June 9, 2015 // Local

Multi-talented woman grounded in God

Todays Catholic

Diane Ort provides music at St. Joseph Parish in Garrett. She also plays the organ at the parish.

GARRETT — Diane Ort is an unassuming, soft-spoken wife, and mother of three — ages 16, 14 and 12. She is also a songwriter, musician and certified public accountant.

Recently, Ort released two CDs, “I Believe” and “Come to the Well,” a collection of songs she wrote. David C. Smith, music director at St. John the Baptist in Fort Wayne and a producer, recorded the music in his Fort Wayne studio.

Ort balances her many responsibilities so that she can always follow where God wants to lead her. Ort says time for prayer can be difficult to carve out; but she finds it so life-directing that daily Mass and prayer must begin her day. She spends time reading the Bible. The rosary might not be recited all at once on hectic days, but perhaps a decade or two is recited with the children on the way to school and the rest before the day’s end as spare time permits.

After her mother died, Ort began to pray the rosary often. When her young niece died suddenly two years later in 2003, she asked the Blessed Mother to give her the grace to pray the rosary every day. Ort’s life story contains several examples of how praying the rosary daily transformed her life.

Shortly after making that commitment to the Blessed Mother, the gloves of St. Gianna Beretta Molla, a pro-life saint, physician and mother were on display at St. Joseph Parish, Garrett. Ort was not familiar with the use of such relics at the time, but was asked to hand out prayer cards of the saint.

She learned that if the gloves of the saint were placed at the site of a person’s pain, the pain was reported to sometimes disappear. Ort, who had suffered from sciatica that made her right side go limp before and after the birth of their youngest child, touched her side with the gloves. Later that night she lifted her baby Trevor from his crib without pain and the pain has not returned. Ort received her healing on Nov. 1, All Saint’s Day. The feast day of St. Gianna Beretta Molla is April 28, which is also Trevor’s birthday.

Late last school year, the Orts learned that St. Joseph’s would no longer offer a seventh- and eighth-grade class. While the family preferred to remain dedicated to one parish, someone suggested they contact St. Vincent de Paul, Fort Wayne, where they found that there were openings in the two grades that their sons were to be enrolled. The Orts maintain a dual membership at both parishes so that their children continue to receive a Catholic education and Diane can continue with her music ministry at St. Joseph’s.

Ort came to understand that the encounter with the relics and the openings at St. Vincent de Paul School were not mere coincidences. They were gifts from God.

“When God gives you gifts and the opportunity to share them, how can you do anything else, but say ‘Yes,’” she exclaims.

Though Ort was once a maker of lists, she admits that it is difficult for the “accountant in her” not to have an itinerary. She still writes important appointments down on the calendar, but does not want to be so structured that she cannot listen and wait upon God’s direction for her.

Ort has been playing the guitar since she was young, never thinking that she would play for anyone other than her family and friends. If she would not have dabbled with her guitar and played the organ at church, she says she would not have become a songwriter as many of her songs arose from her guitar and organ playing skills.

Her first song, “Surrounded by the Angels,” came to her while praying at her mother’s and niece’s gravesites eight and six years respectively after their deaths. Ort suddenly found herself singing the melody and went home to write all of the lyrics to the song the next day.

“I received the song inspirations from God. I actually never tried to write these songs,” she said. “The song inspirations would come to me and then I would work to complete them into an entire song. Usually I would get the melody and lyrics for the refrain and then I would pray about what it was saying and often I would turn to the Bible for the rest of the words.”

Ort’s favorite prayer, repeated 10 times, says it all, “O Jesus, I surrender myself to You. Take care of everything.”

For more information on the CDs, visit dianeort.com.