Author: Carrie Sue Barnes

Carrie Sue Barnes is a fiction author and blogger who fell in love with creative writing as a grade schooler in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. She resides now in Wisconsin with her family, often pulling her love for the Midwest into her writing. Carrie Sue's debut novel, The Hidden Legacy, was released in 2018 by Bold Vision Books to strong reviews. Since then, she has published several short stories and continues to write short fiction and faith-inspired reflections on this site. Carrie Sue loves reading, kayaking, hugging her children and friends, rewatching The Office, and connecting with readers in person and on social media.
Catholicism, Faith, Scripture

Listening to the Apostles

Carrie Sue Barnes

I feel like blogging but I don’t feel much like thinking. The light above my desk is particularly bothersome today. It seems brighter than usual, glaring off my screen and making me wish I could close my eyes… or at least wear a dorky visor cap.

Over the weekend, I decided to begin reading the catholic letters of the New Testament. I’ve read them all before, but in pieces and for various reasons, never straight through and with a single mindset for all seven of them. The ones I’m referring to are the Letter of St. James, the Letter of St. Jude, the 2 Letters of St. Peter, and the 3 Letters of St. John. They’ve come to be known as the catholic letters, as in, written for the universal church (the word catholic means universal), as a way to distinguish them from St. Paul’s letters and the Letter to the Hebrews which are written to more specific groups or individuals. This term is not intended to separate them as Catholic vs Protestant. St. Paul was Catholic, folks. All Christians were Catholic during the time of the New Testament writings and for centuries upon centuries afterward.

The nature of my faith and life in the Church as apostolic has been on my mind. Every time I recite the Creed, I declare that I believe in an apostolic Church. The heritage of the Church, with its ordained bishops and priests able to trace themselves back to the original Apostles, and its teachings arising from the earliest days of the Christianity and never departing from the teachings of Christ and the Apostles (developing in understanding, yes, but departing, no), this heritage is immensely important and wonderful. There is such security in it; security in truth. So I greatly value the apostolic Church, but do I recognize the need for my own faith, the way I understand it and live it, to be apostolic as well? This question reaches me from two angles. One is that I am to be rooted in the apostolic teachings, never weakening or compromising the fullness of truth for my own convenience, but taking full advantage of the deposit of faith that was entrusted to the Church by Christ and passed down faithfully over generations by the Apostles and their successors. Two, I mustn’t forget that to be an apostle one must be sent out on a mission. The switch between disciple and apostle came when the men were commissioned by Jesus to go into the world and preach the Gospel and build up the Church. They are no longer only followers of Christ but also emissaries of His teachings and life. The Church is apostolic in both of these ways (faith & mission), and the Church is made up of its members. The members must be apostolic in both ways too. I must be apostolic.

So as all this inhabits my thoughts and challenges my heart, I figure a good place to start is with the catholic letters. What did the apostles want to say to the Church in those first decades of Christianity? That same Church is the one of which I am a member, the one that provides me with the Sacraments and the fullness of truth, so I would gain much by listening to those first ministers of the Sacraments and teachers of the truth.

Catholicism, Friendship

Fr. Mike Chenier

Carrie Sue Barnes
Time to attempt this. I know my words will fall short of capturing all that Mike’s ordination meant to everyone there, and especially all that it meant to him.

On Friday afternoon, Jessica, Amy and I took our seats at St. Peter’s Cathedral in Marquette, Michigan for the ordination to the priesthood of Mike Chenier and Ben Haase. We arrived early enough to sit near the front. Approximately a thousand people attended the Ordination Mass. With the cathedral seating around seven hundred, the walls were layered with the additional hundreds of men and women in attendance. In the minutes prior to the great, dignified procession, after the prelude music and before the magnificent choir began singing, I felt the same anticipation and eager joy that hangs in the air at the start of a wedding. We were so like the family and friends awaiting the entrance of the wedding party and the bride. I thought how fitting that atmosphere was, for something much like a wedding would occur. Mike would be conformed to Christ, the Bridegroom, and the Church would be his bride. He would commit himself to serve, to honor and to support the Church after the pattern of Christ’s own sacrificial love. As the Mass began, the only way to describe the presence of that huge congregation is thunderous. In our fervent responses during the penitential rite, in our heartfelt songs reverberating between the pillars of the cathedral, and in our applause when Mike and Ben were presented to Bishop Sample for the Sacrament of Holy Orders, the thousand of us made our joy and thankfulness known.

Every bit of the Mass was beautiful in the truest sense of beauty. My first tears came with the first reading. The passage from Jeremiah, Chapter One spoke of God’s holy plans for his servant Jeremiah, plans made even before Jeremiah was created. God stops Jeremiah’s objections of youth and meager ability, assuring him that he will be able to do all that God calls him to do. A familiar passage, surely, but fresh to my ears as I considered Mike. Youth was never his obstacle, as far as I knew him. Youth was his gift. Out of his childhood years with faithful parents, his teenage years of searching and finding and enjoying life, and his young adulthood marked by missionary service, college and seminary – from this youth came the willingness and joy for the call of Christ upon his life. I have loved Mike from the time we were thirteen, my brother and friend in the Lord. As I think of our friendship – how it began, how it grew, how it changed – I smile over how fitting it is that the gifts and strengths in Mike that blessed me in our years of knowing each other will be, over time, the means for Christ to bless so many others through Mike, the priest. If I am to choose one aspect of this, it must be his generosity in love. The love Mike has always offered has been marked by an eagerness to share life. Whenever Mike loved something, if he found joy or beauty or blessing in it, he had to share it. A song, a book, a scenic sight, a passage of Scripture – if Mike loved it , it had to be shared. I cannot succinctly summarize the occasions I was blessed by this. When I attended Mass on Sunday, celebrated by Fr. Mike, he confirmed in my mind and heart this impression he has made on me with his generous spirit and the goodness he finds in living for Christ. He spoke of finding something you love so much that you cannot stand not to share it, not to bless others by it, not to live for it and be willing to die for it.

Returning to the Ordination Mass, another notable aspect of the joy I had in attending was in seeing the lasting fruit of our years among the youth groups in the Diocese of Marquette. I saw faces on Friday that I have rarely seen, if at all, in the last seven or eight years. Faces of faith and friendship that became so dear to me as God was forming me into a woman of Chrsit. Each of their lives is a testament to the formation we received as teenagers, and Mike’s ordination to the priesthood is a pinnacle among them.

The beauty I witnessed on Friday, and again as I attended Sunday Mass with Fr. Mike as celebrant, was due to a very simple truth. There were many contributing factors to name and describe, but at the heart of it is this: here was a man doing God’s will in a precise, committed, humble but confident manner. Here was a man living the life to which God called him, the life that the Lord planned and knew even before Mike was born. There, in that, is happiness.
Catholicism, Faith, Family, Holiness, Love

In This Way The Love of God Was Revealed

Carrie Sue Barnes

This morning, I read this great reflection by Father Thomas Rosica on the nature of the Trinity as a divine community. A snippet toward the beginning sums up the author’s intent in drawing our attention to that nature: “If our faith is based in this Trinitarian mystery that is fundamentally a mystery of community, then all of our earthly efforts and activities must work toward building up the human community that is a reflection of God’s rich, Trinitarian life.”

As a lifelong Catholic, I’ve heard much talk of human dignity, of every man and woman’s unique possession of the image of God within themselves. This great dignity constitutes a call to reflect God, to be formed more perfectly into His image by the thoughts we have, the words we speak, the actions we take. This individual imaging of divinity is of inestimable importance if a person is to every grasp the meaning and purpose of life. It cannot be emphasized enough. What I cannot claim to have heard a lot about is the manner in which the human community is called and is able to image the community of Persons of the Trinity. Every family, every church community, every small group Bible study, every ministry group, every intimate community of friends; the list is unending as we are a people who functions in the setting of community. Like each person possesses the dignity of being made in God’s image and the potential of reflecting Him in the world, so every community of human persons possesses dignity and potential of reflecting the Trinity. I still remember this dawning on me as a brand new understanding of the purpose of family when it was explained to me in my Marriage & Family course at Franciscan U. This call to be an image of the Trinity has become my primary weapon against the fears that would hold me back from giving myself as a spouse and a parent someday.

The author of the article makes a significant point when he explains that the language of the Trinity, that is, the manner in which we understand this great mystery, is relational. “For God, as for us, created in God’s image, relationship and community are primary. God can no more be defined by what God does than we can. God is a Being, not a Doing, just as we are human beings, not human doings. This is a point of theology, but also, with all good theology, a practical point.” In fact, this point is not only practical but also fundamental. It is fundamental to the Christian understanding of the dignity and worth of each human life, measured not in what that life is able to do or contribute or accomplish but rather in the glorious fact of that life being another instance of God’s image and likeness existing in this world. God’s image and likeness! That is what we are. What we do and say is our means for communicating that image and likeness in the world, but it is not who we are as human beings.

What I am trying to come around to is that the individual is made in the image of a community, for God is a community of divine persons, and therefore the individual cannot live up to his or her dignity without living in relationship. As such each talent, strength and ability possessed by an individual is not possessed for their sole benefit. No, it is for the community; for the family. Whether that family is your own by blood or by marriage, or that family is your closest friends or your church community, the answer to your individual call to be God’s image in this world is played out in relationship with others. Holding yourself back from such relationships is a two edged blade, cutting into your individual strength of faith and into the community’s. You deprive yourself of experiencing the reflection of the Trinity, and you deprive others of your contributions to that reflection.

I return to the earlier quotation: “all of our earthly efforts and activities must work toward building up the human community that is a reflection of God’s rich, Trinitarian life.” Sounds like something straight from St. Paul or St. John, doesn’t it? Maybe that’s why I’m loving it so much. I read those words and the natural instinct (‘natural’ insofar as our nature is fallen) to look out for myself pushes itself to the surface. Am I simply to spend myself entirely for others? Have I not also learned the value of an intimate one on one relationship with God? Have I not felt the strain of being too involved, too busy with my faith community? Ah, yes, valid objections. Valid, but signs of immaturity. Mature faith understands how the one on one intmacy with the Lord does contribute to the building up of the family of God. Mature faith trusts that if I pour myself out for others in the name of Christ, there will be others pouring themselves out for me in the name of Christ. Mature faith causes me to love without worry over the vulnerability of loving, to serve without the aim of gaining praise, to pray never only for myself.

One of my absolute favorite movie lines is from “Diary of a Mad Black Woman”. In a convincing speech, Orlando explains to Helen how he knew he was in love with her: “Helen, if I’m away from you for more than an hour, I can’t stop thinking about you. I carry you in my spirit. I pray for you more than I pray for myself.” It is not just the romantic in me who loves that speech (and its repetition when Helen finally realizes she loves, and is free to love, Orlando), it is also the Catholic in me. Orlando’s love, when it has been purified by the tests placed upon it and the patient compassion he has had to practice toward Helen, is not about him but about her. It is the case with every person who learns to love how God loves. God exists in a constant, uninterrupted relationship of perfect love: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Father eternally begets the Son in an outpouring of love; the Son eternally offers Himself back to the Father in love; the Holy Spirit is eternally begotten of the Father and the Son by the communication of their love for each other. All of this is contained in that mystery of faith, the Trinity; and all of this is reflected in human love. It is reflected in both our need for relationships and communities rooted in love and our capability of loving. I refer to agape love, to be specific, but I’m not going to try to explain all that here. Check out The Four Loves by C. S. Lewis.

At the end of this lengthy, rambling collection of this morning’s thoughts, I have a Jars of Clay song in my head. It’s the first track off their “Good Monsters” album, “Work.” I got to sit in on a Q&A session with the band one time and they explained the meaning behind that song. One thing they touched on was the need for community. Dan, the lead singer, talked about the human person being dragged down by the world, especially when that person is trying to live a life of faith, hope and love. A person can end up feeling like they need help just to keep breathing. That is what community is for; relationships with those whom God has given to you is His way of carrying you through. Likewise, you are someone He gives to others to carry them through.

I often pray the Glory Be, hoping that whatever I am doing at the moment will glorify Him. I cannot live out that prayer, giving “glory to the Father, to the Son and the Holy Spirit” if community and relationship are not primary in my life. I cannot honor the community of divine love that is the Trinity if I do not give myself to and receive from the community of that divine love on this earth, the Church.

“In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him. In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us. This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us, that he has given us of his Spirit.” (1 John 4:9-13)
Personal Reflection

Slowly Going Mad

Carrie Sue Barnes

Song #1 in my head:
Oh simple thing where have you gone/I’m getting old and I need something to rely on/So tell me when/You’re gonna let me in/I’m getting tired and I need somewhere to begin/And if you have a minute why don’t we go/Talk about it somewhere only we know?/This could be the end of everything/So why don’t we go/Somewhere only we know?

Song #2:
If you could be in my life like you’ve been on my mind/It’d be so easy/Hello, it’s me again/It’s three days now that you’ve been in my dreams/And I don’t know, I guess you’ve just been on my mind/I don’t know, I guess I think about you all the time

Song #3:
‘Cause you and I both loved/What you and I spoke of/And others just read of/Others only read of the love/Oh the love that I love

That’s right, it’s a trifecta of good music rolling around in the empty spaces. Keane, Schuyler Fisk, Jason Mraz; not a bad mental mix tape.

My coworker has officially blamed me for the Brewers’ terrible performances in their last two games. I didn’t know I had such powers from my seat on the living room sofa. Personally, I place the burden on the shoulders of those fellows masquerading as pitchers: Suppan and Parra, and on the less than wise lineup on Monday night. But if I have to take some of the heat on their behalf, so be it. Have to stand by the team.

One of the lights recessed in the ceiling tiles above the reception desk is blinking at annoying intervals. Nothing adds to the office ambience like a flickering flourescent bulb.

Do you know what sounds ideal to me right now? An outdoor movie and an ice cream sundae. What do you think my odds are of experiencing that in the near future? Maybe “Singin’ in the Rain” shown on the side of an old brick building, or the original “Superman” playing at the local drive-in, or “The Natural” on a canvas screen in a park. Yep, I’d be glad for any of those options. Just don’t forget the ice cream.

Love

Wile Away the Boredom

Carrie Sue Barnes

Yup, I’m bored. I am selfishly turning to this blog for some relief. It’s a slow week here at work. Anyone who knows me knows that is one of my least favorite circumstances. Boredom is torturous to me. So, I can’t promise this will be interesting or insightful, but blogging appears to be my only hope at the moment.

I am doing what I can to not dwell on all the things I would rather be occupying my time with instead of sitting at this desk, wondering how I’ll fill the hours until 5 pm. I just took a phone break to chat with Tina, my friend who will be married in 3 weeks. She had to give me the details on the rehearsal and dinner the night before the wedding. I am heartily fond of a good wedding. The wistful longing for my own wedding day always hits a day later, but I am able to delight in celebrating my friends’ weddings without jealousy. Plus, most weddings provide valid excuses to have more than one drink, eat cake and dance for hours. That’s one of my personal definitions of ‘a good time.’ Although, I do think it’d be awfully fun to have a date for one of these weddings I attend. Anyone interested? I promise a good time. No, not that sort of good time, but the fun, laughing, good food, good drinks, good conversation and of course dancing sort of good time.

I’m ridiculously happy for Tina. She’s one of God’s sweetest creatures, and hilarious on top of it. Then there are Brian and Addie, my friends who were married last Saturday. I met Brian nearly six years ago, shortly after I moved to Appleton. He was always going on blind first dates, rarely on second dates and almost never on third dates. He wanted to find her so badly. Comparing the Brian who I met then and the Brian who got married on Saturday, the gap of happiness and contentment between the two is immense. Funny how he didn’t find her through blind dates or singles groups or anything of the sort. She was a client of his a long time ago, then a longtime friend, then girlfriend. I’ve seen quite a few of my friends ‘settle down’ into family life, but Brian and Addie are among the only ones who really cause me to hope my chance for that relationship will come fairly soon.

Alright, this wasn’t intended to be a sappy love blog. So what else is on my mind besides weddings and falling in love?

Last night I got motivated, physically speaking, for the first time in a while. Busyness and discouragement have preyed on my willingness to make an effort at the gym, when I went to the gym at all. Whenever I slack for any length of time and then begin working out again, I am reminded just how big an idiot I can be. Discouraged? Listless? Restless mind? Hmm, what might help that? Oh I don’t know, maybe a little endorphin-producing, energy-supplying, head-clearing exercise. Silly girl. I’m feeling great today after the running I did yesterday (read: slow jogging with intervals of fast walking). Today it’s time to take it to the woods. I’m revisiting that old friend of mine, the county trail in Hortonville. It’s not what I consider hiking, but the wide, flat dirt path carved through the trees, creeks, swamps, and fields makes for a superb setting for walks, jogs or bike rides. Tonight I will probably just walk, watch the birds, chat with my sisters and nieces if they come along.

I’m impatient to make it to another Brewers game. Soon, I hope. Soon.

A friend, well, more of an acquaintance, ran a marathon last weekend. I’m so proud of him! Check out his video he made to sum up the experience. (FYI: the songs during the video are his own.)

Last year another friend, Jason, completed a triathalon. He spent months amazing me with his unshakable discipline in training. He and Jake both make me ponder the idea of pushing myself that hard for something. The only endeavor in which I’ve ever come close is writing my first novel. That was a marathon of its own kind. But I can’t claim to ever have challenged myself physically in such a manner as these guys have done.

And this concludes the boredom blog. If things are still this bad in the afternoon, perhaps I will pen a part two.

Faith

From the Floor

Carrie Sue Barnes

Sunday night I had a heart to heart with Jesus. Well, mostly it consisted of my heart bursting with expectations and stress and disappointments and discouragement, and His heart waiting patiently for me to quiet down so He could remind me of His faithful, trustworthy love. Sitting cross-legged on the red carpet floor of the church, I had only the light of the sanctuary candle catching on the golden doors of the tabernacle and a dozen candles lit beneath the feet of Mary. The silent darkness and empty pews beneath the high wooden ceiling beams supplied a feeling of humbled smallness. His presence reached to each corner of the room, filling every space and wrapping around me with a nearly tangible pressure. Being the sole breathing creature in the entire church building, I had only a minute of quiet thought before the need to speak aloud to the Lord overcame me. There were no excuses, no distractions, nowhere else I ought to be. I could hear rain, could smell its warm scent upon the air. And I could hear the Lord. How I missed that voice, so long lost in my foolish busyness and worry. Today I can feel the usual temptations and the familiar discouragements tugging at me. They want back in, like life-long household pets displaced to the backyard. For now, their persuasive pleas are not enough to change my mind. I prefer the silence, the smallness of being surrounded by the presence of God. I prefer my seat on the floor, at His feet.

My buddy Matt knows what I’m talking about…

Hope, Intentionality

Boldness

Carrie Sue Barnes

“It’s a bold move to Photoshop yourself into a picture with your girlfriend and her kids on a ski trip with their real father. But then again, Michael is a bold guy. Is bold the right word?” (Jim Halpert, “A Benihana Christmas” episode)

I experience frequent bursts of courage. They aren’t stretches or phases or anything else that might imply a lasting nature. No, my courage to make bold moves, decisions and statements comes in bursts; exciting little spurts that I find irresistable in the moment, and often regrettable after the fact. It’s true. When the courage hits me, it cannot be resisted. I am its dancing marionette. And boldness is a fickle, laughing puppeteer, swinging my arms and legs, opening my mouth and speaking for me. If I didn’t enjoy the passing moments of courage so much, I might build up some defenses against them. Isn’t it fun though? Isn’t it a thrill to say what you really long to say to someone, or to sign on for a challenge before reasoning with yourself against it? The power of that thrill, that self-daring willingness to try and willingness to fall, holds sway over me. Goethe (or whoever really made the statement) was right: boldness does have power and magic in it. He said it had genius too but maybe the presence of that characteristic shouldn’t be assumed. At least with me, it’s pretty hit or miss.

What is consistent is this experience of being true to myself. That’s what matters, according to Shakespeare, right? I have come to appreciate the integrity, the sincere engagement between my will and my actions that is involved in moments of boldness. Whether shallow and trite, or deep and meaningful, if the matter at hand requires any degree of courage, if it requires facing a moment of hesitancy with stubborn resistance, I am likely to consider it worth the effort. Is it always worth the effort? Is the bold choice always the right, the prudent, the wise choice? Are my instances of courage untainted by folly or selfishness? Nope. Lesson learned time and time again. Am I better off resisting though? I loathe the thought of becoming someone who is only guided by an “I know better than to try” or “I know better than to expect” attitude. How easily I might adopt that mindset! How self-contained and protected it would be! I won’t lie. Sometimes I wish for a little self-defense against the optimism and willingness to try that seems to come naturally to me. Sometimes self-contained and protected sound comforting. I’d not only have to sacrifice the boldness though; the self-respect would have to go too.