The Best Catholic Books You Haven't Read...Or Colored!

Lots of adults are returning to their childhood roots and have taken up coloring. It is soothing, it is even healing. Stations of the Cross: An Adult Coloring Book brings it all together: beautiful renderings by Fr. KyNam are accompanied by Scripture and prayers written by Kathryn Mulerink OCDS.

 

Speaking of healing...Dr. Helen Scieszka's mission is healing. The hurts she heals aren't the ones we see--or often even know exist. They are the emotional wounds that haunt us. The wounds that we push deep down and do our best to ignore. Yet, despite our best efforts, they really do affect us on a daily basis. Like a broken leg left untended, our emotional wounds cause us to limp through life.

 

But that doesn't have to be the case and Dr. Helen has gathered up her experience in her practice and put pen to paper to offer a trilogy that, deep within the pages, offers hope and healing to all of us.

 

The Little Girl Lost, Little Girl Found trilogy is meant to be a piece of the slow, gentle, loving healing that so many of us need.

 

Or maybe you are an Alpha male looking for ways to reclaim your masculinity within the Catholic faith. The two aren't mutually exclusive and Jared Zimmerer's Man Up! shows us that in his critically acclaimed book which has been featured on EWTN.

 

For more excellent Catholic books from devotionals to award-winning fiction, visit www.BezalelBooks.com

 

 

 

 

Letting God Find You...

Before my feet touched the floor on January 1^st, 2012, I offered a simple prayer: Please Lord, before the year is over, find me where you want me to be.

Up to that point, I had been suffering from a decades-long chronic condition and although imagined health in my future, that morning I offered every cell in my body to the Lord. I just wanted to serve Him and His kingdom. If He wanted me to be healthy, so be it. If He had other plans, so be it.

From that point on, all hell broke loose.

The first Friday in January, I was on-air when I had an “episode” and was forced to hang up quite abruptly and was immediately taken to the emergency room by my husband. I’ve got to admit, there is nothing quite as humbling as having to hang up during an interview on a national radio show because the room is spinning and the floor seems to be at a 45 degree angle and you are crawling for help.

I suffered more physical problems over the next few months than I had in the previous years; I was subjected to countless medical tests and procedures. It wasn’t exactly what I envisioned 2012 would bring when I offered myself completely to God; but a few close friends helped me survive the year. They were the ones God put in my life to lower me, on my mat, through the roof so that I could get to Christ (see Mark 2:4).

The year is now coming to a close and I remember well that simple prayer I spoke on January 1^st.

Am I where God wants to find me?

I believe I am.

I’ve learned a lot this past year and have tremendous gratitude (and maybe am a bit intimidated) that God would take my prayer so seriously—and allow me to be molded so intimately this year to His will so that He would find me exactly where He wanted me to be.

Last week I spoke to a group of catechetical leaders and the topic was “Becoming a Saint One Day at a Time.” I was able to illustrate 7 different ways that God molds us in our everyday lives. Spending time with these leaders was very anointed and their gracious feedback gave me confirmation that I am, indeed, where God wants me to be.

Along the way this year, my company has published a number of books that I also recognize as gifts from God.

When I started Bezalel Books in 2007, I wanted to serve God through great Catholic fiction. I was a parochial middle school teacher (English and religion) and wanted to see a time where Catholic fiction books flooded the classrooms. It was dream to offer the sort of books that feed the soul while also entertaining and enlightening to kids and parents. I also wanted to give a platform to authors who may not have one otherwise and on January 1^st of 2012, it was my sole desire to make sure that the works of Bezalel Books would continue to exist only if it was God’s holy will and purpose for my life.

To that end, I’m so honored to serve God through our 2012 titles. Most recently, and just in time for Christmas, is one of the most blessed books I feel we’ve ever published: He Shall Be Peace. Written by Jennifer Franks, this fiction book is based upon the visions of the venerable Catherine Anne Emmerich and is the sort of book that lifts the spirit of the reader to new heights.

God certainly has been good in answering my prayer to put me where He wants to find me this year—even if the route He has taken wasn’t quite the one I would have mapped out.

2013?

I’m not sure what I’ll offer before my feet touch the floor; but I am sure that whatever it is, God will be listening.

May your Advent be a blessed and holy one!

 Cheryl Dickow

www.BezalelBooks.com

Should I Pray for Healing...Or Should I Carry My Cross?

It is ironic that, as a Catholic, the most difficult part of having a chronic health issue isn’t the health issue itself but is the big question: Should I pray for healing…or should I carry my cross?

And it is that question that often keeps us spiraling through a journey that is already burdensome and often overwhelming.

In my own journey, which has lasted for the better part of two decades, I know that I’ve gone through many different phases. There were times that I tried to take on St. Paul’s attitude of embracing the “thorn” of an illness while at other times I was on my knees praying—between sobs of anguish—for healing. I’ve attended Healing Masses where I’ve been prayed over by a team of healers and have hands laid upon me; I’ve had private healing prayers said over me.

I’ve done novenas and have sought alternative medical care—all at my own expense—when the established medical system failed me. I’ve been in bed unable to move from the dizziness that has enveloped me and have quietly asked God to use it as He saw fit. I’ve asked Mary to join my suffering to her Son’s and heal another person’s suffering. If a book has been written about healing, I’ve read it and believed in the miracles that Christ performed—and waited for mine.

What I’ve come to see, though, is that while the case can be made that Christ always healed, there is also an important back story that we don’t often think about: how long did that person suffer before Christ healed him or her? In one case we know it was 12 years. The woman with the hemorrhage suffered for 12 years. I remember well the 12th year of my own illness. I remember thinking “This is it! It is my time for healing! Sure 12 years seems like a long time but now I’ll be healed!”

Didn’t happen.

Twelve years came and went and still no healing; but that is because it wasn’t my time. Not easy to admit; but the back story is very important. And that is what I’ve really learned during these past two decades: the back story is the real story. It is always about our personal journey towards Christ and towards wholeness and holiness.

My back story is unique for me; it is the yoke Christ has fashioned that joins me to Him but has my own growth and salvation in mind. It wasn’t easy for me to begin sharing my story with others but I learned in these past few years that the story wasn’t mine to begin with—no story ever really is—it belongs to God to use for His kingdom. 

What is the back story Christ is trying to tell with you?

I hope that in sharing my gift of suffering in Wrapped Up: God’s Ten Gifts for Women, your own journey will be lightened. I’ve prayed for every woman who reads this book and trust that God will honor those prayers for you—and that your own back story will be blessed.

Cheryl Dickow

www.BezalelBooks.com

Chronic Illness: A Gift from God?

For years the only person who knew I suffered from a chronic illness was my husband. Over time, and out of necessity, a few more people were allowed into my world of health issues—and yet no one really knew the severity of what I went through, except my husband.

What I’ve come to realize is that I prefer my world be divided into two clear parts: the private, reclusive Cheryl and the author, writer, teacher, social Cheryl. Mostly, though, at the heart of who I am is the private, reclusive Cheryl.

My quiet, alone time is important to  me—even more so since I began spiritual direction a few years ago and sought to understand the movements of God in my life and live accordingly. I need to be with God in a very real way and have learned how to respond to the ache for Him through my prayer life and “down time.”

As the years progressed and I understood that my physical suffering had value, I began sharing bits and pieces of what I was going through: severe joint problems, nights of dizziness and vomiting that rivaled scenes from The Exorcist, and constant feelings of imbalance (just to name a few). I’m not sure where I saw my “sharing” going but believed that God was using it for some reason beyond the way it was drawing me deeper in my relationship with Him. I was willing to let Him use it as He saw fit. That was all I knew at the time.

So it was that when I signed the contract with Servant Books to write Wrapped Up: God’s Ten Gifts for Women I knew it was time for it to be shared in a very public way in the chapter “The Gift of Suffering.” Still, it isn’t easy opening yourself up to the world and letting people know about your life experiences. It isn’t easy to shine a light on what you are going through and suggest that someone else can draw insight or inspiration from it.

Quite frankly, I would rather have been healthy my whole life; and I share that sentiment and frustration as well in the book.

Nonetheless, I’m allowing God to continue to mold me (I keep thinking “Potter-Clay”) and although I’m still on the journey towards wholeness and health, I pray that the knowledge that suffering from a chronic condition can be a gift from God will shine through in my words which have been prayed through and offered up for every woman who reads Wrapped Up: God’s Ten Gifts for Women.