Messy Buns & Latin Chant

Just like most everyone else, I'm sick and tired of hearing about the NFL. As a friend told me last night, it's entertainers trying to get political, and SJWs jumping into football, which they care nothing about. It is a story that easily polarizes our country, and I believe that is exactly why it is being given so much attention. So here's what I want to read about instead, three stories that are unifying for our Country and our Faith: Marian Statues Surviving Disasters All over the world, we have fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, and so many other natural disasters. In the midst of all these catastrophes,  statues and images of Our Lady keep miraculously surviving unscathed.  There are reports from Spain, Mexico, and two from Huston, all in the last few weeks.  I can't help but call to mind the upcoming 100th anniversary of the Miracle at Fatima. Maybe Our Lady is asking for our attention. Certainly, she is a great source of comfort and refuge in a world...

After studying the Baltimore Catechism for eight years straight (thank you Seton Homeschool...) I had it pretty well drilled into my head that the pope was infallible. It has been a definite shock to me to learn that the infallibility of the Pontiff  is more limited than I had suspected.  The Filial Correction posted yesterday has the Church in an uproar, some claiming its high time, some swearing unending loyalty to the successor of Peter. I don't suppose myself informed enough on the matter to pick a side, and I firmly believe in loyalty and obedience to (and charity towards) the Pope, but I do believe there were some issues that needed to be clarified from Amoris Latetia, and I hope the faithful finally get that clarification. I kept reading a one liner in every article about the last Filial Correction, which was in 1333 of Pope John XXII. But that was all anybody said. It made me very curious; what in our past had been the thing that caused theologians to publicl...

Right above the stairway door in my childhood home, there sits to this day a bottle of Holy Water. Every night as we filed up the stairs for bed, my dad would take it down and bless each one of us on our way up. At about 12 years old I was not as diligent about my nightly blessing, and I began to have horrible nightmares. Call it coincidence, but I call it grace, as soon as I started making sure I got a blessing before I went to bed, the nightmares stopped. For all my daily experiences with parental blessing, the scene in The Sound of Music  where Maria is about to walk down the aisle and Mother Superior blesses her always bothered me. Then at a friends wedding, the priest asked us all to bless the couple and I thought that was plain weird. I don't have the power to confer blessings. We have priests for this sort of thing! Well, it turns out I was wrong. We can bless our people, especially our children. We should bless people, and especially our children. And I found s...

Two things in life are certain: death and taxes. Two things in an internet comment section are certain:  Godwin's Law  and people calling their opponents "sheeple". "American Sniper" has a line where Chris Kyle's dad talks about sheep, sheepdogs, and wolves. He says that all people are either sheep, sheepdogs or wolves. I'm not a sheepdog by any stretch of the imagination, and I hope to heaven I'm not a wolf. So I guess that makes me a sheep. I think I am okay with that. "Sheeple" is always meant in a derogatory fashion, but I can't see how there is anything wrong with being a sheep. I love sheep, raised them in 4H for years. They are delicious, they keep you warm, they sound cute (usually), and to the point of this post, they are very easily led. The Bible thinks quite highly of sheep too. Certainly likes them better than goats, anyhow (Matthew 25:32-33). Heaven is going to be chockablock full of sheep. The problem arises wh...

My favorite kitchen appliance is the crockpot. I can do all my dinner prep at noon, just open the lid at 6pm and voila! A pleasant and flavorful meal! (I hear the instant-pot is even better. Husband, if you are reading, take this as a hint.) Set it and forget it, man. Not having to spend the hour leading up to dinner in what often becomes a mad rush is a welcome break from the magnificent insanity that is family life. This past year, I have also done some early prep for my marriage. I've run across some exceptional marriage blogs ( Sheila Gregorie's is my favorite) and speakers (Dr. Laura, hey hey!) and I figured that I would get all the harsh realities out of the way here at the beginning. I think my unconscious goal was to be a low-key marriage expert by the time 2018 rolled around, so I could just slow cook all my wealth of wisdom until the next crisis hit. Don't laugh, I'm a millenial. I'm allowed to be ridiculous every now and then, right? I'...

Early this week, the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW)  published The Nashville Statement , laying out a biblical understanding of gender and sexuality. It is fairly straightforward, fourteen short articles affirming positives about God's design for us as men and women, and denying the misunderstandings (can we bring back the word heresy?) brought about by militant feminism and the Sexual Revolution. Particularly refreshing to me was the way that the writers included all disordered expressions of sexuality. Article II says, "We deny that any affections, desires or commitments ever justify sexual intercourse before or outside marriage; nor do they justify any form of sexual immorality." There's more to the attack on marriage and sexuality than it just being between one man and woman, and I appreciate that this was acknowledged. Whatever our personal struggles may be, sexually, we are all held to the same standard: Are you married? No? Then don...