Tony, Tony come around....

One of our readers reminded us of a prayer to St. Ann. I've already mentioned to said reader that I don't care for the prayer:

"Dear St. Ann, send me a man, as fast as you can. "

You don't need St. Ann to have that prayer answered. You just need a bar stool and a sinful skirt. You don't even need to bring your purse.

And the meter of the 'poem' is off. That's the other reason I don't care for it. And if that isn't enough, St. Ann is the patron saint for grandmothers, not man hunters.

The terrible prayer to St. Ann reminded me of another Catholic ritual, praying to St. Anthony when you lose something, which always works.

"Tony, Tony, please come down, our keys are lost and can't be found." Or something like that.

I never speak to St. Anthony that informally, but I do speak to him very often. I can't tell you how many times we've leaned over Sister Mary Fiacre, moving her around or reaching for something near her, and dropped our eyeglasses, our car keys, pens, religious medals and scapulars, early June peas, wallets, change, her lower teeth, prescription medicines, important mail....among other things....into the folds of her clothing and under her lap blanket in her wheelchair. Sister Mary Fiacre can't tell us she's sitting on the remote, but St. Anthony can.

St. Anthony was a studious fellow who read everything he could get his hands on. One day everyone gathered for an important lecture but the lecturer was a no show. St. Anthony was asked to stall for a few minutes and gave an amazing speech. From that point on he was a premiere speaker and teacher.

The reason St. Anthony was such a fabulous speaker: he had a photographic memory. He could regurgitate everything he ever read. That's also reason he can remember where you put your keys.

We have his tongue. We also have his esophagus. Some saints are incorrupt. We know that because the first step to being canonized is to have your body exhumed to make sure it's you in the tomb. It's not at all unusual to find saints looking fresh as a rose ( and often smelling like one) many many years after their death. St. Rita is incorrupt, along with St. John Vianney (who just looks great!) St. Bernadette, even Pope John XXIII, to name a few. St. Anthony wasn't, but his tongue and his esophagus were. His tongue is in this fancy jar.

We were saved by St. Anthony just today. Our plumbing blew up yet again and although we have that under control our wash machine had had enough. RIP, Maytag. We were blessed to have a washer in the house, what with Sister Mary Fiacre. Enough said about that.

So we headed to the laundromat, which is wonderfully close by, Sister Mary Fiacre in tow. She likes to watch anything moving, so the big side loading washers and the giant dryers are very entertaining for her.

But the 412 quarters we brought weren't enough and since we didn't bring the car we had nothing to dig through to find a couple more. We prayed to St. Anthony and dug through Sister Mary Fiacre. We found two quarters, a part of an orange peel and a nine volt battery.

Amen.