A Beacon in the Night

{A call to LEAD}

Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words.

St. Francis of Assisi

In my last post I mentioned that I had had the opportunity to go on three incredible retreats this summer. The most amazing by far, was a week long retreat called, LEAD, in Steubenville, Ohio at the college I'l be attending starting next year. 

L. E. A. D.

Leadership. Evangelization And. Discipleship. 

What drew me to LEAD was the fact that it was 100% focused on strengthening your personal relationship with Christ so that we become so deeply rooted in Christ that the world must first find Christ in order to find us. 

But we can't do this on our own. We must rely on the strength and grace of God through a strong, steady daily prayer life and (for the Catholics), frequent reception of the Sacraments. 

And God wants us to have a strong spiritual community to turn to, filled with people who will pray for you, uphold you and encourage you. One of the biggest blessings of the internet and technology is the fact that you can be a part of a rich spiritual community filled with with people spread across the corners of the Earth. 

I know I want to be a beacon in the perpetual dark of night this world revolves in. 

Do you? 

-mk

I Will Not Be Afraid

I wanna be reckless
Cause You are endless
I wanna be shameless
And shout Your greatness
I will not be afraid
To surrender my way
And follow who You are
I wanna be reckless, reckless

                               (Reckless // Jeremy Camp)

As I drove to work today I turned the radio on. I wasn't really paying attention to the music playing, my thoughts were occupied with driving, and the mountain of homework and editing I had for the weekend.  

But all of sudden I heard the words I will not be afraid, To surrender my way. 

My attention turned completely to the song as the words hit home. 


I wanna be reckless, Cause You are endless.

 And follow who You are, I wanna be reckless, reckless.

 Right now I'm trying to figure where God wants me. I'm completely torn between two amazing colleges and I want to choose the right one for me. The one God wants me at. 

As I listened to the song, I realized I needed to let go of my fears and concerns. I love both colleges but sometimes I get myself worried about different aspects of each college. Or about college in general. 

How am I going to handle all the work? Will I feel at home right away and become great friends with people right away? Will I still have time for my photography?

I will not be afraid.

Cause You are endless.

Such a simple reminder. I will flourish where ever God wants me at.

Trust Him. Follow Him.  
 And I will not be afraid. 

~Mary Kate

(song -> Reckless // Jeremy Camp)

Fear Not

Last Wednesday, our phone rang at 12:30AM. My dad and I were still awake and he answered, it was my Aunt. My dad's younger brother was in severe pain and she had no idea what to do. My dad was pretty sure it was a kidney stone (he had one this past fall) so he told my Aunt to call an ambulance and take him to the ER. My dad then drove over to their house and was able to go with them to the hospital.

The next morning I found out that it was a lot more serious than a kidney stone. At 3:00AM my Uncle had had emergency surgery because a CAT scan showed that his aorta had ruptured and he was bleeding to death internally. ( I really dislike human anatomy -always have - so I don't know much about your aorta, but I know it's the artery that all the other ones pour into, and it's the main one).

I also found out that my Uncle, he should have died. The surgeon told my Aunt and Dad that if the only reason my Uncle was alive was the fact that the rupture was in the back of the aorta.

My Aunt and Uncle have four kids, ages 10-3, and another baby is due in October. This past week their youngest, Lauren, has been staying at our house. And today her older sister (6) joined her at our house. Nights are especially rough as first Lauren, and then tonight, both girls cried for their Mom and Dad. I've spent the past two nights sleeping on our recliner in our living room with Lauren on my lap because she only sleeps if you hold her.

My Uncle moved out of the ICU today, but he'll be at the hospital for a while longer. Please pray for my Uncle, Aunt and cousins. This was so sudden and everything happened so fast. It's crazy to think that he's already been in the hospital for an entire week.

Thank you for your prayers!
~Mary Kate

Linking up to Sctipture and a Snapshot

His

As I was reading Isiah this morning this verse jumped out at me. I almost didn't pay special attention to it.

Am I praising God through my photography? Or am I taking all the praise? After all He made everything in my photos and He gave me the gift of photography and He helped me get enough money for my camera and equipment.

 Later on in the same passage, Isiah says,

                         "Human pride will be abased, the arrogance of men brought low, And the Lord alone will be exalted, 
                           on that day the idols will perish forever." Isiah 3:17-18


So today I want to praise God in all his glory for everything he has made and everything he has given me.

Because He is GOOD.

~Mary Kate

Where I'll Be

This Monday I will be joining over 350,000 people in the 39th Annual March for Life in downtown Washington D.C.

Last year' March they was an estimated amount of 400,000 people:


It means sacrificing, time, sleep and comfort.

It means being outside in the freezing temperatures.

It means being a WITNESS. Being a VOICE for the over 40,000,000 babies that have been killed in the U.S. alone since abortion became legal in 1973.

And every year the number of marchers has grown.



Thank you to all my fellow marchers. This will make a difference. In 38 marches the number of marchers as gone from 20,000 to 400,000. And 2005 in San Francisco the Walk for Life began with just over 7,000 participents. This past year over 40,000 people participated in the Walk for Life.
That's almost half a million US citizens raising their voices for the unborn.




I can't describe the emotions that go on that day. And only those who have been able to participate in the March (or Walk) will understand. It is truly incredible to be able to participate in this amazing day.

One of my pictures from last year.

If you can spare 12 minutes of your time than I encourage you to watch this video:

How an Abortion Saved the Lives of Many from Rebecca Keliher on Vimeo.


Life is Precious.

~Mary Kate

I've been loving...

Beautiful light...

A clean family room and books...

My SAT prep book (it's so helpful!)...

My YouCat that came...

Silly, cute little brothers with amazing light for the perfect pictures...

my personal favorite. :) shows his wacky personality (he's 4)

Beautiful eyes...

Can you see our chimney reflected in his eye?

At some point in the next few weeks I will be renting a 50mm lens and then taking 1 year old portraits of my cousin and 1 year anniversary portraits for the same couple I did last year for their engagement portraits. (All for free, for gifts and for my portfolio and practice).
~Mary Kate

Changes

Dear Friends, 


Hi! I hope your life is going good. I just got back from a two day retreat with my youth group. It was an amazing retreat and probably among the best I've been on. While on the retreat God made it clear to me that I needed to make some changes in my life. This blog is only a month old, but it's already quickly become one of the most important things in my life. I cared about it way too much. And what I cared about most, was what people thought about my pictures. I was becoming almost addicted to checking this blog to see if I had any new followers or comments. 


And so I've taken down most of my pages ( I now only have the About Me page) and I'm in the process of writing a couple new pages, one that explains what my purpose is in this blog and the changes I've made, and the other in explaining what I believe and why. I realized that there is no need to share my bucket list, in fact for me it  was a selfish thing (I'm not saying everyone who has a bucket list up is selfish, I really enjoy reading your bucket lists), I wanted you all to see it and read it and like it. But why? What was the point?


I think one of the major changes is, I'm not allowing comments anymore. This has nothing to do with a negative comment or an uncomfortable comment. I loved your comments, way too much. The problem that I realized on the retreat was that everything I posted was for the point of getting new comments, being "popular:" in the blogging world. I wanted to be noticed by people and I wanted my photography to be appreciated. At first it wasn't a bad thing, but it got to the point that this blog was becoming one of the top priorities in my life which it should not be. Not allowing comments is going to be really, really hard for me, as I will continue to post and I hope you'll continue to read and follow but I will have no idea if anyone as read or cared about what I posted. (I am in the process of getting another e-mail, one for this blog so you can e-mail me questions, I'm assuming they'll be mostly concerning what I believe, although I hope to avoid any negative e-mails).


And I'm not strictly doing the 365 Challenge anymore. This time I didn't "fail" but I stopped because it's unimportant compared to my prayer life, my family and my school.


Lastly, I hope to blog of more important things and not just blog to get comments, or get followers, or complete a challenge or simply to have more posts in a month.


So thank you. Thank you for reading and commenting in the past, thank you for following and for you sweet words that made me smile and gave me a nice warm feeling. I will continue to try and read and comment on your beautiful blogs when I can. And thank you in advance for continuing to read and follow my blog.


Remember: Jesus loves you.


~Mary Kate