Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Not here, back soon, and Words of a Martyr


Replace babies with two hungry teens and two hungry twenty-somethings to  see what life will be like  the next few days. 






Posting will be scant to nonexistent til next week--just got an assignment to interview a notable Catholic evangelist whom I was dying to get to talk to anyway, so this is exciting! But it will occupy my every rational and irrational thought other than what is necessary to hold the home front together.  Today: do research on this person and do laundry. Tomorrow: interview this person and make notes for evening  parish bible study. Feed children if time permits.Attend bible study.  Friday: write 2000 words, arranged in coherent sentences and paragraphs. Do more laundry.Encourage children to watch videos and dine on doritos and ice cream. Continue article in a caffeine induced mania through the night   if necessary. Saturday: submit article, direct kids to clean bathrooms and vacuum rugs before collapsing. Hope editor is happy. Sunday:Go to mass. Serve a nice brunch to make up for last week's bad dinners.  Think about blog once more.

In the meantime, do not neglect the Office of readings for the North American Martyrs. If you use ibreviary, you have to scroll WAY DOWN to the bottom to find the right stuff.I'm guessing Divineoffice.org, being American, gives our martyrs more prominence. Don't forget, if Office of Readings is too much to fit into your day, you should just go to the second reading, which is always interesting, and is often stuff you won't come across anywhere else.  Here's a teaser, the actual prayer of St. Jean de Brebeuf as he contemplates martyrdom:

My God, it grieves me greatly that you are not known, that in this savage wilderness all have not been converted to you, that sin has not been driven from it. My God, even if all the brutal tortures which prisoners in this region must endure should fall on me, I offer myself most willingly to them and I alone shall suffer them all.