Ruminations of an Amateur Monastic
Today, July 1 2021, is the effective date of my parish of Holy Rosary merging into the parish of Saint Ann. It is a bittersweet moment. On the one hand, I am told that a decree officially suppressing Holy Rosary parish and merging it into Saint Ann will be published today, and it truly does seem like the final end […]
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Rilee Athena Ryng Not quite two weeks ago, my son Tristan made me a grandfather. It is an awesome thing to watch generations unfold, and for a while, it kind of left me speechless. What could I say about the birth of this beautiful little girl that would be both meaningful and from the heart? The mere profundity of her […]
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The same Jesus who was incarnated in Nazareth and born in Bethlehem is incarnated on every altar in the world in the Eucharist. The same sacrifice of the Cross that occurred two millennia ago in Jerusalem may likewise be seen on every altar in the world in the holy sacrifice of the Mass. This is the great Paschal Mystery, in […]
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We read today in the Acts of the Apostles of this great day, which in a certain way we can celebrate as the birthday of the Church: Pentecost – Duccio di Buoninsegna (1308) When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled,they were all in one place together.And suddenly there came from the skya noise like a strong driving wind,and it filled […]
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Tomorrow is Pentecost, the great solemnity celebrating the coming of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles. The Church has long celebrated this event in three ways: the solemnity of the day itself, the octave of the day, and the vigil. With the liturgical reforms of the 1960s and 1970s, all but the day itself was suppressed, a sad testament to […]
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My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, It is now more than ten months since our last parish Mass was celebrated in our parking lot by Archbishop Etienne. Several months ago, the Archbishop announced that the four parishes of Holy Rosary, Saint Ann, Saint Rita, and Visitation would be merging into a new parish, with Saint John of the Woods […]
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Today, it is 400 days since Ash Wednesday of 2020. Your normal Lent is forty days, but this past year with its Plague and its lockdowns and its social distancing was anything but normal. The festivities of Holy Week happened on television and, it seemed, happened to other people. In the midst of our Lenten desert, Easter was a mirage […]
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This weekend, Holy Week begins with the Sunday of Lord’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem – Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion. Although Good Friday is coming – the Passion and Death are coming – for the moment, this moment, joy resounds as our King arrives in His city. In most parishes throughout the world, the principal Mass is celebrated by […]
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Yesterday was the Feast of the Transitus of Saint Benedict, the anniversary of his death, in the year of our Lord 547. Of course, yesterday was a Sunday (the fifth of Lent, or Passion Sunday), and so the saint’s feast isn’t celebrated this year. Unless, of course, you are a Benedictine, in which case the feast is bumped, or transferred, […]
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Today on the Solemnity of Saint Joseph in the Year of Saint Joseph, we would do well to meditate on the life of the man who helped raise the Son of God. It can’t have been easy. Tradition holds that Joseph was already an old man and a widower when he married the Blessed Virgin, who was very young, perhaps […]
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If you’re a long time reader, you might be expecting my annual post on Saint Patrick. If you’re interested in that, I encourage you to read last year’s “Saint Patrick was an Englishman“. No, these exceptional times call for something altogether different and briefer. Today, midway through an onerous interview process, I was again passed over for a job. I’ve […]
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This morning the image below appeared as a memory on my Facebook feed. The attached post was to encourage folks to join us for Sunday Lenten Vespers at Holy Rosary. Of course, in the three short years since then, Father Wagner died, the church building was shut down, and finally our parish itself was suppressed. Vespers procession at Holy Rosary, […]
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Near the beginning of our virtual Camino, February 2020 Yesterday my beautiful bride Francine and I finished walking our virtual Camino from Lourdes to Santiago, a distance of roughly 957km. You’ve heard of staycations? This was a staymino. It took us just over a year. At least I got one thing accomplished during lockdown! We mostly walked around our neighbourhood […]
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Today is both the Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul, and the thirteenth anniversary of the day I wed my beautiful bride. It is, as I have said before, a “moment when everything changed, celebrated on a day when everything changed”. For reasons too long to go into here, thirteen has always been our “lucky number”, so it’s quite […]
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As 2020 comes finally to its end, we welcome with hope (and no small amount of trepidation) its sequel, 2021. It’s worth remembering, though, that we are also celebrating some other years as well: holy years. The Year of Saint Joseph Pope Francis has declared a “Year of Saint Joseph” from December 8, 2020 through December 8, 2021. This year […]
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Once again, it’s time for our annual look back at the year that was. And what a year! Plague, lockdowns, crazy elections, murder hornets, you name it! But instead of looking at the crazy out there, we’re concentrating on the crazy in here, in the form of a top ten. Who doesn’t like top ten lists? These are the top […]
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Happy fifth day of Christmas! Today the Church celebrates the 850th anniversary of the martyrdom of Saint Thomas Becket. Even the White House has released a proclamation for the day. While the history is good, its conclusion – drawing a straight line from Becket to Magna Carta to the U.S. Constitution – is, to be polite, suspect. But that’s politics […]
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