Mike Eisenbath has been married to Donna for 30 years; they have four adult children and two grandsons. He was an award-winning sportswriter for 23 years, including 18 at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch with duties that included covering the St. Louis Cardinals and Major League Baseball. Severe depression forced him out of that career. He continues to write, with a monthly column in the St. Louis Review and his www.eisenbath.com website featuring reflections on topics such as his Catholic faith and mental illness. Mike is a frequent speaker and radio guest involving those subjects. Among his three books is Hence My Eyes Are Turned Toward You: Confronting Depression With Faith and the Prayer of Jehoshaphat.
She was 19 years old. Still in college. Had a job, though not yet a career. Still living at home with her parents. She was young and beautiful and intelligent and fun – and in love. She and her fiance planned to be married in about nine months, and they were deep into plans for […]
Among the many things the United States has given to the world, there is the grossly over-inflated regard for pop culture. Granted, there has been some version of “pop culture” perhaps as long as there has been public entertainment, admired teachers, respected leaders and producers of literature. But modern American pop culture has taken things […]
At the pinnacle of the sloping ceiling at St. Cletus Catholic Church (in St. Charles, Mo.), at the center of the church, some clear windows allow sunshine to stream downward – when the sun is shining, of course. The sun was shining brightly in our part of the world on Christmas Day. Praise God! Monsignor […]
Funny, talented, wealthy, generous, admired people aren’t supposed to want to die. People are supposed to live beyond the age of 63, Robin Williams’ age when he died August 11. People aren’t supposed to die by suicide. Yet, Williams is no different from thousands of other Americans who die that way. More than 39,000 people […]
Our approximately 48-hour visit to the “top of the mountain” neared its end. I knew we soon would be leaving, with only mid-day prayer and a lunch of Vietnamese food ahead on the schedule. I wanted to savor that prayer experience, to let it satisfy my spiritual taste buds in a way no food ever […]
There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” –Maya Angelou It’s all about our stories. Everyone has them – many of them, in most cases. Your stories, taken all together, explain you. You can look in the mirror, see that face with wrinkles around your mouth and at the corners […]
Not everyone reads the Bible. And even though many people who attend a church that is based in the Bible have beliefs that proceed from the “Good Book,” they don’t all adhere to 100 percent of those words – and perhaps don’t even know what is inside the book. Chances are they know the “highlights:” […]
I like to play this little game now and then: I’ll pick a word – or as is the case more often, a certain word seems to choose me by rolling around unexpectedly in my mind for several days. At a certain point, feeling unable to ignore it any longer, I will sit down and answer […]
The theme my personal website, www.eisenbath.com, is “Hope.” Simple in many ways, so elusive for people in others. When I need some fresh inspiration, I often will roam around looking for interesting thoughts from a variety of sources. Recently, I ran across this: An old horse, an old dog and an old farmer have much in […]
Some gifts are a mystery to me, to the point that people blessed with those gifts inspire me. I’m thinking of two in particular: People who build houses and artists. They convince me to look at others in a whole new way. One of the men at our Saturday morning prayer group spent most of […]
Back when I saw him regularly, Carl seemed like he never was going to age. Even well into his 60s, he was skinny with little gray in his brown hair and skin like that of a much younger man. He regularly played pickup basketball with men many years his junior. He was one of the […]
The air was cold, the moon full, the wind biting as I stood in the backyard waiting for the dogs to do their nightly business. First the smaller, brown one; she likes to sniff and explore. Then the taller, younger one — the energetic Australian shepherd who likes to run quickly to the end of […]
Imagine yourself standing on a beautiful beach. You’re near the spot where the ocean tide rolls up to meet the sand. Your back is to the water, your face to all the beach activity. It’s a bright, sunny day, the kind that makes you feel glad to be alive. People are soaking in the warm […]
You work with me every day. You buy your gas from me. You see me every Sunday in church. You enjoy every holiday with me. You live next door to me. You know me pretty well. But not as well as you think. I have a mental illness. You never would guess that to be […]
I regularly receive an email called “Daily Heartlight.” It features reflections by a rotating group of people, all of them Protestant and most of them preachers. Most of my spiritual reading is Catholic, but I find these often have good insight about faith and Scripture. As we’re approaching Christmas, several reflections have involved Mary and […]
I never have been a big fan of winter. Give me 90-degree temperatures with a chance to wear shorts and a T-shirt rather than 20 degrees, layers of clothing and slick streets. I’ll take baseball, walks to the ice cream shop and the smell of fresh-cut grass any time. Well, there is one thing I […]
One of the most challenging parts of the prayer Jesus taught his disciples — The Lord’s Prayer — comes near the end: Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. That’s not necessarily meant to be a challenge on the surface. At first glance, it actually should bring us great joy. […]
There can be a fine line between loneliness and solitude. In solitude, there is a quiet joy — time spent by yourself in nature or at eucharistic adoration, an opportunity for contemplation and prayer and just basking in a peaceful presence. I love solitude. Like so many, however, I dread loneliness. And unfortunately, I have […]
Growing up, I always knew what I wanted to do for a living. I also had a ready list of things I would never pursue as a career. Carpentry, for one. I tended to have all thumbs when it came to hammers and saws and wrenches. Schoolteacher, for another. Not nearly enough patience. I wouldn’t […]
Sometimes, I find myself aspiring to be a “contemplative.” But looking at the long and somewhat complex definition in the Catholic Encyclopedia, I wonder if that really is possible for those of us who have to live “in the world.” I won’t bother you with much of that entry in the encyclopedia. Suffice to say […]
Like Mount Zion are they who trust in the LORD, unshakable, forever. — Psalm 125 Do you ever think about how much we trust every single day? For instance, every time you turn on your car and pull out of the driveway, you are trusting the people who assembled that car and the mechanic who […]
One Sunday a while back, a family of five filled a pew at church near where I was sitting during Mass. That family grabbed my attention. The pew was much larger than needed to accommodate a regular group of five. But this family, in addition to the two parents, included three young children. Three energetic, […]
I remember a couple of years ago seeing some TV reports about a heartbreaking situation in Somalia and Kenya that continue today. The commentator said, “We must warn you. Some of the images you are about to see are quite disturbing.” We proceed to see starving infants and children with distended tummies, crying children who […]
A while back, I asked someone for ideas for this column. “Why don’t you write about raising kids?” came the reply. Hmm. That would assume I would know what I’m talking about, wouldn’t it? Frankly, I’m not sure that I am an expert on the subject, even though all four of my children now qualify […]
