dispensation notwithstanding

I attended a conference in New Orleans this weekend.  About a month ago, when I knew that I would be there for today's Feast of the Immaculate Conception, I mentioned it to my priest.  I was riding with someone else, and I couldn't tell from Google Maps if there was a church within walking distance of our hotel.  Besides, I didn't know how the Mass schedule would mesh with the schedule for the conference.  He listened to me and then granted me a dispensation of the obligation, if it was not possible for me to attend.  So I really had no intention of going to Mass.

Yesterday evening, looking out of the window near the 14th floor elevator, I saw the stained glass windows of a church next to the hotel.  I wasn't sure it was operational or Catholic, though, and I wasn't really thinking along the lines of going to Mass.

This morning was a lazy one, but at 7 a.m., still sitting in bed, I heard church bells.  Perhaps I should investigate further, I thought.  So I opened the Maps App on my iPad and found out that the name of the church was....get this....Immaculate Conception.  Think someone is trying to get my attention?  So...I did a quick Google Search and found the website for the church, looked at the bulletin, and observed that there was an 8 a.m. Mass on Saturday.

So, even with a "Free Pass", the Good Lord was calling my name.  Drawing me to Him.  I told my co-worker roommate that I was going to 8 a.m. Mass.  The morning conference session started at 8:30, so I'd be a little late.

I inquired at the front desk, where exactly the church was...I'd seen it, but wasn't sure which direction to go from the front door.  "Go down to the corner and take a right."  I did, and as I walked, I could hear the bells,  but still was unsure exactly where the church was.  Then I looked up, and right there in front of me was an older African American lady holding the door open.  I smiled at her and entered.  I wasn't 50 steps from the front door of our hotel!

 

Absolutely gorgeous!!  I was SO distracted!

The abundant stained glass windows were beautiful!

This is the view of the rear of the church - the choir loft, perhaps.

The pulpit...it looks like a shell arching out over it.

A side altar.

A sample of the beautiful artwork and mosaics.

The pews.

Baptismal font.

A couple of the many statues.

All in all, I was glad that I didn't ignore that quiet but persistent voice.  What a treat to worship in such a beautiful space!

still here....

I find myself here - not yet willing to give up my little corner of the internet quite yet.  Writing and photography are two of my favorite ways to express myself, but I find little that seems worth writing about these days.  And not that there is a lot of traffic.  I think most people that find their way to this blog do so because they've done a search for a certain paint color in a bedroom.  (See the #1 ranked post on the sidebar.)   I've been getting my blog fix here...a new little project of mine.

This has been a lazy, lazy summer.  Last summer we closed on a house (a year ago Wednesday) and spent most of the summer doing the hot, dirt, backbreaking work of moving 30+ years worth of accumulated stuff either to the dumpster or across town to the dream house.  There are still things in boxes.  I spent yesterday rearranging the closet in the guest room and bagging things up to get rid of.  Today was an errand-running kind of day.  Took one kid for a haircut, took the other kid to the Boy Scout Office to drop off his Eagle project proposal, and had both + a friend ride along while I dropped off papers to refinance our house at the credit union. 

Side note:  Y'all!  The interest rate has only dropped a percent since we closed last year (we thought we got a good rate last year), but we can save about $150/month on our payments if we refinance.  Over $55,000 over the life of the loan!  Got a mortgage?  Check it out!  Side, side note:  I signed my name 19 times on those "planning to refinance papers". 

Counseling is going slowly because hubby's work is going slowly.  He hasn't had a job in over a week.  I hated for him to miss a job because we had the appointment, and you have to cancel the appointment 24 hours in advance.  So I rescheduled.  Story of my life.  I went by myself last week.  It was good, because I was able to talk freely, but she really didn't have much to offer just me.  She said my coping skills seemed to be good, and she had hope that the marriage could be strengthened.  Things had been going better here....a little nicer attitude, but today wasn't really a good day in that department. 

I had a couple of "a-ha" moments today, though.  The first came at Mass during the preface to the Eucharistic Prayer.  (I love the new translation.)   Today was the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  The responsorial psalm was, "You will draw water joyfully from the springs of salvation."  Nice image.  I'm sitting there picturing a nice little gurgling brook in a country meadow somewhere.  Then came the preface before the Eucharistic Prayer.  It was a special one today for the Solemnity.  In part, it reads: 

For raised up high on the Cross, 

he gave himself up for us with a wonderful love

and poured out blood and water from his pierced side,

the wellspring of the Church's Sacraments,

so that won over to the open heart of the Savior, 

all might draw water joyfully from the springs of salvation. 

I picked my head up and smiled to myself.  "A-ha!  The Spring of Salvation is not some little babbling brook.  It's the Sacred Heart of Jesus!!  And the water that we draw...it's Living Water, isn't it?  It's the Lord's mercy and compassion!  

After I got home, and someone was having a "moment", I decided to go for a walk.  The dog and I.  I love living in a neighborhood where I can walk, and this summer, I am taking advantage of it for really the first time.  I have mapped out a route that is almost a mile, and the dog and I wander easily along.  She doesn't talk much, and so it is quiet.  I would like to pray the Rosary more often, but I often fall asleep when I sit (or lay in bed) to pray it, and I find that popping in a tape and mumbling along with the words when I drive isn't really all that prayerful.  I also feel a little self-conscious strolling through the neighborhood with my Rosary beads (maybe in time I will get over that).  But I have a rosary ring...and today I prayed with that.  It worked out quite nicely.  The dog and I enjoyed the walk.  The Blessed Mother was good company, and I think that maybe the Holy Spirit has just shown me a way that I can pray the Rosary more often.  Good thing, because "A Fortnight 4 Freedom" is right around the corner, and along with that, the opportunity to join Human Life International in praying a Rosary for religious freedom each day!  Join us?

holy family

I'm on the road - headed to see my stepson and his family today.  With six kids under 11, it is anything but a holy experience, most of the time. (Add in to that equation that I'm bringing 3 teenagers - my boys and my niece - to add to the mix.)

Nonetheless - they serve as a model for our own families which are works in progress.

We are leaving from Mass Sunday for a six hour drive (writing this on Saturday), so I'm not sure if I'll be back to post further insights, reflections, or miscellaneous.

Keep Christ in the Christmas Season!

Gotta come back and add after the homily at Mass today. First of all, the good father read a bit of what John Paul II had to say about holy families and the domestic church. Mary and Joseph did not have a holy family because they "had it made". They struggled with things just as we do. They had a holy family because of the presence of Jesus in their family. We can not blame the government, the media or society. The closing challenge of the homily was to take one of the virtues - just one - from the second reading and to work on cultivating that virtue in our family during the upcoming year. Then next year we would also be celebrating our own family as a holy family. Worth trying, I think.

our lady of sorrows

Today is the Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows.  Only in recent times have I come to understand the sorrows of our Blessed Mother.

I've always felt kind of sorry for poor Joseph - the only sinful one in the Holy Family.  Anything went wrong - it must have been his fault.  There is the temptation to think that because Mary and Jesus were sinless that their lives must have been so much easier/better than ours.  But one doesn't have to look very hard to see that that certainly wasn't true.

Mary's sorrows - Simeon's Prophecy, The Flight into Egypt, Losing Jesus in the Temple, Meeting Him on the Road to Calvary, Standing at the Foot of the Cross, Receiving His Dead Body, Placing Jesus in the Tomb. After meditating upon these sorrows, it seems to me that the adage holds true for her, too - "Little children, little problems; big children, big problems."

It also points out the suffering that Mary endured.  What a strong woman she was!  But, as it should, her strength came from the Lord.  May we have the courage to endure the suffering that comes our way!

candles in heaven?

Today the Nativity of the Blessed Mother was celebrated - Mary's birthday.  I went to Mass to celebrate, and I wondered if they celebrated her birthday in heaven.  I thought of how many candles there might be on that cake.  Wow!  I've come to a much greater appreciation of Our Blessed Mother since this summer.  I thought about having a blue cake or dessert for the family tonight, but I ended up at Open House for my high schooler instead, so we ate at different times.   (His teachers said he is doing great.)

At Mass, the priest remarked that after 55 years of priesthood, he had realized something at 5:30 this morning.  That the Immaculate Conception - which we celebrate on December 8 - is exactly 9 months before Mary's birthday on September 8.  Who knew?  He said he counted it off on his fingers to make sure. 

Happy Birthday to the Queen of the Universe!

in honor of the day

August 15 is not only grandchild #5's birthday, but the Feast of the Assumption of our Blessed Mother into Heaven.  What a celebration that must have been when the Mother of Our Lord arrived in heaven!  So, in honor of the Feast, here is her Magnificat in song....



I, for my part, happened upon the most delicious flavor of ice cream tonight.  Blue Bell's Delta Blues. I had a bowl of it last summer at my sister's house.  It is vanilla with blueberries, blueberry sauce and pie crust mixed in.  Blue is a Marian color, you know.  So I bought the last half-gallon in the freezer case at wally-world and enjoyed some tonight.  In honor of the feast, of course!

one prayer answered

Sometimes I am in awe of how well we are taken care of and provided for by our Heavenly Father.  Way beyond what we deserve.

Today was the dreaded first day of school of a much dreaded year for me.  Have you gotten that sense reading this blog?  But I had decided that between the grace of confession and the alcohol in the small section at Walgreens, I would survive the year.

I went to Mass this morning with my sister-in-law and a friend at Our Lady of the Library.  (Not really, they are just having daily Mass in the parish library until their church is repaired.)  It was the Feast of St. Jean Vianney, and the homily was about living so that others can see Jesus in us.  Very appropriate for a back-to-school message.

After that, I very reluctantly made my way to school.

Not long after I arrived, one of my co-workers mentioned that our supervisor had resigned over the summer!!  You can get a sense of the frustration I felt in the first couple of paragraphs of this post.  I am SO thrilled!! I wish the best for her, but I wanted to do cartwheels when I heard that bit of news!

I just finished a novena of the Seven Sorrows Rosary. That's nine consecutive days of saying/praying this rosary.  From someone who's not really a "Mary person."  I wonder if this has anything to do with it?  Especially since my school situation was one of my top petitions.  (And I didn't forget to tell God and His Mother, "thank you".) 

Not all of my issues have dissipated, but now I have the sense that I WILL survive.  I can deal with what is left on my plate.  And I might be able to do it without too many detours by the liquor section at Walgreens!  

Lord, show me the goodness You want me to become.

Happy dancin'.....

of spills and moratoriums and enemies and prayer

Days without a post, and then two in one day!

There is oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.  It's been gushing for quite a few days - 65, I think at last count.  It was an accident that shouldn't have happened.  11 men lost their lives.  They shouldn't have.  There were safety issues on the rig that shouldn't have been ignored.  But it was an accident.  A preventable one, but an accident all the same.

Those who depend on the Gulf waters - those in the seafood industry - from fishermen to processors to restaurant workers and owners - are feeling the effects in a big way.  Tourism has also suffered.  Who wants to go to a mucky, gooky beach?  The damage to wildlife is heartbreaking.

But then our government goes and declares a 6 month moratorium on offfshore drilling!  So not only will the seafood and tourism industries be hurt, but the oilfield and everyone (like my dear hubby) who depends on the oilfield for their livelihood.  Literally tens of thousands of people affected directly or indirectly.  They are so, so clueless.  It's not as if everyone can afford to take a six month vacation.  And it's not as if the jobs will return in six months.  Oil companies will not let their rigs sit idle for that long while some Washington paper pusher does their thing; they will be moved to other locations.  Not to return for years.

And so one starts to wonder if it is stupidity and not knowing how these things work or vindictiveness that drives the decision.  One starts to feel as if the federal government wants to finish off Louisiana once and for all.   Katrina, Rita, Gustav, and Ike gave it their best shots, and came up short.  But the federal government just might be able to pull it off and inflict massive amounts of pain.  BP is not the enemy.  More likely BO. Quite possibly fueled by greed and the opportunity to make money off of foreign oil while killing jobs and wrecking the economy here.  But no one cares.  Here, the attack feels very personal.

Immaculee, in her good-byes to us on Sunday, noted that the people in this area are suffering (even more true because the retreat was in New Orleans) and have suffered, and that she knows what suffering is.  God allows it, and that love can come from it. And we are called to love.   She said that she would pray for us, if we would pray for her. 

Today I went to Mass with my SIL and a friend of her and some friends of the friend.  We went to a local religious community.  THe chapel was at an old Catholic school.  Looked like it might have been a classroom.  Very simple.  Very traditional.  The priest faced away from the people during the Eucharistic prayer and there were snatches of Latin here and there.

The heavens opened while we were inside and we were deluged with rain.  We were headed to a restaurant for lunch and they finally decided we couldn't wait any longer, so we ran through the rain.  We looked like drowned rats.  Maybe it was appropriate for the solemnity of John the Baptist.  We looked baptized, all right.

Anyway (I'm getting to the point here) we were 5 women sitting around a table in a restaurant talking about spiritual matters.  One of the ladies mentioned that she volunteers at the monastery in town and as such talks to many people who have issues with enemies.  So much so that she had written a prayer about enemies, and before we parted ways for she gave SIL and I each a copy.  (She also gave us a beautiful picture of Jesus super-imposed on a monstrance - which was beautiful - I'll try to see if I can share it.)  I must say that there were many fervent prayers for the judge who ruled on the moratorium - for wisdom and common sense.  And without further ado....

Prayer for Enemies

Lord, you know our hearts where our foes are concerned.

We are filled with doubts about their motives and their actions, but at the same time we acknowledge that You alone know how to read souls and You alone are the judge of men.  

We come before You in humility, in repentance, and neediness. 
Left to ourselves, we can never exercise true charity; we will always fall short.

We can't see the whole picture; only You can do that.

The Holy Scriptures assure us that no purpose of Yours can ever be thwarted. 

No evil can ever defeat You or overthrow Your designs.

Help us to keep that in mind as we pray.

Help us to grow in trust that You can and will work all things for good, even the foulest and most despicable situations.

Help us to think twice when we express aversion toward others.

Help us to use those occasions to stop in our tracks, to redirect our thoughts, and to turn those negatives to  positives, believing that with You in the equation, the bitter can become sweet; the dark can become flooded with light; the sinister can fall prostrate before You in repentance; the most dismal situations can become infused with hope, the black storm clouds can reveal their silver linings.

Lord, we pray for our enemies. 

We unclench our fists and release all the energy we've expended in distrusting them to trusting You to take care of them in ways we never can.

To the best of our ability, we pray You bestow blessings on those we don't like, don't agree with, don't want to associate with.  

We ask You to bring us all, Your children, into the family You envision us to be, a family united in love and peace and joy.

In the words of St. Thomas More, "Make us saved souls in heaven together."

To God be the glory for the conversions of hearts that will ensue, both in ourselves and in our foes.

Thank You, Lord, for hearing our prayer.

Amen. 

~ Bonnie Taylor Barry

To that end, our governor has declared Saturday a day of prayer for perseverance in the face of the oil spill.  It is the Feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.  Appropriate.  

sacred heart

Today is the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus.  For daily Mass, a solemnity means that there are three readings, instead of two, and usually the Gloria is recited as part of the Introductory Rites.  Usually for daily Mass there are only two readings and the Gloria is not said.

The readings today were beautiful.  The first reading was from Ezekiel 34, and said in part, "I myself will look after and tend my sheep...I will rescue them from every place where they were scattered when it was cloudy and dark...the lost I will seek out, the strayed I will bring back, the injured I will bind up, the sick I will heal...."  You have to love that image.  God isn't out-sourcing his caring and pawning it off on someone else to do.  He has got our backs!  The responsorial Psalm was the 23rd Psalm, "The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want."  Really?  Probably, most of the time.  The second reading from Romans 5 says, "The love  of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit....Christ...died for the ungodly....we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son....  And the Gospel was the beautiful parable of the lost sheep from Luke 15.  One of my favorite images of Jesus...when he does find it, he sets it on his shoulders with great joy...  I've been that lost sheep...

 

Father said that all week long, through the readings from 1Kings, we have been shown the "heart of God" and the Heart of God is mercy.  Plain and simple, when we sin, returning to the heart of God is about forgiveness and reconciliation, strength and grace.  Mercy.  And if we follow Jesus in humility and obedience, it will lead us straight to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Those Sacred Heart pictures have always seemed a little odd to me.  So in honor of the day, how about a lost sheep image?

I was able to get to Mass early today.  That is my goal every day - to get there 15 or 20 minutes ahead of time to enjoy the quiet and pray, but during school it just doesn't happen.  Today was the first time this summer that I've been there significantly early.  (I thought I was early a couple of days....but I really wasn't.)  Anyway, I was there before the candles were lit.  One of my Facebook mom friends had posted about her cousin last week who had been given only a few weeks to live, so she was one of the people I prayed for while I was there.  Kind of strange to get home and see on FB that during the same time frame I was sitting in church before 6:30 Mass, she had passed away..

I picked up the paint for our parking lot project this morning.  Our test run will get underway this afternoon....

corpus christi

When I was growing up, I always wondered why we Catholics had a feast day for a city in Texas. 

Well, now I know that it is a "solemnity" and that it was instituted after the Council of Trent as somewhat of a response to Protetsants who would say that the Eucharist (the Body of Christ) is a symbol. 

I thought Father's homily tonight was wonderful.  I wonder how much of it I can recall?  He started off by saying that for many "satisfaction" is one reason that many people attend Mass.  So that they can "satisfy" an obligation or so that they can be "satisfied" by receiving the Eucharist.  But that is pretty low on the list of reasons and that even though the crowds in the gospel went away "satsified", there is something much deeper than that going on. 

The Eucharist is not so much about satisfaction as it is about transformation.  The bread and wine are not the only things that are transformed.  When the gifts are brought forward, along with that are the things that we offer from our lives - our trials, our tragedies, our joys, sorrows, successes, and sinfulness.  Offered imperfectly so that it can be taken and given back to us perfectly.  It is not only the bread and wine that is transformed at Mass.  We are also there on that altar, and we are called to be transformed, as well. 

When the priest says, "take this all of you....this is my Body...given up for you", we need to adore Jesus (and not with our noses buried in the misallette) and give Him  OUR bodies to do what He needs.  When the cup is offered, "take this all of you and drink it..."  We need to thank Him, acknowledge our sinfulness, ask for mercy, and offer ourselves to Him.  Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

And when we receive the Eucharist - we need to realize that we are to become what we receive.  It is about transforming our lives to become more and more like Jesus. And when we are transformed, then we are called to transform the world in which we live and work.  God's deepest desire for us is that we become the gift we receive.

hearing God

The Scriptures from both Thursday and Friday dealt with listening to and/or hearing God.  On Thursday, the Optional Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes was celebrated and the gospel used was the one of the wedding at Cana.  There, Mary tells the waiters, "Do whatever he tells you."  We, too, must be ready, must be humble enough to "do whatever He tells us."  Listening in the sense of obeying. 

On Friday, we had the scripture where Jesus heals the deaf man and allows him first to hear and then to speak.  Ephphatha!  (Be opened!)  Listening in the sense of actually hearing.  We must be open to what Jesus is trying to tell us.  First we listen; then we speak.  Is it just me, or is that easier said than done?  No, sometimes we all tell God to "shut up" by ignoring what He is trying to tell us or telling Him how things should be. 

I can remember a conversation about 25 years ago with my best friend.  "How can you hear God?" I asked in frustration.  "He doesn't speak English!"  I wanted to hear God, but He wouldn't speak so that I could hear him, I thought.  Remembering where my life was 25 years ago, it is more likely that what He was telling me was not what I wanted to hear, and so I just turned a deaf ear to it.  Selective hearing, you know. 

But how do we hear God?  My own kids have asked me that question, and I struggled to answer it with something that made sense to them.  God speaks to us through His Word - proclaimed and preached.  He speaks to us through other people - especially the people in our lives who tell it like it is.  He speaks to us through events.  One of the defining points in my life was 9-11.  Think God used that event to reach me?  You bet!  But also when everything just seems to fall into place for a certain outcome.  Or conversely, when nothing seems to work out! 

He speaks to us through listening prayer.  To me, that is the most difficult.  Throughout my life, there have been "ideas" that have occurred to me that must have only come from God, but those didn't happen on any kind of frequent basis, and I'm sure God speaks more often than once every 5 years or so.  At this point in my life, I am trying more to tune into and listen to those little things that we all "hear" - whether it is calling or emailing someone, having maintenance done on the car, or volunteering for something.  It is definitely a work in progress, and sometimes I do have to remind God that He might need to send a neon sign or speak really loudly. 

Then there is the "do whatever he tells you" aspect.  The obedience.  Right now, there are a couple of things that He is telling me to do.  And yet, because of my own stubborness, I have not yet picked up that cross to carry it.  Something to work on for Lent.

holy families?

Sunday was the Feast of the Holy Family.  Fortunately, they don't call it the Feast of the Perfect Family, but I think they got kind of an unfair advantage considering two of the members were sinless.  Poor Joseph!  But they weren't perfect - their teenager decided to stay behind in the city they were visiting without telling anyone, and his parents left without making sure he was with them. 

Our families, too, are called to be holy, though sometimes we are not anywhere close to that ideal!  So, if we are called to be holy, that must be an attainable goal.  Not perfection - just holy. 

The second reading from Sunday is one of my favorite bits of scripture.  It seems to come up fairly frequently, and it will always remind me of our previous pastor for a couple of different reasons.  This is from Colossians 3:12-17, and it gives us some direction for having a holy family: 

Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, (that's us!) heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.  And over all of these put on love.... And let the peace of Christ control your hearts.... And be thankful.  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly....And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Oh, goodness!  Patience?  Bearing with one another - even when you are tired of bearing with some people?  Forgiving?  Again??  Patience?  Love?  Be thankful??  Really??  We are God's chosen ones?  So we have to act like it?  Was He running short on people to choose from ?  Patience??  Peace of Christ?  Peace?  Here?  In this house?  I have to forgive AS the Lord forgives me?  That means I'll be forgiving for years to come??  The same things over and over?  Patience?? 

Does anyone think that this call to be a Holy Family might be a lifetime work?  Probably best accomplished with prayers, as well as compassion, gentleness, humility, patience, forgiveness, love, and gratitude.  Lord, don't go anywhere.  I'll be needing you often for this project! 

chickens or feathers

My thought for the day came from our friendly custodian cleaning my classroom this morning.  "Some days are chickens, some feathers!" 

Yesterday was feathers.  Today was chickens, I think.  We stay SO busy this year, it seems.  Today it seemed like the students got along with each other, and that always makes the day better! 

Today was the feast (?) of guardian angels.  Messengers sent by God in our lives - just because He loves us.  Father says he probably doesn't have just one - maybe he has a couple of different shifts.  Thank you, God for guardian angels and Fridays.