Merry Christmas to all of you. There are so many email and Substack newsletters online, and I am so grateful that you trust me with your time and inbox space. I pray for each of you and your families this Christmas.
Don’t miss the last Catholic Women Lead of the year, where Elise and I share why we’re both not setting New Year’s Resolutions for 2024. (It’ll be out Dec. 26, so subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify so you can listen!)
I also wrote a piece for the Catholic Women in Business Advent theme about patience. You can read it here.
Content I’ve Liked
This article from Fairer Disputations by Abigail Anthony was a great look at endometriosis and the struggles women experience not just from the disease but from the treatment (or lack thereof) they receive. (My only quibble is that Anthony treats the idea that a hysterectomy doesn’t help endometriosis as settled science, when there is actually some nuance and disagreement on that topic. You can read more in this article I wrote for Natural Womanhood on endometriosis and hysterectomy.)
This essay from Front Porch Republic by Nadya Williams is a charming piece on leaving a family legacy of reading.
This OSV article by Caroline de Sury is a must-read for Les Misérables fans (book and/or musical).
A couple of Harvard Business Review articles are good reads: This one by Helen Tipper and Sarah Ellis shares a framework for reflecting on the year, and this one Jamil Zaki is a helpful piece for anyone who struggles to manage empathy with self-care (he introduces the concept of “sustainable empathy”).
A Book I (Kind of) Liked
I finally finished Dracula, a Well-Read Mom read this year. I had mixed feelings. Bram Stoker’s depictions of women were not nuanced, to say the least. But it was creepy in a (mostly) enjoyable way, and I always love a good “Catholic stuff fighting evil” vibe.
I always do a roundup in January of my favorite books of the year, so stay tuned for that!
Are you setting any New Year’s resolutions for 2024? Let me know in the comments!