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+JMJ+ Being out for a walk at 5: 30 in the morning reveals a whole different San Francisco. Within a block of my apartment there are folks on bicycles, mostly guys in hoodies and caps. Their faces are obscured, their purpose is nefarious. These guys are prowling on the sidewalks, looking for something on a…

✙ JMJ The Readings for Thursday in the 17th Week of Ordinary Time (B2) Jeremiah 18:1-6 Matthew 13:47-53 Numquid sicut figulus iste, non potero vobis facere, domus Israel? ait Dominus : ecce sicut lutum in manu figuli, sic vos in manu mea, domus Israel. Cannot I do with you, as this potter, O house of Israel, saith the…

Thinking tonight about Duffy’s “Stripping of the Altars” and the Henrican Reformation: focusing on the cultural shift away from a Catholic, community village/farmland surrounded and supported by the Church’s feasting and fasting, work day and holy day schedule, to a Protestant, urban, individualistic culture, devoid of fasting or holy days (other than Sunday). The idea…

PreludiumAFTER THE CONSECRATION of the Archdiocese to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, on Saturday and, following Father James’ sermon Sunday… Rosary Sunday… and a lot of Marian focus recent, here is my witness to the Rosary! I wanted to share this story of how Our Lady brings us, via herself, to Christ, holding the Cantena…

This whole citythe culturethe foodthe beautyI offer you because here I feel, fully and finally, always at home this parish churchof prayer and praise whereClergy and religious, laity and saintsfind themselves in your presence,I offer you because here i feel, fully and finally, always at home And yet I’m so brokenaware that too much of…

Today’s Readings: Isaiah 26:1-6 Matthew 7:21, 24-27 In the Douay, RSV, and NABRE with other Mass propers. Every one therefore that heareth these my words, and doth them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock, And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and they…

A friend asked why I’ve not blogged about my experience at the Monastery. My reply is that you only meet the good side of a divorce. To be clear, I don’t think anything bad happened, and as Fr Prior noted in his recent newsletter it was a peaceable departure. The final date was suggested by…

In 2004 (Bush/Kerry), the first year the NY Times took this data in the exit poll… the bottom two income brackets voted like this: Under $30,000 —–  D 60%  –  R 40%$30k – $49.9K —–  D 50%  –  R 49% By education, the only bracket with a real win was those with post-graduate education –…

Certainly there’s no snow in Alabama ‘tall. But my brain on All Souls’ Day remembers the Dead for whom a Rosary will be said and all the offices today. My Grandparents, Bessie and Ken, who raised me for the first 6 years of my life, and at whose passing I do, sometimes, feel like an…

Per the Wiki: “For All the Saints” was written as a processional hymn by the Anglican Bishop of Wakefield, William Walsham How. The hymn was first printed in Hymns for Saints’ Days, and Other Hymns, by Earl Nelson, 1864. NB: No one sings verses 3, 5, and 6 any more. 1. For all the saints, who…

The wisdom of the scribe depends on the opportunity of leisure; only the one who has little business can become wise. How can one become wise who handles the plough, and who glories in the shaft of a goad, who drives oxen and is occupied with their work, and whose talk is about bulls? He…

Ecclesiasticus 11:2-20Revelation 9:13-21Luke 10:38-42 There is a man who works, and toils, and presses on, but is so much the more in want. There is another who is slow and needs help, who lacks strength and abounds in poverty; but the eyes of the Lord look upon him for his good; he lifts him out…

Ecclesiaticus 10:1-18Revelation 9:1-12Luke 10:25-37 And who is my neighbor?Luke 10:29b This parable is so rich, so densely packed with content that I think we should be unpacking it until the Three Woes (Rev 9:12) are all passed and we are praising God in glory. The young lawyer is there to test Jesus, and – seeking…