Wednesday's talks

I'm trying to catch up now a little so I wanted to share some of the highlights from yesterday's talks.

Our morning keynote was given by Cardinal Robert Sarah and entitled, "The Light of the Family in a Dark World".

I found Cardinal Sarah to be a gentle, intelligent, and thoughtful man. While he had many great points to make, one worth mentioning here is that, 'The heart of the devil's lie is that God wants to limit you and not see your life fulfilled.'

I believe this is a false impression many people struggle with. It's easy for so many people to just see the Catholic faith as a long list of 'Do Nots' rather than an even longer list of blessings and freedoms and joys.

Cardinal Sarah also worked in one of my favorite passages from the Gospel of John 1, "All things came to be from Him and without Him nothing came to be. What came to be through Him was life and this life was the light of the human race. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it." (I just typed that from memory so please excuse any small errors. I remember the words, not the punctuation. Ha!)

I love that passage, especially the last line so I wanted to share it with you here so that you might ponder it prayerfully with me. I can never read it too many times.

The first breakout I attended was by Terry Polakovic and another young woman who wasn't listed in the program. Their talk was entitled, 'The Special Place of Women in the Family, the Church, and the World'. I really enjoyed it!

They started out going through the life and conversion of St Edith Stein and her teachings on the nature and essence of women. Then they went into Saint John Paul II's interest in her writings and his own thoughts on the 'feminine genius'. They concluded with talking on Theology of the Body.

One of my favorite quotes by St Edith Stein shared in the talk was, "Do not accept anything as truth that lacks love and do not accept anything as love that lacks truth."

The last keynote of the day was Helen Alvare. I've been fortunate enough to hear Helen talk in person and on webinars many times over the years. She covers a broad range of topics and can speak well on all of them. I always enjoy any opportunity to hear her. Yesterday her keynote was on 'Creating the Future: The Fertility of Christian Love'. It was great like always!

I'll share more later. Keep us in your prayers!