a reflective St. Jerome

I am Javert

Bishop Wenski says that if you care about our borders being enforced you are another Inspector Javert of Les Miserables fame. Mary Ann of the Les Femmes  blog gives him a thumbs down. When I read the bishop's comment all I could think about was 93, year old Catholic Louise Sollowin who was raped and murdered  in her own bedroom by an illegal alien last year. Various reports say that he'd been working as a roofer in  in this country for anywhere from two to four months. Obviously it didn't take him long to go bad. The trouble with illegals is that we know nothing about them. Were they criminals in the own country? What is their mental condition? Do they carry a communicable disease? Bishop Wenski doesn't seem to think of any of these questions.


The bishop's comments reminded me of another story that I read last month. A brave young priest in one of the worst parts of Mexico wrote about four young gang members who ran afoul of their gang for beating and robbing a man who was already paying the gang protection money. They acted without permission and presumably took profits for themselves. The punishment was to be execution but due to the priest's pleading it was reduced to exile. They were told to get out of Mexico and crossed the Rio Grande that night. It's a dramatic story but I have wonder what happened next. Did they throw themselves at the foot of the holy Cross and go straight or are they now victimizing Americans?  I guess I'll have to embrace the intended insult and say I'm an Inspector Jarvet because I am sick, sick, sick  of stories like this.

St. Joachim and Little Mary

A third St. Jerome

In this painting St. Jerome, patron saint of librarians looks like he's seen the angel before and was expecting company and instruction as he translates the bible.

Another St. Jerome

St. Jerome in the Desert

This painting makes me smile. The angel has clearly startled poor Jerome by blasting him in the ear. Is the angel telling him to get back to work on the bible or that he needs to get dressed and go see the pope?

Morning has broken.........a blast from the past

Last Sunday Rocky had to work so we went to a different parish for Mass. The church musician played this as the pre Mass music. I looked at Rocky while flashing back to the second grade and the kiddie liturgy. My husband looked at me and gave me an apologetic smile. I liked this song when I was a kid, didn't we all but what the heck were the adults thinking?

Some advice from Fr. Scupoli

You must not shirk your duty. This war is unavoidable and you must either fight or die. 



from The Spiritual Combat by Fr. Lorenzo Scupoli

Requiem Aeternum Pater Walker and other random thoughts

• Eternal rest grant unto Fr. Walker, just 28 years old at the time of his murder. The killer has been caught.
  
• Speaking of crime, there are some people who welcome a financial and societal collapse in America because they think things will be better when the dust settles. I'm not one of them and I don't think those wishful dreamers have really given it much thought. A week ago a woman was killed in a one car accident. As she lay dead, people came and stole the groceries from the car. These people weren't hungry. They didn't need the food. They just wanted the thrill of stealing. A few months ago some young people broke down a fence at an electronic music festival because they didn't have tickets and wanted to get in anyway.The fence came down on a guard who suffered serious injuries. The brats at the music festival aren't starving. In fact, electronica fans or at least their parents, tend to be on the upper end of the financial curve. If people do things like this now what will they do when there really is reason to be desperate?
  
  
• Rocky had to work late so we weren't able to go to Mass at our parish. Instead after we left my uncle's nursing home we went to St. Dominics in DC. It is a beautiful church and we've been there before but never for the late Sunday Mass. After five minutes I looked at Rocky and he looked at me. The cantor was out of control. I understand that they get a lot of tourists but I hate it when the cantor tells us when to stand  and why we're supposed to be there. It was a somewhat odd experience. The cantor, who actually had a good voice was belting out a 1970s folk music concert and in between performances the little old pastor was giving a straight Novus Ordo Mass with chant thrown in.
   
• So let me get this straight. If you have a gay Mass it's okay with Cardinal Dolan but if a priest says in public that one group in the diocese is treated pretty shabbily that is not okay to the point of him being driven out of the country? Cardinal Dolan is a puzzling and disheartening disappointment and for me at least, he has been from the first day he was installed in New York.
  
  
  
  
• Oh Mary, Queen of Heaven, pray for us to thy Son, Our God and King!

At Prayer

Prayer

About that Irish infant home story

My great grandmother had 8 children. You know how many lived to adulthood? Four. My great grandmother was a devoted mother but she could not save all her babies. My mother is named after one of those lost infants. My father was named after an uncle who also did not survive. In the days before penicillin and vaccines young children and infants died so often and so fast that the woman with an only child was a nervous woman indeed.

My mother who is 72, remembers having to wear a small but stinky flannel bag around her neck until she was 12 or 13. It was held by a string or ribbon and was filled with the acifidity herb which was supposed to protect her from getting sick. She said the one good thing about it was that all the kids in the country were wearing the same thing so everybody stank together. Putrid as it was, unless you wanted to make your parents very upset you didn't dare take it off outside of a bathtub or when swimming.

 It was also common in that staunchly Baptist and Methodist area to keep little boys dressed like girls until they could walk to protect them from jealous spirits or jealous adult women who might cast a spell. My youngest uncle, born in 1950, didn't get a hair cut until he was three.


With this in mind, I never gave the breathless Irish nuns-killed-illegitimate- babies-and-dumped-them-in-a- septic tank story one bit of attention. If you or anyone you know were taken in I suggest that  you sit down with an elderly person and ask about the "good ole days" or take a walk to an old cemetery and look at the infant section.

Death Crowning Innocence by Watts

Pentecost and random thoughts...

*The right judgement call can save you a lot of pain and suffering. Last week as I set out to go to work I walked along a path that goes from my building's back door, through a garden to the sidewalk. It has a portico which is nice on rainy or snowy days. As I was trudging I looked up and saw a young man standing at the end of the path. He was wearing flip flops, shorts, and a jacket with the hood up. All I could make out were his eyes. He was looking at me. Oddly enough I felt that someone was staring before I even saw him.  I got off the path and took another connector path to the sidewalk. It put me several feet out of my way but there was nothing on earth that was going to make me walk up to that guy standing in the shadows. When I hit the sidewalk I looked back and saw that he was gone. Interesting.
It's possible that the guy was just meditating. It's possible that he just wanted to say "hi". I didn't care to find out. I've seen him again and he had his dog with  which made him look less sinister but was he still standing motionless in the one shadowy spot on the path and the dog is was not relieving himself.

Our Lord said "Judge not, lest ye be judged," but Our Lord was not saying, be reckless with your life. When you get that weird "danger, danger Will Robinson" feeling act on it.



*Anne Barnhardt, is thinking about quitting blogging.  I would hate that becuase I've learned a lot from reading her. Let me warn you though, in case you're about to link out to her, that Anne is blunt. She is as subtle as a broadsword swung at your head. If you can't take strong language don't go there. She is correct about the thing that grieves her so: Many, if not most Americans, particularly Catholics have gotten spiritually dull and are content to be so. Quite possibly the only thing that will wake folks up is a chastisement of some kind.  I hope she takes a break and comes back.


 *Lately I've been getting copies of Magnificat magazine to take to a dear Catholic lady at my uncle's nursing home. She loves it and reads it every night. The June cover showing a 14th century illumination from a book of hours is just gorgeous.

I'ts mind boggling to think of what happened at Pentecost  Peter and the others went from being frightened and unsure to fearless and faithful unto death.



*Way back in the 60s there was a Gospel album with inexpertly done cover art called "Swing that Gospel Axe" St. Boniface, bishop and martyr, whose feast was this week really did and he lifted the pagans he'd come to evangelize out of the misery of worshipping creations instead of the Creator.

*I just found out that I am going to be the embedded librarian for a department at the law firm I work for. I am not thrilled. Embedding is a cute way of saying that I'll be the designated researcher for this one topic along with all my other duties. Alas, this department covers a topic of law that I have no interest in. Oh well. It might be fine. I might come to enjoy this subject. Our Lady of Good Help, St. Joseph and St. Jerome, pray for me.

Parce Domini

The super quiet Mass

For as long as I can remember all the low Tridentine masses I've been to were dialogue. A few months ago a priest told us during his homily to tone it down because he'd had complaints from other parishioners that in general the congregation's Latin was so bad that  hearing it bellowed throughout the church is like nails on a chalkboard for them.

Oops! Oh my!

Judging by the body language in the pews this miffed a few folks who thought their Latin pronunciation was just ace. I decided to meditate on docility and hoped the priest wasn't talking about me.  So now when this particular good and really holy priest is offering the Mass I'm content to be silent except for the Domine non sun dingus and when he turns to us with a "Dominus vobiscum". Happily, I've come to love the silent low Mass just as much as the dialogue version. Both are  permitted by the Church. Fr. Peter Carota prefers the silent and explains why in this post. 

An unusual Annunciation

Dust up in blog land

There was a rather rough dust up in Catholic blog land last week. Carol at Tenth Crusade and Steve Skojec  both cover all the particulars. It's over this time but my question is this: Why do we defer to Catholic celebrities? They don't have a lick of teaching authority and they sure shouldn't have any power. Some guy or gal with a Facebook account, a lecture tour and an EWTN gig is not a substitute for your priest.