I am now sick. My daughter was sick last week and is still recovering. My son is getting sick. It is only a matter of time before my wife catches the same virus. I can hear her clearing her throat as I type this. The only one who won’t get sick is probably the dog. The school year is now in full swing and our schedules our completely full. With all of the things we are involved in we don’t have time to be sick. While I admit, there are probably many people out there with much busier schedules and greater commitments our schedule seems daunting. This situation reminds me of something I first heard on the Daily Breakfast podcast. It is a memo from God. Father Roderick Vonhögen first played it on DB#35. I think he received this meditation from Sister Janet. I have shared it with many people now. It has been so helpful to me and the people I have shared it with, that I am going to included it here in its entirety. I hope it helps you as much as it has helped me.
MEMO FROM GOD
To: YOU
Date: TODAY
From: THE BOSS
Subject: YOURSELF
Reference: LIFE
I am God. Today I will be handling all of your problems. Please
remember that I do not need your help.
If life happens to deliver a situation to you that you cannot handle,
do not attempt to resolve it. Kindly put it in the SFGTD (something
for God to do) box. All situations will be resolved, but in My time,
not yours.
Once the matter is placed into the box, do not hold onto it by
worrying about it. Instead, focus on all the wonderful things that are
present in your life now.
If you find yourself stuck in traffic; Don't despair. There are people
in this world for whom driving is an unheard of privilege.
Should you have a bad day at work; Think of the man who has been out
of work for years.
Should you despair over a relationship gone bad; Think of the person
who has never known what it's like to love and be loved in return.
Should you grieve the passing of another weekend; Think of the woman
in dire straits, working twelve hours a day, seven days a week to feed
her children.
Should your car break down, leaving you miles away from assistance;
Think of the paraplegic who would love the opportunity to take that
walk.
Should you notice a new gray hair in the mirror; Think of the cancer
patient in chemotherapy who wishes she had hair to examine.
Should you find yourself at a loss and pondering what is life all
about, asking what is my purpose? Be thankful. There are those who
didn't live long enough to get the opportunity.
Should you find yourself the victim of other people's bitterness,
ignorance, smallness or insecurities; Remember, things could be worse.
You could be one of them!
I found a new podcast. It is a new one from LifeTeen.com. It is a quick explanation of the upcoming Sunday readings. It is geared towards teems. If you don’t have a Life Teen service at your parish or would like to help your teenagers get more from the readings and homily it is a great resource. It is only a few minutes long and is produced weekly. The introductory music is a bit loud, but it sure does get your attention. I have subscribed to it and I am going to use it to discuss with my own children. I may also use it with my PREP class if the readings are relevant to what we are doing in class. Check it out if you have the time. Besides, won’t it be nice to have something on their IPODS that is truly good for them? While you are there you may want to check out the rest of their website. There is a lot of useful material and interesting things for teens.
Young Shepherds
Wednesday night was this first night for the parish children’s choir. They are called the Young Shepherds. The children are from both the parish school and the CCD/PREP program. Kids in 3rd through 8th grade can participate. Some older children assist out in various ways. It is amazing how wonderful they sound. My son sings and plays percussion including the xylophone. Any number of children play percussion and a young girl also plays the bells. We also have children that play the clarinet and the saxophone. The woman that runs the choir is just wonderful with the children. She has so much patience and love for them. I hang out and offer my assistance with percussion and anything else they might need. On this night I started making my sixth Rosary. After the kids choir I stay around for the adult choir. I actually sing. I finished the Rosary when I got home.
Monday night my son and I beat
Star Wars Lego II. It is a great game and is rated E10.
There is violence, if you consider shooting Lego characters with a Lego guns that blows them into little Lego pieces. There is no bad language or any dialogue at all. There are many funny outtakes from the movies done with the Lego characters. The most fun part of the game is the co-op mode. This is where you team up to beat the game. It is nice in that you have to work together to win. You can shoot each other by accident or on purpose and that adds a little fun as well. I don't usually let my son play video games on school nights, but I just couldn't resist. I wanted to finish the game as much as he did. It was really nice to do something fun together. Even though we have beaten the game there is a lot more to do to be completely finished. We played the game on PS 2, but it is available on other platforms as well. I highly recommend the game. Especially if you want to have some great parent/child fun.
Tonight was our first class for CCD for the year. A couple of weeks ago each catechist drew a saint name out of a hat to be the class patron saint. I was lucky enough to pick Saint Pio. He was my father’s favorite. My wife picked Saint Frances Cabrini. We will be learning about our saints throughout the year. While there are many resources on the internet to learn about saints, there is one that I would recommend. It is the Saint Cast by Paul Camarata. He creates a weekly podcast about saints. His first podcast back in May was about Saint Pio, also known as Padre Pio. I brought the podcast with me to class with the intention of playing part of it for the class. The first class is always very busy and we ran out of time before I could play it for the class. Hopefully, we will be able to get it in next week.
Answering Kids Questions About Catholicism
Last year when I began team teaching CCD/PREP I went looking for some books that would help me answer some of the questions the kids where asking. I found 2 really good books. Both of them are by
Matthew J. Pinto. The first is "Did Adam & Eve Have Belly Buttons?" and the second is "Did Jesus have a last name?" I found both books to be very interesting and very sound in their answers. I have used them to help answer questions in class and questions my own children have asked. Here are some of my favorite questions.
- How can we pray the Rosary and think it is a good thing if Jesus condemned repetitious prayer in Matthew 6:7?
- How can the pope be totally infallible? If he is, why does he not win the Lottery?
- If Jesus was Jewish, why are we Catholic?
All of the questions in the book were actually asked by children. Their first name and ages are actually listed in the books. I guess if you want to find out the answers you will have to read the books. I am sure you won't be disappointed.
The Real Presence and Teaching CCD/PREP
Yesterday I finished reading the book “No Wonder They Call it The Real Presence” by David Pearson. The book is about how Eucharistic Adoration has changed the lives of a number of people. The book is in an interview format and is about 175 pages. The thing I found most interesting about the book was how even when presented with great adversity the people in the book grew closer to God. I would recommend the book.
This morning a friend called me and some how we got to the subject of teaching CCD. She said that she wanted to help at her church somehow but was afraid that she wasn’t knowledgeable enough. I told her that she could start by offering to assist someone else who was teaching a class already. Then while doing this she could read the course book and a few other books to catch up on the doctrine. I also recommended a few books to get her started. The first book I recommended was "Catholicism for Dummies". 
Then I said she could read "Amazing Grace for the Catholic Heart" for some inspiration. Both books are wonderful and have helped me learn more about my own faith. I recommended the Compendium and the Catechism of the Church as reference. I really hope you gets involved. I am sure she would do a great job.
Today I finished making my fourth rosary. I can't begin to tell you the joy I have received from doing this. If you have never done it, you should give it a try. You can find everything you need at the Rosary Army. They have places to purchase materials, directions on how to make them and directions on how to pray them. They also have a wonderful podcast that deals with many issues surrounding their mission and life as a Catholic Family. They will even give you a free rosary for the asking. If you make them, you can even send them back to the Rosary Army and they will give them away for you. I was surprised at the number of people who want rosaries. Once people found out I was making them, the requests came in quickly. Now I am trying to get more people involved in making them. My first one took me more than 2 hours and it was terrible, but it was made with a lot of love. I would recommend watching the video on their site. It helped me get better. Each one I make is better than the last. I am quite pleased with how they turn out now. I have ordered enough material to make 50 more. I am planning on teaching my CCD class how to make them and how to pray them the second half of the year. It would be nice if we could then give them away, but I am guessing the children will want to keep them for themselves.
Why am I doing this?
I love technology and I love my faith. I am not sure why anyone would ever be interested in what I have to say, but in the slight chance that it might inspire or help someone, I will give it a go.
