Category Archives: Neat Things I Didn’t Author

Seven Quick Takes Sunday

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The other Jennie does it on Friday. So I’m a little late. What else is new? 🙂

1. Broken McSickyPants
This is my new name. My medical issues have only gotten worse. I still have the continual chest pain (which has now become more pronounced) and dyspnea on exertion. Lately, we have added to the mix dizziness, incredible fatigue, nausea and that awful feeling like you are about to pass out. My doctors still don’t have a good idea of what is wrong with me, since I have been passing all of my medical tests (I guess I’ve always tested pretty well). At least the infected poison ivy spots are finally clearing up a little and healing! 🙂 I do not feel like myself, and I hate that I can’t really do anything. Praise God, He gave me a good sense of humor and a sunny disposition. I am actually pretty happy overall.

2. On Being a Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist
Today, we had the pleasure of having Fr. Stanley celebrate Mass with us. Since I go to daily Mass at Our Lady of Good Counsel, where he currently is at, I have been able to see him upon occasion (although he doesn’t really do the 6:30 a.m. Mass that I typically attend). Having him here at St. Anastasia for Sunday Mass was a real treat. He was my first confessor and he has a very comforting way about him. He joked about the length of his homilies as he began his homily today. I was sitting next to the girl I sponsored into the Church this year, and at one point she commented that the wooden pew was hurting her butt for some reason this week. I laughed, “You probably aren’t used to sitting in one spot for so long!” Again, picking on poor Fr. Stanley’s homily. 🙂 In my defense, he started it! 🙂 God gave me a wonderful gift of joy today, particularly during the Mass. I was happy that Fr. Stanley was there, but this went beyond him. As I went up to the altar and received my paten of consecrated hosts, I remember cradling the paten in my hands. I must have had some big idiotic grin on my face, but I wasn’t really worried about that. I just gazed lovingly at Jesus in my hands and thought to Him, “I love You!” I know, it sounds pretty sappy, right? But that’s okay. I don’t mind being sappy. 🙂 I love Him. 🙂 Sometimes I wonder what people think when they get me in line for Communion. Here I am with a huge smile on my face, handing them our Lord, and nearly petting Him into place in their hands — to make sure He gets there safely. Hopefully, they share in my joy at the presence of our Lord, and aren’t standing there thinking that I’m a little odd or something.

3. The World is Now a Safer Place!
Why? Because I finally got new tires on my car! After 1 year, 7 months, 23 days and nearly 47,000 miles of driving, it was finally time to discard the old and buy some new. Of course, the “red” tire health report card, “Change your tires IMMEDIATELY” postcard, squeaking around off-ramps in dry conditions and, finally, hydroplaning in the rain while driving straight all contributed to this decision. Perhaps that fact that I had racing slicks on my car is the reason why I got that speeding ticket a while back, earning me the name Zoomie Vroom McLawBreaker. I really liked that name, by the way. But I have been good, and have been using my cruise control until I can re-train myself to enjoy lower velocities.

4. iPhone vs. BlackBerry Tour
Ah, just when I thought that I would finally change service providers in order to get the fancy-pants new iPhone (since bundling my home internet, land line, and TV service would save me about $60 a month), I have been given pause to reconsider. On Saturday, after getting my tires changed, I walked into the Sprint store, help up my current BlackBerry and challenged, “Why should I not want to trade this in for an iPhone? Convince me!” Now, mostly, I like the iPhone for all the apps and stuff that you can get with it, and for the larger screen. The touch screen keyboard would be a hindrance to typing as you drive (just for example, not that I do this necessarily . . . . ), but it is fun for scrolling. Being able to sync to my Podcasts and iTunes is also a definite plus. I know that iPhone is compatible with my work e-mail system, so that’s not an issue either. And it can go international, which was the main reason why I picked my BlackBerry 8830 in the first place.

Now, nice things about the BlackBerry Tour include the fact that I can increase the memory by adding a micro SD card, and that they give me a 1 GB out the door. That’s pretty sweet. Then, I found out that the new BlackBerry will also have a similar capacity for apps. As an upgrade to my current phone, this one has all the same capability, but adds on a camera and video feature, which I had been missing. The screen resolution is also pretty sweet. They say it supports AAC encoding, so I shouldn’t have to convert my iTunes library, and that it might soon or already does have an app to help with syncing.

Soo…. What can the iPhone do that the Tour cannot also do? And I can still save my $60 a month, by getting rid of my second cell phone. Please discuss benefits of one over the other in the comment box.

5. This Crazy Bipolar Weather
Today it has been alternating between being sunny with puffy white clouds and torrential downpours. Seriously. We left Mass, went to CostCo, came back and it started raining like crazy, just made it in the church before we got completely soaked. Then, we had our 1.5 hour Faith Café meeting, and by the time we got out, everything had dried up! I even managed to mow the lawn when I got home! It wasn’t wet anymore! Then, just now, the rains came again. I raced out, snapped a couple pics, then . . . it was over. Sun’s peeking out again. 🙂 Gotta love Michigan!
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6. Reading Material
I am SO excited, because I have finally finished reading the entire Bible! Okay, okay, so I did this a couple weeks back, but I am still excited! I have bought myself a new Ignatius Bible, RSV translation, the leather one. Yay! Isn’t it gorgeous?! (Humor me)
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My next project is to read the entire Catechism of the Catholic Church! 🙂

7. Blogging and Facebook
Have you guys noticed this phenomenon in your personal life? I have noticed that the more I am on Facebook, the less I blog. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or not. I tend to get more feedback from Facebook (I think my “feeds” are more read there), yet I can’t usually go into depth on any topic. I just found out how to link my blog posts to my Notes on Facebook. Let’s see if this helps any, or just confuses the matter. 🙂

CCC 27

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“The dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God. This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into being. For if man exists, it is because God has created him through love, and through love continues to hold him in existence….”

Okay, so this is at the very beginning of my Catechism, which I received on January 14, 2007, the very first day I stepped into church. So why is it that I am just reading it now, almost exactly 2 1/2 years later?

LOL, I must have skipped that section by coming late to RCIA. 🙂

I have a difficult time seeing myself as loveable to anyone, much less God, who knows everything about me. But that one phrase, “through love continues to hold him in existence” I have heard mentioned before, but didn’t really understand it, so I just set it aside and didn’t pay much attention to it.

But I think that was perhaps the wrong thing to do. Because that might be one of the most important phrases.

What it means is that we exist because God, at every moment, is actively willing our existence. It is not the case that God just made us and then checks in on us from time to time. Rather, if God for just one instant ever *stopped* thinking of us, we would cease to be. That level of attention, dedication and love is really unfathomable.

At every instant, God is choosing for us to be in the world. He is advocating on behalf of our existence. He is giving us life so that we can choose to share in His divine life.

I — and all of you — are *far* more loved and cared for than we ever dreamed was possible. Would that we come to realize the incredible magnitude of that love — it would change everything.

God bless you; He loves you so very much!

If I Am

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So, you may know, I have been having medical problems lately. I’ve been to the ER twice, been admitted once, going through tons of outpatient testing. While they haven’t “officially” found anything, they are thinking that it is a cardiac issue, and one which is not so great to have (as if any are great, really). Lately, I’ve been upset because I am so incredibly fatigued. I mean, ridiculously fatigued. Like, I can’t be awake more than 30 minutes without feeling like I need to lie back down for a nap, and then actually napping for 4 hours straight. It has been beyond irritating for me. I hate being idle. I feel like I’m wasting my day.

Today, I woke up, went to Mass, went out with some friends to lunch, came home and anticipated tossing a load of laundry in the washer and uploading some pictures. Nope. Way too tired. Decided that I’d read a book in bed. Nope. Nap time. Now, it’s like 1:30 pm or so? Yeah. Woke up at 5:30 pm. Where has my weekend gone?? 😦

As soon as I woke up, these lyrics were playing in my head, particularly the highlighted phrases:

“If I Am” by Nine Days

So your standing on a ledge,
It looks like you might fall.
So far down,
Or maybe you were thinking about jumping.
Now you could have it all,
If you learned a little patience!
For though I cannot fly,
I’m not content to crawl!…
So give me a little credit,
Have in me a little faith!
I want to be with you forever,
If tomorrow’s not too late!…

And it’s always too late when you’ve got nothing
So you say!…
But you should never let the sun set on tomorrow,
Before the sun rises today…

IF I AM!
Another waste of everything you dreamed of,
I will let you down…
IF I AM!
Only here to watch you as you suffer,
I will let you down…

So your walking on the edge,
And you wait your turn to fall.
But you’re so far gone,
That you don’t see the hands upheld to catch you.
And you could find the fault,
In the heart that you’ve been handed!
For though you cannot fly,
You’re not content to crawl!…

And it’s always too late when you’ve got nothing
So you say!…
But you should never let the sun set on tomorrow,
Before the sun rises…

IF I AM!
Another waste of everything you hoped for,
I will let you down…
IF I AM!
Only here to watch you as you suffer,
I will let you down…

So you’re standing on a ledge,
It looks like you might fall…

IF I AM!
Another waste of everything you dreamed of,
I will let you down…
IF I AM!
Only here to watch you as you suffer,
I will let you down…

The answers we find,
Are never what we had in mind.
So we make it up as we go along…
You don’t talk of dreams
I won’t mention tomorrow.
And we won’t make those promises that we can’t keep…

I will never leave you!
I will not let you down!
I will never leave you!
I will not let you down!

While I might be frustrated, I need to remember that God is always with me. That He is not here to watch me as I suffer. And that even crawling, we are still making progress, and the only progress worth making is that which draws us closer to being with Him forever.

Guess Who This Is!!! :)

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Guess Who This Is! -- DSCN7978

I thought this was absolutely perfect!  On so many levels!  🙂  The image is a photo I took of the card.  But go ahead, give me your guess in the comment box as to who this is and why I think it fits so very well!

🙂

Thursday Humor

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(Thanks to Michael for sharing!)

Recently, a large corporation hired several cannibals to increase their diversity, “You are all part of our team now,” said the Human Resources Rep. during the welcoming briefing. “You get all the usual benefits and you can go to the cafeteria for something to eat, but please don’t eat any employees.” The cannibals promised they would not.

Four weeks later their boss remarked, “You’re all working very hard and I’m satisfied with your work. We have noticed a marked increase in the whole company’s performance. However, one of our secretaries has disappeared. Do any of you know what happened to her?”

The cannibals all shook their heads, “No.” After the boss had left, the leader of the cannibals said to the others, “Which one of you idiots ate the secretary?” A hand rose hesitantly.

“You fool!” the leader said. “For four weeks we’ve been eating managers and no one noticed anything. But NOOOooo, you had to go and eat someone who actually does something.

Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?

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Thanks to Ironic Catholic and The Curt Jester for today’s Humor of the Day! 🙂

Teilhard de Chardin:
The chicken was pursuing a teleological upsurge toward final consumation in the Omega Point of Divine Love.

Flannery O’Connor:
The chicken was struck by a truck while crossing the road, but experienced a flash of grace in the instant of its death. I prefer peacocks anyway.

Thomas Aquinas:
Whether the chicken crossed the road?
Objection: It seems that the chicken did not cross the road, for chickens are accustomed to the farmyards that are the source of their food, and the henhouse that is the source of their rest.
On the contrary, “And God said to Noah, ‘Go into the ark, and take with you . . . seven pairs of birds of the air. . . .” — which could not have been accomplished had the chickens not crossed the road to the ark.

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:
We don’t care why the chicken crossed the road, as long as it had the right of way and crossed in an approved crosswalk.

St. Lawrence of Rome:
Run, chicken, run! Run from the rotisserie!

St. Paul:
Let’s just hope that the chicken had a life-changing encounter with the risen Christ along the way.

Moses:
And the angel of the Lord went before the chicken, and there was a strong wind, and the traffic parted before the chicken, so that it was able to go into the midst of the road, with the traffic forming a wall on the left and a wall on the right, so that the chicken crossed the road safely. The farmer pursued the chicken into the midst of the road, and the angel of the Lord looked down on the chicken, and the traffic closed in on the farmer, so that the chicken did prevail with the help of the Lord.

Father Daniel Berrigan:
Clearly, the chicken crossed the road as a nonviolent protest of the road’s implication in the military-industrial complex.

Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments:
We’re not sure, but if it was trying to reach across the road to hold hands with another chicken during the Lord’s Prayer, we may have to butcher it.

Ad Hoc Committee to Oversee the Use of the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
The Ad Hoc Committee to Oversee the Use of the Catechism of the Catholic Church declares that this joke is not in conformity with the Catechism of the Catholic Church because 1) it lacks Trinitarian organization; 2) it fails to teach about the judgment of all chickens and the real possibility of hell for all chickens; 3) it fails to mention the fallen nature of the chicken; 4) it fails to use the male personal pronoun to refer to God . . . in fact, it doesn’t mention God at all. Why we are reviewing this? What was the question again?

Job:
…and while we’re getting into it, why did the chicken cross the road, anyway?
God:
Who is this who dares darken counsel by asking why the chicken crossed the road? Gird your loins like a man; I will question you, and you will answer me: Where were you when I made the chicken, with its ineffectual yet tasty wings? Did you give the chicken its cluck? Is it by your wisdom that the chicken runs, flapping its wings toward the distant horizon? Did you set the foundations of the earth upon which the road runneth? Answer, for surely you are great in years!
Job:
Of what account am I? See, I will lay my hand on my mouth, and ask no more why the chicken crossed the road.

Karl Rahner:
If the chicken has made a fundamental option to cross the road then he will indeed cross the road

G.K. Chesterton:
A chicken decided to go to a foreign country and to invent his own heresies. What the chicken found instead is that in fact he had never left his country and had crossed the road and discovered that his heresies were orthodoxy.

Therese de Lisieux:
If the chicken decides to make himself small, God will lift him up and place him on the other side of the road.

Sister Joan D. Chittister:
The chicken crossed the road as a sign of prophetic road crossing to get away from the male dominated hierarchy

Saint Benedict:
The chicken crossed the road to get away from me even though I assured him I was not the Benedict associated with eggs.

Saint Jerome:
The chicken crossed the road since some fool left the vulgate open and he escaped.

Saint Ignatius:
The chicken crossed the road out of obedience to the Holy Father. The chicken should always be disposed to believe that crossing the road is good, if the hierarchy of the Church so decides.

Blessed Mother Teresa:
The chicken crossed the road to help the poorest of the poor chickens.

Saint John of the Cross:
The chicken crossed the road because he realized he was attached to this side of the road. The chicken that is attached to one side of the road however much good there may be in it, will not arrive at the liberty of divine union.

Saint Anthony the Great:
Obviously the chicken crossed the road to get to the desert to purge himself because he suffered from boredom, laziness, and the phantoms of hens.

Saint Domenic:
I suspect that the chicken had Albigensian sympathies since he crossed the road when he saw me coming to preach.

Saint Anthony of Padua:
I have no idea why the chicken crossed the road, but fish I have experience preaching to.

Saint Joseph:
The chicken received a dream over the night warning him to cross the road.

Redemptive Suffering: Our Gift to the Father

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From Volume One: Directions for Our Times as given to Anne, a lay apostle: Thoughts on Spirituality:

Think of Jesus’ Passion as a big present. I mean the biggest you can imagine. As big as a house. It is wrapped in the most precious gold paper, with exquisite bows and garlands around it. The gift is so beautiful it takes eternity to walk around it, study it, and admire it. There are countless different facets of this gift. The study of it will indeed take your lifetime, and much longer.

Now say you want to emulate that gift. Do you have the power, the technology, the creativity to come close? Not on your best day, of course. You were not intended to create that glorious a gift. But this big gift is going to your dad, so you want to enclose some well wishes too. So you get a little gift and you wrap it up in the closest thing to the gold paper you can find. And you set your little gift at the foot of the big one. That is uniting your suffering’s to Christ’s. When your Father sees the gift, from His beloved child, does He say, “What a little gift. How puny it looks next to this big one?” Hardly. He smiles, like any father, and His heart is moved to all manner of generosity by your love and effort. His heart is gladdened. This is uniting your suffering to Christ [41-42].

Wisdom from “The Imitation of Christ”

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by Thomas à Kempis, published by Vintage Spiritual Classics:

“…the union he desires with God is sacramentally achieved on earth whenever he partakes of Christ’s gift of His Body and Blood in the Eucharist.” — Introduction, page xxxvii

“No one undergoes a stronger struggle than the man who tries to subdue himself.” — Book 1, Chapter 3, page 6

Anchor of the Soul

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This struck me as I was reading the Scriptures this morning. I love the picture which came to mind.

This we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and firm, which reaches into the interior behind the veil, where Jesus has entered on our behalf as forerunner, becoming high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. — Hebrews 6:19-20.

I found this passage to be very Eucharistic. The Eucharist — the very real Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of our Lord — is the anchor of our soul. Without Him, we can achieve nothing. Our souls find no rest. Our toil is fruitless. Our hope is in vain. In feeding on Him, we take Jesus into the very core of our being, whether we are aware of it in that moment or not. Within us, God-made-flesh goes behind the facade we erect — our public persona — to the heart of who we are, where we cannot hide from Him. With the power of He who created all that is, He dwells within us; changing us from our core, and giving us the grace and incredible power that He has to offer which can dramatically change our lives — if only we cooperate with that.

Jesus became human for us, so as to become the ultimate sacrifice for our redemption. The saving power of that sacrifice, the love that prompted that unimaginable humbling of our God to come down to our level so as to save us — this is what we take inside of ourselves every time we partake of the Eucharist. How humbling for us this should be. How incredible that we are able to take this for granted. He not only humbled Himself so as to save us, but He further hid Himself under the appearance of unleavened bread and wine so that we might take Him into ourselves — to further unite ourselves to Him, which has been His intention from before the Fall.

I love going to Mass. Not because I particularly want to be able to tell you all that I go to daily Mass and have you think that I am somehow more holy or more devout or something like that. I certainly know that I am nowhere near being a holy person! I just mention this so that you may perhaps come to find the peace and strength and grace of the Lord which I have found. Perhaps it is more telling of my inner sinful nature that I do go to Mass nearly every day. I need Him to make it through my day! And even then I fail much of the time!

I find myself adrift on a sea of my own wretchedness, unable to navigate my way home. I thank God the Father for providing us such a Son — who is the anchor of my soul, who can penetrate all my defenses and reach the core of my being to get my attention and lead me home.

Spiritual Thoughts from our Papa

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— From “Benedict XVI: Spiritual Thoughts in the First Year of His Papacy” by United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

On spiritual deserts: “…the emptiness of souls no longer aware of their dignity or the goal of human life.”
“The world is redeemed by the patience of God. It is destroyed by the impatience of man.”
“The Word of God and reason go together.”
“We cannot communicate with the Lord if we cannot communicate with each other.”
“…without suffering, nothing is transformed.”
“…for the ascent to life’s future it is essential to exercise an interior life.”
“True joy is something different from pleasure; joy grows and continues to mature in suffering, in communion with the Cross of Christ.”
“The more you seek Him, the more you are moved to seek Him.”
“…only those who first listen to the Word can become preachers of it.”
“…no community can forego the witness of a prayerful priest…”
“‘Spiritual reading’ of Sacred Scripture consists of pouring over a biblical text for some time, reading it and rereading it, as it were, ‘ruminating’ on it as the Fathers say and squeezing from it, so to speak, all its ‘juice,’ so that it may nourish meditation and contemplation and, like water, succeed in irrigating life itself.”
“Deceived by atheism they consider and seek to prove that it is scientific to think that all things lack guidance and order as though they were at the mercy of chance.”
“The closer a person is to God, the closer he is to people.”
“Faith…is the criterion that determines our lifestyle.”