Posts
Claire’s Corner
· Today in honor of the Holy Trinity do the Divine Office giving your day to God. To honor God REST: no shopping after 6 pm Saturday till Monday. Don’t forget the internet.
· Spirit Hour: Gin and Tonic Day
· Foodie: Take a break to enjoy some seafood bisque for lunch in honor of National Seafood Bisque Day.
o Here’s a symbolic 7-course meal for the Feast of St. Luke (October 18), centered around his patronage of physicians, artists, and evangelists—with Seafood Bisque as the featured soup course. Each dish reflects themes of healing, illumination, and Gospel hospitality.
o 🕊️ Feast of St. Luke – 7-Course Symbolic Meal
o October 18 • Patron of Physicians, Artists, and Evangelists
§ 1. Appetizer – Oxheart Tomato Tartlets
· Symbolizing the ox, St. Luke’s iconographic symbol, these tartlets use heirloom oxheart tomatoes and fresh herbs.
Symbolic act: Offer a prayer for strength and sacrifice.
§ 2. Second Course – Healing Herb Salad
· A medley of greens with calendula, chamomile, and mint—herbs historically used in healing.
Symbolic act: Reflect on Luke’s role as a physician and healer.
§ 3. Soup – Seafood Bisque 🦐
· Rich and restorative, this creamy bisque honors Luke’s Gospel emphasis on nourishment and hospitality.
Recipe inspiration: Classic Seafood Bisque
Symbolic act: Give thanks for the healing power of shared meals.
§ 4. Pasta – Angel Hair with Lemon & Olive Oil
· Light and luminous, this dish evokes Luke’s name meaning “light” and his Gospel’s clarity.
Symbolic act: Light a candle before serving.
§ 5. Main Course – Braised Beef with Iconic Spices
· Honoring the ox and Luke’s artistic legacy, this dish uses spice blends from Syria (his homeland) and Greece (his burial site).
Symbolic act: Share a story from Luke’s Gospel as you serve.
§ 6. Dessert – Marian Honey Cakes
· Honey-sweetened cakes shaped like icons or scrolls, honoring Luke as the first iconographer and chronicler of Mary’s Magnificat.
Symbolic act: Read Luke 1:46–55 aloud.
§ 7. Drink – Illuminated Citrus Elixir
· A sparkling blend of lemon, orange blossom, and mint—bright and refreshing.
Symbolic act: Toast to the light of the Gospel and the healing arts.
· Today is Adventure Day: An adventure was what happened when you set out to take life by the hand and live it.
· Another pagan festival Pronouns Day St. Jogues is turning over in HIS grave.
· How to celebrate Oct 19th
o Embrace Bridge Day by exploring a local bridge or hiking trail.
o As the sun sets, relax like a sloth for International Sloth Day. Give yourself permission to unwind and enjoy some leisurely activities.
· Bucket List Trip: Around the World “Perfect Weather”
🍇 Napa Stay & Reflection Itinerary
October 27–November 2 • Vineyard Thresholds, Eucharistic Table
Day 1: Arrival & Threshold Blessing (Oct 27)
Arrive in Napa Valley and settle near St. Helena or Yountville. Begin with a gentle walk through a vineyard or along the Napa River.
Symbolic act: Pause at the vine’s edge and offer a prayer of arrival.
Evening: Quiet meal at a farm-to-table bistro—celebrate native herbs, olive oil, and autumn harvest.
Day 2: Eucharistic Anchoring & Civic Memory (Oct 28)
- Morning Mass at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Parish in Yountville
- Midday: Visit the Veterans Memorial Park or a civic landmark in Napa.
Symbolic act: Write a prayer for peace and place it near a memorial stone or flag.
Evening: Journal reflections on sacrifice, sanctuary, and civic hospitality.
Day 3: Marian Listening & Artistic Reverence (Oct 29)
- Visit Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Calistoga
- Midday: Explore the di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art
Symbolic act: Light a candle and sketch a Marian symbol or vineyard motif.
Evening: Attend a chamber concert or local performance if available.
Day 4: Vineyard Pilgrimage & Creation Prayer (Oct 30)
- Walk the Napa Valley Vine Trail—each stretch a station of awe.
- Midday: Pause near Oak Knoll for a Psalm 104 reflection.
Symbolic act: Collect a grape leaf or stone as a token of clarity.
Evening: Supper with roasted root vegetables, local wine, and lemon thyme.
Day 5: Cultural Listening & Civic Hospitality (Oct 31)
- Visit Oxbow Public Market and engage with local growers and artisans.
- Midday: Explore the Napa Valley Museum
Symbolic act: Write a blessing and leave it in a community garden or vineyard chapel.
Evening: Attend a civic talk, harvest celebration, or All Saints vigil.
Day 6: Eucharistic Table & Vineyard Echo (Nov 1 – All Saints Day)
- Day trip to Carneros or Howell Mountain—visit a vineyard with Eucharistic resonance.
Symbolic act: Pour a small libation and bless the vines in honor of the saints.
Evening: Shared meal with bread, wine, and autumn fruit—sacramental and communal.
Day 7: Benediction & Sending Forth (Nov 2 – All Souls Day)
- Final morning walk through Bothe-Napa Valley State Park or along the Silverado Trail
- Midday: Write a closing reflection or prayer of sending.
Benediction:
“May this valley remember my reverence. May my steps echo peace and harvest.”
OCTOBER 19 Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Saints John
de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have PEACE with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access [by faith] to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God.
Faith triumphs in trouble. Christian life is a life that trusts in God’s love rather than seeking to make ourselves clean as the Pharisees. We put self-justification and self-righteousness in the background and know peace with God for Christ has purchased our redemption with his blood. By our faith we become citizens of the kingdom of heaven owing our true allegiance to Christ, through His church whose head is the Pope. Although we are in the world we are not of it. We are faithful citizens of our nation but God’s citizen first.
Copilot’s Take
On this Nineteenth
Sunday after Pentecost, as we honor Saints John de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues,
the reading from Romans 5:1–2 calls us into a deeper awareness of the peace
that comes through faith. This peace is not the fruit of self-righteous
striving, but of surrender to the grace purchased by Christ’s blood. In a world
that often rewards performance and purity, the Christian life invites us to
stand in grace, not earn it—to boast not in ourselves, but in the hope of God’s
glory. The martyrs we commemorate today lived this truth with courage, bearing
witness to a kingdom not of this world. As citizens of our nation, we remain
faithful and engaged, yet our truest allegiance is to Christ and His Church. We
are pilgrims in the world, rooted in grace, called to live lives of mercy,
clarity, and communal renewal.
ON KEEPING THE
LORD'S DAY HOLY[1]
CHAPTER I
DIES DOMINI
The Celebration of the Creator's Work
"Through
him all things were made" (Jn 1:3)
8.
For the Christian, Sunday is above all an Easter celebration, wholly illumined
by the glory of the Risen Christ. It is the festival of the "new
creation". Yet, when understood in depth, this aspect is inseparable from
what the first pages of Scripture tell us of the plan of God in the creation of
the world. It is true that the Word was made flesh in "the fullness of
time" (Gal 4:4); but it is also true that, in virtue of the mystery
of his identity as the eternal Son of the Father, he is the origin and end of
the universe. As John writes in the Prologue of his Gospel: "Through him
all things were made, and without him was made nothing that was made"
(1:3). Paul too stresses this in writing to the Colossians: "In him all
things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible .... All
things were created through him and for him" (1:16). This active presence
of the Son in the creative work of God is revealed fully in the Paschal
Mystery, in which Christ, rising as "the first fruits of those who had
fallen asleep" (1 Cor 15:20), established the new creation and
began the process which he himself will bring to completion when he returns in
glory to "deliver the kingdom to God the Father ..., so that God may be
everything to everyone" (1 Cor 15:24,28).
Already
at the dawn of creation, therefore, the plan of God implied Christ's
"cosmic mission". This Christocentric perspective, embracing
the whole arc of time, filled God's well-pleased gaze when, ceasing from all
his work, he "blessed the seventh day and made it holy" (Gn
2:3). According to the Priestly writer of the first biblical creation story,
then was born the "Sabbath", so characteristic of the first Covenant,
and which in some ways foretells the sacred day of the new and final Covenant.
The theme of "God's rest" (cf. Gn 2:2) and the rest which he
offered to the people of the Exodus when they entered the Promised Land (cf. Ex
33:14; Dt 3:20; 12:9; Jos 21:44; Ps 95:11) is re-read in
the New Testament in the light of the definitive "Sabbath rest" (Heb
4:9) into which Christ himself has entered by his Resurrection. The People of
God are called to enter into this same rest by persevering in Christ's example
of filial obedience (cf. Heb 4:3-16). In order to grasp fully the
meaning of Sunday, therefore, we must re-read the great story of creation and
deepen our understanding of the theology of the "Sabbath".
Nineteenth
Sunday after Pentecost[2]
IN the Introit of the Mass God promises to hear the people who observe His law, and to help them in all their tribulations. “I am the salvation of the people, saith the Lord; in whatever tribulation they shall cry to Me, I will hear them, and I will be their Lord forever. Attend, O My people, to My law; incline your ears to the words of My mouth.”
Prayer.
O’almighty and merciful God graciously
defend us from all that is hurtful, that, free in mind and body, we may with
ready mind perform all that belongs to Thy service.
EPISTLE. Eph.
iv. 23-28.
Brethren: Be renewed in the spirit of
your mind: and put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in
justice, and holiness of truth. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak ye the
truth every man with his neighbor: for we are members one of another. Be angry,
and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your anger. Give not place to the
devil. He that stole, let him now steal no more, but rather let him labor,
working with his hands the thing, which is good, that he may have something to
give to him that suffereth need.
Explanation.
The epistle of to-day particularly
concerns such as live in falsehood, hatred, anger, injustice, impurity, or
other sins. Perhaps we have often renewed our spirit at a jubilee, or a
mission, or a spiritual retreat; we seemed then to be converted, and to have
become new men, but how long did our spiritual renovation last? Alas, how soon
were we sinners again! We thought that, after making a general confession,
everything was done ; instead of zealously using all means to preserve
ourselves in this happy state of spiritual renewal, we allowed ourselves once
more to resort to bad company and dangerous occasions, and gave ourselves up,
as before, to idleness and indulgence. When shall we be lastingly converted?
GOSPEL. Matt. xxii. 2-14.
At that time Jesus spoke to the chief
priests and Pharisees in parables, saying: The kingdom of heaven is likened to
a king, who made a marriage for his son. And he sent his servants to call them
that were invited to the marriage: and they would not come. Again, he sent
other servants, saying: Tell them that were invited: Behold, I have prepared my
dinner; my beeves (plural form of beef) and fatlings are killed, and all things
are ready: come ye to the marriage. But they neglected, and went their ways, one
to his farm, and another to his merchandise. And the rest laid hands on his
servants, and, having treated them contumeliously, put them to death. But when
the king had heard of it, he was angry, and, sending his armies, he destroyed
those murderers, and burnt their city. Then he saith to his servants: The
marriage indeed is ready: but they that were invited were not worthy. Go ye
therefore into the highways; and as many as you shall find, call to the
marriage. And his servants going forth into the ways, gathered together all
that they found, both bad and good: and the marriage was filled with guests.
And the king went in to see the guests: and he saw there a man who had not on a
wedding garment. And he saith to him: Friend, how earnest thou in hither not having
on a wedding garment? But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters:
Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: there shall
be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.
Remark. ---This parable is, in many respects,
the same as that for the Second Sunday after Pentecost, and has the same
meaning. See, therefore, the explanation of that gospel; in addition to this,
consider also the following
Explanation.
1. In the
present parable the king is our heavenly Father, who has espoused His only
begotten Son to the Church.
2. The feast
is made up of the doctrines of the Gospel, the holy sacraments, with the other
means of salvation, and of eternal joys.
3. The servants sent to invite the guests are
the prophets, apostles, and disciples of Christ.
4. Those
invited are the Jews, who, despising the honor intended for them, put to death
the prophets and apostles.
5. In their
place others, that is, the heathen, were called from all quarters of the earth,
who, having been in the broad road to destruction, now occupy the place of the
Jews in the marriage -feast of the Church, and will one day occupy their place
in heaven.
6. The wedding
garment signifies charity, which shows itself by good works; without this,
faith avails nothing. That the man without a wedding garment was silent when
questioned by the king shows us that no one will be able to excuse himself
before God for not having charity, since everyone may have it if he only ask it
from God, and be willing to practice it.
Aspiration.
I thank Thee, O Jesus, that, through Thy incarnation, passion, and death, Thou hast gained for me eternal happiness; give me also the wedding garment of charity, that I may be admitted to the heavenly marriage-feast, and not be cast into the exterior darkness.
Lessons
of Consolation from the Joys of Heaven[3]
In
what these joys consist, St. Paul himself, though more than once caught up to
heaven and allowed to see and taste them, could not describe. He only says that
eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of
man, what things God hath prepared for them that love Him. In heaven all
beauties, all delights, all joys, are found in the highest and most perfect
degree free from all evil, free from all anxiety and disgust, and free from all
fear of ever losing them. In a word, in heaven man shall possess God Himself,
the source of all joy and happiness, and shall, with Him, enjoy God s own
happiness for all eternity. We shall be like to Him (i. John iii. 2). Is there
need of anything more to give us the highest conception of heaven? How lovely
are Thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! My soul longeth and fainteth for the
courts of the Lord, my heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God (Ps.
Ixxxiii). How weary of the world am I when I contemplate heaven!
Saints John de Brébeuf and Isaac
Jogues
Martyrs in North America[4]
Today in the dioceses of the United States the Church celebrates the optional memorial of Sts. Issac Jogues and John de Brébeuf (priests and martyrs) and their companions (martyrs). They were Jesuit missionaries who died as martyrs in North America where they preached the Gospel.
·
Pray
to the Holy Spirit to renew the evangelization of distant countries as well as
the re-evangelization of our own nation.
·
More
Christians have been martyred in the 20th century than in the previous nineteen
centuries combined. For example, pastors are being arrested and sometimes shot
in China and Cuba. Believers are forbidden to buy goods or own property in
Somalia. Christians who testify to their faith in Iran or Saudi Arabia may be
put to death for blasphemy. Mobs have wiped out whole villages of Christians in
Pakistan. Pray for courageous and zealous missionaries in these countries where
the Church is persecuted.
·
Support
the Indian Missions in the USA.
·
Visit
the National Shrine of the North American
Martyrs in
Auriesville, New York. This site offers a
wonderful gallery of pictures of the shrine.
·
Learn more about each of the
martyrs. You might also like to read this definitive scholarly biography, Saint Among Savages:
The Life of St. Isaac Jogues, by Francis Talbot, S.J.
· Learn for Christmas the Indian Christmas Carol, the first American Christmas carol John de Brébeuf wrote to teach the Christmas story to the Huron Indians.
1173 When the Church keeps the memorials of martyrs and other saints during the annual cycle, she proclaims the Paschal mystery in those "who have suffered and have been glorified with Christ. She proposes them to the faithful as examples who draw all men to the Father through Christ, and through their merits she begs for God's favors."
Bible in a Year Day 106 Saul Is Chosen
As we begin the Royal Kingdom period, we hear about the first king of Israel,
Saul. We discover that though Saul looks like a fearless warrior, he has a
major flaw. Fr. Mike also points out the significance of the readings from
Proverbs. Today's readings are 1 Samuel 9-10 and Proverbs 6:23-35.
Daily Devotions
·
Unite
in the work of the Porters of St.
Joseph
by joining them in fasting: Today's Fast: Conversion of
Sinners
·
Religion
in the Home for Preschool: October
·
Litany of the Most Precious Blood
of Jesus
·
Offering to the sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
