Wading into Lent

We have a lot of Lent to go.  Perhaps we should spend some time talking about things that can be a little confusing.

Like the other day, when we talked about the changes to the Stations of the Cross.  Maybe not confusing, but a surprising number of people don't know there has been a change.  I chalk that up to churches not wanting to let go of their Stations of the Cross panels, some of which are beautiful works of art in wood, stone and beautifully painted plaster.  They are old and irreplaceable.

Which makes the rules for the Stations of the Cross a bit dodgy, since you have to walk around to do them and the new ones aren't up there on the wall for many of you.  How does one do the new Scriptural Stations? That can be confusing.

I don't know.  I imagine you'll just have to walk around, stand in front of the number, and picture a different rendering.  In other words, you'll be standing in front of Jesus is condemned to death, but you'll be picturing the Agony in the Garden.  And when you land in front of Jesus picks up his cross, you have to picture Judas betraying Jesus and then Jesus getting arrested  By the time you reach Jesus picking up His cross on the your new list, you'll be standing in front of of Jesus falling the second time.  That's #7.

At least when you're standing in front of #9, you can look back at the rendition of #8 on the wall of Jesus meeting up with the women of Jerusalem.

Nothing matches up until the very last one when Jesus is placed in the tomb.

Happily for you, there are quite a number of little Stations of the Cross booklets you can carry around with you. That should help.

Which reminds me! You know you can get Lenten coloring books for the kids?

I'm not sure I'm enthusiastic about Lenten coloring books, but I'll go along with it.  My beef is that these types of teaching tools are billed as "fun" for the kids.  A "fun" way to teach them about Lent.

I realize that it is going to be tough going to teach them about Lent if it isn't any fun.  But...Lent isn't supposed to be fun, so right there, what are we teaching them?  And why does everything we learn have to be fun?

I know, I know. "Fun" is part of the way we teach children to enjoy learning new things.  If it's fun, it might generate interest and being very interested in things is rather fun.

Isn't Lent interesting enough to hold a child's attention without having to crack out a pinata full of holy cards? (Because a Lenten pinata better not be full of candy!)

I digress.

It's okay to stick with the Traditional Stations. No one minds.  But our current Pope has asked up to take up the new ones.  I'm on board with that.  I love the new Scriptural Stations, even though we lose poor St. Veronica.  There are plenty of other St. Veronica's to replace her

A reader tells us:

Our parish still uses the Stations which are on the wall - the traditional ones - when we pray the Stations together on Fridays during Lent. On Good Friday, we have a Choral Stations of the Cross, with a meditation on each Station and music which corresponds to that Station. For that we use the "modern" version. It works for us!

You make it sound so easy!  What about the walking around part?

APB St. Blybig

My Lenten penance of the day stems from this question from a reader:


I do have a saint question; I ran across the name St. Blybig in a book. I have not been able to find any information about him/her. Can you help?


What book?  It wasn't Grimm's Fairy Tales or Dr. Seuss, was it?


There are many obscure saints, saints that are only known in certain countries, cities are areas.  Perhaps there is a St. Blybig.  I can't find him.  Or her.

Here's hoping he isn't a dog.


Are you sure you got the spelling right?  It wasn't a joke?  St. Twoply?  St. Bestbuy?  St. Captainbly?


Nothing frustrates me more than not being able to find information on a saint.  Sometimes, even if you find the saint in the annuls of saintly history, you'll only find some iffy dates and a word, like "martyr" or "bishop".


Poor St. Blybig, if there is one, doesn't even get that much.  I do have a suggestion for you, though. If you ever turn to St. Jude, the patron saint of hopeless causes, you might consider switching over to St. Blybig (if he exists).

The whole reason St. Jude is the patron saint of hopeless causes, is because he really hardly know anything about him at all.  Someone, somewhere at some time decided, "Hey! No one knows anything about him, so not many people are likely to pray for his intercession, so he must have a ton of eternity on his hands.  Let' s give him the really tough ones!"


Certainly, that would also be true of St. Bigboy, I mean Blybig.


I'll be interested to hear if any of my readers can find him.  We'd better have a chat with St. Anthony.

Goodbye Mr. Chips Ahoy!

Well this is it! Here's hoping you have your Lenten ducks in a row, picked something to give up, cleaned out the pantry, dusted off the fasting rules, located your glow in the dark rosary and have at least considered getting a Lenten wreath to mark the time.

You'll like having the wreath, because you get that one day off on your pink candle Sunday, and you'll be able to see it coming up and have a beer or a piece of chocolate on that day.  Many people ask me if it's okay to have whatever you're giving up for Lent on Laetare Sunday, and my actual answer is: Jesus didn't take any time off during His Passion.  But then, His Passion only lasted for one really long gruesome day, and you've (we hope) been at it for weeks.  Still, giving up the internet is no crown of thorns.

On the one hand, it makes sense to have a little treat on the fourth Sunday of Lent. The gospel reading for that day used to be the story of the miracle of the loaves and fishes. But...now it's the story about how Jesus gets in a tiff with the powers that be for healing a blind man on the Sabbath.  Hmmmmm.

It's going to be up to you to make the call.

I also am aware that I will be saying good-bye to some of you for a bit.  Perhaps we should say "Adieu".  Again, I don't speak French, but doesn't that mean "til we meet again"?  Giving up the internet, or at least, surfing around reading blogs and lolling on recipes sites and Facebook is a very common (and worthy) thing to give up for Lent.

So Adieu, internet giver uppers!  We'll so look forward to seeing you again on Easter!

Before you go, I'd like to remind you of one very special Lenten practice, the Stations of the Cross. Like fasting and rosary praying, there are rules to the Stations of the Cross. Let's review:

1. You have to walk around.
You can't just sit in your pew and slide your eyes over the Stations hanging there on the wall.

2. Say an Act of Contrition before you start.

3. Don't get confused if the little booklet you have of the Way of the Cross is different that what is hanging on the wall of your church, because chances are, if your booklet is new and your Church is old, what's on the wall is all off.

Sigh.

There are two sets of the Stations of the Cross.  The 14 Traditional ones:

1. Jesus is condemned to death
2. Jesus is given His cross
3. Jesus falls the first time
4. Jesus meets His Mother
5. Simon of Cyrene carries the cross
6. Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
7. Jesus falls the second time
8. Jesus meets the daughters of Jerusalem
9. Jesus falls the third time
10 . Jesus is stripped of His garments
11. Jesus is nailed to the cross
12. Jesus dies on the cross
13. Jesus' body is removed from the cross
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb and covered in incense.

And the modern version:
1. Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane (the Agony in the Garden)
2. Jesus is betrayed by Judas and arrested
3. Jesus is condemned by the Sanhedrin
4. Jesus is denied by Peter
5. Jesus is judged by Pilate
6. Jesus is scourged and crowned with thorns
7. Jesus takes up His cross
8. Jesus is helped by Simon of Cyrene
9. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
10. Jesus is crucified
11. Jesus forgives the thief
12. Jesus entrusts Mary and John to each other
13. Jesus dies on the cross
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb.

Quite a difference, eh?

I feel bad for the old churches like my childhood parish which has statues and stations that are very, very old.  The Stations match the statues and are in relief.  They were still there on my last visit, just as they have always been, with Veronica more or less in the middle.  The reason we got the modern version is because someone finally noticed that there are things in the original Stations of the Cross that are not in the New Testament. File this with the names of Mary's parents, Joachim and Ann, also not in the New Testament.

In the Traditional Stations, #3,4, 6, 7 and 9 are not incidents that appear in Scripture and #13 is embellished a little, with the Scripture saying that Jesus was taken down from the cross. Jesus being laid in the arms of His Mother is not mentioned.  It could have happened.  But we don't really know that it did.  Bad news for Michangelo.

My favorite non New Testament Station is number six, "Veronica wipes the face of Jesus".  This one really has legs.  It is a late bloomer to the Stations in the first place, not arriving until the Middle Ages, along with, and probably not coincidentally, the Shroud of Turin.  There was no woman named Veronica who wiped the face of Jesus.  The name refers to what happened, "Vera"= True, "Icon"=image or mark.  Vera-icon. Veronica.

Ann and Joachim.   If we're just going by the New Testament, we don't know the names of Mary's parents and no one stepped forward to wipe the face of Jesus and walked away with His face on their towel.  But Mary did have parents and we do have the Shroud of Turin, although the Shroud of Turin is not Veronica's towel.  They do seem to be cut from the same cloth.

So to speak.

Pope John Paul II began the Scriptural Stations of the Cross and Pope Benedict XVI has made it official.

We hope the possible confusion doesn't deter you from making the Stations of the Cross at least once during the Lenten season. How about tomorrow?  That might be just the ticket to get your brain around what Lent is really all about.

The Dollar Menu

If I had really been on my game, I would have done yesterday's post about Polish donuts today, the feast day of St. Casmir, the patron saint of Poland.  C'est la vie.


Or C'est la guerre, perhaps, would be more appropriate when invoking St. Casmir. He was a conscientious objector. Or should we say, C'est non la guerre?  I don't speak French.


Yesterday in the comments section, we took a side trip to Hawaii where the donutty treat is malasadas. 

Aloha Sister!

The large number of Portuguese Catholics in Hawaii has turned the islands' Fat Tuesday into Malasada Tuesday. A malasada is a soft, yeast doughnut, and is probably one of the most wonderfully simple, delicious things to eat. I have fond memories of my grandmother and her sisters making hundreds of them before Ash Wednesday every year. 


These little babies are over-large donut holes, fried crispy on the outside and rolled in cane sugar (from Hawaii).  But the actual treat is Portuguese.  There were a lot of Portuguese workers and sailors in the South Pacific, who later went to Hawaii to build things.  The Hawaiians really glommed onto malasadas, like sugar on a malasada.


Meanwhile, readers want me to know about another Lenten practise:


 Did you know that the File-o-Fish was created by a Catholic McDonald's own specifically for the Meatless Fridays (which were all Fridays in the past)? Sounds like a question for Jeopardy to me...


Yes.  I am well aware.


Perhaps I need to start making myself some Hula Burgers.

Taste of Lent

The Lenten food is coming out of the wood work.  "Another country heard from", as the saying goes. It seems every ethnic group and conclave has some kind of Lenten tradition.  It was to be expected.

Perhaps before Lent actually arrives next week, we'll have a world food tour via our readers.  Since just about every group has representatives in the US, we get quite the smorgesborg.   (And we can thank the Swedes for that.)

Today's treat comes from a Polish American reader:

I'm unimpressed by hot cross buns myself, but I'm sad that there's no way for me to get fresh paczki in Los Angeles. Unfortunately my parents are visiting from Chicago on Ash Wednesday, not Fat Tuesday. No paczki for me!


Now I could get behind this treat!  Think "jelly donut".  Only better.  Because the batter for the dough is really, really rich with butter and eggs and sugar. And whiskey!  Then it's stuffed with fruit or creme. Then they put powdered sugar or glaze or icing or dried fruit on top.

I've never had one, but if I could get my hands on one I would be pleased.

The Polish people make and eat these for Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, in a true Lenten tradition (unlike hot cross buns!) of using up items in the pantry that we won't be using for weeks because we are about to fast and do without.  I can get behind this tradition as well.  We're working on that this week, as a matter of fact.

We've had some odd dinners. Everything has jelly on it.  We're keeping the peanut butter.

Which, contrary to popular belief, is the meaning of Fat Tuesday, basically eating everything in the pantry.  I believe it's come to mean, "have a big party with lot of booze."  That is not a preparation for holiness. You also run the risk of having a hang over and missing Mass on Ash Wednesday.

At least you'll have a big fat headache with which to align your suffering with Christ.

But it's not Lent yet!  So I'm going to tell you where to get paczki in Los Angeles.  Next door to Our Lady of the Bright Mount Church is a Polish home called SZAROTKA (3400 W Adams Blvd., which I think is at Adams and Crenshaw, but don't go by me, go by Mapquest or something).  I believe you can go buy paczki on Sundays there.  I even found you a phone number so you can call and place an order: 323 735 1381.   Let me know if this works out for you!

One a Penny, Two a Penny

I am not a fan of hot cross buns.  At best, I like the bites that include icing (like a four year old child!) and you can have the rest.  For those of you who have somehow lost out on this long Christian tradition, we eat hot cross buns on Good Friday, and I guess if you actually like them, on Easter Sunday. You hang one in the kitchen so you never burn your bread. Hot cross buns baked on Good Friday never go bad. Or something like that.

Superstition.  Unless you stick an oven timer in that bun hanging in your kitchen, you have to remember to get your bread out of the oven on your own. To ask that bun to keep your bread from burning is just...voodoo.

It seems that hot cross buns were corralled onto Good Friday by old Queen Elizabeth, who didn't want  a daily reminder of the Catholic Church, or as she put it "popery", in a stick bun and passed a law that they could only be sold on Good Friday and Easter.

So you can imagine my surprise, when trotting around the internets reading the Catholic news (it's astounding how much Catholic news there is!) that there is a whole area of the country that goes berserk over hot cross buns (to each his own, I suppose)  and can't get enough of them.  It seems bakeries bake them only during Lent. So hot cross buns are like vine ripened tomatoes and blueberries, only in season for a short time.

Get 'em while they're hot!

To which I have to just point out: it's Lent!  Aren't the words "Lenten TREAT" an oxymoron?

Given how I actually feel about them, perhaps I should consider eating one every day during Lent. I'll have to choose the kind where the cross is cut into the bun, rather than made of delicious icing.

Lent 2011

With Lent coming soon, I need something to post by my computer to remind me to "try to be good" to paraphrase the title of a Sanford Phippen book  from Maine.


I've been thinking about Lent, too.  It's just around the corner!  We have just about a week to get it together and figure out what we're going to give up.

I'm really torn this year, as I would like to give up sweets.  It would be a huge sacrifice for me, as I have quite the sweet tooth, or, what's left of a sweet tooth after all that sugar.  If I don't want St. Apollonia as my new patron saint, I'll have to do something about my intake of corn syrup.


But... I don't believe in giving up something for Lent that you need to do anyhow.  Want to quit smoking and go on a diet?  Do it on your own time.  This season is about you and God, not about you and your waist size. At the end of Lent, you should be saying, "Wow, I have a much closer relationship with God now!"  Not, "Wow, look how great I look in these jeans!  Thank you, God!"


So, if I do give up sugar, I'll have to just do that and find something else to give up.  That will make it an extra difficult Lent.  Won't I be a joy to be around?  I'll have to be a joy to be around, anyhow.  It doesn't do any good to give something up and then go around acting like a bear being poked with a stick.  That's the whole trick to Lent.


So perhaps for your computer screen you should put on there, "Be joyful!"  This won't work unless you've done something that makes you suffer, though.  If you're one of the Kum By Yah Lenters,  you'll have to take another tactic.

"Be Good" is a rather vague, if not impossible, statement.  Come on, Lent is all about digging deeper.  You're going to have to at least take a stab at determining what exactly would make you a better person.  Again, this isn't about your nail biting habit.  What's the one big change you could stand to make?


And then, what steps do you have to take to make that change?  Need to be more charitable? You don't have to become St. Francis of Assisi overnight. But you can examine how you can be more charitable each day.  Perhaps your computer screen could say, "Got Charity?"


Maybe you should make a list of things that could go on there and change them every few days or so:


Eat Humble Pie


Stop Talking


Speak Up


Go the Extra Mile


Find More Gratitude


Wear Unattractive Clothes This Week


Give Some Things Away


Go to Confession


Put Yourself Last


You get the idea.  You can tailor your list to your own shortcomings.  I'm sure our readers have some thoughts on the subject.


Again, I'm all for the old "give something up". Make it count.


Good Egg is from Paloma's Nest

The Plate Act

Dear Sister,

Can you advise me on how to grow in virtue? Are there any books on the subject that you recommend?

Thank you and God bless, Jenna


Well, that's a big bite to try and swallow. Certainly, there are smarter and more virtuous people than me to tackle this one. St. Thomas Aquinas springs to mind.

He's hard to read, really, for most of us.  I admit that in all humility, one of the seven Heavenly Virtues. Here's your check list:
1. Chastity
2. Temperance,
3. Charity
4. Diligence  (you're going to need that to do the other six)
5. Patience
6. Kindness
7. Humility


So, to be more virtuous, all you have to do is be chaste and pure according to your station in life, achieve balance in your dealings and mental state, give generously of your love, talent and goods, work hard at everything you do, give everyone else a break, treat everyone with kindness and stay humble, especially when you become perfect from doing all of this.


Did that help?

I'm joking.  It can all seem overwhelming.  Rather like you're always doing that plate juggling act.  Remember that?  The juggler has a line of poles, he spins a plate on the top of the first pole, the second the third, the fourth and by then the plate on the first pole is slowing, so he runs back and spins it again and then runs over to the fifth pole and puts a plate up there but by now the second and third plates are slowing so he runs back.....


I feel his pain. 


It's a lot to try to do a whole plate act right off the bat.  I'm sure the juggler just starts with one.  I'd go with humility.  Once you've got that one spinning, the rest are not so hard. If you can just keep three plates going, you'll be well on your way to have all seven spinning merrily away. To practice, do this:


1. Say thank you.  To everyone for everything (God too!) all the time.
2. Say I'm sorry, frequently, whether it's because you have erred or because you feel empathy with the pain of others..
3. Say I love you.


Before you know it, you'll be able to balance a chair on your head with your Grandma in it while you spin those plates.  Let me know when that happens. I'd love to see it.

Pagan Baby Reunion II

Sister: I have a question. What ever happened to pagan babies? I bought 2 when I was 8 &9 respectively. I saved my pennies until I had enough money to buy a baby. We would put our pennies and sometimes nickels in a milk carton kind of thing, with a slot for money. I named one of mine Elvis Joseph, and the other was named Connie Frances. They were born around 1957 or 1958. Can you check the missions in Africa and see what Elvis and Connie are up to. Can we still adopt babies?

You, personally?  We had to pool our money together, the whole classroom until we saved up the $5 to send to the missions to buy our pagan baby.  And you got to name them yourself?  We took a vote with the whole room.  How did you get away with naming your pagan babies after people in show business?  We always picked a good saint's name so our pagan babies would have that heavenly help.  I suppose you did slide a couple of saints in there. But clearly, you were more interested in the singers than the saints.


We forgive you. You were nine.


Although you were past the age of reason (seven).


I don't have the addresses of the "missions in Africa".  After we purchased our pagan babies and gave them a name, all we got was a certificate to hang in the front of the classroom.  In my first grade room, our certificates lined the front of the the blackboard like laundry on the line.  By the time I was in the fifth grade, the pagan baby program had gone the was of the Boy Saviour Club.


Because of the Boy Saviour Club I learned "Robert's Rules" in the second grade.  You just can't beat a Catholic education!


You'll never know what became of little Elvis and little Connie.  Let's pray that the baptism and Catholic upbringing you made possible helped them to live good lives, avoid Las Vegas and looking for where the boys are and get past the embarrassment of going through life with those names.

Swiss Army Phone

Hello Sister! 
today at work i overheard someone talking about a "confession app" for what i assume is some kind of portable electronic device.

have you heard of this? what do you think of it? i was shocked and dismayed. you can't go to confession over the internet, and you definitely cant do it just to your phone!!!


I'm shocked and dismayed at your lack of use of capital letters.


For those of you who are too lazy to just do a quick Google search of this new fangled way of approaching the Holy Sacrament of Reconciliation, let me first assure you that you can't phone in your confession. That's not what this does.


This is a application for your very fancy phone (that you could maybe do with a little less phone fanciness and offer it up to the Poor Souls in Purgatory or give the money you save by having something very basic to the Poor Souls on Earth) is a confession tool, meaning, it helps you prepare for making a good confession.


It lists the Ten Commandments, for example,  and asks questions about ways in which you may have broken them so you can figure out how you've sinned.  To which some people might respond, "I don't want my phone to tell me how I've sinned."  And to which we must reply, "As long as someone or something does, we're okay with it."


I really don't see a problem with it, except for the waste of money it is.

But then I don't understand why people join gyms.  That costs a lot of money and all you really need to do is find a nice flight of stairs and climb up and down them. Remember how Rocky didn't have any money? Upper body work? Carry something over your head. 


Walk down the street, jog. The weather's bad? Get on your living room floor and do some sit ups and push ups. Run in place in the garage. Make the kids lie stiffly and pick them up like dumb bells.


I am not calling your children dumb bells.  I am just suggesting they act like dumb bells.


That didn't help did it?


My point is, that you don't need this on your phone, as the tools that are in the app are already available on the internet, in books and in pamphlets. 

All you really need is a pencil and paper, then, to jot things down. Including your Penance after you're done applying your apps.


There is also a whole thing on there about how to go about making your confession. The "Bless Me, Father for I Have Sinned" drill.  You won't need that once you've done it a couple of time.


There are several versions of the "Act of Contrition" on there. Hooray! Pick one and memorize it.


Remember memorizing things?  Do you know anyone's phone number anymore?  If the answer is no, memorize some. Because some day, your fancy device will break or be beyond reach or drop in the dishwater and there you'll be, unable to call a soul.  


Don't make yourself so helpless!  These devices that make our lives so much easier can also make us oddly helpless.


The verdict: Useful, but not necessary.  Unlike Confession.

A Little I Love You

Happy St. Valentine's Day!


Notice I added the "Saint" part.  I think we should start doing that again, as a reminder that the day, dedicated to people in love and loving in general and letting people know we love them, isn't about the balloons that express the sentiment.  I haven't heard anyone complain about the "War on St. Valentine", either.  


Try as we may to control the way the human race responds to the stimulus around it, things go awry. St. Valentine's Day is yet another one of those holidays that the Catholic Church brilliantly grabbed and turned holy.  Until the 5th century, people enjoyed  Lupercalia, a fun fest that involved ritual animal sacrifice. The skins of the animals were they taken up by young men in goat who ran through the streets, slapping women with them.  What fun!  It was all about fertility, gods and superstition.


Pope Julius I finally put the kaboosh on that mess, substituting good St. Valentine. (Or, at least, some St. Valentine. We're not sure which one he had in mind.)


And here we are with roses, chocolate roses, little candies with all manner of messages, balloons, diamonds at the bottom of champagne glasses and moms struggling to make sure they have enough little paper valentines for each child in each class of each of her children. Yikes!


It's a lot of pressure.  St. Valentine feels your pain. He was under a lot of pressure, too, what with being a martyr and all.


I do embrace the little winter holiday of pink cupcakes and "I Love You".  As long as the "I love you" part is prominent, there is no down side.

Groundhog Crepes

What's today? Groundhog day!  The Groundhog did not see his shadow, which is excellent news for people in places like Chicago today.  On Monday I looked at this week's "extended forecast" for Chicago, which read: Monday, Snow; Tuesday, Snow/Wind; Wednesday/Blizzard.


We all know about the groundhog. Funny. I have yet to hear anyone complain about the War on Candlemas. You'd think the War on Christmas crowd would be all over this one.  I have heard that PETA protests every year. The groundhog looks fine to me.


What's today? Candlemas!  Why do we even have Groundhog day? Because of Candlemas! When we light the candles for the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple it may or may not cast a shadow on the hedgehog, according to the Germans, and if the hedgehog sees his shadow, he gets frightened and burrows back underground, thus signaling six more weeks of winter.  Guess where these people settled in America?  If you guessed "Pennsylvania", Grover Groundhog will give you a dollar. (Less than ten people in the whole world might catch that reference to Grover's famous line to Mandrake, the hunting dog of Porky Pig. Thank the Lord for blogs where one can relieve the brain of these burdens.)


Those crazy Germans.  First the Christmas pickle and now this.

It's a lovely feast day. Mary and Joseph bring the Baby Jesus to the Temple, Mary for purification forty days after childbirth.  They bring the poor man's sacrifice of two turtle doves and on the way in they encounter Simeon. He mentions that God promised him that he would live to see the Messiah.  The celebration (the fourth Joyful Mystery of the Rosary) focuses on Simeon's remarks:

Now you are releasing your servant, Master, according to your word, in peace; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared before the face of all peoples; a light for revelation to the nations, and the glory of your people Israel  (Luke 2:29-32).

Simeon then prophesied to Mary: "Behold, this child is set for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which is spoken against. Yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul, that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed" (Luke 2:34-35).

The "light to the nations" part is why we have Candlemas, a day we celebrate Jesus' first entrance into His Father's House, blessing the candles we will use all year long.

And unfortunately, adding superstitions as we go.  

Groundhogs.  

Pennies.

St. Aloysius is thrilled to have found Catholic Cuisine and I'm thrilled that she did. Feast your eyes on recipes for feasts for this feast day!  Crepes!

In France, each member of the family prepares a crepe (which is not pronounced CRAPE, by the way, but CREP) and while they do so, they hold a coin in their hand in the hope of financial stability until next Candlemas.  Superstitious.  They may as well hold a rabbit's foot for luck.


Still, some delicious crepes and some edible candles would be lovely.  I have had dinner crepes with chicken and mushrooms that had to be sinful to eat.  We can say a prayer for financial security without any cooking while coin holding.


And don't put your candle cookies away after today! Make a double batch!  Tomorrow is the Feast of St. Blaise.

The Return of the Chapel Veil

Since we are on the topic of Mass etiquette, what about Chapel Veils? I see them becoming more common at my church and I am curious if anyone else has considered wearing them.

Whether we're talking about Mass etiquette or mass etiquette, things have certainly gone downhill.  Seen anyone texting at Mass yet?  I'll bet you have.


I haven't.  But that's only because I'm sure I haven't been sneaky enough. I've lost my nun "suddenly appear behind you with no warning" powers in my old age.  Guess my bones creak too loudly. They always know I'm coming these days and behave accordingly. No one has had the nerve to text right in my face at Mass.  That day will come, I am certain.


What were we talking about?  Oh, yes!  Chapel Veils!  To answer your question, yes, they do seem to be making a comeback. I used to care.  Now I can't get up any steam on the issue. For one thing, the Chapel "Veil" has a curious history.  And for another, the lone person wearing a chapel veil has a tendency to look "holier than thou", which is unfortunate, since it's really no one's beeswax.

Women didn't used to have to be told to wear a hat in church, because women always had their heads covered when they left the house.  Have you ever seen a picture of little St. Bernadette without that thing on her head?  No, you haven't, because she wouldn't have left the house without it. There was never a rule in the church that women had to wear a hat, because women were already wearing  hats.  You won't find a rule that says you have to wear clothing to church, because everyone already does that.


What clothing is worn is entirely another matter.  A rulebook would be handy.  I digress.


And then hats slowly went away.  The Catholic Church did actually make a rule that women have their heads covered. That was 1917.  After Vatican II, the rule disappeared, but wasn't officially announced.  There is no rule now.


Vatican II was in the 1960's, the era of big hair.  I contend that the Chapel Veil was born to save big hair from being squashed. I can only back that up with empirical evidence: before the Chapel Veil, we all either wore a hat or a bandanna, St. Bernadette scarf to Mass.  So we all looked like Polish cleaning ladies, except around Easter, when we all had our new hats.  When 60's big hair arrived, so did the Chapel Veil.

I don't know how we ended up with Grandma's doilies on our heads. How many times did you get to Mass, realize you didn't have your doily had have to grab a Kleenex, or a place mat, or the church bulletin and stick it up there? At that point, we can all agree that the whole hat issue has turned to mush.


I am not anxious for the return of hats in church.  Are you surprised?  I am.  I am very old fashioned and was very sad to see the hats go.  But they did go, so to have them come back now seems to me just to be one more pointlessly divisive thing to use to sit around and judge each other at Mass. Either way, hat or no hat, once people start in on them again, along with the hand holders against the non-hand holders, the opinions will begin, the teeth will grind, the blood pressure will rise.


We'll have great reason to put on our judges robes, too, as hat wearers cover their heads and nothing else and non hat wearers don their Little House on the Prairie garb.  It won't be pretty.


You know what secretly tickles me about that cell phone picture at the top of the page?  Someone had to take out their phone to take it.


Maybe I'll write a rule book.  Would that help?