A Day Full of Miracles

Being love bombed by VatiGod

I’d been praying fervently for a while: for more trust in Jesus, less anxiety, and for a new job (or, I said, “not necessarily a job-job, but work that pays the bills and is spiritually fulfilling and gives glory to you, Lord”).

So last Wednesday, VatiGod* decided to love bomb me with a barrage of small miracles… all in the same day.

In the morning, I dropped off A. at work and went grocery shopping. I ran into T., a fellow Carmelite. She asked me how I was doing, and I said, “Still no job, and I’m still waiting for a certain document from Germany that I need for my job search.”

She said she would pray for me, and half an hour later, BOOM! an email came in with that same document. That alone would have made my day, but it got even better.

I think I mentioned that my guinea pig Stella is the best-catechized piggy in the world because whenever I leave the house, I put on EWTN/Catholic radio for her entertainment. (She’s crushing on Fr. Mike Schmitz, big time.) When I got in the door, the radio was on and I heard, “Do you think you might have a good radio voice? Do you have script writing abilities? Do you know how to promote? Then call B. at [phone number].”

Yes! Yes! Yes! I just about jumped up and down. That sounded right up my alley. I called the phone number for the radio station and left an enthusiastic message.

Short detour. Once upon a time in Germany, I had a phase where I wanted to break into broadcasting. There was this one crazy year—I was about 25—where I appeared on the German version of Wheel of Fortune (and won), became an unwitting protagonist on a prank show, applied for a job as TV host, made a demo tape, paid for the tape by moonlighting as a cable carrier at a late-night talkshow, started a radio internship, took voice training classes, and did some voiceovers for radio commercials and the party hotlines that were so popular in those days. (Gosh, I’m dating myself.) All of this happened while I was working a full-time job as a junior copywriter in an advertising agency. But I digress.

An hour later, another surprise. A well-dressed black kid my son’s age who introduced himself as D., knocked on my door trying to get me to switch energy suppliers. I reluctantly let him in, and he sat down on the couch with me to give me his spiel. Apparently, they’d also trained him in making a bit of conversation to put prospective customers at ease, but I was still suspicious, so he got the monosyllabic treatment.

D: “So how ya doin’ today?”

I: “Good.'“

D: “Ah, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. (long pause) So have you lived in Steubenville your whole life?”

I: “No.”

D: “Ah, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. (long pause) How long have you lived here, then?”

I: “Since 2022.”

D: “Okay, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. (long pause) So what brought you here?”

I: “God.”

D: “God?”

I: “Yes, God literally told me to move here.”

And with that, the floodgates opened. D. became very animated and began to testify to me about his recent conversion. He’d been living a rather sinful party life, he said, and one day a Christian friend had asked him, “Hey, man, how are you doing? Are you okay?”

D. recounted, “‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I’m fine.’ But he looked me in the eye and went like, ‘No, man. Are. You. Okay?’ And then I couldn’t even see his face anymore; it was just bright light, and then I knew it was Jesus talking to me, asking me that in that moment. And I just broke down and cried.”

D. said his friend took him to his church, and there was an altar call, and he went up and accepted Jesus into his heart, and his life was never the same again. Wow.

Amazing, VatiGod. I almost didn’t let this kid in the house, and suddenly he and I were talking about Jesus and sharing stories about his love. It brought us so close that I hugged D. goodbye when he left. It’s incredible, Vati, how you bring people together and make friends out of strangers.

Well, and then B. called back—the guy from the Catholic radio station—and we chatted for an hour and a half. I came out of it with the prospect, not for a job-job but for a paid gig: help B. find parish events in the area and record little announcements to be played on air, solicit donations from local businesses, and generally promote the station to a broader Catholic audience. I don’t think I could find a much better way to glorify you, Lord… except by writing this blog, which is still my greatest joy.

What a day!

Now, here’s a disclaimer: I don’t know yet if this gig is going to pan out, but so far, so good.

I recently exchanged messages with a fellow Catholic blogger saying that it’s better to write about experiences after you have understood their meaning and their lesson and can convey that to your readers.

I mostly agree, in the sense that we shouldn’t complain about hardships only for the purpose of getting people to feel sorry for us, but that’s hopefully not what I do. This is a diary of sorts, and I’m reporting my experiences to you in real time, so I can’t always know what they are good for. The “lesson” might emerge in a week or a month or a year… or maybe never.

That’s one of the reasons I became a Tarot reader back in the day: I wanted to know what the future holds. I couldn’t live with the uncertainty because I had no trust in God and His love and mercy. So perhaps this is the lesson in my recent adventures—they’ve taught me to just follow along where the Holy Spirit leads me and trust that there is a reason and a destination.

In the end, it may not even be about me.

We wouldn’t know anything about Ven. Jan Tyranowski—who shares his birthday with me—if it wasn’t for the influence he had on another great man.

Tyranowski was a seemingly unremarkable person. He was interested in many things; he loved hiking, science, gardening, psychology and foreign languages. He started his career as an accountant but later took over his father’s tailor shop. A devout Catholic, he became more and more involved in parish activities and joined the apostolate of “Catholic Action.”

In 1940, during World War II, Tyranowski was asked to take over the pastoral care for a small group of young men. The task scared him, but he accepted. Among the young people who participated in his “circles of the living Rosary” was a seminarian whose life was profoundly affected by Tyranowski’s teachings, especially when he said that “being saints is not difficult.”

That young man was the future Pope and Saint John Paul II, who always remembered Tyranowski’s impact on his life and faith.

In other words, God may not reveal to me—now or ever—what the big picture here is, but I have to trust that it’s for my own sanctification and the greater good. And that goes for you too.

O wash me and I shall be clean,

O purify me and I shall be whiter than snow.

Have you recently (or ever) had a “God Story” like this where things seemed to miraculously fall into place or where you had a direct encounter with the Lord? Tell me about it. I’d love to showcase some of YOUR stories in this space.

God bless you!

*VatiGod is my personal term of endearment for God the Father. Vati (pronounced fah’-tee) means Daddy in German.

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