Feast of St. Wolfgang

 

Today, on the feast of St. Wolfgang, I present a picture of the village of St. Wolgang located on the shores of Lake St. Wolfgang!

Brett Favre

 

Brett Favre, Catholic.

St. Crispin's Day, October 25

St. Crispin is a saint, alright, but is more famous because of Shakespeare than anything...

In Shakespeare's "Henry V", the king rallies his demoralized troops before the Battle of Agincourt. He concludes with:

"We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day."



You can listen to the whole speech here.

Animals in Heaven

 

So... are there dogs, cats, horses, and pigs in heaven or not? I agree with with Sister Mary Martha.

You can also read this.

Think of it this way...if animals have immortal souls, and you kill a cow to make a steak, is it murder? What if your horse shatters a leg (or whatever it's called) and you have it "put down"?

I wouldn't want MURDERER stamped on my soul as I approach the Pearly Gates...

Feast of St. Isaac Jogues, October 19

 

You can read about this remarkable martyr here.

St. Isaac Jogues was a Jesuit missionary who worked with the Huron and Tobacco Indians, who called him "Bird of Prey". Or in the language of the Hurons, "Odessonk". Sound familiar?

Word of the Day, Part II

From William F. Buckley:

"But a failure to attend church on Sunday is, by Catholic standards, contumacious, an ostentatious rejection of a formal obligation."

con·tu·ma·cious

Pronunciation:
\ˌkän-tü-ˈmā-shəs, -tyü-ˈ, -chə-ˈ\

Function:
adjective

: stubbornly disobedient : rebellious

Yikes!

 

It's called pareidolia (from Wikipedia):

"The term pareidolia, referenced in 1994 by Steven Goldstein, describes a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant. Common examples include images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon, and hidden messages on records played in reverse. The word comes from the Greek para- — beside, with or alongside — and eidolon — image (the diminutive of eidos — image, form, shape). Pareidolia is a type of apophenia.

Quiz Question for October 14

 

Vatican II brought about many changes in the Church, including substituting balloons for the normal staff carried by the Pope.

Just kidding. What is the staff the Pope normally carries called?

P.S. - It's a trick question.

Feast of St. Denis

 

Pope Fabian (236-250AD) sent St. Denis to Gaul (France) to restore some sense of order to the Church, which was suffering under the Emperor Decius. He settled on an island in the Seine River near Paris.

Decius had mandated that everyone must convert to Paganism, forcing them to offer a sacrifice or burn incense to the Pagan gods - or die. Instead, Denis (with his trusty sidekicks, Rusticus and Eleutherius) began converting the pagans. This didn't sit well with the local pagan "priests" who arranged to have the three scourged, imprisoned, racked, thrown to wild beasts, burned, and finally beheaded.

Legend has it that St. Denis picked up his head and walked some distance to the place he had chosen to be buried. A basilica and Benedictine monastery were eventually built over the burial site (the building of the basilica was begun by St. Genevieve). He is the Patron Saint of France. He is also the patron saint of headache sufferers (NO! REALLY!).

He is often depicted in art holding his head. So let's say you were drawing a picture of St. Denis...where would you put the halo? Over the head in his hands, or where the head used to be? The Church is strangely silent on this issue...

Compare and Contrast (part 2)

The fightin' sisters (see post below) were upset about the harsh treatment they received from the Mother Superior.

Compare their reaction to that of St. Bernadette:

"Acting under the quite unfounded notion that Bernadette's visions and all the attendant publicity might have made the young woman vain or self-important, Sister Marie Therese Vauzous, now novice-mistress at Nevers, was very severe with her former pupil. Although she made life difficult for Bernadette, the little novice met all tests with perfect humility."

Why I Don't Want To Be a Nun

We talked in class about why females can't be priests. On the other hand, guys can't be nuns.

In a way, I'm glad for that. I can't imagine having to spend my time in a convent hanging out with the likes of Sister Paula Gonzalez.

Quiz Question for October 7

Just because we aren't holding class tomorrow doesn't mean you don't get a question.

So... who told Mary to name her child Jesus?

Oh Lord, Give Me Strength

 

ROME (AFP) - A convent in southern Italy is being shut down after a quarrel among its last three remaining nuns ended in blows, press reports said Sunday.

Sisters Annamaria and Gianbattista, reportedly upset about their mother superior's authoritarian ways, scratched her in the face and threw her to the ground at Santa Clara convent near Bari in an incident in July that was kept quiet until now.

Archbishop Giovanni Battista Pichierri tried to reconcile the nuns but finally decided in late August that they had "clearly lost their religious vocation" and asked the Vatican for permission to close the convent.

Sisters Annamaria and Gianbattista moved to another convent, but Sister Liliana barricaded herself inside, refusing to leave, the reports said, adding that she suspected Battista Pichierri of planning to cede the convent to another community.

Liliana has been at the convent since its founding in 1963.

Feast of St. Francis of Assisi

 

Here's to St. Francis, Patron Saint of Ecologists! He was a 13th century Al Gore! Compare and contrast:


St. Francis:

Humble
Holy
Poor
Thin
Wrote "Canticle of the Sun"

Al Gore:

Made a Powerpoint presentation into a movie.

Red Mass

 

Last Sunday, the "Red Mass" was celebrated at the Cathedral of St. Matthew in Washington, D.C..

The Red Mass is celebrated each year on the Sunday before the opening session of the U.S. Supreme Court. The tradition of the Mass goes all the way back to 1245 when it was celebrated at the opening of the Sacred Roman Rota to ask for guidance from the Holy Spirit for those seeking justice.

Six of the nine Supreme Court justices attended. FIVE of the nine are Catholic - Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Thomas, Alito, and Kennedy. Justice Bryer also attended (he's Jewish).

Oh, yeah - the President also attended. That's him in the picture, with Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and Chief Justice Roberts.

And in case you are wondering, the Sacred Roman Rota is the second highest ecclesiastical court in the Church. The top court is the Apostolic Signatura,