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**?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> feed xmlns:yt="http://www.youtube.com/xml/schemas/2015" xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"> link rel="self" href="http://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA"/> id>yt:channel:c_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/id> yt:channelId>c_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Claude LeBlanc/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2013-09-13T17:53:52+00:00/published> entry> id>yt:video:Kft7GXzkB8Q/id> yt:videoId>Kft7GXzkB8Q/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #15-Looking Back on My Life, pt 8: TRYING TO COPE WITH THE REALITY OF LIFE/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kft7GXzkB8Q"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-03-17T19:11:12+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-20T18:13:13+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #15-Looking Back on My Life, pt 8: TRYING TO COPE WITH THE REALITY OF LIFE/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/Kft7GXzkB8Q?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/Kft7GXzkB8Q/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my 11th reflection, I mentioned that it was “expected” that I would become a priest, especially by my mother, and also that I didn’t feel that my emergent sexuality could be expressed in a healthy and appropriate way in my family dynamic. You can imagine how an adolescent boy would compensate to try to cope with this conundrum. While I became more and more isolated, especially from girls, I did manage to go on one date while a senior in high school, taking an elementary school classmate to a dance, but in secret from my mother. It took me many decades to understand and address the wounds that were underneath that compensation. The shame that accompanied it proved to be a difficult shell to crack. Honestly, it has only been since being diagnosed with ALS that I can say I have fully accepted the Lord’s mercy and healing, the shame has disappeared, and the wounds completely healed. It may be that ALS will be the greatest blessing of my life! I’d like to share an experience I had during the summer of 1977 that may shed light on my inner world. The movie “Grease” was being filmed at the local public high school, and I was curious. There were many people there and I wasn’t noticed, so I went into the gym where they were filming the dance sequences. I ended up going every weekday for over a month, meeting John Travolta and other celebrities. I discovered there was so much more to life, good and bad, than I had imagined. To this day I’m grateful for that awakening. That this experience happened right before I entered the seminary is significant. The way I was raised, while with loving intent, was stunting. What I thought was “typical” proved to be anything but. I was excited to see what else life had to offer. Now, I can only imagine what my parent’s experiences of growing up were. One of the things I look forward to is being able to freely talk to my dad about his childhood wounds and the shame he lived with. It will be an enlightening conversation!/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="2" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="51"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:zvtaqX8wK30/id> yt:videoId>zvtaqX8wK30/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #14--FACING THE PROGRESSION OF MY ALS/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvtaqX8wK30"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-03-12T20:32:57+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-25T06:10:30+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #14--FACING THE PROGRESSION OF MY ALS/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/zvtaqX8wK30?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i3.ytimg.com/vi/zvtaqX8wK30/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections, at the request of my children, on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from as well. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I’m taking a break from “looking back on my life” to reflect on an experience I had recently. A close friend invited me to attend a four-day retreat with him and two others at Prince of Peace Abbey in Oceanside. Excitedly, I accepted, but Yolanda was concerned; it would be the first time I was away from her overnight since I was diagnosed. In my ninth reflection, I shared how difficult it was for people who didn’t know me to enter into conversations, and that was also true on this retreat, but since it was silent, it didn’t really matter—I fit right in! However, I had to face the progression of my ALS in another way. That “other way” can be summed up in a conversation I had with another friend who is recovering from cancer. When I wished him “happy birthday” he responded, “I pray to Jesus that you are not suffering.” My reply was, “We’re all suffering; mine is just different than I thought it would be. I’m in no pain, but I’m at the point where I need help taking care of myself, and I don’t want to be a burden on anyone, especially my wife. While on retreat, I shared what I was facing (in writing) to one of the priests. He asked me if I wanted to be more like Christ. Of course, I nodded. Then he quoted St. Paul: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross” (Phil. 2-8). In other words, if I wished greater union with God, I needed to humbly take up the cross that meant not only accepting help, but submitting myself to the care of others. If you’re wondering, “What’s so tough about that?” then reread my tenth reflection and you’ll understand. Apparently, the path being laid out for me by God is (and please excuse me for putting words in His mouth): “The more you willingly submit to those I have and will put into your life, you will grow in obedience to My will and accept that death from ALS is a great gift.” Well, I’ll have to unpack that a little further, but suffice it to say, I’m getting ready for the journey of my life—a great “leap” of faith./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="2" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="21"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:q0A9nQaJ6uw/id> yt:videoId>q0A9nQaJ6uw/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #13--Looking Back on My Life, part 7: THE INCREDIBLE BLESSING OF MUSIC!/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0A9nQaJ6uw"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-03-01T17:07:47+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-09T20:49:28+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #13--Looking Back on My Life, part 7: THE INCREDIBLE BLESSING OF MUSIC!/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/q0A9nQaJ6uw?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i2.ytimg.com/vi/q0A9nQaJ6uw/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT If there’s one thing that has been constant throughout my life, it’s the incredible blessing of music. From as young an age as I can remember, the sound of music captivated me. Like most everything else, it’s been a source of joy and struggle. My earliest memories are hearing the Hank Williams and Johnny Cash records my father had, and trying to play his right-handed guitar upside-down. At about seven or eight, one of my dad’s sisters and her husband were visiting from Canada and bought me a small toy organ. It fascinated me! I experimented with sounds and wrote simple compositions. Unfortunately, neither of my parents encouraged me to get lessons; and in the family dynamic, I dared not ask. I often wonder how differently my life would have turned out if I had received them. However, in 8th grade, my school started a band, and I chose to learn trumpet. That decision changed my life! As I said in a previous reflection, my mother allowed me to choose from the three Salesian high schools in the area. I chose the one with the best band—Don Bosco Technical Institute. My father worked as a machine operator in a factory in nearby Vernon and was happy I would “learn a trade.” There was no expectation that I would go to college; my father had to work on the family farm full-time after 6th grade, and my mother had not completed high school before getting married. The happiest moments of my four years of high school were being in the band. We had over 70 members and were one of the best in the area. The director, Bro. Gene Burns, had spent many years building up the program. I experienced things I never would have otherwise, like parades in San Francisco and Santa Maria, events such as California 500 Indy car races, numerous competitions among other things. My best friends were in the band. My mentorship under Bro. Burns was the main reason I joined the Salesians after high school; I wanted to work with him. But, as you’ll see in a future reflection, that never happened./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="18"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:iI-wHS6aefw/id> yt:videoId>iI-wHS6aefw/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #12--Looking Back on My Life, part 6: WHEN GOD SAVED MY LIFE!/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI-wHS6aefw"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-02-22T17:03:36+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-02T04:56:21+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #12--Looking Back on My Life, part 6: WHEN GOD SAVED MY LIFE!/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/iI-wHS6aefw?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i2.ytimg.com/vi/iI-wHS6aefw/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I probably should have placed this before my previous reflection, but it really doesn’t matter. In it, I questioned whether my decision to enter religious life at 18 was based on my faith or my mother’s. I didn’t mean to suggest that I was without faith. In fact, there’s never been a time when I thought God didn’t exist. My questions were, “Does He know and care about me?” I received the answers at about age nine. It was the day of my mother’s cousin’s induction as a deputy sheriff. After the ceremony, we went to his house for a reception. Since I knew they had a swimming pool, I came prepared. No one else wanted to swim, but since I had lessons a few years earlier, my mother gave me permission. Thinking I remembered everything I was taught, I jumped right in, but flailed. Quickly, I ended up at the bottom of the pool. It was then that I felt what seemed like a hand on my back, pushing me up to the ledge of the pool, only there was no one else in the pool. There was no one outside of the pool. There were no wet footprints leading from the pool anywhere. No one in the house had realized what had happened, either. After some time, I realized that it had been God, or my Guardian Angel acting on His behalf, who had saved my life. As you can imagine, this experience has had a profound impact on my life. Since then, I’ve never doubted God’s awareness and love for me. My new question became, “Why?” At first I thought it was because I was destined for a very special mission that would become clear to me later on, but looking back, I’ve lived a very unremarkable life, so there had to be another reason. The only answer that has made sense to me is, “Because He loves me!” I’ve shared this story throughout my life, but with this caveat: “If God loves an ordinary guy like me, He loves everyone else in the same extraordinary way, including you. He may not do what he did to me; but He’ll do whatever you need!”/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="28"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:G1zfYVsdgbY/id> yt:videoId>G1zfYVsdgbY/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #11--Looking Back on My Life, part 5: WHOSE FAITH—MINE OR MY PARENT’S?/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1zfYVsdgbY"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-02-15T23:24:06+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:25:48+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #11--Looking Back on My Life, part 5: WHOSE FAITH—MINE OR MY PARENT’S?/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/G1zfYVsdgbY?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/G1zfYVsdgbY/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT As I’m in the habit of doing, I left a loose thread at the end of my eighth reflection when I spoke about being grateful for having been raised Catholic. Something that everyone has to face is differentiating from their parents, whether it’s their faith, politics, lifestyle, or other things. In my case, because of the dysfunction of my family of origin, I was very enmeshed in its ethos, and it took me well into my 20s to mostly separate. Growing up, when we would pray as a family, which wasn’t really that often, my mother would ask God that one of her sons become a priest. I could feel a subtle pressure directed towards me to answer that call, even if it was only from my mother. So, bearing the façade of the “good, happy, and studious” boy, I adopted the belief that it was God’s will and decided to join the Salesians and enter the seminary after high school. It wasn’t something I dreaded; I had many great friendships with the Salesian priests and brothers at Bosco Tech; I just never discerned that the call was from the Lord. Of course, during adolescence, my sexuality was emerging, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t talk about it at home; I was raised to be asexual in a way, with the message given that sex was always a necessary evil to be avoided if possible. My father’s only advice about the matter was usually blunt: "Don’t get married." As I’ve mentioned in a couple of previous reflections, sexuality has to go somewhere; if it isn’t expressed appropriately, it will be suppressed and maybe acted out inappropriately. That’s what happened to me and I found out many years later that my father went through some of the same “medicating” as I did. That gives me so much more to explore. In the next few reflections, I’ll unpack these thoughts further. Remember, my intention is never to embarrass or accuse anyone in these reflections, but rather to promote healing in the future generations of my family, and hopefully to a few others./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="2" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="24"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:pgPBg1xTm_0/id> yt:videoId>pgPBg1xTm_0/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Praise the Lord Who Lifts Up the Poor (Psalm 113) 1999 Sing a New Song version/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgPBg1xTm_0"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-02-10T01:20:54+00:00/published> updated>2024-02-25T03:18:11+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Praise the Lord Who Lifts Up the Poor (Psalm 113) 1999 Sing a New Song version/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/pgPBg1xTm_0?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i1.ytimg.com/vi/pgPBg1xTm_0/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>I wrote this in the early 1990's and this recording was made in 1999 by the Sing a New Song concert choir at St. Lawrence Martyr Catholic Church in Redondo Beach, CA under the leadership of Steve Trelease, conducted by Christopher Walker./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="0" average="0.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="15"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:wgrxNsVd_kE/id> yt:videoId>wgrxNsVd_kE/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #10--Looking Back on My Life, part 4: STRIVING FOR PERFECTION/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgrxNsVd_kE"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-02-09T15:26:04+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:26:30+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #10--Looking Back on My Life, part 4: STRIVING FOR PERFECTION/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/wgrxNsVd_kE?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/wgrxNsVd_kE/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my seventh reflection I said that I’d get back to something I shared about my early childhood. The small and simple story I’m about to share reveals, I think, something that has had a large and complicated effect on my life. Somewhere near the start of first grade, I was called by my teacher (Sister Mary Virganne) to go to the chalkboard and write something on it. All I remember is that I dropped the piece of chalk, it broke in half, and I was terrified about what was going to happen to me. I had no reason to fear her—she was patient and kind—so, why was I so afraid? After much reflection, and therapy, I’ve concluded that I had, by that time, co-dependently adopted the belief that I needed to be perfect to keep peace in my family. I assumed that Sister would tell my mother what I did and my parents would end up fighting about what to do with me. Of course, she didn’t. I’m not blaming either of my parents; they each had many wounds from their own childhoods. My mother’s mother abandoned her family when she was only two, and her father died in a house fire from smoke inhalation after going back in to rescue her when she was about 16. I can’t begin to imagine how those experiences have affected her life. All I know about my father was that he had to leave home at 18 because, as he said, “there were too many mouths to feed.” He was one of 13 children, and while that is understandable for the place and time, some of his sisters have confided that he was the “scape-goat” of his family, but I have no idea why. He didn’t go back to visit his family in eastern Canada for over 25 years. Why am I telling you this story? The perfection I thought I needed to have could, of course, never match the reality of what I felt and knew of myself. So, from a very early age, I adopted the façade of being a good, happy, and studious boy and slowly lost touch with my feelings and was in denial about contrary experiences. I became the classic “people pleaser” and it has taken my whole life to unravel what that means and to try to undo it. More about that in a future reflection./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="0" average="0.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="18"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:w73-j9GsBy4/id> yt:videoId>w73-j9GsBy4/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #9--A CLEARER VIEW ON THE PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL EFFECTS OF ALS/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w73-j9GsBy4"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-02-01T16:49:34+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-17T07:45:17+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #9--A CLEARER VIEW ON THE PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL EFFECTS OF ALS/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/w73-j9GsBy4?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/w73-j9GsBy4/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I’ll resume “Looking Back on my Life” in the next reflection, but first, I want to share an experience I had this past weekend. 10 months ago, I was the retreat master for the 2nd year Confirmation candidates of my parish, held in Avalon on Catalina Island. According to the Director of Religious Education, it was well received by the youth and the team, so I was invited to lead this year’s retreat. I accepted, but by last August it became clear that I wouldn’t be able to do so because of ALS. I was disappointed, but as this year’s retreat approached I still hoped to go. As an answer to prayer, just one day before the retreat I was invited to attend as a “prayer warrior” and I joyfully agreed. When I arrived, I was warmly greeted by the team, but while there, I was able to clearly see the physical and emotional effect ALS has had on me during that time. I went from retreat master to observer; from coordinating everything to not being able to help physically and barely communicating. I began the day in the hall as an observer of the team and candidates, but soon realized that my time would be better spent in prayer, so I stayed most of the day alone in the courtyard and the church. Sometime during the day, my wife texted asking how I was doing, and I replied, “Being here makes me realize how much has changed in these 10 months. It’s easier to sit still with God, but since most people can’t understand me, they don’t try. I think it’s awkward for them. It’s a little isolating, but I’m going to have to get used to it.” Last summer, when I shared the diagnosis with my spiritual director, he said, “If you had to have a disease, ALS is the perfect one.” I was surprised at the time, but this past weekend, I finally understood and accepted what he had said. I’ve been longing for a deeper and lasting union with God in a way I’ve only previously glimpsed. No matter how constrained my communication will be with others, there’s nothing keeping me from communing with God. He’s given me what I’ve asked for; now, the choice is mine./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="30"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:_EcfRThuH8k/id> yt:videoId>_EcfRThuH8k/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #8--Looking Back on My Life, part 3: RAISED IN THE FAITH/ FOUNDED ON ROCK/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EcfRThuH8k"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-01-20T19:42:51+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:27:20+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #8--Looking Back on My Life, part 3: RAISED IN THE FAITH/ FOUNDED ON ROCK/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/_EcfRThuH8k?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/_EcfRThuH8k/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I was raised a practicing Catholic and it’s the one thing about my childhood I’m most grateful for. My father grew up in an entirely Catholic culture (and he has a brother who is a priest), while my mother became a Catholic as an early teen. My mother tells a story about the time when she and my father were engaged. One day, she jokingly said she wasn’t Catholic, and he wanted to call off their wedding. Luckily for me, that didn’t happen! I was baptized just one month after my birth at St. Columbkille church in Los Angeles, and taken to Sunday Mass from a very early age. I learned my prayers and would pray before meals and at bedtime. There was never a question about whether or not I would go to Catholic school. My mother sent my father to St. Matthias School in Huntington Park every day until they took me. I became an altar server for the Latin Mass. I was allowed to choose between three Salesian high schools; Salesian in East LA, St. John Bosco in Bellflower, or Don Bosco Technical Institute in Rosemead. I chose the latter and I’ll share my reasons and the lessons learned there in a future reflection. It’s common these days for parents to say, “I’ll let my children decide what they believe.” After teaching high school for over 40 years, and seeing several studies, I know this doesn’t work; many children raised this way will never choose to believe in God, let alone practice a Faith. I don’t understand why parents do this. If the purpose of life is being united with God forever in Heaven, why leave this most important thing to chance? Do these same parents let their children decide whether or not to go to school, or do anything else they want? So, why am I most grateful for being raised Catholic? I do have issues with the Church, which I’ll get to later. But, it has literally been the foundation of my life, and it is solid. Nearly everything I have chosen--my career, wife, how to raise our family, and where to volunteer—has been built on and centered around this Rock as you will see./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="35"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:v5NgL7SWtc4/id> yt:videoId>v5NgL7SWtc4/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #7--Looking Back on My Life, part 2: EARLY CHILDHOOD/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5NgL7SWtc4"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-01-16T21:12:49+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:28:00+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #7--Looking Back on My Life, part 2: EARLY CHILDHOOD/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/v5NgL7SWtc4?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i3.ytimg.com/vi/v5NgL7SWtc4/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT Last time, I stated that I wouldn’t focus much on details, but I’m going to break that already. I was born on May 17th, 1959, at St. Francis Hospital in Lynwood, California, to Bernard and Elizabeth (or Betty Blair) LeBlanc, as the oldest of three sons. My father emigrated from Bouctouche, New Brunswick, Canada, a few years earlier, but my mother was born and raised an Angelino. I’ll never forget that I was born on a Sunday because my mother reminded me, and my brother Eric (who is 13 months younger), of that fact hundreds of times, being grateful to God for it. In my next reflection I’ll focus on my religious upbringing, but this time I’ll remark on a few general things I remember. I grew up in what was then known as South-Central Los Angeles, on 71st St. near Main St. We moved to Lynwood when I was two, Cudahy when I was four, and Huntington Park, in our own home, when I was six. At the time, I thought I was having a wonderful early childhood, not aware of any tension. I loved my parents, my brother, and our home. My mother stayed at home while my father worked two, and sometimes three, jobs to allow her to stay home and pay for Catholic school. I now know that our family life was not as peaceful as I had imagined. My father’s main job (a machine operator at American Can Co. in Vernon) was during the “swing-shift”, from about 3pm to midnight, so we didn’t see much of him during the week, and, as it turns out, both of my parents preferred it that way. He would “make it up” on the weekends by taking us and our friends to many interesting places throughout the Los Angeles area, but rarely did our mother come along. It’s interesting how our perceptions often differ from reality. My parent’s wounds, many of which I am still discovering, were passed on to me and my brothers within a seemingly normal environment. I’ll unpack this thought in a future reflection./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="3" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="67"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:8xJ0u0emFLM/id> yt:videoId>8xJ0u0emFLM/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #6--Looking Back on My Life, part 1: LESSONS LEARNED/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xJ0u0emFLM"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-01-11T18:57:07+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:28:28+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #6--Looking Back on My Life, part 1: LESSONS LEARNED/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/8xJ0u0emFLM?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i1.ytimg.com/vi/8xJ0u0emFLM/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT Each of my children (all adults now, two married, and one with a daughter), have asked me to write down the stories of my life, and the lessons I’ve learned from them, before I die. It’s taken me a few months to decide how to do this, but it makes sense to me that these reflections are the best way. In this one, I’ll share how I want to approach these requests and why. I’ll recount the stories chronologically and focus on the lesson(s) learned more than the details. My purpose is not to embarrass anyone, but, rather, to emphasize the blessings that have occurred to me because of the persons and events I’ve encountered. We all have a fallen nature, and negatively affect others. As true as it is of others’ effects on me, it is true of my effect on others. So, before I go through the stories of my life, I want to share a general lesson—how to live with regrets. There are many things I wish I’d done, or not done, or done differently. I know some of the ways these things have hurt me, and others, especially my wife and family, but not all of them. They often haunt me. I can’t undo them. Even though I believe they’ve all been forgiven, they’ll never be forgotten, and I have to live with that reality each day. When I hear someone say, “I have no regrets,” I don’t know how they can say that. Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” and even a cursory reflection on one’s life should reveal plenty to regret. I have no choice but to offer them to God each day, with remorse, trusting that He can bring good from them. I’m not sure how many reflections it will take me to unpack these regrets, and the more successful things of my life, but I’ll start recounting my journey from the beginning next time./media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="2" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="23"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:SNfpq_Nfozc/id> yt:videoId>SNfpq_Nfozc/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #5-COPING WITH FRUSTRATION WITH HOPE (Honest, Open, & Patiently Enduring)/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNfpq_Nfozc"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2024-01-05T19:24:26+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:29:01+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #5-COPING WITH FRUSTRATION WITH HOPE (Honest, Open, & Patiently Enduring)/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/SNfpq_Nfozc?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i4.ytimg.com/vi/SNfpq_Nfozc/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my previous reflection, I introduced an acronym, HOPE, that I use to help me cope with the inevitable frustrations that come with the progression of ALS; things like not being able to comb my hair, trim my nails, or open bottles. It seems that the list grows a little longer each day in unexpected ways, and often my first reaction to each new loss of function is a growl or fist pounding. At first, I tried to just stop the reactions, but the things to be frustrated about were coming faster than I could consciously resist. I’ve learned that the best way to cope with these challenges is with HOPE, not the Theological Virtue, which is, of course, essential, but that I need to be honest, open, and have patient endurance. Let me explain. Honesty is admitting reality. If I’m frustrated, there’s no point in pretending I’m not. That’s not going to help me deal with it. If I need to give God a “talking to,” I do, and usually it’s just by asking Him, “why?” Honesty prepares me for openness. I’ve learned that God is always listening, and when we’re honest, He often answers quickly and clearly. Once I have His answer, I work, with the help of His grace, on conforming my will to His, with patient endurance. I’ve come to the conclusion that these small daily frustrations are God’s loving way of preparing me for the larger ones that will come when I’m closer to death. I may lose the use of many, or most, of my physical functions, and become completely dependent on others. What a providential preparation these frustrations are for becoming totally dependent on God! What a generous gift that is to HOPE for! I HOPE you will HOPE for that, too! Until next time, may God bless you!/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="27"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:l3erR6dZn1E/id> yt:videoId>l3erR6dZn1E/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #4--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 3)/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3erR6dZn1E"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2023-12-31T19:43:24+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-01T17:29:33+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #4--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 3)/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/l3erR6dZn1E?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i1.ytimg.com/vi/l3erR6dZn1E/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: In my previous two reflections, I shared some of the ways God is healing me through ALS, including spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, and socially. This time, I want to share the profound effect this divine healing has had on me. In many ways, I am changed; I am a new man. First, spiritually. To be honest, I’ve always struggled with prayer. I haven’t been very devotional, and the time I make for prayer can often be described as a constant distraction. I’ve never been able to completely “turn off” my mind and just sit quietly with God, no matter how hard I’ve tried. Yet, during the past year, I’ve come to believe that I am, in fact, unconditionally loved by God, and my effort, not the outcome (which is dependent on God anyway), is the point of prayer. Emotionally, psychologically, and socially, I’ve changed from being mostly introverted into becoming an extrovert. I wasn’t one to hug others, and now I am embracing them. I hesitated answering phone calls, but now, I am making them. I write and send several cards and notes each week, while I used to almost never send them. I very rarely went out of my way to meet and welcome others, but now I’m entertaining or visiting someone almost every day. These things have happened to me; I have done nothing intentionally to change them. They are God’s healing of the wounds I’ve lived with all my life. I rarely feel or notice the wounds anymore, and when I do, short prayers like the Jesus prayer, or a prayer like “Jesus, I trust in You, You take over” help immediately. Healing has happened alongside my disease. That’s why I often say, ALS means Always Lean on the Spirit. In my next reflection, I’ll share how I’ve learned to deal with the frustrations of my disease with HOPE—H for Honesty, O for Openness, and PE for patient endurance. Until next time, may God bless you!/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="5" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="61"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:Z2iMuLBnDUI/id> yt:videoId>Z2iMuLBnDUI/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Video Reflection on Dying #3--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 2)/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2iMuLBnDUI"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2023-12-26T15:33:27+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-26T15:36:00+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Video Reflection on Dying #3--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 2)/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/Z2iMuLBnDUI?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i3.ytimg.com/vi/Z2iMuLBnDUI/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my previous reflections, I shared how my ALS diagnosis has helped me face that accepting God’s will is really what’s best for me, and that a major reason why, is noticing the beginnings of spiritual healing. Last time, I also mentioned that I’ve noticed some emotional, psychological, and social healing because of it. That is what I want to share today. Like many of us, I grew up with negative messages and thoughts. Some of the external ones were, “You need to be better to be acceptable” and “You’re not smart enough.” I internalized them, and added my own, like, “I’m ugly” and “I’m unlovable.” What do you think happens to someone with these wounds? In my case, I withdrew from others, and isolated emotionally. Of course, that led to unhealthy attempts to deal with my sexuality, that have reverberated through my life and affected others, although unintentionally. Somehow, I managed to keep up the appearance of “having it all together”, going to college, having a career, marriage, and family, but inside I felt as if I were looking at others living life, while I was just watching. As a response to having ALS, I have had many heart-to-heart conversations with God, which have helped me more fully accept that I am loved unconditionally by Him. I’ve also experienced the caring of others in a way I never could have imagined. I have been contacted and visited by more extended family, friends, and former students in the past six months, than I believe I have in the previous 30 years. This had had a profound effect on me, and that will be the topic of my next reflection. God Bless!/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="5" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="74"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> entry> id>yt:video:jfpgR2-8Rv4/id> yt:videoId>jfpgR2-8Rv4/yt:videoId> yt:channelId>UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/yt:channelId> title>Eddie Hazell Trio live at the Sussex Country Library, Newton, NJ, on 9-21-1980/title> link rel="alternate" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfpgR2-8Rv4"/> author> name>Claude LeBlanc/name> uri>https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc_r3RNGexrpSjmJyXXRsfA/uri> /author> published>2023-12-19T23:56:05+00:00/published> updated>2024-03-21T12:05:33+00:00/updated> media:group> media:title>Eddie Hazell Trio live at the Sussex Country Library, Newton, NJ, on 9-21-1980/media:title> media:content url="https://www.youtube.com/v/jfpgR2-8Rv4?version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390"/> media:thumbnail url="https://i3.ytimg.com/vi/jfpgR2-8Rv4/hqdefault.jpg" width="480" height="360"/> media:description>/media:description> media:community> media:starRating count="1" average="5.00" min="1" max="5"/> media:statistics views="60"/> /media:community> /media:group> /entry> /feed>

Claude LeBlanc

29.12.2023 · 04:52:09 ···
13.01.2023 · 13:55:23 ···
21.04.2023 · 15:36:55 ··· 5 ··· ··· 16 ···
28.03.2024 · 10:07:22 ···
13.01.2023 · 13:55:23 ···
21.04.2023 · 15:36:55 ··· 5 ··· ··· 31 ···

1:: Video Reflection on Dying #15-Looking Back on My Life, pt 8: TRYING TO COPE WITH THE REALITY OF LIFE

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 17.03.2024 · 19:11:12 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my 11th reflection, I mentioned that it was “expected” that I would become a priest, especially by my mother, and also that I didn’t feel that my emergent sexuality could be expressed in a healthy and appropriate way in my family dynamic. You can imagine how an adolescent boy would compensate to try to cope with this conundrum. While I became more and more isolated, especially from girls, I did manage to go on one date while a senior in high school, taking an elementary school classmate to a dance, but in secret from my mother. It took me many decades to understand and address the wounds that were underneath that compensation. The shame that accompanied it proved to be a difficult shell to crack. Honestly, it has only been since being diagnosed with ALS that I can say I have fully accepted the Lord’s mercy and healing, the shame has disappeared, and the wounds completely healed. It may be that ALS will be the greatest blessing of my life! I’d like to share an experience I had during the summer of 1977 that may shed light on my inner world. The movie “Grease” was being filmed at the local public high school, and I was curious. There were many people there and I wasn’t noticed, so I went into the gym where they were filming the dance sequences. I ended up going every weekday for over a month, meeting John Travolta and other celebrities. I discovered there was so much more to life, good and bad, than I had imagined. To this day I’m grateful for that awakening. That this experience happened right before I entered the seminary is significant. The way I was raised, while with loving intent, was stunting. What I thought was “typical” proved to be anything but. I was excited to see what else life had to offer. Now, I can only imagine what my parent’s experiences of growing up were. One of the things I look forward to is being able to freely talk to my dad about his childhood wounds and the shame he lived with. It will be an enlightening conversation!

2:: Video Reflection on Dying #14--FACING THE PROGRESSION OF MY ALS

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 12.03.2024 · 20:32:57 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections, at the request of my children, on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from as well. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I’m taking a break from “looking back on my life” to reflect on an experience I had recently. A close friend invited me to attend a four-day retreat with him and two others at Prince of Peace Abbey in Oceanside. Excitedly, I accepted, but Yolanda was concerned; it would be the first time I was away from her overnight since I was diagnosed. In my ninth reflection, I shared how difficult it was for people who didn’t know me to enter into conversations, and that was also true on this retreat, but since it was silent, it didn’t really matter—I fit right in! However, I had to face the progression of my ALS in another way. That “other way” can be summed up in a conversation I had with another friend who is recovering from cancer. When I wished him “happy birthday” he responded, “I pray to Jesus that you are not suffering.” My reply was, “We’re all suffering; mine is just different than I thought it would be. I’m in no pain, but I’m at the point where I need help taking care of myself, and I don’t want to be a burden on anyone, especially my wife. While on retreat, I shared what I was facing (in writing) to one of the priests. He asked me if I wanted to be more like Christ. Of course, I nodded. Then he quoted St. Paul: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross” (Phil. 2-8). In other words, if I wished greater union with God, I needed to humbly take up the cross that meant not only accepting help, but submitting myself to the care of others. If you’re wondering, “What’s so tough about that?” then reread my tenth reflection and you’ll understand. Apparently, the path being laid out for me by God is (and please excuse me for putting words in His mouth): “The more you willingly submit to those I have and will put into your life, you will grow in obedience to My will and accept that death from ALS is a great gift.” Well, I’ll have to unpack that a little further, but suffice it to say, I’m getting ready for the journey of my life—a great “leap” of faith.

3:: Video Reflection on Dying #13--Looking Back on My Life, part 7: THE INCREDIBLE BLESSING OF MUSIC!

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 01.03.2024 · 17:07:47 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT If there’s one thing that has been constant throughout my life, it’s the incredible blessing of music. From as young an age as I can remember, the sound of music captivated me. Like most everything else, it’s been a source of joy and struggle. My earliest memories are hearing the Hank Williams and Johnny Cash records my father had, and trying to play his right-handed guitar upside-down. At about seven or eight, one of my dad’s sisters and her husband were visiting from Canada and bought me a small toy organ. It fascinated me! I experimented with sounds and wrote simple compositions. Unfortunately, neither of my parents encouraged me to get lessons; and in the family dynamic, I dared not ask. I often wonder how differently my life would have turned out if I had received them. However, in 8th grade, my school started a band, and I chose to learn trumpet. That decision changed my life! As I said in a previous reflection, my mother allowed me to choose from the three Salesian high schools in the area. I chose the one with the best band—Don Bosco Technical Institute. My father worked as a machine operator in a factory in nearby Vernon and was happy I would “learn a trade.” There was no expectation that I would go to college; my father had to work on the family farm full-time after 6th grade, and my mother had not completed high school before getting married. The happiest moments of my four years of high school were being in the band. We had over 70 members and were one of the best in the area. The director, Bro. Gene Burns, had spent many years building up the program. I experienced things I never would have otherwise, like parades in San Francisco and Santa Maria, events such as California 500 Indy car races, numerous competitions among other things. My best friends were in the band. My mentorship under Bro. Burns was the main reason I joined the Salesians after high school; I wanted to work with him. But, as you’ll see in a future reflection, that never happened.

4:: Video Reflection on Dying #12--Looking Back on My Life, part 6: WHEN GOD SAVED MY LIFE!

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 22.02.2024 · 17:03:36 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I probably should have placed this before my previous reflection, but it really doesn’t matter. In it, I questioned whether my decision to enter religious life at 18 was based on my faith or my mother’s. I didn’t mean to suggest that I was without faith. In fact, there’s never been a time when I thought God didn’t exist. My questions were, “Does He know and care about me?” I received the answers at about age nine. It was the day of my mother’s cousin’s induction as a deputy sheriff. After the ceremony, we went to his house for a reception. Since I knew they had a swimming pool, I came prepared. No one else wanted to swim, but since I had lessons a few years earlier, my mother gave me permission. Thinking I remembered everything I was taught, I jumped right in, but flailed. Quickly, I ended up at the bottom of the pool. It was then that I felt what seemed like a hand on my back, pushing me up to the ledge of the pool, only there was no one else in the pool. There was no one outside of the pool. There were no wet footprints leading from the pool anywhere. No one in the house had realized what had happened, either. After some time, I realized that it had been God, or my Guardian Angel acting on His behalf, who had saved my life. As you can imagine, this experience has had a profound impact on my life. Since then, I’ve never doubted God’s awareness and love for me. My new question became, “Why?” At first I thought it was because I was destined for a very special mission that would become clear to me later on, but looking back, I’ve lived a very unremarkable life, so there had to be another reason. The only answer that has made sense to me is, “Because He loves me!” I’ve shared this story throughout my life, but with this caveat: “If God loves an ordinary guy like me, He loves everyone else in the same extraordinary way, including you. He may not do what he did to me; but He’ll do whatever you need!”

5:: Video Reflection on Dying #11--Looking Back on My Life, part 5: WHOSE FAITH—MINE OR MY PARENT’S?

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 15.02.2024 · 23:24:06 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT As I’m in the habit of doing, I left a loose thread at the end of my eighth reflection when I spoke about being grateful for having been raised Catholic. Something that everyone has to face is differentiating from their parents, whether it’s their faith, politics, lifestyle, or other things. In my case, because of the dysfunction of my family of origin, I was very enmeshed in its ethos, and it took me well into my 20s to mostly separate. Growing up, when we would pray as a family, which wasn’t really that often, my mother would ask God that one of her sons become a priest. I could feel a subtle pressure directed towards me to answer that call, even if it was only from my mother. So, bearing the façade of the “good, happy, and studious” boy, I adopted the belief that it was God’s will and decided to join the Salesians and enter the seminary after high school. It wasn’t something I dreaded; I had many great friendships with the Salesian priests and brothers at Bosco Tech; I just never discerned that the call was from the Lord. Of course, during adolescence, my sexuality was emerging, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t talk about it at home; I was raised to be asexual in a way, with the message given that sex was always a necessary evil to be avoided if possible. My father’s only advice about the matter was usually blunt: "Don’t get married." As I’ve mentioned in a couple of previous reflections, sexuality has to go somewhere; if it isn’t expressed appropriately, it will be suppressed and maybe acted out inappropriately. That’s what happened to me and I found out many years later that my father went through some of the same “medicating” as I did. That gives me so much more to explore. In the next few reflections, I’ll unpack these thoughts further. Remember, my intention is never to embarrass or accuse anyone in these reflections, but rather to promote healing in the future generations of my family, and hopefully to a few others.

6:: Praise the Lord Who Lifts Up the Poor (Psalm 113) 1999 Sing a New Song version

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 10.02.2024 · 01:20:54 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· I wrote this in the early 1990's and this recording was made in 1999 by the Sing a New Song concert choir at St. Lawrence Martyr Catholic Church in Redondo Beach, CA under the leadership of Steve Trelease, conducted by Christopher Walker.

7:: Video Reflection on Dying #10--Looking Back on My Life, part 4: STRIVING FOR PERFECTION

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 09.02.2024 · 15:26:04 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my seventh reflection I said that I’d get back to something I shared about my early childhood. The small and simple story I’m about to share reveals, I think, something that has had a large and complicated effect on my life. Somewhere near the start of first grade, I was called by my teacher (Sister Mary Virganne) to go to the chalkboard and write something on it. All I remember is that I dropped the piece of chalk, it broke in half, and I was terrified about what was going to happen to me. I had no reason to fear her—she was patient and kind—so, why was I so afraid? After much reflection, and therapy, I’ve concluded that I had, by that time, co-dependently adopted the belief that I needed to be perfect to keep peace in my family. I assumed that Sister would tell my mother what I did and my parents would end up fighting about what to do with me. Of course, she didn’t. I’m not blaming either of my parents; they each had many wounds from their own childhoods. My mother’s mother abandoned her family when she was only two, and her father died in a house fire from smoke inhalation after going back in to rescue her when she was about 16. I can’t begin to imagine how those experiences have affected her life. All I know about my father was that he had to leave home at 18 because, as he said, “there were too many mouths to feed.” He was one of 13 children, and while that is understandable for the place and time, some of his sisters have confided that he was the “scape-goat” of his family, but I have no idea why. He didn’t go back to visit his family in eastern Canada for over 25 years. Why am I telling you this story? The perfection I thought I needed to have could, of course, never match the reality of what I felt and knew of myself. So, from a very early age, I adopted the façade of being a good, happy, and studious boy and slowly lost touch with my feelings and was in denial about contrary experiences. I became the classic “people pleaser” and it has taken my whole life to unravel what that means and to try to undo it. More about that in a future reflection.

8:: Video Reflection on Dying #9--A CLEARER VIEW ON THE PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL EFFECTS OF ALS

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 01.02.2024 · 16:49:34 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I’ll resume “Looking Back on my Life” in the next reflection, but first, I want to share an experience I had this past weekend. 10 months ago, I was the retreat master for the 2nd year Confirmation candidates of my parish, held in Avalon on Catalina Island. According to the Director of Religious Education, it was well received by the youth and the team, so I was invited to lead this year’s retreat. I accepted, but by last August it became clear that I wouldn’t be able to do so because of ALS. I was disappointed, but as this year’s retreat approached I still hoped to go. As an answer to prayer, just one day before the retreat I was invited to attend as a “prayer warrior” and I joyfully agreed. When I arrived, I was warmly greeted by the team, but while there, I was able to clearly see the physical and emotional effect ALS has had on me during that time. I went from retreat master to observer; from coordinating everything to not being able to help physically and barely communicating. I began the day in the hall as an observer of the team and candidates, but soon realized that my time would be better spent in prayer, so I stayed most of the day alone in the courtyard and the church. Sometime during the day, my wife texted asking how I was doing, and I replied, “Being here makes me realize how much has changed in these 10 months. It’s easier to sit still with God, but since most people can’t understand me, they don’t try. I think it’s awkward for them. It’s a little isolating, but I’m going to have to get used to it.” Last summer, when I shared the diagnosis with my spiritual director, he said, “If you had to have a disease, ALS is the perfect one.” I was surprised at the time, but this past weekend, I finally understood and accepted what he had said. I’ve been longing for a deeper and lasting union with God in a way I’ve only previously glimpsed. No matter how constrained my communication will be with others, there’s nothing keeping me from communing with God. He’s given me what I’ve asked for; now, the choice is mine.

9:: Video Reflection on Dying #8--Looking Back on My Life, part 3: RAISED IN THE FAITH/ FOUNDED ON ROCK

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 20.01.2024 · 19:42:51 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT I was raised a practicing Catholic and it’s the one thing about my childhood I’m most grateful for. My father grew up in an entirely Catholic culture (and he has a brother who is a priest), while my mother became a Catholic as an early teen. My mother tells a story about the time when she and my father were engaged. One day, she jokingly said she wasn’t Catholic, and he wanted to call off their wedding. Luckily for me, that didn’t happen! I was baptized just one month after my birth at St. Columbkille church in Los Angeles, and taken to Sunday Mass from a very early age. I learned my prayers and would pray before meals and at bedtime. There was never a question about whether or not I would go to Catholic school. My mother sent my father to St. Matthias School in Huntington Park every day until they took me. I became an altar server for the Latin Mass. I was allowed to choose between three Salesian high schools; Salesian in East LA, St. John Bosco in Bellflower, or Don Bosco Technical Institute in Rosemead. I chose the latter and I’ll share my reasons and the lessons learned there in a future reflection. It’s common these days for parents to say, “I’ll let my children decide what they believe.” After teaching high school for over 40 years, and seeing several studies, I know this doesn’t work; many children raised this way will never choose to believe in God, let alone practice a Faith. I don’t understand why parents do this. If the purpose of life is being united with God forever in Heaven, why leave this most important thing to chance? Do these same parents let their children decide whether or not to go to school, or do anything else they want? So, why am I most grateful for being raised Catholic? I do have issues with the Church, which I’ll get to later. But, it has literally been the foundation of my life, and it is solid. Nearly everything I have chosen--my career, wife, how to raise our family, and where to volunteer—has been built on and centered around this Rock as you will see.

10:: Video Reflection on Dying #7--Looking Back on My Life, part 2: EARLY CHILDHOOD

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 16.01.2024 · 21:12:49 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT Last time, I stated that I wouldn’t focus much on details, but I’m going to break that already. I was born on May 17th, 1959, at St. Francis Hospital in Lynwood, California, to Bernard and Elizabeth (or Betty Blair) LeBlanc, as the oldest of three sons. My father emigrated from Bouctouche, New Brunswick, Canada, a few years earlier, but my mother was born and raised an Angelino. I’ll never forget that I was born on a Sunday because my mother reminded me, and my brother Eric (who is 13 months younger), of that fact hundreds of times, being grateful to God for it. In my next reflection I’ll focus on my religious upbringing, but this time I’ll remark on a few general things I remember. I grew up in what was then known as South-Central Los Angeles, on 71st St. near Main St. We moved to Lynwood when I was two, Cudahy when I was four, and Huntington Park, in our own home, when I was six. At the time, I thought I was having a wonderful early childhood, not aware of any tension. I loved my parents, my brother, and our home. My mother stayed at home while my father worked two, and sometimes three, jobs to allow her to stay home and pay for Catholic school. I now know that our family life was not as peaceful as I had imagined. My father’s main job (a machine operator at American Can Co. in Vernon) was during the “swing-shift”, from about 3pm to midnight, so we didn’t see much of him during the week, and, as it turns out, both of my parents preferred it that way. He would “make it up” on the weekends by taking us and our friends to many interesting places throughout the Los Angeles area, but rarely did our mother come along. It’s interesting how our perceptions often differ from reality. My parent’s wounds, many of which I am still discovering, were passed on to me and my brothers within a seemingly normal environment. I’ll unpack this thought in a future reflection.

11:: Video Reflection on Dying #6--Looking Back on My Life, part 1: LESSONS LEARNED

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 11.01.2024 · 18:57:07 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT Each of my children (all adults now, two married, and one with a daughter), have asked me to write down the stories of my life, and the lessons I’ve learned from them, before I die. It’s taken me a few months to decide how to do this, but it makes sense to me that these reflections are the best way. In this one, I’ll share how I want to approach these requests and why. I’ll recount the stories chronologically and focus on the lesson(s) learned more than the details. My purpose is not to embarrass anyone, but, rather, to emphasize the blessings that have occurred to me because of the persons and events I’ve encountered. We all have a fallen nature, and negatively affect others. As true as it is of others’ effects on me, it is true of my effect on others. So, before I go through the stories of my life, I want to share a general lesson—how to live with regrets. There are many things I wish I’d done, or not done, or done differently. I know some of the ways these things have hurt me, and others, especially my wife and family, but not all of them. They often haunt me. I can’t undo them. Even though I believe they’ve all been forgiven, they’ll never be forgotten, and I have to live with that reality each day. When I hear someone say, “I have no regrets,” I don’t know how they can say that. Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” and even a cursory reflection on one’s life should reveal plenty to regret. I have no choice but to offer them to God each day, with remorse, trusting that He can bring good from them. I’m not sure how many reflections it will take me to unpack these regrets, and the more successful things of my life, but I’ll start recounting my journey from the beginning next time.

12:: Video Reflection on Dying #5-COPING WITH FRUSTRATION WITH HOPE (Honest, Open, & Patiently Enduring)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 05.01.2024 · 19:24:26 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my previous reflection, I introduced an acronym, HOPE, that I use to help me cope with the inevitable frustrations that come with the progression of ALS; things like not being able to comb my hair, trim my nails, or open bottles. It seems that the list grows a little longer each day in unexpected ways, and often my first reaction to each new loss of function is a growl or fist pounding. At first, I tried to just stop the reactions, but the things to be frustrated about were coming faster than I could consciously resist. I’ve learned that the best way to cope with these challenges is with HOPE, not the Theological Virtue, which is, of course, essential, but that I need to be honest, open, and have patient endurance. Let me explain. Honesty is admitting reality. If I’m frustrated, there’s no point in pretending I’m not. That’s not going to help me deal with it. If I need to give God a “talking to,” I do, and usually it’s just by asking Him, “why?” Honesty prepares me for openness. I’ve learned that God is always listening, and when we’re honest, He often answers quickly and clearly. Once I have His answer, I work, with the help of His grace, on conforming my will to His, with patient endurance. I’ve come to the conclusion that these small daily frustrations are God’s loving way of preparing me for the larger ones that will come when I’m closer to death. I may lose the use of many, or most, of my physical functions, and become completely dependent on others. What a providential preparation these frustrations are for becoming totally dependent on God! What a generous gift that is to HOPE for! I HOPE you will HOPE for that, too! Until next time, may God bless you!

13:: Video Reflection on Dying #4--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 3)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 31.12.2023 · 19:43:24 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: In my previous two reflections, I shared some of the ways God is healing me through ALS, including spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, and socially. This time, I want to share the profound effect this divine healing has had on me. In many ways, I am changed; I am a new man. First, spiritually. To be honest, I’ve always struggled with prayer. I haven’t been very devotional, and the time I make for prayer can often be described as a constant distraction. I’ve never been able to completely “turn off” my mind and just sit quietly with God, no matter how hard I’ve tried. Yet, during the past year, I’ve come to believe that I am, in fact, unconditionally loved by God, and my effort, not the outcome (which is dependent on God anyway), is the point of prayer. Emotionally, psychologically, and socially, I’ve changed from being mostly introverted into becoming an extrovert. I wasn’t one to hug others, and now I am embracing them. I hesitated answering phone calls, but now, I am making them. I write and send several cards and notes each week, while I used to almost never send them. I very rarely went out of my way to meet and welcome others, but now I’m entertaining or visiting someone almost every day. These things have happened to me; I have done nothing intentionally to change them. They are God’s healing of the wounds I’ve lived with all my life. I rarely feel or notice the wounds anymore, and when I do, short prayers like the Jesus prayer, or a prayer like “Jesus, I trust in You, You take over” help immediately. Healing has happened alongside my disease. That’s why I often say, ALS means Always Lean on the Spirit. In my next reflection, I’ll share how I’ve learned to deal with the frustrations of my disease with HOPE—H for Honesty, O for Openness, and PE for patient endurance. Until next time, may God bless you!

14:: Video Reflection on Dying #3--GOD IS HEALING ME THROUGH ALS! (part 2)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 26.12.2023 · 15:33:27 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· NOTE: I'm writing these reflections on the lessens learned during my life as I face death due to ALS at the request of my children, but I thought there might be something for others to benefit from. My hope is that you will be blessed by the blessings of my life. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT In my previous reflections, I shared how my ALS diagnosis has helped me face that accepting God’s will is really what’s best for me, and that a major reason why, is noticing the beginnings of spiritual healing. Last time, I also mentioned that I’ve noticed some emotional, psychological, and social healing because of it. That is what I want to share today. Like many of us, I grew up with negative messages and thoughts. Some of the external ones were, “You need to be better to be acceptable” and “You’re not smart enough.” I internalized them, and added my own, like, “I’m ugly” and “I’m unlovable.” What do you think happens to someone with these wounds? In my case, I withdrew from others, and isolated emotionally. Of course, that led to unhealthy attempts to deal with my sexuality, that have reverberated through my life and affected others, although unintentionally. Somehow, I managed to keep up the appearance of “having it all together”, going to college, having a career, marriage, and family, but inside I felt as if I were looking at others living life, while I was just watching. As a response to having ALS, I have had many heart-to-heart conversations with God, which have helped me more fully accept that I am loved unconditionally by Him. I’ve also experienced the caring of others in a way I never could have imagined. I have been contacted and visited by more extended family, friends, and former students in the past six months, than I believe I have in the previous 30 years. This had had a profound effect on me, and that will be the topic of my next reflection. God Bless!

15:: Eddie Hazell Trio live at the Sussex Country Library, Newton, NJ, on 9-21-1980

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 19.12.2023 · 23:56:05 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ···

16:: Blessed Are They Who Hope in the Lord Ps1 6 OT C

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 11.04.2023 · 13:23:51 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 6th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE LEADSHEET is available by contacting me at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com or at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/19288.... I wrote this in 2017 and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

17:: The Lord Comes to Rule the Earth with Justice (Psalm 98)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 14.10.2022 · 20:13:57 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 33rd Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@.gmail.com. I wrote this in 1989, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

18:: The Lord Comes to Rule the Earth with Justice (Psalm 98)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 14.10.2022 · 19:28:09 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 33rd Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@.gmail.com. I wrote this in 1989, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

19:: Lord, When Your Glory Appears, My Joy Will Be Full (Psalm 17)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 14.10.2022 · 03:47:20 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· For the 32nd Sunday in OT, year C. A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

20:: Lord, When Your Glory Appears, My Joy Will Be Full (Psalm 17)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 13.10.2022 · 18:18:22 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· For the 32nd Sunday in OT, year C. A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

21:: I Will Praise Your Name Forever, My King and My God (Psalm 145) OT Verses

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 10.10.2022 · 17:15:20 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 14th Sunday in OT, year A and the 31st Sunday in OT, year C) I wrote this in 1990, revised it in 2014, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. A FREE leadsheet is available at https://www.facebook.com/groups/192884481166915/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@.gmail.com. All rights reserved.

22:: The Lord Hears the Cry of the Poor (Psalm 34)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 06.10.2022 · 18:35:32 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 30th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by contacting me at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

23:: The Lord Hears the Cry of the Poor (Psalm 34)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 06.10.2022 · 17:20:32 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 30th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by contacting me at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

24:: Our Help is from the Lord Who Made Heaven and Earth (Psalm 121)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 27.09.2022 · 00:31:39 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 29th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@.gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

25:: Our Help is from the Lord Who Made Heaven and Earth (Psalm 121)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 26.09.2022 · 20:10:59 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 29th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@.gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

26:: The Lord has Revealed to the Nations His Saving Power (Psalm 98)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 26.09.2022 · 01:12:50 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 6th Sunday of Easter, year B, and the 28th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com and at https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/. I wrote this in 1989, revised it in 2015, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

27:: Praise the Lord, My Soul! (Psalm 146)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 10.09.2022 · 16:37:31 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 23rd and 32nd Sundays in OT, year B, and the 26th Sunday in OT, year C) I wrote this in 1991, revised it in 2015, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. A FREE leadsheet is available by emailing me at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com or at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/192884481166915/.

28:: Praise the Lord Who Lifts Up the Poor (Psalm 113)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 07.09.2022 · 16:12:13 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 25th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

29:: I Will Rise And Go To My Father (Psalm 51)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 07.09.2022 · 03:12:52 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 24th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: ukuleleblanc@gmail.com and https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

30:: Praise the Lord Who Lifts Up the Poor (Psalm 113)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 06.09.2022 · 02:21:06 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ··· (for the 25th Sunday in OT, year C) A FREE leadsheet is available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1937302153162016/ or by request at ukuleleblanc@gmail.com. I wrote this in 1992, revised it in 2016, and offer it for your prayer and reflection. All rights reserved.

31:: I Will Rise And Go To My Father (Psalm 51)

01.01.1970 · 01:00:00 ··· 04.09.2022 · 00:37:08 ··· ···
··· ··· ··· ···