Come Holy Spirit

We are praying for the Holy Spirit to come down and renew us and the face of the whole earth. It's the world's oldest novena--praying from Ascension Thursday to Pentecost Sunday. I love all the readings, in particular the final discourse Jesus gives at the Last Supper (beginning John 14) about not letting our hearts be troubled, His sending the Advocate, to love one another, and finally His High Priestly prayer (John 17). I quote it completely because it's so beautiful. I love that our Lord has taught us to pray and continues to intercede with the Father for us.

John, chapter 17

 

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The Prayer of Jesus.^* 1When Jesus had said this, he raised his eyes to heaven^* and said, “Father, the hour has come. Give glory to your son, so that your son may glorify you,^a 2^* just as you gave him authority over all people,^b so that he may give eternal life to all you gave him. 3^* Now this is eternal life,^c that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ. 4I glorified you on earth by accomplishing the work that you gave me to do. 5Now glorify me, Father, with you, with the glory that I had with you before the world began.^d

6“I revealed your name^* to those whom you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. 7Now they know that everything you gave me is from you, 8because the words you gave to me I have given to them, and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you, and they have believed that you sent me. 9I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours,^e 10and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine, and I have been glorified in them.^f 11And now I will no longer be in the world, but they are in the world, while I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are. 12When I was with them I protected them in your name that you gave me, and I guarded them, and none of them was lost except the son of destruction, in order that the scripture might be fulfilled.^g 13But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely.^h 14I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world.ⁱ 15^* I do not ask that you take them out of the world^j but that you keep them from the evil one. 16They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. 17Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth.^k 18As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world.^l 19And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.

20“I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.^m 22And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are one, 23I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, that the world may know that you sent me, and that you loved them even as you loved me. 24Father, they are your gift to me. I wish that where I am^* they also may be with me, that they may see my glory that you gave me, because you loved me before the foundation of the world.ⁿ 25Righteous Father, the world also does not know you, but I know you, and they know that you sent me.^o 26I made known to them your name and I will make it known,^* that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them.”

Here's the link to Veni Creator Spiritus in Gregorian chant.
Come Holy Spirit! Fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. 

These holy cards copied from http://comeholyspiritvenisanctespiritus.blogspot.com/

Memorial Day

This picture taken from Flickr. There is a video and pictures at

About Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery - American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC). The images of hundreds and hundreds of crosses in neat rows in American cemeteries in Belgium are ones I'll never forget even though I have no pictures in my photo album. Why not? I wonder. Probably because it's another thing I took for granted living in Verviers, the cemeteries within easy driving distance. But how blessed we were to be present at the 50th anniversary of VE-day at Henri-Chapelle. It really strikes you when you watch old men remembering their victory and sobbing over the losses of their brothers in arms. I will always be grateful to these brave men who gave their lives to defend our freedom. I wonder what they'd think of the US now with all our talk of being safe, huddled in our homes. How easily we believe the experts without questioning, how easily we give up our freedom to gather, how easily we give up fighting for the common good. But I do believe that God is working in us for a greater good, according to His purpose. Thy will be done, O Lord.  

Here I am, on a trip to the Canary Islands. The other is taken on a cruise down the Mosel river when our parents came to visit. I loved our stay, visiting historic battlefields and beautiful churches. Someday I want to visit with the children, but if there's only one place on earth I'm allowed to visit before I die, it'd have to the be Holy Land.   

With our parish reopening, I feel so much better. To be present at Mass is no small thing. Yesterday we sang the Dam Busters Hymn (Ps. 46) as a prelude. So grateful for our wonderful organist, Steve Collins, who is a veritable font of information on church matters, history, cars, and of course, music! We are praying now for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in a new and big way! I'm asking for all seven gifts (see my pillowcase). The Christian life is all about growing, growing, growing in the devout life. I picked up a little gem of a book from the recycle pile: The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. How strange and wonderful to find it now, just when Michael was thinking about getting a copy.  

Movies and More

My new look! It's been headache central over here so I'm no longer disappointed that I'm not in Calcutta at the moment. It's much easier to massage Biofreeze into my head without it getting into my eyes when the hair is short. Dagny gave me the haircut--she doesn't hesitate, lol. This is the shortest my hair has ever been. It reminded me of the Passion of Joan of Arc. It's the best version I've seen--pretty much follows the transcript of the trial. It's a silent film and shot in such a way, with closeups of the actress' expressive face and those of her interrogators. You can really feel St. Joan's fear and confusion with all these churchmen threatening her, berating her. Ah, but she's a saint and nobody even remembers the names of those high and learned church officials. It's been so great to watch these movies with Max. He's taking an online class on Film in History and he shares the lecture with us before watching so we're getting a free education. The first one was Pasolini's The Gospel According to St. Matthew. Wow! I loved the look of the movie and the young and manly Jesus! Interestingly, the young man who plays Jesus was an atheist and remained an atheist after this movie. Sometimes I wonder how it's possible because the Gospels are transformative, but then I remember that even Jesus couldn't get everybody to follow Him. Many followers lefts Him because they did not like the Truth. He said, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. I love what St. John says: the light shines in the darkness and the darkness can never extinguish it. Indeed, no matter how dark the world gets, the Holy Spirit will illuminate Truth. Come Holy Spirit and renew the face of the earth. Next on the list: Spartacus and Gladiator.        

That's my hair you see--2 inches of curls--that will line the nests of birds. We also have our first honey! Michael was removing the bars where the combs were going across and it was so honey-laden. Isn't the comb beautiful? A marvel of engineering when you consider how heavy the comb gets when it's filled with honey (or brood or pollen). I want to make a skin cream--mix the comb with coconut oil and lavender. Or a candle! So great to have bees! God's gift to make life sweet and beautiful. 

My Short Books for Kids

I have drawers full of short stories and poems and decided that this is the year I will make them available as a collection--only a couple have been previously published in magazines. I'd almost finished finalizing the collection of EZs when the kids returned home for the remainder of the semester due to the pandemic. So I turned into an art director, hiring my daughter to make some original line art for this collection. I love it so much and it was well worth the wait! I thought I'd have all this a month ago but she's been busy with school and it took her some time to get into the groove. You can't rush artists. lol. This is her first published work and I'm so pleased I'm going to hire her again for the chapter book I'm working on too. What a joy it's been to remember our days together when they were little. I thought with so many families homeschooling and hunkered down at home, this would promote the simple joys of childhood and encourage families to create art of their own.

Max and Dagny is a collection of 20 easy-to-read stories, poems, and fun facts for beginning readers. It's available as a paperback (recommended) or e-book with darling little illustrations from my daughter. Free preview here. 

So the Emory contest. We didn't win. But I loved the winning story, its simplicity and focus on helping others. Well written and illustrated. I also liked two of the honor books. How I wish we'd received an honorable mention too, but I know how subjective this business is. I'm so pleased to be able to publish it myself. However, I was not allowed to publish this on Amazon because "Due to the rapidly changing nature of information around the COVID-19 virus, we are referring customers to official sources for health information about the virus. As a result we are not offering your book for sale.  Amazon reserves the right to determine what content we offer according to our content guidelines." I get it. There's always junk science. But our book is a very basic treatment of virology and immunology for young kids. I have appealed but we'll see. It struck me how easy it is for large companies to control what's available. Already this happens in the media. So I'm grateful that I could upload our book to Draft2Digital. It's a distribution service and all my self-published books are on there because it's a lot easier than making separate account for all the different ebook outlets. And they are poised to provide printing services soon. So yay!    

Why in the World? is a nonfiction book about the Coronavirus pandemic for children aged 6-12. It covers basic virology and immunology, brilliantly illustrated by Kris Manning. It's only available as an ebook at this time. 

Despite the setbacks, I'm loving all the creative aspects of self-publishing. The freedom is phenomenal and some day I want to be able to publish the books I love that I've read in manuscript form. Maybe one of my kids can learn accounting and all that business stuff :) I already have an artist on board! I have still much to learn, especially when it comes to formatting ebooks with art, but I'm getting there. And we won't talk about marketing :) I love designing and making covers, formatting the paperback so that the interior is easy to read and pleasing to the eye. It's great learning new things even though I see myself hiring a lot of this out because there are still so many stories I want to tell and not enough time to write them all. I'm so thankful to God for this beautiful writing life.

Motherhood and More

Bittersweet Mother's Day. Max would've been flying out to go on his mission trip to Calcutta, instead he's home with us. I'd scheduled Mass intentions for Dagny for her birthday (best gift ever), instead we were only able to have our little domestic church. Still, we are blessed.   

My reflection for Thursday's Gospel--washing of the Disciples' feet--is up on CatholicMom. I wrote it last September, not realizing that Catholics worldwide would not have access to Mass due to the pandemic. How we hunger for the Real Presence of Christ amongst us. How we long to receive Him. How we miss Him. One of the blessings has been no sacrilege--but with churches slowly poised to reopen, I am appalled at some of the suggestions of dropping the Sacred Host into people's hands. Better not to distribute the Holy Eucharist than to do this. The risk of abuse is too much.

I am equally distressed at the lockdowns continuing. Do they actually save lives? Perhaps. Take a look at these two articles: Lockdowns Don't Work by Lyman Stone and The Worldwide Lockdown may be the Greatest Mistake in History by Dennis Prager. I hope and pray that it's people like these who are advising our governments about policies because it's one thing to be under emergency orders for a month or two (that have already destroyed many small businesses) but quite another if civil liberties are suspended for months on end.

There is always a trade-off between risk and security and unfortunately most people do not estimate risks very well. Every year, we have 1,000 people who die in car accidents just in the state of SC. Do we ban driving? We take a risk every time we hop into the car. We take precautions, like having a vehicle in working order, wearing seatbelts, and driving defensively, but we drive at our own risk. We risk becoming a nanny state, or worse, under totalitarian rule if we do not think for ourselves and our families. We are praying, praying, praying for our leaders to make wise decisions. I also loved this article by Msgr. Pope: Coronavirus, Where is Thy Sting? Why This Gripping Fear is Useless because yes, we want to live abundantly, both physically and spiritually. 

So here's my birthday girl--19 years old! Still a teenager but maturing into a lovely young woman. She's the same age as i was when I met Michael, but the biggest difference is that she's God's girl and knows it. That's her true identity. I pray she continues growing closer to God. I still remember how upset she was when she learned that there was no St. Dagny--I told her she can be the first. After all, that's what she, and all of us, are made for. Heaven!   

Here are some scenes from our little patch of paradise and it wouldn't be complete without a couple of book recommendations: Ultimate Makeover by Carrie Gress and A Mind at Peace by Christopher Blum. Be well. Pax Christi!

      

Three Hearts

The winner of Carol's Snowmallows is...Deanna! Congratulations!!!

What a beautiful day! Today is the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker, also a first Friday that's devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the month of Mary. The US and Canadian bishops are also planning to re-consecrate North America to her. I love convergences like these. It feels like a complete consecration. I have so many thoughts but I'm unable to express them so I've been looking for some art depicting these three hearts and came across a beautiful blog: Holy Card Heaven where they post pictures of vintage cards. When we lived in Belgium, I loved watching ladies with their shuttles flying as they created beautiful lace. How in the world did they keep track of the design? 

And so I share this amazing art--to lift up your own heart to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the Chaste heart of St. Joseph. For what is prayer but lifting our poor hearts to His.