HOW CAN HE SLEEP WHEN THE WHOLE WORLD IS GOING TO RACK AND RUIN?



At least that is what I would say if I were the dog. Is anybody else out there besides the beagle (and the author) actually losing sleep over the tempest, tumult, and tyranny that defines our collective life at this moment?

Our leaders keep telling us that our economy has been hijacked by some bad, but nebulously described men, and then we find out that if the government were a person, he would find himself as the lead story on the reality show, "Stupid Criminals". As they use credit, hastily printed "pretend" money, China, and other slick measures to spend, spend, spend, one might notice a similarity between our leaders and that other genius, the Philadelphia mom who claimed she had been kidnapped and was calling 911 from the trunk of her car, when all the time she was living it up at Disney World (she, also, having appropriated other people's money so to do).

I heard the first couple are on a date tonight, having a lovely dinner and taking in a Broadway show.

Meanwhile the Russians are lecturing us about our astonishingly swift descent into Marxism, whilst tiny little dictators in terribly bad suits continue to enrich uranium, shoot off nuclear test missiles, and shake their defiant little fists at us - and no, I am not talking about the children right now.

There is so much else that has gone wrong, that the aforementioned makes up but the icy tip of the iceberg of Woe, which itself looms ever larger since all the other icebergs are melting as I write this!

So how has it come to this? The Lord, in His usual, pithy style, gives us a hint when He tells His listeners, "No man can enter into a strong man's house, and spoil his goods, except he will first bind the strong man; and then he will spoil his house." Ahh, someone slipped in and bound the strong man. And he didn't notice.

Well, I guess someone is a really sound sleeper!

What's a strong man like you, America, doing in a place like this?
How did you let yourself get all tied up, and not put up a fight?
Will you go gently into that good night?
(Because, I mean, that night is really not such a good one.)

Perhaps we have been too naively negligent of our own freedom, good-naturedly trusting it to hirelings. Intellectual honesty requires scrutiny and that's hard work, so we've been a little less discerning than is prudent. Perhaps the pleasures, the pizza and the perversion have distracted us as they tied us up in knots. The nature of vice is always to turn vicious after a while. Self-indulgence, abandonment of duty, and tolerance for its own sake tend to trigger an autoimmune disease of the soul, leading it into the snare of dependency and then to dissolution.

So what should we do? Well, to start with, wake up.

Wake UP!! Daylight is waning and the light is surely going out in the West. Jesus said, "I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work."

So earnestly do your work, whether it is running a business or cleaning a toilet, wiping out crime or wiping a child's nose. But be awake while it is yet day, speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, and talk of the pure, lovely, great and true things to your young ones, and to anyone who will listen. Be constant in season and out of season.

Refuse to be branded by other people's value judgments, and stand your ground. Nobody gets to earth by accident, it is God's will that you are here, born for such a time as this. Pray for the mind of Christ, be filled with the Holy Spirit, and speak the truth in love. Always, always speak the truth, before truth is silenced by those inconvenienced by it!

You know, as much as foundations seem to be shaking, I was undone by one small thing today.

My lovely husband, Bob The Garden Killer, struck again this afternoon. Seems he thought I told him to go out back and mow down my parsley and dill patch. I was out there this evening tending to something else when I caught the zesty fragrance of FRESHLY CUT DILL!!!!!!!!!!

I looked over at the patch. At first I was stunned, then somewhat cutting, myself, when I found him. Then despair set in. This kind of thing seems to happen with relentless, seasonal regularity.

Well, I've never been one to sensibly accept the inevitable, so I made an executive decision. I will go right back out there and plant some more seeds. And so should you. If the sun comes up again for you tomorrow, take that as confirmation that you are to get back out there and produce something beautiful and useful.

While it is yet day.

Praise be to Jesus Christ! I am out of the house most days right now, doing some temporary work,and therefore neglecting this blog. Quite possibly, I may have opportunity to get back to writing in a week or so. In the meantime, several close family members are undergoing a time of distress, and I must do what I can for them.

I would just urge anyone who stops by to pray for our world, and for our leaders to be righteous and to do what is good for our land and our people. Please also join me in praying for the sick, the dying, and the needy, wherever they may be.

God is good, and He has a good plan for His children. May we be obedient children, so that God may bless us!

(I wrote this last year, and since I have had to be away from my home and routine for some five weeks now, I haven't been able to write. So I republish this, in tribute to my mother and grandmothers and all who have rocked the cradle with love).
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For Mothers Long Gone and Mothers Now










This street had seen its time of glory
I mused that night at summer's end
But left off thoughts of former history
As lightning now the sky did rend

Hastening towards my car parked yonder
The tenor of the air now changed
Came the flood as I ran weeping
Tears confounded in the rain

There were letters in the lightning
Missives racing down the street
Quickened words, electric hissing
Urging me this very night

Remember those who were, but now
Are gone, forgotten in the gloam
Who did in-dwell these ancient houses
Where love and faith once made their home.

Now on wind-swept porch lies only
Unclaimed news and broken chair
Once sat Mama singing sweetly
While she combed out sister's hair

In the yard now brambled, trampled
Once grew pretty roses fair
Hollyhocks and yellow daisies
Grown with tender loving-care

By the matron queen who nurtured
Each bud, and each rose-cheeked babe
But hands that soothed the brow of husband
Now rest, silent in the grave.

What justice or what mercy
Forbids not time to wash away
careful mending, curtains lacy
But lets her deeds all meet decay?

Why no lingering fragrance
Of soups and stews and baking bread?
No candle beckons weary family
For most of those she loved are dead

Mens' work of old still speaks of them
In mortar, bricks, and written word
No praise she sought to sew a hem
To build up lives she much preferred.

Still stand houses, pavement stays
Coarse strangers there, with strangers' ways.
Weep not her place knows her no more;
Her love's paved steps to heaven's door.

For love lives on, in heaven stays
Safe from storm, and ravaged age.
Good's not wasted, nor she who prays.
Virtue gains a golden wage.

Her work done, we take it up
of nurture,  home, and the regular folk
If her mansion above have a front-porch swing
I'll know I'm home when I hear Mama sing.

by Gail Aggen

Published October 30, 2009




FRUITFUL VINES DEFY GRAVITY

"Thy wife [shall be] as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house" Psalm 128:3

This is what I strive to be, but like the green plant's struggle to break free from the earthen womb and climb higher toward the sun, so is my struggle to keep reaching higher in God's plan for my life.

So when the pressures, the negativity, and the trials come to crush me to the ground, that is when this little vine must reach up toward the Sun of Righteousness, that I may grow toward Him, defying gravity as I do!

CHOOSING COSMOS OVER CHAOS


There certainly is a solution to the problem of the rampant, escalating rate of violence and murder in our land. The callousness of people's behavior, the forceful seizing of other people's property, and the cheapening of human life can be reversed, indeed!

This requires some very simple, but very radical changes in our lives. Although I am a person of faith, I could, even as an atheist who has studied the evidence, say that first we need some kind of religious revival. The individual members of our society need to get re-calibrated (that is, form consensus and adhere) to the values espoused in admonitions such as "love your neighbor as yourself", "do unto others as you would have them do unto you", and "do not steal, do not kill, do not covet . . .", etc., and even "love your enemies", and "do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good". A society embracing these values would begin to produce some very good and "peaceable" fruit.

Going on from here, we would need to voluntarily return to a society that in many ways would look more like that of pre-WWII. Here is the radical part: one of you needs to stay home full-time, in order to be a guardian to the home, the children, and the community. Even those who do not have small children in the home need to maintain a presence in the everyday community. Single parents who are unable to work from home could especially benefit from your help. This model is essential because we need to start valuing our common life and its nucleus, the home, as much as we do our material possessions.

Would you leave your brand new car unlocked (with your Ipod on the front seat) in the parking lot at the mall while you spent the entire day inside shopping? Would you leave your house windows wide open and the doors unlocked while you went away for the weekend? Or put a sign on your front door when you leave for work in the morning that says "No one will be home all day so anyone who reads this is welcome to come in and do what you want in our house. Please take away or destroy anything from here as you please" ? How ridiculous! People who would do this would be certifiable or fools or both!

Why then, do we leave what is truly precious, our moral health, our families, our human community to the dogs of depravity? Why take such good prenatal care of our babies, monitor their health, development and well-being as infants and then abandon them to the culture of death as soon as they can sit up in front of a glowing screen? Why also the rush to stick them with care-giving surrogates (on said screen and with human ones) whose values may not be ours and whose "care" may be questionable or negligent? Why do we keep the windows shut so as to keep out the rain and bugs, but leave our teenagers in the house alone while we take off for the weekend?

Because we need "our space" and our things?

Because this culture is now out of control, we may have noticed that our space is shrinking and our things are rotting. Our space? Please, we need to grow up. And yes, of course nobody wants to live in an unsafe neighborhood so they think a big fancy house in a "great school district" is mandatory. But in the last year I have heard about or attended the funerals of several young people who lived in the "great school district". I would never, ever blame individual parents for any of this, because they may have done everything right, but their children fell victim to bad people and the culture itself. Only as a community together can we change things for each of us, but each of us must start with changing ourselves and our lifestyles.

My point is that as people's behavior becomes good, so would their surroundings. Better to have to rent a tiny house, have one old car, and have your children home, helping you hang clothes out on the line while you talk with them about important things. Or have them do garden chores or help with meal preparation after school in a neighborhood full of families who have decided to do the same. We need to be people who adhere to the principles that were literally etched in stone a long time ago and upon which our civilization was founded.

Those who by word and example teach love and respect to their children, who

mind their own business, live within their means, stay out debt, and teach their children to do the same, are people who create a culture of life, not death.

Or as a wise person once said, "Better a dry crust with peace and quiet
than a house full of feasting, with strife.".

LADIES IN WAITING


Sweet dogwood bridesmaids
and tulip tree
sweet cherry blossom
pink royalty


Crabapple's blossom
its fragrance sweet
its fruit though bitter
yields jellied treat







Here come the brides now
Bradford Pears in
puffy white gowns
like crinoline

Gracing traveled lanes
pastel colors
in bright profusion,
Winter's dolors

seem but illusion
our hearts now wake
from frozen slumber
new steps to take

trusting gentle maids
in flowered gowns
bid us to follow
to summer's crown

A GOOD SUNDAY STARTS ON SATURDAY
(AND MAYBE EVEN FRIDAY)

Note: This is a continuation of the previous post.

I, the procrastinator, know better than most anyone how things just don't work out (an understatement of biblical proportions) when one does not plan ahead and one leaves everything for the last minute. So as I have finally learned, for us to experience a Sunday that is lived "decently and in order", I must plan and do things ahead of time.

As the bible says, there is a time and a season for every purpose under heaven. So, in terms of really enjoying a day of worship and rest, we have to push ourselves a bit during the week, not taking such big breaks maybe, so we can savor the Sabbath as an entire day of rest and recreation. What does this mean practically?

First, we come up with a plan. Make the grocery list to incorporate the Sunday menu, and then shop for everything during the week. When planning said menu, perhaps we might want to do something simple like grilling some meat outdoors and accompanying that with a salad and sides that could be put together the day before.
Or the entire meal could be assembled or started on Saturday night, as in a stew or hearty soup. The Pilgrims used to simmer a pot of beans through the night on Saturday so that they would not have to cook on Sunday, hence the famous "Boston Baked Beans". The traditional New England boiled dinner, with its corned beef or smoked picnic and vegetables would also be a good Sunday choice.

A community meal, moreover, is a great way to combine a lessening of labor with a beautiful time of fellowship, either done at church after the service as some churches do once a month, or with family and friends at home or in the park.

Coming from an Italian background, I remember that Sunday dinner was always done at midday, or at least by 2 p.m. That would give the family a chance to relax afterwords, and mama's "big work" was done early so she could enjoy the rest of the day. She could then just serve a ham sandwich on hard rolls or some other light fare in the evening. It still irks me when I don't plan well enough to do this and I end up scrubbing pots and pans after dark on Sunday night!

Besides, making this switch sets the day off as something special. I remember our neighbor, the resident atheist and cynic commenting on this practice, saying "I don't know why people have to have a big Sunday dinner in the afternoon. Sunday is just another day like the others. Uhh, NO!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is not and that is the whole point.

By the way, this is also the guy whose house was always immaculate, but who commented in spite of my messy house full of children, "There is something different about your house, there is a certain presence here that is very peaceful", or words to that effect.

I responded with, "Yes, that's the Holy Spirit". He didn't come over again for two years!

How can we prepare our house for the Sabbath? Simple. Clean it and do yard work on Friday and Saturday. Now this is simple but not easy. You have to keep picking things up and putting them away as well as making to-do lists of some sort throughout the week. Don't leave all the work till Friday and Saturday, if you can help it. And like I said, with little children, my house did not always look photo-op ready. But I tried and so can anybody.

Nowadays, my husband, God bless him, has fallen in love at this late juncture (we've been married 27 years) with keeping the laundry done and put away even! He will throw in a load on Sunday, and I often need to appeal to him by saying, "Even the machines need a rest once a week". And I believe this is true. We wouldn't work our oxen 7 days a week, so I think that God will bless our work machines too, if we give them a rest. Hey, my washing machine lasted for 24 years!!

Speaking of oxen, as in those proverbial oxen whom the Lord proposed we rescue if the fell in a ditch on the Sabbath: We need to remember that we probably won't be able to keep the Sabbath perfectly, to the letter of the law, and we can take comfort in remembering that we are no longer under the law anyway. So we put forth a good effort with a pure heart during the week to prepare for the Sabbath, and the rest is under the covering of the precious blood, right?

So why is it important to desire to put forth this effort to keep the Lord's Day holy anyway? Because it's the Lord's Day and He desires it for the proper worship due to Him and for the refreshment and restoration of His people. In light of this, I am, with God's help, going to make more of an effort to get things done by a reasonable time on Saturday, so that I can come away for a time of prayer, Scripture study and preparation for the Sunday worship service. For the Jews, the Sabbath begins at sundown on the night before, and that is a worthy thing for us to do if we can manage it. Light the candles, have a nice meal, clean the kitchen and put your feet up.

So what should our stance be as regards shopping or going to restaurants on Sunday? Well, I believe that even the unbelievers should not be put in a position to labor for us on the Lord's Day unless they are the necessary keepers of the peace, the hospital workers or any of those who oversee the general welfare of the people (as in utility workers, for example).

Back in the ancient days of my childhood before convenience store chains had been established, we had these little neighborhood mom-and-pop stores, along with the supermarkets. The supermarkets and big retail would all be shuttered on Sunday and the little corner stores would either open for a couple of hours on a Sunday morning or open up around sundown for a bit. This, to me, is entirely reasonable, because sometimes your ox really does fall in a ditch and you need milk for those children or some such thing. But alas, those "blue law" days lie in the distant past, along with big family dinners and long walks through the fields with Daddy, looking for wild berries in the summer or animal tracks in the snowy winter.

Or do they? Did you know we are still, for the moment anyways, free people and we can still set ourselves apart from the ways of the world and do things God's way? Didn't your mother ever say to you, "So, I suppose if Johnny jumps off a bridge you will jump off, too?". Well, sadly, I think we have jumped off that bridge, but God is in the Resurrection business and we can climb back up the cliff and start over. The stores, hair salons and everything else might be open but that doesn't mean we have to darken their doors on the Lord's Day, does it? I know, with everyone working so much, most of us don't have enough of that precious commodity, time, to set ourselves apart and stay home.

But did you know that the price of everything, especially big-ticket items like cars and houses absolutely took off like a skyrocket when women joined the workforce en masse? And that advertising simply went steroidal with raising the standards of housekeeping and yardkeeping and must-haves? We have been conditioned like lab dogs to salivate at the sight of all this worldly nonsense, to believe we NEED to keep up with the mythical Joneses or have massive flower beds or Coach purses or whatever, but the truth is, we don't need all this stuff to live a joyous, rich life. Now that people are losing their jobs en masse, we might want to re-examine the old ways of the one-income families to find the hidden treasure of time-rich living, as opposed to materialistic living.

My prayer in this economic upheaval is that the prices would come down to reasonable, fair levels, and therefore families could choose not to owe their lives to the company store. This would help us in our Sabbath-keeping and most likely in most other ways to honor the Lord. May the Holy Spirit guide us into all truth in these matters and may you be blessed in your daily walk with Him.

"Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee.
Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day [is] the sabbath of the LORD thy God: [in it] thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that [is] within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and [that] the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the LORD thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day."

Deuteronomy 5:12-15.

KEEPING SUNDAY IN THE MODERN AGE




What do you do on Sunday? Do you and your family dress up in your best clothes and attend church on Sunday morning?



Do you enjoy lingering to visit with your fellow parishioners after the service?




Perhaps on nice days the grown-ups chat while the children play outside?









Do you have a big Sunday dinner with the whole family,



followed by a lovely nap, or a Sunday drive?




Perhaps you take a walk to the park and linger over a good book on a park bench.



All of the foregoing activities give honor to our Lord on His day, while giving us our much needed rest and break from the routine. Human beings were designed with a built-in requirement for intermittent rest; those who try to exercise seven days a week reap diminishing returns on their fitness, for example. And psychologically, a seven day work week will eventually unravel one's psyche; even the thought of it unravels mine!

Yes, God is so serious about us using our Sabbath to worship Him and to rest from our work routine that He made it one of the Ten Commandments! So, as Christians do we faithfully follow the Sunday admonitions, and in so doing, set ourselves apart from the World?

Or does Sunday revolve around this??








Or these?








That's a bit more realistic, isn't it? I think this is so because most all the homemakers are out of the house all week at work. When I started working full-time I caught myself getting extremely irritated when a young family, friends of my oldest son, stopped by unannounced on the weekend. I had X amount of time to shop, clean, and do yard work, and I panicked at the thought of having to just STOP and entertain company! The young people had no idea that they were a huge inconvenience because in the past I had always been home, cooking, dabbling in something interesting or just relaxing (dirty word, sorry) and would be glad to have company to visit with and ply with food and drink!

Wow. What a revelation. These new, palpable feelings of annoyance and stress really upset me. So this is what life is like for the vast majority of Americans in this day and age. Living by the stop watch, under the gun, and prioritizing life to the point where it loses its soul. I decided one thing.

I don't like it and I'd rather have to go without some stuff in order to live life at a reasonable pace, with meaning and purpose. Yes, I said I would rather go without some stuff and be considered weird or lazy, and still have time to build and maintain home, relationships and family. And of course to give the Lord His due on a Sunday (and one hopes, all days). Am I a Christian or not?

Speaking of Christians and Sundays, even we can uphold the form of things while scamming a bit. How many of us cannot wait to get through the service so we can head out to Panera's for lunch, get to the Sunday afternoon movie matinee, or otherwise engage in some kind of buying activity which requires someone else to labor on Sunday for our benefit? Or run by Walmart or the grocery store to pick up that little something that we really need that day, when if we had planned a bit better or at all we could have bought it on Saturday?

Is this being nit-picky? Legalistic? Judgmental? Condemning? After all, even Jesus rebuked the Jews for accusing Him of working on the Sabbath by healing the man with the withered hand, or disapproved of his hungry disciples plucking grains of wheat to eat as they walked through a field.

In Luke 14:15, KJV, Jesus is quoted as saying " . . . Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day?".

Well, in my own humble estimation, I think the Lord was saying we must never put the sabbath rest above doing what is good (e.g., healing, rescuing) or necessary (e., eating to keep up our health and strength). God is all about common sense. But we must not give ourselves permission to take these truths and run with them to the point that we start rationalizing ourselves right out of Sunday. Keeping Sunday sacred is the rule to which there exist a few exceptions. But it is the rule, nevertheless, and one of the TEN BIG ONES, right up there with "Thou shalt not murder".

In the next post, I hope to develop a few ideas about how we can take back Sunday as for the Lord in ways that make sense for the times in which we live.

Finding Our Way Home

What is it about these pastoral scenes that evokes such a longing in us? We wish we were part of the picture, walking the pleasant path toward our little cottage in the village. This is nostalgia, which in the Greek means, "homesickness". Is it genetic memory or something hardwired into us by our Creator, that simply impels us towards that simple dream of a peaceful respite among flowers and quiet lanes, amid nature's sounds? The the distant lowing of the cattle in the fields, the breeze coarsing through the meadowgrass, the feel of the warmed earth under our bare feet, all seem irresistible to the frayed nerves and the worried brow of our present-day existence.




Perhaps these scenes speak to us of simple manual labor, which exercises the body, makes one truly thankful for one's daily bread, and frees the mind to talk with God, to contemplate the cosmos and meditate on one's own life in ways that lead to true answers. I believe that so much of the malaise and soul-sickness of the young and not-so-young could be healed by the balm of honest, daily work done out-of-doors.
Then would the little cottage suffice, the simple meal shared beneath its roof be taken in health, and the sinking into one's cozy little bed come early, with blessed sweet sleep soon following.

Perhaps it is time to create lives in harmony with the paintings and ideas we love. It can be done anywhere there is a desire to create true home and purposeful living.

Through naivete and poor planning, I once lived in a very run-down section of Philadelphia in a huge apartment building. The air outside stank, there was a railroad track running right past the back of the building, and beyond that, a giant refinery of some sort, with a stack from which a huge ball of gas burned night and day. It was a daily battle to keep the roaches out of our living quarters, while rats could be seen running down the streets at night and prostitutes carried out their trade just down the hall from me. I often found myself in the unenviable position of riding the elevators with the johns, usually dirty, sweaty men just fresh from their jobs at the local construction site.

Our firstborn, a son, was about a year and a half old at the time and I was pregnant with our daughter. The lease was unbreakable, and there was no way out of this situation for almost a year. The Lord showed me that I must go through the experience and bloom where I was planted, and no amount of tears and supplication would change things, so I knew I must resign myself to my fate and come up with a plan to make life bearable. But, no, before I could plan, I must have a vision of what kind of home atmosphere we could nurture inside our four walls.

So I quite simply decided that I lived in a charming little farmhouse at the end of a sunny lane. That is the vision I kept inside of me which soon bore fruit in that squalid place.

The first thing I began and maintained continuously was to keep an immaculate home, free of clutter, in order to make life more pleasant for us and less attractive to the vermin. My windows were clean and the curtains open during the day to let in the natural sunlight. Our possessions were few and mostly older, hand-me-down "treasures", which suited me fine. I had an old chenille bedspread on our bed and the furniture was draped with homemade afghans and lace doilies. Little knick-knacks and a few homey pictures and paintings brought charm and beauty into the otherwise plain rooms.

I did not want to store any unnecessary food in the place so I took my little boy shopping for fresh food almost daily. Along with searching out parks or places to stroll with him, I managed to give us both the exercise we needed and daddy, mommy, baby and baby-to-be got plenty of good fresh nourishing food.

Altogether, I determined that our home would be a haven of joy and beauty. I knew I had succeeded when my neighbor right below me, (a single mom with two little children, with whom I became acquainted) came to visit me one day with one of her friends. Now my neighbor's apartment was the exact duplicate of mine, but hers was kept dark, dirty and cluttered. During their visit, though, they both commented that I must have a different, roomier and more beautiful model than the one in which she lived. No amount of reasoning with them could convince them that we had the same apartment! I knew I had succeeded in my plan!

Please understand that living in that place did not become less difficult. I had to continually contend with the insects, and the bad things that went on in and around that building. I was even stalked a couple of times and had someone making almost daily anonymous, weird phone calls (this was in the days before caller ID), which continued until we moved away.

We were also disappointed that we could not find a church home there and finally ended up driving a good distance each Sunday to attend church in Delaware. Before we found that place, I had tried a few, including one which turned out to be "home" to the local gay Episcopal population. As I sat in the pew, vastly pregnant, I began to notice that most of the congregation arrived in the form of male couples who sat really close to one another! I'm sure they were quite horrified to have me there. I think its kind of funny now, but I was so desperate for a church family that I didn't really put this all together until after the service, and after the coffee hour which was less of a coffee hour and more of a wine and cheese party!

I do thank the Lord, however, for that year in Philadelphia because it showed me His provision and mercy. And I was able to do one thing for Him. The night before I moved out of there, I took my baby girl in my arms and a couple of bible tracts and went down and knocked on the prostitutes' door. The seventy-five year old madam answered (we often were in the laundry room together, making small talk. Oh, man!). Anyways, I prayed really hard, and knocked on the door.

She opened it, and I am not making this up, it looked like there was no apartment, nothing behind her. Just impenetrable black, black, black! Like you cut out a person from a photo and place it on black velvet - the total absence of light - Hell itself! I began to tremble, but I had come this far, so I said the following: "Eleanor, please know that I have nothing to gain by doing this, and in fact I am moving out of here tomorrow, but I want you to know that God loves you, He has His hand on your life, and I thought you might want to know more about this so I brought you these little tracts with some information. God bless you".

She just stared at me, and then tears formed in her eyes. All she said was "Thank you very much", and she took the tracts, and I pray that my little action had some good effect on her and possibly others. Needless to say, I turned on my heel and bolted away as fast as I could.

So I would just encourage anyone who finds themselves in a living situation that is less than ideal: Get busy, roll up your sleeves, and get to work! The forces of darkness may be arrayed against you, but you can always clean and pray while you are doing it. Ask the Lord what His vision is for your home and then do what He tells you. Then with the psalmist (and me) you can truly say,

"Blessed be the LORD, for he has wondrously shown his steadfast love to me when I was beset as in a besieged city." Psalm 31:21

May we continue to envision our homes as little colonies of heaven, walk in the good works He has prepared for us, and rejoice in the Lord daily!!!!

"Home Sweet Home"
Buy at AllPosters.com

I am so delighted to be home! And its Spring and we can start pulling and raking and digging and planting!! My oldest boy has moved back home so now my house is a busy hub, with our four sons sharing the space with four cats, one dog, four fish, one happy mama and one returning papa, who himself has been out of town working for three weeks.

My seasonal, temporary job has offered me the opportunity to work from home this Spring, and I am hoping my computer will test out as being sufficient to do this.
Life is good and God is great! He is on the throne and gives us all we need to live a victorious and joy-filled life.

I have been slowly sprucing things up around here, re-organizing spaces and putting little touches of seasonal beauty around the place. I hope to begin organizing my recipes, but especially want to pull out the ones for our traditional, Italian Easter goodies. Though this is the season of Lent, a time of repentance and reparation, the Lord seems to be using it in my life to renew and regenerate my relationship with Him. And as goes our relationship with our heavenly Father, so goes our relationship with everyone and everything else!!

I have realized that, in any given age, at any particular time, we might have reason to fear or mourn or rage about something. If we focus on those things, however, we become enslaved and powerless. Better to dig in and do our work with diligence and hope, and face each day determined to make it a better day for ourselves and the world around us. And be thankful.

Besides, prayer changes things and the problems we have in our personal lives and in our corporate life must yield to the Holy Spirit when He is invited in to intervene. So, instead of yelling, screaming, whining and complaining or being fearful, we can seek to lift it up to the Lord and go about our business doing the work He has given us to do.

Therefore, for the remainder of Lent, and hopefully beyond, I will abstain from hanging on every word that proceeds from the mouth of Fox News, and will cease reading or disseminating e-mails that deal with government, politics, church problems, declining morality, oil, global warming or non-global warming, etc. I know that things are a mess, and that certain evils are gaining traction, but its like a soap opera; you can miss the show for a year and then tune in to find that things are pretty much in the same state as when you tuned out. For me, I will find it more effective to spend my new-found time in prayer and supplication regarding the problems of this fallen world, of which I am well aware. And as for the rest of the time, boy do I have a lot of work to do, plus a girl's got to sleep sometime, ya know???

A STORM AT END OF SUMMER

This street had seen its time of glory
I mused that night at summer's end
but left off thoughts of former history
as lightening now the sky did rend

Hastening towards my car parked yonder
the tenor of the air now changed
thunder clapped as I ran grieving
lives now vanished with the rain

There were letters in the lightning
missives racing down the street
quickened words, electric hissing
urging me this very night

to honor those who were, but now
are gone forgotten in the gloam
who did in-dwell these ancient houses
where love and faith once made their home.

Now on wind-swept porch and landing
unclaimed news and broken chair
once sat Mama singing sweetly
while she combed out sister's hair

In the yard now brambled, trampled
once grew pretty roses fair
hollyhocks and yellow daisies
grown with tender loving-care

by the matron queen who nurtured
each bud, and each rose-cheeked babe
But hands that soothed the brow of husband
now rest silent in the grave.

What justice or what mercy
forbids not time to wash away
the careful mending, white curtains lacy
but lets her deeds all meet decay?

Why no lingering fragrance
of soups and stews and baking bread?
No candle beckons weary family
for most of those she loved are dead

Mens' work of old still speaks of them
in mortar, bricks, and written word
No praise she sought to sew a hem
To build up lives she much preferred.

Houses still stand, and pavement stays
coarse strangers therein with strangers' ways.
Weep not her place knows her no more;
her love led many to heaven's door.

For love lives on, and in heaven stays
Safe from storm, and ravaged age.
Goodness is not wasted, nor she who prays.
The virtuous woman gains a golden wage.

She taught souls who taught souls, who will take up the work
of nurture, of home, and the regular folk
May her mansion above have a front-porch swing
where I'll know I am home when I hear Mama sing.

by Gail Aggen

Light on a Hill

Tom Vormund the bus driver sat, as was his custom after a long work day and a delicious supper, in his shabby recliner chair silently watching the courtroom TV show that aired every weekday night. Tom, normally the goofy life of the party at work or extended family gatherings, religiously avoided talking during two daily activities: eating his meals and watching light-weight programs on TV. In fact, the more shallow or banal the show, the more rapt attention it received from Tom. Or so it seemed to his wife Gloria, who was just out of sight washing dishes in the kitchen. Each day she steadily whittled off time in purgatory by just being within continual earshot of the sci-fi channel and Steven Seagall.

Living in the reduced, formerly glorious city of Schenectady, NY and dwelling in a large, World War I era, formerly glorious house in need of serious updating, she secretly thanked God that her kitchen was not part of some suburban, "wonderful open floor plan". In fact, hiding back here and doing dishes in solitude (since, especially if one asked for help it would ensure that one would be completely left alone), gave her respite from her busy day with the six children, the animals, the phone calls and ill-timed visits from neighbors, friends and relatives. Gloria Vormund, nee DeGrazia, even as she approached middle age, had just begun to become aware of how eccentric and out-of-step she truly was, thinking her thoughts and treasuring her stay-at-home life in this day and age, doing dishes by hand and singing the Mass parts in her head as she scrubbed and stacked.

Just now the baby, strategically placed next to Daddy, was swinging in his swing, hostage to its hypnotic rhythm, surveying the opening credits rolling over a shot of the TV courtroom. Big 6 year old sister, Sophia, was imparting fashion advice to little 4 year old sister Giselle, as the former, with her long, golden curls lovingly brushed out the long, auburn curls of the latter, cozily ensconced as they were in their pink, doll-infested bedroom.

The boys were each engaged in favorite pastimes, as well. The eldest child, 12 year old Joshua, had slipped unobserved, out the back door and into the alley that ran along the back yards between the streets. Free at last, he stood outside in the not quite satisfactory shelter of a scraggly tree and lit up an illicit Marlboro. As he took a nice, big puff, his quick and agile mind thought about this stifling, ridiculous world of school and church and family rules and how inanely lame it all truly was, and resolved to live a libertine life somewhere else, as soon as he turned 18. He was all alone, or so he thought, except for the neighbor's homely tom cat, who came out from under a broken end table that the garbage men had missed. He rubbed up against the boy's leg and received some gentle head-rubbing affection from that bohemian in a ball cap, that hardened sinner, the animal-loving Joshua.

He was all alone, or so he thought.

The younger boys, up in their room with the unmade beds, busied themselves in more age-appropriate activity. Nicholas, 8, was busily searching under the bed for lost Legos in order to assist brother Anthony, 10, with the construction of their newly imagined project, the foreboding dark fortress of the rock trolls. However, just as the warm soapy, low-tech washing of dishes freed their mother's mind to ponder the sublime mysteries of life, so the builders of Lego castles had leisure to discuss the truly important.

"Do you know how much money we could make on a yard sale? Let's get all our old toys and the junk in the attic and have one Saturday", said Nicholas, who was not as sentimental about keeping old things as he was desirous of raising capital for new endeavors. His big brother, Anthony, though not one to turn down a little extra coin with which to hunt down bargains, was nevertheless, more of a collector.

"Well, we could, but do you really want to give up all your old toys?" he asked, fitting a tiny black helmet on the head of a menacingly cute Lego troll man.

"Hmm, we could start with the girls'
stuff then", answered the pragmatic Nicholas, still under the bed.

"If Sophia catches you, she'll beat your head in with that big, old hard plastic doll that used to be Mom's", laughed Anthony.

"That's the one I'd get rid of first", said Nicholas as he wiggled back out from under the bed with a small cache of the tiny building blocks. "Here", he said.

"Thanks, Nick. I still don't think we can have a yard sale, though. Maybe in the Spring, but not right now cause its November. And people don't like to walk around and be cold at yard sales".

Anthony was right. November, in upstate NY, is a dark melodrama of lengthening shadows. It serves as a rainy, blank interlude between the bright gaudy, golden days of high Autumn and Thanksgiving Day, which finally pulls back the curtain on the year's crown jewel, Christmas. Ah, Christmas, the holiday that lasts well into a New York January and in some minds, makes the rest of the year just able to be suffered.

Even now, on a Monday evening at 6 p.m., the night outside the lace-curtained window was black as pitch, its air filled with a chilly drizzle and the long, sorrowful descent of the last brown leaves from the great branches of old trees to the rotting leaf graveyard that was the grass and street below.

"Well then," resolved little Nicholas, "I might just load up my wagon and go door to door".

Gloria was just rinsing off the last dish, her beloved, oversized cast-iron skillet, which she then dried with a paper napkin, placed back on the gas stove, gave its inside an olive oil rub, and lit the burner in order to season it for its next use, undoubtedly tomorrow. Her ritual was interrupted by Tom who was talking loud enough in the living room to attract her attention.

"Now I know this is fake!" he proclaimed, either to her, the baby, or into the unquestioning ether. She turned down the burner to low, and went in to investigate.

"What?" she asked.

"How many times have I watched this show?" he asked.

"Tons, why?"

"All these cases are fake."

"No, they're not. What do you mean?"

"Every time they start a new case, they show the people walking in and what does the announcer say?" Tom asked rhetorically, because Gloria sure didn't know or care. He proceeded to enlighten her.

"They always say, 'the litigants are on their way into the courtroom'".

"So?" she asked, clueless and mindful of her pan on the stove.

"Now how could all these people be from the same family, huh?"

"They're not from the same family, what are you talking about Tom?"

"Exactly. How could they all be the Litigants? How come they all have the same last name, the Litigants? The guy always says, 'The Litigants are on their way into the courtroom"

Just then, the baby looked up at his mother and sighed.

NOW IS THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT





"And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." Mt. 24:12

Praised be Jesus Christ in every tabernacle!

We have a new president and he has chosen the people with whom he wants to lead. We must pray for them, without fail, every day. At the same time, I will not seek to conform to any immoral laws and values in the name of unity. For what fellowship hath light with darkness?

Because sinful ideas, behavior, and governing are not named for what they are, we have been desensitized to what an affront and offense they pose to God, and I am only taking His Word for it!

Calling evil good, and good evil will soon destroy us if we continue to countenance such a stance. Every civilization before us that has relaxed its moral standards eventually succumbed to rot and collapsed in its own stench. "And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it." (Mt. 7:27).

Why do we call what is evil, good? I think it stems from inordinate desires and a lack of personal accountability. We redefine terms, so that we may have what we should not. Look at something as simple as knowing we cannot afford a house at X price, but grabbing it anyway through a "magical" mortgage. This act of personal irresponsibility, magnified by the thousands of such transactions has brought down an economy, which threatens to bring down our country and the rest of the world with it! The seedy uncle of this, credit card debt, moves the process speedily along.

We lived in apartments until we could afford a house that could be managed on one income. I never felt any shame in this. Why should I? Before WWII a goodly number of people, including the professional classes, lived in rented homes. I don't understand why it is shameful to rent but not so to take a mortgage on a house you cannot afford and then furnish it with items purchased with credit cards. And now that the house of cards has collapsed no one is asking the hard questions of those who were not personally accountable enough to live within their own means.

Another example of calling something evil good is the homosexual neurosis and the dangerous and lets just say, really negative sexual practices that it foments. There, I've said it and I'm calling it for what it is. We cannot continue to "make nice" about this. You can love who you want to, but its more than likely true that your feelings stem from either being seduced/molested as a young person or because of poor and inappropriate parenting from mom and/or dad. I am not mocking anyone here; I am sorry for the pain that these children were put through, and therefore do not think there is anything gay at all about having one's innocence stolen or being neglected or abused. That traumatized person needs help, love, compassion and healing, but they will not receive it because the gay lifestyle is lauded and admired, so no help can come to the hurting soul.

Let me be clear: Homosexuals are children of God whom He loves as much as the dearest saint. I said, however, that homosexual neurosis is evil, i.e. a bad thing with which some are sadly afflicted, and that homosexual practices are gravely disordered and inherently evil. Eventually, through health issues and a soul bereft of help, a person will break down, and when you legislate homosexuality to be normal behavior, legalize gay "marriage" and insist on indoctrinating children in the beauty of a homosexual lifestyle, it will bring down society.

There is, however, another reason for homosexual behavior. A more basic reason than those aforementioned, can be found in the pre-Judaeo-Christian pagan worldview. Heathen society considered that a man may pleasure himself with anyone or thing that he desires if he has power over them. So, in this case and as it is progressing today, homosexuality is a subset of this entitlement. This was standard practice in the world before Moses. The list of (perfectly acceptable) receptacles for a man's lust included wife, sister, slave girls, little boys, other men, sheep, goats, etc. Isn't that great? The Mosaic code created a startling and radical new way of living and relating, but now the old paganism has resurrected itself in the form of enlightened, compassionate progressivism. The role of woman and wife was elevated by the Law and the fulfillment of that law, Jesus Christ, but now, in the name of equal rights, women are being used, abused, dumped and left bereft of support by men whom they allow to do what they will with them. Satan himself must laugh at the irony that women have bought into this sorry bill of goods because they believe in feminism - "the empowering of women".

What is true of paganism in sexual practices was also true of the value of life itself in the "Old Religion" and finds its new incarnation growing insidiously in our own culture today. In the good old pagan worldview, a man may do whatever he wishes to anyone or thing under his control and authority. No surprise that human sacrifice abounded, with the even more titillating variation of sacrificing one's children on the fiery altar of the gods. In Rome as in other ancient communities, babies born with birth defects were brought down to the city dump and left there to die. (Interestingly, when the Christians came around they would go and rescue the babies and bring them home to raise up as their own).

In native American culture as in other pre-Christian cultures, the old and disabled were routinely put out of the camp to die. I do not know if the following was typical, nevertheless an incident occurred on land that is now within the city limits of my hometown, which is horrifying to contemplate. It seems a young Indian chief was trying to put distance between himself and his pursuing enemies. His aged mother had fled with him and his men. When he saw it was slow going, he instructed his braves to stop at that spot, and bury his mother alive so that her presence would no longer slow them down.

There's life without the light of Christ for you.

The old nature and its old religion put little value on the sanctity of life. Indeed, the Mosaic injunction of an "eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was actually an improvement over the heathen view that said, "You make me mad and I'll massacre your whole village".

Abortion, road rage, senseless violence, pornography, pedophilia, assisted suicide, deciding who should live based on their "quality of life", eugenics, all these are part of an ancient evil, man as a senseless brute, filling up his cup of iniquity and asking Satan to supersize it for him. No, we will not be accountable for ourselves, our finances, our part in building truly stable marriages, families and communities. No, give us bread and circuses, and above all, give us "change we can believe in".

May we wake up in time, cease the dialogue with darkness, speak the truth in love and may the Lord, in His mercy, bring revival to our land.

Praised be Jesus Christ in His most holy Nativity!!!!!! And blessed be his gentle mother Mary and humble foster father Joseph. Holy Family, watch over us in these uncertain times.
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I FOUND THIS JEWEL FROM ARCHBISHOP HAYES (written in 1921) ON THE CATHOLIC FAMILY NEWS WEBSITE (contact info at bottom of article) AND I AM PUBLISHING THIS ON MY PAGE IN ITS ENTIRETY. ALONG WITH CATHOLIC FAMILY, I PRAY THAT GOD WOULD RAISE UP HOLY MEN AND WOMEN TO SPEAK THESE THINGS IN OUR DAY.


Christmas Pastoral Letter of Archbishop Hayes

Editor’s note: In this beautiful and hard-hitting 1921 pastoral, New York’s Archbishop (later Cardinal) Hayes1 treats of Christmas; the Holy Family; Christian Family life; and the evils of contraception and divorce. Oh for the days when an American Bishop would speak like this.

Dearly Beloved of the Clergy and Laity:

"To take life after its inception is a horrible
crime; but to prevent human life that the
Creator is about to bring into being, is
satanic. In the first instance, the body is
killed, while the soul lives on; in the latter,
not only a body but an immortal soul is
denied existence in time and in eternity. It
has been reserved to our day to see
advocated shamelessly the legalizing
of such a diabolical thing!"
- Archbishop Hayes



Christmas comes again to bless us with heavenly grace and brighten with eternal hope our journey through this vale of tears. The vale, in many respects, was never gloomier, and the tears seldom less bitter. The world's material progress, rich in power and promise a few years ago, has lamentably failed, in the supreme hour of need, to stand the strain of the terrible affliction of war. We have been groping for the wall, as Isaias the prophet says, --and "like the blind we have groped as if we had no eyes, we have stumbled at noonday as in darkness" (Is. 59:10). Divine light and strength have been ever at our side; but man would have none of it. Being a law and guide to himself he has been groping in vain for peace and the solution of the world's appalling problems. Though God has visited the children of men with a scourge of their own making, He still loves us with infinite love and would comfort us with an all-forgiving and all-healing compassion.

Over the ashes of war, over the sufferings of mankind, over the distress of nations there appears on the world's horizon, with His exalted Mother and His humble Foster Father, the Divine Child of the ages of prophecy and fulfillment--"the Key of David and Scepter of the House of Israel; that openeth and no man shutteth; and shutteth and no man openeth; coming to lead out of bondage man sitting in darkeness and the shadow of death." Jesus, Mary, Joseph bring Bethlehem,--starry sky and sleeping hills; the shepherds and the sheep; the patient watches and the awing silence of the night; the darkness of the earth and the light of Heaven; the song of the Angels and the star of the Magi; the warm, cheery inn and the forbidding, bleak stable; the ox and the donkey; the straw of the manger and the bare, cold ground of the cave; and the gold, frankincense and myrrh from Saba with the dromedaries of Madian and Epha.

In the entire panorama of Bethlehem thus unfolded the only thing made by human hand, and not by God, was the inn that refused a roof to the Child. The stable-cave has been held in blessed honor ever since; the inn in everlasting condemnation. No one knows the site of the inn nor the name of its inhospitable keeper. Still on that heavenly night it was the many who walked the path to the inn for bodily comfort and passing pleasure; only the few, led by Angels and inspired by grace, sought the stable, and beheld the wondrous revelation of Emmanuel, God with us, the Lord of Lords, the Prince of Peace, the Savior of mankind.

There is nothing wrong with God's beautiful world--the universe formed and fashioned by His hand. Only the world of pride, lust and self, created by man and alien to God, has been judged and found wanting both by Heaven and earth. To redeem us from the bondage of sin Our Heavenly Father sends not the plagues of Egypt to afflict us, but His own Beloved Son, the Babe of Bethlehem, "for the fall and for the resurrection of many in Israel and for a sign which shall be contradicted" (St. Luke, II, 34).

On that holy night in Bethlehem a new spiritual and sublime standard of life, thought and action was given to men until the end of time. The Holy Family became the ideal, the law and the copy of childhood, womanhood, parental duty, home-making and the dignity of labor. Innocence of children, purity of woman, chastity of man, poverty, honest toil, humble station, obedience and patience were embraced, sanctified and taught by God Himself as precious and essential for our welfare here and hereafter. Riches, worldly honor, exalted position, great learning, and success,--laudable though they be when sought, reached and used within right reason--all are secondary, unnecessary, and often dangerous, in God's plan, for the following of Christ and the salvation of our immortal souls.

Let us first consider the Child. Christ, the Son of God, coming into the world as a babe has given to human birth a sacredness that compels the Angels to reverence. In Heaven He had His Eternal Father but no mother; on earth He would have a mother but no father in the flesh. The Christ Child did not stay His own entrance into this mortal life, because His mother was poor, roofless, and without provision for the morrow. He knew that His Heavenly Father, who cared for the lilies of the fields and the birds of the air, loved the children of men more than these. Children troop down from Heaven because God wills it. He alone has the right to stay their coming while he blesses at will some homes with many, others with but a few or with none at all. They come in the one way ordained by His wisdom. Woe to those who degrade, pervert, or do violence to the law of nature as fixed by the eternal decree of God Himself! Even though some little angels in the flesh, through the moral, mental or physical deformity of parents, may appear to human eyes hideous, misshapen, a blot on civilized society, we must not lose sight of this Christian thought that under and within such visible malformation there lives an immortal soul to be saved and glorified for all eternity among the Blessed of Heaven.

Heinous is the sin committed against the creative act of God, Who through the marriage contract invites man and woman to cooperate with Him in the propagation of the human family. To take life after its inception is a horrible crime; but to prevent human life that the Creator is about to bring into being, is satanic. In the first instance, the body is killed, while the soul lives on; in the latter, not only a body but an immortal soul is denied existence in time and in eternity. It has been reserved to our day to see advocated shamelessly the legalizing of such a diabolical thing.

In the name of the Babe of Bethlehem, Whose law you Christian fathers and mothers love and obey, stop your ears to that pagan philosophy, worthy of a Herod, which ignoring revelation and even human wisdom sets itself above the law and the prophets of the Old and the New Dispensation, of which the Christ Child is the beginning, the bond and end. Keep far from the sanctuary of your Christian homes, as you would an evil spirit, the literature of this unclean abomination. Sin not against children who, after all, are the noblest stimulus and protection to marital affection, fidelity and continency.

The Babe of Bethlehem comes also to restore reverence for parents--as much needed today as reverence for childhood. If parental authority is fast becoming a byword, it is because parents have failed in their reverence and guidance of childhood according to spiritual standards. Their own children have turned to punish them. God is the supreme sanction of all authority. Neglecting God's law by irreligious or indulgent lives parents have lost, to an alarming degree, their God-given authority over their offspring, who in nursery and school, in sport and society, in literature and art, see, hear, talk of, and, too often, live a freedom of thought and action that knows neither the conventions nor the moral restraint of Christian society. Parents to rule wisely should obey reverently the higher law of God and by example and precept teach their children how elementary in life is the duty to obey authority, Divine and human, domestic and civil. Not the Church alone, but thoughtful men and women, leaders in many spheres of life, are lamenting the deplorable and rebellious spirit of our youth against the restraints of home and family life. It is not within the power of human fear or selfish interest to secure obedience, except it be a servility that cannot be trusted in the building of character. The one lofty motive to inspire the young to reverence and obedience is Christ's own obedience to Mary and Joseph; to them, the creatures of His own hand, the Creator and Lord of the universe was willingly subject in Bethlehem and Nazareth.

Many of humanity's gravest problems would cease to be, if the leadership of Christ, as the Little Child leading, were more fully recognized and followed in the care and training of children and in the upbuilding of the Christian home.

Our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XV, in the Motu proprio on St. Joseph, sounds a solemn note: "The sanctity of conjugal fidelity and respect for paternal authority have been grievously transgressed by many during the war; the remoteness of one spouse served to relax the bond of duty in the other, and the absence of a watchful eye gave rise to freer and more indulgent conduct, more particularly amongst the younger members of the female sex." Christmas is a Divine call to woman. The Virgin Mother is placed by God before all womanhood as an example of purity, devotion, and duty. Her whole being is consecrated to the exalted office of motherhood. Christ not only would be a child, but He would have a mother--and an immaculate one, that man might know the mind of God with regard to woman's place in the world. Providence ordained that God's own Mother, deprived of wealth, fame and social prestige, should have no distractions in her motherhood, except the temple and the home. The sublime simplicity of woman's mission seems no longer fashionable. The eternal commonplaces of building the home by rocking the cradle, spinning the wheel, preparing the meal, making the fireside cheery, teaching the children to pray reverently and live justly are more vital to the permanent good of society and the nation than the wisest legislation conceivable to offset the dangers lying in woman's new freedom and uncertain adventure that may leave in their wake empty cradles and homeless communities.

Another Christian lesson the world needs to learn is God's law against divorce. The Gospel tells of Mary's severe trial when "Joseph, her husband, being a just man, was minded to put her away privately. But while he thought on these things, behold the angel of the Lord appeared to him in his sleep" (Matt. I, 19-20) and prevented him doing so. Divorce has become a national curse; and the evil is spreading. Verily it is a deadly disease in our body politic, not to speak of the moral and spiritual harm born of broken homes, broken hearts, seared souls, abandoned children and unholy alliances.

Disastrous beyond possibility of description to society is the condition when women measure their lives, not by the number of their offspring but by the number of their husbands. Pagan Rome, at the height of its imperial power, with a conquered world paying tribute to the Caesars, sealed slowly but surely its own doom. No foe without proved as terrible an enemy as corruption within. Widespread divorce desecrated the sanctuary of the family with the consequent degradation of woman. The constructive forces of the empire were weakened by the deadly moral poisons that Roman society absorbed into its very vitals and took no means to throw off. When this happens in the human body, death follows.

Let us thank our Heavenly Father for the valiant women we all know--and their name is legion--who with the highest ideals of wifehood and motherhood carry on heroically the honor of the family. Neither height nor depth, nor sorrow nor pain, nor sin of husband nor ingratitude of children, nor privation nor loss, nor opportunity of comfort nor lure of pleasure can tempt such noble women to shirk their duty or break up their home. Silently, patiently, cheerfully and holily they spend themselves and are spent for the spiritual and temporal welfare of their own flesh and blood in their children. Mary, the Mother of Christ, strengthens with the grace and fortitude of Heaven such wonderful mothers, who are one of the most sacred benedictions on this earth.

Since Our Savior, the only begotten Son of the Eternal Father, deigned to be called the "Son of the Carpenter," and since Mary, the Mother of Christ, rejoiced to be known as the "Spouse of the Carpenter," we may readily understand the dignity of the person and office of Joseph in the Holy Family. God evidently would teach through St. Joseph that the supreme dignity of man rests not on a temporal or human foundation but essentially on our relation to Christ, the God-man. The Incarnation elevated human nature to the supernatural order, in which man must live, move and have his being, if our human nature is to reach its highest and noblest expression and purpose in conformity with the Divine Will.

St. Joseph, a poor and obscure workingman in the eyes of the world, was raised in the sight of God and the Angels, to a dignity with which none of earthly origin can be compared. Yet Joseph was nothing more than the faithful head of Holy Family, neither prophet nor priest, nor apostle nor teacher. Nor did he present the heroic figures of Joseph of old in Egypt, or of David, the Shepherd King of Israel. By the labor of his hands, he cared in poverty for Jesus and Mary. He led them amid most harassing circumstances to Bethlehem, Nazareth and across the sands of the desert to Egypt and back. The humble home and little family were his universe of love and service. In comparison with the Babe and the Mother, through whom God manifested His infinite love and mercy, the imperial glory of the Caesars, the jeweled palace of Herod, the gorgeous gardens of the Pharaohs and the undying fame symbolized by the Pyramids were but dead sea fruit to Joseph's mind. His example fixes the real values of human life. Father and husband, ruler and subject, employer and employee, rich and poor--all should pattern their lives and perform their duties in the spirit of this "just man." This justice means reverence for religion; obedience to lawful authority; fair dealing on the part of capital; honest work on the part of labor; purification of wealth; sanctification of poverty.

This Christmas pastoral I place most humbly in the hands of St. Joseph, whom the clergy, the religious and the faithful are honoring in our churches and chapels this day, at the very hour I am writing the final words of this message to my beloved children in Christ.

Praying the Infant Savior to bless most abundantly with every Christmas grace the entire flock, I am, Faithfully your Shepherd,

PATRICK JOSEPH,
Archbishop of New York.

In Commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the
Proclamation of St. Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church.

December 14, 1921.



Note:

1) Archbishop Hayes became a Cardinal in 1924.





From the December 2008
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Unbounded Riches in the Electric City

I was born in 1954 to a typical Schenectady family - blue collar, Italian, Catholic, patriotic, somewhat neurotic, but thoroughly family-centric. Now that I have had ample time to reflect on my childhood as juxtaposed to the "great cultural enlightenment" of the last 40 years (aka the de-volution of society), I can truthfully say that growing up in Schenectady at the time I did, was "A Wonderful Life".

I always felt my hometown was kind of magical, and never more so than at the darkest time of the year, when the sun set early and the first downy flakes began to fly. Undaunted, and in spite of the dying of the year, the city "that lights the world" truly lived up to its rep, beginning with the parade down State Street in late November.

My father loved a parade. We would be bundled up to the point where we walked about like the unfortunate dead in zombie movies, put into place along the road, and then treated to the colorful stream of high school musicians, puffy politicians, marching veterans, and yes, oh yes Santa himself! The street lights boasted tinseley finery and storefronts be-decked themselves with frosted windows, merry elves, snowmen and all manner of glorious Christmas imagery. Carl Company department store had the best, and you knew there was a God in heaven after viewing their annual Christmas display.

Santa shopped lightly and carefully at Carl's and other downtown stores for our gifts. Always thrilled with the "bounty" underneath our skinny balsam tree, we secretly suspected that we were the richest people around. Sure, Dad was a construction worker who would be pink-slipped as soon as the ground froze. But that meant that he was there all winter to work on his "inventions" and repairs down in the cellar. I would be working too, right beside him, banging nails into blocks of wood mostly, but having a glorious tom-boy time of it!

He also had leisure to take us sledding at the golf course and skating at Central Park. We would take weekly walks to the Woodlawn library (as Dad loved detective stories and was always in need of a fresh supply), and sometimes we'd just trek through the frozen wilderness behind Bishop Gibbons school, looking for animal tracks. I also remember having a child-sized snow shovel, and while my big brother was out earning money by shoveling snow for the neighbors, I would be my father's right-hand girl, enduring with him the frustration of having the snow plow come and push all the snow off the street and back up onto our just-finished driveway. My father would say words I never heard him say in front of my mother, but were reserved for outside misfortunes and banged fingers down in the cellar workshop.

These memories and many more came rushing back to me the other day when my husband was doing some minor repair work in our Virginia Beach home. I went to see how things were going and there, with other tools he had left on the counter, was the little hammer that I used as a child down in the cellar of the white cottage on Albany Street. I guess my husband must have taken it when we were clearing out the old homestead after my mother died. At that time, still full of grief and loss, I remember not caring about any of the fancy, "for-show" stuff, but making sure I took her rolling pin, her measuring cup, and the big metal spoon, relics of a wonderful woman's hard work and devotion. My parents and my childhood were not unique, but rather like most others at that time and place. Would that, once again, regular folks had steady, good jobs and wore their modest, pay-as-you-go lives like a badge of honor. The taxes would go down, wouldn't they?

I am so thankful for the city and the people that formed me. We were a somewhat gruff exteriored people, but generous and loyal to a fault. There is something grand, and yes, magical about the place: its traditions, its beautiful buildings, the alleys, the magnificent park, those little bomb-like lanterns that used to mark out street work being done, the food (still unsurpassed in any place I have seen in the states or abroad), the fragrant mud of Spring, the green freshness of summer, the audacious color of autumn and yes, the long, sleepy winters - they all form a most wonderful, unique place. And after having traveled and lived in many different places, I can assure you that the people of Schenectady are themselves larger than life, characters all, a splash of vivacious color on an-otherwise gray canvas of the run-of-the-mill. If we could afford to live there, we'd be back. (I have some ideas about this, but alas, I am now an outsider).

You are a people and a place which vastly underestimate yourselves. Perhaps that is still what makes you so special - you are not self-conscious, there is no contrivance, no "marketing" of your life. Just the simple, unconscious piety, the family, the underlying good nature, the holiday parade. You truly are an electric city. Have you ever secretly suspected that you might be the richest people around?