Book Recommendation, and then some...

http://dynamiccatholic.com/four-signs-of-a-dynamic-catholic/

I cannot say enough good things about his book.  Just find it.  Read it.  And you'll see what I'm talking about. Every parish needs this, or something like it.



Have you not seen this? Come on! This is a great film, with great music, too.  An emotional story with an array of characters that will make you tear up, and if you don't, get your eyes checked.  Two more words on this:  Martin. Sheen.



This began as a set of 4 that was given to us, and after the first book, I was hooked!  We are on the sixth novel so-far, with a seventh set for next year, AND a movie adaptation scheduled for early next year.  Told from a first-person point of view, these books are a superb combination of humor, action, sci-fi, horror, and wittiness.  I highly recommend this read.  I never thought I'd like Dean Koontz, but I was way wrong, AND he's a Catholic! Nice!  See also:  Forever Odd, Brother Odd, Odd Hours, Odd Apocalypse, and Deeply Odd.



Alter Bridge (Fortress) = Excellence in Music.  Good enough equation?  Should be.  I've been a guitar player for 13+ years, and I've been a fan of these guys for about 10 of those.  The musicianship here is top notch.  It'll be burning up my speakers for a while.  [Caution:  Heavy rock music not for those with heart conditions.]

And Becca recommends:



Jaime has a beautiful voice that she puts to work for the Lord.  This is not her first album, and I definitely plan to get some of her older stuff.  This album highlights the pro-life message and also has a song about a woman struggling with infertility, two issues very near to my heart.  I had the pleasure of meeting her in person a few months ago and we talked for quite a while.  She is very nice and is very dedicated to what God is calling her to do through her music.  Please check her out!

Love,
Nick and Becca

 

Bread and Wine. Why?

Undoubtedly, it's been quite a while since either of us have been writing.  But we have been busy, teaching 8th grade CCD (the new title PSR just doesn't work with my brain) and helping out with RCIA at our local parish.  I even gave the presentation on Baptism.  I hope I wasn't too boring...

Anyways, I had some thoughts that I'd like to share that occurred to me during the last class, which was on the Eucharist.  I asked myself, why bread and wine as the two used to become the Precious Body and Blood?  God has a good reason for everything he does, He is the Ultimate Good.

So as I was listening to the presentation I was pondering the reasons, and here's what I came up with:

Bread:  -Grown up from the earth as wheat, a symbol of God the Creator.

-Harvested, and made into dough, the work of human hands, symbolizing the work that God the Son Incarnate would do as a man

-Baked using fire, symbolizing the cleansing and inspiring fire of the Holy Spirit

(And now that I think of it, bread is made in that order, and that is the order in which God revealed Himself to man.  Cool.)

Wine:  -A fruit of the Earth, like wheat, symbolizing God the creator
-Harvested, and pressed, again showing the labor of humanity, and Christ in His humanity
-And barreled or bottled and stored, for long periods of time until wine is produced, symbolizing Patience, which is a gift of the Holy Spirit

And these are only my personal thoughts that occurred that night, which led me to research even more, coming across these two great articles at Catholic Answers.

http://www.catholic.com/magazine/articles/why-wheat-bread

http://www.catholic.com/magazine/articles/why-grape-wine

And I'm sure there are many other reasons as to why; there are many examples in the life of Jesus in which He either uses, speaks of, or makes a miracle out of either of these two consumables.

But even better from that night, and wonderfully enough my thoughts on the bread and wine were geared towards the Trinity, there was a surprise visitor from out of state.  He was the priest from the parish in Syracuse, NY that had closed down, and from which our parish was buying the contents to fill our new church building.  And wouldn't you know it, it was Holy Trinity Catholic Church?  Of course it was, and he told use great details about his old parish.  He was born and raised there, and eventually became the pastor.  He assured us that he couldn't have been happier that all of the items were going to be used for what they were made for, the worship of God.

I knew all of these statues, and altars, and all the things they've presented to us that will go in the church were very sacred items, from an old parish and I was glad they would be used.  But to hear a story behind it, to see the face of the priest who's known the place all his life, it just added an even more rich and beautiful origin than we could have imagined.  It was quite a blessing to hear him speak so lovingly about it.

Later in the talk, before the visiting priest gave his story, some were discussing Eucharistic miracles, and from a previous post, here's one that I've heard many times:

http://sheldensense.blogspot.com/2012/03/having-doubts.html
And the link straight to YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PJ8BORx1p8

Take care,
~Nick