Category Archives: Being Catholic

Blessed

Blessed

Hail Mary, full of grace

At a Lenten overnight retreat with 65 adolescent girls.

The Lord is with thee

Yoga pants, push up bras, still trying to make sense of their bodies and their souls, clear skinned and broken complexioned, immature and seeking- all seen and heard and embraced by a higher power.

Blessed are you among women

You are precious and perfect in God’s eyes, a temple of the Holy Spirit, hope for the world.  Don’t ever underestimate what lies yet dormant within you.  You are destined for goodness and prosperity.

And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus

Co-creators with God, the capacity to bring forth life both literally and figuratively.  Nurturer, dreamer, lover, sanctuary.  You have so much to give.  I wish you could see what I see when I look at you.

Holy Mary, mother of God

Look within yourself for inspiration and strength.  Look outside yourself and see your journey unfold.  Reach out and make a holy connection with all of human kind.   You are never alone in this world.

Pray for us sinners

Let Mary be your spiritual mother.  Let her life and her sacrifice inform your every decision.  You are loved and forgiven.  Again and again and again.

Now and at the hour of our death

Live like there is no tomorrow.  Take joy in this day.  Be the woman you are destined to be.  Start now.  Don’t dilly dally.  Your life is precious and you are already on the path.  Be kind.  Be in solidarity with the poor and the poor in spirit.  Be the womb that gives forth life.

Be a woman of God.

Amen



 

Getting my ash in gear…

Getting my ash in gear…

 

Yesterday’s Ash Wednesday Liturgy at Presentation High School was a beautiful thing.  Eight hundred young women in formal dress uniform exuberantly singing an old Protestant hymn, Amazing Grace.  The gym was filled to capacity- standing room only.   The homily was delivered by a woman- our own resident bible scholar, Claire Foley.  Peer ministers doused their fellow students with ashes.  A slide show highlighted one of our Sisters of Presentation, Sr. Rachel Pinal, who works as a missionary in Somotillo, Nicaragua.  The liturgy kicked off our Mission Drive month, raising money to support our Sisters of Presentation working for peace and justice in South America.

No wonder Pope Benedict is resigning.  This old church ain’t what it used to be!

However, in the faculty room over lunch one would never have known that we have progressed this far as Catholics.  People were still talking about “giving something up” for Lent.  I assumed we were a more enlightened and progressive Catholic faculty.  Is it really that simple?

During Lent, the forty days and forty nights culminating in the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus on Easter Sunday, we are called to conversion, reconciliation, mercy, grace, self reflection and humility.  How do you get there by giving up candy?

I’m just sayin’….

But the most amusing thing for me as the Senior Class Counselor was one of my naughtiest students carefully tracing a cross of ashes on my forehead and advising me to “Turn away from sin and be faithful to the gospel”.

Oh Lordy..

My life is plaid.

Beautiful Easter!

Beautiful Easter!

Nothing is more practical than finding God,

that is, than falling in love.

In a quite absolute, final way, what you are in love with,

what seizes your imagination, will affect everything.

It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning,

what you do with your evenings,

how you spend your weekend,

what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart,

and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.

Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.

– Attributed to Pedro Arrupe. S.J.

 

It was a very Good Friday!

It was a very Good Friday!

I’ve had at least two people ask me in the past two days why it’s called Good Friday.  Funny… in all the years of being Catholic I’ve never asked that question.  It just goes to show how much we Catholics take in and accept as truth in faith.

I guess I could google it.  But I’d rather think that it’s “Good” because Jesus died and paid the price for our sins so that we can have eternal life.  Granted… I have never questioned that either!

Yesterday I attended Good Friday services at the Santa Clara Mission.  The lights were dimmed, the incense plentiful and the music was prayerful.  It was a solemn liturgy and I had some heavy things on my heart.  A good friend from high school recently died of a heart attack.   Another family’s 21 year old son was killed in an accident by a drunk driver.  A young teen has disappeared from Morgan Hill and has not been found.

I felt such solidarity with the congregation as we marched forward to venerate the cross singing “Were you there when they crucified my Lord”.  People knelt to kiss the cross.  Others bowed.   Ok.. I get emotional at these things.  I’m an N and an F on the Myers Briggs.  It doesn’t take much to make me weepy.

But just as I began to search for yet another tissue in my purse, the presiding priest asked us to join him in the Lord’s Prayer.  The somewhat feeble and elderly man standing next to me grabbed my hand firmly and raised it up in his and began to pray in earnest!  His strength and conviction shot through his hand into mine and straight to my heart.  I felt suddenly transformed by his faith and a presence of love.

Maybe it’s all hocus pocus.  Catholics were New Age before the New Agers were!  Beads and incense and smoke and mystery.  Death and resurrection.  I’ve bought it hook line and sinker my whole life.

I don’t need to explain it or google it.  I experienced it yesterday.  And it was certainly a “Good” Friday.

 

What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine also!

What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine also!

I went foraging today for greenery, pods and other accoutrements of fall in order to decorate my front door wreath and herald in the new season.  Off I went up Llagas Ave with my hand pruners and a recycled Safeway grocery bag under my arm.  Today’s booty included pale pepper tree berries (they will be bright red by December and worth another trip up the hill for Christmas decorating), fragrant eucalyptus with flowers intact, almonds still encased in their protective hull, wild pomegranates (oh they pruned back my favorite bushes so they are scarce this year) and some unidentified tree pods.

I am writing this post at the urging of my middle son, Patrick, who has endured patiently his mother’s habit of petty theft, all with good intentions of thoroughly enjoying God’s beautiful earth.  I learned how to do this very early in life (along with a few WWII marching songs) while walking with my dad for exercise.  My dad always said that if it hangs over the fence onto the sidewalk it’s yours!  That includes apples, kumquats, avocados, almonds, olives and any kind of greenery that might look good on your fireplace mantel.

Oh Lordy!

This seemingly harmless activity became a habit when we moved to Portland, Oregon.  So many beautiful flowers and colors I’d never seen before having grown up in semi-arid season-less Southern California.  I couldn’t resist the lovely hues of violet in the hydrangeas and lilacs that grew so prolifically around every corner.  I once had a small gathering of friends for tea and one of my guests asked me “Where did you get those beautiful flowers?”  I replied, “Which ones?  The hydrangeas are from 31st Ave near Crystal Springs Ave and those roses came from behind Reed College.”  (Whoopsy.. maybe that wasn’t exactly legal.)

When we moved back to Northern California my Lebanese neighbor Eza and I used to walk together on Saturday mornings and catch up on our work week adventures.  She wasn’t too sure about my habit of pinching and picking but I taught her the song: “This land is your land. This land is my land.”  That seemed to quell her anxieties.

A couple weeks ago I came home from work and it appeared that my neighbor, Rick, was having a tree trimmed in his back yard.  On further inspection I saw that it was my gangly out of control curly willow that the gardeners were dragging out to the wood chipper!  It was hanging over the fence dropping leaves and debris all over my good neighbor’s yard.  He took it upon himself to have it trimmed- never mentioning a word to me or asking me to share in the expense.  Now that’s a good neighbor and an interesting twist to this tall tale.  It hung over his fence so he considered it his problem.

Now I am going to Mass tonight at the Santa Clara Mission to pray for my gracious neighbor, Rick, to thank God for the wonderful community I live in and to ask forgiveness for my sins and mercy to overcome my bad habit.

Oh.. did you know they have the most beautiful rose garden there?

Mea culpa! Mea culpa!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Women of Substance

Women of Substance

Those of you who are cradle Catholics like I am know exactly what is happening in this picture.  You might even be humming to yourself the familiar tune from the Stations of the Cross.

Every Friday during Lent at St. Philip Neri Parish in Lynwood, California- grades one through eight- we attended this ritual which reenacts the journey to Calvary where Jesus was crucified on Good Friday.  Along this path Jesus meets Veronica.

Just recently on Facebook a friend of mine posted in exasperation: “I’m looking for one strong female role model!  Come on! I know you are out there!”  She received 52 comments.

The thread went something like this:

I need someone to talk to, draw inspiration from.  Someone who doesn’t go eeeek when they break a fingernail!  I’m frustrated with the shallowness of women these days!  It’s all about appearance!

We need a round table of women willing to meet with no makeup on!

I could spend a whole day on the shallowness of boobs!

How much wine have you had?

Not nearly enough!

Why aren’t there more women adventurers?  Why do we allow ourselves to be tied down and tethered to domesticity?

A slave to our biology!  To bear and then nurture selflessly…

Or the corporate apron!

I like men lots. I can’t stand women running around degrading the whole sex with fake boobs and fake weakness and fake airheadedness to make cavemen feel macho.

A woman who is willing to face each and every one of her fears directly in the eye!

Putting it in a form of a prayer always works to bring what I seek into reality.

And a prayer it is… find me one female who is a work in progress, willing to face her fears, doing the best she can in this world with integrity and strength which is her birthright.  A person from whom I can learn and grow into the best woman I can be!

Amen!

When Jesus crossed the path of Veronica she had a decision to make.  Holding the linen cloth and seeing Jesus in all his suffering- blood mingled with sweat dripping off his face- she stepped out in faith against all odds.  She shrank from fear and gathered every ounce of courage in order to do the right thing despite the violence of the angry guards and a culture that disregarded women in every venue.  She laid that cloth on Jesus’ face and lovingly and tenderly wiped the grime, showing him a measure of humanity and grace.  What woman wouldn’t?  It is our gift as well as our curse.  She could not let him pass by unattended and without mercy.  She meshed her innate chemistry as a woman with the courage of a martyr and left us with this extraordinary illustration of how to be a woman of substance.

Veronica is a role model to all women.  Did she really exist?  Theologians laugh and say “yes.. and there is a Santa Claus!” But Veronica has always existed for me.

As a little girl standing with her classmates at St. Philip Neri going through the motions of the Stations of the Cross.

Even before I knew what kind of courage and fearlessness it would take to be a woman.

 

Lord have mercy!

Lord have mercy!

So there seems to be some kind of mistake?  Who planned a meatless Lenten Friday to follow a green beered boiled dinner of succulent corned beef and cabbage?  What are we supposed to do with those left overs today?  One would think that God and St. Patrick would work this placement of holidays and fast days out while they are leisurely sitting around in heaven shooting the bull.

And here lies the dilemma…  Last week I made a meatloaf on Thursday and couldn’t eat the left overs on Friday.  In the faculty room at Presentation High School we had a discussion about what is worse.  Eating the meat on Friday in order to not be wasteful or throwing it out and breaking out the good ol’ frozen fish sticks- reminiscent of our Catholic growing up years? Which is the bigger sin?

We decided that the tension of this discussion is all about awareness.  Awareness of our eating habits as Americans in general- our abundance, our waste and our over concern about our waistlines. Hoping we can work all this out in the lunchroom for the next several weeks of Lent.

Any non-Catholics out there interested in some leftover Corned Beef and Cabbage?  Gonna put on my hair-shirt and open a can of tuna for dinner tonight. I’ll pray for you.

“You are dust and unto dust you shall return”

“You are dust and unto dust you shall return”

We are well into Lent- the Catholic season of  40 days and 40 nights before Jesus is raised from the dead on Easter Sunday.  This picture was taken on Ash Wednesday when we celebrated Mass as a school community and learned some important lessons about what it means to be generous and to have gratitude. But mostly we took away foreheads full of ashes in remembrance of our physical bodies having their origin and their destiny in dirt.  You heard me.  Dirt.

Such disparity in this photo!  These young women, so young and beautiful with their bright smiles and hope for the future; their willingness to learn and grow and connect with life!  Their hopeful faces smudged with ashes…

I want to tell them some secrets about life but they will need to learn those on their own at the school of hard knocks.   But today I want them to know that they are perfect in every way.  And that they are loved beyond belief by their parents and by their God.  And that no one can take that away from them.

Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.  Be the beautiful young women that you are and guard this treasure.  That is my Lenten prayer for you.  Fresh faces and ashes.  Amen