More New Liturgical Info: "Stop Holding Hands"

We know what this is about, right? Holding hands during the Our Father. Our family prefers to discreetly hold our own hands ... in other words, we fold our hands in prayer and leave each other alone. If someone insists on grabbing my hand, I'll allow it. But, I don't like it.

Neither does Bishop Foys of Covington who has issued a decree clarifying the proper gestures and postures for Mass and says, among other things:

Special note should also be made concerning the gesture for the Our Father. Only the priest is given the instruction to “extend” his hands. Neither the deacon nor the lay faithful are instructed to do this. No gesture is prescribed for the lay faithful in the Roman Missal; nor the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, therefore the extending or holding of hands by the faithful should not be performed.

This comes via Deacon Greg at The Deacon's Bench who has more pull quotes and a link to the overall decree.

To be fair, I have always known that you really aren't supposed to be doing this. I just didn't bring it up. Trying to keep the peace and all that jazz. But since it's been brought up ... I'll pass it along.

Vietnamese Coffee, Anyone?

It's over at Meanwhile, Back in the Kitchen.

Blogging Around: Seasonal Stuff

New Liturgy

• An important point people keep getting wrong about the new Mass - from Deacon Greg
• "Well, actually he's not talking to you." Answering One Critique of the New Translation - from Msgr. Charles Pope

Gift Giving

• Dr. Boli's Encyclopedia of Misinformation -- is now an actual book! If you've seen my sidebar, you know how amusing and clever this book is. It is surprisingly inexpensive.
• xkcd has posters, shirts, mugs, and a book -- you could hardly miss with getting something from here for the geek in your life. Or even just the comic lover.
• Happy Catholic - the book! I'd be remiss if I didn't remind everyone that there's a great book you can give friends and family. Buy it from your Catholic book store, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or ... get an autographed copy from me that has an extra quote that didn't make it into the book.

This 'N' That

• The Emperor's Edge - free on Kindle. I've been enjoying this book read aloud on Podiobooks.com but you can read it for yourself free. It is a steampunk-ish fantasy which I discussed a bit more on Goodreads.
• Danielle Bean to take over leadership of Catholic Digest. So says Jeff Miller with great huzzahs. I never even heard of Catholic Digest. So their appointment of Danielle already is doing them good! Congratulations to Danielle and best wishes for this to be a fruitful period for her and the publication.
• Smile that melts misconceptions: How Taya, who was born with Down's, became darling of the modelling world. Via New Advent comes this wonderful story. Take a look at this little doll ... more photos are scattered throughout the piece.
  
  

New Liturgy - not that hard and I had a few "aha" moments thanks to the new wording.

We didn't have much trouble with the new liturgy although we were probably helped by our deacon's homily, which pointed out that the correct response to "the Lord be with you" was "and with your spirit" ... AND that it happens five times in the liturgy.

There was some stumbling, but not much.

Our favorite of the local news stations, Channel 8, was there during the Mass we attended, and did a story on the new liturgy. You can see quite a bit of our church here ... and also, quite a bit of our Church. I was surprised because I knew practically everyone shown in the video. Rose is in it for a bit, although blurred in the background. On our big tv screen, Tom and Rose said they saw me in the very last shot in the pews, albeit quickly and far away.

You can see it here, if you are interested.

Snapshot: Walking to Work

My car has been in the shop for a few days, having some repairs done to a door after a slight accident.

Tom decided to walk to work at one point in the complicated process of getting three people to work, errands done, and so forth ... with two cars.

He liked it so well that he walked home again that evening.

We realized that we actually only live one mile from work. We'd never thought about walking because you've got to cross a six-lane highway (though, to be fair, it does have a stoplight so we can get across).

I began walking, too, though usually once a day, with Rose picking me up or dropping me off, depending on what other errands had to be run.

It is invigorating. It connects us to the weather, the topography, the world around us.

I imagine that we'll continue it on days when it isn't pouring rain or when the morning temperature isn't 90 by 9 a.m. (yes, it happens).

I also realized that I usually say my world is lived in a 5-mile radius, but that our church, work, the grocery store, library, bank, and Target are all within one mile or less.

No wonder I can duplicate that small town feeling inside of a big city like Dallas.

I like it that way.

And I'll probably be walking to many more of those places in the future.

Chinese Pork with Eggplant and Rice Sticks

Turn Rose loose with a lot of eggplant from our CSA and a recommendation that my Cooking Light cookbooks usually include lots of vegetables in main dishes ... and certainly get a really delicious result for dinner. Even Hannah ate it and she's no eggplant fan.

Find out more at Meanwhile, Back in the Kitchen.

Thanksgiving ... Seemed Longer This Year

I mean that in a good way. A very good way.

It was almost like taking a vacation.

We were worried about transporting Tom's mother after her amputation. She's been moved to a skilled nursing section where she lives but hasn't been to our house since all that happened.

We went to visit her on Thanksgiving morning and she was so mournful (not in words, but attitude) that we made renewed efforts to figure out how to get her home for Thanksgiving dinner. It wasn't easy, but it was do-able so Mom came home for a couple of hours, which was all she could manage.

She was so happy to get out and watch the cooking and have a home cooked meal. I haven't seen her eat so much for a long, long time. It made us very happy just to see her face at the table. We will definitely be bringing her home again soon for a visit.

On other fronts, all went quite well. The Sweet Potato Casserole with Pecan Crumble was simply amazing. Rose loved the ginger. I loved the nutmeg. We may be working on adapting it to pie form soon.

I got tons of reading done. It helped that my pal, DJ, had just lent me Midshipman's Hope and Challenger's Hope by David Feintuch (my comments at links). I like military science fiction and, although the first book began slowly, I was soon caught up in the adventures of a young midshipman when a fatal accident thrusts him into leadership.

I didn't get to listen to Patient Zero as much as I'd hoped (my comments here), which left me eking out bits and pieces of the final showdown as I washed dishes or swept the floor. I'm still eking ... this feels like the longest, slow motion finale in history. One of the things I love about this book is the hands-down patriotism of the main character, Joe Ledger. That made it perfect for Thanksgiving weekend when all-American seemed the way to be.

That all-American bent was reinforced when we watched Captain America. Loved it! Solidly old school patriotism, the way it would have been in the original comic books, and a straight forward story line. In many ways, it made us think of another family favorite, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.

Rose and I also watched Tokyo Godfathers, both as a kick-off to the Christmas season and because Scott and I will be discussing it this week on A Good Story is Hard to Find. I forgot just how many funny moments this anime has ...

Other movie watching included Monsters, which Rose had heard good things about and which I had on my list for some time. Sadly it struck us much like Schultze Gets the Blues ... potential and story idea were good but it needed other input (or something) because the story just meandered and nothing much really happened. The one thing that seemed quite clear was that it was an allegory about illegal immigration. Turns out that wasn't the intention of the British writer and director, but that doesn't matter because anyone living in Mexico or the southern U.S. is going to see it loud and clear. I did like the monsters. They were creative and fascinating. Hannah says that the way their life cycle was discussed was exactly the way something like that would happen and she also pointed out that it was a typical "invasive species" story. That's what happens when you watch things with Wildlife Management Sciences majors.

The best movie of the weekend, though, was Gone Baby Gone. This was everything that critics said. Ben Affleck's directing was superb and surprising considering that it is the first movie he's directed. Casey Affleck's acting was subtle and right on target. The supporting cast was wonderful as well. The story was morally grounded and made me want to look for Dennis Lehane's books, as this was based on one of his. All round a wonderful movie.

An Excellent Review of the Twilight Series as Well as Good Advice About Letting Kids Read the Books

Right here from Clare Cannon ... I sure love Goodreads, which is where I found the review.

Buffy vs. Edward Cullen

I was never a Sarah Michelle Gellar fan so I just watched Angel instead.

However, I may have to change my ways. (Because even whiny Slayers are better than twinkly vampires.)

Via Frank Weathers, who saw it first.

Star Wars Subway Car

Brilliant.

Snapshot: Rose - Cook of the House

I finally have a breather so I can do more than the minimum around here ... so I'll start by filling you in on the most significant change in the household lately.

About three weeks ago, completely frazzled from our huge annual project which takes all waking hours, I assigned Rose the dinner duties for weekdays. She's home for a bit between graduation and heading off to L.A. to seek her fortune in film editing. Other than training the dogs to do tricks (three dogs now know "down", two also know "shake" and all are gradually coming to grips with "fetch), she's been whiling her time away reading Middlemarch and working on screenplay ideas.

She likes to cook but hadn't been expecting this, which began with a phone call (as she reminded me the other day), "Check the freezer for things to use, but you've got to make dinner tonight. And the rest of the week."

She rose nobly to the challenge. I don't remember what she pulled together for that evening, but she has been planning weekly meals that reminded me of the joy that can be had preparing and consuming meals when you go beyond the same old thing.

I have to admit that  "same old thing" is what I'd been doing for too long. I believe that most people who are responsible for daily meals every day of the week will know what I'm talking about.

Rose, however, faced different problems when in college. She had little time, little money, and few people to consume what she was interested in making. She has had all those deficits filled in our family where I give her my debit card, add my weekend cooking items to her grocery list, and where all four of us either appreciatively enjoy the meal OR laugh together over the failure of the recipe. I hasten to add that in each case the failure has definitely been in the recipe writing or testing, not in Rose's skill in cooking.

The biggest change for me is that Rose's fearlessness in trying whatever looks interesting has rekindled my interest in cooking is returning to enjoying the process and experimenting more. It is becoming more of a joy than a chore.

Also, I painlessly lost three pounds because Rose incorporates so many vegetables in every meal and I'm not tasting while cooking all the time. Something to take note of for my full-time return to the kitchen!

I will be sharing some of the recipes that I've been trying and my favorites of those that Rose has served.

First up, Burgers with Blue Cheese Mayo and Grilled Onions.

Weekend Joke

Thanks to Mark W. for this one!

A young woman on a flight from Ireland asked the priest beside her, "Father, may I ask a favor?"

"Of course child. What can I do for you?"

"Well, I bought an expensive woman's electric hair dryer for my mother's birthday that is unopened and well over the Customs limits, and I'm afraid they'll confiscate it. Is there any way you could carry it through customs for me? Under your robes perhaps?"

"I would love to help you, dear, but I must warn you: I will not lie."

"With your honest face, Father, no one will question you."

When they got to Customs, she let the priest go ahead of her. The official asked, "Father, do you have anything to declare?"

"From the top of my head down to my waist, I have nothing to declare."

The official thought this answer strange, so he asked, ""And what do you have to declare from your waist to the floor?"

Priest answered, "I have a marvelous instrument designed to be used on a woman, but which is, to date, unused."

Roaring with laughter, the official said, "Go ahead, Father... Next please!"

Mailbag: Publishing, Videos, and Voodoo

From my inbox and worthy of your interest:

Publishing

• TAN BOOKS: It's the three year anniversary of Saint Benedict Press’ acquisition of the venerable TAN Books out of bankruptcy ... interesting article.
• FREE CATHOLIC BOOKS, written by saints
• FRANCISCAN MEDIA: "St. Anthony Messenger Press has changed its name to Franciscan Media. With its new name and branding efforts, Franciscan Media hopes to bring greater clarity to our Franciscan tradition and become more inspiring, innovative, and personally relevant in today’s marketplace." ... my comment: it's certainly easier to say in a hurry. Read about it here.
  
• SOPHIA INSTITUTE PRESS: Sophia Institute Press announced Wednesday the acquisition of Catholic Exchange. I remember back in the day when Catholic Exchange was just about the only good place gathering together Catholic writers. They were ahead of their time. Read more here.

Worth Watching

• Eskimo Hallelujah Chorus ... charming, creative, and sweet ... they hold up the cards with the words while the music and singers provide the sound. Some of the very creative ways to display the cards really made me smile.
• The Hunger Games ... the movie. Haven't read the book, but this looks great! (scroll down for the trailer)

Pope & Voodoo Newswatch

• BBC article wins the prize for how many times can an article force the word Voodoo into an article about the Pope going to Africa. Despite the pope never mentioning it once. I believe the article may have been commissioned by Dah Aligbonon.

Every Blogger's Nightmare ... It's Funny Because It's True

From the hilarious Doug Savage.

Julie and Scott agree to make coffee for Ulysses in return for a cube of deceased vegetation.

Also, they read Way Station by Clifford D. Simak.

Get it at A Good Story is Hard to Find.

Just When My Plan Was All Coming Together ...

... the catalog was ahead of schedule and I was going to have this weekend off and was assured of Thanksgiving weekend also.

And then the client changed a very basic formatting issue in such a way that we are going to have to work on every page much more.

Darn it!

So, my very cursory blogging will have to continue. Thank you for your patience!

Something I'm Reading ... Flunking Sainthood

Flunking Sainthood: A Year of Breaking the Sabbath, Forgetting to Pray, and Still Loving My Neighbor by Jana Riess

The premise of this book is that the author was to try a different spiritual discipline every month. She failed at each, if I understand the back of the book (and the title) properly. However, it seemed an interesting read if for no other reason than to read her quotes from other sources and for her take on the various disciplines.

I dipped into this a while back when I received it and found it an easy read but the author came off as really whiny (they call it wry, but whiny was my reaction, especially in March where she really, really did not like Brother Lawrence -- who I've always found rather endearing).

Picking it up again, I decided to skip to the end to see if there was a worthwhile result and any hope that the whininess would lessen (however amusingly the whining might be couched). Definitely there is a big payoff ... and one that I can relate to. Therefore, I picked it up from March and am going to see if the other disciplines sit a bit better on the author. Perhaps encountering Brother Lawrence so early in the process was simply unfortunate for both the author and the book.

More later ...

BLEG: Recommendations for a book about "offering it up?"

The concept of offering one's suffering to God as a sacrifice was introduced last week at RCIA.

It is never an easy concept, but one person in particular struggled with understanding it. A request was made for a book recommendation.

I have no clue, people. At least about a book to help with this concept.

Recommendations?

Just as a source of further information, should someone be reading and wonder what the heck we're talking about, here are two previous posts of mine on the subject:

• "Offer It Up." What the Heck Does That Mean?
• The Holy Mass and Personal Self Surrender

Community benched ... scheduled "to return at some point..."

Nooooooooooooooo!!!!!

Say it ain't so!

The Catechism Demystified

This is a talk that I gave to our RCIA class last week. I'm sharing it here for anyone else who'd like a little help finding their way around the Catechism, which can be confusing but need not be.

I am not an expert on the Catechism, but I do know how to use it.

The Catechism can be a bit tricky to find your way around so I wanted to take just a couple of minutes to familiarize everyone with it.

Let’s start with what the word catechism means. A catechism is a summary of principles.

So, the Catholic Catechism is specifically designed as a reference guide. Some people call it the Catholic “rule book.” It is much more than that though.

“In the Catechism, we see the wealth of teaching that the Church has
received, safeguarded and proposed in her two thousand years of history. From Sacred Scripture to the Fathers of the Church, from theological masters to the saints across the centuries, the Catechism provides a permanent record of the many ways in which the Church has meditated on the faith and made progress in doctrine so as to offer certitude to believers in their lives of faith."

That is what Pope Benedict says about the Catechism ... and he should know.

The current Catechism was requested by Pope John Paul II and produced under Cardinal Ratzinger’s supervision. Cardinal Ratzinger is now Pope Benedict XVI.

This Catechism is the first systematic synthesis of faith issued since the Council of Trent in 1566. Between then and now there were catechisms that were issued locally as various people saw the need.

The English version of this catechism came out in 1994 and was revised in 1997, so this is really current.

Think of it as the sort of encyclopedia from the days when all we had were books ... when you would sit down to look up facts about the moon and get pulled into other sections because they were so fascinating.

Of course, when you have a two thousand year old institution whose goal is to help get us to Heaven, they don’t think quite the way we do about organization.

The Catechism is arranged in four main sections that are often called the “Four Pillars” of the Faith:

• The Profession of Faith (the Apostle’s Creed)
• The Celebration of the Christian Mystery (the Sacred Liturgy, especially the sacraments)
• Life in Christ (including The Ten Commandments in Catholic theology)
• Christian Prayer (including The Lord’s Prayer)

Numbering system:

Let’s look at a page. (get pdf of sample page here)

Every paragraph is numbered. (red circle) Those numbers are very important.

When you look up something in the index, the numbers it refers you to are
paragraph numbers, NOT page numbers. This can be confusing until you get used to it, but it does give us an idea of just how much information is packed into each paragraph.

The numbers in the margins (green square) are cross-references ... to other paragraphs in the Catechism that refer to the same subject and may shed more light.

The cross-reference paragraphs are a good reason to have the actual book. The Catechism is on-line in a lot of places (the Vatican’s web-site, the US Bishops’ website, etc.) and is super handy for searching. I use the online version all the time.

But those versions don’t have the cross-reference paragraphs ... and sometimes those lead you to just what you were looking for or for added depth you wouldn’t have found otherwise.

In Brief:

The writers of the Catechism know that this may be more information than you wanted. Maybe you were looking for a simple answer and didn’t need all the extra info.

Each chapter ends with an “In Brief” section that summarizes the main points of the chapter in one or two sentence paragraphs.

Footnotes:

Of course, there are are copious footnotes for both direct quotes in the text and also where they refer to sources of the teaching, in particular the Scriptures, the Church Fathers, and the Ecumenical Councils and other authoritative Catholic statements, such as those issued by recent Popes.

Compendium

Just finding your way to the correct “In Brief” answers may seem a bit daunting if you’re trying to find something quickly ... which is something I’ve experienced in our small group.

And the writers of the Catechism realized that too.

So, in 2005 they came out with the Compendium to the Catechism. (Download a sample page here.)

It is a more concise and conversational version of the Catechism.

Again the paragraphs are numbered. These paragraph numbers don’t have any relationship to the numbers in the Catechism.

However, these numbers in the margin (red circle) DO correspond to numbers in the actual Catechism so if you want to read more, it is easy to find.

EVEN EASIER

Say you need more explanation though, and the Catechism is a bit too confusing. I’ve been there. Here are three good books. (Links lead to my reviews.)

• The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Catechism
• Catholicism for Dummies (I haven't formally reviewed this ... but will ... but these many posts with excerpts give ample evidence of the solid value of this book)
• Catholic Mass for Dummies

Surprised?

For one thing, how can we trust these books though to tell us the truth about Catholic teachings?

Two reasons.

First, they all use those same, all-important paragraph numbers from the Catechism so that you can go check what they’re saying against the Catechism itself.

There is a much easier way to be sure though.

I didn’t trust these books myself ... until I saw that each went to the trouble of getting the Catholic seal of approval.

Here’s what I mean by that.

Look on the copyright page for one or more of these phrases (below). These mean that the book has been submitted to Catholic authorities to be checked for accuracy.

If the author belongs to a religious order, the book is submitted to the order’s superior. If the author is just a regular writer, the book is usually submitted to local Catholic authorities, like the local diocese.

In either case, first the book is examined by an expert, called a censor. If the book is accurate, they issue:

Censor’s stamp: NIHIL OBSTAT (“nothing stands in the way”)

After the Nihil Obstat has been obtained, the manuscript will be submitted another person for checking.

In the case of a religious order, it is examined by the order’s religious superior ... in which case it receives the:

Religious Superior’s stamp: IMPRIMI POTEST (“it can be printed”)

I have only come across the Imprimi Potest once ... in The Catechism, which has Cardinal Ratzinger’s stamp of approval.

In the case of the regular book given to the diocese, the manuscript would go from the censor to the bishop to receive the:

Bishop’s stamp: IMPRIMATUR (“let it be printed”)

The religious superior may also go ahead and submit the manuscript they approved for an Imprimatur. So it is possible to have a book with all three seals of approval.

By the way, it is only necessary to put the Imprimi Potest or Imprimatur on the book. You can assume it has gotten a Nihil Obstat first if it made it to those two stages.

Caution:

A word of warning though ... if you see a book that only has a Nihil Obstat, be cautious. It may be in error. This happened in the 1960s a lot and some of those books contained incorrect material, even heretical material. You need the double-check system to be sure something didn’t slip by someone. That is why if one bishop gave the Nihil Obstat, another bishop has to give the Imprimatur.

The Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur are often followed by this statement on the copyright page:

The “Nihil Obstat” and “Imprimatur” are official declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the Nihil Obstat and the Imprimatur agree with the content, opinions or statements expressed.

So if one of these authors has all theCatholic truths right but is using them to try to prove that we shouldn’t drink hot coffee because it’s the devil’s temperature ... we can’t blame the Catholic Church.

FINALLY

Remember those footnotes in the Catechism? The ones for materials that are simply referenced, where they might have summarized twelve pages of a Church Council document into two sentences?

If you ever wonder just what was summarized, there’s a book for that too.

The Companion to the Catechism of the Catholic Church ... which is a compendium of texts referred to in the book but not quoted there.

It has every word of the pertinent part of the originally referenced materials, in English, so you don’t have to go all over the place looking for something.

It is almost 1,000 pages long and is really fascinating and enlightening if you want to see it all from original sources.

Just imagine if all this material had been included in the Catechism.

That would’ve been a book no one would have wanted to open.

It makes the Catechism not look so big after all, does it?