United in Praise: Living Out God’s Love With All Creation
Easter is a liturgical time when we celebrate the Resurrection of the One who “makes all things new” and anticipate the descent of the Holy…
Easter is a liturgical time when we celebrate the Resurrection of the One who “makes all things new” and anticipate the descent of the Holy…
“Here it comes!” my husband said, as the wind slammed our hillside house and a storm of heavy, wet flakes descended on our deck. It felt as if the sky were turning itself inside out and then falling on top of us. Beautiful, yes; scary, just a bit. The furnace stopped humming and embraced silence as a spiritual path. The refrigerator subsided, muttering, then was quiet. All of the lights were snuffed, as if light itself were being hoarded within the bulbs until a better day presented itself.
We sprang into action. Luckily, we could dip buckets into a half-filled hot tub in the basement and haul them upstairs for flushing toilets. We got out the candles and the hurricane lanterns, one so old it barely worked, a relict from hurricanes during my own childhood. My husband ran out onto the deck and started piling wood into a leather carrier, lugging it indoors — along with a blast of wet, cold air.
The main option for the “Blessing of Animals” comes from the Book of Blessings (which is available in your nearest sacristy as well as from…
Recently, on a pilgrimage in Italy, I heard a Franciscan Friar of the Renewal relay in a homily one of the many stories of St.…