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NIC’s Corner
You who dwell in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shade of the Almighty, Say to the LORD, “My refuge and fortress, my God in whom I trust.” Psalm 91:1-2
§ Foodie Cheat: German Butterbrot
· Spirit Hour: Water or Apple Cider Johnny Appleseed
· Get an indulgence
Bucket List trip: Rich vs Poor Tour:
Denmark 14 and the Solomon Islands 203—two nations separated by wealth, geography, and infrastructure, yet each offering distinct spiritual landscapes for the Catholic pilgrim.
· 🇩🇰 Denmark — Ranked Among the Wealthiest
o GDP per capita: ~$52,000 USD
§ 🧮 Why Denmark Ranks High in Per Capita Income
§ Denmark consistently ranks among the top nations in income and quality of life. Its wealth is not driven by natural resources, but by civic cohesion, education, and a pragmatic blend of free-market efficiency and generous welfare.
o Key Factors
• Universal Welfare State: Free healthcare, education, and childcare reduce personal financial burdens and support social mobility.
• High Tax, High Trust: Danes pay some of the highest taxes globally, but 88% say they’re happy to do so.
• Low Inequality: Income distribution is relatively even, fostering social harmony and reducing poverty.
• Business-Friendly Environment: Denmark ranks 4th globally for ease of doing business, with strong exports and innovation.
• Civic Cohesion: Low corruption and high institutional trust create a stable, inclusive society.
· ✝️ Quality of Life for Catholics in Denmark
o Though Catholics are a small minority (less than 1% of the population), the Church in Denmark is quietly resilient and deeply ecumenical.
§ 🕊️ Strengths
• Freedom of Religion: Catholics enjoy full legal protection and freedom to worship.
• Ecumenical Spirit: The Church often collaborates with Lutheran and other Christian communities in social outreach and liturgical events.
• Cultural Integration: Catholic parishes serve diverse immigrant populations, especially from Poland, Vietnam, and the Philippines.
• Access to Beauty: Denmark’s natural and architectural beauty offers contemplative spaces for spiritual renewal.
§ ⚠️ Challenges
• Secularization: Denmark is one of the most secular societies in Europe, with low religious participation overall.
• Limited Infrastructure: Few Catholic schools or retreat centers exist, and clergy numbers are modest.
• Cultural Isolation: Catholics may feel spiritually isolated in a society where faith is often private or absent.
· 🌿 For a Catholic
Denmark is a place of quiet witness. The Church here is small but faithful, offering a rhythm of sacramental life amid a culture of contentment. It’s a land where reverence must be intentional, and where beauty—whether in liturgy or landscape—can become a doorway to grace.
· 🇸🇧 Solomon Islands — Economically Modest, Spiritually Rich
o GDP per capita: ~$2,149 USD
§ 🧮 Why Solomon Islands Ranks Low in Per Capita Income
· The Solomon Islands is a developing Pacific nation with limited industrialization and high reliance on subsistence agriculture and foreign aid.
§ Key Factors
• Small Economy: With a GDP of $1.76 billion, the nation’s economic base is narrow.
• Rural Population: Most citizens live in remote villages with limited access to infrastructure.
• Climate Vulnerability: Rising sea levels and natural disasters threaten livelihoods and development.
• Low Internet Access: Only 43% of the population uses the internet, limiting educational and economic opportunities.
• Youthful Demographics: A growing population strains education and employment systems.
o ✝️ Quality of Life for Catholics in Solomon Islands
§ Catholicism is deeply woven into the cultural and spiritual fabric of the Solomon Islands, offering vibrant faith amid material simplicity.
· 🕊️ Strengths
• Strong Parish Life: Catholic communities are active, joyful, and deeply rooted in village life.
• Missionary Legacy: The Church has long supported education, healthcare, and peacebuilding.
• Liturgical Beauty: Masses often incorporate local music, dance, and language, creating a rich enculturated worship.
• Community Resilience: Faith communities are central to disaster response and social cohesion.
§ ⚠️ Challenges
• Limited Resources: Many parishes lack electricity, transportation, and access to priests.
• Geographic Isolation: The archipelago’s spread makes pastoral care difficult.
• Economic Hardship: Poverty affects access to education, healthcare, and sacramental preparation.
• Climate Threats: Rising seas and cyclones threaten churches, schools, and sacred spaces.
· 🌿 For a Catholic
The Solomon Islands offer a pilgrimage of simplicity and joy. Here, faith is not a luxury—it’s a lifeline. The Church is a shelter, a school, and a song. To walk among the island parishes is to witness the Gospel lived with humility, creativity, and hope.
· How to celebrate Oct 3rd
· Rise and shine! Start your day by partaking in National No Sugar Day. Swap out your regular sweet treats for healthier options like fruits, nuts, or natural yogurt. Challenge yourself to steer clear of sugary drinks, opting for water or herbal tea instead. Embrace the opportunity to give your body a break from the sugar rush.
· Celebrate Buy British Day by supporting local businesses. Head to a nearby market or search online for British-made products. Treat yourself to a little something special while contributing to your community’s economy.
· National Wide Awakes Day encourages us to stay alert and aware. Take a walk, soak in your surroundings, and appreciate the world around you. Engage in meaningful conversations and connect with others on a deeper level.
· International Crumhorn Day invites us to enjoy some music. Listen to your favorite tunes or even try your hand at playing an instrument. Feel the rhythm and let the melodies transport you to a different place.
· On Mean Girls Day, gather your friends for a movie night. Watch a classic favorite or discover something new together. Share laughs, snacks, and good company, relishing in the joy of friendship.
· Celebrate National Techies Day by diving into the digital world. Learn a new skill online, explore innovative technologies, or simply relax with your favorite video game. Embrace the wonders of the tech realm.
· Virus Appreciation Day encourages us to find beauty in the unexpected. Take a moment to reflect on challenges you’ve overcome, lessons you’ve learned, and growth you’ve experienced. Embrace the twists and turns of life with resilience and gratitude.
🌿 Leafing the World Behind — Day 4: “Shedding What No Longer Serves”
Theme: Resilience as Faithful Endurance
🌅 Morning Reflection: The Long Wait
“You have turned my mourning into dancing… and clothed me with joy.” — Psalm 30:11
“Nothing is far from God.” — St. Monica
Prompt: What burdens have you carried too long? What griefs or hopes have stretched across years? What are you still waiting for?
Symbolic Act: Choose a leaf that’s dry or torn. Hold it gently. Reflect on what you’ve endured. Then release it—into wind, water, or soil—as a gesture of trust.
Saintly Emulation:
St. Monica waited decades for her son Augustine to return to faith. She wept, prayed, persisted. Her resilience was not passive—it was active love stretched across time. She teaches us that resilience is not just surviving—it’s loving through delay, trusting through silence, and enduring with grace.Virtue Connection:
According to Character Is Destiny: Catholic Edition, resilience is the virtue that refuses to quit—not out of stubbornness, but out of hope. Monica’s life is a testament to this: she bore sorrow, misunderstanding, and spiritual drought, yet never ceased to believe that grace would bloom.
🍲 Midday Ritual: Meal of Memory
- Act: Prepare a meal that reminds you of someone you’ve waited for, prayed for, or grieved. As you cook or eat, name aloud the ways you’ve endured—and the ways you’ve been sustained.
- Blessing: “For every tear sown in hope, and every joy reaped in mercy—I give thanks.”
🌌 Evening Devotion: The Vigil Flame
- Reflection: What promise are you still waiting to see fulfilled? What prayer have you repeated for years?
- Symbolic Gesture: Light a candle and let it burn for someone you carry in your heart. Speak their name. Speak your hope. Let the flame be your vigil.
🕊️ Closing Prayer
“St. Monica, mother of tears,
You who waited in love,
Teach me to endure with grace,
To shed what no longer serves,
And to trust that God is never far.”
🌟 Pilgrimage Arc Reminder
This is Day 4 of your 33-day journey toward All Saints Day (Nov 1). Each day honors a virtue, emulates a saint, and invites symbolic enactment. Let your character ripen like fruit on the vine. Use Character Is Destiny: Catholic Edition as a companion to deepen your daily rhythm.
OCTOBER 3 Friday
Revelation, Chapter 15, Verse 4
Who will not FEAR you, Lord, or glorify your name?
For you alone are holy. All the nations will come and worship before you, for
your righteous acts have been revealed.”
We
glorify God when we are righteous as he is righteous who makes the rain fall on
both the good and the evil.
A righteous person, no matter how
blameless, will always take humanity’s failures personally. A righteous person has reverence for both God
and those He created.
Reverence is "a feeling
or attitude of deep respect tinged with awe; veneration". The
word "reverence" in the modern day is often used in relationship with
religion. This is because religion often stimulates the emotion through
recognition of God, the supernatural, and the ineffable. Reverence involves a
humbling of the self in respectful recognition of something perceived to be
greater than the self. Thus, religion is commonly a place where reverence is
felt. However, similar to awe, reverence is an emotion in its own right, and
can be felt outside of the realm of religion. Whereas awe may be characterized as an
overwhelming "sensitivity to greatness," reverence is seen more as
"acknowledging a subjective response to something excellent in a personal
(moral or spiritual) way, but qualitatively above oneself" Solomon describes awe as passive, but
reverence as active, noting that the feeling of awe (i.e., becoming awestruck)
implies paralysis, whereas feelings of reverence are associated more with
active engagement and responsibility toward that which one reveres. Nature, science, literature, philosophy, great
philosophers, leaders, artists, art, music, wisdom, and beauty may each act as
the stimulus and focus of reverence.[1]
Copilot: On this October 3rd Friday, as we reflect on Revelation 15:4—“Who will
not fear you, Lord, or glorify your name?”—we are invited into a posture of
reverence that is both humbling and active. Reverence is not merely awe; it is
the soul’s response to holiness, a deep respect that moves us to glorify God
through righteous living. To be righteous is to feel the weight of humanity’s
brokenness and still choose compassion, justice, and mercy. It is to honor God
not only in worship but in how we treat those He created. Reverence awakens us
to the sacred in all things—sunsets, music, wisdom, and even the quiet dignity
of a neighbor’s kindness. Today, let reverence guide your steps and
righteousness shape your witness, for in doing so, you glorify the One whose
acts are eternally revealed.
First Friday[1]
Mary Alacoque, a nun of the Order of the Visitation, at Parayle-Monial, France; one day, when, according to her custom during the octave of Corpus Christi, she was deeply engaged in devotions before the Blessed Sacrament, the divine Savior appeared to her, showed her His Heart burning with love, and said: “Behold this Heart, which has so loved men that it has spared nothing, even to exhausting and consuming itself, in order to testify its love. In return I receive from the greater part only ingratitude, by their irreverence and sacrilege, and by the coldness and contempt they have for Me in this sacrament of love. And what is most painful to Me is that they are hearts consecrated to Me. It is for this reason I ask thee that the first Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi be appropriated to a special feast to honor My Heart by communicating on that day and making reparation for the indignity that it has received. And I promise that My Heart shall dilate to pour out abundantly the influences of its love on all that will render it this honor or procure its being rendered.”
The Supreme Lover[2]
The
Goodness of God means that God gives us what we need for our perfection, not
what we want for our pleasure and sometimes for our destruction. As a sculptor,
He sometimes applies the chisel to the marble of our imperfect selves and
knocks off huge chunks of selfishness that His image may better stand revealed.
Like a musician, whenever He finds the strings too loose on the violin of our
personality, He tightens them even though it hurts, that we may better reveal
our hidden harmonies. As the Supreme Lover of our soul, He does care how we act
and think and speak. What father does not want to be proud of his son?
If
the father speaks with authority now and then to his son, it is not because he
is a dictator, but because he wants him to be a worthy son. Not even
progressive parents, who deny discipline and restraint, are indifferent to the
progress of their children. So long as there is love, there is necessarily a
desire for the perfecting of the beloved. That is precisely the way God's
goodness manifests itself to us. God really loves us and, because He loves us,
He is not disinterested. He no more wants you to be unhappy than your own
parents want you to be unhappy. God made you not for His happiness, but for
yours, and to ask God to be satisfied with most of us as we really are, is to
ask that God cease to love. — Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen
[2]https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-02-07
Daily Acceptance
of Death[2]
Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, I accept from your hands, whatever kind of death it may please you to send me today (tonight), with all its pains, penalties and sorrows, in reparation for my sins, for the souls in purgatory, for the conversion of sinners, for all those who will die today (tonight), and for your greater glory. Amen.
Pray
twice daily. By Father John A. Hardon, SJ
Today is the birthday of my former wife Diane T. Havermale who
succumbed to pancreatic cancer in February 2015; She is loved and remembered by
her seven children: Claire, Christopher, Candace, Dara, Rachel, Nicole and
Vincent. Please pray for her intentions.
Bible in a Year Day 89 Israel’s
Cycle of Disobedience
Welcome to the book of
Judges! Fr. Mike foreshadows the events of Judges, and the cycle of
disobedience we'll continue to see Israel go through. He also gives some
context on the book of Ruth, and how we can find grace within the frustrating
moments of Scripture. Today's readings are Judges 1-3, Ruth 1, and Psalm 133.
Fitness Friday-In honor of October Fest
Recognizing that God, the Father created man on Friday
the 6th day I propose in this blog to have an entry that shares on
how to recreate and renew yourself in strength, mind, soul and heart.
German
Volume Training[3]
It's brutally hard, but I've found it to be an effective way to pack on muscle fast! In strength-coaching circles, this method is often called the Ten Sets Method. Supersets and trisets allow you to perform a lot of work in a short period of time. The rest-pause method allows you to use heavier weights, so you can recruit the higher threshold muscle fibers, and eccentric training enables you to overcome strength plateaus. The bottom line is that almost any training method will work—provided you do it with intensity—at least for the few weeks it takes for your body to adapt to it. There is, however, one training system that stands above all the rest. It's brutally hard, but I've found it to be a very effective way to pack on muscle fast! In strength-coaching circles, this method is often called the Ten Sets Method. Because it has its roots in German-speaking countries, I like to call it German Volume Training. To the best of my knowledge, this training system originated in Germany in the mid-'70s and was popularized by Rolf Feser, who was then the National Coach of Weightlifting. A similar protocol was promoted by Vince Gironda in the U.S., but regardless of who actually invented it, it works. In Germany, the Ten Sets Method was used in the off-season to help weightlifters gain lean body mass. It was so efficient that lifters routinely moved up a full weight class within 12 weeks. It was the base program of Canadian weightlifter Jacques Demers, Silver Medallist in the Los Angeles Olympic Games. Jacques was known in weightlifting circles for his massive thighs, and he gives credit to the German method for achieving such a spectacular level of hypertrophy. The same method was also used by Bev Francis in her early days of bodybuilding to pack on muscle.
The
program works because it targets a group of motor units, exposing them to an
extensive volume of repeated efforts, specifically, 10 sets of a single
exercise. The body adapts to the extraordinary stress by hypertrophying the
targeted fibers. To say this program adds muscle fast is probably an
understatement. Gains of 10 pounds or more in six weeks are not uncommon, even
in experienced lifters!
Goals &
Guidelines
The goal
of the German Volume Training method is to complete ten sets of ten reps with
the same weight for each exercise. You want to begin with a weight you could
lift for 20 reps to failure if you had to. For most people, on most exercises,
that would represent 60% of their 1RM load. Therefore, if you can bench press
300 pounds for 1 rep, you would use 180 pounds for this exercise.
For
lifters new to this method, I recommend using the following body-part splits:
Body-Part Splits
·
Day 1: Chest & Back
·
Day 2: Legs & Abs
·
Day 3: Off
·
Day 4: Arms &
Shoulders
·
Day 5: Off
When
using this program or any other, you should keep a detailed journal of the
exact sets/reps and rest intervals performed, and only count the repetitions
completed in strict form.
Copilot’s version for an old
man
Here's a modified version of
Fitness Friday–October Fest, tailored for a 72-year-old male seeking renewal in
strength, mind, soul, and heart. It honors the symbolic sixth day of creation
while offering a practical, spiritually resonant approach to German Volume
Training (GVT):
🏋️♂️ Fitness Friday:
October Fest of Renewal
Ending October 6th — the
Sixth Day of Creation
On the sixth day, God
created man—formed from dust, animated by breath, and called to stewardship. As
we approach October 6th, let this Fitness Friday be a celebration of renewal:
not just of muscle, but of mind, soul, and heart. Whether you're 27 or 72, the
call to recreate yourself in strength and spirit remains timeless.
🔄 Recreating the
Temple: German Volume Training for Seasoned Stewards
German Volume Training
(GVT), also known as the Ten Sets Method, is a classic hypertrophy protocol
that builds muscle through high-volume, moderate-load repetition. While
originally designed for elite athletes, it can be adapted for older
adults—especially those with a foundation in resistance training and a desire
to renew their physical temple with care and intensity.
🧠 Why It Works
- Targets
motor units with repeated effort, stimulating muscle growth
- Builds lean
mass efficiently, even in experienced lifters
- Encourages
discipline, journaling, and intentional movement
⚠️ Modified Guidelines for a 72-Year-Old Male
To honor the body’s wisdom
and longevity, here’s how to adapt GVT safely:
|
Original
Protocol |
Modified for
72-Year-Old |
|
10 sets of 10
reps |
6–8 sets of
8–10 reps |
|
60% of 1RM |
50–55% of 1RM
or RPE 6–7 |
|
90 sec rest |
90–120 sec
rest |
|
Compound lifts
(e.g., bench press) |
Safer
alternatives (e.g., machine press, incline dumbbells) |
|
High weekly
volume |
2–3
sessions/week with full recovery |
🧘♂️ Weekly Split
for Renewal
This split balances effort
with recovery, integrating spiritual and mental renewal:
- Day 1:
Chest & Back + Breath Prayer
- Day 2: Legs
& Core + Psalm Walk
- Day 3: Rest
+ Lectio Divina
- Day 4: Arms
& Shoulders + Gratitude Journal
- Day 5: Rest
+ Sunset Reflection
📓 Stewardship
Journal
Track:
- Sets, reps,
rest intervals
- Energy
levels, sleep quality
- Reflections
on strength, humility, and renewal
💬 Closing
Reflection
As we honor the sixth day of
creation, let this training be more than physical. Let it be a liturgy of
movement—a way to renew the temple, rekindle courage, and rejoice in the gift
of life. Whether you're lifting weights or lifting prayers, you are participating
in the divine rhythm of creation.
Daily Devotions
·
Unite
in the work of the Porters of St.
Joseph
by joining them in fasting: Today's Fast: An increase of the Faithful.
·
Religion
in the Home for Preschool: October
·
Litany of the Most Precious Blood
of Jesus
·
Offering to the
sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverence_%28emotion%29
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