thoughts on the first year of blogging

As promised, here are my thoughts on the first year of blogging:

A friend of mine got me started blogging, a year ago, and I was embarrassed to not have one already! I was at the climax of my discernment (at least my discernment of seminary) and thought it would be a good idea to blog my thoughts during the application process. I thought it would be good to be able to look back, down the road, and see if/where I've grown and changed.

Hehe, I remember vividly the whole process! It seemed like so much and I was very anxious! Work was increasingly unfulfilling and I was miserable at my job. Well, to be clear, the job itself was awesome: awesome people, awesome pay, awesome company, good family values, high-paced, high-tech, high-rise! But I just couldn't do it anymore and I was thinking more and more of the priesthood. This blog has been great for getting my thoughts off my chest and it's also been a good place to store all the neat little prayers and other finds I've come across over the year... things that have inspired and motivated me. Now I can always have them to look back on. I also hope that this has been a good means for all of you, friends, and family to keep up with how I'm doing. Lastly, I hope that this has encouraged others to prayerfully discern God's call for their life as well.

Some memorable posts, in chronological order:

• My first post, where I described my purposes for this blog
• On joining the Knights of Columbus
• My post on a rough time during the process and on the interviews
• On meeting Scott Hahn
• On adventures on God's green earth
• A low point at work
• The log of an IM chat with a co-worker on my meeting with and acceptance by the Archbishop of Louisville!
• My essays during the application process on: Ministry of the Word; Ministry of the Sacraments and Shepherding; Prayer, Celibacy, and Obedience; and Justice and Simplicity
• Meeting Jeff Cavins
• On the Archdiocese end-of-summer retreat for seminarians
• Stress at the end of the applicaton process
• On the first day at seminary!
• Thoughts on discernment at St. Mary's
• Tips on how to pray the rosary, from St. Louis de Montfort
• On my first time at the local abortion clinic
• On the last words of Pope John Paul II (and here)
• On my first time wearing clerics!
• My first paper in Seminary, on Plato's Phaedo
• My second paper on belief in Jesus Christ
• My third paper on Plato's Euthyphro
• My fourth paper on "Rational Animal/Political Animal" by Laurence Berns
• On the start of preparing for St. Louis de Montfort's Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary. I still haven't posted the reflections for each day, I intend to back-post these at some point just so I can have them here. Here are the three major parts at least: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)
• My fifth paper on The Courts and the Church on Gay "Marriage"
• My sixth paper on St. Thomas Aquinas on the human person
• My seventh paper on Leo Kass's The Hungry Soul
• My eighth paper on Descartes and Nietzsche on the human person
• The artwork of my good friend Dave
• On My trip to El Salvador
• On a week with my old spiritual director and witnessing my first death
• On the 33rd annual Pro-Life Mass and March (and here and here)
• Receiving the Ministry of Lector
• Winter Break Retreat
• My first paper of my second semester: Machiavelli and Aquinas on virtue
• My second paper: Aristotle on god (small "g")
• My third paper: Sokolowski on natural virtue
• On the Latin Mass at St. Alphonsus

So...wow! It's been a very eventful and exciting year! It's been very hard too... but as I told some seventh graders recently: It should be. Becoming a holy and learned priest should be through hard work. But I've struggled alot over this past year with procrastination and doubts. But our Blessed Lord won't let me stop thinking about the priesthood and throughout it all, and despite myself, he's been sending me little affirmations here and there that have helped me persevere. And that's what I'm trying to focus on during this second year of blogging: Praying, in times of trial, not for consolation or favors, but simply for perseverence to endure the trials and downtimes of discernment that Our Lord desires that I go through, according to his most Loving and Holy Will. Jesus, I trust in you.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us.
Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us.