As we gathered for Mass on New Year’s Day, Fr. Shenoy Thomas spoke about the Blessed Virgin Mary and encouraged us to call on her more frequently as we walk into 2025. Just as Jesus gave her to John from the cross, he said, Jesus gave her to us. And she’s just as alive now as she was 2,000 years ago.
I felt as if he was speaking directly to me. Nudging me ever closer to Mom, challenging me to go deeper. To go further.
Flash forward to New Year’s afternoon, post-reuben sandwiches and black-eyed peas, to our annual Saint of the Year selection. We pull out a bag that contains dozens of strips of paper, each bearing the name of a saint or blessed. After asking the intercession of Blessed Mary and all the angels and saints, we select a slip of paper from the bag.
While the names of many well-known saints are tucked inside, there are others that aren’t exactly house-hold names. Take a couple of our past patrons, for example: Saint Seraphim and Blessed Miriam Teresa.
As the queen of overthinking, what could possibly go wrong other than me selecting the wrong slip of paper, am I right?
Nevertheless, our moment of reckoning was upon us, so I stuck my hand in the bag and tossed all the little pieces of paper around. After feeling around for just the right one, I held it between my fingers and hesitated.
Had I gotten the correct one? Or was our saint on the other piece of paper I’d moved to get to mine. Did I need to drop my paper and do some more digging? Back and forth the questioning went, until I realized that I’d indeed already chosen our saint—or rather our saint had chosen us. So I trusted the process, held onto my selection and pulled it out of the bag.
I unfolded the paper and read it to myself.
“Well?!” Dan asked. “Who is it?”
Instead of blurting out our saint, I read him the words that appeared under the name:
Pray for greater dependence on the maternal love of Mary.
I could barely believe my eyes. Our Lady of Guadalupe had chosen us. She’d picked us, of all people to walk with through the Jubilee year. I don’t mind telling you it brought tears to my eyes.
Since then, we’ve noticed Our Lady of Guadalupe in myriad ways, from her image on one of the rosaries I use each day to a window cling that hangs in our kitchen window.
Even back in December, She’d been a subject of conversation between Father and I. And as fate would have it, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileon just announced a new initiative encouraging devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe, which includes a home enthronement.
Thinking back on that New Year’s Day homily, I realized Fr. Shenoy had indeed been talking to me, whether he knew it or not. And I imagine our Lady was right there looking on, smiling with great delight in the knowledge of what was to come.
Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us!
Ready to find your saint for 2025? Click here for access to a list of patron saint names. Or go here to have a saint selected for you.
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