Return to Me.....

This quote is from Loyola Press, A Jesuit Ministry-

Return to Me with Your Whole Heart

From the first day of Lent, the Ash Wednesday readings make God's call to us clear: "Return to me with your whole heart" (Joel 2:12 NAB). It is an extraordinary invitation from God to each one of us - to me in a personal, individual way. God invites me to drop the defenses that I hold up between myself and God. God wants us to realize that our standards, our ways of judging and loving, are very different from God's way, and so much smaller. God loves each one of us. For an entire Lenten season, for an entire lifetime, God loves each one of us. "A clean heart create for me, God," Psalm 51:12 NAB offers. "Give me back the joy of your salvation." That is exactly what our loving God wants to give us, the joy of salvation. This is the invitation of each day of Lent. Today is the day to accept it.

For me, personally, it has always been difficult to accept that God truly loves ME.  I think as I have gotten older, and I hope wiser, certainly more mature (read more wrinkles) that I have learned I am a perfectionist.  I don't like this about myself.

I don't think perfectionism is an admirable quality in myself.  It helps me to be successful- sometimes- but it also hurts me.  It doesn't let me see what I do well, it doesn't let me enjoy the moment now, I spend to much time hoping to be "the perfect Jennie."

I truly believe God wants us to strive to be as perfect as we can- but he does not EXPECT us to reach that goal.  Here is another quote that helps me- and this is my favorite:

For God so loved the world that he gave^* his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.^k

It can be found here if you are looking for a Catholic Bible.

Of course, this quote is also found in Protestant Bibles :). 

I wasn't always Catholic- I was BLESSED to find my home in the Roman Catholic Church- and it was the crucifix that called to me, and that symbol, which is sometimes misunderstood, comforts me still when times are hard.