Catholic 101: Lent

Yes, it's that time again--Lent! Time to think about what to give up, what you're going to eat on Fridays, and things like that. 

I did a weeklong series on Lent a few years ago, and you can read it here. I cover fasting, prayer, alms giving, stations of the cross, and more. Think of it as a basic Lent primer in seven parts. 

Here is Pope Francis' Lenten message for 2016. Since it's the Year of Mercy, going to confession at least once before Easter should be on our list of Lenten musts.  

And of course, Restore! If you haven't registered yet, there's still time to do so. All the details are here.  

Later this week I'll have my Lenten book post up, if you're looking for reading suggestions.  

Happy Feast Day, St. Thomas Aquinas!

Dominican Feast Day=party, in my world. 

To learn more about St. Thomas, the Angelic Doctor, you can read a post I wrote about him here. 

Lent 2016: Restore

Lent is crazy early this year, I know. Doesn't it feel like it was just Christmas? (Well, it was, in its defense...it is the 25th!) 

Ash Wednesday is February 10th this year, which makes Easter March 27, which is almost the earliest it can fall. So I can understand if the idea of preparing Lenten ideas, or pondering a Lenten program, can seem overwhelming right now. For the past few years, it's seemed that way to me. 

Can I suggest something? 

For the past two years I've done Restore, Elizabeth Foss's beautiful Lenten workshop. If you're feeling tired, burnt-out, at the end of your rope, and really in need of self-care and restoration, this is the place to come. The workshop runs from Ash Wednesday to Saturday, April 2--the week after Easter. Bonus! And all of the wonderful content is yours to keep!

There are two options: 

This is the full option, which is $49--$16 less than last year!--and you get all of these things to keep--even the podcasts. How's that for goodness?  Everything works through the Gumroad app. You can even print these things off, if you're like me and like paper copies of things to hold on to and mark up. 

$49 a bit steep for you? Here's another option: 

This one is $15. Again--you get to keep all these things. No worries about it disappearing into the Cloud somewhere. 

No, you don't have to be Catholic! Elizabeth is, and I am (of course), but there's no Special Secret Catholic handshake to get it. All women are welcome. There is, of course, the strong faith element. For more FAQs, here's Elizabeth's page on the workshop. 

I love Elizabeth's work, wholeheartedly. If you're a mom, I think this will particularly resonate with you. She's a mom of nine kids! But again, you don't have to be a mom--you don't even have to be married!--to glean goodness from this program. 

So if you're looking for a great Lenten program, I highly recommend this one. I recommend it so much that I'm here, tell you all about it. :) 

Want to purchase? Go here, and select which option you'd like! 

I look forward to restoring with you!

(Note: If you purchase from the link above, or on the sidebar, I get a small percentage of the price back since I'm a Gumroad affiliate. So you'll be helping me, too! But I definitely, DEFINITELY love this workshop and wouldn't recommend it to you guys if I didn't. It's been so helpful to me the past two Lents!)

Happy New Year! And a New Series

Happy new year, guys!

No, I don't have my months wrong. First Sunday of Advent=Church New Year. 

Advent is here-Jesus is coming. That's a good reason to be happy, right? (And Stuffing Leftovers.)

Since it's a new Church Year, I'm going to kick off a new series, starting next Monday. 

As regular readers know, I teach first grade CCD. You would think that most adult Catholics would know the stuff I teach at that level. But I'm surprised to hear, when I talk about the stuff I teach, that a lot of Catholics have no idea. They can't define "grace", or what a virtue is. (They can name virtues, but they aren't really sure what a virtue is.) They don't know how the 12 apostles died. (That's actually pretty cool.) The big things, yeah, they know that. But the things that really make Catholicism beautiful? Sometimes they're missing that. 

So I've decided to, every Monday, go through my class lesson plan, and do a post about what we teach the kids about a certain topic. We cover a lot in first grade--all the sacraments, the life of Jesus, the liturgical year, the 12 apostles, the 10 commandments, the beatitudes, saints, some Old Testament, etc. I'll go a little out of order at first and start with Advent and the Liturgical Year next week, because that's where we are. 

I know I'm continually amazed by what the kids ask, and what I learn teaching them. I hope you enjoy it, too! 

Daybook No. 112

Outside my window::

Cloudy, a marked contrast from yesterday's blue skies and sun, but since It's going to be in the 60s, I'll take it. Especially since....gulp.....snow might in the future! 

Wearing::

My PJs--I just got up (it's 8 AM as I'm writing this) 

Reading::

North and South, Mockingjay, Rising Strong,  and The Betrothed. I really like North and South--Margaret Hale is a great character. I'm late to the Rising Strong party, but better late than never, and I also have Daring Greatly to read.

In the CD player::

Fun Home and Hamilton. No Christmas music until at least after Thanksgiving!

Living the Liturgy::

Today is Lucy Pevensie's feast day! And since she's my Dominican patron, I get to party all day. 

Around the House::

Doing the deep cleaning to get ready for decorating> I don't have much to do--the tree, a few baubles, and my Fontanini creche (one of the best Christmas gifts I have ever received, ever). The Baby Jesus doesn't go in the creche until Christmas Eve, and the Magi make their way into the set proper by Epiphany. If you're looking for a Nativity set, I highly recommend this one. The figures are made of a type of plastic that means kids can chew on them, play with them, etc., and they won't break!

Speaking of Catholic households, this is a good article from Our Sunday Visitor that's worth a ponder. 

I'm also in the last stages of Tidying Up. I took three bags of books to Half Price books yesterday, so I'm still looking for the book/CD/DVD "click point" that Kondo talks about. I'm sure I'll find it--eventually. :) Until then, I just keep taking books to HPB. 

Creativity::

I have "won" NaNo--but the book's not done. Oh no. I'm going to write a sequel. (I can't believe it either!) Nothing about this book has gone the way I thought it would, but it's been in a great way. My friend Andrea says the "muse has inhabited me", and while that may or may not be true, it sure is fun. I will officially "win" NaNo on the 20th, when you can start verifying word counts. 

So I have to put an ending on this guy (a cliff-hanger, of course), and then start the new document for book two, maybe do some outlining--and then touch nothing until January. This is what usually happens with my NaNo books--I finish them in November and then don't touch them until January. That gives them, and me, a nice break before I begin revising/editing. 

And I can purl! You'll see the proof tomorrow in the Yarn Along. 

Pondering::

In light of the attacks on Paris, this is an excellent read. It's long, but it's well-worth the time it takes. 

There are so many problems in our world that are new, and all colliding at once--fighting a war against an enemy we can't see (as Judi Dench said in Skyfall), the Syrian refugees, elections, earthquakes in Mexico and Japan....

The only solution I can see to it is to pray more intensely. 

Plans for the week::

Not much, which is nice. CCD on Sunday, when we'll talk about Jesus' birthday (we talked about Advent last week). And then it's Thanksgiving week, and then we're into December! Holy cow!

This Week's Question: How do you celebrate Thanksgiving in your family? 

Deciding who lives and who dies

First, we have some OP Power, from Fr. Thomas Petri, who is the Academic Dean of the Dominican House of Studies in D.C. 

A sampling: 

Do we lose something, as a people, when it not only becomes legal but also expected that those with terminal illness should “choose” to die? If the European experience tells us anything, it is that those expectations willinevitably come. As clinicians morally coerce patients to end their lives (or impose that choice themselves) they will say that such is the caring thing to do, to free the friends and family who would otherwise be bound by responsibility. Yet no one is an island. It’s okay to be dependent. And though it’s difficult, we each know we owe constancy to those who need us the most.

This is one of my hot topics, obviously. In some countries, I'd have been aborted, using today's technology. I am genetically imperfect in a variety of ways. I have CF. I have thalessimia minor--and in Cyprus, babies with thalessimia are aborted, to the extent that there aren't new babies born with it. * 

I've been dependent on other people for most of my life, and I will continue to be so. I can't use a phone, so my parents have to make any necessary phone calls for me. My parents pay for my medications that keep me alive, because my salary is so low that there's no way I could pay for all my health care and live independently. My mom accesses my port every month. My life is totally dependent on the drugs I take. Without them, I'm not here. Heck, I'm only alive because someone decided to donate her organs. Like Blanche Dubois, I exist on the "kindness of strangers." 

Is it great, all the time? Well, no. I'd really like to be able to use a phone, but I like being alive more, so I don't begrudge--too often--the drugs that made it necessary for me to have the bionic ear. 

By my count, I've been close to death about five times. I've had some pretty unpleasant hospital experiences. (pH probe, chest tubes--I'm looking at you!). But never have I wished, in those moments, that I wasn't alive for them. 

"Princess, life has it all over death!", The Engineer tells Kim in Miss Saigon. And that's true. Life is the greatest gift we have. It's not perfect. No one's life is perfect. There will be pain. There will be suffering. It's guaranteed. We cannot prevent it. We cannot remove it. 

A fulfilling life isn't about what you can do. Life is precious because of what it is. We are created in the image and likeness of God. The angels envy us. No matter what we can or cannot do, physically or mentally, the most vulnerable among us need protected. Not snuffed out. 

______________________________

* for the Cyrus stat, from Wikipedia: A screening policy exists in Cyprus to reduce the incidence of thalassemia, which, since the program's implementation in the 1970s (which also includes prenatal screening and abortion), has reduced the number of children born with the hereditary blood disease from one of every 158 births to almost zero.[

Seven Quick Takes No. 100

I. 
Yes, It's a long time I've been doing these guys, and if I was on Top of Blogging Life, I would've had some giveaway today. But no. Sorry! I'm thinking about having another giveaway soon, though. 

II. 

NaNoWriMo 2015 is upon us! I really love NaNo time, even though this year it took me a long, long time to decide what I wanted to write about. I have now decided, and I'm ready to go come November 1! I'm hoping to use some of the 9 hours I'll be in the car this weekend to do some brainstorming for my characters, but we'll see what happens. (I'm going to an out of state wedding) If the brainstorming doesn't happen in the car, it can always happen in the comfort of my hotel room (maybe with Room Service? Girl can dream.)

I will try to post regular NaNo updates here, so you can keep track. Previous "finished" novels (meaning I got to 50K words and "won) are listed above in  the Writing menu. 

III. 

Yes, Indiana is the third stop of Emily's Crazy October Tour. Boston, retreat, and now, Indiana. I've been to Indiana before, but only to Indianapolis and Richmond, so it'll be a chance for me to see more of this state. 

IV. 

I was back to my CCD kids for the first time in a few weeks last week, and I missed them! They learned a lot of stuff while I was gone. Last week we talked about Adam and Eve, and this week my co-catechist is going to take them through Noah, Abraham, and Moses. You know, nothing difficult or important. ;-) I'm sad I'll be missing 10 commandments week, because I love teaching the kids about that. Explaining adultery to first graders is always  a lot of fun. (I'm kidding. Their faces, though, are a lot of fun--they always look like, 'why would anyone want to do that?!')

V. 

So, ST. John Paul II's feast day was yesterday, so Quick Takes V, VI and VII are just gonna be JPII quotes. You ready? :) 

{P, F, H, R} 7: Retreat time!

Linking up with Like Mother, Like Daughter. 

{Pretty, Happy, Real}

 I spent last weekend in retreat. It was the annual Lay Dominican retreat, which is held every October, either here in Columbus or in Cincinnati, and chapter members from four states come and spend the weekend together. I've been to St. Therese's (this retreat house) many times for silent retreats, but never for our Lay Dominican Regional Retreat. I'm going to write more about the retreat experience tomorrow, but here are some of the photos from the weekend. 

Our Lady of Lourdes in the retreat house grotto. 

St. Therese Reliquary off the main chapel. 

The chapel before vespers. 

Back wall of the chapel 

Our Lady of the Rosary

Or: Today is the Day that the Rosary Saved Europe. 

Don't believe me? Read about it here. 

Happy feast day, St. Therese!

Happy Feast Day to all of you who love St. Therese as much as I do. 

Here's a post I wrote a few months ago about her being my "accidental patron". 

Daybook No. 105

Outside my window::

Partly cloudy and warm. I'm ready for fall.....I've got a candle burning to helpfully spur my "fall feelings" inside. :) I am, however, wearing jeans! 

Reading::

Early Warning, Middlemarch, The Mark of Athena, A Year of Pleasures. 

In the CD player::

Sarah McLachlan's Shine On. 

Remembering::

A dear colleague/friend of mine, Cheri Mitchell. She was the former director of BalletMet, who had just retired, and I met her during my work with the Young Professionals board. She was so dedicated to her work and the arts in Columbus, but she was also incredibly supportive in my own writing and theatrical endeavors, often leaving kind notes or comments on my Facebook page whenever I wrote about theater project or writing updates. I will miss her. 

She was hit by a car when she was out running this morning. It's so crazy to think that she woke up this morning and was fine....and now she's gone. 

I will be keeping her soul and her family in my prayers. Can I ask y'all to do the same thing? 

However, Cheri would've been pleased with this next bit....

Writing::
The book, as we know, is done. And it will be mailed out tomorrow! I have to scribble out a cover letter tonight, but soon it will be on its way to San Francisco....and then I wait!

My newest Real Housekeeping piece is up, as well! It's a little different but I think you'll like it.

And I also think I've solved the problem of my 2014 NaNoWriMo novel. Basically, I started writing this novel, and it just didn't want to write--I was missing something. But I think, with some thinking on it, I have a new idea an possibly a new format for it (multiple narrators). Now that THE BOOK is done, I have time to go back to some of my fiction projects that are in various stages of completion. 

Health::

I had a clinic appointment yesterday, and everything is stable, so that's good, and I got my flu shot. Oh joy! I had a dentist appointment today, and I've got my first cavity in like, 20 years, so I guess that's something....going back to have that fixed after the Boston trip. It's super tiny so it's not a huge deal but I was sad to break the streak of Awesome Teeth. :-P 

Pondering::

The Pope's visit and the Synod on the Family. Both of these things sort of give me the heebie jeebies. I miss John Paul and Benedict. I know we've had "average" popes before, but the majority of my life was spent under two amazing popes, one of whom is a saint. 

Pope Francis makes my head hurt. When I read Laudatio Si', I spent a lot of time going "what? What does that mean?" I know he's Argentinian, so he's coming to things from that perspective. I know he's South American. I know he doesn't speak English. But I just can't get a good read on him, or really understand what's important to him. He just seems so all over the place. I don't really like it when the pope is all over the place. 

I'm listening to Fr. Robert Barron talk at the World Meeting of Families right now, which is the precursor to the Synod, I think. The Synod also makes me nervous. I don't like changing things to be "modern" or "hip." I like things that are true. I'm a Dominican. I don't like to see things change that are contravene truth and what we believe. I'm hoping that doesn't happen. I'm also hoping the pope doesn't say something inexplicably crazy in front of the UN or Congress. 

Maybe I'm worrying too much, and maybe I just need to "let go and let God." But I still worry. And it's not that I feel "challenged" by him--it's that a lot of the stuff he says is so dang confusing!

Around the house::

Took five more bags to Half Price books today--CDs and books, mostly. Yes, I skipped ahead a bit and did my CDs today. The CDs are supposed to be done after paper. I did the downstairs paper, which is stuff like my lease, tax returns, etc. and tossed the stuff I didn't need anymore, and managed to combine what I do need into one vertical file. There are also the papers in the office, which will probably just be summarily trashed, because it's stuff that Kondo calls "seminar notes"--things I printed out, meaning to read them.....and then never did. Out they'll go. 

From the kitchen: 

I loved Jamie Oliver's chicken fajitas so much when I made them a few weeks ago that I'm making them again. I serve them with his really easy homemade salsa and some cheddar cheese, and no tortilla, to reduce the carb load. And let me tell you, it's amazing. I think next week we're going to have another Food Stories post up about Mexican Food. I'm also thinking about making my first kedgeree this week, which excites me greatly, because it's fish and cheese and other awesome things. :) 

Planning for Boston::

We've made two reservations--one at La Summa, in Boston's North End, and one at Legal Seafood by the New England Aquarium. The Jeopardy test is at 9:00 on Sunday morning, and let me tell you, I'm going to be HUNGRY after that test, so we'll be heading to the Faneuil Hall area of downtown first, so we can eat!

"You've Got To Be Kidding!": Being Mad at God

"And you can say to God sometimes, 'you have got to be kidding'...oh, I think you can say anything. You can say, 'I am mad at you, and I am not going to be a good sport about it!' And that's prayer...It's all prayer."

--Anne Lamott

Anne Lamott and I are on opposite ends of the political spectrum, but there are times when she hits the nail squarely on the head, and this is one of those times. 

If you never, ever read another thing I write (though I hope you do), remember this: You can be mad at God. It's OK. He can handle it. 

Is your jaw on the table yet? Do you wonder how I can be a "good Christian" and write what I just wrote? 

Some people are. I've had people say to me that being mad at God is a sin that will send me to Hell. Now, I believe in Hell, and I know a lot of ways to get there, but I don't think honesty is one of those ways. 

I taught my CCD kids a few weeks ago that prayer is talking to God, which is what it is. When you want to have a relationship with someone, eventually, the gloves come off, right? What friendship, marriage, partnership, etc. doesn't have the eventual fight? Eventually, the guy you marry will see you with your makeup off. Eventually, your best friend is going to see you when you're in a not-nice mood. It's part of life. 

God made us the way we are. He wants us to come close to Him, to enter into a real relationship with Him. He loves us so much, that that love created us, and sent His son to die for us. God doesn't want, and doesn't need, us to be happy all the time. 

Should we thank God in all circumstances, like the Bible says? Yes. Absolutely. It drives me crazy when people say "God is so good!" only when the job has been gained, or the house bought, or the kid chosen for the team. God is always good. Ann Voskamp says that God is always good, and we are always loved. And we are. The Bible tells us to give thanks in all circumstances. God is never not good. He can't be--his very nature is Goodness. 

You can do that--and still get irritated at God. "God...this position I'm in right now? It sucks. I'm not real thrilled that I'm here. I don't want to be here. I want something different. But.....you are in control. But right now, I'm sort of pissed at you, and I want you to know that." 

Do bad things happen to good people? Yes. I've also been told that my illnesses, my "issues", are because I didn't have enough faith. That I didn't do enough. I didn't pray enough. That if I just did more, somehow, God was going to change everything. 

Guys. God is not a Cosmic Vending Machine. You don't put in prayers and get a Milky War Bar of Good Answer back. Yes, we have to pray, and we have to believe. But even with all those things--there is still suffering. Jesus, the Most Blameless, Perfect Person Who Will Ever Live, still died on the cross. 

Every time I've been mad at God, it's because I haven't been open to His Will. I would have long, drawn-out sessions of "I do not want to do this. I do not like this plan..." but at the end of all of them, I--and you--opened my hands and said, "OK. The only way I will stay sane through any of this is to commend my spirit to you. Just give it up. Surrender all of this to Your Will, because the only thing that's going to keep me sane in that." Corrie Ten Boom prayed that same prayer--keep me in the center of your will! Don't let me poke around outside it, because that's going to drive me crazy.

You can get mad at God. You can say "God, I do not understand any of this, and it makes me SO MAD!" That's OK! That is valid. That is prayer. 

But the thing that brings you back, and keeps you from going crazy? Knowing that He has a plan. It's His Plan, you don't know it, and you're not in control of it. Open yourself up and say "OK. Your plan is driving me nuts, but I know that without the plan, outside of your plan, I will definitely go nuts. The only way to keep myself in peace and goodness and sanity is to stay with you. You have to take me through this, because I can't." 

What do you think? Can you be angry at God? Is anger legitimate prayer? When have you been angry at God, and how did you work through it--or are you still angry? 

 

 

 

Seven Quick Takes No. 85: Things I teach my CCD kids

CCD started last week, and I've realized that a lot of folks I talk to don't know the things I teach my kids--as in, they were never taught these things.  So, for your edification--and since all of you can't make it to class--here are seven big things we teach them during first grade. 

I. 

God loves them. God loves us all more than we can possibly imagine. He created us because he loves us--and so that we can know, love, and serve him in this life, and be happy with him forever in the next. God loves us no matter what we do. However: 

II. 

That doesn't mean you get a free pass . We teach the kids the 10 commandments early on. God loves us so much that He gives us rules for our happiness. He wants us to go to Heaven to be with Him when we die--but we have a choice. We don't have to do what He asks of us. 

At our parish, the kids receive First Confession and First Communion in second grade. So we have to make sure the kids are ready for these. So that means emphasizing that God loves us, but also, that our relationship with God is hurt by sin. Confession restores grace (God's life in our souls) and our friendship with God. 

We don't want them to be scared of God, as in, terrified that He'll send them to Hell for taking an extra cookie. (Fear of the Lord is something different.) But we do want them to know what sin is, and what it does. 

III.

On that end, we teach them about Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory, and that everyone in Heaven is a saint. They may not be a canonized saint, but they are saints.  

IV. 

Prayer is talking with God. This week, we're going to talk about how God loves them, why God created them, and what prayer is. I know a lot of times we get hung up on formal norms of prayer and the "best" way to pray. But at its heart, prayer is just talking to God. That's it. You talk to your friends, right? God is your best friend. (Or He should be!) How will you get to know God if you never talk to Him? We also briefly touch on the different kinds of prayer--petition, intercession, thanksgiving, praise, adoration. 

V. 

Since we're a Dominican parish, we teach them about the Rosary, as well as Dominican saints. Our classroom's patron is St. Hyacinth. 

In that vein, we also teach them about the Church year, especially the seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter, and we teach them the Stations of the Cross. 

VI. 

They learn about the Real Presence. If I'm teaching that week, I am absolutely nuts about this. I love teaching kids about the Eucharist. When I tell them that they will receive Jesus--Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity--when they receive communion, their faces just light up. It's such an awesome part of our Catholic faith. We make sure that they know what it is before they leave. 

VII. 

Finally, we teach them about the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. I became really big on this after a priest at our parish told the catechists during a meeting that he interviewed a sixth grader who didn't know what the trinity was. I vowed that would never happen in my classes. 

So, those are some of the most important points we teach in first grade. Did you know all these by the time you reached second grade? 

Why I'm a Dominican

(For How a Lay Dominican Prays, go here) 

So, all throughout this long Dominican saints series, you may be wondering why I'm a Dominican. Well.....that's sort of an accident. 

I was unknowingly surrounded by Dominicans in elementary school. My favorite elementary school teacher had been a Dominican sister. The sisters at the convent on our parish grounds? Dominicans. My family always had a devotion to the rosary, which was given to us by....Dominicans. (You should know that by now, at least!) I always have a rosary in my purse, and my bedposts have always bedecked with rosaries. The rosary is my favorite prayer. If I say I'm praying for you, it usually means you're getting a decade of the rosary, or, in some cases, my entire rosary. 

I had always been drawn to the Liturgy of the Hours. I remember reading about them in one of my prayer books as a teenager, and I wished I knew how to pray this mysterious set of prayers. Back then, there wasn't internet like there is now--there were no websites to visit. 

I've always loved reading and study. Well, OK, not math study. (Sorry, Dad.) But learning has always been fun for me. I read our World Book Encyclopedia for fun. Sometimes I click around on Wikipedia for fun. I'm a nerd, yeah, but I like expanding my knowledge. Unless it's math. :) 

My patron saint for Confirmation was St. Therese, and I was definitely drawn to the Carmelites. As a child of John Paul II, the idea of redemptive suffering, of the meaning of suffering, was something I was attracted to, and something the Carmelites seemed to know a lot about. St. Teresa of Avila is also a saint I admire. 

So, all of this was sort of conspiring to lead me to the Dominicans--even the Carmelites. :) 

In 2010, I was looking for a way to deepen my spiritual life. I wanted more than just the prayers I was saying. I wanted a deeper, more cohesive prayer life. I knew some orders had third orders or lay associates. So I began to do a little web searching. 

I found the third order Dominican website (now we're called Lay Dominicans, but I still like being called Third Order Dominicans...I'm old-school). It talked about the four pillars of the life: prayer, study, community, apostolate. A lay Dominican prays a daily rosary, and the liturgy of the hours. A Lay Dominican loves study and the pursuit of truth. Apostolates bring the truth we study out into the world, and community binds us together. 

This sounded pretty good. Where could I find a chapter? 

Oh, two miles from my office. Really. 

At St. Patrick Church, which was run by Dominicans, there was a Lay Dominican chapter. I had also been toying with the idea of a new parish. 

So on my lunch hour that day, I went to St. Patrick's, and attended Mass. I loved the priests. I loved the way the Mass was said, reverently and prayerfully. I loved that confession was offered every day!

I went into the office and filled out a registration form. Two weeks later, I went to my first Lay Dominican meeting. 

I made life promises to the order last December, so they can't kick me out now! 

So, yes, I made up my mind quickly. But I'd been around Dominicans all my life, and hadn't known it. I knew, instinctively, that my personality and temperament fit into this order the best. Third Order life, to me, is a deepening of my instinctual desires. I have the Liturgy of the Hours, I have the richness of Dominican community--which is almost 800 years old!--and I have a place where my spiritual life can flourish under the rule St. Dominic gave his first followers.  It may not be as easy to identify as Franciscan or Carmelite or Benedictine spirituality, and one of the reasons I wrote the series on Dominican saints was to get some of them out there. We can be sort of forgotten. But Dominicans really are deeply embedded in the history of the church. 

For more Dominican saints and blesseds, you can go here.. If you'd like to investigate being a Lay Dominican, you can go here. 

Bl. Margaret of Castello: Patron of the Unwanted

In the back corner of my parish sanctuary, there's a small shrine to Bl. Margaret of Castello. When I first joined St. Patrick's, I had no idea who this woman was. Blessed Margaret of where? But the more I learned about her, the more I realized that she needs to be much better known. She's a great blessed for our times. 

Bl. Margaret was born to noble parents, who were horrified when they found out that the son they had so wanted was, in fact, a girl--and a blind, hunchbacked dwarf of a girl, no less. She was hidden away from the world because her parents were terrified someone would see her. Food was passed in through a window, and she could hear Mass and receive communion through another window. (Like many wealthy families, her family had its own chapel.) The local priest undertook her catechesis. But Margaret, for the first sixteen years of her life, saw very few people. 

When she was sixteen, her parents heard of a shrine where miraculous cures were being reported. Her parents took her there, praying for a cure. When Margaret was not healed, her parents abandoned her. 

Think about that. They left a blind, totally innocent sixteen year old girl, alone. And didn't come back for her. They didn't have a change of heart halfway down the road. 

Eventually, she found shelter with some Dominican nuns. She became a member of the third order and took care of those in prison and the dying. 

She died on April 13, 1320, at the age of 33. More than 200 miracles have been attributed to her intercession after her death.  Her body is incorrupt. 

Her feast day is April 13 (yes, a lot of Dominicans in April!). She was beatified in 1609 by Pope Paul V, and her cause for canonization is pending. 

She was a blind, hunchbacked dwarf--and yet she worked miracles. She did incredible things in her life, but her parents--and many others--thought she was useless because of her disabilities. No one is useless to God. 

For more on her canonization process, and this incredible woman, you can visit the Blessed Margaret's Guild site. (The  Guild is based at my home parish. Every Wednesday we have veneration of a relic of her heart, and special prayers, after the daily Masses.) 

St. Hyacinth of Poland: The Apostle of the North

St. Hyacinth is a pretty cool saint, and I'd never heard of him until I started my formation with the Dominicans. He's called the "apostle of the north" because of his work spreading the Dominican order to the northern parts of Europe. 

He also carries around statues. But more on that in a second.

St. Hyacinth was a contemporary of St. Dominic's, being born around 1185 to a noble Polish family. He studied in Krakow and Bologna and received his Doctor of Law and Divinity. When in Rome with his uncle, the Bishop of Krakow, he witnessed a miracle performed by St. Dominic. He immediately entered the Dominican order with two companions and received the habit from St. Dominic himself in 1220. After an abbreviated novitiate, he and his companions were sent back to Poland to establish the order there. 

St. Hyacinth established new monasteries as he and his companions traveled north. He alone continued to Krakow and went through northern Europe spreading the faith. Tradition holds that he went as far as Scotland, Greece, Turkey, Russian, Sweden, Lithuania, Norway, and Denmark. 

It was in Kiev that his most famous miracle occurred. The Mongols were attacking the city, and the friars were preparing to flee the invading forces. Hyacinth went to the chapel to take the ciborium (the container that holds Consecrated Hosts--which means they have become the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ) with him. As he opened the tabernacle, he heard the voice of Mary asking him to take her, as well. A large stone statue of Mary was in the chapel. Taking both the statue and the ciborium, Hyacinth kept them safely with the friars and safe from desecration by the Mongols. 

St. Hyacinth died in 1257, and was canonized by Pope Clement VIII on April 17, 1594

His feast day is August 17 (what a coincidence!), and he is the patron of Lithuania and those in danger of drowning. He is also, in some places, the "patron" of pirogies. He is also called the "Polish St. Dominic" for his evangelistic zeal. He was the seventh Dominican to be canonized, and he is pictured among the saints in the Bernini Colonnade outside St. Peter's Basilica.  

St. Agnes and Blessed Lucy: Saturday Dominican Special

I wrote about Bl. Lucy of Narni before, during my saint series. So if you missed that, go back and read it, because Blessed Lucy is awesome, and she's my Dominican patron. 

Today I'd like to introduce you to another Dominican saint: St. Agnes of Montepulciano. She was a Dominican prioress in medieval Tuscany who was known as a miracle worker during her lifetime--not too shabby, huh? So let's meet her. 

Agnes was born in in 1268 to a noble family. Her devotion to God was evident from a very young age, beginning at age four, when she would go to her room to pray to Jesus alone. At age nine, she entered a Franciscan convent, and by age fourteen, she was appointed bursar (the bursar provides for the material needs of the monastery and keeps the monastery's account books.). She was noted for her deep devotion to the Blessed Sacrament  and deep life of prayer, and, at age 20, was elected Abbess of her community.

People suffering from physical and mental illnesses seemed to be cured in her presence, and was reported to have multiplied  loaves, like in the gospel stories of the loaves and the fishes. Sometimes flowers sprang up around her as she prayed. She was frequently called upon to make peace between warring families in Italy. An apparition of the baby Jesus, held in the arms of his mother, appeared to her one year on the Feast of the Assumption. 

It was another vision that led her to the Dominicans. St. Dominic appeared to her one day during prayer. Due to the inspiration she received during this vision, she led her monastery to enter the Dominican order. 

Other members of the order venerated St. Agnes for her holiness. St. Catherine of Siena called her "Our mother, the Glorious Agnes", and made a pilgrimage to her Agnes' hometown where her niece, Eugenie, was a nun. 

Agnes died at the age of 49, on April 20. Her body is incorrupt. She was canonized by Pope Benedict XIII in 1726.  

Her feast day is April 20. 

St. Pope Pius V: Rosary Warrior

Pope St. Pius V basically saved Christendom in Europe--not to mention Europe, period. That's right.

Well, OK. He didn't. The rosary did. But you'll understand more in a second. 

Pope St. Pius V is the only Dominican saint who was also a pope. (In the photo above, you can see his habit peeking out from under the surplice.) Born Antonio Ghislieri on January 17, 1504, he entered the Dominican order at the age of fourteen and took the name Michael (or Michele, in French and Italian) as his name in religion. 

(Side note: This is why you call Dominican priests/friars "Fr./Br. First name." They chose that name as their name in religion, and they're proud of it! So you can call them Fr. Michael, Fr. Thomas, Fr. Paul.) 

Michele was ordained in 1528 and was sent to the Italian town of Pavia, where he served as a priest for sixteen years. While there, he wrote many pieces against the Protestant Reformation. As prior of several Dominican priories, he insisted on discipline, overcoming the lax standards that had been the rule in these priories. He was elected pope on January 8, 1556, right before his fifty-fourth birthday. 

He was very important in ensuring the formality of the Mass, and asserted the importance of ceremonials in the life of the church. He also promulgated the 1570 version of the Roman Missal, which we know today as the "Latin Mass", "The Tridentine Mass", or "The Extraordinary form". (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI allowed this form of the Mass to be more widely celebrated following a molto proprio (meaning "on his own inititative"--it's a type of Apostolic Letter) promulgated in May, 2007.) 

He also declared Thomas Aquinas the fifth Doctor of the Church, and supported Mary, Queen of Scots, against Elizabeth I in England. (He's the pope who excommunicated Elizabeth.) He is also credited with the formation of the pope's signature white garments, since the Dominican habit is white. 

Like Rose of Lima, Pius V had to deal with a hostile navy--this time, the Turkish navy, in order to prevent Italy from being added to the Ottoman empire, and its Christians being forced to convert to Islam, or become slaves. Pius V had asked the Holy League countries to fight against this invasion. The Pope also asked all of Christendom to pray the Rosary for the success of the fleet.  On October 7, 1571, the pope and the Rosary Confraternity of Rome met to pray the rosary for the success of the Holy League ships against the invaders. Don Juan of Austria led the Holy League ships against the Turkish fleet, and routed the enemy near Lepanto, off the Greek coast. 

The Battle of Lepanto, by an unknown artist. 

Pius V attributed the victory to Mary's intercession. In the Church year, October 7 is the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. It was originally the feast of Our Lady of Victory, but Pope John XXIII changed it to the current title. 

A stained glass window of Our Lady of Victory. 

Pius V died on May 1, 1572, of cancer. He was canonized on May 22, 1712, by Pope Clement XI. His feast day is April 30 (right after St. Catherine of Siena!). 

St. Rose of Lima: Saint of Peru

St. Rose is an excellent saint for our times. 

Recently, I was reading a magazine article that talked about scar removal and the various ways to do it. I laughed a bit and then sighed, because I've got a third-degree burn on my right arm. Well, I did. But it's one huge scar, and no amount of dermatological intervention is going to make it go away. I live with it, and I don't mind it--but I know to some people, it would be a huge problem. 

I'm not saying we shouldn't try to be beautiful. I wear make-up, y'all. I'm saying that St. Rose teaches us that physical perfection isn't all we should be focusing on--in fact, she saw it as a hindrance to what her real calling was. 

St. Rose was born on April 20, 1586, the seventh of eleven children born to Gaspar and Maria Flores. Her parents had little money, but some social prestige. Her baptismal name was Isabel, but she was nicknamed Rose after an incident in her childhood--a servant claimed to have seen her face transform into a rose. When she was confirmed in 1597, she formally took Rose as her name. 

As a young girl, she read about St. Catherine of Siena, and began to emulate her, especially with intense fasting. She was a beautiful girl, and was often praised and admired for her beauty. In what may be a bit of extreme measures, she cut off her hair and smeared peppers on her face.(The hair, OK. The peppers? I'm not going to try that anytime soon.) This, you can imagine, did not please her parents, who wanted her married. Her mother, especially, loved and praised her daughter's beauty. 

Rose spent many hours before the Blessed Sacrament, and received communion frequently. She undertook severe, secret penances, and abstained entirely from meat. Finally, in frustration, her father gave her a private room in the family house for her use, and her parents gave up trying to marry her off. 

She helped the sick and hungry of Lima, bringing them to her room and caring for them, and selling her exquisite needlework and embroidery to help support the poor and her family. She was especially devoted to the indigenous Peruvians, and prayed intensely for their conversion. 

During this time, Dutch pirates invaded Lima's harbor and defeated the Peruvian fleet. They intended not only to loot the city, but to desecrate Lima's churches. The women, children, and religious of Lima took refuge in the churches, and in the church of Santo Domingo, Rose stirred all of them to prayer. The pirates burst into the church, but saw St. Rose ablaze in light, holding the monstrance which contained the Blessed Sacrament. They fled and returned to their ships, leaving the churches in tact. 

Rose had wanted to become a Dominican nun, but her father forbade it, so she became a member of the third order instead. She took a vow of perpetual virginity when she was twenty, and only allowed herself to sleep two hours a night, so she'd have more time for prayer.

Rose was eventually diagnosed with arthritis and asthma. Her only human support was St. Martin des Porres, himself a Dominican, who offered her spiritual counsel. 

She died at the age of 31, after being joined to Christ in a mystical marriage, like her great role model, St. Catherine of Siena. She was canonized on April 12, 1671, by Pope Clement X, and was the first Catholic in the Americas to be declared a saint. 

Her feast day is August 22, and she is the patron of embroiderers, gardeners, florists, India, Latin America, the resolution of family quarrels, Peru, the Philippines, against vanity, and the city of Lima. She's often seen wearing or holding wreaths of roses--her mother liked to place these on her daughter's head to accentuate her beauty, but Rose saw them as her own "crown of thorns" 

St. Thomas Aquinas: The Angelic Doctor

If you've read the writing of Aquinas, angelic may not be the first thing that comes to mind. Frustrating? Yes. Deep? Yes. Angelic? Um....maybe not. But we'll get to why he's called that. 

As you also may have guessed, St. Thomas joins St. Catherine of Siena as one of the Dominicans who have been named Doctors of the Church. You shouldn't be surprised by that. Anyone who wrote as much as Thomas wrote and inspires an entire study of theology (called "Thomism", or "Thomists", for those who subscribe to his views) should definitely be ranked s one of the Church's greatest teachers. 

But in his time, St. Thomas was kind of an odd duck. Called "the dumb ox" by his brethren, because he barely spoke, Thomas was born on January 28, 1255, in Italy. Hi parents, Lundolf and Theodora, wanted Thomas to follow his uncle into the abbacy of a local Benedictine monastery. But Thomas had other ideas. 

At the age of 19, he resolved to join the newish Dominican order. His parents, displeased with this idea, tried to dissuade him, finally locking him up in his room for a year in order to prevent him being given the habit. He used this year to tutor his sisters and communicate with members of the order. Finally, his brothers smuggled a prostitute into his room, hoping she would tempt him; Thomas drove her out of the room with a flaming poker (something I always thought was a bit hard on the poor woman). That night, two angels appeared to him as he slept and gave him the grace to always remain celibate. 

Finally, in 1244, his mother relented and arranged for Thomas to "escape" his room via the window one night. Thomas escaped, and finally joined the order. The order sent him to the University of Paris, where he was a student of another great Dominican, St. Albert the Great. While there, he picked up the "dumb ox" nickname from his fellow students. Since he didn't talk much, his fellows thought he was stupid. Upon hearing this, St. Albert said,

"You call him the dumb ox, but in his teaching he will one day produce such a bellowing that it will be heard throughout the world." 

Thomas taught in Cologne as an apprentice professor, teaching students about the books of the Old Testament, and writing commentaries on the books of  Isaiah, Lamentations, and Jeremiah. He received his master's degree from the University of Paris and continued to write various theological works, including Summa Contra Gentiles, one of his most famous works. 

In February 1265, Thomas was summoned to Rome to serve as the papal theologian (a post first held by St. Dominic, and held by Dominicans ever since) for the newly-elected pope, Clement IV. Thomas also taught the students natural and theological science at Santa Sabina. He traveled between Paris and Rome many times over the years, filling various posts and teaching. 

In 1272, Thomas retired from teaching at the University of Paris and returned to Naples, where he lived the rest of his life. Here, he worked more on his greatest work, the Summa Theologica, and gave lectures. One night during prayer, he had a vision of Christ. "You have written well of me, Thomas," Christ said. "What reward would you have for your labor?" Thomas answered, "nothing but you, Lord." After this, Thomas had a vision of some sort, but he never told anyone what it was--only that after the vision, everything he had written suddenly seemed "like straw" to him, and he abandoned the Summa, never finishing it. He died on March 7, 1274, while giving commentary on the Song of Songs. Thomas was canonized 50 years after his death by Pope John XXII. 

The Summa, while unfinished, is one of the greatest theological works of all time, and one of the classics of western literature. It was intended as a guide for theology students (that's right, beginners!), and was a compendium of all the teachings of the Catholic Church. It includes topics such as the existence of God, creation, man, man's purpose, Christ, and the sacraments. It's broken into three major parts: 

1. The first part: Prima Pars: God's existence and nature; the creation of the world; angels; the nature of man
2. The second part: Secunda Pars: broken into two subparts:
   1. Prima Secunda: general principles of morality and a theory of law
   2. Secunda Secundae: morality in particular, especially virtues and vices
3. The third part: Tertia Pars: the work and person of Christ; the sacraments; the end of the world (unfinished)

His feast day is January 28, and he is the patron of academics, apologists, protection against storms, book sellers, Catholic schools, chastity, learning, pencil makers, philosophers, publishers, students, and theologians. He's called the angelic doctor because of his angelic purity, his writings on the angels, his angelic wisdom, and angelic piety.