This poem began in my head as I lit a candle in front of the Nativity scene after High-Mass today.

At the Créche

My little Savior, here for Thee
I light this little flame,
That its bright tongue may speak for me,
Whose tongue cannot sing worthily
The praises of Thy name.

Inflame me also, Infant dear,
Here cradled in the straw,
That I may burn with holy fear,
And love of Thee who liest here,
And reverence of Thy law.

Before Thy crib, my Lord Most High
Laid low in humble hay,
O let me live and let me die,
To shine in Heaven's light, as my
Small candle burns today.

- January 10, 2010
Feast of the Holy Family

A few posts ago, Jude E. brought up a good question: Is it cool to be Catholic?? This is a subject very close to my heart, and I answer emphatically in the affirmative! YES-Catholicism is brimming over with Coolness! We are the source of all coolness!! Some reasons:

1) Beer-invented by monks.

2) Chocolate-invented by monks.

3) A more philosophical reason: Just as God is the source of all good things, and Coolness is a good thing, so God is the source of all Coolness (haaaaa-cue the theme music..) And since God Himself founded the Catholic religion, what religion is cooler? And thus, the adherants of said religion would be cooler than others.

So...Catholics wrote the book on cool!!!! Not convinced? Let's ask ourselves a few questions: Who is more rebellious (given our current culture), more dangerously living (martyrs ) more innovative (St. Thomas come to mind) more sure of themselves (good conscience= high self-esteem), more independent of peers (attachment to creatures? Say what?), more mysterious (the mystics, anyone?) and more "untouchable" (well, when God cooperates and gets us narrowly out of danger)??!! You just can't beat that! Seriously...there's just something about a Catholic saint that can't be faked. That "something" is participation in "the divine coolness", if you will.

Catholicism IS coolness!!! Anyone else is merely participating in our universal "coolness principles"!

And now, a visual image of ultimate Catholic coolness: (drum roll, please...)


"Enjoy your Modernism while you can-The Day of Reckoning fast approaches!"

As of five this afternoon (St. Louis time) we deErausquins have a Sister squared (= Sister sister.) Lucia is now Sister Maria Lucia, O.P.!

And I discovered a very fitting TradCat, and as we haven't had one for a while, here we have -- er, heer we haz it.






























And then, lo, I discovered another that was too good to pass up.

Yes, I know 'tis a bit early. But, since Jude, Edward, DragonLady, Devil's Advocate and I will all be off at the Jam Session in Syracuse on New Year's day, I figured better early than late or not at all.

To all our readers, then, I wish

My little King, my mighty Lord eternal,
Thou who wast born today, and ever art,
How is it that thou comest to my heart,
Before whom tremble all the powers infernal?
Dear Lord, who art so great and yet so small,
So humble and so high, so strong, so weak,
I look upon thee and can hardly speak —
Thou who art God and yet art Man withal.

My loving Lord, Thou Love whom I behold,
Teach me Thy great humility, I pray,
That I may be as low as now Thou art;
For Thou, whom all creation cannot hold,
Hast yet become, upon this Christmas day,
Little enough to come into my heart!

Saw this video linked on Angelqueen. Pretty funny. :)

This pretty much sums up Lucia's opinion on movies-made-from-books-we-love (the Lord of the Rings in particular!) , though with an exception or two. (Bedknobs and Broomsticks is one of those. Rather an awful book, but a hysterical movie!)