Do you believe in Angels?

Angels are all around us.

Do you believe in Angels? I do. Of course, Angels are real.

I’ve studied them, I’ve written about them, and have even experienced them. Angels are mentioned in both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. I also wrote a book about Angels (“Angels for Kids“). We are all blessed to have our own Guardian Angel to accompany us through life.

Here’s an excerpt about Angels from my book 52 Weeks with Saint Faustina: A Year of Grace and Mercy.

Incidentally, Father Andrew Apostoli, CFR had me on his show “Sunday Night Prime” twice to discuss the holy Angels. I’ll post about that soon (and come back here at some point to leave links to the shows — check below under my signature). I don’t have an assistant or anyone that helps me with the work, so it may take a while — I’m not complaining, I do have help from my amazing Guardian Angel!

Truth be told, I don’t really have time to write this blog post, but if I don’t do so now, it might never be shared. We are about one week away from Christmas. As I type these words, I am battling a migraine. It’s a dreary wet cold day here in New England. I can’t even get the fire started properly, as there are too many ashes in the wood stove. We need to make some time to clean them out.

I haven’t had time to decorate much for Christmas and I have only stolen away a few hours recently to begin my Christmas shopping. I have been busy with life and with book writing. I am on a tight deadline for an important biography I am currently writing. Plus, my husband got very sick right after Thanksgiving and ended up in the ER one night due to a very low oxygen level.

Thanks be to God, he turned a corner and is doing very well now. I asked Jesus to please (if it was according to His holy will) spare me of the dreaded virus so that I could take care of my husband and also try to continue on with other responsibilities.

Thanks be to God again, Jesus spared me. It was a true miracle in my humble opinion. Trust me. I was endlessly coughed upon and exposed to it by a couple of other “positive” people for a number of days in close proximity, and then the 24/7 care of my husband (for about 2 weeks).

God has His reasons for everything and I am singing His praises for taking such good care of us. All the while, we are and have been praying for so many other people who are sick or suffering in some way. The ministry of helping others in need is very busy at this time.

But let me get to the point of this sharing with you …

As I mentioned, I have that very tight book deadline. Actually, it was due yesterday! Thanks to my kind and understanding publisher, I have a bit more time to complete the manuscript. However, yesterday, I was working away on it (with a migraine) and suddenly the manuscript was completely gone! Yes, I said, “gone!” It had mysteriously disappeared!

The only document that resembled the manuscript was a much shorter one that had given me trouble earlier on in the writing process, so I had copied the work I had done on there thus far, and transferred it to another document where I have been writing ever since — AND saving my work every few minutes in various places (drives) due to having had lost a bunch of important work in the past (when the hard drive on my fairly new computer totally crashed and was not retrievable). 🙁

Even with saving my work constantly, the manuscript disappeared! I’m sure you can imagine the fear that began rushing through my veins! This was months of work. All the while, I was trusting God that He would help me — somehow — that no matter what, all would be well — eventually.

My cell phone was just about dead, so, I picked up the land line phone (which had been out of order for a couple of days, but was suddenly working!) and I called a technician. I knew from past experience that I had to be very careful. I needed to get immediate help because if I did the wrong thing, I could lose the entire manuscript for good. I was getting confusing messages on the screen of my computer and every single option offered was not good — at all!

After some initial delay with the automated communication, I finally got a real person on the phone, someone with whom I would try to explain my situation and whom would hopefully and prayerfully be able to help me. Please God! I prayed.

“Hello, my name is Angel …”

“Hello my name is Angel. May I ask your name?”

You can probably imagine my surprise and delight to be speaking with someone named Angel! God is pretty amazing like that!

Well, there is just so much to the story and I don’t want keep you hanging, but I need to be a bit brief so that I can get back to my work.

In a nutshell, Angel was a true Godsend! We had the most amazing conversation. He ended up telling me that he served in the military for a number of years and that he always counts his blessings and continues to put his “life into the hand of the MAN above.” That really told me something about him.

Well, it took almost 2 hours to fix the problem and thank God it is fixed now. The last few minutes (or more!), we shared with one another about our Faith in God and even about writing. You see, this man has a book in him, just wanting to be written.

I believe God put me in Angel’s life yesterday to encourage him to write the book that has been on his heart for years now. And God certainly put him into my life to inspire Faith in my own heart and to give to me this story to share with you (not to mention the fact that Angel had saved my book)!

I told Angel that I was so delighted when I heard him tell me his name at the beginning of what would be a truly blessed conversation — one I won’t forget.

One more thing! Last evening, I swept up some piles of dirt and pieces of bark from fire wood that my husband had brought into the house, and I headed to the kitchen to get our dinner going. Right then, broom and dust pan in hand, I literally stopped in my tracks.

“Wow!” I said out loud, entering the kitchen.

It had suddenly dawned on me that I had been working on the chapter about ANGELS (and demons) when my book manuscript disappeared and all of the above happened! I hadn’t thought about that when I was in the midst of trying to save my book.

Pretty amazing!

I’ll add quickly here that during our phone conversation, I offered to give Angel my email address in case he wanted to get in touch about his future book (so I could encourage him :)) and he said he couldn’t take that over the phone since the phone call was being recorded by the company, etc. So, since we were “screen sharing” at that moment, I punched in my website and it popped up. I told him he could find out how to reach out to me through my website.

He was amazed as he looked at my website.

I wish I could tell him that one last thing, though … because I know he would think it was pretty amazing — and that is that I was actually writing about the Angels just moments before He, (Angel!) answered the phone and helped me with my huge problem. Maybe he will see this blog post. 🙂

Well, my dear Reader, please pray for my writing. I best get back to it now. I just wanted to share this with you.

Stay safe and well. Take your vitamins! I can’t help it, it’s the MOM in me! Keep praying and counting your blessings. Give God’s love to others. They surely need it, especially at this time of year.

God bless you!

Warmly,

Donna-Marie

PS I did come back to share these links: Here is one of my Angel shows with Fr. Andrew Apostoli, CFR. It’s titled, “Angels of God.” And here is the next show we did on the Angels, “Your Angel’s Questions.”

I hope you can watch them. Angels are truly fascinating and so helpful to us along our path through life.

“Angels of God” Fr. Andrew Apostoli talks about the Angels

My dear friend Fr. Andrew Apostoli, C.F.R. talks about the Angels on this show on EWTN: Sunday Night Prime. He was reiterating some of the things we had said on our Angel show prior to this one and mentioned some things that we ran out of time to talk about. We have done two Angel shows together.

One thing that Fr. Andrew reminds us that I mentioned in our previous Angel conversation is that our Guardian Angel brings us at least three things:

!) PEACE when we are troubled or suffering.
2) PENITENCE from our sins, encouraging us to make reparation
3) INSPIRING US TO PRAY to be strengthened and enlightened.

Take a look here below to watch the show:

 

PERFECT for FIRST COMMUNION and CONFIRMATION

I am happy to offer my books to you at a special price for First Holy Communion and Confirmation gifts!

SUITABLE for either First Communion gift OR Confirmation gift…

An autographed copy of Our Lady’s Message to Three Shepherd Children and the World

$15.99 Hard cover children’s chapter book

AND an autographed copy of my book Angels For Kids!

$14.99 Paperback filled with Angel Catechesis for children and adults

BUNDLED together for just $28.00 plus shipping and handling. A $3.00 SAVINGS!

***

SUITABLE for Confirmation gift…

Here is another option: An autographed copy of Our Lady’s Message…

$15.99 Hard cover chapter book

AND: An autographed copy of My Confirmation Book:

$16.99 Hard cover keepsake and teaching book

BUNDLED together for just $30.00 plus shipping and handling. A $3.00 SAVINGS!

***

Here is another GIFT option:

My Confirmation Book AND Catholic Saints Prayer Book (both hard cover)

BUNDLED together for a CONFIRMATION gift for ONLY $22.00 (plus shipping and handling)!

***

YET ANOTHER GIFT OPTION!

Suitable for First Holy Communion gift OR Confirmation Gift:

An autographed copy of Our Lady’s Message…

AND an autographed copy of Catholic Saints Prayer Book!

Catholic Saints Prayer Book

Hard cover: Inspiration and wisdom from 32 popular saints! Prayers, bios, patronages, quotes

BUNDLED TOGETHER for ONLY: $21.00 (plus shipping and handling)! A $3.00 SAVINGS!

 

Your Angel Questions

Fr. Andrew Apostoli and I recently did our second Angel show together for EWTN’s Sunday Night Prime. I now have the link to the show in case you’d like to watch it. I find that the world of Angels is utterly fascinating. I hope you enjoy the show!

 

In case you missed it, you can see our first Angel show here…
VISIT TO “SUNDAY NIGHT PRIME” discussing the holy Angels with Fr. Andrew Apostoli:

Fr. Andrew Apostoli talks about the Angels and my book

Fr. Andrew Apostoli, C.F.R. talks about the Angels on his EWTN TV show “Sunday Night Prime.” He mentions me and my book “Angels For Kids” We previously did a show together about the Angels and Father was following up with more information in this show below.

We will be doing another Angel show very soon. Stay tuned!

My visit on EWTN’s Bookmark TV Show

I loved visiting with Doug Keck On EWTN’s Bookmark show. He is such a gracious and very brilliant television host. I have been honored and blessed to have visited with him on several Bookmark shows.

Screen Shot 2015-03-23 at 10.07.21 AM

I am striving to reach the kids with solid teaching on the Angels, their invisible companions (based on Scripture and St. John Paul II’s catechesis on the Angels) and also teaching them about the Gifts of the Holy Spirit for their Confirmation preparation and for LIFE!

 

Screen Shot 2015-03-23 at 10.30.42 AM

 

We chatted about my books “Angels For Kids” and “My Confirmation Book.”

BOO02741

I’m having a special sale on both books here.

Screen Shot 2015-03-23 at 10.08.55 AM

You can see out visit here:

 

Tomorrow on EWTN’s Bookmark!

ANGELS FOR KIDS AND MY CONFIRMATION BOOK

Sun. 03/22/2015, 9:30 AM; (and maybe 11:30 PM too)

Mon. 03/23/2015, 5 AM; Mon. 03/23/2015, 5:30 PM;

Sat. 03/28/2015, 5:30 PM

BOO02741

IMG_3858

From EWTN’s website:

Author Donna Marie Cooper-O’Boyle teaches children about the purpose and existence of God’s messengers in “Angels for Kids;” helps youths prepare to receive the Holy Spirit’s gifts in “My Confirmation Book.” Hosted by Doug Keck.

Buy both on SALE here. Both books for $30.00 (a $2.00 savings)!

Sharing a blogger’s reflection on “Angels for Kids”

A blogger homeschooling Mama of five shares about my Angels for Kids book:

We started our next book, “Angels for Kids” by Donna Marie Cooper O’Boyle. Let me tell you, I have only read ahead a few chapters (because I am a busy mama and I just don’t have the time or energy to read all the way ahead! I am a self-professed ‘non-reader’ anyway–I prefer to do all kinds of other things before I choose to sit down and read a book. Reading is great, I admit, but I still prefer lots of other things to reading), but I am really impressed with this book.

First of all, Donna Marie Cooper O’Boyle addresses the book to her young audience. She speaks to them in her introduction, and continues with a friendly and easy-to-understand tone throughout the chapters.

Second, it is full of beautiful Scripture references and stories of the Angels. Each chapter is full of verses, leaving no doubts that not only should we believe in the Angels, but God has given us His own words about them so that we might believe. I also like that each chapter begins with a short verse. I am using some of them as copywork for my children, and hope to also use them in prayer to help memorize verses.

Third, Donna Marie Cooper O’Boyle also references teachings of the saints and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Our history is rich in belief about the angels! She helps that young readers understand and appreciate the rich traditions we have, and by the end of the book, have a new appreciation and (hopefully) a deepening respect for (and even relationship with!) the angels.

To date, we have finished the first two chapters. (Chapter Three, “What Angels Look Like”, is on the agenda later today) Chapter One, “A Multitude of Angels”, tells us all about who the angels are and are not, (they are not fairies!), and what they do. In short, the angels are in God’s service, to aid us in attaining salvation. How fabulous is that? To finish up chapter one, I created copywork sheets for my girls with Hebrews 1:14, “Are not all angels spirits in the divine service, sent to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?” I made another for my 5yr old, with his name, “angel”, and “St. Michael the Archangel”.

Chapter Two, “Angels in the Bible”, might be the longest chapter in the book. From creation in Genesis to Revelation, stories with angels are re-told. Even though this was a long chapter to read aloud, and I wondered at times if my kids were beginning to day dream, I loved this chapter. I know the angels are in the Bible; I have heard the stories all my life. Probably everyone can at least name the Angel Gabriel, who announces the birth of Jesus. And yet, I was delighted to be reminded of not only Gabriel, but all the other angels who play a role in the lives of so many. I had many “oh yeah!” moments while reading this chapter. To finish up chapter two, my 5 yr old retold a favorite story and illustrated it, and the girls illustrated their favorite angel story.

I am keeping it simple as we read and “study” these books this year. Not only to do not have abundant time for coming up with elaborate crafts and activities, but I want our mini family “book club” to be relaxed, casual, and enjoyable. Here and there I’ll come up with a craft or recipe, I’m sure (‘cuz that’s how I roll), but at the same time, it is nice to have a family read that isn’t part of our syllabus and isn’t crying out to be enhanced with Pinterest-worth crafts. It’s the reading together that counts!

Well, that is wonderful, Gina! Thank you for sharing my book on your blog. I pray that your family is thoroughly blessed!

Angels protect us!

A woman named Kerry Bevins recently wrote to me and expressed her happiness over seeing my recent visit on EWTN’s “Sunday Night Prime” discussing the holy Angels. She said, “I have just watched your program on You Tube from last night. The baby slept in my arms as I watched. I learned so much. We see so many angel decorations, people collect angel figures, yet to me they always remained so abstract. Thank you so much for this wonderful program.”

You can see the show on You Tube video here.

Talking about the Angels

Talking about the Angels

.

Here’s a description of my Angels for Kids book which is available on this website:

The invisible world of angels is so often overlooked, though it has been present since before the dawn of Creation, offering attentive service and protection to humankind. Based on Catholic teaching, Angels for Kids offers proof of the true existence of angels while dispelling prevalent contemporary myths.

This inspiring book will open the eyes and hearts of youth and their families to a greater awareness of the unseen world, as well as provide warm encouragement to keep company with the incredible angelic friends who unceasingly glorify God and who have been a significant part of salvation history; protecting Jesus throughout His life, announcing heaven’s plans, and guiding and protecting the faithful. A chapter of special prayers to the angels completes the book.

Angels for Kids

Angels for Kids

“Science calls us to believe in the unseeable – black holes in space, which cannot ever be seen. They believe in black holes because of anomalous behavior in space. Christians, Jews, Muslims, and others believe in angels because of anomalous behaviors we experience in life’s events and God’s Revelation in Scripture. We do well to introduce children to these facts, along with astronomical facts, to prepare them for a mature spiritual life. This book is such an introduction, and parents might be reminded of their own angels as they read with their children.” ~Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J.