Finally!

It is a very good day today because my new 1962 Daily Missal arrived yesterday from Baronius Press!

I have not had a chance to have a proper look yet but I 'christened' it this morning by reciting the Morning Prayers.

I am very happy with my purchase!

For the Love of God

In his 'Conversations' Br Lawrence of the Resurrection says 'that he was always ruled by love, without any other consideration'.

He said 'that he found his resolution to make the love of God the end of all his actions the only satisfactory one.'

He further says that 'our business is simply to love and be happy in God.'

Why are we so afflicted that none of our leaders want to follow this simple rule. Why will no one in a position of authority and power, stand up and publicly declare that under their government, their authority, they will make love of God the end of all their actions. We need rulers who are grounded in the Beatitudes, in the Cardinal and Theological Virtues . . .

But then, upon reflection, I must concede that these words are all very well and fitting in the right context but what about me. I am the ruler of my decision making.   Am I ready to make my love for God the end of all my actions? Will I do everything for the Love of God?

I most certainly don't do it at the moment. 

I think that the log in my own eye will have to try and be removed as one of my first actions . . .

Pies

In my blog profile I say that I like to bake and eat my own cakes.

That is true.

I also like to bake and eat other food too - such as pies.

Thanks to the wonderful Providence of God, I was able to make six minor chicken pies this weekend for our week's dinners (it is hard to find the time to cook after a long day at work)  That's three each - one for each day and I shall think of other things to eat for the other two days.

I flavoured them with orange zest and an eggcup full of medium sweet sherry and they are delicious (if I do say so myself).

So I took a photo of one of them. . .

And here it is!

May I share with you?

To mind mind this is a most inspirational representation of the Crucifixion.

It was painted by the great Spanish painter, Diego Velazquez de Silva (1599-1660), and is to be found in the Prado Museum, Madrid.

This painting says a great deal to me.  It attracted me from the moment I first saw it and so I bought it in postcard form.

It sounds rather trite to call it my 'favourite' painting of the Crucifixion.  'Powerful' would probably be a more apt descriptive word to use.

Anyway, I feel very drawn to it and so I thought I would share it with you. . .

I admire. . .

St Philip Howard!

A true confessor for the Catholic Faith!

Why?

For his steadfastness in the face of ten years of tedious imprisonment.

For his willingness to be moved by God and as such to renounce his former, sinful life.

For his serenity in the face of certain death (sentenced to death for attempting to leave England, he expected each day of his imprisonment to be his last, never knowing that the Queen had not signed his death warrant.)

Corpus Christi

Today is the Feast of Corpus Christi and here in Germany it is a public holiday.

I went to Mass at 9am and my goodness what a beautiful experience it was.  

What a Holy exaltation of the Most Blessed Sacrament!

Our Church is a basilica dedicated to St Suidbertus and today the interior looked wonderful.  The altar was lit by large candles and the air was heavy with the smell of incense.  There were four priests, thirty four altar servers (I counted them), members of the St Sebastien Brotherhood in their black silk top hats and carrying the banners of their order.  Members of the St Peter's Brotherhood were also there similarly dressed while the (I think) St Suidbertus group, were dressed in their green hussar uniforms and carrying banners with St Suidbertus on them.

Holy Mass began and, joined by the choir and the thumpingly good organ, we sang and prayed and celebrated this wonderful feast.  

At the conclusion, four men dressed in black and wearing what looked like hunting caps came and stood in the aisle facing the altar, in front of them came some of the altar servers, carrying the processional cross, they then turned and moved down to the back of the church.  As they did so we left our pews and fell in behind them, followed by the rest of the altar servers carrying bells and candles, the priests, then four men carrying a baldequin under which processed a priest carrying the Blessed Sacrament within an ornate wooden monstrance.  Behind him were the members of the brotherhoods who had been standing at the very back of the altar while Holy Mass was offered.  

The back doors (which used to be the main front doors until serious damage suffered in WWII) were opened and we processed outside into the courtyard.  Once we were all outside the priest gave the order and we processed out and down to the Rhine.  We moved passed the old castle, along the avenue and out into the fields.  Singing hymns and chanting decades of the rosary as we went.

Horses along the way came galloping across the meadow towards the fences, and then stood as if anxious to see the Blessed Sacrament pass by!  

Soon we re entered the town which was decorated with papal flags and banners with religious symbols, all the while singing and praising God.

Soon we entered the school grounds and here we stopped at the outdoor wooden chapel.  Benediction was given and then we were off again, procession through the town, past the little supermarket, the antique shop, the shoe shop, past our own apartment, down the high street where all the nice cafés are, and through the old alley ways, past the old almshouses, until we were back in front of the church for a final blessing.  The bells of the church peeled forth in joy and slowly I made my way back home.

Three hours had passed but it felt like no time at all.

Why cannot our own bishops in England, Wales, the US, Australia etc see that it is in keeping the old celebrations in full, on the correct days, with due ceremony, that we the people, gain so much spiritual nourishment?

Forgive us!

I just read this appalling report in the Telegraph.

We offend God in so many ways!

Mobile interruptions

I have just been reading an interesting post on 'Auntie Joanna Writes' (I don't know how to put links on my posts yet but you can go there by clicking on the blog link at the side).

Joanna was lamenting the way children are given sweets and colouring books etc to keep them quiet during Holy Mass. I posted my own comment in reply and this set me thinking about such things and immediately the issue of mobile phones in Church came to mind.
The other week I was at Holy Mass here in the Basilica. The priest had commenced his sermon and I was silently reading my devotions as my German is not good enough to follow what is being preached and the priest tends to mumble somewhat.
Suddenly the air was rent by the sound of a mobile 'phone going off.

The person got the 'phone out of their coat pocket and switched it off.
A few moments later and another mobile 'phone went off - it was the one that has that annoying baby squealing that gets louder and louder the longer you leave it. The owner was scrabbling in her handbag but obviously not locating the offending article because the sound was indeed getting louder and louder and louder!

In the end she ran from the church, returning a few minutes later after the said 'phone had been silenced.
It was all so intensely irritating, but imagine my surprise when not five minutes after this and yet another 'phone went off!!!
This was the absolute limit.

I can understand (to a degree) that you might forget to switch off your mobile 'phone although really you should make it one of your priorities before entering a Church anyway. But if you heard someone else's 'phone start ringing surely, surely, you would feel compelled to check your own mobile to see if it was left on?

This third interruption caused a great deal of hurrumphing from the elderly fraus in the pew behind me and this in itself was, I think, wrong.

Why?

Well, we are an imperfect people.
We need (in most cases) outside influences such as atmosphere, to assist us to create the mood we wish to enter in to.

At Holy Mass we are trying to focus our attention on God. To hear the Word and to take part in the Eucharistic sacrifice. To offer adoration and love.

The interruption of the sacred 'space' with unnecessary noise is a serious offence in my opinion.

It also indicates a certain lack of charity and is a cause for leading others in to sin because we cannot help but judge the person responsible, negatively.

We become irritated when we hear the 'phone go off. Our mind leaves its intended focus and instead we direct uncharitable feelings of irritation towards the person responsible.

I Admire. . .

Fr Werenfried van Staaten

Why?

My goodness you could write a very long book on the reasons why I admire and love this very holy man.  

Some are:

For convincing the Belgian and Dutch housewives and farmers to send food to a beaten and battered people who now found themselves without food and clothing but who until very recently had been their foes: the Germans.

For all the wonderful work he has fostered throughout the world to help in the building up of the Church: from helping to build churches, provide transport for priests, training for religious, missions, looking after poor seminarians . . .

For the great foundation that is his memorial:  Aid to the Church in Need.

For his bridging the gap between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches in newly freed Eastern Europe.

For his kindness, his prayers, his generosity, and his humility.

The list goes on . . .

(I don't have a photo yet but when I find one I shall be putting it here.)

Trinity Sunday

O Eternal God!  O Eternal Trinity!  Through the union of Thy Divine nature Thou hast made so precious the Blood of Thine only begotten Son!  O Eternal Trinity, Thou art as deep a mystery as the ocean, in whom the more I see, the more I find and the more I find the more I seek!  For ever immersed in the depths of Thee, my soul is never satisfied, always famished and hungering for Thee, eternal Trinity, wishing and desiring to see Thee, the True Light!

(This is the first stanza of a prayer of St Catherine of Siena)

Cooking with Lucia

It was hard to sleep last night - my mind was filled with thoughts of riding the new bicycle around the village and perhaps into the countryside.

Alas: rain.  Rain and more rain.

No bike riding so instead I did some cooking.

I love to cook.

In particular I love to bake cakes.

Big, small, medium, in a loaf tine, in a pattie pan, in a muffin pan, in a 6, 8 or whatever inch tin, double-decker filled with raspberries and cream, plain Madeira, Nigel Slater's fab Marmalade cake.  It doesn't matter so long as it is baked correctly.

I love baking cakes - and eating them afterwards.

So what has this got to do with Lucia Popp?

Well when I cook I cook to music and I created a special cooking CD for myself.  Along with a rousing rendition of Rule Britannia (the full one not the cut down version), various Rameau Harpsichord pieces and the Westminster Choir singing Jubilate Deo, I have Lucia Popp singing Mozart's Laudate Dominum and Exultate Jubilate.  In the kitchen, with the door closed, I can sing and cook to my heart's content!

I am sorry to all those Emma Kirkby fans but I do think that in the rendition of those two works, Lucia Popp has the edge.  I would link you to a couple of versions posted on You Tube but I don't know how to do that yet. . . 

What a sad day it was when Lucia died, at the summit of her career. . .

*I got the picture of Lucia Popp from the Princeton University Radio site: www.cd.princeton.edu/=san/tv.html/

Mobile

Here in Germany we have no car.

I sold mine and AGA doesn't have a licence anyway.  We have been relying on foot-power and the extremely good tram and bus system we have here, but the urge for something a little more independent was strong.

We did have bikes up until last year but mine began to break down and AGA had his torched (I kid you not) by some 'little urchins' during the New Year fire works display (this was after someone kicked his back wheel in).  Mind you, he would insist on keeping it outside instead of storing it on the balcony (like I did) and so, as AA Milne was once moved to write: 

"well what can any one do?"

But now we are mobile once again with new bikes.  And these are special.  They are klapp fahrrads - fold up bikes - not as expensive as the custom built Bromptons you sometimes see being carried about jauntily by their owners, but just as nice.  

Seeing that they were on sale in the next town we caught the bus after work and bought them. They came in huge, cumbersome cardboard boxes but somehow we managed to get them to the bus stop.  Arriving back in our own town we then lugged them back from the bus stop, up the hill to our apartment until I thought my arm would fall off.  At one point I did toy with the idea of taking the bike out of the box and leaving it (the box, not the bike) for the rubbish men but a dog, taking on the role of my conscience, barked at me in a meaningful way and I realised the error of my way and persevered in lugging.  Now however, in the comfort of home and looking at them all shiny and newly assembled I must say they look great.

No more slogging it by foot to work from now on.  

No more being passed by work colleagues and school children who shout out hallo before zooming off into the distance on their own fancy bikes.

It is back to wonderful pedal power for us and so we will ride our bikes wheresoever the wind takes us and then fold them up and bring them into the apartment at the end of the trip.

Our Lady of Fatima

Our Lady of Fatima

Please pray for us

Today is the Feast Day of Our Lady of Fatima!

Oh My Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, lead all souls to Heaven, especially those in most need of Thy Mercy.

I Admire . . .

Margaret (Mercy) Clements (née Giggs)

(A woman who lived the Beatitudes)

Why do I admire Mercy Clements?

I admire her:

For her unstinting charity.

For her work with the poor and needy

For her heroic care of the 'hidden' Carthusian martyrs, left to starve to death in Newgate Prison. 

For her refusal to bow to the self-appointed Head of the Church and her subsequent exile for the faith, in Belgium*.

For her open door policy to any priest on his way to England, to share some of her hospitality while waiting for a ship.

Perhaps one day Mercy Clements will be proclaimed a saint. . .

Here are two quotes about Margaret 'Mercy' Clements:

"Nine of these glorious (Carthusian) brethren, priests and lay-brothers alike, were thrown into the horrible and foetid dungeons of Newgate.  There they were deliberately left to perish from hunger, chained to the walls and pillars of their dungeon.  For a time these holy Carthusians were kept alive by the charity of Margaret Clements, St Thomas More's adopted daughter, who came to the prison disguised as a milkmaid, bringing food in her pail, with which she fed them.  When, from the king learning that his victims were still alive, Margaret could no longer enter the prison, she contrived by taking some tiles off the roof to let down a basket of food to them  But they being able to feed themselves very little, and the gaoler fearing that it should be perceived, refusing to let her come any more, the nine languished and died, one after another."

"As Margaret Clements lay dying at Mechlin, an exile for the faith, she called her husband and told him that the time for her departure was come, and she might stay no longer, for that there were standing about her bed the blessed martyrs of the London Charterhouse whom she had relieved in prison in England and that were calling on her to come away with them  Thus she was escorted by that blessed company to the joys of the heavenly banquet. 

*actually I have read that she went into exile twice: one during the reigns of Henry and Edward, and then a second time during the reign of Elizabeth I

A Dutch Treat!

AGA and I have been away for a few days in Leiden, a university town in the Netherlands.  We spent a large part of Pentecost wandering around the beautiful Keukenhof Gardens, a short bus ride from Leiden itself.  I took a lot of photos.  Perhaps even an excessive amount if you consider 200 photos too much to take on one day.  

Thanks however to digital cameras, one can take loads of photos and then do a photo 'check', deleting those you don't want and keeping those you do!  I am yet to do this . . .

In one section of the gardens there is an exhibition hall.  Last time we where there it was tulips and daffodils.  This time it was lilies.  And my goodness there were lilies everywhere!  Looking at their beautiful petals and the various colours, I am reminded of the words of Our Dear Lord as recorded in Chapter 6 of St Matthew's Gospel when speaking of God's Most Holy Providence:

". . . consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labour not neither do they spin.  But I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these."

Here is a photo of some lilies for your delight.

Tis the Season

Asparagus Season that is...

Thanks to Almighty God's most marvellous bounty, asparagus is everywhere at the moment in this part of olde Germania. 

Everyone is eating it.  

Restaurants are dreaming up new and wonderful ways to serve it. Supermarkets have it in bulk And we are eating it too.

Not every day though because of the unfortunate side effects . . .

Tonight we had roast chicken, goats cheese, Russian eggs and . . . asparagus.  And yes I know that that is a huge dob of butter on the asparagus but I decided to throw cholesterol caution to the winds because you have to have butter on your asparagus - Delia says so!

Three Martyrs for the 6th of May

My "Birthday Book of the English Martyrs" tells me that on this date (6 May) three holy martyrs died for the Catholic Faith!

Who are they? I hear you ask.

Well, the first two are Blessed Edward Jones and Blessed Anthony Middleton.  Both Priest trained at Douai.  Both captured in London.  Both sentenced to death in 1590 by the draconian laws in force at the time.  Both martyrs.

Blessed Edward was martyred opposite a grocer's shop in Fleet Street.  It had been in this shop that he had been 'taken'.

Blessed Anthony was captured at a house in Clerkenwell and it was opposite this dwelling that he suffered for the Faith.  My book gives a quote.  Mounting the scaffold the martyr said:

"Since it is not lawful to speak, behold! The Roman Catholic faith which by my speech I cannot, by my death I will confirm!

Both priests were hanged drawn and quartered - alive.  We are told that their deaths caused much discontent among the populace.

Fifty-four years to the day (6 May 1644) the Parliamentarian forces under the Earl of Manchester had just taken the city of Lincoln.  Many valuable prisoners were rounded up, and included in this number was Venerable (I don't think he is a Blessed yet) Robert Price; a well-known and staunch recusant  gentleman of Washingley in Huntingdonshire (and a neighbour to the earl).  

At this point he was a colonel in the royalist forces.  The parliamentarian soldiers, many of whom knew him by site, routed him out from the other military prisoners. . .

'Art thou Price the Papist'? they asked insolently.

The Colonel replied with dignity: 'I am Price the Roman Catholic.'  Whereupon, according to the records, they shot him dead on the spot.

Oh Blessed Company of Holy Martyrs. 

Please pray for us who are lukewarm in spirit!

Burma

10,000 dead and many, many thousands more without homes and the necessities of life. . .

How can such things happen?  What can I say to God?  How can I practice God's Presence at such a time?

A Prayer to God in times of Adversity

In all things may the most holy, the most just, and the most lovable will of God be done, praised and exalted above all for ever.  Your will be done O Lord, your will be done.  The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.

I Admire . . .

Pope Benedict XV !

Why?

Well among many other things I admire him for:

His kindness, compassion and sense of charity.

His refusal to be drawn into taking sides during the conflict now known as World War I.

His refusal to be diverted from his calls for peace and reconciliation, which not only caused him to be castigated unfairly by both sides, but which led to his exclusion from the 1919 Paris Peace Conference.

His tireless pastoral ministry while Archbishop of Bologna.

His fearlessness in opposition to doctrinal and spiritual error.

His staunch defence of Holy Mother Church.

His great love for Our Lady.

Now is the month of Maying

Today we went to the local plant nursery to get some more plants for the balcony.  It was such a lovely day.  I took some photos and I thought I would share a couple of them on my blog!

Rosary Time

I find that the booklet in the above photograph, issued by 'Aid to the Church in Need' is, for me, a great aid to praying my rosary.  I am not very good at reciting my rosary and it is only in recent weeks that I have been making a concerted effort after having listened to one of the 'Mother Angelica Classic' podcasts as put out by the EWTN Network. 

Laziness and distractions are my main enemies - especially on the weekends and days off. During the week I usually have no problems as I recite the Rosary on the way to (or from) work.  This is a pleasure for me as my walk to work takes me through the semi-rural area in which I live.  

On the weekends however, the thought of laying longer in bed, daydreaming, breakfast, doing other things, reading etc, all crowd in and before I know it I have run out of available time!  Today however things were a lot better.  AGA has taken to exercise and is going for one hour walks before breakfast.  I decided that while AGA is doing his earthly exercise I could do my celestial one.

So far so good and with God's help it will continue.

God's Holy Providence

This is the first day and first entry of my blog.  

It also happens to be the Feast of the Ascension and May Day, which is dedicated to St Joseph the Worker.

As this is my first entry I suppose I should set out my reasons for writing a blog and to do this I must quote a very kind and holy French Carmelite named Br. Lawrence of the Resurrection.

The quote comes from a booklet entitled "The Practice of the Presence of God", from which I drew inspiration for my Blog's title.

Brother Lawrence lived in Paris during the 17th Century and this booklet, which was translated by Donald Attwater, consists of conversations between Br. Lawrence and the Abbé de Beaufort, as well as a series of letter from him to various people.

Well now, as to my quote: It is taken from the First Conversation, which took place on the 3rd of August in the year 1666.

Here it is:

"The first time that I saw Br. Lawrence he told me that Almighty God had granted him an extraordinary grace in his conversion, which had taken place at the age of eighteen, while he was still in the world.  He told me that one winter day he noticed a tree stripped of its leaves and reflected that before long leaves would appear anew, then flowers and then fruit, and that this consideration gave him so striking an idea of the providence and might of God that it had never since been effaced from his soul . . ."

Ever since I myself read those words, not only have I looked on Brother Lawrence as a friend but my view of the World has changed.  I think that one way of practicing the Presence of God is in acknowledging His most Holy Providence.  

How great is Our God in His Goodness to us!