Holidays and Holy Days
Here you will find musings related to Advent and Lent, Christmas and Easter along with reflections prompted by holidays like Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day, and the onset of summer. It’s also a place for thoughts on Holy Days and related topics like the communion of Saints and the Sacraments. Posts are pictured with the most recent first. Look for season-related series or start with one of these popular reflections:
- 5 Thanksgiving Psalms to Pray This Week
- 40 Days in the Word: 3 Ways to Add Scripture to Your Lenten “Diet”
- Praying with the Penitential Psalms
- Find Peace This Advent
- The Jesse Tree: An Advent Tradition for the Whole Family
The sun is setting on another beautiful Easter Sunday. My phone and news feeds are full of Easter greetings. He is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! But at the back of my mind are the closing words of today’s gospel reading: “For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead” (see John ...
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In the mid-60s we were living in Hong Kong – my Dad was helping to start a missions hospital for refugees there. I was six. We heard that Princess Margaret and Lord Snowden were coming for a state visit, and we ran to the street to see them drive by. I couldn’t wait! From my story books, I knew exactly ...
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The man lies on a stretcher, desperately in need of medical attention. He’s not far from the door to the hospital, but no one will admit him. It’s a Union army hospital—and the man is a Confederate soldier. A nurse tries in vain to get him help. Finally she cries out, fiercely, “Everyone deserves mercy!” That dramatic scene was part ...
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Some situations just never get better. And I wonder: God—where are you?? We’re two weeks into Lent and the darkness is starting to settle in. I’m feeling the effects of self-denial and am not enjoying it. But worse is the longing for resolution to a long-standing problem. Lord—this is crushing me! I cry. Where is the end? I am trying ...
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I wasn’t thinking of Lent when I scheduled our annual baking day in the old wood-fired oven. The home we meet in was originally a boarding school, built in 1830 just as the side-flue oven was invented. The 7’ deep, brick-lined oven heated by a fire in an adjoining chamber provided ample room to bake the bread needed to feed ...
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I just spent the most boring hour of my life at Jiffy Lube, waiting for an oil change and car inspection. There were no magazines or pictures to look at, so I was stuck with my own thoughts. All around me, people were absorbed in their phones. Not even the three-year-old twins beside me offered a diversion, as they had ...
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Many of our neighbors are putting their lights and decorations away, but for us Catholics, Christmas has just begun! It started with the Christmas vigil masses and continues through the next three Sundays: The Feast of the Holy Family on December 30 Epiphany on January 6 The Feast of Jesus’ Baptism on January 1 During this time, we’re invited to ...
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“This time, I will praise the Lord.” That’s what Jacob’s wife Leah said in Genesis 29 as she named her fourth baby Judah, which means “praise.” “This time, I will praise the Lord.” This time. Because she named her first three boys for her pain: Reuben (“see, a son”) because “surely now my husband will love me;” Simeon (“God has ...
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Is it Christmas yet? Is baby Jesus here? We have children in the house this year, and their excitement is contagious. Can we open the Advent calendar? What’s coming next?! For three weeks we’ve been getting ready, and they’re starting to think it’ll never come. When we light the last candle – it’ll be almost here, I say. Then light ...
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