In Pictures

I am in the fourth week of teaching a class at Aquinas, so I don’t have much time to post.  Okay, so I’m in the first week.  But with a Maymester class, every day equals a week of class in a normal semester.   At the end of the second class, one of the students stood up, stretched, and said, “Second week down!”  So tomorrow is our fourth class.

But I at least have time to post pictures.  You wouldn’t want to read an entire post about any of these things, anyway.  So here we go…

A few weeks ago, I made a killer lasagna for dinner when a priest friend came to visit.  He blessed my new condo and I made him dinner.  Win, win.  The recipe came from a composer-chef friend of mine.  He and his wife had me over for dinner a few months ago, and I fell in love with this Sicilian lasagna and had to have the recipe.  Lasagna with meatballs inside of it?  Score. And the ricotta cheese wasn’t overpowering.  (Trena, remember shuddering while eating the shells at Christendom?) It was deeelish.  While it was pretty labor intensive, it was a good way to spend a Sunday afternoon and the work produced awesome results.

I forgot to take a picture of the actual finished product.  So all I have are pictures of the prep.

Mmm, meatballs.

I was in the mood to make ice cream, so I did that, too.  I was originally going to make ice cream inspired by “Spouse Like a House” at Handel’s (how I miss you) — namely, ice cream with peanut butter-filled, chocolate-covered pretzels —  but I didn’t dip my pretzels in chocolate, and the ones I bought didn’t have enough peanut butter in them.  So  I ended up throwing in peanut butter cups, too.

It was good, but only because you can’t really go wrong with peanut butter and chocolate in ice cream.  I’d buy different peanut butter pretzels next time.  And dip them in chocolate.  Father ate it without complaint.

…

My “house” at school (sort of like a sorority, but not) had a bake sale to raise money for veterans who have had trouble getting back on their feet after coming home.  Since Joan of Arc is the patroness of our house, we thought helping veterans was fitting.  My friend Paul did the posters, and they just crack me up:

One of the history professors emailed me and noted, “Joan of Arc must really hate the English.”

…

Part of my job regularly takes me to Knoxville, TN, where Cardinal Rigali is living in retirement.  Many of his things from the conclave are on display in the chancery, including the prayerbook and Rite book for the conclave, the little briefcase he was given (it had the little sede vacante umbrella embossed on it with “2013″ – it’s no wonder it took awhile to get this conclave going, they had to make all these things!), his little red lap desk with his name card that was waiting for him at his place in the Sistine Chapel, a sample ballot, and the pen he used to vote.  I couldn’t get over the humorous fact that the pen is a simple blue Pilot pen.  After seeing all the special books and the embossed small briefcase, I expected some cool pen.  Or maybe a quill.  Nope, just a blue Pilot.

There were also pictures of him taking the oath and processing — right behind Cardinal Bergoglio. Very cool.

…

A few weekends ago I re-vistited a wine bar my cousin Michael had  introduced me to last year.  It’s in an old house, and in addition to a regular bar area, the different parlors in the house have machines with various kinds of wine.  When you arrive you get a card (similar to a hotel key) that you put in the machines prior to making a wine selection.  Then you choose whether you want a taste, a half glass, or a whole glass.  It’s pretty fun- and can get very expensive if you aren’t careful!  I went down with some friends for happy hour and wondered why I don’t go down more often.  But perhaps it’s a good thing it’s not closer.

…

May 1st is the Feast of St Joseph the Worker.  I happen to work in a building trailer structure named after St. Joseph, and so we decided to celebrate his feast day.  Yes, we celebrated on March 19, too.  But if the Church celebrates him twice, we can too.  In true southern fashion we had barbecue and slaw and chips and invited everyone to come hang out in our building trailer structure for awhile.

Providentially, on that same day, we received the sign for our building place of work that we requested several months ago.  We have formed a nice little community in our portable building (which just means that we’ll probably be split up before too long. Isn’t that the way it works?) and I we decided we deserved a sign on the outside of our building so people would know who we were.  A minor request, really.

Especially since this is the sign on the outside now, just to the right of the front door:

What does that mean, you might ask?  Well I did too-  eventually.  It’s apparently leftover from when the, er, structure was on the property of an explosives testing site in Bucksnort, TN.

You can’t make this stuff up.

So this sign has been on our building for 10+ years.  So leave it to me to be difficult and ask if we can have a sign that indicates we’re the St. Joseph…

But what?  What are we?  Since the philosophy faculty is at home in our structure, they said we can’t be the St. Joseph Building, because by their nature, buildings don’t have wheels.

We couldn’t very well put “St Joseph Structure” on our sign, could we?

So we decided on “St. Joseph’s.”  That’s what everyone says on campus, anyway.  ”Where is Dr So-and-So’s office?”  ”In St Joseph’s.”

But apparently that message didn’t get to the actual order-er of the plaque. So now we’re St. Joseph Hall.

We’ll take it!  Although as our sarcastic selves, we put the sign in the hallway for the first day.  ”Where are you putting the sign?”  ”In the hall.”

Our shrine to our sign.

…

You know what is dangerous?

Homemade Nutella ice cream with Trader Joe’s Ultimate Vanilla Wafers.  I was in charge of bringing dessert to book club last week, and instead of making some elaborate something or other, I made Nutella ice cream and bought those awfully-addicting vanilla wafers from TJ’s.

Too good.  You know what else is dangerous?  Trader Joe’s Oatmeal Cranberry Dunkers. My sister Jill introduced me to them, and they’re deadly.  I bought them without thinking, and quickly took them to work before I ate them all in one sitting.  Everyone loved them. And hated me.

Buy at your own risk.

My week (or two, or three) in pictures.  Food, alcohol, and Catholic stuff.  Sounds about right.

Happy Birthday, Pope Benedict!

I know, Pope Emertius.  But it still sounds weird to me.  And you all know I know he’s not Pope anymore.

Today is Pope Benedict’s 86th birthday!  So my friend Loretta and I went to eat German food to celebrate.  We toasted him with German beer.

And we ate schnitzel and spaetzle.

We tried the newest German/Austrian restaurant in town, Viener Fest, and frankly, I wasn’t overly impressed.  The food there was better than the other German restaurant in town, but it wasn’t as good as the Rathskellar in Indianapolis and not nearly as good as Cantina Tirolese in Rome.  The atmosphere was so-so and our waitress wasn’t superb.  But if I ever have a hankering for schnitzel, I’ll be back.  All in all, it wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t what I imagined when I looked at their menu.

I do love spaetzle, though, so it was a nice way to celebrate his birthday.  I wonder if he and Archbishop Ganswein had spaetzle tonight? Or a nice beer?  Or maybe just some Fanta.

Or maybe they just watched the evening news.

I love, love, love this picture.

And then I went to teach my bible study, where I asked the 60 people present to pray for him.  So that was probably better than toasting him with beer.

Different from all other nights

There are several cues during the Evening Mass on Holy Thursday that tell you something is different tonight. Mass begins and ends with an empty tabernacle.  Flowers and the Gloria make appearances after absences during these days of Lent (with a few exceptions), but the joy doesn’t remain long. The organ is quiet. The bells are replaced with clackers. The Mass ends with the procession of the Blessed Sacrament to the altar of repose and ends silently, as we wait with Jesus in the Garden. The altars are stripped.  We wait.

Two thousand years ago, twelve men celebrating Passover with their leader would have noticed differences to a familiar liturgy as well.  Jesus spoke of the unleavened bread being His Body.  And he spoke to them of a new covenant.  Then, after singing the Hallel Psalms, instead of finishing the Passover meal, Jesus left and led them to the Garden to pray.  It was a memorial they celebrated for 30+ years of their lives, and suddenly Jesus was doing something different.

Understanding the Passover sacrifice and meal helps us to understand exactly what Jesus was doing that night.  (Which is why I recommend Brant Pitre’s book Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist to everyone I meet.)

Why is this night different from all other nights?  This is the famous question the son would ask his father during the Passover liturgy.  And the father would respond, “It is because of what the LORD did for me when he brought me out of the land of Egypt…”

Notice – it is what the Lord did for me.  Not for my fathers.  Not for our people a thousand years ago, two thousand years ago.  For ME.

For the Jewish people, this “memorial” (go back to Exodus 12 and see how often it is referred to as a memorial, a remembrance) was not just a way to recall a past event.  The Hebrew understanding of remembering, memorial – zikaron – was not a passive remembering of a past event.  It was a participation in that event.  The past event was being made present for you, so that you too could share in the Passover, the redemption of the first born.

It was what the Lord did for you.

This was in the forefront of the minds of the Apostles that night.  This was on their minds as they heard Jesus’ words: Do this in memory of me.  Same word.  Zikaron.  Anamnesis.  Not “think back to this night years from now and think of me fondly.”

No.  Zikaron.  Make this present.  Participate in it.  So that it is not just the redemption of your fathers or your people two thousand years ago — but so that you can share in that redemption.

And then Jesus tells them something drastic — He is here to make a new covenant.

But hadn’t God told the Israelites that Passover was supposed to be a “perpetual institution?”

The call of the first born is not revoked.  It is fulfilled.

Do this in memory of me.

photo copyright Stephen Golder

The heroes

My sister doesn’t see herself as a hero.  We’ve talked about it before.  She goes throughout her day doing what moms are supposed to do. She wipes noses.  She answers a million questions.  She makes muffins.

And perhaps those things don’t make her a hero.  That’s just life, right?

But what she and her husband did on October 22 – and every day after that - does make them heroes.

They chose to give John Paul a chance.

On October 22, Jill discovered from her doctor that her son was developing without arms.  No one had answers to the million questions that have surfaced since that day.  Why did this happen?  What other medical complications will he have? What will life be like now?

God had given John Paul life.  And God had given John Paul to them for a reason.  And they accepted that gift.

Today John Paul came into this world, thanks to his loving and courageous parents.  In our sophisticated world full of medical advancements, many would have advised his parents to make a different choice.

But they chose to be heroes.

Smoke Schedules

In terms of Catholic news coverage, I can’t recommend enough setting up a Twitter account to follow people like Catholic News Service and Salt + Light.  Over the past few weeks, the fantastic stories, trivia, and pictures have come through that medium, and it’s been such a great way to experience all of this second-hand.

Where else are you going to find pictures like this one?

Papal cassocks gone- conclave imminent!
Courtesy of @JamesMartinSJ

So since I can’t cover all the stories, I direct you there.

One question that has come up is regarding the times of the smokes.  Before I experienced the conclave of 2005, when stories of papal elections were only pages in history books for me, I assumed that people literally camped out in the Square around the clock, waiting for the smoke.  When we lived it, we realized that we only needed to be in the Square just before lunch time and just before dinner time (Roman dinner time).  We knew the basic schedule and knew when to expect smoke.

This time around is no different.  The cardinals’ schedule has been made public, and from that we can guestimate when to expect smoke.

An important note — they only burn ballots twice a day, but they vote four times a day.  This is important, because the timing of the smoke could indicate the color of the smoke.  This is a small detail of which we were ignorant in 2005, and I can’t decide whether people are making more of a point to mention it this year because of what happened in 2005, or none of us were thinking clearly in 2005.  Let me explain.

The cardinals will vote in the morning (see schedule below).  If the first vote of the morning does not produce a 2/3 majority, they will immediately vote again.  After this second vote, the ballots will burned, regardless of result.  Same with the afternoon – if the first vote of the afternoon (the third vote of the day) doesn’t produce a Pope, they will proceed immediately to vote again.  If the first vote of the day (or the third vote of the day) does produce a 2/3 majority, and that cardinal accepts, there is obviously no need to continue voting and the ballots are burned immediately.

So if we see smoke a little early, either earlier in the morning or earlier in the afternoon… the smoke is white.  Unless the cardinals somehow sped through two votes and finished up early, we can say with confidence that early smoke = white smoke.  So in 2005, since Cardinal Ratzinger was elected on the third vote of the day, the ballots were burned earlier than they would have been if they had voted a 4th time that day.  So since the smoke was early, there should have been no question regarding its color.

Anyone who lived through that, whether at home or in Rome, heard everyone arguing about what color that smoke was.  (In our defense, the smoke looks much lighter on the close-up television screens than it does in real life, too.) So is all of this knowledge regarding early smoke being white smoke a result of realizing in hindsight that there was no need for confusion in 2005?  Perhaps.

Anyway, without further ado, I present the possible smoke schedule.  Obviously, smoke could really come any time before or after these times– this is only a guess, based on the cardinals schedules (see below), when the voting will begin, and how long it will probably take.

*NB: Since Rome isn’t on DST yet, they are only 5 hours different from EDT and 6 hours from CDT.

Day	Rome Time	Eastern Time	Central Time
Tuesday	7:00pm*	2:00pm*	1:00pm*
Wednesday	10:30am OR Noon	5:30am OR 7:00am	4:30am OR 6:00am
	5:30pm OR 7:00pm	12:30pm OR 2:00pm	11:30am OR 1:00pm
Thursday	10:30am OR Noon	5:30am OR 7:00am	4:30am OR 6:00am
	5:30pm OR 7:00pm	12:30pm OR 2:00pm	11:30am OR 1:00pm

*They don’t have to vote Tuesday night after entering the conclave, but I’m not sure why they wouldn’t.

The Vatican has confirmed that bells will accompany the smoke, just as they did in 2005.  A word to the wise — the Angelus bells will ring in St. Peter’s Square at noon and at 6, dangerously close to smoke sighting times.  Don’t let these fool you, even if commentators on certain channels get mixed up.  If we have a Pope, the bell on the left-hand side of the facade of St. Peter’s, under the statue of St. Jude, will ring.  That bell only rings at special occasions and does not ring the Angelus. Look for this bell to ring, not just any bell.

So there’s a run-down of estimates, but as I mentioned, if the Cardinals are particularly spry and quick on their feet, the trip from their seats to the front of the chapel might not take as long and smoke might come before these times.  On the other hand, if they re-elect Benedict, it’ll take them awhile to get to Castel Gandolfo to see if he accepts, and until he accepts, no white smoke.  [:)]

After the white smoke, we’ll have to wait awhile to find out who the Pope is — he needs to collect himself, be dressed in the white cassock, receive the Cardinals, etc.  So even if you don’t see the white smoke yourself, you’ll have time to get to a television to see Pius XIII or Paul VII or Gregory XVII come to the loggia.

Below is the cardinal’s schedule for this week.  I thought it was interesting and thought I’d share.

Don’t forget to keep the Cardinals in prayer!

CONCLAVE 2013
Daily Schedule

First Day (March 12, 2013)
ore 15.45 Transfer from the Domus Santae Marthae to the Apostolic Palace
ore 16.30 Procession from the Pauline Chapel and Entrance into the Sistine Chapel
ore 16.45 Individual Oath by each Cardinal and possible first ballot
ore 19.15 Vespers in the Sistine Chapel
ore 19.30 Transfer to the Domus Santae Marthae
ore 20 Dinner
Schedule for Subsequent Days
ore 6.30 – 7.30 Breakfast
ore 7.45 Transfer to Pauline Chapel
ore 8.15 – 9.15 Celebration of Mass in the Pauline Chapel
ore 9.30 Mid-morning Prayer from Divine Office in Sistine Chapel and Voting
ore 12.30 Transfer to the Domus Santae Marthae
ore 13 Lunch
ore 16 Transfer to Apostolic Palace
ore 16.50 Voting in the Sistine Chapel
ore 19.15 Vespers in the Sistine Chapel
ore 19.30 Transfer to the Domus Santae Marthae
ore 20 Dinner

ti vogliamo bene, Papa!

The coverage was amazing — the sweeping shots of Rome, the sunset over Castel Gandolfo just as the CTV cameras were finishing live coverage.  I only avoided completely losing it in tears thanks to the commentators, whose statements were at times erroneous or unintentionally humorous and took my mind off the fact that this was the last time I was probably ever going to see my beloved friend.

I took this picture on Palm Sunday in 2008, and it is how I will always remember him.  Beautiful, eloquent, and fatherly.

I already miss him.

A last goodbye

Sixteen days ago I was woken up, like so many others, with earth-shattering news.  I proceeded to go through my morning in a fog, getting to work without really knowing how I got dressed, did my makeup, and drove in traffic.  I didn’t have an appetite and didn’t taste my breakfast.

The fog has lifted, but nothing had sunk in.  This morning my alarm went off at 4am so I could watch part of his last audience.  I printed off the text of his address to read in the chapel.  And then it all hit me.

As I read the address through my tears, I was taken back eight years.  I was sitting in a classroom in Rome and hearing from my Italian professor John Paul’s last words to the crowds who had come under his window to pray by his deathbed with him.

Vi ho cercato… The words were etched on my heart that day, and have never left me.

I have sought you.  And you have come to me.  For this, I thank you.

The parting words of the only Pope I had never known.  The beginning of a roller coaster that would see me sleeping in the streets awaiting a funeral and laughing through tears after white smoke, and would eventually lead me to study theology and work for the Church I loved.

As I read Pope Benedict’s final address, an unusually-personal account of his own roller coaster, I found the same reassurance in his last words.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I am truly moved, and in you I see the church is alive!

I always felt slightly foolish for feeling like I knew Pope Benedict.  But I felt close to him after reading his writings and then living in Rome in 2008 and seeing him every week. I felt like I knew him.  Over the past eight years, whether it was watching Midnight Mass on television or sitting with him for a concert, I felt like he was my friend.

And now I realize I’m not alone in that thought.

Please take time to read his beautiful address in its entirety- this last lecture of sorts.  I cannot comment on it more; words fail me tonight.

Here allow me to return once again to April 19, 2005. The gravity of the decision was precisely in the fact that from that moment on I was committed always and forever by the Lord. Always – he, who assumes the Petrine ministry no longer has any privacy. He belongs always and totally to everyone, to the whole Church. His life is, so to speak, totally deprived of the private sphere. I have felt, and I feel even in this very moment, that one receives one’s life precisely when he offers it as a gift. I said before that many people who love the Lord also love the Successor of Saint Peter and are fond of him, that the Pope has truly brothers and sisters, sons and daughters all over the world, and that he feels safe in the embrace of their communion, because he no longer belongs to himself, but he belongs to all and all are truly his own.

The “always” is also a “forever” – there is no returning to private life. My decision to forgo the exercise of active ministry, does not revoke this. I do not return to private life, to a life of travel, meetings, receptions, conferences and so on. I do not abandon the cross, but remain in a new way near to the Crucified Lord. I no longer wield the power of the office for the government of the Church, but in the service of prayer I remain, so to speak, within St. Peter’s bounds. St. Benedict, whose name I bear as Pope, shall be a great example in this for me. He showed us the way to a life which, active or passive, belongs wholly to the work of God

A happy event on a bittersweet day

My friend Jenny is living in Rome right now, with her Catholic News Agency husband and her adorable tow-headed boys.

This was her post this morning: A Kiss Goodbye

Words fail me.  And it couldn’t have happened to a better gal.  Her boys are getting memories to last a lifetime.

A bittersweet morning.  More posts to come.

 

 

Threads

The past few days, I’ve thought a lot about the whole threads vs tapestry image. You have probably heard the metaphor — that our lives are like threads in a big tapestry that God is weaving. We can only see a part of the picture, but He can see the whole thing. So whenever something happens that doesn’t make sense or seems unfair, we have to remember that we can’t know why everything happens. Every once and awhile, God may give us a glimpse of the bigger picture, so we can keep our thread in perspective.

Tuesday was the first anniversary of my good friends coming into the Church. That evening, they welcomed their first child into the world. God has a beautiful tapestry.

Today opens the Year of Faith, in which we’ll be spending the next year growing in faith, nourishing our faith, spreading our faith, and professing our faith. The Year begins today because it is the 50th Anniversary of the Opening of the Second Vatican Council (and thus also Blessed John XXIII’s feast day). One of the reasons that John XXIII chose today to open the Council was to place it under the intercession of our Blessed Mother, because today is the feast of the Maternity of Mary, to remind us that she was the Mother of God. Pius XI in 1931 instituted the feast to commemorate the 1,500 year anniversary of the Council of Ephesus, which gloriously proclaimed Mary as Mother of God.

For the next ten weeks, I’ll be teaching Church History to the men in formation for permanent diaconate. Among tonight’s topics? The Council of Nicaea, which gave us the Creed which forms the central focus of this Year of Faith, and the Council of Ephesus.

I love the way God works. I love that He always knew this is how it would work out.

I love His tapestry. Several years ago, I thought it was His Will that I return to school so I could eventually teach in a seminary, forming the men that lead our Church. That wasn’t His Will. And yet, here I am, two years later- instead of working on grad school applications, I’m teaching men who will be deacons in our Church.

May this Year be a fruitful one for all of us. May we have the strength to fight to good fight of faith. May we have the courage to spread the faith. And may it be slightly less eventful than the last Year of Faith. 1967-68. Think RFK, MLK, race riots, Vietnam…. Yes, let’s pray for a less eventful year.

But regardless of what happens, we’ll only see threads. He will know the whole picture.

St. Anthony

There’s a little town in northern Italy named Padua.  For many, it is a blip on the road between Verona and Venice, a inexpensive hotel room outside the more famous towns, or, at best, the home of famous art, architecture, and monuments.

But for pilgrims, it is home of Il Santo, the beloved son of Padua, St. Anthony.

Known for his expertise in finding misplaced car keys, St. Anthony should be more widely known for his preaching, his knowledge of Scripture and theology, and the sanctity of his life (that prompted the Church to canonize him less than a year after his death).  His gift of preaching was so magnificent and brought so many to the truth, God preserved the physical instruments of the gift — Anthony’s tongue and vocal chords are incorrupt and visible in the church that bears his name (pictured above).

St. Francis was reluctant to have his priests study theology, fearing it would get in the way of the simplicity of their way of life and be an obstruction to their extreme poverty.  His friendship with St. Anthony changed that opinion, and St. Anthony was given the task of educating the new Franciscans.

Instead of just using St. Anthony as a lost-and-found, celebrate his feast today by reading and praying the Sacred Scriptures.

Buona festa!

I have no pictures inside the beautiful basilica because of the “no foto!” rules there. : )