It's official!! (Meditation on Lent at 12:24 a.m.)

I am sitting here in front of the computer when I should be sleeping. It's a perfect night for sleep -- chilly and rainy, with a chance of smooth, clean sheets on the bed -- and why I'm wide awake is something I wish I could change, especially since all this awakeness is only going to lead to Ash Wednesday being one REALLY LONG DAY.

Here's the thing: On the home schooling e-list I'm a member of and amongst my friends on Facebook, there's been an article circulating about, an article with an idea that many of my friends have said is "the perfect thing for Lent," as if we're talking about a really great necklace to accessorize a party dress. So I, being the nosey kind of person I am, and also piously hoping to have the Best Lent Ever! went like an idiot and looked at this article and immediately wanted to go off into a corner and, I don't know, maybe just DIE a little bit, not much, but reviving enough to go to 6:00 Mass today and get my ashes.

Here's the article. Read it at your peril, if you're some kind of person who is crazed with self-loathing or maybe just a grouchy old bat like me. I mean, I'm sure Mrs. Wittman is a lovely person, but oh my holy saints and angels, what kind of mind can come up with this sort of torture and even type Sunday is a Day Off! in bold type with an exclamation point? I would certainly think that Sunday would be a day off: you're going to need at least 24 hours to drag yourself to the hospital so that they can give you some glucose and some penicillin and some drug with plenty of codeine in it. All so that you can go back home on Monday morning and start the whole dreary business again.

All in twenty minutes, twice a day.

During that forty minutes, you have to do things like deep clean the kitchen, wipe down all light fixtures, clean out closets, organize the Tupperware, built a storage shed out back, hand polish each blade of grass in the front yard, clear the trash off at least three major thoroughfares in your city and climb to the roof of your church to personally inspect and repair each individual slate shingle.

Well, okay, some of the things on that list might have been slight exaggerations. But I'm not joking about the Tupperware! And I am also not joking that, down at the bottom of that list, there is an entry for Day 39 (Good Friday) that instructs me to "Prepare kitchen for Easter baking." Are you KIDDING me??!! All forty days of work and I still have to do something called "Easter baking"? At that point, I'm sure that all I would be baking is my own head, placed in the oven with a note pinned to my back that would read: "I JUST CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE. ALL THIS AND NO SWEETS - TOO MUCH!"

I do hope that my friends who have decided to undertake this challenge will meet with success, and although I insist on a clean and tidy house myself, I found as I read that list that I really don't care quite THAT much. I am okay with Fly Lady and her much more relaxed manner of dealing with dirt and clutter; I don't get that stressed-out feeling that I have now, the one that has totally wiped the sleep from my eyes as I contemplate Garage Week, Day 31 -- Throw out all unnecessary junk. I am completely unwound by that thought, and I don't even have a garage.

Not just for your dryer anymore

Oh, I know they're spelled differently -- lint, Lent -- one is a common noun that describes all that fuzzy stuff that comes off your clothes as they're being tumble dried. I have a very artistic friend who created gorgeous handmade writing paper out of dryer lint once. Lent, the proper noun, is that forty day period of fasting and abstinence before Easter, when Catholic and (some) Protestant Christians alike walk with Jesus, uniting with Him in His Passion and celebrating His resurrection while anticipating His second coming.

Lent is a time of year that I always look forward to, although upon reflection I'm not sure why: I'm not all that good at it. There was, for instance, that year I gave up Diet Coke as a personal sacrifice and by the third of the six weeks, my family members were all going around with big, frightened eyes and white faces. Then there was the time I gave up sweets and berated myself loudly one morning for having jelly on my toast. ("Don't you think you're taking this to a ridiculous extreme?" my husband asked warily. "No," I replied. "I'm just sad because, if I had to goof up on my no-sweets fast, why did it have to be with TOAST and why couldn't it have been NUTELLA?!?")

I also start out with great spiritual plans: I will read a chapter of the Bible per day, pray a rosary, go to weekday Mass on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, plus go to the Stations of the Cross at least three times. I'll do both the morning and evening prayers! I'll read at least two books on the lives of the saints (making sure to choose people who were not gruesomely martyred, because eww.) That's always the plan on Ash Wednesday, anyway. By the first Sunday, I've already managed to crumble, substituting one decade for an entire rosary and looking at my Bible and feeling guilty instead of actually opening it.

Considering all this, is it any wonder that a non-Catholic, non-Lent-participating Protestant friend asked me, "If Lent is so hard, why do it?"

Ah, there's the rub. Why do it? Why go through six weeks of self-denial and abortive attempts to attain spiritual growth?

Because it's good for the soul, that's why. Jesus taught us to fast; he fasted forty days in the desert. Jesus taught us about self-denial; he went to the cross for us. Jesus taught us about prayer; at times, he took himself apart from the disciples to spent time in communion with his Father. At other times, he prayed with them.

Any time we work to be more like him, Jesus meets us more than halfway. And then there's that spiritual harvest thing: the more you give Jesus -- your love of desserts, your willingness to meditate on his life while praying the rosary, your trip into the confessional, and the money you'd usually spend on buying a fancy coffee dropped quietly into the poor box -- the more he gives you back. Seriously, even when my grandiose plans for spiritual advancement fall through and I end up doing only about a quarter of what I originally intended, I always feel like the measure that has been pressed down, shaken together and running over by Good Friday. I feel close to Jesus (I can hear him saying quite clearly, "Okay. STOP IT" when I'm thinking about doing something that would not make him proud, one of the less agreeable parts of that Lenten Closeness.)

I feel good.

And when the Easter Vigil is over and we're driving home in the darkness with the sounds of the bells and the Gloria still ringing in our ears, that's when I feel the best. Exultant, as sweet and full as the Communion cup I've sipped from, glowing in the true presence of the Savior.

So let's just say that I've experienced Easter Sundays without the trials of Lent beforehand and with those trials set constantly before me, and I would never, ever go back to the first way. You can only have a true Easter, a real shiny-happy glorious Easter if you've humbled yourself to suffer with Jesus in the desert.

Ten years ago, I would have never thought that could possibly be true. I would have said, quite wrongly, that God has no need of our silly sacrifices. The pastor of the Protestant church I was attending back then even said it during one of his sermons: "I can't understand why those Catholics think that their 'giving up' something matters to God." How could it possibly matter to God, who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, if I stop eating candy for six weeks? Does it really matter if I give up Facebook or watching HGTV? Doesn't that seem a little weird, to think that God cares about such trivial things?

If you believe that, then let me ask you this: If your ten year old mowed the neighbor's lawn for week after sweaty week and then used some of the money he earned to buy you a birthday present, would you find that trivial? Would you say, "Aww, that's sweet, son, but listen, this is just a Penguin paperback you bought with the money you earned from cutting Mrs. Franklin's grass. It's not like this is a real gift, but thanks for trying."

OF COURSE YOU WOULDN'T. If your kid did that for you, you would fall to the ground and drown in a puddle of happy tears and have to be revived by the emergency medical technicians who came on the ambulance and the first thing you'd say when you came back to your senses would be, "Look. Look at this beautiful, lovely Penguin paperback my darling child bought for me." You'd probably sleep with that book under your pillow for the next million nights, and long after it had crumbled into cheapo paperback dust, you'd remember that sacrifice, that unselfishness, that desire to do something to make you happy, that honor given to you that was so much more than a trivial gift that cost $9.98 at Wal-Mart.

And do you think God, the omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent being who told us to call him "Daddy," do you really think that he thinks anything less than that?

Try it and see.



A great article titled "What Can I Do Before Lent Begins" can be found here.

Catholic Culture.org has an entire area of their website devoted to the hows and whys of Lent; you can check that excellent resource out by clicking here

Ash Wednesday

Ah, the beginning of Lent! As a convert, I always enjoy Lent quite a bit -- I have some cradle Catholic friends who give me a look of patient perseverance when I say this, indicating that I may be the special treat they'd personally like to give up.

But I like Lent. It's hard, I admit. But since it is all about Jesus and the hardships He suffered, the temptations He overcame, the voluntary sacrifices He made, it only makes sense to join Him in His sorrows. I mean, we're ALL ABOUT joining Him during the Christmas celebrations, right? The twinkly lights, the gaily-wrapped packages, the tree be-decked with ornaments and the table be-groaned with tempting foods. I've heard plenty of people say that they're sick of the commercialization of Christmas, and I've known folks who have decided to opt out of a Complicated Christmas in favor of a Simplified Christmas, but I've never heard anyone say (other than John Grisham's Luther Krank in Skipping Christmas), "No, thanks. I don't think I'll participate in any of the merriment this year."

But trying to get people to volunteer to make personal sacrifices? To go without, whether the going without means sweets, X-Boxes or the internet, well, that's a whole different deal.

That's where the Church comes in so handy, I guess because misery loves company? No, that's not it. It's more like standing together, being a family in good times and in bad. Like all families, the Catholic Church, counting their members in the billions worldwide, has its regular everyday folks, the crazies, the jerks, the posers and the ones who are so good, they give you hope that the name they pass on will be one that honors everyone. During this time of year in particular, we're all gathered around the same sparsely-laid table, hanging together and waiting for the feast of Easter. It's so much more than what some call a "community" and definitely more than what other Christians see as just a mystical body of believers, tied loosely together by a common belief in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, but divided by so much more.

That's not to say that all Catholics are in agreement. As a family, there are feuding members and members who don't want to have anything to do with one another, and others who are crucially disappointed in how things are being done. There are others who decide to bail altogether and seek their own way. But in spite of all that, there's that excerpt from St. Paul's epistle to Timothy, the young bishop, that can be found in the first letter, third chapter, fifteenth verse:

"But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth."

The church -- the Church -- is the pillar and foundation of truth, the household of God, the home of all Christians with the sacraments as their birthright. At the time of this letter's writing, it was obviously very young, not to mention highly illegal. But it existed and was constantly gaining new members. The truth that the Church holds in sacred deposit is that same truth that Jesus mentioned when He said in John 16:13, "When He comes, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on His own, but speak what He hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming."

That was an important verse to me as a convert, both spiritually and historically. Since God had led me to question what I believed and why I believed it, I wanted to make sure I was going to end up someplace that had ALL the truth, the whole thing, even the parts I didn't necessarily want to have to acknowledge as true (hello, birth control?) I wanted all of it, the exalted, holy and uplifting truth and the ones that made my soul exalt and the hard truths that made me feel as fretful as a four year old, even while I was bending my knee to them in acknowledgment of their validity and importance, despite my petulance in receiving them.

I wanted it all and I got it, along with the tuna casserole I'm serving for dinner on on this, our eighth Ash Wednesday as Catholics.

Easter Basket blessings!

Today was the Blessing of the Easter Baskets at church, the third year in a row we've had this really lovely tradition. It is Slavic in origin, and since Father is of Polish descent, he brought this tradition to the congregation, which is largely composed of Catholics of Irish, German and Italian descent. I wrote about it last year, too; this year, we weren't surprised to see many of the same people we saw then, lugging their heavy baskets up the long walk to the church's front door, into the narthex, into the church itself, and down the long aisle.

Being that it is Holy Saturday, the Blessed Sacrament was not present in the tabernacle. It feels very strange in there without Him. The emptiness seems immeasurable, kind of like when you move from one house to another: The old house still has some of your belongings in it -- a couch, some chairs, the refrigerator and stove -- but it still seems as if the heart of the home has moved on somewhere else.

Considering how strange it feels to be without the Presence of Jesus in the church, imagine how it must have felt to the disciples all those many years ago as they were hiding, their faith at its lowest ebb, wondering if any minute they were going to be arrested.

Anyway, here's what our Easter basket contained this year:

Wine -- Red wine symbolizes the blood of Christ, spilled to cover our sins

Bread -- Last year we bought hot cross buns from Panera for our basket which were delicious but expensive, and the year before that, I made a traditional egg-and-dried fruit bread that no one would eat. So this year, I employed the trusty bread machine (on the dough setting) to make a nice, rich bread put together with eggs and milk to make it richer. I didn't braid it or shape it like a cross or anything; my talents don't go in that direction. I just put it in a regular bread pan and baked it that way. The bread reminds us that Christ is our True Bread.

Salt -- Salt is a condiment, much prized throughout the world when Christians first started assembling Easter baskets, and it reminds us of our duty to flavor the world and make it better by our presence.

Eggs -- The Eastern Europeans traditionally gave up dairy products and meat for the duration of Lent, so eggs were abundant at Easter when the long fast was over. The girls colored a dozen eggs this morning, and it was the first time that they sat swirling the eggs around in the Pass dyes while listening to rock music -- what a juxtaposition! The rocker was David Cook, that handsome sweetheart from American Idol last year, and I kind of secretly like him, too, so it was all good. Eggs have been used for centuries to help people understand the concept of the Holy Trinity because they are three -- shell, white, yolk -- contained in one.

Cheese -- We bought some cream cheese which I unmolded from the container and then pressed dried cranberries into in the shape of a cross. It looked very nice. The purpose of the cheese is to provide a food that is bland yet sweet, and is intended to remind Christians that we are to be moderate in all things, but that is hard when you haven't eaten candy for soooo looooong. We will be moderate on Monday, perhaps.

Butter -- Since the Slavic people gave up all dairy products for Lent, butter also figured largely in their Easter celebrations. It was included because of its richness, which makes sense. Why do you think those vendors at the Indiana State Fair dip their roasted ears of corn in to melted butter before they hand them over to you? Butter makes everything better, and I didn't need the Indiana Dairy Council or even the Roman Catholic Church to tell me that.

Candle - The candle symbolizes Jesus as the Light of the world. This year, we bought a short, white pillar candle and placed it on my pretty pressed glass candle plate beside the basket.

Bacon -- Traditionally, of course, the meat in an Easter basket is ham, but kielbasa and bacon can also be used. Frankly, we couldn't afford a ham this year. The pork symbolizes our freedom from the Law of Moses, which forbids the eating of pork. Jesus didn't come to abolish the Law; He came to fulfill it, and it that fulfillment, as St. Peter's dream teaches us in Acts 10:11-17, we are no longer bound by those strictures. We are free to eat. And since we are free, we are going to come home from the Easter Vigil Mass this year and have bacon sandwiches on that good bread!

We really love this tradition and look forward to it every year as one of the highlights of Lent. It might just seem like a lot of trouble, putting all these things in a basket and lugging them to the church, but when you're sitting there looking at your pretty basket while Father says a series of really beautiful prayers over it, you truly realize how meaningful it is. It's also fun afterwards seeing what everyone else brought in their baskets.

Spring cleaning

I'm sitting here, panting and sweating, enjoying a fifteen-minute break from spring cleaning duties. Holy Week seemed like a good time to undertake the twice-yearly horrors of finding out what is really lurking underneath the couch and in the back of the under-sink cabinet in the kitchen. (I'll spare you the details.)

First of all, we've been in the process of shoring up our souls during this long season of Lent through the self-disciplinary measures of fasting, prayer and almsgiving. Secondly, if deep housecleaning isn't a penitential act of self-discipline, I don't know what is. Third, Easter Sunday will hopefully dawn sunny, warm and bright and we won't have to look through winter-grimed windows as we eat our candy and say, "Eeeuuuwwww...."

Fourth of all, I hate it when my hair gets damp with perspiration and little strands stick to my forehead. I wish Pat were here because, although you'd never know it from his snarky attitude and elevated left eyebrow, but he is a wicked good house cleaner and not only works faster than I do, but also with a great deal more determination, being less likely to sneak off upstairs or outdoors to "get some furniture polish" or "shake out a rug" leaving everyone else to toil on.

Here's our living room/foyer cleaning list:

1) Wash ornaments, glass shelves and inside/outside glass of curio cabinet

2) Dust baseboards and window frames with lambswool duster; use sweeper's wand attachment to go around the floor line of the baseboards

3) Wash all inside window glass (outside is inclement today, thank heaven, I mean, darn it) and polish all glass in framed artwork and photographs

4) Run all throw rugs, curtains, afghans and sofa pillows through washer/dryer

5) Dust walls allllllll ten feet up with Swiffer dust mop (God bless the person who invented all that Swiffer stuff)

6) Move all furniture and vaccuum beneath; any furniture too big to move, attach long wand to sweeper hose and suck all dust and cobwebs from behind

7) Polish all wooden furniture; use brushie sweeper attachment to dust lamp shades

8) Feel sad over the fact that budget won't allow rental of upholstery cleaning machine, ditto carpet cleaning ditto

9) Clean the stairs, banister and balusters

10) Sternly quash feelings of bitter envy for people who have cleaners to come in and do all this crap for them while they go out for lunch -- thinking such thoughts is not Lent-like behavior

We've been at it for nearly three hours, and laws-a-mercy, I am ready to take to the bed. But everything looks very, very lovely. You'd have to see it. All we need to do is move the furniture back, sweep the rest of the floors, polish the wooden furniture and put the pillows back on the sofa and we're done.

A severe lack of detachment

Last year, I tried to give up drinking Diet Coke for Lent and made it through the entire first day, shambling around the house like something from Night of the Living Dead. My husband got home from work, noticed my blank stare and slack jaw, realized what my problem was, and told me he was having none of this giving-up-of-Diet-Coke thing.

"If you give up Diet Coke, you'll be miserable and then we'll be miserable," he said grimly, and rather unfairly, I thought. I mean, sure, I was a little out of it on Ash Wednesday 2008, but once I rinsed the jelly out of my hair and apologized to the robin outside the living room window who was building a nest in the tree and raising the most ungodly racket with all that insane chirping and....and....SINGING, I was fine, just perfectly fine.

"There's only so much sacrifice required," he told me. "And I'm giving up eating cheeseburgers AND I'll have to live with you and that is too much. TOO MUCH."

So, resentfully, I drank a can of Diet Coke and was able to focus my eyes and close my mouth for the first time that day. I gave up all sweets instead and it was really, really hard.

My husband did not give up sweets last year.

But he did give them up this year.

And you know that pretty speech he made me about how I'd be miserable and then he'd be miserable, yada yada yada? Well, next year, I plan to make it to him if he decides to give up sweets again because I'm telling you: Without candy or cookies or even licking the powdered sugar off one of those little Hostess donuts, he is as cross as a sack of weasels and we're not even two weeks into this SEASON OF HOLINESS and I DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH MORE I CAN TAKE.

Edited to add: Husband was forced by the power of the collective will of his wife and two daughters to buy some cookies from the vending machine at work and EAT THEM so that he can come home in the evening acting like himself instead of Satan's little helper.

Holy Saturday - "The power of this holy night..."

Tonight is the great Easter Vigil, where we will enter into a dark church with an empty tabernacle, the sanctuary lamp snuffed out; where a new fire will be lit, both without and within. Where the beautiful Paschal candle, recalling the wounds of Christ will be lit from the fire; where that Paschal candle will light the candles of every person there. Christ is the light in the darkness and His light has spread throughout the earth.

Tonight is the night of the Church's highest hymn, the Exsultet, the Easter Proclamation. This hymn is traditionally sung by just one voice, no instruments. Just one pure, clear voice in the church, telling in these ancient words the story of mankind's downfall, God's plan for salvation, His showing of the way through the law and the prophets, and finally through the coming of His Son, Jesus.

My favorite line: "To ransom a slave, you gave away your Son." I always bring tissues. It's impossible to sit through this Mass and be untouched by Him.

Here's the Exsultet, the powerful hymn of praise and thanksgiving for the unearnable gift of our salvation through Christ Jesus.

Rejoice, heavenly powers!

Sing choirs of angels!

Exult, all creation around God's throne!

Jesus Christ, our King is risen!

Sound the trumpet of salvation!

Rejoice, O earth, in shining splendor,

radiant in the brightness of your King!

Christ has conquered! Glory fills you!

Darkness vanishes for ever!

Rejoice, O Mother Church! Exult in glory!

The risen Savior shines upon you!

Let this place resound with joy,

echoing the mighty song of all God's people!

For Christ has ransomed us with his blood,

and paid for us the price of Adam's sin to our eternal Father!

This is night, when Christians everywhere,

washed clean of sin and freed from all defilement,

are restored to grace and grow together in holiness.

This is the night, when Jesus broke the chains of death

and rose triumphant from the grave.
What good would life have been to us,

had Christ not come as our Redeemer?

Father, how wonderful your care for us!

How boundless your merciful love!

To ransom a slave you gave away your Son.

O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,

which gained for us so great a Redeemer!
Most blessed of all nights,

chosen by God to see Christ rising from the dead!

The power of this holy night dispels all evil,

washes guilt away, restores lost innocence,

brings mourners joy;

it casts out hatred, brings us peace,

and humbles earthly pride.

Accept this Easter candle, a flame divided but undimmed,

a pillar of fire that glows to the honor of God.

Let it mingle with the lights of heaven

and continue bravely burning to dispel the darkness of this night!

May the Morning Star which never sets find this flame still burning:

Christ, that Morning Star, who came back from the dead,

and shed his peaceful light on all mankind, your Son,

who lives and reigns for ever and ever. +Amen+

Easter basket blessing

Our parish is very new, so new that we don't yet have a real church. It's nice to be in on the ground floor, so to speak, because we get to help build the traditions that will be part of the parish for years to come.

One new thing Father D. started last year was the Easter Basket Blessing. The girls and I had lovingly bought all the things we wanted to put in it and were sitting in the kitchen coloring eggs when my mother called to tell me that an arsonist had set fire to St. Anne's in my hometown. Hopefully, this year's Easter Basket Blessing day (tomorrow) will be a lot less eventful. By the way, the Easter basket in that photograph is not our Easter basket, although you can see the same elements: ham, bread, cream cheese, etc. But look at those gorgeous, hand-painted eggs! And I have a feeling that bread didn't come from a store.

Here's an article I found online titled "How to Put Together a Traditional Easter Basket" by Fr. Hal Stockert about the Easter baskets of the Slovic, German and Greek Catholics. Father D. sent this out as a little flyer in our bulletins. Below is the list of the things we're putting in our Easter basket and their symbolism.

ham -- This meat symbolizes our freedom from the Law of Moses, which forbid the eating of pork.

eggs -- European people traditionally gave up dairy products and meat for the duration of Lent -- ouch! -- and so eggs were abundant at Easter. Martha Stewart did this great segment on her show a few years ago, demonstrating how to dye eggs with onion skins, which is apparently a Polish tradition. I know that sounds awful, but onion skins turn the hard-cooked eggs an absolutely lovely golden color. Anyway, we're just using the traditional Paas dyes. In fact, I'm typing this post while we're waiting for all the little colored tablets to dissolve.

bread -- We bought hot cross buns at Panera this morning (and believe me, they weren't one a penny, two a penny). The hot cross buns will take the place of the sweet loaf I made last year, which everyone refused to eat. But anyway, the buns are rich with eggs and dried fruit (strawberries and orange peel, or so said their little label inside Panera's bakery case) and they are included in the Easter basket to remind us that Christ is our True Bread.

salt -- Salt is a condiment, much prized throughout the world when Christians first started assembling Easter baskets, and it reminds us of our duty to flavor the world and make it better by our presence.

cheese -- We bought a tub of cinnamon cream cheese which I'll form into a ball and put on a pretty plate covered with plastic wrap. The purpose of the cheese is to provide a food that is bland yet sweet, and is intended to remind Christians that we are to be moderate in all things. (I think that maybe the cream cheese of the Slovak, German and Greek Christians wasn't as good as ours.)

wine -- Red wine reminds us of the Blood of Christ, shed to cover our sins.

candle -- Jesus is the Light of the world. We bought a nice Sacred Heart holy candle at the grocery in the section where Hispanic foods are sold.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The only thing we don't have is a traditional basket cover which Fr. Stockart's article says is usually "intricately embroidered" with various Resurrection themes. I don't trust myself on the "intricate" part, but I used to be a real whiz at cross-stitching, so I wonder if maybe I could come up with something for next year? Hmmm...

Tomorrow at 1:30, then, we'll be at the church with Aisling lugging the basket (as the youngest child, she gets this honor) for our second Easter Basket Blessing at our parish.

Good Friday - Stabat mater dolorosa

A lovely piece of traditional Good Friday artwork

At the Stations of the Cross, we always sing a verse of the ancient hymn, Stabat mater dolorosa, after each station, translated from Latin as "the sorrowful mother stood weeping." I don't think it is a particularly beautiful hymn -- it's almost more of a chant, each syllable, word and line varying by only a few notes. But the words are very powerful, telling the story of Mary's pierced heart, prophesied in the Temple by Simeon when Jesus was an infant.

Here is the English translation we sing from the 1901 Adoremus hymnal. It is sung in a dirge-like tempo, perfect for the solemnity of this day.

Stabat mater dolorosa

At the cross her station keeping,
stood the mournful mother weeping,
close to Jesus at the last.

Through her soul, of joy bereavèd,
bowed with anguish, deeply grievèd,
now at length the sword hath passed.

O, that blessed one, grief-laden,
blessed Mother, blessed Maiden,
Mother of the all-holy One;

O that silent, ceaseless mourning,
O those dim eyes, never turning
from that wondrous, suffering Son.

Who, on Christ's dear mother gazing,
in her trouble so amazing,
born of woman, would not weep?

Who, on Christ's dear Mother thinking,
such a cup of sorrow drinking,
would not share her sorrows deep?

For his people's sins, in anguish,
there she saw the victim languish,
bleed in torments, bleed and die.

Saw the Lord's anointed taken,
saw her Child in death forrsaken,
heard his last expiring cry.

In the passion of my Maker,
be my sinful soul partaker,
may I bear with her my part;

Of his passion bear the token,
in a spirit bowed and broken
bear his death within my heart.

May his wounds both wound and heal me,
He enkindle, cleanse, and heal me,
be his cross my hope and stay.

May he, when the mountains quiver,
from that flame which burns for ever
shield me on the judgment day.

Jesus, may thy cross defend me,
and thy saving death befriend me,
cherished by thy deathless grace:

Holy Thursday

An old favorite from Leonardo daVinci, meant for this day.

Today is Holy Thursday, the first day of the Triduum, the three days of solemnity when Jesus suffered His Passion. The Masses and services held on these three days are so beautiful, so holy and so heavy with meaning, it's impossible to come away untouched.

We often go to Mass on Holy Thursday (last year, my husband had his feet washed and had to take off his shoes and expose his salt-white feet next to a guy who'd evidently spent spring break smack dab on the equator), but this year, his work schedule is not permitting that to happen, since the Masses offered at the two parishes we frequent are both at the same time -- seven o'clock p.m.

Tomorrow, the girls and I will go to the Stations of the Cross at twelve noon and stay on for the Good Friday service, which includes Holy Communion and the veneration of the cross. Tomorrow is also the first day of the Divine Mercy Novena, which will start at 3:00 p.m., the hour of Jesus's death, the hour of mercy.

This, in my opinion, is the best time of the entire year to be a Catholic.

WEBSITE REVIEW: The Virtual RosaryTM

The Virtual Rosary is, in my opinion, one of the best downloads you could ever hope to happen across on the internet, and that's exactly what I was blessed enough to do several years ago.

The best thing about the Virtual Rosary is not that it is enhanced with music (which can be shut off if you find it distracting) or that there are wonderful passages from Holy Scripture that accompany each Mystery; the best thing is not even that you can not only download this onto your palm pilot as well as your home computer. The best thing is that this amazing prayer resource is absolutely free.

As in, it costs no money. When you see how nice it is, you'll wonder why. But Mike Monteleone, who founded the Virtual Rosary Project (and whose story you can read here), says that he has three goals for the site:

1: To teach the rosary and make it simple with the program's super-easy operation.

2: To help keep the rosary refreshing and deep for anyone with the aid of scripture, illustrations, and music.

3: To build a worldwide community of people to pray for each other through the PrayerCast network.

To that end, it is cost-free for anyone who'd like to make it a permanent computer file, and it is so worth it. It's easy, too. If you're a little freaked out about downloading and installing software on your computer, don't be. Simple instructions are available by clicking the Tech Support tab on the site.

WEBSITE REVIEW: The Stations of the Cross

This is one of the best online prayer sites I've ever found. There's nothing to download; all you have to do is click the link and you can be praying a beautifully well-done Stations of the Cross right at your computer. It's very easy to do and the artwork and scripture that accompanies each station is just lovely. They even have a button at the upper left part of the page that allows you to make the text bigger. They've thought of everything!

The site is maintained by the Roman Catholic Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Norwich, England. It is a fascinating website and also offers the Rosary and the Angelus for those who find it convenient and helpful to say their prayers online.

Holy Week, of course, is the crowning time of the year to pray the Stations. I guarantee that this will deepen your faith and lead you to a greater closeness with Jesus. It just will.

So if you can't make it to your parish during this week -- and working folks and the homebound can have a lot of trouble making this happen -- try this.

St. Patrick's Breastplate

St. Patrick was born in 387, the Christian son of Roman parents living in Britain. As a young man, he was captured by Celtic slave traders, who kidnapped him and took him to Ireland where he led a very difficult life for several years. He eventually escaped from his captors, made his way home, and was reunited with his family. He began studying for the priesthood and was ordained as a priest and then appointed as a bishop. St. Patrick had a dream in which he saw the people of Ireland calling out to him, begging him to bring Christ to their pagan land. He left Britain to do that very thing.

St. Patrick spent forty years among the Irish people, teaching, preaching and healing the sick. He founded monasteries and trained young men to be priests; he cared for the poor. He started a small flame of faith in a land that burned into a brushfire, allowing the Irish people to withstand hundreds of years of persecution for their Catholic beliefs.

St. Patrick died on March 17, 461.


St. Patrick used the shamrock to teach the people of Ireland about the Holy Trinity.

The following prayer is known as St. Patrick's Breastplate. It was taken from his Confessions.

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through the belief in the threeness,
Through confession of the oneness
Of the Creator of Creation.

I arise today
Through the strength of Christ's birth with his baptism,
Through the strength of his crucifixion with his burial,
Through the strength of his resurrection with his ascension,
Through the strength of his descent for the judgment of Doom.

I arise today
Through the strength of the love of Cherubim,
In obedience of angels,
In the service of archangels,
In hope of resurrection to meet with reward,
In prayers of patriarchs,
In predictions of prophets,
In preaching of apostles,
In faith of confessors,
In innocence of holy virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I arise today
Through the strength of heaven:
Light of sun,
Radiance of moon,
Splendor of fire,
Speed of lightning,
Swiftness of wind,
Depth of sea,
Stability of earth,
Firmness of rock.

I arise today
Through God's strength to pilot me:
God's might to uphold me,
God's wisdom to guide me,
God's eye to look before me,
God's ear to hear me,
God's word to speak for me,
God's hand to guard me,
God's way to lie before me,
God's shield to protect me,
God's host to save me
From snares of devils,
From temptations of vices,
From everyone who shall wish me ill,
Afar and anear,
Alone and in multitude.

I summon today all these powers between me and those evils,
Against every cruel merciless power that may oppose my body and soul,
Against incantations of false prophets,
Against black laws of pagandom
Against false laws of heretics,
Against craft of idolatry,
Against spells of witches and smiths and wizards,
Against every knowledge that corrupts man's body and soul.

Christ to shield me today
Against poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against wounding,
So that there may come to me abundance of reward.

Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise,
Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,
Christ in every eye that sees me,
Christ in every ear that hears me.

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through belief in the threeness,
Through confession of the oneness,
Of the Creator of Creation.
+Amen+

Good Shepherd, think of me (Palm Sunday)

This is one of my favorite hymns, written by St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153) The lyrics were translated from his writings by Henry Williams Baker in 1861.

The image of angels adoring the Lord Jesus as He hung on the cross is a very powerful one, I think.

O Sacred Head, Surrounded

O Sacred Head, surrounded
by crown of piercing thorn!
O bleeding Head, so wounded,
reviled and put to scorn!
Our sins have marred the glory
of Thy most Holy Face,
yet angel hosts adore Thee
and tremble as they gaze

I see Thy strength and vigor
all fading in the strife,
and death with cruel rigor,
bereaving Thee of life;
O agony and dying!
O love to sinners free!
Jesus, all grace supplying,
O turn Thy face on me.

In this Thy bitter passion,
Good Shepherd, think of me
with Thy most sweet compassion,
unworthy though I be:
beneath Thy cross abiding
for ever would I rest,
in Thy dear love confiding,
and with Thy presence blest.

But death too is my ending;
In that dread hour of need,
My friendless cause befriending,
Lord, to my rescue speed:
Thyself, O Jesus, trace me,
Right passage to the grave,
And from Thy cross embrace me,
With arms outstretched to save.

Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week and marks the first time that we read the story of Christ's Passion from the gospel of St. Matthew. It's always surprisingly difficult to be part of the congregation at this Mass, reading the part of the Crowd. We have very few lines, but the ones we have make me tremble just like the angels: "We choose Barabbas!", "Crucify him!" and -- worst of all -- "Let his blood be on us and on our children!"

During Holy Week, we almost spend more time in church than we do at home. We attend weekday Mass every day during Holy Week if possible. On Good Friday, which is a day of fasting and abstinence, we go to church at noon and stay through an entire series of events: Stations of the Cross, the rosary, communion service and then through the solemn time of gathering in the narthex where the Blessed Sacrament has been placed on a makeshift altar, surrounded by spring flowers. There we spend at least an hour in Adoration, heeding His request to His disciples to stay with Him, be with Him during His hour of need. On that night, we are His disciples, waiting with Him in the garden called Gethsemane.

Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament won't be present again in the church until the consecration at the Easter Vigil Mass.

RECIPE: Friday Bean Burritos & Corn Pudding

For some reason, we haven't yet had these yummy bean burritos for dinner on a Friday this Lent, but they are really good. The only caveat in this recipe is that you have to make sure you buy the vegetarian-style refried beans because regular refried beans are made with lard. I don't know if the lard used in the refried beans (which makes them delicious, thankyouverymuch) counts as a meat product or not -- I know that soups made with a meat based broth like chicken stock are a no-no, but lard? Better err on the side of the purity of the fast though, right?

Anyway, I usually serve these with corn pudding. Or if I'm lazy, chips and salsa. Although a salad with sliced red peppers, some onion and ripe olives wouldn't go amiss, particularly if you served it with ranch dressing that's had a tablespoon of jalapeno pepper juice stirred into it. Mmmm!

Friday Bean Burritos

1 package burrito-sized flour tortillas

1 can vegetarian-style refried beans (I like Old El Paso brand, but if you're a purist in things like this, you could always make your own.)

3 green onions, finely diced (or more, if you really like lots of onions)

2 cups shredded sharp cheddar, colby-jack OR pepper jack cheese

picante sauce


Directions:

Place refried beans in a small saucepan and add a couple of tablespoons of water. Heat on stove until beans steam and emit small bubbles -- they are too thick to boil, so watch them carefully. I highly recommend that your spray your little saucepan with cooking spray beforehand.

Place tortillas in a microwave-friendly tortilla steamer (available at your grocery) with paper towel dividing each tortilla. You can also place the paper-divided tortillas on a dinner plate, inverting another plate over them for the same effect. Heat tortillas until they are steamy hot.

Have diced green onions, shredded cheese and other desired additions -- sliced black olives, jalapeno peppers, sour cream -- ready.

To make burritos, place a hot tortilla on a heated plate in front of you; spread a small amount of beans in a horizontal line from side to side. Sprinkle with cheese and onions; add some picante sauce. Ask the person whose burrito you are crafting if they'd like any additional items. If they want them, add to burritos in small amounts.

To roll the burrito, fold the right hand side of the tortilla about 1/3 of the way over towards the middle. Take the top of the burrito and fold it down over the beans, cheese, etc. Then roll the burrito from bottom to top, as tightly as you can without tearing the burrito. Serve to grateful family member or friend. Garnish with a scoop of corn pudding, if you're feeling frisky.

That's how they used to roll 'em at the late lamented Chi-Chi's, the best American Tex-Mex chain restaurant, like, ever. *sob!*

Corn Pudding

Super-easy and so good. Known as 'corn cake' at Chi-Chi's, I prefer the term 'corn pudding' because it seems to fit the consistency better.

1 can corn, undrained
1 can creamed corn
1 box Jiffy corn muffin mix
1 egg, beaten
1 stick butter
1 can of sliced green chilies, drained (optional)

Spray an 8x8 casserole with cooking spray. Heat oven to 375^o F. Cut stick of butter into chunks and place in casserole; put casserole into oven and allow butter to melt. When melted, remove pan from oven and add both cans of corn, beaten egg and package of muffin mix (and chilies, if desired). Stir until all ingredients are combined. Return the pan to the oven and bake for 45-60 minutes or until top is golden and center is set.

Serve with an ice cream scoop, creating an adorable mound on the heated plate. Or just dig into it with a big ol' serving spoon and splat a serving down on each plate. This recipe makes, I think, about eight servings. But don't hold me to that. It all depends on the size of your ice cream scoop, and/or the energy with which you dig into the casserole dish.

RECIPE: Easy Friday Spaghetti

This is always a favorite on Fridays during Lent at our house, with the girls and my husband, anyway. I much prefer my incedibly delicious broccoli-rice casserole (sorry, Miss Kayte -- it contains cream o' mushroom soup), but this isn't bad, by any means. Even better, it's easy-peasy. And it can be jazzed up or kept as simple as you'd like it to be.

This recipe serves four people, by the way, so if you have to feed more than that, just double all the ingredients.

Easy Friday Spaghetti

1 jar marinara sauce

1 T. dried oregano, crushed

1/4 t. dried basil, crushed

1/4 t. dried thyme, crushed

pasta for four, in any shape you find appealing

Optional items:

1 small can sliced mushrooms, undrained OR 1 fresh portobello, washed and diced

1 small onion, diced

1 t. crushed red pepper


Decant marinara sauce into a medium saucepan and add herbs, as well as any other optional items you'd like to include. Heat very gently -- this sauce will splatter your cooktop unmercifully. Cook the pasta with a generous amount of salt and a dab of oil. Serve spaghetti with warm garlic bread or a baguette with olive oil and a little green salad. Very yummy, very easy.

Laetere Sunday

Today was the day of rose-colored vestments, indicating that Lent is halfway over. Two weeks from today is Palm Sunday; three weeks is Easter.

The pink vestments replace the purple ones -- the color of penitence -- because this is the Sunday when the Mass readings turn from their solemn focus on our brokenness and instead give us a sense of joyful hope: the readings are as warm and consoling as a fleece blanket wrapped around the shoulders. The best is yet to come, they say. It won't always be like this.

This is an exciting year for my family, these days leading up to Easter Vigil. This will be our five year anniversary of being received into the Catholic Church, the best five years of my life.

That's why, on this day, we are more joyful than usual.

RECIPE: Egg Salad

One of our favorite lunches on Fridays during Lent is egg salad. This is one of those beloved comfort foods, for me dating back to my college days at Ball State. My friend Jennifer and I would lug all our books down to the Dugout, a little cafe in the basement of Studebaker Hall where she lived and sit in a booth and study, eating egg salad sandwiches on white bread with glasses of the coldest milk ever. Dee-licious! Those were happy days, fondly remembered. Jen, who was worried back then that she'd fail out of the BSN program for lack of being able to administer an injection into an orange, is now a nurse at a big hospital in Indianapolis. And I am, well, me.

I don't really have a recipe for this, so all amounts are approximate. If it isn't creamy enough for your liking, add another dollop of mayonnaise. If you prefer it less tart, cut back on the mustard. That's one of the great beauties of egg salad -- you can adjust the ingredients in various ways and still have a tasty final product. We've found that the only thing you can really add too much or too little of is salt.

Egg Salad

6 eggs, hard cooked and de-shellified

3/4 c. mayonnaise

2 T mustard + a couple of extra squirts

1/4 tsp celery seed (can substitute one stalk of diced celery)

1/2 tsp dried dill weed, crushed

salt to taste (eggs need a lot of salt, so add, stir and taste until you have it as you like it. Ha! I threw some Shakespeare in there!)

Optional ingredient: stir in about ten sliced green pimiento olives. Make sure to cut down on the salt you add if you choose this option


In a medium-sized mixing bowl, smoosh eggs with a fork. Or if you have one of those fancy chopper doo-dads like my mom does, use that instead. Add remaining ingredients, except for salt. Add salt in 1/8 teaspoon increments and stir, tasting after each addition.

Makes six nice sandwiches. Serve on toasted bread or on plain, soft white Wonder Bread. In the summer, however, this is also really good on a quartered ripe tomato.

Love over lo mein

This evening, my husband took me out for dinner at my favorite Chinese restaurant in these parts. It is beautifully decorated and they play soft classical music -- lots of J.S. Bach, Vivaldi and Mozart -- over their speakers and their food is delicious. It is also inexplicably cheap.

Two things of note happened while we were dining:

The first thing is that I dipped my egg roll in a small puddle of Chinese mustard I'd put on my plate for that purpose, but continued talking to my husband throughout the dipping process, so that by the time I (long-windedly) got finished with what I was saying, I'd forgotten about the first act of dippage and went for the second dip. The resulting bite of egg roll nearly made my sinuses implode. I thought my head was going to turn into a flaming skull and start shrieking around the room like a helium balloon with the gas released, only scary-looking. Anyway, the allergy medicine I take at night? Well, I don't think I'll be needing it. Maybe for the next two years.

The second thing that happened is that the Tall Family came in. I'm talking about a man who was about 6'6 and his wife, who was about 6'2. They had their two daughters with them, one who was as tall as I was and the other, who wasn't much shorter. I figured that they were probably a first grader and a pre-schooler, all vertical things considered. They were very nice looking people, very stately and dignified. I thought that maybe they were somehow related to Legolas, Arwen, Elrond and Galadriel.

Anyhoo, Mrs. Tall did a very curious thing. She rummaged around in her large handbag (a Chanel knockoff) and brought out a plastic canister of anti-bacterial wipes and a pump bottle of Purex hand sanitizer. The family stood back, making sure not to touch anything, and the missus went over the entire surface of the tabletop with an antibacterial cloth. Then she did the chair seats with another cloth. And, I kid you not, she wiped down the ladder backs of the chairs. I AM NOT KIDDING. No matter what you're thinking, I am telling you the truth.

After she had wiped down their table (I thought she was going to come over to me and my husband and spray us with a Flit gun full of bleach solution), her family lined up solemnly in front of her and each received a squirt of Purex onto one upturned palm. At this point, I had abandoned my manners and was staring in frank amazement, a bit of lo mein falling out of my mouth onto my plate.

"Hark, yon germophobes," I whispered to my husband, indicating the Tall Family with a gesture of my head. "They are not only tall, they are very, very clean."

"When they come and sit back down, do you think I should start coughing?" he asked wickedly.

Mrs. Tall had left the canister of wipies on the table -- maybe she planned to start on the wall behind their table after she ate -- and I noticed the little Chinese server looking at it in bemusement as she set down a little tray with their bill and four fortune cookies on it.

I wanted desperately to see if she'd wipe off the tray and the cookie wrappers with an antibacterial wipe, but I never got the chance. Mr. Tall's shoulder was in the way.

My fortune cookie said this: "Be prepared to accept a great opportunity that will come your way."

I can hardly wait.

Sacrifice unrequired

Today was a longish sort of day, a difficult day. Ash Wednesday usually is. But it's supposed to be, right? It's a day of penance and fasting, a day when we're not only reminded of our own mortality and the grace and mercy of Jesus, but also the day when we're reminded that all our Lenten sacrifices -- things that are so hard for us -- are so very, very small when compared to the sacrifice He made for us.

So it wasn't a particularly jolly day, but not terrible.

When my husband came home, I was huddled on the couch with my feet up, covered from chin to toes with my big, thick Symphony on the Prairie blankie. I was drowsy, all warm and comfy with Wimzie curled up beside me. Hubby entered the room and said, "Are you going to be ready to leave for Mass in twenty-five minutes?"

"Yup," I said.

"What are we having for dinner?" he asked, looking pitiful.

"Mac and cheese."

"Are you in a bad mood?"

"No, I am not."

We went to Mass, which was lovely, praying our rosary on the way home. (We're adding the St. Michael prayer and the Memorare to it during Lent and probably thereafter, since this six weeks is a very habit-forming period of time.) As soon as we walked in, I put a pot of water on the stove for the pasta and set the cheese sauce to warm. I was bustling around in the kitchen and I wasn't aware of being terse or cross or otherwise unpleasant, but suddenly my husband turned to me and said, "Have you had any pop today?"

"No," I said, surprised. "I gave it up for Lent, remember?"

"No," he said firmly. "No, I do not remember that. I thought you said you weren't giving it up."

"I said I was."

"Okay, well, good. But you can't. You can. Not. Give. Up. Pop."

"I already have given it up!"

"Take it back. I mean it. TAKE. IT. BACK."

"Good grief. This is the dumbest thing I've ever heard! I am not taking it back!"

"Oh, yes you are," he said grimly. "Look. Lent is already hard with the other stuff we give up as a family. The no cookies, no candy, no jam on our toast. The Fridays with no meat. All that stuff. The last thing the rest of us need us for you to be suffering major withdrawal from your chemical dependency on diet pop."

I was wounded. "You make me sound like some kind of addict!"

"I'm just saying."

"Okay, FINE!" I tossed my head haughtily. "I'll think of something else. I hope you're happy."

"Oh, I will be," he said fervently, and reached into the fridge, pulling out a Big K Diet Cola, clean and cold and tempting. My eyes followed his hand as he popped the top and held it out to me. I grabbed it, somewhat in the manner of a cheetah culling a gazelle out of a running herd, and began pouring it straight down my throat.

My husband watched me in alarm, mental images of junkies with needles hanging out of their arms playing on the movie screen in his head.

"That is some goooooooood stuff," I said, coming up for air and wiping my mouth on my sleeve. "Goooooooooooood stuff."

"Would you like another one?" he asked politely, proferring another can.

"OH yeah." I took a couple of deep swallows and then said, "I heard this funny joke today. It seems that an invisible man married an invisible woman. They had a very happy marriage, had a couple of children. Their kids were both really nice, got good grades and the whole bit, but neither one of them was anything much to look at."

My husband sagged in relief against the refrigerator. "It is very, very good to have you back with us," he said. "Very good."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."