Tag: prayer

• Peace or Piece?

  What brings you peace? Piece Peace

  michardillo

  August 12, 2025

  Essay

  baking, classical music, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-2028, French food, hot tea, library, Louisiana, Mass, prayer, reading

• Charge It Up

  We are in Los Angeles visiting our daughter. It has been a lovely visit. The hotel is standard Marriott Courtyard, but the rooftop pool is very nice. I’ve been able to swim laps almost every day we have been here. Today, being Sunday, we got up, got dressed, and headed off to Mass. One of…

  michardillo

  August 10, 2025

  Essay

  Catholic, Catholic Church, charge it up, faith, Fr. Emmanuel, Gospel of Luke, keep watch, prayer, remain vigilant, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, stay awake, Sunday Mass

• Friends, Family, Food, But No Funeral!

  My husband and I just recently returned home from a nine-day trip to our home state, Louisiana, where we had the time of our lives. This trip was planned around my nephew’s engagement party, bookended by family time and some really great food. When my husband and I married, we were both living in Maryland,…

  michardillo

  May 2, 2025

  Essay, faith, food

  Amite, Baton Rouge, Boston’s, Brady’s, Cajun, Catholic, crawfish, Don’s, Duke’s, engagement party, family, food, friends, funeral, Gumbo, Hammond, Holy Ghost Catholic Church, Lighthouse Coastal Brasserie, Louisiana, Mass, Mississippi River, New Orleans, North Shore, prayer, Southeastern Louisiana Univeristy, strawberry shortcake cheesecake

• The Pause Between Acts

  April. 19, 2025 Day 7 of Holy Week Reflections Holy Saturday Today is Holy Saturday. Today we pause between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. A pause. An empty space. There is no Eucharist in the tabernacle. In fact, the tabernacle doors are wide open, and empty. The candle above the tabernacle has been extinguished. There…

  michardillo

  April 19, 2025

  Essay, faith

  Angelus, Ave Maria Press, blessed-virgin-mary, Catholic Church, Catholic school, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, Jared Dees, Jesus, prayer, Praying the Angelus, Regina Caeli, teaching

• My Two Special Saints

  On an unseasonably warm March day this year, I attended the 5:00 Vigil Mass at my parish, which was also Confirmation with Bishop Evelio Menjivar of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. The large church was packed, with folding chairs lining the entire interior perimeter of the church and chairs outside the doors of the…

  michardillo

  April 13, 2025

  Essay, faith

  Archbishop Philip Hannan, Archdiocese of New Orleans, Archie, Augustine, Bishop Menjivar, Catholic, Catholic Church, Confirmation, Edinburgh Castle, faith, funeral, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, John F. Kennedy, King David I, Louisiana, Malcolm III, Mass, Monica, New Orleans, Plaquemines Parish, Port Sulphur, prayer, Robert F. Kennedy, Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, Scotland, St. Margaret of Scotland, St. Margaret’s Chapel, St. Monica, Veronica

• A Very Merry Bookmas!

  It’s Christmas Day! I’ve had a wonderful Advent and now Christmas season with my family and close friends. It has to be the most relaxed Christmas I’ve ever had, having retired from teaching this January 12, 2024, I came into Advent this year without reams of papers to grade, midterms to create and then grade,…

  michardillo

  December 25, 2024

  books, Essay, faith, food

  Advent, baking, book-review, books, chocolate, Christmas, cookbooks, cooking, cozy mystery, essays, exercise, faith, family, fiction, food, friends, healthy, Judi Dench, Kate Quinn, Martha Stewart, Maryland, Mass, Mrs. Quinn’s Rise to Fame, nonfiction, novel, Olivia Ford, prayer, reading, self-care, Shakespeare: The Man who Pays the Rent, teacher, teaching, The Briar Club, The Cookbook, writer, writing

• Book Review: Something Better by Diane Parrish

  Reading a debut novel is always exciting for me. Maybe it will be great and I will anxiously await the sophomore novel, and on and on, being a completist from the start! Maybe it will be very good and I can watch the author’s craft strengthen and develop from one book to the next. Maybe…

  michardillo

  September 2, 2024

  books, Essay

  book-review, books, church, death, debut novel, Diane Parrish, divorce, faith, fiction, forgiveness, grief, infertility, infidelity, loss, Meridian Editions, Moss Media, NetGalley, novel, prayer, reading, writer, writing

• The + Side of #SocialMedia

  As a practicing Catholic, each year I spend a few weeks before Lent to think about what I want to do during this season of preparation. Some Catholics give up something they love as a sacrifice, some add some sort of charity work or almsgiving during Lent, and some fast and pray more. When I…

  michardillo

  March 23, 2024

  Essay, faith

  Bookish Friends, books, Buy Nothing, Catholic, community, Currently Reading, facebook, fasting, Holy Week, K-pop, Katrina, korea, Lent, prayer, reader, reading, sacrifice, social media, teaching

• This is Heaven; How May I Help You?

  TikTok is an ocean of possibilities. I have an account but I don’t ever open it. I do, however, frequently watch TikToks that are cross-posted on Instagram or Facebook, and that is how I stumbled upon 26-year old Taryn Delanie Smith, a former beauty queen who is as of this writing sitting pretty with 1.3…

  michardillo

  September 9, 2023

  Essay, faith

  Angelus, classroom, Denise, God, Great Commandment, Heaven, prayer, students, Taryn Delanie Smith, teaching, TikTok

• Language Learned, Passport Packed

  Sunday, March 17, 2019: This morning, the Second Sunday in Lent, Fr. Gabriel, our parochial vicar, began his homily at 10:30 Mass with, “How is your Lent going?” For the first time in a very long time, I felt as though I was fully prepared to say, “Good!” For a few weeks before Ash Wednesday,…

  michardillo

  March 18, 2019

  Essay, faith

  Heaven, Lent, passport, prayer, sacrifice, Scotland