Saint John Paul II, pray for us.

JP2 in Wadovwce Poland, his hometown

I abandon the blog for what feels like weeks and then do three post in three days. I know, send me to the looney bin.  But when your day off coincides with an awesome feast day you have to celebrate big, by writing a post and making Polish food for dinner.

Blurry but this is the baptismal font that JP2 was baptized in. 

What passionately Catholic 20 something year old doesn't love St. Pope John Paul II?!  He challenged the status quo in a way we all desire too  He was radical in the face of mediocrity, war, and a common settling way of life.  He loved his mama in a profound way.  When he was shot, he truly lived out the Gospel forgiving the gun man.  He wasn't average, he was extraordinary.  He inspired saints. He brought men and women to their knees before the blessed sacrament.  He truly loved.  On his first feast day as saint, we must celebrate!  We must contemplate, how can my life more closely reflect all that this man was.  I can't say the words better than he already has...

“It is Jesus that you seek when you dream of happiness; He is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; He is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is He who provoked you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is He who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is He who reads in your heart your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.

It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.”

Lord, satisfy me.  Give me the grace to never compromise or settle.  Show me how to be genuine. Stir in my life the desire and strength to do something great, to be radically different.  To live in the world but not of it.  Teach me to be humble and patient.  Saint Pope John Paul II, pray for me and guide me in the path of sainthood.