Fatima Jovem 2012

What's it like being in Fatima with 2,800 young people from parish youth groups all over Portugal? Aside from the organization of the event only letting us sleep 4 hours (locking us out of our rooms and making us go to really loud events...ah!)... it was wonderful. It's an annual event called "Fatima Jovem" and we got to stay together as a parish, go on a scavenger hunt through the lesser-known places in Fatima where there are lots of olive trees and participate in the rosary, candle-lit procession and other great things at the sanctuary. I got to be with really, really special people from my youth group and with an amazing man like whom there is no other. What an incredible journey we've been on... together, with the youth group and with GOD!... since four years ago when I invited him to help out with the youth group and he said yes. 

The vine and the branches

This week's Sunday, Sunday, Sunday podcast...

http://lifeteen.com/sunday-sunday-sunday-050612/

... is simple and great!

• It was through his actions that they were going to believe the sincerity of this words. 
• Prayer and the sacraments, the Eucharist, that is our source of life and of water. That's how the branch stays connected to the vine. 

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The forgivness chapel downtown

This Saturday I was lucky enough to save a downward-spiraling day with a trip to downtown Lisbon with my boyfriend, which included confession and mass at the Martyrs' Basilica. 

I loved Lifeteen's facebook page which said: "Hello Saturday. Haven'ts seen you in a week. It's a perfect day for cleaning your room... or your soul! Have you thought about going to Reconciliation today?" 

Basilica dos Martires has a wonderful adoration chapel with our beloved John Paul II's image and right before entering you have a "forgiveness" chapel with a huge life-size cross. It's one of my favorite churches in Lisbon and one of those places where you feel like you have to be silent and like the silence is so oddly comforting...

"All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful." 

— Flannery O'Connor (The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O'Connor)

Food and bud

DId you know Anthony Bourdain from Travel Channel's "No Reservations" visited lisbon? And did you know that the original Budweiser is Czech and it's a lot tastier than the American budweiser or even Portuguese beer? The things I learn at my sister's house. She so kindly invited my boyfriend and I to her house for a delicious fish dinner yesterday. It was the second national holiday in two weeks... go Portugal!

PS Check out my post at IgnitumToday called "The Death Penalty, Cowboy Culture and G.K. Chesterton"

Embroidery... go!

My friend Sofia and I have officially started embroidery projects! It's all very exciting. Today we learned our first stitch: the backstitch. Martha Stewart's basic embroidery tutorial is particularly helpful. Our first lesson today was: making anything is going to take a lot of time. But don't all good things really take time? And it's so much more special to do it with someone else. So far it seems easier than I was expecting... and this is coming from someone who doesn't know how to sew on a button....!