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1. I sat and sobbed through Mother Angelica’s funeral mass yesterday on EWTN. It was a lovely tribute to such a brave, feisty and holy woman of God.
She persevered through so many trials, including going against her own bishop and other powerful men of the church – and she always won too, even if just in the court of public opinion – because she was always, always backing up her statements with the long-standing teachings of the church and the word of God.
I noticed in some of her old broadcasts she is holding a particular bible all the time. It looks well worn and used. It looks like they placed that same bible on her casket yesterday so I had to do some research to look it up. According to the EWTN web site, it’s the Jerusalem Bible, and it was Mother’s favorite bible for teaching. I might request one for Mother’s Day.
2. Father Swirski also died on Easter last week. It seems as though God was enjoying His special day by calling some of His favorite folks home to be with Him – at least that’s how it seemed to me.
Father lived an amazing life. Orphaned at 3, drafted into the army at 14, imprisoned for defying the authority – oh, and a personal friend to Pope John Paul II!
When I met Father Swirski, he had come into residence at my parish because his smaller Polish Catholic Parish was closing. And that was probably a good thing because I heard that Father was not only acting as pastor, but as janitor and gardener as well! Father was always pleasant and always smiled. He was also an amazing confessor – I looked forward to going to confession to Him. He took time to answer questions and he never laughed or yelled at me. There have been two priests that I have had deep spiritual discussions with – and Father Swirski was one of them.
3. Miss C has now been to 5 funerals; three of those were for priests. She is almost 2 1/2.
At Father Swirski’s funeral she sat still on my lap with her arms around me and her head on my shoulder, and from time to time she would sit up and kiss me on the mouth – which made the funeral very sweet for me.
My earliest memories of going to church are of sitting on my own grandmother’s lap and holding her, feeling loved and warm and cuddly. So I hope that Miss C’s experiences at church are equally warm and leave a good feeling with her.
After the funeral, Bishop Lennon motioned her over and asked her how she was, and she said, “OK.” Then she showed him her stuffed tiger, at which point he broke into a smile and moved on.
4. As much as I love cross country season, I seriously dislike track. Track is hours and hours of sitting around and then a few minutes of excitement, followed by more sitting. Unless your kid is a distance runner. Then it’s jut hours of running, a few minutes of excitement, and then time to go home.
Noah started track this week. He was running the one mile on Tuesday when he had an unexpected tangle with another runner’s feet and ended up S P L A T on the ground! My first thought was, “Oh no!! Not another broken clavicle!!”
But he got up quickly and still finished in just over 5 minutes – which is still considered kinda slow believe it or not!
5. Rosie also starts track this week. Her practices are about 30 minutes from my house, three times a week, in the middle of no where. So I have made up my mind that on good weather days I am going to walk around the track during practice to get in an extra workout. I have my MP3 all loaded up for that. But on cold days, I’m going to read my Kindle – which I also have all loaded up!
6. Noah, my youngest son and the one who is discerning a vocation in the priesthood, is going to two proms and a high school dance. There is another young lady who seems to be pretty keen on going bowling and to other activities with him and I think she might be getting up the nerve to ask him as well. If it all comes to pass, I think it will be ironic that the youngest, most serious about his faith, son got the most dates!
7. It would be a blessing to have 1/8 of this woman’s strength.