post by Jessi Hannapel
Cimela and I have been praying a novena this month that has become very dear to us—the St. Joseph Holy Cloak novena.
This story really began four months ago when Cimela and I attended the Christ Our Life conference in Des Moines and had the opportunity to see our friend Julie MacFarlane-Barrow, a founding member of the charity Mary's Meals. She spoke at the conference and shared miracles that have happened for them through prayer. In one story, during a difficult financial time for the charity, Julie, her family, and others prayed a 25 minute 30 day novena to St.Joseph. She called it "a hefty novena." On the final day, a phone call came in—the biggest gift Mary's Meals has ever received, which will feed tens of tens of thousands of children.
Inspired by this beautiful story, Cimela and I set out to pray the novena for a special intention of our own—help for Cimela's parent's business that was in a difficult position. On the 30th day we were on pilgrimage to visit Our Lady of Guadalupe. We visited the cathedral and prayed the novena in front of a St. Joseph statue. That day St. Joseph sent a worker to Cimela's parent's shop, and her dad hired him on the spot! He had felt inundated with work but it's difficult to find someone who works in his trade. This man said he was walking down the street and felt an urge to turn towards this autoshop. He spent all of his life in Argentina working on these types of cars and he's been a huge blessing bringing peace to the shop.
During our month of prayer, we were inspired to create a booklet for the novena to use as we prayed and to help promote this novena to others.
We've made the book available in our store. Check it out here!
Please join us in prayer as we prepare for the feast of St. Joseph on March 19th!
