1. Back at Last! This is my first 7-takes post in months. The reason being that I don’t have the wit and energy to write multiple weekly blog posts while working on a book. As of late last night, said book is finished and submitted to my editor. The Everyday Catholic’s Guide to the Liturgy of the Hours is on its way! …

Eeek! Here it is the end of Wednesday and I forgot to do the weekly Q&A.

Welcome, new follower Ron. Good to have one more psalmsayer sharing a love for the Liturgy of the Hours. If any of you like …

A golden oldie rerun while I pound away on chapters 8 and 9.

The Church teaches that the primary hours of the Divine Offices, the “hinges” of the day, are Morning and Evening prayer (Lauds and Vespers).…

Psalm 103 comes up in  the psalter for this Wednesday’s  Office of Readings .In verse 5, after listing some of God’s blessings–forgives guilt, heals your ills, redeems you, crowns you with love and compassion, fills your life with good things–the psalmist adds, renewing your youth like an eagle’s.

Every time I read this line, I first give the little happy sigh with which I respond to beautiful  biblical nature imagery, a mini Hallmark poster of the image flashing in my brain.

Then I stop and say, Wait!…  what?

Because I can’t figure out what’s so special about an eagle’s youth. Not his strength, power, beauty, far sight, but his youth.

My first guess–could it be there was a phoenix-type myth going on about eagles that the psalmist had picked up on?

I did a search and found that many people share my question. An interesting “biblical birdwatching” site gave a lengthy description of how many times a bald eagle molts until he acheives the mature, white-head-and-tail plumage at 5 years of age. The evangelical writer considered this molting a kind of renewal. Not bad, but 1. this would teach a lesson about the desirability of the eagle’s  maturity, not his youth, and 2. the bald eagle is a North American bird. I don’t know that any eagles of the middle east have so dramatic change in coloration.

Luckily, I remembered that the Fathers of the Church have commented at length on just about every verse of scripture.…

Image: Virtuousplanet.com…

iBreviary, one of my favorite apps for the Liturgy of the Hours,…

Welcome, new …

“Perhaps we should stop seeing the office of readings as “that really long liturgical hour with those two long readings” and start thinking of it as “that really compact, efficient daily prayer & study time that makes it possible for me to pray, read scripture, and read the best of the writings of the saints, all in less than half and hour”. Because that it what it is. Perhaps, looking at it this way, more people would be eager to try it. “
-from The Everyday Catholic’s Guide to the Liturgy of the Hours…

Father Greg was a good monk. So humble. He loved the peace and quiet of his monastery. It was so easy there to dismiss the distractions of the world and devote himself to prayer.

But then, Fr. Greg was chosen to be a bishop. That was then end of the serene contemplative life. He resisted the invitation at first, but finally submitted to the will of those who felt he was the only man for this particular job.

Dealing with his new diocese was really tough for Father Greg. He said he felt “divided and torn to pieces” by all the competing demands on his time and energy. Administrative tasks were the worst: the diocese owned lots of property. All sorts of projects and people needed money, and some were so manipulative in their attempts to get a piece of the pie that the bishop secretly thought of them as “robbers”. It was hard to be patient and charitable with these people. There were both physical and spiritual dangers of all kinds for the Bishop’s flock. Heretical ideas were gaining traction among the people. Criminal gangs were a huge problem in the city, and the bishop spent hours working with government officials to minimize the damage and devastation caused by them.

Bishop Greg (we had  better call him that now) worried about losing sight of his apostolic commission to preach the gospel, so much did all these chores distract him. His position forced him to spend lots of time with men of the world: politicians, the wealthy.…

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