Saints and Feasts and Rogation Days, Oh My!

On May 8, 2024May 8, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In AscensionLeave a comment

+JMJ+ Whew! So much is happening this week. We’re in May, the month devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary, tomorrow is Ascension Thurday (except most of the US will observe it on Sunday). There are two saints’ memorials today, and it’s the feast of the apparition of St. Michael in 590 AD, and the dedication of the sanctuary built on the site. AND today is the final day of the Minor Rogation Days. (I have to admit, I’ve heard of Rogation Days and I’ve read about them, but I’m only just now getting it through my head what they actually are. What can I say? I discovered the Church long after the changes of Vatican II, and though I read a lot of old books, what I don’t know is vast.

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The Way to Emmaus

On April 3, 2024April 4, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In Easter, Seasonal3 Comments

+JMJ+ Tonight I was reading in the devotional, In Conversation with God, Vol. 2 (see notes below) for Wednesday in the Octave of Easter. The chapter talks about the disciples on the way to Emmaus, part of the readings for the day’s Mass, and the title is “Letting Oneself be Helped.” Sometimes that is the hardest thing, isn’t it? Asking for help. Letting someone help us. Surrendering that insistence on doing things our own way when clearly our own way isn’t working. Or isn’t working as well as it could be. Or is actively working against us. Surrendering control, allowing someone else to decide how to help us and when, and what we need to do. We balk at it naturally. But what if the One trying to help us is the Lord? Do we balk at His direction? Do we refuse to let Him help us?

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Happy Easter!

On March 31, 2024March 31, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In Easter, SeasonalLeave a comment

Regina Caeli

V: Queen of heaven, rejoice, alleluia.
R: The Son you merited to bear, alleluia,
V: Has risen as He said, alleluia.
R: Pray to God for us, alleluia.
V: Rejoice and be glad, O Virgin Mary, alleluia.
R: For the Lord has truly risen, alleluia.

My First Holy Thursday Experience

On March 27, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In Holy Week, Seasonal, Series, What is Christianity2 Comments

+JMJ+ Though this was originally written a few years ago, I’m including it as a re-share in our current Catholic Christianity 101 or What is Christianity series. No other Holy Thursday has affected me as deeply as that first one just two nights before I was to be received into the Church at the Easter Vigil. And so I will share with you again, and for those who have not read it, for the first time, my account, lightly edited, of that evening.

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Christ didn’t suffer so that we don’t have to

On February 21, 2024February 21, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In Lent, Seasonal, Series, What is Christianity2 Comments

+JMJ+ It’s Lent, the season of suffering, one could say, and it seems like a good time to mention this in our ongoing Catholic Christianity 101 or What is Christianity series. This one is more, perhaps, about how to be a Christian and less about what Christianity is, but I’m going for it anyway. I know it will contradict what a whole lot of people say—people who should know better but have forgotten or never knew—but Christ did not suffer so that we don’t have to. He suffered so that we could learn how to suffer. More, so that we could suffer and unite our suffering to His redemptive suffering. So we could offer our suffering for the benefit of others. That they may be healed physically, well, yes, if the Lord wills that. But mostly so that they, and we, may be united to Him, now, in this life, and in the next.

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Happy Feast of The Baptism of the Lord

On January 8, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In Baptism of the LordLeave a comment

+JMJ+ Howdy, y’all. I hope your Christmas and New Year’s were filled with joy or something close to it. Today is the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. I found a video about this feast by Dr. Brant Pitre—and if you’ve followed this blog for very long, you know how much I enjoy his work and sharing it with you. Video after the fold.

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I slept through New Year’s

On January 2, 2024January 2, 2024 By Lee (@disciple96)In New Year, Seasonal2 Comments

+JMJ+ Happy New Year! Which, by the way, I slept through, most of it, anyway, including the fireworks, which, by the way, were at the lake we live, the critters and I, who, by the way, slept through the fireworks, too, after they calmed down, which, by the way, Miss Lucy Dawg did after only a nod from me, saying it’s okay, and which Miss Kitty did only after skedaddling away at the first BOOM and hiding somewhere in the house, which hiding, by the way, ended after a couple of hours when she crept out from said hiding and hopped up onto the arm of my chair, which, by the way, is where she spent the next couple of hours, nodding off and then she got down and slept near, not by, but near, well, near-ish Miss Lucy Dawg.

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Merry Christmas!

On December 25, 2023 By Lee (@disciple96)In Christmas, Seasonal6 Comments

+JMJ+ Merry Christmas! I hope your day has been holy, blessed and joyful. Thank you for spending time at the blog, reading and commenting this past year, and thank you for the tips, all of which are deeply appreciated. I hope you’ll join me here at the blog after New Year’s. Until then, may His peace be with you and yours always. +JMJ+

Image: The Adoration of the Shepherds, by Charles Le Brun, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Advent, joyful hope, nearly there

On December 18, 2023 By Lee (@disciple96)In Advent, Seasonal5 Comments

+JMJ+ (Our Catholic Christianity series picks back up after Christmas.) This will be a brief post, I promise. We’ve entered the home stretch now with this last week of Advent leading up to Christmas. It’s the time for hymns like Veni Veni Emmanuel and the O Antiphons, one for each night. Gaudete Sunday’s antiphon was O Sapientia. Monday’s is O Adonai. This evening (the beginning, liturgically, of Tuesday) it will be O Radix Jesse. See links at the end for some very good posts on these antiphons and praying them. I’ve linked a couple of videos below, too, that I hope you’ll enjoy.

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Advent, the season of growing light

On December 11, 2023December 11, 2023 By Lee (@disciple96)In Advent, SeasonalLeave a comment

+JMJ+ It’s December now and the nights grow longer and the wind grows colder. The season of Advent is upon us. In a certain house at the end of a certain street, a family gathers around an Advent wreath in a darkened room. They light one candle, singing hymns and praying prayers. They do this several nights during that first week, in their midst one lone little light in the darkness. As its light flickers, a flicker of hope begins to arise in the hearts of those gathered around.

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All Hallows and All Hallows Eve

On October 31, 2023 By Lee (@disciple96)In All Saints, Seasonal2 Comments

+JMJ+ All Hallows, which begins the evening before, is the liturgical feast of All Saints. Not a pagan holiday but a Christian holy day, a remembrance that this is not our home, that we are passing through, that our goal, our end, our home is union with God. That we have many sisters and brothers who are already there waiting for us, praying for us, we are in communion with them in the Communion of Saints. The Church Triumphant.

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Happy Fourth of July, y’all!

On July 3, 2023 By Lee (@disciple96)In Holiday, Seasonal1 Comment

+JMJ+ Greetings and happy Fourth of July, you all! I’m taking some time off from the blog as my eyes have been getting worse. I haven’t decided exactly how long yet. I’ll keep you posted. (Posted! Ha! Get it? Ahem.) Stay tuned. Meanwhile I hope you and yours are having a splendid summer. Below the fold there’s a link to an interview with five Catholic thinkers, including Prof. Chad Pecknold. Seems like a timely and good thing to read. Happy Fourth of July, y’all! See ya soon.

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