Catching a few rays

This week I went to daily Mass by myself for the first time in YEARS. Mass here in Cortland, NY, is 7 am and I figured that I could sneak out and get back before the kids were really coherent enough to damage themselves or the house. My oldest is almost 12, so she is "in loco parentis."

It was amazing. Let me say first that daily Mass was everything that I remembered it to be. . . the echoes of prayers said in a Church that is mostly empty, the cold pews, the three sentence homily. At first I found myself wondering how it could be that this handful of folks could be lifting up the Church with their prayers. It all seemed, if you'll excuse me, a little pathetic. But then, after communion, I felt such joy at the real presence of Jesus within me. With no little children to distract me, He seemed very close. . . "more inner than my inmost."

I pray often for the "radiation" of God's fatherhood. If you have not read the play "Radiation of Fatherhood" by Karol Wojtyla, then I highly recommend it. I have read the whole Theology of the Body and all of the encyclicals, but my favorite is "Radiation."

I yearn to feel this radiation, to behold the face of the Father. Like everyone else, I guess, I want to be chosen, to be anointed. In Mass today, it seemed possible.

Are you still with me?

I was shocked when I read when my last post was! Moving is like being in a time warp. Good thing my husband is paying the bills these days.... As I said, he is still in Michigan, now I'm here in Central New York. Here to live out the dream (!) I'm still trying to get my act together with regard to New York's homeschooling laws and so not so much communing with nature (the hills, the barns, the stream...) yet. But we have ploughed a good-sized garden and planted a cover crop. And so the spring will be much anticipated.

It is hard to put together deep thoughts here, although I think much about anonymity. Maybe it is the generation I grew up in (or the one that parented me!), but, despite the immense satisfaction I get from being at home with my children, I still wish I were "someone out there in the world." Fr. Francis Martin said that 90 percent (or was it 95 percent) of what we have in our brains is heresy. I think that my definition of what constitutes "the world" may apply.