What can God do with a young, blonde, selfish brat from Orange County, CA? Growing up a fairly mediocre Catholic, I often wondered that myself. I cared more about boys and being school president, valedictorian and volleyball captain than being holy. However, God knew that I desired something more than empty relationships, success and popularity. He knew that the desires of my heart longed for Him; my body yearned for him and I was “like a land parched, lifeless and without water” (Psalm 63: 2). All my achievements and titles were “rubbish” without His love (Phil 3:8).

So in His goodness, humor and time, God exposed me to His love through Theology of the Body and offered me two life-changing weeks to transform me from “brat-of-God” to “daughter-of-God.” The first was in the summer of 2002, when I was a Young Apostle at a Steubenville Youth Conference. That week I experienced three firsts: daily mass, NFP and holy men. My heart was transformed! I started going to daily mass, devouring the Church's teaching on contraception/sexuality and desiring a holy man to date (which, of course, led to a 4-year drought at my public university). During college, I also picked up Christopher West's Good News about Sex and Marriage and studied TOB through DVDs, CDs and live talks. At the same time, I taught myself how to play guitar and an unknown talent for songwriting emerged. All the songs I wrote were about God, and I noticed that TOB strongly influenced my lyrics.

I experienced my second life-changing week was eight years later in March 2010. I had been doing full-time ministry as a traveling speaker, worship leader and OCP/SpiritandSong.com artist/composer for three years. A few months earlier, I read Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body and Christopher West's Heaven's Song: Sexual Love as It Was Meant to Be. I was amazed at how much I learned about the Eucharist, the Liturgy, Mary and myself as a woman. I started focusing my songs and talks on the fact that we are created for communion and union with God. God, and God alone, became the only desire of my heart! I came to the TOB 1: “Heart and Head” immersion course thirsting for more of this life-changing teaching and wanting to receive and share it with others. I was overwhelmed with the truth of God's immense love, which genuinely satisfied my hungry heart! I sat through the entire week of lectures with extreme joy in my heart and on my face. TOB 1 gave me so much freedom to be who I really am – not a bunch of titles and achievements, but a child of God who is made to receive and give love!

Theology of the Body has changed every aspect of my life because it has given me a new lens in which I see life. My relationship with Jesus in the Eucharist, my relationship with Mary, my relationships with men, how I view myself as a woman, how I approach songwriting and I how do ministry – all of these have been transformed by TOB. I wish I could write a page for each one of these topics, but alas, you have been spared the reading. I will spend the rest of my life studying the Theology of the Body and sharing it with others, because I have been transformed by the love of God through this radical teaching. That is what God did with the young, blonde, selfish brat from Orange County.

Jackie F. attended the TOB 1 “Head & Heart” Immersion Course in March 2010. She is a Spirit & Song artist (a division of Oregon Catholic Press) from Orange County, CA, where she continues to reside and do ministry as a full-time traveling worship leader, singer-songwriter and speaker. While you can find her on SpiritandSong.com as a webcast host for “The Commons,” most of the time you'll find her acting silly to make people laugh, eating (or talking about eating) or reading a theological/spiritual/philosophical book in an airport somewhere in the world. Her debut album Your Kingdom Is Glorious was released through SpiritandSong.com/OCP and on iTunes in November 2008.