I remember clearly when it became clear to me that I had mastered the art of camouflage. It was at Ft. Caffee Arkansas. I was on an OP, in the defense, during the NTC for light fighters that had been established there. I flock of hen turkeys came by. If you are not familiar with them, you must realize that turkeys are very wary and skittish--a byproduct of being hunted to near extinction, only the most paranoid survived--and turkey hunters practice camouflage discipline in the extreme to get a shot. These turkeys came to within arms reach--i could have grabbed one, or stabbed on onto an antennae for my radio, has I been so inclined.
The Army was not easy for me--I was always aware of what I had not done right. But at that moment, I realized that I had mastered camouflage, and could be as near as no matter to invisible in the woods. It was a good feeling.
I keep waiting for that feeling in my spiritual life, and have come to the realization that it will never happen. Satan will never miss me because I am so good. I will never master the "Christian Life". Rather, I will always fall into temptation, will always find myself holding back.
Perhaps that is what Lent is about--the realization that all we have is the Hope of Gods Mercy, and that we will, in the end, be utterly dependent on it. We will never, by our own merits, or our own efforts, overcome sin. Instead, we are too accept what we are, strive to improve even in the knowledge that we will fail, and rely on the Grace of God.
I may have mastered the art of camouflage, but I have not mastered the art of Christian Living. Thanks be to God, My Lord is a merciful one, and despite my shortcomings, I have the hope of salvation. If I ever think I have earned it, I shall be wrong, and I shall have fallen into the heresy of Pelagianism.
Oh--Happy St. Patrick's Day, and God Bless Pope Benedict XVI!
TRIUMPHALIST--YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT?
Thursday, March 17, 2011
I Ain'tn't Ded!
But I am avoiding too much politics and current events during Lent--at least writing about them. I should have something to write about this weekend. Might be worthwhile, might not.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
"Just Another Redneck Sunday"
Just another Redneck Sunday (To the tune of an 80s song whos performers i am now embarrassed to admit I thought were kinda hot... .)
Well, We got up and went to Mass this morning, and it was a very nice Mass indeed. I don't always get that "Oh-Wow-GOD-Oh-Wow-GRACE-oh-Wow!" charge out of Mass, and I don't need to. The liturgy was reverent, the music wasn't something more appropriate to a campfire gathering (actually, it verged on the sublime!) and the homily was meaningful and well thought out. The grace doesn't depend on my emotional response to the Liturgy, so I was blessed simply by fulfilling my Sunday obligation and participating.
I managed to get a couple of hours of outdoor recreation in today, as well. For me, in the spring, that's either fishing or gardening, and since we're having a 10 year crest on the Ohio today, it was gardening. Enough to be recreational, but not enough to become onerous labor. I set out the last of the cabbages--we set out seven last night before it got dark, and four rosemary plants and some pansies. The rosemary and the pansies went into the masonry bed by the front steps, on the level below Our Lady. The cabbages went into the veggie patch in the back yard.
Our soil is a yellowish, heavy clay, but after four years of me fiddling with it, it's becoming friable and the colour is tending onto a healthy brown clay-loam. It's odd--I have gardened on everything from sand to some of the worlds best topsoil, and i have had to learn about clay. So having four intensively planted raised beds, I experimented. The bed that has turned out the best is the one I spent the least on correcting. The first year, all I did was put all of the grass clippings where the bed was going to be the next year. Then I turned it over in the following spring, using the English trench method. Planted it, and then covered it with more grass clippings. In my other beds I added six to eight inches a year of shifted compost, and that bed got about six inches in three years, but lots and lots of grass clippings. It now has the best tilth and colour of any of them.
Sundays are to be a day of rest, to keep them Holy, so I won't be doing anymore in the garden today--I don't want it to turn to labour. Right now, the Grandchild is taking her nap, and so are her Mommy and Daddy. I'm writing a post about nothin' much. To keep Sunday as the lords day takes a little thought--not a lot, but a little.
Sunday dinner is important--we try to get as much of the Fam around the table as we can, and friends are welcome too. Tonight, we have a roast in the oven slow cooking. Because we shouldn't have today be a day for unnecessary labour, it's just seasoned and doing a slow bake, a no trouble thing. We'll boil up some potatoes and mash them, serve the whole thing with a quick steamed veggie and some gravy--maybe 45 minutes of prep and active time, but a nice meal to honor the sabbath and for us to gather around the dinner table together for.
People talk about the "Domestic Church', and certainly it's a valid concept, but we have to keep at it to make it work. Just as we cultivate our garden and flowers, we have to cultivate Family. In this world, that can be hard. It used to be that the mother was the beating heart of a family, and kept hearth and home. Nowadays, with most of the more lucrative manufacturing jobs gone in our region, both parents have to work. So that natural cement is gone. So we have to work at it more. One of the things that happens as well is the cultural dispersion we experience. People come and go a lot, and there are distractions and practices that erode faith and devotion. So it takes work, and a real commitment to forgiveness, at times. (In our case one Son-in-Law just got out of gaol--on Ash Wednesday. He was in Church with us this morning.)
The thing is, nowhere is the common priesthood of all the faithful more evident, and nowhere do we have a better opportunity to practice it than in cultivating the Family, with all it's little but constant sacrifices and efforts at charity and compassion. Being a parent, a grandparent even, is in fact a vocation, and a call and path to holiness. Sometimes we laymen forget that. Right now, it's a good time to remember, that we are made holy not by what we want to be or do, but by what we are and are doing--if we do it in conformity with the Faith through reliance on Christ our lord.
So if you're just hanging with the Fam this Sunday, remember something--respect your vocation and strive to be worthy of it, and to live up to it. Being a family member is a vocation, a means to sanctification, and a thing that is sacred in itself.
So it's just another Redneck Sunday, Te Deum Laudimus!
Well, We got up and went to Mass this morning, and it was a very nice Mass indeed. I don't always get that "Oh-Wow-GOD-Oh-Wow-GRACE-oh-Wow!" charge out of Mass, and I don't need to. The liturgy was reverent, the music wasn't something more appropriate to a campfire gathering (actually, it verged on the sublime!) and the homily was meaningful and well thought out. The grace doesn't depend on my emotional response to the Liturgy, so I was blessed simply by fulfilling my Sunday obligation and participating.
I managed to get a couple of hours of outdoor recreation in today, as well. For me, in the spring, that's either fishing or gardening, and since we're having a 10 year crest on the Ohio today, it was gardening. Enough to be recreational, but not enough to become onerous labor. I set out the last of the cabbages--we set out seven last night before it got dark, and four rosemary plants and some pansies. The rosemary and the pansies went into the masonry bed by the front steps, on the level below Our Lady. The cabbages went into the veggie patch in the back yard.
Our soil is a yellowish, heavy clay, but after four years of me fiddling with it, it's becoming friable and the colour is tending onto a healthy brown clay-loam. It's odd--I have gardened on everything from sand to some of the worlds best topsoil, and i have had to learn about clay. So having four intensively planted raised beds, I experimented. The bed that has turned out the best is the one I spent the least on correcting. The first year, all I did was put all of the grass clippings where the bed was going to be the next year. Then I turned it over in the following spring, using the English trench method. Planted it, and then covered it with more grass clippings. In my other beds I added six to eight inches a year of shifted compost, and that bed got about six inches in three years, but lots and lots of grass clippings. It now has the best tilth and colour of any of them.
Sundays are to be a day of rest, to keep them Holy, so I won't be doing anymore in the garden today--I don't want it to turn to labour. Right now, the Grandchild is taking her nap, and so are her Mommy and Daddy. I'm writing a post about nothin' much. To keep Sunday as the lords day takes a little thought--not a lot, but a little.
Sunday dinner is important--we try to get as much of the Fam around the table as we can, and friends are welcome too. Tonight, we have a roast in the oven slow cooking. Because we shouldn't have today be a day for unnecessary labour, it's just seasoned and doing a slow bake, a no trouble thing. We'll boil up some potatoes and mash them, serve the whole thing with a quick steamed veggie and some gravy--maybe 45 minutes of prep and active time, but a nice meal to honor the sabbath and for us to gather around the dinner table together for.
People talk about the "Domestic Church', and certainly it's a valid concept, but we have to keep at it to make it work. Just as we cultivate our garden and flowers, we have to cultivate Family. In this world, that can be hard. It used to be that the mother was the beating heart of a family, and kept hearth and home. Nowadays, with most of the more lucrative manufacturing jobs gone in our region, both parents have to work. So that natural cement is gone. So we have to work at it more. One of the things that happens as well is the cultural dispersion we experience. People come and go a lot, and there are distractions and practices that erode faith and devotion. So it takes work, and a real commitment to forgiveness, at times. (In our case one Son-in-Law just got out of gaol--on Ash Wednesday. He was in Church with us this morning.)
The thing is, nowhere is the common priesthood of all the faithful more evident, and nowhere do we have a better opportunity to practice it than in cultivating the Family, with all it's little but constant sacrifices and efforts at charity and compassion. Being a parent, a grandparent even, is in fact a vocation, and a call and path to holiness. Sometimes we laymen forget that. Right now, it's a good time to remember, that we are made holy not by what we want to be or do, but by what we are and are doing--if we do it in conformity with the Faith through reliance on Christ our lord.
So if you're just hanging with the Fam this Sunday, remember something--respect your vocation and strive to be worthy of it, and to live up to it. Being a family member is a vocation, a means to sanctification, and a thing that is sacred in itself.
So it's just another Redneck Sunday, Te Deum Laudimus!
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