My Sisters the Saints by Colleen Carroll Campbell

My Sisters the Saints by Colleen Carroll Campbell was an inspiring book for me of a woman's deep faith and the saints who became her sisters along the path to her answered prayers because I could so readily identify with her through my own personal witness of redemptive suffering followed by the triumph of the cross in many adverse episodes of my own life This book really resonated with me. I never had a quest to understand the meaning of my feminine identity in light of my Christian faith and Italian upbringing and a culture shaped by modern feminism. My Italian upbringing especially largely due to my almost perfect mother solidified in me an unshakable view of what true femininity and womanhood were not. I found grace and inspiration from Mary, the Mother of God and through my dear Mamma’s selfless giving to me. Secular feminists were never appealing to me. I was never confused over sexual promiscuity or fidelity, professional success or family; marriage over cohabitation; or freedom over responsibility. I loved pleasure but my life was not driven by it. Love and liberation were not tied for me ever. In fact, what I would ultimately discover is that true liberation would come from my surrender to God' completely. Unrestricted Freedom was just a trap and a way that Satan would lure modern women under the guise of equal rights for women to total subjugation and slavery. My dear mother may have been a slave but she was a slave of God through her own volition. Saint Paul exhorts us to be slaves of Christ, to imitate HIs unconditional love and that is the love that my dear Mother refracted onto me through her exemplary deeds. My parents were not educated in the sense of formal schooling or through reading Scripture but they embodied Jesus in how they lived their daily lives. I, on the other hand, through my Catholic and public formal education cultivated a true love for my Catholic faith through frequent attendance of daily mass, the love of contemplative prayer, reading of scripture and spiritual books, reciting of the Rosary and other devotions and going to adore, thank, praise and petition my Lord and Savior at Eucharistic Adoration. I would come to fully realize later in life the incredible gifts and graces that I would receive through the beauty of my Catholic faith, its Church and most importantly, through its founder, our Lord, King, and Savior Jesus Christ. I also discovered EWTN and Relevant Radio later on in life and I am so indebted to them for the vast enrichment and deepening of my faith. I love everything about the Catholic Church:

1 Jesus as (God – man, Nativity, Crucifixion and Resurrection for Man's eternal salvation)

2 The Eucharist for my spiritual daily nourishment (my Heaven on Earth) - being with Jesus, truly present body, blood, soul, and divinity in communion with all the angels and Saints. Such a beautiful gift from God to us!

 3 The other six Sacraments- Reconciliation where all of my sins are absolved, Baptism which is the initiation or entry to the kingdom of God; Confirmation which is the continuation of God's grace to opening my heart to the gifts of the Holy Spirit especially the gifts of awe and wisdom; Marriage which is a union of two souls ( a man and a woman) to love as Christ loved us; Holy Orders which is to give us unbroken, apostolic succession to teach us the Gospel and to give us the body and blood of Christ in Persona Christi and lastly, Last Rites so that we may meet our Maker and make peace and be granted eternal life.

5 The Communion of Saints such as Saint Francis of Assisi, St Joseph, St Anthony, Saint John Paul II, Saint Gianna Molla, Saint Gerard, Blessed Francis Seelos for a few examples with their heroic love & faith in God to guide us through their illustrious example of love of God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). Colleen Carroll Campbell was able to get through her crosses and trials with the mystery of life, love, illness, and death through her encounter and inspiration with the following six female saints: Teresa of Avila, Therese of Lisieux, Faustina of Poland, Edith Stein of Germany, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and Mary of Nazareth. Her fascinating personal memoir, My Sisters the Saints was a great witness of faith and of authentic feminism for me.

4 The Blessed Virgin Mary (Our Lady of Lourdes, of Fatima, and of Medjugorje)

The Blessed Mother Mary is the perfect mother of God and of us all. She has always helped me in my trials and tribulations in a world that is imperfect and through it all always helping me to draw closer to Jesus, to help him, serve him and imitate him. Reciting my nightly rosary when I can before I fall asleep from exhaustion always gives me peace and a tremendous sense of hope because nothing is impossible for God. (Luke 1 verses 36-37). 

“Generations that called Mary blessed not only because of her unique privileges, but because of the role she plays in guiding the rest of us toward the complete union with God.”  Colleen Campbell

 God used a tumultuous pregnancy and Mary's example to teach me to truly love those who had hurt me in the past, to truly forgive them, and to truly love and trust my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To surrender completely, to accepting His will through my brokenness and through the miraculous birth of my first beautiful grandson I did not marvel that God transformed my life so radically but I thanked him with immense gratitude for having done so. My faith was never shattered, never doubted, just tested and triumphant.

 6 The Pope, the Catholic Church, Bishops, Priests and Sisters and Missionaries

I don't know what I would have done or who I would be today without the guidance, counseling and teaching by these holy, good, and beautiful mentors of imitators of Christ.

 7 The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass – (liturgy and sacrifice of Calvary)

 When I am at Mass I am at home with my Creator. I feel safe and at peace and the most joyful I could ever be.

 8 the Beatitudes of Christ on Mount Olive

 These are radical tenets for imitating Christ’s Compassion (Caritas)to my fellow man.

“Love one another as I have loved you.  Love God and love your neighbor and enemies as yourself.” This is a tremendous shift from the old Covenant to the New Covenant of Jesus Christ and very difficult to do. To follow the Ten Commandments is challenging enough but to follow the Beatitudes is even more challenging but definitively more edifying.

 9 The Cross

Christ gives us spiritual trials in our souls for those who love Him so that they may learn to love Him more. In Catholic school I was taught what my mother and father exemplified in their life, to unite my sufferings to the sufferings of Christ. “To err is human to forgive is divine.” Christ said to his Father on the cross, “ Forgive them for they know not what they do.”  My own father would always say that the best vendetta is to forgive. If we imitate Christ in loving and forgiving our enemy we get closer to Him and closer to perfect love (Caritas) as in Christ’s Passion. It takes God’s grace which alters our pride into humility. Christ’s love surpassed even that standard, as he gave his life not just for his friends but for those who had made him their enemy.

The six saints described by Colleen Carroll Campbell in her spiritual memoir illuminated the Christian life for me in a way that made me relate completely to her experience with them and with my own experience with the Catholic faith and my Italian upbringing.

I highly recommend this moving and powerful book of Colleen Carroll Campbell.