Epiphany - January 6th

For by gold the power of a king is signified, by frankincense the honor of God, by myrrh the burial of the body; and accordingly they offer Him gold as King, frankincense as God, myrrh as Man.   
St John Chrysostom

 We had a beautiful High Mass for the Feast of Epiphany.

  After the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass we concluded with the Litany of the Holy Name of Jesus and then the blessing of Epiphany Chalk.

We concluded with a postlude of the March of the Magi. That was a fun one to sing!

Blessing of Epiphany Chalk

For the Feast of the Epiphany, it is traditional for parish priests to bless chalk for each family, so that they may mark the names of the three Magi over their doors, in the blessing of homes as a witness of their faith and protection against evil. This blessing is from the 1952 version of the Roman Ritual, translated by Philip Weller.

The chalk is a type of memento mori, or literally, Memento homo ("Remember, man, you are dust and to dust you will return.") image, a reminder of the dust of the earth from which man was made.

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread ‘til thou return to the earth out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return. 
Genesis 3:19

P: Our help is in the Name of the Lord.   
All: Who hath made heaven and earth.
P: The Lord be with you.   
All: And with thy spirit.

P: Bless, † O Lord God, this creature chalk, to render it helpful to men. Grant that they who use
it in faith, and with it, inscribe upon the entrance of their homes the names of thy saints,
Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar, may through their merits and intercession enjoy health of body
and protection of soul. Through Christ our Lord.

All: Amen.

The chalk is sprinkled with holy water.

We were able to take the chalk home for Holy Blessings.

Blessing of a Home at Epiphany
May Christ bless this House… All who dwell and pray in it… And All Whom they Welcome in His Name

V:  On entering the house the Magi found the child Jesus with Mary, His mother.

R:  They did Him homage and presented to Jesus symbolic gifts: gold to the great King, incense to the true God, and myrrh as a foreshadowing of His suffering and death.

Let us pray.
God, our Father, by the guidance of a star, you revealed your only Son as the Savior of all nations. Grant that we who already know you by faith, may be brought to the contemplation of your glory in our heavenly home. We ask this through Christ your Son Our Lord. Amen.

All may recite the Canticle of the Blessed Virgin Mary (The Magnificat) Luke 1: 46-55, by which Mary praised God 
at the time of her Visitation to the house of Elizabeth. 

All: My soul doth magnify the Lord. And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior. Because He
hath regarded the humility of His handmaid: for behold from henceforth all generations shall call
me blessed. Because He that is mighty hath done great things to me: and holy is His Name.
And His mercy is from generation unto generations, to them that fear Him. He hath shewed might
in His arm: He hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He hath put down the
mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble. He hath filled the hungry with good things:
and the rich He hath sent empty away. He hath received Israel His servant, being mindful of His
mercy. As He spoke to our fathers: to Abraham and to his seed for ever.

V: Be enlightened, O Jerusalem, and shine forth for your Light has come.

R: And upon you is risen the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ born of the Virgin Mary.

V: All nations shall walk in your light and kings in the splendor of your birth.

R: And upon you is risen the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ born of the Virgin Mary.

Reading of the Gospel for the Solemnity of the Epiphany of Our Lord. St. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapter 2: 1-12.

V: Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, has appeared and been revealed to the nations. 

R: The prophets foretold His coming, and the angels and shepherds adored Him. 

V: The Magi rejoiced to find Him and they lay their treasures before Him.

R: All you nations and peoples, come and adore Him. 

All recite the Our Father as the rooms of the house are sprinkled with holy water. 

Let us pray.

Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation. Through your goodness we have received all benefits.

Come, visit and bless † this house so that it may be a shelter of health, chastity, self-conquest, 

humility, goodness, mildness, obedience to the Commandments, and thanksgiving to God, † the 

Father, † the Son, and † the Holy Spirit.              

May the love and blessings of God, † the Father, and † the Son, and † the Holy Spirit, descend 

upon this house,  all those who reside within it, and upon all those whom they welcome in the 

Name of our Savior, Jesus Christ.   And may God’s grace and peace remain with all of them 

forever.  Amen. 

The initials of the names ascribed by tradition to the Magi (Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar), and the numerals of the current year are written with the blessed chalk upon the entry doors of the house in the following manner:   

20 C + M + B  19 

Some interpret the letters to stand for Christus Mansioni Benedicat!  May Christ bless this house!

12 days of Christmas

 Christmas afternoon we spent at Grandma's house nibbling, playing games, eating, and playing more games.

 We smoked part of a fresh turkey. Since it was our first time trying to smoke turkey we only smoked to (gigantic) legs and a (gigantic) breast. It will probably about a 60 pound turkey with his feathers, wings and things while it was still alive. I might add, here, that it was mighty tasty!

 Everything was delicious and very, very pretty.

 This is the Nativity set set up so lovely. You can't really see all the details with the lights but each shelf has a scene on it. Very lovely.

 Then we had yet another farm incident. This time it warmed up  after Christmas and absolutely down poured one night, creating sink holes in the barnyard. This cow got stuck down in one. :(

 I went over to check the pigs and it was pretty sloppy (but pigs like sloppy) and it wasn't too deep.

 We spent several hours working on this poor cow as it was delicate work trying not to harm her yet getting a cow up. Cows are large creatures, and very solid.

 We got her out and let her rest a bit. We made a home for her under a tent of sorts so she could warm, gave her all the lovely juicy tidbits cows like, but alas, she was dead by morning :(

 Eternal Rest grant unto Leo Wipperfurth, O Lord, and let Perpetual Light shine upon him, may he rest in Peace.

 Since we had 12 days of Christmas off we were working on some projects. The first was a new office for me in the little loft in my room. They moved a walk back 4 feet and made me a nice little office that is nicely open style with a secret closet.

 We had stir fry (yum) and Aragorn used his hand made chopsticks, maybe by one of the TKD school dads.

 This is my secret closet. The only stuff in it is overflow stuff like empty "work boxes" and whatever didn't fit on the shelf next to my desk.

 Since we are also working on bookshelves I was able to take a nice shelf and the little cupboard we got at a flea market. They fit perfectly.

 Simple and hopefully something I can manage to keep neat and orderly, but that will be a feat in itself.

Rosie drew this awesome picture of Gimli!

 We celebrated Christmas with extended family on December 30th.

 We started the day with Rosary in their lovely little chapel.

 Which is complete with a little choir loft. Since we were fitting 50ish people in the chapel some prayed from the choir loft.

 The line for dinner was mighty lengthy.

 We also brought cheese balls. "Cheese balls, definitely cheese balls."

 The next day I was making juice and simply thought the fruits and veggies looked particularly pretty. This awesome colander I discovered at Willie St. Coop. Best ever.

 Then for New Year's Eve we went to the bakery to celebrate with our friends. 

 It had snowed-iced-rained-froze-etc. on New Year's Eve but it was glorious when we came home from Mass on New Year's Day.

 Blessed Mother statue with a fur cap and cape on (ok, it's snow, but it does look pretty)

 A beef got out and found the salt on Sam's truck to be mighty tasty.

 Part one of the book shelves are done. We have a very large home library. We homeschool, what else would anyone expect? We haven't counted in a goodly number of years but I'd guess around 2-3000 books, it's absurd, it's addicting, lots of good books here. We believe in books. I loathe reading off computers when I can read off paper. Books are a comfort "food" so to speak, not something you can get out of a computer.

 Then the living room turned into an infirmary. We had cases of vomits scattered hither and thither. Thankfully it was not bad cases. Believe me, I've seen worse and in multitudinous numbers simultaneously. We found some lovely geographical DVD's which showed various places on the earth. That and some movies helped bide time.

 January 5th some of the (healthy) kids were in a tournament. I decided not to compete as I wasn't ready.

 Frodo is the only one who did creative/xtreme.

 Marigold participated in her first tournament (novice, rather than competitive)

 She did a form

 And one-step

 She got 1st place in one-step and 2nd place in her form.

 Rosie kept score

 So did Bilbo for the first time.

 Bilbo and Pippin were in the same ring.

 Pippin: 1st in weapons, combat, and sparring, 3rd in forms
Bilbo: 2nd in combat and sparring

 Merry was home sick :(

Rosie also performed.

 Rosie: 1st in form, weapons, and combat, 2nd in sparring

 Bilbo trying to see how many kicks he can do on the solo strike

 Frodo spent most of the day judging and at the end of the day did his traditionals.

 Frodo: 1st in creative form, 3rd in xtreme form, traditional forms, and combat. He didn't place in sparring as he was in the first round competing against someone who was extremely good, he didn't mind losing to someone so great. :D

 Then we helped clean up some of the mats.