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Today I want to talk about something that drew me to the Catholic Church: the liturgical year. It’s been on my mind lately because I have just begun using the gorgeous Blessed Is She planner, and I’m re-inspired to celebrate the church year at home. In my downtime you’ll find me Googling “catholic liturgical year” and “living liturgically” and “celebrating the liturgical year at home” and filling up my Pinterest board. #nerd Photo from the Blessed Is She website The liturgical year is not an expressly Catholic thing. From what I can tell, it is also celebrated by Orthodox, Anglicans, Episcopalians, Lutherans, and to a lesser extent Methodists (although I attend a modern Methodist church that is not liturgical in…
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Last Friday was the feast day of St. John Vianney, the patron saint of the parish church I’ve been attending. They held a special mass followed by a free spaghetti dinner, so I took the opportunity to invite my husband and my parents to attend. As I suspected, they were lured by the free food and came! The night ended up being a bit rough for me (my 3-year-old son Liam did not behave AT ALL and I spent most of mass in the cry room), but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. To my surprise, the next day my husband David told me that he would be okay with our family attending Catholic church together from then on, even…
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“It’s a good thing you weren’t born Catholic,” my husband said. “You would have become a nun.” We were in the car together, without kids, a rare occurrence. It was shortly after his first detox from alcohol relapse back in October (but not the one that would stick). We hadn’t been speaking very much over the past six months, and certainly not about anything deep. Being in the car reduced the awkwardness. I thought about what he said. Finally, I replied, “You know, you’re right. I think I’d enjoy being a nun.” This was maybe not the best thing to admit to one’s husband, that one would enjoy a lifetime of celibacy foregoing marriage and family. He certainly pretended to…
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I’m in a period of waiting. Does anyone like waiting? Transitions? I would honestly like to know. I much prefer to have decisions made, plans in effect, routines functioning, etc. Primarily, I am waiting to enter the Catholic Church. Did you see that coming? Maybe, if you get my newsletter or follow me on Instagram. But the Catholic Church surprised me. After almost a decade watching one of my best friends live out her authentic relationship with Jesus as a Catholic, I finally started asking more questions about it over a year ago. I realized that I had a multitude of misconceptions about it, and discovered a fullness of faith that I hadn’t dreamed possible. I had a really hard…
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Guess what? I’m back to putting words out into the world! Although I can’t keep up with blogging these days, and I’m not very good at doing it sporadically because I put too much pressure on myself, I’ve figured out the perfect medium for me right now: I started a monthly email newsletter! The first one went out at the end of July, and a new one will go out monthly. I’m loving it because it’s more personal, more flexible, and it’s still a great way for me to share with you what I’m reading, things I love and want to share, fun links, updates from my life, and any other thoughts I’m having. I’ve received such encouraging feedback already,…
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