A priest of the Archdiocese of Dubuque
My #1 goal in life is to be a disciple of Jesus..hopefully this would lead me to being a good priest for God &His people.
Happy Mother’s Day
to all women who nurture
and care for others.
Your heart, presence, love,
joy, vulnerability, tenderness,
strength and sacrifice is a
tremendous gift for all.
Thank you! 💐
The line in front of Notre Dame's Basilica of the Sacred Heart before the Easter Vigil, ~5:30 PM. Definitely smaller than usual, but not b/c of a lack of fervor. Instead, with a record number of ND students being received into the Church this evening, there isn't much space.
Thousands of people became Catholic across the United States at the Easter vigil
Mobile archdiocese – 603
Archdiocese of Anchorage-Juneau -200
Diocese of Phoenix – 1600
Diocese Tucson -530
Los angeles=- 8598
Youngstown 300
San Francisco - 700
Duluth 186
Atlanta – 3442
Washington 1755
Lansing – 940
Oklahoma- 1100
Tulsa – 1000
Cleveland – 1000
Orlando -900
Venice – 1072
St Augustine – 1263
Newark – 1701
Kansas City 733
Fort Wayne 787
San diego- 1846
Fort Worth 1550
St Louis – 1000
Richmond- 900
Wichita – 600
Portland – 1600
Nashville -872
Brooklyn – 1200
Cincinatti – 1096
Chicago -1000
Dallas – 2500
Galveston – 3000
Baltomore – 1200
Omaha – 700
Philadelphia -1100
New Orleans – 700
Detroit – 1400
Denver – 770
Shreveport- 257
Duluth – 186
Madison – 360
Greenbay – 175
Milwaukee – 270
Lent is about having an encounter with God.
This isn’t just about fasting and cultivating virtue. This is about meeting the person of Christ and allowing ourselves to be changed.
S18 E5: Entering the Desert
The Pope’s Lenten suggestion: “A very practical and frequently unappreciated form of abstinence: that of refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor….Let us begin by disarming our language, avoiding harsh words and rash judgment, refraining from slander and speaking ill of those who are not present and cannot defend themselves. Instead, let us strive to measure our words and cultivate kindness and respect in our families, among our friends, at work, on social media, in political debates, in the media and in Christian communities…In this way, words of hatred will give way to words of hope and peace,”
130 schools said no.
He led the losingest program in college football history to a national championship anyway.
Fernando Mendoza was a 2-star recruit from Miami.
He tried to walk on at his hometown school. They passed.
So did FIU.
So did FAU.
So did everyone else.
At 17, he was sitting in his bedroom, crying over a silent recruiting inbox—after driving to 18 camps with his dad and sending highlights to more than 100 programs.
Not one FBS offer.
His only option? Yale. No scholarship. No NFL path.
Everyone told him to be “realistic.”
“Know your place.”
“Be grateful.”
He didn’t listen.
Because Mendoza understood something most people miss:
The worst outcome isn’t failing.
It’s never getting the chance to try.
Two weeks before signing day in 2022, his phone rang.
Cal needed a body. One offer. Out of 134 schools.
He took it.
He arrived as the third-string quarterback.
Spent a year on the scout team.
Lost his first four starts.
Got sacked 41 times behind a broken offensive line.
Still got up. Every time.
Then Cal brought in a transfer instead of building around him.
So Mendoza left the only school that had ever said yes.
He transferred to Indiana—the losingest program in college football history.
People laughed.
“Career suicide.”
“Graveyard program.”
“Nobody wins there.”
One coach told him something different:
“I’m going to make you the best Fernando Mendoza possible.”
That was enough.
Mendoza wasn’t just playing for football.
His mother has battled multiple sclerosis for 18 years.
Before every snap, he thought of her.
“My mother is my why.”
Indiana went 16–0.
Beat six Top-10 teams.
Won their first Big Ten title since 1945.
Mendoza threw 41 touchdowns.
Won the Heisman—first in school history.
First Cuban-American to ever do it.
Then came the title game.
Miami. Near his hometown.
Fourth-and-4. Season on the line.
Quarterback draw.
The kid 134 schools rejected spun through defenders and dove into the end zone.
Game over.
Indiana—national champions.
The losingest program became the best team in America.
All because a 17-year-old refused to believe “no” was the end.
Rankings don’t decide your ceiling.
Gatekeepers don’t write your ending.
Being overlooked isn’t a verdict—it’s a starting point.
Sometimes all you need is one shot…
and the courage to bet on yourself when nobody else will.
Don’t quit.
Credit: Barclay Mullins
“I am a Catholic. I am a Catholic man.”
— Heisman Trophy winner Fernando Mendoza on why he took his trophy to the priests at the St. Paul Center at his university
Pope Leo XIV drops a truth bomb ahead of Nicaea anniversary: Beware the "new Arianism" creeping into culture and even among believers—admiring Jesus as just a "great human," not the true God among us. https://t.co/2DFmqiyQg8]
Fernando Mendoza backs up his talk on TV by giving glory to God at Sunday Mass.
I have wrestled with sharing this because he shows up out of love for God, not human praise.
But I share because i hope his witness inspires others to go to Mass.
Christians do not call burial places “necropolises”, that is, “cities of the dead”, but “cemeteries”, which literally means “sleeping places”, places where one rests, awaiting the resurrection.
We have a geeky Pope, and I’m all here for it; Pope Leo XIV to university students:
“As a former teacher of mathematics and physics, allow me to do some calculations with you. Do you know how many stars there are in the observable universe? An impressive and wonderful number: a sextillion stars — that is, a 1 followed by 24 zeros! If we divided them among the 8 billion people on Earth, each person would have hundreds of billions of stars. With the naked eye, on clear nights, we can see about five thousand. Even though there are billions upon billions of stars, we only see the closest constellations; yet these are enough to point us in a direction, as when navigating the sea.”
St. John XXIII on how to approach each new day: “Consult not your fears, but your hopes and dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what is still possible for you to do.”