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Merciful Discipline 5: Hopeful, We Fight for the Dignity and Integrity of Our Priests

Andrew Comiskey

Mar 28, 2012
4 min

Merciful Discipline 5: Hopeful, We Fight for the Dignity and Integrity of Our Priests

Merciful Discipline 5: Hopeful, We Fight for the Dignity and Integrity of Our Priests The fine work and selfless dedication of the great majority of priests should not be obscured by the transgressions of some. – Pope Benedict I will raise up for Myself a faithful priest who will do what is in My heart and mind, and his house will be firmly established. (1 Samuel 2:15) As a new Catholic, I have a fresh appreciation for the honorable, difficult office of the priest. I rely upo

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Merciful Discipline 3: Broken, We Endure Shame

Andrew Comiskey

Mar 14, 2012
4 min

Merciful Discipline 3: Broken, We Endure Shame

Merciful Discipline 3: Broken, We Endure Shame In the Church, God has put Himself into hands that betray Him again and again. – Pope Benedict Do not hold against us the sins of the fathers; may Your mercy come quickly to meet us, for we are in desperate need. Help us, O God our Savior, for the glory of Your Name; deliver us, and forgive us our sins for Your Name’s sake. Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?” (PS 79:8-10a) We repent on behalf of the abuse-broken chu

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Merciful Discipline 1: Broken, We Pray for the Abused

Andrew Comiskey

Feb 28, 2012
4 min

Merciful Discipline 1: Broken, We Pray for the Abused

— Merciful Discipline 1: Broken, We Pray for the Abused No wound runs deeper in the Church today than the sexual abuse of children by her priests. Over the last 30 years, the wound has become apparent as brave, broken souls throughout the world have dared to confess the perversion deposited in them by priests. We the Church bear this wound. We are the broken: bewildered, angry, more tempted to strike the Church than to heal her. And yet we are ‘her’, the wounded bride, as nee

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Faithful Mother for an Adulterous Generation

Andrew Comiskey

Feb 24, 2012
1 min

Faithful Mother for an Adulterous Generation

— Faithful Mother for an Adulterous Generation 40 Days of Mercy Devotional – Lent 2012 – Day 3 ‘Rejoice, for you are closer to God in His mercy than a baby to its mother’s heart.’ (423) ‘The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, and rich in love. The Lord is good to all; He has compassion on all that He has made.’ (Psalm 145:8,9) ‘Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget

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Andrew Comiskey

Feb 20, 2012
2 min

Rousing a Captive Culture

‘How can I not?’ he reasoned, as he listed the divorces, affairs, co-habitation and children born out-of-wedlock in his family. We are inundated daily with the breakdown of holy boundaries in heterosexual relating. A new poll reveals that 61% of US singles have sex on their first date; not surprisingly, for the first time in US history, more than half of births to American women under 30 now occur outside of marriage. The devolving of heterosexual morality in our culture is t

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Andrew Comiskey

Feb 8, 2012
2 min

Authority to Name

Creation of Adam and Eve, stained glass window in the church of Dinant, Belgium, created in 1821. A federal appeal court ruled yesterdaythat Prop. 8–our voter-approved definition of real marriage–violated the US Constitution. Fear not: this is but the latest of numerous efforts to overturn the people’s will concerning marriage. Tuesday’s decision will be appealed and most likely ‘fast tracked’ to the US Supreme Court who will decide once and for all the definition of marriage

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Details Concerning My Conversion to Catholicism

Andrew Comiskey

Jan 19, 2012
5 min

Details Concerning My Conversion to Catholicism

I wanted you to know that on Easter (April 2011) this past year I was confirmed in the Roman Catholic Church. That significant decision began three years ago and involved two rounds of RCIA (the adult catechism course), wise counsel, and much prayer. I want to emphasize that my decision is a personal one. Desert Stream Ministries has not become Catholic; it remains ecumenical and will continue to serve a variety of churches, mostly evangelical, which seek to minister to broke

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Andrew Comiskey

Jan 3, 2012
2 min

The Kingdom Among Us

Does Luke 17:25 reduce His Kingdom, that swirl of holy creativity in which the blind receive sight, the deaf hear, the lame walk, and the mute shout for joy, to the kingdom of self? Then I read that the Greek word for ‘within’ can be translated ‘among’. A light dawned: the ‘Kingdom is among us’ points to the whole Body of Christ in which each must bring his/her gift and offer it to others. In other words, the Kingdom is not mostly an interior gift that we contain and brood ov

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Andrew Comiskey

Dec 23, 2011
3 min

Reduced to Mercy

And God is always faithful to reduce me to mercy when I have majored on other things. He does this through suffering, through the slow boil of real life that tends to burn off extraneous things and distill what matters. In cooking terms, a ‘reduction’ involves the intensifying or thickening of a liquid mixture through boiling it. Some things evaporate, thus concentrating the flavor. I won’t bore you with details on my ‘boiling points’; we all have them, and they either reduce

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Andrew Comiskey

Dec 15, 2011
2 min

The Advent of Repentance

These family members are now subject to deceived, politicized loved ones whose ‘gay selves’ have turned hard and cold toward the ones they left behind. Times have changed, people. No longer are we dealing with same-sex strugglers in search of alternatives to ‘the gay self’; this generation seeks only its confirmation. Those family members who cannot in good conscience bless him as ‘gay’ or her as ‘lesbian’ are deemed unloving at best, and probably abusive. Repentance unto Mer

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 29, 2011
2 min

Fire of Gratitude

Prayer consisted of replaying old fears and hurts until I wondered how pure my devotion to Jesus actually was. Is silence merely ground for my self-concern? My ideas imprisoned me until I entered the kitchen and thought of Annette. How hard she had worked the day before! All our kids had been scattered on the holiday itself and so she worked tirelessly to ensure that they all could come later; she even skyped seminary-bound Katie into the mix. Then she baked and mashed and fr

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 23, 2011
3 min

Perseverance and Mercy

— Perseverance and Mercy ‘O great day, in which divine love will be confirmed in me. On that day, for the first time, I shall sing before heaven and earth the song of the Lord’s fathomless Mercy. This is my work and my mission, which the Lord has destined for me from the beginning of the world.’ (825) St. Faustina knew well the goal of Mercy: to end well, dying unto Life, and to ensure in one’s lifetime that as many souls as possible die in that merciful state. During her bri

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 21, 2011
3 min

Merciful Eyes

— Merciful Eyes ‘To see the image of God in every sister—all love of neighbor must flow from this motive.’ (861) How we see others must be anchored in how God sees them. ‘To love a person means to see him as God intends him to be,’ in the words of Dostoevsky. Above all else, God wants us to walk in the dignity of bearing His image and likeness. That means all men and women represent Him in their humanity; such a high call distinguishes us from the rest of creation. Sin may ha

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 18, 2011
3 min

Mercy for the Worldly Church

— Mercy for the Worldly Church ‘O my Jesus, I beg You on behalf of the whole Church, give us holy priests. You Yourself, maintain them in holiness. O Divine and Great High Priest, may the power of Your mercy accompany them everywhere and protect them from the devil’s traps and snares which are continually set for the souls of priests. May the power of Your Mercy, O Lord, shatter and bring to naught all that might tarnish the sanctity of priests, for You can do all things.’ (1

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 15, 2011
3 min

Mercy for Marriage

— Mercy for Marriage ‘O Jesus, You do not give a reward for the successful performance of a work, but for the good will and the labor undertaken. Therefore, I am completely at peace, even if all my efforts and undertakings shall be thwarted or even come to naught.’ (952) In 2000, God called Desert Stream Ministries to fight for marriage in the USA. Reaching for the gold ring of ‘normal’, gay activists were seeking to redefine marriage by excluding the need for one man committ

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 13, 2011
3 min

Boldness and Mercy

— Boldness and Mercy ‘If the Lord demands something of a soul, He gives it the means to carry it out; through grace, He makes it capable. At the Lord’s command, the soul can undertake things beyond its expectation if God’s power and strength, which makes the soul courageous and valiant, are manifest within it.’ (1090) ‘Your assignment on earth is to beg Mercy for the whole world.’ (570) Jesus gave St. Faustina a bold calling: to immerse souls in the flood of God’s Mercy at Ca

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 12, 2011
3 min

Patience and Mercy

— Patience and Mercy ‘The greatest power is hidden in patience. I see that patience always leads to victory, although not immediately; but that victory will become manifest after many years.’ (1514) During this fast, we are crying out for many ‘fruitless’ ones who have wandered far from their home in Christ. We beg God to manifest His Mercy to them. At the same time, we know that God is priming us to be merciful, an answer to our own prayers. He intends to fertilize and break

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Andrew Comiskey

Nov 2, 2011
3 min

The Gaze From The Cross, Part 4

— The Gaze from the Cross, Part 4 (Please also read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3) ‘When I was dying on the cross, I was not thinking about Myself but about sinners, and I prayed for them to the Father.’ (324) Prayer for sinners to enter into God’s Mercy must become action: intercession primes our hearts with God’s intentions for them. What a privilege to steep loved ones in God’s merciful heart for them! Prayer then looses merciful words and actions toward each one. I love tha

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Andrew Comiskey

Oct 31, 2011
3 min

The Gaze from the Cross, Part 2

— The Gaze from the Cross, Part 2 (Please also read Part 1, Part 3 and Part 4) ‘Remember My Passion; if you don’t believe My Words, at least believe My wounds!’ (379) We meditate on the Cross, or Passion, of Jesus because His Cross is His most exquisite and profound manifestation of Mercy for us. St. Faustina says it best: ‘The greater the suffering, the purer the love.’ (53) He endured a slow, agonizing death to give us everything He had: His water for washing away our sin (

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Andrew Comiskey

Oct 20, 2011
3 min

Mercy and Judgment

— ‘Do not fear anything, I am with you. These matters are in My hands and I will bring them to fruition according to My mercy, for nothing can oppose My will.’ (573) God was merciful to me in my ‘waterless pit’; He drew me out of the hell of homosexuality through Heavenly Mercy. Without mercy, I would have died young, never to have known or created real life. Mercy matters; without it, sin and death prevail. We eat poisoned fruit and suffer either an immediate or a slow and a

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