Transcript

When a person enters into the Catholic Church, their study of the Catholic faith shouldn't end there.

No, our, our entire lives should be filled with studying the riches of our Catholic faith because we can never exhaust it.

One of the greatest things that I've found in, in helping me to understand our faith better is just simply to study the lives of the saints.

The saints' lives are, are like little catechisms themselves, each one of them, because they each show forth the marvelous beauty of our Catholic faith in a different way.

Books written by the saints as well can be extremely helpful.

In my own life, reading the works by Teresa of Avila, most especially The Way of Perfection and Her Interior Castle, the works of Saint John of the Cross, of, of Saint Therese of Lisieux, Saint Francis de Sales's Introduction to the Devout Life, all of these books are, are marvelous tools that, that help us to understand our faith but they also increase within us zeal and love for God.

Reading these works by our great saints makes us want to be saints ourselves.

And that's one of the great fruits of studying, uh, as a Catholic.

My favorite book of the Bible is the Psalms.

It's about David, uh, the man after Jesus' heart, and his lamenting.

His lamenting to, to the Lord.

Uh, it w- For, for me, it provides a, uh, a model of approaching the Lord's throne of grace, and in doing so, um, I can bring to Him my distress, my sufferings, my pains, and the commission of my sins.

So, I'm always finding a need, actually, and one way to do that is to go to Him with a contrite heart and lament.

I, I love, um, the Divine Mercy Diary, which is the, a diary by Sister Faustina, a young nun who was, who was, um, um, who was told by the Lord to, uh, write the Divine Mercy Chaplet and to, um, and to create a image, an image of Him, of the Divine Mercy.

And what I have learned from her is that, is how she suffered physically from her disease but also suffered, um, disbelief about her commission from the Lord.

Also, how she was diligent in prayer, always to ask the Lord for direction about her, His mission to her, about, about the image, but also in prayer for others.

He told her to pray at 3:00 PM for the mercy of the sick and the dying and she did this every day, no matter where she was.

She adored, uh, Divine M- She adored, um, Eucharistic Adoration.

She was, she had a very m- humble life as a nun.

She cooked in the kitchen, folded, folded the linen, but she was very dedicated to her love, her love for the Lord.

You don't have to digest it in one day.

You can read just one section, but it's a beautiful, um, description of one who loved the Lord and followed His, His, His plan for her life.

Some of my favorite, um, spiritual reading, uh, some of the books that I have learned the most from and gotten the most out of, um, are Theology and Sanity by Frank Sheed.

It's a very good overview of what it means to, um, be Catholic.

Um, Thomas Howard's On Being Catholic.

And, um, as far as writings of the saints, um, Introduction to Devout Life by F- Francis de Sales, um, for me, didn't feel like so much of an introduction.

It felt, um, and still does, you know, like a challenge.

Um, and it's wonderful.

I, I enjoy the challenge.

Saint Therese of Lisieux's Story of a Soul is a, just a beautiful spiritual work.

Um, and I greatly enjoy reading historical fiction on the lives of the saints.

Um, it's a fun and very palatable way to learn a lot of the stories of the saints.

Another book that I really enjoyed and that really spoke to me was Walter Ciszek's With God in Russia.

And reading, reading that book, reading what this man went through, um, the life that he lived, starving, freezing, um, being worked to death, being beaten in the gulags in Russia, um, really put into perspective how small the crosses are that I've been given.

Um, you know, it's, sometimes you get caught up in your day and you think, You know, I'm tired.

I didn't sleep.

I was up feeding babies all night.

Now I've got a toddler throwing Cheerios all over the floor and I still need to, you know, educate my older children.

Um, and it can be easy to fall into the trap of complaining, but it helps me to read about the lives of the saints and the paths that they've had to walk, um, and it puts my life back into perspective and also provides a how-to manual.

Um, reading spiritual works, you know, your study, your study of the church doesn't end with RCIA. That's just the beginning.

Um, it's so important to continue to learn about the church and about its members who have thrived within her and have attained the ultimate goal of heaven and understanding how it is that they, that they did that.