02/23/2026
Found Poetry Women Celebrate 2026
We’ve waited for this day, we’re gathered in your name, you’re the reason we’re here…open up the heavens, we want to see you!
If you have questions, ask them!
Ladies, please silence your cell phones – this weekend is about hearing from God!
Amazon can wait ‘til Monday!
I also need a drink…of water!
Fill this room with your love…
A faithful friend is a sturdy shelter…
God knows exactly what we need, even when it comes to friendship.
Some of our most important friends are our faith-filled friends.
Having friends who truly pray for you is a quiet, yet priceless blessing
When your strength is low, they carry your name before God.
Even Jesus knew how important it was to have friends –
Twelve of his close and faithful followers.
Jesus desired connection…
This weekend, we are all friends, whether you like it or not. Open your heart. Let the Holy Spirit move through you. You were never meant to walk alone.
Welcome to Women Celebrate!
God has surrounded you with 600 friends! Use this time to grow in your love for Jesus Christ. If anything is weighing on your heart this weekend, take it to Jesus.
Look around…God’s treasures are all around you. Praise Him for them.…let them be a true beacon of life and hope.
I just want to speak the Name of Jesus
Declaring there is hope and there is freedom
Your name is power, your name is healing, your name is life
Over fear and all anxiety, I speak Jesus
Shine through the shadows, burn like a fire.
Shout Jesus from the mountains, in the streets, Jesus in the darkness over any enemy.
Jesus for my family, I speak the holy name of Jesus!
Jesus have my heart, my will, my soul, with you I lay it down, with joy I cast my crown. Jesus have it all. Your will is what I want.
To you belongs the glory…all blessing and all honor
Let all that has been made, glorify your name
To you belongs the glory…the praise of all the world
My brother is not a saint…
Over and over!
Years may come and go, Here’s one thing I know
All my life. You’re a friend of mine!
It’s a pelican…we are not all mothers, but we’ve had mothers. The pelican is willing to pierce her breasts to give her brood their life.
Just say no - really cool pencils. “Too cool to do drugs!” “Cool to do drugs.” “Do drugs!”
Or simply - “drugs!”
The charging bull. All of a sudden, the fearless girl shows up.
Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars.
Power comes in learning when to stand your ground and when to rise above it.
The gaze that saves!
Yo, Zach come on down…I want to have dinner at your house. What are you thinking, Jesus?
..Jesus is the giver of every good gift…
she reaches out for Jesus and keeps reaching for the stars.
We are all in this together. The Holy Church of God. Catholicism: Here comes everybody. My status on Facebook…it’s complicated.
Christ invites us all to team up with one another to receive and to give life.
Friendship is a school of love. The mass is a school of virtue.
It is self-sacrificing friendships that teach us how to love.
I’m very well aware of when I’m doing well and when I am not.
Friends come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. Might we be able to choose so wisely that somebody new comes into our life?
What does Jesus Christ say about friendship? … love one another as I have loved you. You are my friends…I no longer call you slaves, instead I have called you friends. This is my command…love one another!
God has chosen me; it was not you who chose me. It was I who chose you.
Personal but not exclusionary…never so personal that is doesn’t include friends.
Freely chosen!!! You do it for each other…you are choosing…God invites me to expand that circle of friends…not just people who look like me
Can the lion lay down with the lamb?
A good friend will always be there to bail you out of jail. A best friend will be sitting next to you saying, damn that was fun.
A cord of three strands is not easily broken. Jimmey’s Angels!
How long have we been friends? 94 years.
I’m not a user of coffee, tea, alcohol, and I never used salt…What she didn’t’ use I DID use.
Mind your own business…You have to accept a person for whoever she is.
I agree with you 100%
Jesus, it’s just good to be here…
Where are we all from? …I’ve got little traveling gifts for your travel back home. Thanks for going the extra mile!
Any who! …the skit right after me is pad-worthy!
I’m in rehab…I’m in shoulder rehab…it’s awful.
God will continue to call you to retreat with Him.
I told him about the silent retreat I was making…and he said, well good for you, time to reset, time to reboot and I’m like…yah!!!
This really is a gem of a weekend.
We are different as the day is long! That is another story for another time.
Jean is riding the sourdough bread train. The starter and the feeder
I knocked one over and it’s like slime…
How do you proof it? Like, is it spelled right? You gotta get off that train…
and nobody needs that much bread!
Make new friends, but keep the old…one is silver and the other is gold. Friends are precious… one who finds one, finds a trouble…if you find me it’s trouble, if you find one of my teammates, it’s a treasure.
Let’s become the eyes of Jesus this weekend.
Last week I bought a new car…it’s big money…it’s important to have a good one…it started playing the rosary!
Someone lost their phone…I should have answered!
We have a lot of gifts for you—potatoes, bananas, and little Debbies!
Baby, get ready! …staying the whole night through…feels so good to be with you. You and me goin fishin in the dark!
Feels so good to be with you.
Amazing love that welcomes me…the kindness of mercy…my soul undeserving. God you’re so good…you’re so good. The dead are raised, the sinner saved…
I am blessed, I am called, I am healed, I am whole…
And should this life bring suffering, Lord I will remember what Calvary has bought for me... God you’re so good… You’re so good to me!
Thank you for coming back for the second day! The chalice…tell me what you love most.
What else do you see in this cup? It’s gold on the inside. What’s in there…nothing…look again…I can see myself! Can you see yourselves in here? I see a simple gift of wine. I see the blood of Christ washing over you.
I’m happy to see myself in there…I’ll tip it in such a way that I’ll see you as well. We are all in this cup, dear kids—your friends, your foes, there are saints in this cup, there are sinners in this cup, and the blood of Jesus washes over all of us.
You do not know what you are asking…can you drink the cup that I must drink?
Packers 22 years, Prisoners 19 years, Parishioners…
Packers…the quarterback got sacked…You allowed him to fail, to fall, to roll on that ground and get up alone? What sort of teammate are you? What sort of friend are you?
I see Jesus Christ…I see the Packers…all those who were overlooked…all of us where it seems that we fall down alone…have to get up alone…all those good souls who are willing to fall with us and help us up…dear women who celebrate, can you drink the cup that I am going to drink?
“I will take the cup of life, I will call God’s name all my days.”
Prisoners… Jimmy, would you ever consider going to Green Bay Correctional institute? Bishop, I taught at Abbot Pennings High School, that will be a piece of cake.
I start staring back at him…time for a little come to Jesus…You wanna mess with me you probably win…you blankety blank with a Catholic mass, I will take you out at the knees.
Assault-chapel! They took him out, not me. You earned street cred…I cried all my way home. I see Jesus Christ in that cup, little did I know this guy’s name was Jesus, in this cup too. I see the intimidator, I see the intimidated in this cup.
“I will take the cup of life, I will call God’s name all my days.”
Parishioners…Little Jaelyn…zero filter…I have a comment and then I have a question…of course you do… I think I can speak for all the 2nd graders here…you really put us at ease. We know that you’re gonna take care of us, but what happens if we get stuck with Fr. Shamus? Any Norbertine will never blow out your candle. …this cup, what do I see? I see Jesus in this cup…I see those who approach the sacrament of reconciliation in this cup…I see the young and the old, the rich and the poor, those in prison and those free…can you drink the cup?
“I will take the cup of life I will call God’s name all my days.”
She’s shy…I like that in a person…we were devastated that they had found more cancer…she who had straightened up began to walk hunched over…I walked bent over too, with my precious friend.
There are no words that I could speak into the life of my friend…And God said, let there be light…Lord that’s a bright verse, but I need something really powerful…have you ever counseled the Lord…I don’t recommend it…
there must be something there…” let there be light.” She went hu…is that it? …basically …flashes of light…because that’s where the antibodies are defeating the cancer…God knew that…there is so much we don’t know...so much our friends don’t know, but God knows! He understands our weakness and he longs to touch us…
…just for the record, it’s Pam. A faithful friend is a sturdy shelter, whoever has found one has found a treasure.
something we all long for…relationships that are safe!
Friendship is not optional…it is essential to our spiritual and emotional well-being.
We listen deeply…we notice details…we remember birthdays…we create spaces where hearts feel safe…We are a reflection of the heart of God.
Relational, faithful, and compassionate.
A sturdy shelter…Something that protects… Someone around whom you can truly be yourself. They embrace your joy as if it were their own.
Say that name out loud!
Place of stability…the world is full of fair-weather friends. A faithful friend stays with us when you and I are not at our best.
She knew what I needed and she helped me take the time just to be for a while.
A friend who is a place of refreshment.
A faithful friend is a treasure. Not a convenience, not a nice bonus, but a treasure. Just one is a blessing…they see your potential when you don’t, their presence in your life is worth more than money…
treasures must be cared for…guard it… polish it… protect it…
We are gifted relationally. No offense, Fr. Jim. We have emotional intelligence, we are empathetic, we hear the heart, we hear what’s not being said, we know how to pass on the faith, we know how to build community, we are circles of trust and belonging wherever we are.
Friendships don’t happen accidentally…they are cherished, fostered, and they take time…
Be intentional in growing faithful friendships
Practice vulnerable honesty
Listen with an understanding heart
Be faithful.
Women’s friendships are the light in the darkness…gifted by God to form life-giving friendships. Lean into that gift. Let God use your relationship to heal, strengthen, and inspire. You are already someone’s treasure.
Never in my life did I ever think I’d be standing before all of you today.
I didn’t want to speak into a microphone in front of a large group of people. Can you hear me now?
The Holy Spirit spoke.
I’m the only child who met while their parents were in jail. I was a mistake...that’s what I was told.
I had questions. I was confused. I didn’t know what to believe.
I became addicted. I told him I had gone to church in the past and it just wasn’t for me.
I decided it would be best if I broke up with my boyfriend and stopped using drugs.
…a term that defines the life I was living…Hell…
I wanted to understand…I was blind…I was an unbeliever… what is the point of this life?
One day a guy named Quinn walked into the salon for a haircut. Two weeks later, Quinn came back to the salon for another haircut.
Six months after getting to know Quinn, he asked me to go to church with him and his daughter Cloe.
I knew I was marrying my best friend.
One of the moms named Joy asked me if I wanted to join their Tuesday morning bible study.
Joy…What did she have in her life? Whatever it was I wanted it. I learned that she was living for Jesus.
See the world though different eyes, Jesus’ eyes. I started having a relationship with Jesus.
…bring anything to the cross of Christ and be forgiven
I experienced adoration…it was just so beautiful…it was as if Jesus was saying Here I am!
Now I see it differently. Faith isn’t about checking boxes. It’s about where you place your trust. It’s about believing in the blood He shed. Trust the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
…once again God has other plans.
I still need to take time to have a personal relationship with the Lord.
we need to be still and listen. God’s grace is sufficient. The Lord has the final word. That’s it!
Sacrament - outward sign instituted by Jesus Christ to give grace.
You will look so much better on the way out than you do on the way in. Jesus Christ was true God. The gifts that God gave him, he gave to the apostles…
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spriit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven, whose sins you retain are retained. Christ wants us to be at peace.
While anger and hurt can be justified, if we don’t take care of it, we become hurt people. I’m like a hockey goalie…you also need to know about your brightness…the good deeds you are doing.
We will help your light shine!
We celebrated the Eucharist as a verb this morning because it is an action of becoming, changed into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. Tonight, the Eucharist is a noun because it IS the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.
I will come to you in the silence…I claim you as my choice…In the shadows of the night, I will be your light, Come and rest in me. Do not be afraid, I am with you.�I have called you each by name. Come and follow me I will bring you home I love you and you are mine.
Maybe you are not sure yet how God will use this weekend, but He will.
Yes, they are all our kids…and by the same man. I am the main driver of our 12-person van.
Prayer, prayer and more prayer…
A boat potato…or a water-walker?
Now what? We go home. How do I take this with me?
Be gentle on ourselves. Find someone to share your weekend with. Remember where they’re at. It is our honor to share what we’ve learned this weekend. It makes Jesus known and loved.
Set some goals for yourself…make them attainable.
Find women who share your faith. A woman behind us, beside us, and a woman who is in front of us.
We can carry each other’s burdens and share each other’s joys.
-problems are the ingredients for our holiness.
My friends are my big family…my people…my treasures…the ones who help get me to heaven.
Who are your people? Those who get you closer to God…
Let technology serve you to help you serve others…not the other way around. We should touch our spouse as much as we touch our phone…
can you imagine?
What is your goal when you leave here? Who are your people, your friends…who will you evangelize to?
We can do small things with great love…
Stay in the Word…the bible is relevant and true
Don’t ever doubt the impact you have on little people’s lives.
Jesus is waiting for us to connect…
She said she was suffering from anxiety…we prayed a Hail Mary together.
Pray at bedtime, put down your book, stay awake for one more minute…pray an Our Father…it will change you.
Come Holy spirit, be with us today, in all we think, do, and say…amen
The Eucharist is the best…because Jesus is the best. Let’s make it a priority.
We are asked to love, it doesn’t have to be complicate.
Cherish and invest in your friendships. Don’t over think this going forth.
Just ask Him…
A faithful friend is a sturdy shelter, whoever has found one has found a treasure.
