Eileen Benthal

The quiet, peaceful atmosphere of a cemetery makes it a comfortable place to pray.

After all, as anyone who has felt like they were drowning in the difficulties of life knows, it’s sometimes hard to breathe when you feel so overwhelmed. The trust that helps me BREATHE also requires that I trust myself and know that am enough, I have enough and God is enough for me.

As the flowers bloomed, died and bloomed again, I grieved losses and experienced a renewed hope. Slowly, we all began to recover.

How does a lifelong, faithful Catholic, reconcile herself with a church plagued by the scandal and horrors of clergy sexual abuse and cover-up?

God wastes nothing in our lives — all our life experiences fit into His plan to become spiritual treasures when we most need them.

Every child, regardless of ability, teaches the intrinsic value and dignity of each human person from conception to natural death.

It may be easier to sit in fear in the dark, but we are called to step out and "tell others about this life."

Personal suffering makes one relate to Mary's suffering as she grieved the death of her Son.

People with visible and those with unseen disabilities, as well as those with no limitations at all exemplify that every life has meaning and purpose and the ability to bring hope.

I don’t know the story behind the woman marked with the sign of the cross, or the sobbing woman collapsed in her arms but I know the pain of grief and sorrow. And I know the sign on her forehead is our reason and the solution to have hope.