Denver, Colo., Apr 22, 2019 / 03:00 am (CNA).- Jenna Guizar grew up without any sisters.
But these days, Guizar relishes having a “sisterhood” of digital and physical communities of Catholic women around the world.
Guizar presides over a growing international women’s ministry, Blessed is She, which will mark its fifth year in September. The ministry began as a web-based devotional for Catholic women based on the day’s Mass readings.
“I loved what some of the Protestant women’s ministries were doing with Scripture study, inviting women to spend time daily in the Word. I wanted that for Catholic women, too,” Guizar, 35 and the mother of four daughters, explained.
“I saw an opening for this kind of content for women, and a hunger in the Church. I was hungry for it, too, and I didn’t see it happening in the Church, but I never thought of going elsewhere, I wanted to be fed in the Catholic Church.”
Now Guizar, along with a small staff and a national team of writers, whose contributions are vetted by theological editors, is feeding more than 60,000 women around the world with a daily email that delivers reflections on the Mass readings, along with a link to the readings themselves on the USCCB website.
On social media, tens of thousands follow along in regional Facebook groups, forming virtual communities that have morphed into hundreds of physical communities around the world.
On Blessed is She’s Instagram account, which has more than 100,000 followers, retreat director Beth Davis hosts a popular segment called ‘Teachable Tuesday,’ where she gives instruction different Catholic methods of prayer, wisdom from the lives of the saints, and deeper dives into Scripture.
Participants pop on at the beginning of the segment and announce their geographical locations: Ireland, Australia, Tanzania, Mexico, and the United States.
“Basically my whole adult life has been spent working for the Church,” says Davis, “but I’ve never experienced what we experience with these women every day, on retreats, on Instagram, in regional groups.
“There’s almost too much to choose from, she said, when asked for stories about her experience. “[We have] stories of women coming home to the Church, of becoming Catholic, of encountering Jesus for the first time in spite of years of knowing Him on an intellectual level.”
“What makes Blessed is She different is that it’s not about one person, there is no cult of personality. It’s all focused on Christ.” Davis explained, and Guizar agreed, when asked what she thought was driving the ministry’s growth.
“We’re just here walking alongside the women we serve, as women who are experiencing deeper conversion in their own lives,” added Guizar, explaining that she doesn’t see herself as doing anything extraordinary, apart from being available and willing to answer a need to which she herself felt drawn.
“My own personal, daily conversions happen in large part because of Blessed is She. I feel a great responsibility and honor to be given this ministry by the Lord. I feel a great responsibility to draw closer and closer to Him so that I can be the leader and woman He wants me to be,” Guizar said.
Guizar recalls one of the first times she realized Blessed is She might become something bigger than she’d envisioned:
“It was getting close to Advent during our first year, and I thought I’d like to make a little prayer journal and offer it to our subscribers. I had no idea whether it would sell, I just created it in a computer program and self-printed them. But we ended up with more than 800 presales. That’s probably the first time I started to realize this was going to be a lot bigger than me.”
Both Guizar and Davis said that working for the ministry has deepened their spiritual lives.
“I get to come to work every day with someone who prays with me, asks me about my prayer life, who really lives an example of personal holiness,” said Guizar of Davis, “it’s so good for me.”
She continued, “My spiritual life has changed dramatically through the discipline of prayer. I feel drawn to live a life of integrity. If I’m asking a woman to do something in her life, I better be doing it as well… like I have to be living this out in order to talk about it.”
Guizar recounts growing up in a dynamic youth group in the Diocese of Phoenix: “After youth group there was nothing to fill that void of community in my life as an adult. We had good friends and we had a good parish, but we didn’t feel like we were growing in our faith, and we didn’t feel like our relationships were really rooted in Christ.”
“I needed this community for my own conversion” Guizar said.
She recalls feeling a growing sense of isolation as a young mother, struggling to find her place in the Church.
“I wasn’t homeschooling my kids or doing liturgical crafts. I was fascinated by that experience when I read about it, but it wasn’t my life. I felt like I had more questions than answers. I didn’t have any wisdom or experience to offer.”
That’s when Guizar conceived of a daily Bible devotional modelled after some of the Protestant women’s ministries she admired. “I knew of all these Catholic bloggers, women with a deeper knowledge of Scripture and with more formation than me, so I reached out and invited them to contribute.”
That was back in the fall of 2014. The first Blessed is She devotion went out on September 1, 2014. By the end of the year, more than 200 women had signed up to receive the emails. By 2015, that number had increased to more than 2,000 women. And by early 2019, that number had risen to more than 60,000.
50% of Blessed is She participants are millennials – or younger – falling between the ages of 18 and 35. Women between 36 and 65 make up another 35% of the demographic.
Blessed is She brunches and retreats now make up a significant portion of the ministry’s focus, with more than 400 member-hosted brunches logged in 2018. So far in 2019, more than 500 women have attended a Blessed is She retreat somewhere in the US or abroad. Still to come this calendar year: retreats in Nashville, Texas, and Ireland.
If you ask for stories of how Blessed is She is impacting women’s lives, the answers come back to a common theme: community.
Oliva Spears, a Blessed is She writer who manages the site’s blog content recounts “dozens of messages” from women who are coming back to the Church through their involvement with Blessed is She:
“Faithful Catholic women who are lacking community in real life and who’ve felt like they’re the only Catholic left on the planet” are finding out they’re not alone, and being encouraged by other women who are following Christ.
Nell O’Leary, Blessed is She’s managing editor, remarks on the community built in the regional Facebook groups that becomes “real, in-the-flesh friendship.”
O’Leary said, “One older woman had prayed specifically for a young mom who was moving to her city to find the perfect house. When those two met at my Blessed Conversations group, they embraced like old friends. The bonds of sisterhood transcended age, location, and even the internet.”
Bonnie Engstrom, another contributing writer, told the story of re-watching an old ‘Teachable Tuesday’ recording on Instagram with her small group in her parish:
“Beth talked about how God’s not finished until He is finished. She specifically said that to older moms whose children have left the Church and there were so many grandma’s present who felt so reassured by that. These are women who are in church every day, praying for their children. They felt heard by God through Beth’s words.”
Guizar touched on the theme of community repeatedly in an interview with CNA, emphasizing its significance to the heart of the ministry.
“I want women to know that the Lord loves them right where they’re at, and that He wants to bring restoration and healing, that He will bring it.”
When asked about how her four young children fit into the mission, Guizar acknowledged the tension between being open to life and leading an international ministry,
“Mike [my husband] is great about it, he is always saying, ‘If the Lord wants it right now, it’s going to happen.’ We don’t shy away from having more kids, because we want more kids to know the Lord, to live as missionaries in a secular culture.”
Guizar says she doesn’t have a plan for Blessed is She, but is just trying to be faithful.
“The Lord gave me Blessed is She to save my soul every day,” she said. “I really believe it was as much for me as for the women who we serve.”
“I have no idea where Blessed is She will be in five years. I had dreams at the beginning that I think have evolved now, into an acknowledgement that even if I had a plan, He would surprise me anyway. So I’m just along for the ride.”
Editor’s note: In addition to her work at CNA, Jenny Uebbing is a periodic freelance contributor to Blessed is She.
[…]
Once again hasty statements set down on paper before a full investigation is rolled out. How juvenile – or is politically motivated?
That which has been reported by investigators gives people in high positions an opportunity to speak seriously about the motivation admitted by Mr. Long for committing murder of eight persons.
Atlanta Shooting Suspect Told Police He Targeted Massage Parlors Because of Sex Addiction – WSJ
By Valerie Bauerlein and Cameron McWhirter
Updated March 17, 2021 7:58 pm ET
TEXT
“ATLANTA—Robert Aaron Long, the suspect in the killing of eight people at three massage parlors in the Atlanta area, told investigators that he targeted the businesses because he blamed them “for providing an outlet for his addiction to sex,” law-enforcement officials said.”
“Mr. Long, who is in custody, took responsibility for the shootings and said he acted alone, according to the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office.”
“It’s a temptation for him that he wanted to eliminate,” Capt. Jay Baker said. “He said it was not racially motivated.”
Here is an opportunity for those in high places to speak to the damaging effects of pornography addiction which apparently according to Mr. Long’s statement was his motivation for the terrible slaughter he perpetrated. Mr. Long was a customer at massage parlors, he was deranged in his addiction and he killed eight people in cold blood “because he blamed them ‘for providing an outlet for his addiction to sex,'”
Why are our leaders(?) not addressing this serious issue of pornography plaquing our society. Guess it is easier or more politically appealing to blame it on race. Where’s the right thinking? – gone out the window. In other words, right thinking has become very unpopular – so go with the flow, people. After all, swimming up stream requires the vision of a goal to be reached, motivation and strong muscle. Softies in high places are flabby, unable to address the issues when it comes to the “seamy side of the garment” These spineless softies are unfit for strong leadership, and grasp at straws rather than “take the bull by the horns.” Where are the John the Baptist, Thomas Moore and St. Paul types when we need them? Gone, I guess. Instead we have elites sitting in their plush offices setting down politically palatable baloney.
That the victims were all Asian probably had nothing to do with it, I presume.
“I must eliminate temptation by killing asians in their massage parlors”
Is a pseudo-religious reason so much more palatable, or non-exclusive to racism? I wonder why it’s almost always white people who are the first to say “it wasn’t racist!” when minorities are killed. Look, you aren’t being impugned here Rosemarie; it’s ok.
Why are you assuming Rosemarie is white? What does her ethnicity have to do with her basic argument? Nothing at all, actually. Why are you also assuming that the motives had to be racial when there is no evidence to support that at present? Check your own biased and privileged assumptions first please.
Not all the victims were Asian. Get your facts straight. Do you have any familiarity at all with crime statistics? Do you know who commits disproportionate shares of violent crime in the US? Hint: It is not white males. A casual review of interracial crime statistics is even more revealing.
J.K.
From what I read, these particular targeted parlors were not illegal.
1) Mr. Long was deranged in his addiction and he killed eight people in cold blood–that is as insane as if an alcoholic tried to eliminate liquor stores because they were a temptation for him to buy liquor.
2) Some congressional and clerical leaders jumped to conclusions as to what Mr. Long’s criminal motivation was before a full investigation has been carried out. That kind of hasty exercise does not exhibit right thinking.
What happens so often with congressional and clerical leaders is that the immediate crux of the problem is laid at the doorstep of firearms or race.
Anyone interested in viewing a sliver of the ugly underbelly of human or drug trafficking can look at the billion dollar industries in a few of the links below:
Chinese moms in America’s illicit massage parlors – SupChina
New solutions for the old problem of illegal massage parlors (apnews.com)
(U) Drug Trafficking Organizations – National Drug Threat Assessment 2010 (UNCLASSIFIED) (justice.gov)
Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations (fas.org)
https://news.trust.org/item/20210301101717-gtrmv/
Canned tuna making ‘glacial progress’ in tackling modern slavery (trust.org)
“The global fishing sector is rife with allegations of abuse – human trafficking, debt bondage … and even murder,” BHRRC’s Pacific representative Amy Sinclair told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“But despite continued high demand for canned tuna, our research found there had been glacial progress on action by leading brands when it comes to workers trapped in modern slavery in the Pacific,” she added.
See – it’s all about money and power. Human lives are expendable at the trafficking scene. What a tragedy! That is the problem which needs to be addressed.
I eagerly await the bishops’ statement denouncing the murder of white Christians by a Muslim immigrant terrorist in Colorado yesterday. Of course, no such thing is in the works. The response to this one will be a call for gun control and more funding for mental health services. There also will be warnings against any backlash or scapegoating. Under no circumstances, will it be acceptable to argue against letting more of the adherents of the “religion of peace” into the country.