7 Quick Takes, Long and Random Edition.

What? So it's not Friday. Let's agree to overlook this detail.

1) So, I passed my defense and I'm officially done with grad school! As of graduation day, I'll have a Masters of Education in Religious Education with a Concentration in Total Community Catechesis. Or, an MEd in RE with TCC, for short. I'm pretty psyched to be done, and yes, proud that I did this. No one at my high school graduation would ever have imagined I'd end up with this many letters, including myself. I only went to college by the hair on my chinny chin chin. Still, I did a pretty decent job there and here I am today, all mastered up.
2) I'm in a dark night of the soul, and deep. I don't think the word "night" quite covers it, it's been a while and something I've suffered through in varying degrees at different times. At the end of this month I'm heading off on a silent retreat (directed, blessedly, by my own spiritual director, who is both a saint AND an angel) and I have to tell you, the impending silence is a little scary. I imagine I'll have to do a lot of listening for God's voice, and that'll be a change, considering my prayer life with God is more like this, with Dr. Evil as me, and Scott as God:

Still, I know it's time to face up to God and what the heck God wants for and of me. As nervous as I am about the retreat, I also feel like it's an island I'm swimming toward.
3) Meanwhile, our cats are dying. Our oldest, Zarley, is 18 and in renal failure but rebounding nicely, for some unknown reason- my best guess is that she is too... "special..." to die. Zarley's always had issues, but she's a love. Pip, who's 16 or 17 now, is sicker, more suddenly, with renal failure. We know we're in our last months with them, and it's so weirdly shocking to think of life without them. We've been together nearly half my life now, and they've seen me through a lifetime roller coaster of emotions. We want to be good to them and responsible, and we're hoping it'll be a peaceful process and that when the time comes, we'll know what to do. In the meantime, we have an IV bag hanging from the pot rack in our kitchen and a baggy full of needles so that Scott can heroically give Pip fluids subcutaneously every few days. He is my hero and a wonderful kitty-daddy. I know, I know.
4) And meanwhile, I've started training to be a Hospice vigil volunteer. We'll eventually be on call to sit with people in their last hours/minutes, if they don't have anyone to sit with them as they die, or to be there if the family can't be. I'm honored and intrigued to be part of this organization and process. The first week, we heard about the dying process and Hospice's philosophy and mission, and the second week, we heard from a nurse about infectious diseases we might catch. I learned that you should never put your pocketbook down on a soft surface in someone's home, and that you can catch Hepatitis from sushi. Still, I'd rather die from a sushi-related disease than go without it for the rest of my life.
5) In order to be a vigil volunteer, we first have to be direct care volunteers for six months, regularly visiting with people who have less than 6 months to live. Honestly this sounds much more foreboding than being with an actively dying person. How's that for introversion???
6) So now I am on the other side of the volunteering process, and I'm learning a lot about what it's like to be the one volunteering instead of the one looking for volunteers. I really feel called to this volunteer work, for whatever reason. At the first information meeting, they let us know we'd need 9 weeks of training, plus six months of volunteering, plus some more training, and TB testing, and would have to fill out an application and have an interview. There was a minute when I thought "bait and switch!!!" and there have been many minutes when I have thought "I'll see how tonight goes and then decide if I'll go on" but now there's this momentum that is part my wanting to serve, and part my wanting to finish where I started, and partly my wondering what God is calling me to through this.
7) Again, my Lent is a bit of a wash. I had given up rolling my eyes, and have found that as it turns out, I don't roll them all that much. So far, I've not stopped myself from doing it, but I am more aware. I had also given up Bejeweled Blitz, which I'm finding surprisingly hard, and had decided to start walking to daily Mass in the mornings, as I've done in Lents past. But Mass on that first Thursday was too hard for me spiritually, being all DNOTS-ing and all, and my schedule has been crazy. I think the other problem is I'm leading (and reading) a Gospel of Mark BS (that's Bible Study! Come on!) and Mark is all, "the sabbath is for humans, not the other way around" and love over law and all that. Mark always derails my Lents. In all seriousness, I'm doing some serious exploration of the idea of suffering, and what it's about, and that makes it tricky to volunteer for it.

See, now that I'm not in school anymore I can't write enough. Thanks for your patience and good wishes (on Facebook) and all that. And no, I'm pretty sure I won't be going for a PhD. Wouldn't that be a hoot though? Ha!

Famous Last Words (or, Plumb Unlucky)

Last weekend, I glibly wrote this for my column in our bulletin:
This weekend, as I was resting up and trying to shake off a new Spring cold, I heard Scott start to yell from the kitchen. He kept saying “OH NO!!! The ceiling!!! There’s a leak!!” I ran in to see that indeed, there was not just a leak – it was raining in our kitchen! Some work had been done in the upstairs bathroom that week, and that meant water that was supposed to be upstairs, ended up downstairs.
It was a complete mess. We grabbed every piece of Tupperware we have and placed them on the floor to catch the drips, and waited for the landlord to come. In preparation for the workers who will replace the ceiling this week, we moved everything out that we could, and covered the rest with plastic or sheets, in hopes to keep the dust from the construction controlled. But for me, the hardest
part of it all was that I had to take down the many pictures we have on our “wall of love.” The wall of love started with a few pictures, but each year it has grown to cover a whole wall in the corner of our kitchen. All the Christmas card photos of our friends end up on that wall, and I often stand there with a cup of coffee in my hand, looking at the faces of the people that I love and feeling thankful for their presence
on my wall and in my life. So I mourned a little, pulling down all those
pictures before the water could ruin them. I could put them back once everything is dry and fixed, but it'll never be the same.
The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of starting over. The wall is totally blank, just empty space, but I know that by the time Christmas cards start coming again, I’ll have plenty of loving faces to look at over my coffee.
I feel this way about Lent. I give up things that I love every year – not because I want to force myself to mourn, but because I know God will fill my empty places. Feeling the absence makes me appreciate the blessings that come to fill my blank slate. Stripping away some good things reminds me that so many others are without love, and I appreciate the love that I have in my life even more intensely. It’s good for me to return to baseline every year, and build up again from there. I grow deeper in trust from the loss, and deeper in gratitude for the luxury of having something so good to give up.
How’s your Lent going so far? What have you stripped away, so that God can fill in? Even if you still haven’t started yet, it’s not too late. This week, watch as God returns to you what you offer up to Him.

Well I did take all the pictures down, but I saved out four that I decided to keep up. The carpenters came during the week and rebuilt the ceiling, and we put everything back into place, and wouldn't you know it, the ceiling busted open again. I am, as I type, listening to a combination of dripping and plumbing work going on. Our whole house is disrupted, and my day is off to a dry (read: no shower, no toilet!) start. And those four pictures? They were just barely saved from this latest rainstorm.
And that reminded me of Lent too. It made me think that I choose my sacrifices pretty carefully; I'll give up this but I'm definitely keeping that. I don't feel called to give up on that this year. Haven't I sacrificed enough?
Now, I should say that while I get the idea of sacrifice (I really do, you don't have to comment and teach me) and I'm all for it, I also remember that Jesus said the Sabbath is made for us, not the other way around... I don't think sacrificing should be just for the sake of sacrificing. I don't think God rained... rain down upon my four treasured pictures just to prove an ascetic point to me.
It's just that it reminded me that I don't have all the answers, that I can't control my life experience nor my faith experience. And it reminded me that my faith and my beliefs will always be tested- so if I'm going to go off teaching about God through my experience, I'd better be prepared to re-write my lesson plans now and again.
I do have a propensity to try to see challenges as spiritual exercises (although not so much lately as my spiritual muscles have been pretty taxed) and this is no different. Today I'll have to wait to get to work to poop, and I'll hope my hair doesn't look to awful and that no one will be able to smell... ahem, tell, that I've not showered today. And when I feel uncomfortable, I'm going to try to remind myself about those people who haven't showered in a while, who don't know when or where they'll be able to poop next, people who are turned away because they smell... and I'll remind myself to be thankful for all I have.

Bulletin!!

I think my blog has been a little gloomy lately so here's a glimpse at some happy hope, straight out of our parish bulletin. Our pastor's recovering from surgery so I got a promotion to the big page 2 column! Woo!! Here it is, for your perusal.

I don’t know about you, but I am ready for warm weather and flowers and sunshine. It seems like this year, Spring is taking its sweet time getting here. Lent, too, seems to be taking forever somehow! The word Lent is derived from the word for Spring, so I guess it makes sense that they both seem to be crawling along at the same agonizing pace. I just want to fast-forward to beauty and joy, to Easter.
But that is not how we roll in the Catholic Church. We know that in order to have Easter, we
must endure Good Friday. To experience the beauty, we must first face the ugliness. To quell my impatience, this week I went back to read from a favorite book, Parker Palmer’s Let Your Life Speak. He invites us to look at the season of Spring as a hint of how our lives unfold and how the process of growth works:
“...there is a hard truth to be told: before spring becomes beautiful, it is plug ugly, nothing but mud and muck. I have walked in the early spring through fields that will suck your boots off, a world so wet and woeful it makes you yearn for the return of ice. But in that muddy mess, the conditions for rebirth are being created.”
Palmer reminds us that growth is not all about the blooming – change is hard work, and some of the conditions for change are happening even before we are cognizant of them.
If you are finding yourself at this halfway-point of Lent to be struggling with the changes you promised to make on Ash Wednesday, be encouraged. The blooming may be still in the unseen future, but the Holy Spirit is working in the present, beneath our feet, in the muddy refuse of our false starts.
There is still time for you to Repent and believe in the Gospel. You and I, even if we’ve done a less-than-brilliant job at being the best Christians we can be so far this Lent, still have time and opportunities to turn things around.

Downhill Battles

Well, well, well. I guess it's fan-hitting season, and I didn't get the memo.
That is...
This Sunday, we will hear about the Transfiguration- wherein Peter, James and John follow Jesus up a mountain, get to see His Glorious Self revealed, and freak out a little. They try to come up with a plan to celebrate the goodness of this revelation (let's build tents!), and consider staying up there for a while, soaking it all up. Jesus, as Jesus does, says something like "dur, NO." He walks them right back down that mountain. Jesus really forces His followers to face reality- the reality of who He really is, and the reality of the real world off that mountain.
And here we are in Lent, which I get excited for every year, thinking it'll be this glorious time of spiritual growth, wherein Jesus and I will grow close and I will have warm feelings of happy religiousness. I always expect it'll be like a glowing 40 day retreat, but every year, it's a little bit more like... boot camp.
I want to imagine that a relationship with God is cozy, warm, and easy- I want to stay on the mountaintop, basking in His glow, but the truth is, it's hard. Ministry? Hard. Real life? Hard!
And I have a really, relatively, super-easy life. My house has, so far, not been wiped out by a tsunami, for example. Still, this life stuff, it's hard work. But... I'm willing to do the work of being in relationship with God, on and off the mountain, and I will lean hard on his assurances that I can be un-afraid.

Simple..

Simple Woman's Day Book
FOR TODAY 2/12/11...
I know, I know, it's so cheap to blog using a fill-in-the-blanks structure like this, and I oughta just buck up and blog like a big girl, but for some reason the thought of cold-writing is just too much for me right now. So, you'll take the Daybook and you'll like it.
Outside My Window... it's almost hard to believe, and feels like I'm jinxing it just to even mention it, but Spring seems to be... springing. A LOT of the snow has melted, and the yard is a mess. Today I cleaned up the largest of the branches that were littering the lawn, and Scott couldn't resist doing a little sweeping out there too- the nice rocks that our landlord put down in the parking spaces last year are ALL OVER THE PLACE. It's going to take a serious amount of raking to get them back where they are supposed to go, but we're in that giddy, early-spring mood that makes us anxious to don our work gloves and have at it.
I am thinking... about my Dad, and a friend, who both are scheduled for the same cardiac procedure this week. As we get ready for Dad's, my siblings and I are maneuvering the visiting and worrying and whatnot. It's new territory for us, and there are so many of us, and we're all being careful not to be too pushy or too lax, or too impatient or too assuming, or... well, it's tricky stuff, made trickier maybe because we like each other and don't want to let this stress cause any damage to our relationships.
This weekend for Generations of Faith, we did a program that had a TON of moving parts- several speakers and locations and props and transitions, and we handled it as a team- but all evening as people ran up to me to ask last-minute questions about details unanticipated, I wished there was one central director who was in charge.
In both settings, my family and at GOF, it's harder to work as a team, but at the end of the day (night) it feels good to do high-fives all around (we actually don't high-five, but you see what I'm saying) and know we've really worked well together.
I am thankful for... my job! (Do I say that every time?) In our Archdicoese, we're looking at a reorganization, whatever that might mean... and, we really have no idea- there's no real information forthcoming from the Powers That Be, which leaves us with nothing to do but imagine outcomes, best- and worst-case. I'm so fortunate to be where I am, and it is scary to think things might change...
From the kitchen... NOTHING! I missed my weekly visit with my favorite baked-goods consumer this week, which left me with no excuse to bake, especially since Lent is here. Today's errands turned into kind of a long process, and we ended up having dinner at a great local restaurant, and I broke all my Lenten rules. Sorry, God. I'll do better tomorrow, or at least Monday.
I am wearing... I totally got dressed today. But now I'm back in my pajamas.
I am creating... a retreat, for women! I'm doing a day retreat for a parish nearby, at a lovely retreat center, and I'm so excited for it. I think it's going to be a really lovely day.
I am going... to bed soon. MY lovely doctor has given me a lovely prescription for lovely sleep medicine!! I never thought I'd need help sleeping, but I was waking up a LOT at night, just about every time I would turn over. It is heavenly to sleep through the night, and not feel drugged out- I still wake up if I need to, and wake up in the morning fresh as a daisy. I love going to bed!!
I am reading... Not much this week, as I have been on Spring Break. Woo! But I have been reading the news accounts about the earthquake in Japan and the Tsunami, and all the other bad news in the world.
I am hoping... for a little good news this week. For Japan, for my friends and family with their various medical issues, for warm weather, for lower gas prices. Whatever- I'll take any good news I can get!
I am hearing... Some silly movie that Scott is watching, and otherwise peaceful silence.
Around the house... the cats are still in hate with each other, but mostly just hissing and growling rather than the old fighting. So, I guess that's an improvement.
One of my favorite things... oh, I don't know, I'm tired. I'd better head to bed- daylight savings, you know, tonight. Oh! Daylight Savings is one of my favorite things, I guess.
A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week: crazy work week, back to class, and up to Maine to be part of the parent-care. Don't let me forget to write that paper that's due Friday!
Here is picture thought I am sharing.
It's Pip! She loves to get into our bedroom closet, although she needs a boost up to the higher shelves nowadays. But when she's done in there, she still leaps out of the closet onto the bed, and I got a great shot of her this time!

Straighten Up!

I'm trying to improve my posture. I had an awesome massage this past weekend, in hopes that I could start getting myself back in line. I have a sore shoulder that, most days, feels like someone's stabbing it, and some days, I can't raise my arm up very high. And shrugging?? Forgettaboutit!!!
Anyway, my massage therapist is brutal and great, and I felt better (albeit SORE) for a couple of days, but it's really just as sore as before, and probably is shoulder cancer. Okay, I don't think there is such a thing as shoulder cancer. But these are the things one thinks about while being invisibly stabbed in the shoulder, you know?
Anyway, since my massage, I've been trying really hard to sit up straight, stretch out my pectoral muscles like the therapist urged me to do, and realign myself to stand up nice and tall, shoulders back, like I'm facing a firing squad. Ha!
Anyway, it's exhausting! It's a lot of work to stand up straight and sit up straight, and my muscles are wimpy and weak and it's seconds before I feel my shoulders curl and my back sag again, back to the comfort of dis-alignment. And the mindfulness involved in being aware of my posture and reminding myself to sit up sit up sit up is something I'm just not used to. I feel odd, sitting up straight, too- suddenly taller than everyone around me and wondering if they are wondering why I look so wooden. There's a weird psychological element to it, this physical change in my stature.
Maybe I'll add my posture to my Lenten promises, and offer up the hard work it's turning out to be.
(picture credit)

Looking Ahead to Ash Wednesday

Here's a bit of the parent session I taught this past weekend for our parish's Generations of Faith, with some changes to make it blog-able:



(pic credit)








As we prepare for Ash Wednesday, let's look at a little piece of scripture that I think will pull this all together for us- we often hear it on Ash Wednesday (it’s one of the options) as we are blessed with ashes: “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

Why do you think this snippet of scripture was chosen for this day, which marks the beginning of Lent? I always hear that it's a reminder of our mortality, which, I guess is always important- but, why on Ash Wednesday?

To clear it up a little more, let’s look at the context: it’s from Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament- it happens near the end of a speech by God to Adam and Eve after he’s found them hiding from Him in the garden. Remember, they're hiding from Him because they've gone against His instructions, and... well, just maybe they know they're in trouble.
Here’s the scripture with a little context: (Gen. 3:16-19)

To the woman he said,
‘I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing;
in pain you shall bring forth children,
yet your desire shall be for your husband,
and he shall rule over you.’
¹⁷And to the man^* he said,
‘Because you have listened to the voice of your wife,
and have eaten of the tree
about which I commanded you,
“You shall not eat of it”,
cursed is the ground because of you;
in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
¹⁸ thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
and you shall eat the plants of the field.
¹⁹ By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread
until you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.’

Check it out: God is MAD when he says this! It reminds me of an old parental line: "remember, I brought you into this world and I can take you OUT!!!"

I think it's pretty common for a parent to get angry when their kids do something stupid- but I think at the heart of that anger is usually frustration, born of dashed expectations. Parents have hopes and expectations for how the child they've created will behave in the world. They expect their children to be grateful for what they have been given, to know right from wrong and to act accordingly. They are angry because they are thinking "I know you can do better- I have been trying to raise you to do better."

And I think that's what God was saying to His little creations who, as the story goes, should have known how to act in the face of temptation and chose differently.

When a parent chews out their kids for doing something stupid, they demand change- they want their kids to turn it around, straighten up, and remember who(se) they are and that they've been taught- and for us, Catholic Christians, Lent is the time to do that. If we've gone astray during the year, failed to live up to God's expectations of us, now it's time to repent, and to return.

This Ash Wednesday, when I'm blessed with ashes and I am told "remember, thou art dust and to dust thou shall return" I'm probably going to hear "remember, I broughtest thou into this world and I can takest thou out of it!" and I'm going to try to do better. I want to make my Father proud.

A Comment on Comments (with comments)

I commented on a blog! On an NPR radio show blog!
I haven't commented on a blog in years, and outside of some blogs I don't usually even bother reading the comments. I think the blog commenting process is similar to that of getting into a car and feeling safe enough to have road rage. Suddenly you're in a large cage that will give you the courage to flip off people who, outside the car, could kick your ass. When commenting on a blog, you sit in your jammies and use a false name and flip off the whole world. Whenever I've felt like commenting, I've been angry, and that is no mood in which to take to the internet.
Sometimes I read them out of curiosity and/or for humor's sake. Just last night, I read comments over at the Groupon.com blog about their Super Bowl ads. I was able to discern that most people were angry about the Tibet one, and I enjoyed one comment that said something like "shame on you, Groupon. Again. SHAME ON YOU." Heh, that still makes me laugh.
Anyway, today I was listening to The Takeaway, and they featured someone from Beliefnet talking about the new Confession App that everyone is sending me notes about these days. They said why has religion (who is this "religion" they're asking about?) been so resistant to technology and social media? They said the Pope hasn't exactly approved the app, but hasn't not approved it, either... and they wondered if the new model of church will be the online forum.
So many responses leap to mind.
1) can you imagine a church that's like an online forum? See above. I'll take a buncha people praying quietly together in one room any old day over that.
2) I don't know about "religion" but all we hear about these days from the RCC is about using technology and social media for evangelization, etc. There doesn't seem to be much resistance there, except here in Boston where everyone is assumed to be a child molester.
(oh, that's harsh. I should delete that.)
3) and here's what I said to the Takeaway people. This app is basically a back-lit version of the paper handouts at the door (or that should be at the door) of every Catholic Church that say "How to go to Confession." No big whoop. Sure it's got some bells and whistles but whatever. It's not a local, high-tech confessional. If what I hear is true, there's nothing there for the pope to be against. It's SUCH a non-story.
The bigger story, I'd say, is how popular it seems to be. It's 1.99 to download, which to me is a major commitment, app-wise. I'll spend .99 out of curiosity, but I would only spend two bucks on an app that I intended to use, and use... religiously. Ha! Sorry.
Anyway, maybe it's just me but that's the significant takeaway here. The app is listed at #22 top grossing and #23 top paid apps on the list. That's huge, no?
Last year our parish had surprisingly bigger crowds at Lenten Masses than we could remember, and when we offered Confession on Wednesday nights in Lent, people LINED UP to receive the sacrament. Why this renaissance? There's yer story.

Bring On Lent

I have been OUT OF CONTROL diet-wise lately.














I think it's my deep-seated Catholicism that makes me go nuts this year- my gut knows that Lent should be around the corner so I naturally go a little crazy. You know, because Inspired Self-Control, for Spiritual Purposes, is coming right up.
I know, this is contrary to the whole idea of fasting, of sacrificing... I know that when I give up something for Lent, I should still be not doing it a year later... but that is not the kind of Catholic I am. I am the kind of Catholic who lives like a wicked sinna all year long and then pulls it together for Lent. On Easter? I go nuts.
All right, that is kind of an exaggeration. But when Lent comes I actually do look forward to a time of discipline and dedication and prayerful action. I am already dreaming of things to do for my Lenten promise, and have some good ideas. As a low-carber, most of the time (but not right now, see above picture) the nice thing about Lent is that I can beg out of people's offers of sweets, and can blame it on God. The rest of the year, people get annoyed or insulted when I turn down their brownies, or make nasty cracks about the low-carb lifestyle, etc... but during Lent suddenly everyone is sympathetic and supportive of my efforts!
I have some other ideas that I may add on or subtract to my life during Lent but I'm not set yet. A friend of ours writes Lenten Bumper Stickers with his youth group kids, and I've used that with my kids in the past, and it's surprisingly fun and helpful. The catchy slogan turns into a mantra somehow... mine in the past has been "He DIED for me, I'll DIET for Him." But maybe I'll work on something snazzier for this year. It's going to be a doozy, I can feel it. But it's still over a month away! How am I going to stop foraging before then???

Lent Fatigue

I have Lent fatigue. Lent is indeed the busiest season for churchies, we add all sorts of extra programming and it's traditionally sacrament time, too, so there's even more going on. We've been having simple soup suppers followed by Stations of the Cross every Friday, which has been absolutely lovely but means that we haven't had two days without going in to the church since Ash Wednesday. Ohhhh for two days off!!!
And I've been doing this low-carb thing for my Lenten promise- and doing really well at it! I've been disciplined, even drinking that awful low-carb beer instead of the real stuff, even when we're out on the town! Maybe that doesn't sound too impressive to you, gentle reader, but ohhhh it is.
Last Sunday was Laetare Sunday, which is meant to remind us that we're getting there- that joy and rejoicing are just around the corner. It worked on me, and I started dreaming about Easter Sunday morning, sleeping late and eating great things all day, relaxing with Scott in pajamas all day, maybe a nap... ahhhhh. I can't wait.
But there's still a bit to go- and I'm going to look for some new low-carb things to try, get a little variety in to stave off the boredom, and try to keep myself on track until glorious, glorious Easter.

cheery cheery cheery

Today it was around 60 degrees, and sunny. I saw green points poking out of the ground, and went for a walk without a proper coat, without gloves, without snow-proof shoes. I've been getting emails from a seed catalog company and it's full of temptations. I think we've planted mostly perennials in our little garden at this point, but I seem to recall a few empty spots.
I can feel a difference, physically, when it starts to warm up like this. This morning I cleaned the whole kitchen and part of the bathroom, made myself breakfast and lunch, and got it all done before going to work!
I always think about how brilliant it is that Lent happens in the Spring. I know, I know it's no coincidence but I really love how we start in darkness and each day as we grow closer and closer to the glory of Easter, the days become brighter and warmer and all around are signs of new and renewed life. It really is a hope-filled time and I can feel my heart warming along with my fingers.
Right after Easter we leave for California for a religious education conference, and I can't wait! I love having something to look forward to. I feel happy and lucky to have the life I have!

Catholic Tool

I know, I've been very neglectful of this blog, and you, dear readers... I just haven't been able to complete a fascinating thought lately. Maybe it's because I'm on "Spring" break. We've had a ton of snow and it's been awfully cold, and I'm starting to feel that longing that comes around in March every year.
I've charged right into Lent with pretty good resolve, and this year I'm low-carbing, which is tricky in Lent. Fridays are especially tough for an almost-complete-meat-eater. It's also been Scott's birthday "season," which means parties and cake at every turn. I don't want to be a Catholic Tool and peel the cheese off the pizza at staff lunch, and so I suck it up and try to do the best I can.
Each Friday for Lent our parish is hosting simple soup suppers followed by the Stations of the Cross. A different parish group sponsors the suppers each week, and supplies the soup. Our first one was sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, pros at this sort of thing, and they served minestrone and corn chowder. The chowder was delicious due, no doubt, to the bacon bits in it.
The more I learn about Jesus, the more I cringe at things like the Stations of the Cross. I have a hard time paying such strict attention to just that part of the story, because to me the important parts of Jesus' Christ-hood are, well, all the parts. So when we kneel and say that by His holy cross He redeemed the world, well, I have some trouble with almost that whole sentence. This is the trouble with gaining a little bit of knowledge I guess. I still have another half-semester of Christology to go, so maybe that'll swing me back around.

Oatmeal Chronicles

Today I switched to the Scott's Porrage Oats and had a much easier time of it. I poured a dash of cream over and put some yummy brown sugar on top. Better.
Does anyone care about this?

bleahhhhh

Oh GAWD oatmeal is just gross.
I mean, Happy Ash Wednesday!!

oatmeal, shmoatmeal...

Right, so here comes Lent and I am this year flummoxed as to how to mark it in my life. My hope to make the 9:00 Mass at my parish won't work, due to pre-9 traffic... I'd have to leave over an hour beforehand, and that would mean I wouldn't be able to walk in the morning... and I DO need to do some walking. I've decided to start downloading the daily Liturgy of the Hours and the daily readings onto my ipod and walk to the strains of Bible-ness every morning... or so.But that's not what I asked you all hear to talk about.
I thought that a good new habit to take on for Lent would be to eat OATMEAL for breakfast every day... or so. We have two different types of oatment in our house to try- one is rolled Scottish Porage oats (from Scotland!) and the other is steel-cut Irish oatmeal.












The steel cut, which is supposed to be better for you because it's less processed, takes twice as long to cook- but it has a less mushy texture than the rolled Scott's, which I think is the same kind of thing as Quick Quaker oats.
The thing is, I have never liked oatmeal. Blech. That's why it's such a good penitential act for me for Lent. But it's supposed to be so good for me... So, I'm going to take a stab at it. Today I put brown sugar and chocolate chips in it, but I will prob. be fine with just some brown sugar or a touch of honey. We'll see.

MFRS

This morning my brother the pilot, was here, and Scott was asking him some leftover questions from our flights to and from Florida. He had noticed that the dials in the cockpit aren't dials anymore, but displays. One big "glass cockpit" as the flight attendant told him. Scott was concerned that if there was a power failure, all those dials would blink out, and then where would one be?
Bruce's answer was fascinating, not only because of the detail in which he described the various wirings and power sources of the cockpit, but because of the words he used. He said "in order for all the dials to fail, there would have to be "Multiple Failures of Redundant Systems". Isn't that a gorgeous hunk of words?
Yesterday at staff meeting we heard that the Archdiocese of Boston has sent out an email that St. Patrick's day will be recognized on March 14th this year... and that there will be no liturgical recognition of the saint's feast day. That's because the 17th is during Holy Week this year. So, they've moved the feast to the Friday before (which is of course a Lenten Friday and therefore, no corned beef and cabbage for you my friend).
I smell Multiple Failures of Redundant Systems. St. Patrick's is one of the few days that the world relates fairly positively to the Catholic Church in these parts, these days. Now, though, not only does the RCAB create questions and confusion among the once-a-year-Catholics, but they move the local's favorite feast to a Lenten Friday. To top things off (this is where the Multiple comes in), St. Patrick is the patron saint of the RCAB... and this is our Archdiocese's 200th year. Way to piss off your patron!!
Fortunately for me, I don't like corned beef. But I like St. Patrick, and this Archdiocese can use all the help it can get. He's got his work cut out for him!

Here comes Lent

Tonight at our Faith Festival we study the upcoming (and soon!) seasons of Lent and Easter. This year Lent could be a completely different experience for me. I've been in a Lent rut for the past several years, identifying closely with Jesus' suffering because I was suffering for my ministry, too. I have, as my Lenten practice, walked to daily Mass, and changed some dietary something. My Lenten Slogan each year was "He DIED for me, I'll DIET for him".
But this year, I'm not so much suffering. How are you supposed to do Lent while being all happy and stuff? My new schedule means going in to work earlier, which means my walk to church is out. I will miss that discipline- I liked walking through the snow and ice at the beginning of the season and knowing that by Easter, grass would be greening. Of course, this year with Lent starting so early, it probably won't be very spring-like when Easter rolls around anyway. I do want to continue with daily Mass, but going to my parish at 9 means leaving by 8:30 and with morning traffic, that really should be 8:00. That's out. There's a 12:15 Mass down the street from my parish, but I've been once and it was pretty dreadful. Maybe that'll just have to be my penance. Maybe I'll drive to the 9:00 here in town, then keep on driving to work. Yeah, that'll work...
But I do want to do something dietary, and not just because I'm feeling a bit blimpy (as I always do this time of year) but because I feel so joyful and thankful, I want to show my gratitude by being a better steward of the life and body God has given me. We'll see.
When I was young I used to give up obscure things like Orange American Cheese, or Macadamia Nuts, or something like that- easily avoidable. In college I tried giving up soda every year, and failed miserably every year. Later on in life, I gave up fried foods and found Fridays to be fairly tricky- unfried fish at that time was a bit out of my price range and too much tuna fish is just... too much.
So, we'll see. And, we'll see how it feels to sacrifice from a place of non-suffering. Should be interesting...

Easter is Holy here

We have a very special and unbreakable policy at our house- we hold Easter to be family-holy. We both work hard all during Lent, and harder during Holy Week, with both of us at our own parishes, basically saying "see ya!" on Holy Thursday and reuniting after 10:00pm on Saturday night, after our parish Vigils.
So when Easter Sunday comes around, we stay home. We put on our pajamas and have a late night snack and then head to bed to sleep it all off. Then, Easter Sunday, we do.... nothing.
We sleep late, stay in those pajamas for the whole day, don't shower, don't go anywhere, don't talk to anyone. We have a great, greasy breakfast, sit around till the afternoon, then have a nice dinner (roast beef, bernaise sauce, rolls, peas, mashed potatoes, a lovely wine today) and then head back to the living room to "sit it off". And that's about it for Easter Sunday. I try not to think about work, I try not to do any churchy reading, and I steer our tv viewing to old movies and Simpsons episodes. It is pure heaven, and surely makes Easter something we look forward to all during Lent. We are so blessed.
K, now I've worked too hard. Must go back to my chocolate and wine. Happy Easter everyone!

Holy Thursday

This morning I rolled out of bed seriously grumpy. That word sounds too cute for the mood I was in, really- I was mad because I had to get up early and drive in to work for staff meeting. Not "regular" staff meeting, though, but "touchy-feely" staff meeting, which is a new invention at our parish meant to foster loving feelings between the staff and leadership. I suspect I'm not the only one who usually views these meetings as a waste of time- we're supposed to use this time to share and support each other but no one does- there is a general understanding that the less is said, the sooner we can all get out of there and back to our busy days.
Today was different because our pastors thought it "would be good" for us to meet for the Liturgy of the Hours before the meeting. And to boot- on this particular morning there was an additional blessing of an inch of messy, slushy snow... sigh.
Anyway, I took my seat in the church with my fellow staff members and a few parishioners, and I knelt to pray briefly. I asked God to help me find meaning and direction in Jesus' story this week, this Holy week, and to help me pay attention and receive his direction willingly, eeeeeeven if what He wants of me is not what I want.
I decided to really focus on the readings and prayers, each word- and I did. I heard about freedom from persecution, and I read that if we just will do what God leads us to do, He will stand behind us. Okay.
Ten minutes in to the prayer service, three of "my kids", high school seniors, walked in wearing sweatpants and sneakers and sat down in the pew ahead of us- one of the front pews in the church. I noticed that the staff members around me sort of sat up straighter, taking on "role model" mode. The kids settled in and figured out the prayer sheet, reading along with the Left side in the call and response. I was at once affirmed and convicted.
After the service we went off to TFSM and the kids went back to school. Now I'm here at home for the shower I never took this morning and a do-over for the day.
Happy Holy Thursday.

baaaad Catholic

Lent is a busy time for Youth Ministers- there's something about the season of Lent that lets people feel okay, even righteous, about adding on some spiritual focus and discipline to their lives. We YM's grab the chance to offer great ways for kids and families to do just that, and in my case, that has meant a constant rush, full-on run from Ash Wednesday to Holy Week. I've had something every night, and have been even double-booked, home late and dying to sleep in mornings. But I promised for Lent that I would get up every morning and walk to Mass at my local parish. Okay, Mass is at 9- not really all that early- but in the throes of Lenten exhaustion, it's darned near dawn.
So, I have done a terrible job at this promise this year- I skip when it's too cold (it's been below FREEZING!), or there's a funeral at the parish (which really is only kindness to the poor mourners, as I look like hell in pajamas at AM Mass), or I am just too flat- out tired (did I mention I've been tired lately?), or I have an early morning meeting (hey, what can I do about that?). And as if it isn't hard enough to be disciplined for myself, this year Scott has joined me and we've been terrible influences on each other.
My OTHER Lenten promise, which was giving up flour and sugar, has also been a dismal failure. And the worst part about that is, it's JESUS' fault! Well, here's what happened. For Lent, I offered a study of the Gospel of Mark for my adult leaders. The study has been fascinating, and really rewarding, and one of the themes I've glommed onto is Jesus' confrontation of the leaders for missing the point- for focusing more on the rules than on the relationship with God- like here: "The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath." (Mark 2: 27) See? He says the fasting and the rules are not the point to dwell on. Concentrate your efforts on your faith and relationship, not on trying to lock-step in time with the rules. And because I am such a good Christian, I have definitely NOT focused on the rules.
I was planning to get back on the horse tomorrow and walk to Mass, but I hear it's going to be wicked cold. Maybe I'll do an Easter devotion of walking to Mass. That would be nice...