October is Financial Planning Month and National Retirement Security Month, with additional reminders throughout the month to focus on saving, credit, and planning for our financial future. There is something beautifully symbolic about the timing.

Sisters, we must be bold in our proclamation of the Gospel. In our church pews, in our schools, in our work, and in our families.

Several years ago now, when my husband and I were living in Ann Arbor, Michigan, we made an epic journey together to Hell and back. Now, I’m not trying to evoke a metaphor here to refer to a tumultuous time in our lives. Rather, I’m speaking about our trip to Hell, Michigan, a small and unconventional community in Livingston County. Whenever I think back to this trip, I am reminded of important life lessons on trust and encountering God in all circumstances.

In the life of a Catholic woman in business, distraction can masquerade as responsibility. Messages, meetings, client demands, research, family obligations, financial pressures, and new ideas all compete for our attention. We may be working constantly while becoming increasingly fragmented within. We react quickly but discern poorly, completing tasks without remembering what all the activity is meant to serve.

In this personal reflection on the feast day of St. Faustina, we are reminded to commit ourselves to the Lord as she did. Despite dealing with ridicule and doubt, and ultimately dying young after a painful illness, St. Faustina left a life that serves as an example for us all.

Devotion to the Holy Angels is the kind of book that asks you to slow down, reflect, and savor its words rather than rush to the final page. I expected a book I could read quickly, but the Rev. Henri-Marie Boudon asked something different of me: to pay closer attention, pause to absorb his teachings, and meditate on the beautiful gift of a Guardian Angel that God has given each one of us.