If one more person interrupts my Fr. Hesse videos, this trad dad is going to blow a gasket.
That aside, I have been enjoying my final days of the 12 days of Christmas. We know, of course, that the Christmas season continues a bit longer. But for now, prayer seems to be the order of the day. And why wouldn’t we pray during these days? Our Lord has been born for us. If nothing else, prayers of thanksgiving are in order.
With that in mind, it is a good time for another St. Rita novena so send me intentions. If you would be so kind, please pray for a special intention of mine. God bless you all and Merry Christmas!
To quote the sheep who gave her fleece to line my jacket, “New year, new ewe.”
The dad jokes only improve with age.
I stayed up well past midnight last night hosting a big bash and then woke up for the Sunday Mass. No anticipatory liturgies for us, thank you. And thanks to the traditional calendar, I got the joy of figuring out how to answer the question “What’s circumcision?” Next year, the kids are getting dictionaries for Christmas.
On a more serious note, I am actually sad about the death of the Holy Father. I remember well the day in April 2008 when my very pregnant wife and I stood along Fifth Avenue and watched the Popemobile roll past in the most impressive motorcade I have ever seen. One week later we had delivered our son. Since we did not know the baby’s sex ahead of birth, and convinced we would be having a girl, we did not have a boy’s name picked out. The night of his birth, we had narrowed it down to two – one of which came to us based on our admiration for the pontiff we had just seen. Leaving the hospital that night, my wife tasked me with selecting the name. I thought this was unfair, that we should both agree to whatever name our son would be saddled with his whole life.
Upper East Side papal parade. Check out the ancient flip phone.
I went home and thought. I tried each of the names in my mind, imagining situations where I’d have to use the lad’s name. “X, give your old man a hand with this project,” or “Y, next time fill the car back up when you take it out,” or “Z, that gin and tonic ain’t gonna make itself. Chop chop, pal.”
I returned to the hospital the next morning. On my way I made a few stops. I picked out a Tiffany charm for my wife’s bracelet to commemorate this most significant event. It was a silver lollipop with a blue enamel swirl. Then I hit up the religious articles store. I walked into the hospital room with both hands behind my back.
“Well,” asked the wife, “what are we going to call him?”
I looked at her and said, “Behind my back are two holy cards. Pick a hand and the card in that hand is going to be his name.”
She protested. “I wanted you to pick it,” etc, but I insisted.
She pointed to my right hand. I drew out a card. The founder of Western monasticism. “Oh good,” she said. “That’s the name I had hoped you’d pick.”
“Glad to hear it,” I said as I flashed the card in the other hand. It was the Vicar of Christ. Seems we were in sync.
Pray for him. Pray for his soul. Do not canonize him. Don’t declare him a Doctor of the Church. Pray for him. And pray for each other. We know the trad world is small. It doesn’t take much to offer three Ave’s a day for the intentions and good health of fellow trads.
To quote the sheep who gave her fleece to line my jacket, “New year, new ewe.”
The dad jokes only improve with age.
I stayed up well past midnight last night hosting a big bash and then woke up for the Sunday Mass. No anticipatory liturgies for us, thank you. And thanks to the traditional calendar, I got the joy of figuring out how to answer the question “What’s circumcision?” Next year, the kids are getting dictionaries for Christmas.
On a more serious note, I am actually sad about the death of the Holy Father. I remember well the day in April 2008 when my very pregnant wife and I stood along Fifth Avenue and watched the Popemobile roll past in the most impressive motorcade I have ever seen. One week later we had delivered our son. Since we did not know the baby’s sex ahead of birth, and convinced we would be having a girl, we did not have a boy’s name picked out. The night of his birth, we had narrowed it down to two – one of which came to us based on our admiration for the pontiff we had just seen. Leaving the hospital that night, my wife tasked me with selecting the name. I thought this was unfair, that we should both agree to whatever name our son would be saddled with his whole life.
Upper East Side papal parade. Check out the ancient flip phone.
I went home and thought. I tried each of the names in my mind, imagining situations where I’d have to use the lad’s name. “X, give your old man a hand with this project,” or “Y, next time fill the car back up when you take it out,” or “Z, that gin and tonic ain’t gonna make itself. Chop chop, pal.”
I returned to the hospital the next morning. On my way I made a few stops. I picked out a Tiffany charm for my wife’s bracelet to commemorate this most significant event. It was a silver lollipop with a blue enamel swirl. Then I hit up the religious articles store. I walked into the hospital room with both hands behind my back.
“Well,” asked the wife, “what are we going to call him?”
I looked at her and said, “Behind my back are two holy cards. Pick a hand and the card in that hand is going to be his name.”
She protested. “I wanted you to pick it,” etc, but I insisted.
She pointed to my right hand. I drew out a card. The founder of Western monasticism. “Oh good,” she said. “That’s the name I had hoped you’d pick.”
“Glad to hear it,” I said as I flashed the card in the other hand. It was the Vicar of Christ. Seems we were in sync.
Pray for him. Pray for his soul. Do not canonize him. Don’t declare him a Doctor of the Church. Pray for him. And pray for each other. We know the trad world is small. It doesn’t take much to offer three Ave’s a day for the intentions and good health of fellow trads.
To quote the sheep who gave her fleece to line my jacket, “New year, new ewe.”
The dad jokes only improve with age.
I stayed up well past midnight last night hosting a big bash and then woke up for the Sunday Mass. No anticipatory liturgies for us, thank you. And thanks to the traditional calendar, I got the joy of figuring out how to answer the question “What’s circumcision?” Next year, the kids are getting dictionaries for Christmas.
On a more serious note, I am actually sad about the death of the Holy Father. I remember well the day in April 2008 when my very pregnant wife and I stood along Fifth Avenue and watched the Popemobile roll past in the most impressive motorcade I have ever seen. One week later we had delivered our son. Since we did not know the baby’s sex ahead of birth, and convinced we would be having a girl, we did not have a boy’s name picked out. The night of his birth, we had narrowed it down to two – one of which came to us based on our admiration for the pontiff we had just seen. Leaving the hospital that night, my wife tasked me with selecting the name. I thought this was unfair, that we should both agree to whatever name our son would be saddled with his whole life.
Upper East Side papal parade. Check out the ancient flip phone.
I went home and thought. I tried each of the names in my mind, imagining situations where I’d have to use the lad’s name. “X, give your old man a hand with this project,” or “Y, next time fill the car back up when you take it out,” or “Z, that gin and tonic ain’t gonna make itself. Chop chop, pal.”
I returned to the hospital the next morning. On my way I made a few stops. I picked out a Tiffany charm for my wife’s bracelet to commemorate this most significant event. It was a silver lollipop with a blue enamel swirl. Then I hit up the religious articles store. I walked into the hospital room with both hands behind my back.
“Well,” asked the wife, “what are we going to call him?”
I looked at her and said, “Behind my back are two holy cards. Pick a hand and the card in that hand is going to be his name.”
She protested. “I wanted you to pick it,” etc, but I insisted.
She pointed to my right hand. I drew out a card. The founder of Western monasticism. “Oh good,” she said. “That’s the name I had hoped you’d pick.”
“Glad to hear it,” I said as I flashed the card in the other hand. It was the Vicar of Christ. Seems we were in sync.
Pray for him. Pray for his soul. Do not canonize him. Don’t declare him a Doctor of the Church. Pray for him. I named a son after him and he kind of let us down (just a bit)…
And pray for each other. We know the trad world is small. It doesn’t take much to offer three Ave’s a day for the intentions and good health of fellow trads.
Today is the Sixth Day in the Octave of Christmas. At the oratory where I attended Mass this morning the priest announced prior to Mass that he would be saying the Mass for Sunday within the Octave as it is a feria and that Mass (Sunday) will not be said in deference to the Mass of the Circumcision of the Lord this year. That rustling sound you just heard was Harvey hurriedly flipping the ribbons in his missal.
Pray for Pope Benedict XVI Ratzinger. In the past few days I have begun to realize that the term “sedevacantist” might soon apply to me – not in the perjorative way foisted upon me and others who recognize, as I do, the total invalidity of the events of February and March of 2013, but in the actual sense. As in, there might soon be no pope. As there have been periods of sedevacant before, I am not worried. Our Lord is in control.
As I left Mass, thinking these thoughts, I noticed that the servers were setting up for a funeral. Death comes to us all. Are you prepared? Am I? Stay confessed, but more importantly, live your life at the foot of the cross! this way it won’t come as a shock when you find yourself there being judged by the One hanging from its magnificent wood.
I received a beautiful email from a reader today. A young child for whom I had been praying for a miracle in my St. Rita novena went home from the hospital today. Praised be Jesus Christ! Please continue to send me any intentions. I am nothing in this chain but a poor sinner who has received far more than I deserve. I promised to make known the favor of God’s saint and His miracles and this is what I try to do.
Later in the day I went to see my twin sister’s grave. This cemetery is a beautiful place. My sister and I drove around a bit, stopping to check out older sections of the place. It is located on a ridge overlooking Manhattan. This same sister, so many years ago, chose the site of our family plot at a time when we needed to purchase a grave immediately. No one plans for the deaths of small children. She selected the site because from the top of the hill, one could see the Twin Towers. My mother is a native Manhattanite. There was also a beautiful shade tree growing over the back of the grave. Beyond the city, one could look out toward the east, toward Ireland and Scotland and England, where our people had come from. In 2001, the cemetery workers cut down the tree and the Towers, well, we know what happened to them.
I mention the Trade Center because one of the sections we stopped at was filled with 9-11 dead. Yes, we are that close. There’s a memorial (I think it’s tacky but that’s just me – see below) and then rows of headstones. There are police officers and firemen buried here who died that morning.
Here is one example. I have not blacked out the name because I think prayers for his soul are important. RIP, Mr. Finnerty. I presume the last line refers to his body, like so many others that day, never having been recovered.
Also in this cemetery are some examples of truly beautiful works of art in the form of headstones and monuments from an era when the faith was alive and symbolized in design.
The Holy Family
The Sacred and Immaculate Hearts
On this next-to-last day of the year, when the pope may be dying, when a baby was healed, when the specter of death looms large but reminders of God’s love and mercy are still to be found; I found myself meditating on the words “You know not the day nor the hour.”
Tonight, dear friends, I traveled to the Fatherland – Nova Caesaria.
This morning I went to Mass for the Fourth Day in the Christmas Octave and the Feast of the Holy Innocents. These were the baby boys slaughtered ruthlessly by Herod out of blind rage and jealousy. They are called Martyrs by the Church. We sang the Coventry Carol after the Leonine prayers. Rachel weeps…
In my travels, I glanced out the window and from about 700 feet I noticed, in the dark, a most familiar sight as we were landing. It is the cemetery wherein my twin sister is buried along with two brothers who died at the same time, as children. There are others in the plot. Two other brothers who died as adults, and my dad. But there are also a niece and a great-nephew (practically babies). There’s also a rando in there. Don’t ask.
That dark polygon is the cemetery at night.
The death of a child certainly teaches one many lessons about the faith. Perhaps one day I will share some of those lessons. But for now, on this fourth day of Christmas, I was happy that God saw fit to fly me over the twin’s grave. I waved from the air. Tomorrow I shall go lay flowers and wish her a Merry Christmas in person.
Boy this week keeps getting better! In the blurb in my missal this morning I read the following:
“St. John is the virgin Apostle, crowned with the halo of those who know how to conquer their flesh; for this reason, he became ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved.’ Thanks to his angelic purity, he imbibed that wholesome wisdom of which the Epistle of the Mass speaks and which has given to him the halo of the Doctors. Finally he received the crown of the Martyrs, since he barely escaped a violent death…”
There you have it, folks. He knew how to conquer the flesh and Jesus loved him.
I suspect not a few of us in this movement still need to work on this. We need to work on it as if our lives depended upon it because they actually do. Our whole life must be about subjugating the appetites to the will of God, starting with the appetites of the flesh – be they food, drink, or anger, or lust. Learn from St. John.
Fr. Dave Nix had a piece last week wherein he offered the advice of St. Alphonsus Liguori that frequently making the sign of the cross is an invaluable aid. I began incorporating this practice in my daily life, especially when passing the crucifixes hanging in my house, and noticed an immediate difference. One cannot help but be drawn to pause for a moment and dwell on the mystery of the Trinity and the power of the Cross.
I leave you with a meme. Completely unrelated, I know, but a friend sent this along to me and I just love it. With a nod to Miss B. who faithfully shares all the best memes every week. What would we do without her?
Folks, I got off all that social media nonsense a while ago. Sorry but I'm not on Twitbook, Facepalm, YouHu, WingWang or any of the others. Maybe an event will happen to make me change my mind like Peter and Paul coming down with flaming swords and commanding it be so. Until then, read the blog and if you feel a comment is in order or you feel like sharing a tip or suggestion for a topic, email me at harvey@harveymillican.com.
Harvey Millican's Blog: Musings of a Trad Dad 