We’re called to detach from the very world we spend our days in, turning toward the higher things God has to offer. And as much as we might want to spend our days in silent prayer, that’s not always our calling.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t take a page from the book of those who do.

“If priests and religious have an obligation to meditate on the great truths of our holy religion in order to live up to their vocation worthily, the same obligation, then, is just as much incumbent upon the laity — because of the fact that every day they meet with spiritual dangers which might make them lose their souls. Therefore they should arm themselves with the frequent meditation on the life, virtues and sufferings of Our Blessed Lord — which are so beautifully contained in the fifteen mysteries of the Holy Rosary.” — St. Louis de Montfort

We are in spiritual danger every day. St. Peter puts it plainly: “Be sober and vigilant. Your opponent the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8)

We face a constant barrage. But we are not without a weapon.

Learn the Rosary. Pray it. Meditate on the life of Christ and Our Lady. Turn your focus from the physical world to what God is offering us — now, and in eternity.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, help us to turn to You for strength, for grace, for everything we need to live our vocation and follow You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

The interior life is the foundation. Without it, nothing else holds. When we neglect prayer and place all our energy in exterior activity, the spiritual life begins to dry up. Faith and love for God have to come first — everything else is built on top of that.

And it’s from that foundation that our works flow. As St. James tells us, “Faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (James 2:17)

The interior life was never meant to stay interior. Whatever fruits grow there are meant to be brought into the world — shared, offered, given away. We’re not called to hide them behind the walls of our souls.

“A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them.” (Matthew 7:18-20)

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, You have a plan for our lives. You have planted us where You will. Help us to bear fruit as You will. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

And in some ways, that’s not entirely false. We have a tremendous — and terrifying — power in the gift of free will. We can make ourselves masters of our lives. We can create our own meaning. But in doing so, we pit ourselves against God. We place our will against His. And that is a dangerous game.

This is the banner of our times: unrestricted freedom to do whatever I want. It’s an enticing trap. But as Christ tells us, “For the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many.” (Matthew 7:13)

As Christians, we’re called to a different path. To take the freedom God has given us and choose — freely — to follow His will. When God calls, we don’t answer with “but that’s not what I want.” We answer with “here I am.”

It’s only in cooperating with His will that the path opens for us.

So today, let’s ask Him: What do you want for me?

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, You have given us power and freedom. Help us to make the most of it. Help us to always do Your will. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

We build massive lists of goals we think will lead to happiness — personally, maritally, in our careers. For raising good kids, we assume they need iPads, expensive experiences, and schedules packed to the margins. And we often think sainthood means moving to India, starting a religious order, and changing the world.

It’s too much. Too many things to track, too much to execute on any given day.

Here’s what I keep coming back to: happiness, good parenting, holiness — all of it starts with simply giving our time. Being present. To our spouse, our children, our neighbors, our coworkers.

St. John Paul II called this the gift of self. And it’s the simplest path to holiness and happiness there is — one that transcends time, place, and culture.

No laundry list required.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, give us the strength to offer ourselves as a gift to those around us, to those that You have put in our lives, so that we may always do Your will and become one of Your saints. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

Oftentimes, what’s good for us and what we want are at odds.

We know eating right and exercising is good for us — but lounging on the couch with a bag of chips sounds pretty enticing. We know hard work is noble — but YouTube has a way of eating the afternoon. We know prayer is good for us — but so does another ten minutes of sleep.

What’s good for us loses. Not to something bad, necessarily. Just to something less good.

If we want to grow in our faith, we have to learn to recognize the good in front of us. And then we have to cultivate the habit of actually acting on it.

Once isn’t enough. It has to be habitual. That is virtue.

So today — where’s the good?

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, help us to see as You see, to see the good, and to act on it. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

Through His sacrifice, Christ has loved us in ways we cannot fully grasp. And more often than not, that involuntary feeling of love or gratitude is simply missing when we’re in His presence. The heart doesn’t cooperate the way we’d like it to.

But our faith is not a feeling. It’s taking what we profess to believe and living in accordance with it.

In the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, that means calling to mind what we know to be true — and responding accordingly. Praise. Adoration. Love.

What happens when we don’t feel it? The truth is, many times we won’t. But what we can control is our wills. We can use our intellects to acknowledge what is true, and then submit our wills to that truth.

That is faith.

Let us pray. May the heart of Jesus, in the Most Blessed Sacrament, be praised, adored, and loved with grateful affection, at every moment, in all the tabernacles of the world, even to the end of time. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

We return to that idea of goodness again. And I’ve been sitting with this one in my own life — as a father of five.

There is an opportunity before fathers in particular that I don’t think we talk about enough. To be, in some real sense, the face of the Father for our children. Not just to model the faith — though that matters — but to let ourselves be, as best we can, a reflection of God’s goodness and tenderness in the home.

The downstream effects of that are hard to overstate. A child who grows up experiencing a father who is present, good, and loving will find it easier to believe that God is present, good, and loving. That’s not a small thing.

St. Louis Martin didn’t just raise saints. He gave them a picture of fatherhood that pointed beyond itself — toward the Father.

That’s the calling. Goodness and tenderness, pursued faithfully, day after day.

Let us pray. Jesus, You revealed the face of the Father. Help us to do the same in whatever way You want. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

There’s an important word in there: goodness.

Most of us believe — at least in some sense — that God is all-powerful. That He can do anything. That’s not usually where our faith struggles.

But do we believe that He is good? That He doesn’t just provide for us, but that He is so loving, so attentive, that He is involved in every corner of our lives? That He wants the best for us? That He works tirelessly for our good?

Louis and Zélie’s lives were not without struggle. Not without trial or hardship. And yet they carried this confidence in the goodness of God through all of it.

That’s a different kind of faith. Not just believing God can — but trusting that He will, because He is good.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we believe that You are good. We believe that You love us and want the best for us. Increase our faith. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

I’ve been reading The Extraordinary Parents of St. Thérèse, where I came across that line.

The Martin family is a remarkable example of this. Louis and Zélie Martin — now saints themselves — raised five daughters, all of whom entered religious life. The most famous is St. Thérèse of Lisieux, one of the most beloved saints in the history of the Church.

Thérèse became a saint as a Carmelite nun. Louis and Zélie became saints as husband and wife, as parents. Different states in life, but the same trusting response to God’s call.

It wasn’t the state in life that made them saints. It was what they did within it.

Whatever our state in life — married, single, religious, widowed — holiness isn’t waiting for us somewhere else. It’s available right here, in whatever God has placed in front of us today.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, help us to follow Your will this day, in the way that best pleases You. Help us to look for You in our daily lives. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

“If you knew the gift of God.”

And if my notes are right, that’s from John 4.

To someone who has never known God — or who doesn’t understand the Eucharist — we might say those words as a kind of invitation. If you only knew. But speaking for ourselves, we do know. We’ve known for so long, maybe, that we’ve started to forget.

The supernatural has become the natural to us.

We believe that Jesus Christ — God Himself — comes to us under the appearance of bread and wine. That we receive Him. That this happens every single day, in every Catholic church, all over the world. Someone hearing that for the first time would probably say, “Wait — you believe what?”

Yeah. We believe that.

But do we receive it that way?

“If you knew the gift of God.” We do know. The question is whether we’re living like it.

Let us pray. Lord, we give thanks for the many gifts that You continue to give us. Help us to always remember that You are a generous and loving God. In Jesus’ name. Amen

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

I had a moment this past week where so much of the imagery we hear in Scripture just clicked for me. Here’s what I mean.

Imagine a father who goes ahead to a new land to prepare a home for his family. While he’s gone, he hasn’t forgotten them. He hasn’t left them behind. Everything he’s doing — all of it — is still for their good. For their future. So they can be together.

That’s the Ascension.

But the analogy goes even further. Because the father doesn’t just leave the family to find their own way. He sends someone back to help them make the journey.

And this is where it goes beyond any analogy we could construct. It’s not just that our Lord sends someone. He sends His Holy Spirit. He sends Himself — to be with us, to guide us, to help us make the journey home.

That’s what we’re waiting for in these days.

He has gone ahead. He hasn’t forgotten us. And He is coming.

Let us pray. Lord, help us trust that You are still working, even when we cannot see it. Come, Holy Spirit. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

And again, this comes from my own personal experience. I do not get to daily Mass as much as I’d like to.

Now, of course, I have reasons. Like I said: there are five of them, and the sixth is my wife.

But, like praying a daily Rosary, it comes down to being intentional. Planning for the important things. Not letting them get pushed to the margins and fit in when you can.

Now, of course, with going to daily Mass, there are some logistical aspects: the commute, the time it’s offered, etc.

But I know for me I can plan that for once a week, twice a week, if not more.

And depending on your work and home situation, I’d encourage you to think about it.

If you don’t go to daily Mass already, what would it look like for you to go once a week? Twice a week?

Can you build toward that?

Not because you have to. Not out of obligation or guilt.

But because the Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith.

And if we can be there more often—even just one more time per week—that’s worth building toward.

Let us pray. Lord, help us prioritize the Eucharist. Help us be intentional about getting to Mass. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

And in this month of May, it might not be any surprise that the thing that I would love to do more is pray a daily Rosary.

As far as the prayers and devotions that the Church in general recommends, praying a daily Rosary is near the top.

A number of years ago, I actually was in a good habit of praying a daily Rosary.

And like anything, I found it to be a habit that you need to go through the early stages of building the muscles —which is very deliberate, very intentional.

It can be very challenging in the sense of forcing something into your routine.

But the beauty of that is that, just like eating healthy or working out or getting your steps in, once it becomes routine, you don’t have to think about it as much.

So I’m not going to publicly state that tomorrow I’m going to start my daily Rosary routine.

But it’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot more in this month of May.

And I guess I would encourage you to do so as well.

Let us pray.

Lord, give us the discipline to do the things we ought, the things that You are calling us to. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

Our family went to Sunday Mass there this past weekend.

And for me, it’s just one of the places that I know I can find peace and quiet.

Of course, there’s only so much peace and quiet when you bring five kids along to Mass.

But what I mean is that there’s something about the architecture, the space, the beauty of that church that makes it a special one for me.

I think all of us need more places like that. Or at least one that we know we can go to.

A place to find refreshment. A place to find solitude. A place to find that peace, that stillness where we can be with our Lord.

It doesn’t always have to be in a church.

I think having a designated prayer space or a prayer chair in your house can have a similar effect.

But when our lives are so full of craziness, I think having those places that we can return to—and knowing that they are there—can be very powerful for our spiritual lives.

Let us pray. Lord, help us to find the peace and quiet that we need to be with You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

Even for myself, on the one hand, my first reaction is no.

I think, for the most part, people don’t change. But it also depends on what you’re talking about.

There’s a lot of personality quirks, a lot of how you are raised, that can influence who you are and how you behave. And sometimes those things are really hard to get over, especially when you don’t see them yourself.

On the other hand, I would say people change all the time.

The friends that you might have had in middle school weren’t your friends in high school. A job you once loved has become stale and burdensome.

I think sometimes, though, we can look at this question from the negative side.

Whether they change or not, it’s often in relation to us. Those bothersome qualities, that’s what people don’t change. Or, if people do change, it’s in the context of “they don’t fit me anymore.”

But I think there’s another dimension to change that can be a good thing.

And it is believing, hoping that people can change. Not for our convenience. Not so our lives are easier. Not so they irk us less.

But for the sake of their souls.

There’s a difference between hoping someone changes because they’re annoying us and hoping someone changes because we want them to know God.

Let us pray.

Lord, help us believe that You can change people. Change their hearts. Draw them close to You. For the sake of their souls. We make this prayer for them, and for ourselves. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

In Mass, she loves to not only be held and look into your face, but she has to touch your face with both hands.

It’s not lost on me that in God’s wisdom He instilled in babies this longing—this deep desire to see and touch the face of their father.

And we as adults should also desire to see the face of the Father. To touch the face of the Father.

That’s what the Eucharist provides us: a way to actually encounter God through Jesus Christ.

A way to touch Him. To be close to Him. To look into His face.

It satisfies one of the simplest and maybe deepest longings of our lives on earth.

We think we need to understand everything, to have all the answers, to figure it all out before we can come to the Father.

But maybe we’re supposed to come like my daughter comes to me.

Just wanting to see His face. Just wanting to be close. With that simple, deep longing to be held by the Father.

Let us pray.

Lord, give us the simplicity of a child coming to her father. Help us approach You—and approach the Eucharist—with simple longing. We want to see Your face. We want to be close to You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

And while this reflection is not about my personal health and fitness journey, I am continually amazed at the parallels between having a healthy body and a healthy soul—and the lessons that we can take from one to the other.

In this particular instance, the lesson that I have found is that little actions add up.

Specifically, for nutrition. Before I started tracking, I would eat pretty healthy. However, looking back, I notice now how often I’d graze: a couple of cashews here, a few pretzels there, extra bites after dinner, a little snack before bed.

I was underestimating how many times throughout the day I would just have a little nibble of something. And those nibbles add up to be enough to throw you off of your health goals.

You can be eating too much, but don’t think you are.

Now, the parallel for our faith is that we allow little concessions (pun intended).

We let little things slide, thinking that they’re not a big deal.

A little gossip. A little white lie. A little impatience. A little resentment that we don’t let go of. A little compromise here. A little corner cut there.

None of them feel like a big deal in the moment.

But over time, those small bad habits compound.

In the same way that small good habits do.

The question for us is: Which ones do we want to be building and developing?

Let us pray.

Lord, help us cut out the little bad habits that are compounding against us and build the little good habits that compound toward You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

It’s an odd expression that I learned a while ago and had to look up. I didn’t realize it came from a book, but the idea is this:

If every day you had to eat a frog, you could either waffle and think about it and groan about it and worry about it all day—and then eat the frog at the last minute.

Or you could get up and eat it first thing. And then enjoy the rest of your day.

First things first. Take care of what needs to be taken care of, and then go from there.

The big question is: What frog are we avoiding in our spiritual life?

Is it prayer? Is it confession? Is it a conversation we need to have?

We can spend the whole day—or the whole week, or the whole month—worrying about it, avoiding it, letting it hang over us.

Or we can just eat the frog.

Get it done. First thing.

Let us pray.

Lord, give us the discipline to do first things first. Help us stop avoiding the things we know we should do—especially prayer. Give us the courage we need. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

Like playing golf and having a family. Or, enjoying a beer and staying fit. With the right balance, both can exist in your life.

But then there are other things—things that aren’t “both/and.”

They’re “either/or.”

They can’t coexist. One has to go.

A very stark example: being on a dating app while being married. There’s no balance to strike there. One has to give.

And I would challenge us that there are things in our lives that are more at odds with our faith than we might care to admit.

Not “balance” issues. But “either/or” issues.

Things that can’t coexist with a life of faith—but we’ve been treating them like balance problems instead of incompatibility problems.

Maybe it’s toxic relationships. Or resentment we’ve been nursing. Maybe it’s pornography. Maybe it’s shows, movies, or other content that might as well be pornography.

Maybe it’s something else entirely.

These aren’t things that need balance. These are things that need to be cut out.

Because when two things can’t coexist, something has to give.

And it can’t be your faith.

Let us pray.

Lord, help us to see our lives and our decisions as You see them. Help us to have the courage to make the changes we need to make. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.

If you are described as unhinged, it is not a compliment. It’s the equivalent of being off your rocker, off base, out of control.

Funny enough, I was reading a book—written at least a few decades ago, a spiritual book—and they use this phrase “unhinged” in matters of faith.

Not in matters of someone throwing a major fit in a Starbucks. But in matters of the soul.

I like the imagery as it relates to our faith.

Because a hinge on a door becomes the point that the door rotates around. Of course, the door doesn’t swing all the way around, but you get my point.

It is the fulcrum.

And the door can function properly when the hinge is properly installed, properly aligned, and strong.

When that hinge is even just loose, the door does not work the right way. Let alone if the hinge is completely busted off the wall.

The reflection for us is: Are we unhinged in our faith?

Do we let our faith be the center that everything else both draws its strength from, functions from, and works around?

Or have we become unhinged—detached from the very thing that’s supposed to hold us in place?

Let us pray.

Lord, don’t let our faith become loose or detached. Make it the strong center point that everything else in our lives draws from and revolves around. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Keep fighting the good fight. Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.