An Ordinary Person, an Extraordinary Gift - Tapa dura

There once was a time I did not enjoy the things I most enjoy today; writing was one of them. This is one of my first writings at the age of 30. I wondered if there would be more. Little did I know, it was just the beginning.

My aunt had given me a woman's devotional Bible to read. In the commentary, it said, "Take notice today of ten things God has created." As I left my home to go to work, all I saw was buildings, houses, and the highway - much more concrete than nature. And then I prayed about it, "Lord, it's so hard to find you in all this cement." That's when I looked up and saw the most beautiful sky, and started to notice God in this place.

-Deanna Danielle

"An Ordinary Person, An Extraordinary Gift" is a well-reflected, practical piece of work.

Deanna extensively shared her own personal faith experience that is enshrined with failure, rejection, success, and trials. However, in them, through the common obedience to the teachings of Jesus Christ, that is always love based. She was able to see the extraordinary in the ordinary.

The coming together of people from different Diaspora that made up the collage of the Apostles demonstrates how a profound understanding came to be possible in that community when the apostles accepted the ordinariness of their lives through the extraordinary teachings of Jesus Christ. Deanna was positively poised in her work to help her readers on a practical level see how Jesus Christ, our primary teacher, is always transforming us into what he wants us to be and represent. Always ready to transform the 'ordinariness' of our lives into the 'extraordinary' vision of strength, courage, and hope.

-Fr Paul Nwambu
MAPCC, BCC.

"An Ordinary Person, An Extraordinary Gift" is a lullaby for the soul, composed not in the colloquial sense, but in the cadence of loving experience, shared with the hope of reawakening the message of God's love to our collective, overwrought heart. The text is succor for an audience searching for the simple, and welcoming, reminder of the very real existence of divine love.

-Elaine Caughlan
Copy/Line Editor

What a beautiful person-inside and out! What a BIG heart she has! Such a pleasure being her friend and relative. God has truly been such an integral part of her life. You have to read this book to see for yourself.

-Maria Staropoli
Women's Leadership