Catholic letters.
Direction.
I know updates are forever en vogue on Substack, so here is mine, AMDG.. God willing, it will be the last, ever.
In nómine Patris, ✠ et Fílii, et Spíritus Sancti. Amén.
My dear friend..
The Caveat
Once upon a time, I wrote frequently, quite. Two, three, it wasn’t difficult to write four times a day. Musing, enjoying, thinking of you and God, and enjoying the interplay between my soul, the world, and man. You know I’ve said this often, it has now become a boring trope in this space and it will never be mentioned again.
The problem is I never moved beyond the context of my inner thinking to who it was I was actually talking to. I sought meaning, discovery, pleasure, and more, but it was very self-inclined. I wrote as I delighted in God, but for whom? what neighbor?
I’ve always had an idea, I’ve always shaped him and her, sometimes and often known them, but my own purpose wafted and waned, much like the inner workings of my interior life.
One day I was completely taken by this waning and waning of my own soul. Then, out of deference to my God in recognition of my own smallness, I slowly began to cease writing, the work of my soul taking precedence.
I imagine this happens to many writers who enjoy playing beneath the gaze of our Father. We become so enraptured in the day-to-day experiences He offers us, we forget for whom we write, we have difficulty with contextuality: Dearest, how can I explain to you what it is I’m experiencing? especially if it’s so other-worldly? What do I do if you can’t know what I mean? Is it Just for me to any say anything? speak? utter? groan?
Throw in family stuff, with me as Matriarch, and it becomes difficult to peel away to play with any muses or entertain any idea beyond the parameters of Here, Now, this little one, what lies before you.
Let me define my Substack phases, thereabouts —
2 years consistently writing, uninhibited
1 year lessened writing, confusion increasing, unpublishing letters
1 year even more so, flip-flopping between Substacks
1 pathetic year of nothing — 10 writings perhaps.
looking to 2026 and the future God has planned for me. I am done with this nonsense!
So now: I throw all that away in the embrace of Thérèse‘s Offering Prayer —
I wish to make reparation for my sin by casting them into the furnace of His Merciful Love.
We start anew, for —
He that sat on the throne, said: Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me: Write, for these words are most faithful and true.
And he said to me: It is done. I am Alpha and Omega; the beginning and the end. To him that thirsteth, I will give of the fountain of the water of life, freely.
Gone is my concern and faithless selfishness.
Why?
Dearest, I’ve grown up a bit since I last wrote you.
Wrote you - wrote you - wrote you - really wrote you - had something lasting, meaningful, purposeful, and useful to say - grown up.
How? Let us count the ways —
1. Duty Defined.
I’ve long been confused about thinking, living, loving, live-writing to a public when I have such serious work to complete at home. My vocations are wife, mother, Carmelite, teacher, daughter, sister, friend to souls in the real world. Where does hobby-writing fit in? Where does the desire to really write something substantial, a more permanent work begin if all my out-flow is online?
My habits and proclivity for live-writing have largely been shaped by being online for 3 decades. During my Substack phases I began refining my views on first fruits: who should be the first receivers of my holy thought? my holy jostling that tends toward cyberspace? Intertwined in these ideas is the question: why can I not just silently write in a corner of my life? offline?
Answer — A.) my own family and friends, souls I interact with in real life. Jaunts through social media are just that: wandering through paths, known and unknown, to collect flowers and leaves to bring back to my family and friends in real life.
It is a great injustice, I believe, to hoard holy things online and not share personal learnings, growings, and knowings, with those God has placed physically in my life. The Algo isn’t God. And I can no longer justify signal grace to excuse my [typically disordered, on-and-off again] attachments and addictions to social media and the internet.
The assumption is —
I want to be a saint. I am here to be a saint. I am in the word, but not of the world. I am God’s first, and, like Jesus, I protect and retrieve what is His own and who belongs to the Father.
— beginning with my own soul.
I can do no good thing by myself.
I can do no good thing if I am not filled, much less poised to receive.
I can do no good thing if I am not poised to receive from the Holy Fountainhead.
So.. I have to watch my spiritual intake for the good of my soul, much like I have to watch my diet, my sleep for the good of my body.
Dearest, thanks be to God, I know who I am, what I am, what my passions and proclivities are — and I’ve Reason and Faith to know better and God’s Sanctifying Grace to do His Good in Right Order.
Yes, I’ve figured it out, Deo Gratias, I’ve a hardened returned.
B.). On writing offline — think habit: I’m just not there yet. Seeds and samplings sprout in my copious Notebook writing, to be sure, but content-producing still pines for community and friends (audience). To wean myself, I have silenced comments and likes and move toward ignoring statistics and growth. If souls wish to reach out, there are means.
2. Audience declared.
One day recent, I revised my bio.
Catholic Letters.. a Carmelite muses to her friends in Exile.
We are all in exile. You are my friend, I will gladly receive every friend God sends me.
And: I am done waiting for my friend to write to me in the form I admire most, you have left me to recourse, I will write you my letters, and I expect not a response, because such is pure love: to graciously pass on what is given, disinterested in keeping, being moved by the simple love one has for another, for their highest good.
I wish I had the perfect words, but I am not perfect and I know you understand.
To write is enough.
3. Quiet humility and obedience.
I am a stupid woman. And I am too old to be concerned about clicks.
My simple goal is to hear and listen, to ponder and contemplate, and to convey God’s Love —
Alleluia. Give glory to the Lord, and call upon his name: declare his deeds among the Gentiles. Sing to him, yea sing praises to him: relate all his wondrous works. 3 Glory ye in his holy name: let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord. Seek ye the Lord, and be strengthened: seek his face evermore. Remember his marvellous works which he hath done; his wonders, and the judgments of his mouth. — Psalm 104, 1-5
Dearest, I will not worry about anything else except the conveyance.
O, how stuck I have been in my head! Not being able to form the least paragraph!
..but, God has His Time and His Work to deal with everyone, most of all, me. It is time.. it is time..
3. An Exercise of the Faith and Reason, of the Memory, Will, and Intellect.
Writing from the will? Done, accomplished and able. Expression has never been a problem with me, I’ve no shame, no guilt, no lie that lies before me, begging to be covered. My Intellect, however, has rested in shadow, and she wishes to emerge and engage. We shall see what harvest she brings forth.
My Memory? O, my dear friend.. how vast, how mingling. He wishes to speak, and we will let Him. He will tell the stories as He always does. To sit at the feet of Truth and wait on Wisdom.. we will exercise Patience and Perseverance. ..and work Revision!
What a self-indulgent little mongrel I have been, ever-hungry, hoarding the least morsel for me, me, me.
I’m so tired of it all. Yes, I’m tired of looking at the mirror of myself on the wall of my soul, thinking it some beautiful, yet imperfect thing that only needed a refashioning, a repainting, a repositioning. How long I tried to ponder it.. What a waste when His Glory is everywhere to be admired.
I’ve seen. I’ve long looked out of other windows, and never said anything about the Glorious views I’ve witnessed. These, I will share with you. To see, to learn from the good, the true, and the beautiful.. like you, gentle soul.
Dearest, to glorify God.
Gaze with me, let us look upon our Lord’s work together. Everything is His.. ours. This kind King is ever generous, especially to His own children. If we wish to create and fashion as He does, we must see.. and love.
Let us love what and who belongs to us, through Christ Jesus.
In nómine Patris, ✠ et Fílii, et Spíritus Sancti. Amén.
❤️ in Love, your veronica St. Albert the Great, 11.15.2025