First Friday

  

For those of you who are not Catholic (or maybe have forgotten some traditions), the first Friday of the month is a special day of prayer and worship.  Imagine having a day devoted to the most Sacred Heart of Jesus (his heart is burning for love of us!), and just as He shows His love for us, we are called to show our love for Him and ask mercy for the times when we turn away from Him.  One of the best ways to show this love is the adoration of Eucharist at Mass.

We began our time of prayer with Adoration of the Eucharist (Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ).  We were so blessed to have our family arrive to lead the Rosary.  We prayed with a focus on the Passion of Christ (his agony in the garden, his scourging at the pillar, the crowning with thorns, his way to Calvary carrying his cross, and his crucifixion) which is such a powerful meditation to bring you to your knees before the Lord.

The day was also an opportunity for us to go to Confession.  This was especially important for Edward as he is preparing to receive the Holy Spirit in the sacrament of Confirmation, as well as his First Communion, tomorrow.  The older boys and Michael also were able to confess their sins.  I will need to find a time to go also, but we ran short of time as Mass was to begin.  The feeling of cleansing after Confession is not something to avoid...there is just a joy in the experience of knowing you are right with the Lord!

Mass was offered for all the intentions of our little home school group.  We have about ten families in the area who are able to come together for the Mass.  It is nice to enjoy Mass and fellowship afterwards.  Today everyone wanted to hear about Zaira.  I even let a few of the teenage girls hold her for a short time as the boys had all made their way to games in the house next door!

We made it home to finish out our school work for the week.  We even got through that science experiment we had to abruptly stop LAST WEEK!  The boys have now been given the experience of chemical concentration via water and Tums solution!  Most of the school day was spent with a first round of tests.

Michael and Edward made their way to a rehearsal for tomorrow.  I think this is one time when I really wish the Church would allow the Spirit to move through the ceremony.  However, I suppose when there is a large group who have prepared for this sacrament, there needs to be a little pre-meditated organization.

Speaking of getting organized!  I almost forgot to tell about our decision on the hushpuppy recipe!  If you read the blog post a few days ago, we were not 100% pleased with our first recipe.  Last night we got together with the other family competing with us.  We tried a new recipe...you can read about it on my 4H blog as this event seems to go back and forth between the two venues.  Today, Brenda and I talked about how to help our team win the spirit award that is given out each year.  We had already decided on our team being called The Patriots.  I might have even mentioned that the team would dress up like Betsy Ross, Washington, Lincoln and Crockett.  However, Davy Crockett just did not seem to be working with the rest of the group.  So, we decided to have Henry dress up like Teddy Roosevelt instead!  He is even going to carry in a big teddy bear!  Then we started thinking about other ways to decorate our table.  We now have an awesome plan to bring it all together.  We cannot wait to see it in reality...we have a couple of weeks to make it happen!

We ended the day with a reading from a book about the angels.  This month is dedicated to remembering these precious messengers of God.  We started reading this book in hopes to continue and complete by the end of the month.  It should be possible as it was meant to be read during the month of September and has been nicely divided for daily reading.  It is called St. Michael and the Angels.  It is very interesting to see what we know about the angels from the Bible stories.

Tomorrow should be a busy day so I am hoping to get to bed early tonight.  Say a little prayer for our family, especially Edward!