Ten minutes ago I finished playing a dirge-of-an-entrance-hymn perfectly suited for Lent: Forty Days and Forty Nights. I played the organ extra slow just to make sure no one would enjoy it. Looking at their faces I’m thinking I succeeded. But as I start to listen to the prayers at Mass and hear the readings [...]
Christmas Cards, official items printed with a Christmas message and sent to wish others a “A Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You.”, were first printed in England in 1843 making them as old as the opera Don Pasquale, the United Free Church of Scotland, the British colony of Natal, a Christmas [...]
There are those Catholics who check in for services on Christmas and Easter twice a year and pretend they’re visiting from out of town. Then there are those Catholics who choose to go the extra mile and attend Mass on Ash Wednesday, thus increasing their holiness by nearly 50%. It is a not-so-subtle way of [...]
Catholics really like sacred scripture. In fact we just plain love the Bible and the Church fully asserts that it is written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, that they have God as their author. Now some will drop their jaws at this and say “whaaaaat!” Don’t you Catholics believe plenty of things that [...]
We all have fears and phobias. The Church has patron saints to protect you from them. Print this list out and carry it with you so you will have the prayers you need to get you through the terrors of every day life. St. Gertrude of Nevilles (March 17) Suriphobia – Fear of Mice In [...]
(not that kind of director!) Catholics like spiritual directors. Good luck finding one…but we like them a lot. Good luck finding a handy definition for spiritual direction as well. Basically, THE Spiritual Director is the Holy Spirit. The human director is a person with whom you discuss your spiritual journey, who teaches you to notice [...]
One could never accuse the Eastern Catholic of being a lazy participant in the liturgy. Throughout the almost two hours of celebration the clergy and laity do enough moving to merit applause from the US Gymnastics team. A Divine Liturgy is also a noisy place. The silences common to the Roman Rite do not exist [...]
What Can Brown Do For You? I’m glad to have the opportunity to explain more about sacramentals, which seem to drive many people around the bend. I hope those who have been driven around the bend by sacramentals and the questions about them are offering up their suffering. It IS LENT.We’ve had quite the discussion [...]
Catholics love lists. They’ve inherited this trait from their Jewish forebears. Adam named the animals, and Noah probably used a list to make sure he got them all on the ark. His descendants made sure they included long lists of geneology in their sacred Scripture. Eventually they graduated into discreet quantities:12 Tribes of Israel, The [...]
Catholics like candles. Lots of candles. We like them next to the altar. We like them next to the ambo (that’s the lectern, guys). We like to light them from big bonfires once a year, and give them to babies we’ve just splashed with water. We particularly like to talk about the significance of the [...]
