easter Sunday is actually not part of Holy Week, but it is the first day of the Easter season. You can read more about Holy Week here! 

Last night (Palm Sunday) at my youth group we watched this short film appropriately entitled, Palm Sunday. I'd definitely seen it before but last night was the first time I got the full message it has to offer. I put it below, it's only four minutes long so you should definitely watch! 

Okay so obviously being whipped and beaten and nailed to a cross after carrying a huge wooden block of wood for miles would be extremely painful. But I've read other torture stories before and many have seemed pretty comparable to Jesus's Crucifixion. So for the longest time I didn't get why the Church says that Jesus experienced the worst pain possible. I just always assumed that it didn't even matter how much it hurt physically, Jesus was going through it all as an innocent man saving humanity and that was enough for me. Then  it hit me last night while watching this video...
Jesus died to save humanity from sin. Not just the sins of the people of His time on earth, not just the sins we are committing on earth now and not just the sins that will be committed in the future. He died for all of the above - every sin that has or will ever be committed. Every one of those sins whether it be a swear word or a genocide is a lash to His side or another thorn on His crown. That is insane! There are 7 billion people on earth right now, each one a sinner. Add that to all of the people that have and will live and you'll have over a trillion sins. All of the pain sin causes us caused pain for Jesus. Just try to imagine, a trillion lashes, a tear just dropped onto my laptop at the thought. We will NEVER even come close to knowing how much pain Jesus endured. He did it to save us because even though we are sinners and are unworthy of His Love, He loves us unconditionally. 

I hope I've sparked a new appreciation for the crucifixion of our lord, Jesus Christ for you. I for one am still trying to wrap my head around it all. 

I'm praying that this has been a lent full of repentance and new appreciation for all of you. If it hasn't, it's never too late to start! I don't know if "happy Holy Week!" is the right phrase to use so I'm just going to leave you with the classic verse from the Gospel of John: 

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

In His Name, 

Meredith 

questions, comments or prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

**PRAYER REQUESTS** 

Those being baptized at the Easter Vigil this Saturday, especially my friends Alex & Gabby.

The 8th & 9th grade confirmants at St. Ann

"Hop on my back!"

Well friends, we're approaching the busy season. Banquets, recital, tryouts - oh my! For me, there are a lot of "lasts" and I'm only a sophomore. A lost of it has to to with growing up, which is both scary and exciting. In this past year alone my responsibilities have doubled, driving, choreographing solos, and as of yesterday, becoming an EMHC (Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion). Being able to do all of those things and be trusted to carry them out properly is awesome but I think we all  miss the days where we had no responsibilities. When we're little kids we don't have any responsibilities, we don't have high expectations from anybody nor ourselves, we haven't been exposed to the struggles this earth holds for us. So in the wake of some ridiculous drama/ stress at my dance competition this past weekend, it was great to be able to hang out with a four year old girl to take my mind off of all of the worldly troubles. 

This particular four year old is one of the dance teacher's daughters, Tatum. To be honest, I'm not a big fan of kids but I cannot get enough of Tatum. She's got an infectious spirit, one of those laughs that instantly makes you happy. At the beginning of the weekend I was deemed her friend and by the last day, she told me that she loves me. Aside from funny selfies and vines, the most important thing I got from my weekend with Tatum is a reminder on how we're all made in God's image. Four year olds don't have tunnel vision like we teens do, if you come talk to to Tatum, she declares you  her friend. She's accepting, we all should be too. The second thing I learned is that we all need to laugh more. Olivia and I rode back to the hotel with Miss Jessica (Tatum's mom) on Saturday night, Tatum in tow. Most fun car ride of my life. Tatum would say something random then start cracking up, causing us all to do the same. She told us all about her fish named Bunny and her three brothers (Barrett, Landon and Daddy. Landon is her favorite.) Eventually she ran out of real words and started making up her own which was even funnier. When we got back to the hotel and had to split up in the elevator, Tatum was devastated. 

As I said, the weekend was full of ridiculous drama and stress, which all dance competitions are, but hanging around with my favorite four year old took my mind off of all of that stuff and definitely made it a trip to remember. 

So, that was my short, sweet and happy post to make up for my previous one. I hope you have a great day/night. Here are some pictures and vines taken with Tatum this weekend, enjoy...

Stretching with the big girls!

Selfiie ft. Olivia 

Sisters???

She did not enjoy being onstage for the award ceremony...

Dancin' 

breakfast "it's too early to be awake!"

pic ft. her new pink elephant

And of course, here're the vine that the title of this post came from...

https://vine.co/v/MiD9O9iEe0j

"He called a little child and had him stand among them.  And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. "And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me."

Matthew 18:2-6

In His Name, 

Meredith 

questions, comments or prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

**PRAYER REQUESTS** 

Tatum and all of the other little kids with such pure hearts, that they stay pure. 

New EMHCs (Including me) 

St. Anthony Appreciation Post

If you do not know of Saint Anthony you are missing out. He is the saint of lost items/people. My entire life my mom and grandma have been telling me to "say a prayer to St. Anthony" whenever I lose something. When I was little I thought his voice would boom in my head telling me where my lost item was and it never did so I sort of resented him for not helping me. However as I've gotten older I've discovered how he actually works and I probably have to pray to him at least once a week. I have a St. Anthony key chain on my key ring so I don't lose it. (it's worked so far *knock on wood*) 

Saint Anthony was especially awesome last night. The weather in DFW is similar to that of Antarctica at the moment, or at least that's what it feels like to a Texan. Temperatures below 20 and ice on the roads, it was a perfect night for my dog to run away. He does it all the time, but my dad can always catch him before he gets too far from home. But my dad is out of town right now and like I said, the weather was horrible which makes for a perfect storm. On top of that, my sister freaks out whenever he gets out, screaming and crying that she's scared blah blah blah. Well as you can probably imagine, she was ballistic last night, especially because she though he was dead. 

I am a pretty calm person because I have accepted that everything's a part of God's greater plan. Plus, my dog always comes back. Even though I too, was a little scared that Zack (my dog) might not return considering the harsh weather and that fact that it was 10 at night, I wouldn't dare let it show. I just prayed to good ol' St. Anthony and sent out some prayer requests. After about an hour of unsuccessful searching I sort of accepted that Zack wasn't coming back. I had a weird lack of sadness about it which is odd because I've had this dog since I was four years old. Around 11:30 or so, my sister broke her sobbing with a shriek, "ZACK!" she yelled, pointing at the window. He was home! I dropped to my knees and thanked St. Anthony. 

So, needless to say, St. Anthony is pretty great. Here is the St. Anthony prayer:

"Dear St. Anthony, look around, I've lost (insert lost item here) and it can't be found." 

I have added my own verse, so you won't find this part online or in a book but: "With your love and with your grace please return it to its place" Click here to read more about St. Anthony!

That's all for now. I have another post coming tomorrow so stay tuned! 

In His Name, 
Meredith 

questions? comments? prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

Dancing with Jesus

I'm supposed to be packing and I leave for Houston at 6 am tomorrow morning so what better to be doing right now than writing a blog post?! But I just have to because God has been so incredibly awesome this week I need to share.
One of my greatest strengths and weaknesses is that I don't get stressed. It really is a great quality to have until you're a week away from competition and you haven't finished choreographing your solo. Yes, you guessed it -  my inability to get stressed out leads to massive procrastination. I made a promise to myself at the beginning of this year that I was going to practice my solo at least once a day so that it could be perfect by the time competition rolled around. Well, needless to say I broke that promise so this week I tried to cram in as much rehearsal time in as possible, which is difficult when you're leaving on Thursday morning. Here's my original plan...
Saturday: rehearsal with Miss Rachel
Sunday: go to open studio and run solo
Monday: use other room while Connie works with another girl on her solo
Tuesday: leave ballet early (boo hoo) and use other room to work
Wednesday: use other room instead of going to jazz

But of course, my plan didn't go as I had hoped. Here's how it actually turned out...
Saturday: got strep throat, had to cancel rehearsal
Sunday: still sick, can't be around other people nor could I actually dance
Monday: Connie's student forgot she was supposed to stay and I can't be at the studio alone at night
Tuesday: left ballet early as planned but had a mental breakdown because it was a bad turning day and I couldn't do anything right
Wednesday: Taught my turn & leap class part of my solo.Used other room instead of going to jazz - got solo worked out and now feel a lot better about it (yay!)

This whole week I have been asking God for help; Lord, please grant me the focus and perseverance to finish and feel comfortable with my solo. Finally, today, something clicked. I had the focus and I got major work done. There was a point when I stopped dancing and realized how close He was, like Jesus was in the studio with me choreographing and cleaning my dance. At that, I was overwhelmed with joy and had to pause, turn off the lights and have a mini-worship sesh by myself (to Lord, I Need You by Matt Maher of course!) because I was (am) so grateful! THANK YOU JESUS YOU ARE THE BEST!!!

So, even though I'm supposed to be packing right now, I wanted to share this with y'all. Always know that it might take a few days for God to answer your prayers, but He will, it's all part of His greater plan. Aside from dance this has been a rough week for me, I made a huge decision regarding the future that would be quite scary if I didn't know God is on my side. I've leaned on Him and asked for His guidance a lot more than usual this week and He has really come through. 

**Quick prayer requests: 1) My drill team as we travel and compete this weekend. 2) Please continually keep Tommy Gantt in your prayers, he is battling cancer. 3) Please pray for me and my solo on Saturday**

In His Name, 
Meredith 

questions, comments or prayer requests? Feel free to email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

This song came on while I was driving home and it was really speaking to me tonight so I thought I'd share it with y'all. It's called: End of Days by Hillsong Young & Free 

I'm Back/ Planning Ahead

Hey y'all. I'M BACK!!! (Well at least I hope so) 
The other day I was reading a girl's blog and I thought to myself, "Remember when you had a blog for like a week then school started and you forgot about it?" So I logged on to Blogger and saw that I hadn't posted since August... that's almost six months ago but it feels like a week! Which got me thinking about how darn fast this year has gone by. Then I asked myself why this year has gone by so quickly. And I have come to the conclusion that we are always so busy looking forward to things, we forget to enjoy in the moments we're in. I feel that trying to blog more, will help me cherish these moments so that in two years when graduation comes, I can say that I have chronicled my best (and worst) memories. 
So much has happened since I wrote on here last. Football season, wisdom teeth surgery (and complications), dance conventions, birthday parties, church retreats, semester exams, driver's license tests and much, much more. Today I was going through my iPhoto library, looking for a picture to post for my friend, Kassidy's birthday and all of these memories came flooding back. Another thing that I started after taking a blogging hiatus was the daily devotional, Jesus Calling. I was a bit hesitant to start it because it's so popular and I didn't know if it was just a book people take pictures of to make themselves look all Christian-y. But I am glad to say that I read it every night and it is AMAZING, definitely worthy of all the hype! If you don't have a copy, get one, I have given it to multiple people as a gift and they all love it as well. One topic that has come up a lot lately in JC is living for this moment and not fearing the future. To be completely honest, those pages scare me. We live in a society where you have to plan ahead, you're trained to fear the future. If I don't take the right classes in high school, I won't get into a good college. If I don't get ahead on studying, I'm gonna fail this test. So on and so forth. I miss the days when you didn't have to plan things out, they days when you could just walk up to your friends door and run around outside with them for hours on end. The days when you were worrying about having enough clothes for all of your barbies and not who you're going to ask to a banquet that is four months away. I wish we could be elementary schoolers again, when grades didn't matter and your mom made all of your plans for you. But the harsh reality is that we can't go back to those days. I will be the first one to admit that I spend more time in the future than I should. As I said before, we are all so busy. In the next four months alone I have six dance competitions, four dance recitals, drill team tryouts, at least two banquets, I'm a confirmation sponsor and then there's also school mixed in there. WOW. Of course one of my dance studio competition conflicts with drill team tryouts. The drill team banquet conflicts with a dance studio competition. And the dance studio banquet conflicts with the Confirmation Mass. I have to plan ahead to make sure I can work all of these things out because they're all priorities. Knowing that I'm not able to be in multiple places at once causes stress. Now on top of that I'm reading that you shouldn't think about the future? It often feels impossible to find peace. 
But I finally figured out that God isn't saying not to to look into the future, He is saying not to fear it because He is leading us down the path we're on, there is no need to fear! God has you right where you need to be at this very moment, though you might not believe it, this is all part of His greater plan. Here is the passage from Jesus Calling that once frightened me, it now gives me peace. 

February 1st:

Follow Me one step at a time.  That is all I require of you.  In fact, that is the only way to move through this space/time world.  You see huge mountains looming, and you start wondering how you’re going to scale those heights.  Meanwhile, because you’re not looking where you’re going, you stumble on the easy path where I am leading you now.  As I help you get back on your feet, you tell Me how worried you are about the cliffs up ahead.  But you don’t know what will happen today, much less tomorrow.  Our path may take an abrupt turn, leading you away from those mountains.  There may be an easier way up the mountains than is visible from this distance.  If I do lead you up the cliffs, I will equip you thoroughly for the strenuous climb.  I will even give My angels charge over you, to preserver you in all your ways. Keep your mind on the present journey, enjoying My Presence.  Walk by faith, not by sight, trusting Me to open up the way before you.

"With your help I can advance against a troop;
with my God I can scale a wall." Psalm 16:29

"For He will give His angels [especial] charge over you to accompany and defend and preserve you in all your ways [of obedience and service].  They shall bear you up on their hands, lest you dash your foot against a stone." Psalm 91:11-12 (AMP)

"For we walk by faith, not by sight." 2 Corinthians 5:7 (NKJV)

(Jesus Calling, Sarah Young) 

I know y'all are probably equally as busy as I am so I hope that this passage helps you find peace. Know that you are always in my prayers and as Father Henry would say, JESUS LOVES YOU! That's all for now! 

- Meredith

Questions? Comments? Prayer requests? Leave them below or email me: meredithmunro@icloud.com 

Wondering what I was doing instead of blogging for the past six-ish months? Here are some highlights (not in chronological order!) 

My Church was on Say Yes to the Dress! 

Sweet Sixteen party! 

New Year's Eve! 

Got to watch Sarah in her percussion concert! 

I finally got a Pope Francis calendar.

Winter HSM retreat! 

I went to the Notre Dame Shamrock Series at AT&T Stadium and took some terrible panos. 

I dressed up like Miranda Sings a couple of times...

Then I met her! 

One of my favorites, when I was in kindergarten I got to go write a letter to Santa at CHS and this year I got to help my kindergarten teacher's son write his!  

I got my make-up done by a six year old boy. 

Home coming pep ralley! 

Home coming dance! 

I took a picture with Pope Francis!!! 

My dad as a "Larry" for the homecoming football game.

A life long dream, Sarah and I have always wanted to switch hats.

DCYC Saturday Part 3 - His will and my will are the same explained

I'm not sure if I have mentioned the headlining band, Ayleron, but 1. they are awesome! and 2. they had a concert on Saturday night. Everybody from St. Ann's ate dinner super fast and rushed to the front right when the doors opened so we could have the best spots at the concert. During the concert the band played one of their original songs entitled, "Make Me Whole" I bought it right when I got back to our room that night and have had it on replay non-stop and it has already become one of my favorite songs. Click here to listen! I plan on eventually writing about my favorite Christian artists/ songs and this will definitely be there! 

After the concert, one of my youth ministers, Naomi Lehew, gave a talk. She told personal stories that the kids from my church had heard a million times, but getting to see her reach teens outside of our high school ministry was amazing. Then, she told us about Blessed Chiara Luce Badano. To make a long story short, Blessed Chiara was a girl from Italy who was beatified by Pope Bendict XVI in 2010. When she was diagnosed with a rare and painful form of bone cancer that ended her tennis career, she said, "If He wants it, then so do I" When Naomi said this, it clicked with me "His will and my will are the same" Which, like many things in the Catholic Church, is easier to say then do. Sometimes we get so caught up in what we want, that when God hands us something different, we deny it. But we need to realize that God puts obstacles in our path so He can help us overcome them. Once we learn to accept this, our lives become much more enjoyable. If it's what He wants, it is what we NEED! 

Above is the documentary made about Blessed Chiara Luce Badano. 

Along with the realization of the meaning of "His will and my will are the same." I was enthralled by Blessed Chiara's story. She was a beautiful, athletic teenage girl, she had so much going for her and she had to give it all up when she got cancer. And she did so willingly. Most people would not have the same attitude when being diagnosed with a life threatening disease. But what really got me was the fact that she is on the road to sainthood. When I think of Saints, I think of people from ancient times, but Blessed Chiara passed away in 1990! I feel that Blessed Chiara is the embodiment of what Pope Francis says in this quote, and WE can be too! 

So those were my Saturday highlights! I am soooooo sorry it took so long. I will post Sunday sometime this week!

In His Name,
Meredith
If you have questions, prayer requests or just wanna say hi please leave a comment! And remember if you need somebody to talk to feel free to email me meredithmunro@icloud.com twitter: meredith_munro
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DCYC - Saturday Part 1. "His will and my will are the same"

Our day began with Mass at 7:00 am. When you go to bed at two in the morning, you can't expect it to be easy to wake up at 6:00 am. But eventually we got out of bed and got ourselves down stairs. It was so early in the morning and so much went on on Saturday, I honestly cannot remember anything about the Mass except this; even at seven o'clock in the morning, everybody was singing at the top of their lungs, praising the Lord. With that, I was ready to take on the day and adsorb everything I could. 

During the conference that morning, father and daughter duo, Michael and Alli Hoffman spoke to us. They talked a lot about staying with your faith through college. Michael said that 80% of college students will not attend church weekly in college. He then had everybody except the first four rows of the room stand up.  Probably around 480 people were standing and to me that looked like a huge amount. But 80% of all college students. That's 80% of the nearly 20 million college students here in the US. That's 16 million people straying from the Lord. Mike encouraged us to be the generation that changes that statistic. And I expect to do my part in that. I'm now at the age where I need to start thinking about college (ugh) and the big thing I look for in a college is whether or not it is Catholic. Partially because I want to major in theology but also because I know that if I am in a setting where going to Mass regularly isn't encouraged, I could get swept up in the idea that God isn't number one. I have gone through times when I wasn't as close to the Lord as I should have been and they have been without a doubt the hardest times in my life. College is hard enough as it is, and I want to be surrounded by people who are as passionate about God as I am. 

The thing that most resonated with me from Mike and Alli's talk was this: "His will and my will are the same" At the time I heard it, I was like "oh that sounds really cool and profound" but it wasn't until later that night I truly understood the meaning of it. "His will and my will are the same" 

As I said, I am writing about Saturday in chunks because it was such an amazing day and I would write a novel about it if I could. Really, I want to be able to convey a message from each part of the day and there is no way I can do this with justice all in one post. So stay tuned for Saturday part 2, where I will talk about a workshop I went to with Fr. Zach Webb.

In His Name, Meredith

If you have questions, prayer requests or just wanna say hi please leave a comment! And remember if you need somebody to talk to feel free to email me meredithmunro@icloud.com 

twitter: meredith_munro

instagram: mered1th

instapray: meredithbm 

Instapray!

Hey y'all really quickly I just wanted to talk about this new app I found called "Instapray" The best way I can describe it is like a twitter for prayers. Basically you write prayer intentions or even just thoughts or bible verses and people can pray with you. My friend, Tommy was diagnosed with Cancer this summer and recently found out that his cancer spread. I asked for people to pray for him, his family and medical professionals and within two minutes over twenty people from all over the world, who don't even know Tommy had prayed for him. So go to the app store and get it! It is free! And follow me: meredithbm :)Click here for the app's websiteIn His Name, MeredithIf you have questions, prayer requests or just wanna say hi please leave a comment! And remember if you need somebody to talk to feel free to email me meredithmunro@icloud.com  

DCYC - Friday

I arrived at the High School Ministry office with my two friends, Daniella and Kassidy, and anxiously watched people arrive. We had no idea who was else was going to the conference, I was half excited to meet new people and half nervous that somebody I didn't feel comfortable around would show up. Luckily the room soon filled with a great group of people from all different schools and circles of friends, which made me even more excited.
We walked in late to the opening assembly but that didn't stop St. Ann's HSM from going full force, singing and dancing. Later that night Steve Angrisano told us a story that really stuck with me. He talked about how one night he was out with a group of Nuns and ended up in a bunch of crazy situations. In the few hours he was with these Sisters, they impacted the lives of four completely different people. The things he said about the Nuns made me realize a couple of things.
1) The nuns thanked the waiter and manager at the restaurant for the meal and how caring they were and said the meal was the best food they've eaten. Steve said these Nuns appreciated the food like they had not eaten in forty days. Simple, everyday things such as restaurants often get ignored. Yes, we pray before we eat, but do we really appreciate the food we eat? As an upper middle class teenager in Coppell, TX hunger is not something I am exposed to. But it is all around us, there are people just a few miles away from where I live who depend on Catholic charities and food banks for their meals. They can't just go out to eat whenever they feel too lazy to cook. I have volunteered at the food bank countless times and the most gratifying thing is getting to see how much the recipients of the food appreciate the people who package, shelf and sort it. The Sisters were just as thankful to the people cooking and serving the food as the people from the food bank are for the volunteers. If a group of Nuns, who certainly are never short of food and how it got there, can appreciate it that much, why can't we?
2) When the Sisters were walking out of the restaurant they were approached by a man whose asked them to pray for his wife, who had cancer. Of course the Nuns said yes but Steve was expecting that to be the end of the conversation. However, instead of taking off and praying for him later, the Nuns put their hands on the man right then and there and prayed over him and for his wife. In the middle of the street. How many times do we say, "I'll pray for you" and then wait until later to do it? Why can't we drop everything to pray for somebody? Fear? Something better to do? This made me realize a bad habit of mine, which I am deciding to call "pray-crastination" (ok well I think it is kind of funny???) As I go through the day I develop a list of things I will pray for that night, but WHY do I wait? We have the gift of prayer so we can use it wherever and whenever we need it, we should take advantage of that lovely ability we have.
3) After leaving the restaurant, Steve and the Sisters went to the grocery store. On the way there the traffic light was broken and Steve was freaking out because he thought he'd miss his flight. Outside of the grocery store there was a woman sitting on the ground and crying. The Nuns, went over and spoke with her. The woman's husband had just left her and her children homeless and she was on the brink of a breakdown. The Nuns prayed with her and gave her the address of a place where she could go for shelter, work and food. As they were driving Steve to the airport, one of the Nuns expressed how happy she was that the traffic light was broken on the way to the grocery store, because if they hadn't been there when they were, they might not have met the woman and been able to help her. Isn't that great? I absolutely love how God does things like that. And we often don't think of the things that slow us down as good things, but sometimes they are. God, along with Saint Anthony (he's awesome!!!) have worked that way in my life recently...
Over spring break I went on a school trip to London and Paris. Very late the night before we were to leave London, I got back to my hotel room and noticed I didn't have my phone. I looked everywhere, asked everyone but it was nowhere to be found. That night I repeated the prayer "Dear Saint Anthony, look around I've lost my phone and it can't be found." over and over until I fell asleep. I know a phone is a material thing that i don't necessarily need, but being halfway around the world without my parents is scary, let alone without a communication device. I was also afraid of what my parents would do, they definitely would not replace my phone if I was irresponsible enough to lose it in a foreign country. My tour guide, Linda called the bus company and asked them if they had my phone but they still had not returned her call when we were going through security at the train station to go to Paris. It was snowing very heavily in Paris that day and our train kept getting delayed. I had to find other ways to entertain myself while all of my friends were listening to music and playing games one their phones while waiting at the train station for nearly five hours. Eventually our train was cancelled and we had to stay another day in London. The extra day came with numerous blessings, we got to see a lot of things in London we didn't have time to before; The London Eye, The Tower of London, Piccadilly Circus etc. And during those times, it was a blessing not to have a cell phone to distract me from the beauty and history of the city. The afternoon we were leaving for Paris, Linda got a call from the bus company... they had my phone! Still today I don't think Linda knows how much I appreciate her. She easily could have said "Your loss kid" and not done anything, but instead she called every person possible to get my cell phone back and I am so thankful that God gave me such an amazing woman as a tour guide. We picked up my phone on the way to the airport and all was well again. But I truly could not process how incredible it was that we just so happened to be stuck in London that day I lost my phone. If God had not sent that snowstorm to Paris, I would have left the country without the cell phone that my loving parents provided me. Now, I know that my phone was not the sole reason it snowed that day, but that is the cool thing about Our Lord, he watches over every single one of us and sends his grace at all times. I know I was not the only person who benefited from Paris's snow. 
Linda to me was like the Nuns to the woman at the grocery store; they didn't have to help her out, but they did because that is what Jesus would do and they wanted to follow his example. It's what I always tell myself, "Never put yourself in a situation where you have the power to do something and choose not to" 
4) Being a Nun sounds like a 24/7 Jesus party and I want in! 

By the end of Friday night, I could tell this weekend was going to be transformational. 

A fun difference between this conference and a normal retreat is that there's no adult in your room to tell you when to shut up and go to bed. Needless to say, my friends and I did not get very much sleep that night. 

Thank you so much for reading my blog! I will post about Saturday (probably in 2 or maybe even 3 parts) as soon as possible. This is a busy week for me, please pray for my drill team as we go through line camp this week! 

In His name, 
Meredith 

If you have questions, prayer requests or just wanna say hi please leave a comment! And remember if you need somebody to talk to feel free to email me meredithmunro@icloud.com