Musings of a Catholic Convert

Morning Offering:

A good friend of mine pointed out something I should have been doing for a long time. I should be offering my day to the Lord. When we lay something at the feet of Christ, He transforms it. Whether it be our actions, our thoughts, our circumstances, or anything else, Christ can and will use it for His glory and our sanctification. The prayer below is one I found to “cover a lot of ground” spiritually speaking. I encourage you to offer your day to the Lord today. I will do the same.

Most Holy and Adorable Trinity, one God in three Persons, I firmly believe that You are here present; I adore You with the most profound humility; I praise You and give You thanks with all my heart for the favors You have bestowed on me. Your Goodness has brought me safely to the beginning of this day. Behold, O Lord, I offer You my whole being and in particular all my thoughts, words and actions, together with such crosses and contradictions as I may meet with in the course of this day. Give them, O Lord, Your blessing; may Your divine Love animate them and may they tend to the greater honor and glory of Your Sovereign Majesty. Amen.

Tuesday Ramblings:

First, before I forget, I want to share a link with you. Jimmy has a particularly interesting post about the Liturgy and Canon Law that I think you should read. If you don’t already, drop by Jimmy’s site (link at left) and read some of his posts. He is a good Catholic and an engaging writer. Read this one too.

My brain hurts from all the things going on at work. We sure are busy. Being busy has its advantages though. I’ve noticed over the past few weeks that the busier I am the faster the day flies past. Before you know it, you’ve been working for 9-10 hours and it’s time to head to the house. At least on the way home I can actually listen to a song or two instead of those radio morning shows. It’s not that they’re not funny on occasion, but I’d rather be rockin out than listening to a joke.

Have a great day, y’all.

The Market is Stabilizing:

Over the weekend the video game market began to stabilize. The initial rush to get fluctuations consoles has waned to an online trickle. Those who hesitated to put their item for auction until Saturday or Sunday missed out on potentially making more than $4000 profit. Units this morning are still going for around $1500, nearly triple what people paid for them in stores. If you have a PS3 for sale, you had better get it out there soon before demand dips again.

The Nintendo Wii is another story. Nintendo had the foresight to capitalize on getting as many units in stores as possible and at a significantly lower price point. While the units are sold out (at least where I checked), there is still a heavy online demand for them. Units currently are fetching around $550 (more than twice the msrp). But with additional shipments en route already, that price will surely drop.

Did I get either of the systems? Nope. I will bide my time. As much as I’d like to have a Wii, I still need to see just how responsive this new controller really is. My prediction is that if the control scheme is lagging or problematic, there will be a gamer reaction strong enough to catch my attention. If not, then I have confidence that the system has staying power (unlike the gamecube).

Since I’ve been thinking videogames this morning, I failed to mention to you just how cool it was to go to Mass in our new Church. The building is B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L! I was pleasantly surprised how well tHebrews 10:30 crowd adjusted to being in a Church instead of a gym. The majority of folks remembered the proper gestures. I wish that people would forget the non-liturgical gesture of holding hands during the Our Father. You’re missing the point of this prayer, people. Quit grabbing hands and focus on the Father. It’s not in the rubrics and it has nothing to do with the nature of this particular prayer. The horizontal focus comes next in the sign of peace. But I digress. The Mass was beautiful, as Mass always is, but even moreso to me yesterday. Just one more reason I’m grateful that God has led us to this place at this particular time.

Tis a Good Thing:

I’m glad to have some conversation in the comboxes for a change. Good times. Good times. So did any of you camp out at the electronics store to take a chance at buying a $600 game machine JUST so you could sell it on ebay and make some money? Hmm? I drove by the Target in town and saw some kids (and adults) with tents and lawn chairs. They were ready. I wonder if the supply in the store was enough to let them each buy one? Maybe they sat in the cold all night for nothing but an “I’m sorry. We just sold out.” Wonder if they cried.

Will there be riots this morning? These things are selling for $3k on ebay right now.

What’s in a name?

You’ve heard the question in Romeo and Juliet, or perhaps you heard the Petra song. Either way, my post today has nothing to do with them. Rather, I’m pondering what we are going to name our soon-to-be-born baby girl. First name have we do. Trouble in finding middle name have I. Why am I trying to type like Yoda?

So I’m working on names in my free time today. Patron Saints Index, here I come.

Java, I hardly knew ye:

I think I’m going to drop coffee, at least for a while. I’m drinking this fake crystal light stuff that has a spot of caffeine in it PLUS VITAMINS AND MINERALS! Trying to get more water into the old system as Halloween has done a number on my tummy. With Thanksgiving and Christmas feasting on the horizon, I have to get my will and my body on the same page so as to avoid the sin of gluttony.

We get to have our first Masses in the new Church this weekend and I can hardly wait! What other joys await us this weekend? Incense and bells would be AWESOME! Meeting Christ in the Eucharist is always a moving experience, but I can’t wait to meet Him in this Church. Is it Sunday yet?

My eyes, my eyes:

They are stinging something awful today. I stayed up late watching Rocky movies last night after I got back from a KofC meeting. No matter of those movies they make, I’m still going to go watch them. Yes, I liked Rocky V, especially the salto throw that Rocky gives Tommy during their street fight. Nice.

Get up, ya bum, cuz Mickey loves ya!

Yup. I’ll be watchin Rocky VI when it comes out in December. I heard from reliable sources that there is a twist to the plot. Appparently Dumbledore gets killed toward the end. You heard it here, folks.

Pope St. Leo I (The Great):

Today is the feast day for St. Leo The Great. I reccomend reading up on this man. Just reading all he did during the time of his pontificate makes my head spin. It will give you an idea of just how much responsibility the Bishop of Rome truly has. For this reason, and many others, we should daily lift up prayers to our Heavenly Father to strengthen and guide the Pope as he follows Christ in tending to the needs of the family of God, which is the Church.

In case you were wondering, RCIA was indeed an enjoyable time last night. I had time to mingle more than I normally do so I was glad to get to talk with folks. So many wonderful men and women in our class. I’m honored to be part of the team that is going to help welcome them into the Catholic Church. Yay RCIA!

Upon returning home, my son introduced me to his new game. It’s called “jump on daddy’s leg and hang onto his ankle while he walks around dragging you on the floor.” I have also decided to call it “reminder of all those ankle injuries from high school and college.” Oh well. It’s a small price to pay for his joy and carpet burns, right? C’mon. He’s not really getting carpet burns. Do you think he would keep holding on if he was getting those irritating rasberry marks on his tummy? His goal in this game is to wear me down via a modified “ankle pick” so that I stumble to the ground. Having fallen, I am then vulnerable to his “tackle takedown” and a multitude of nearfall and pinning combinations.

At least he didn’t kick me last night.

Kicking Again:

I must have been awakened no less than 5 times last night by our 2-year old. He climbs into our bed and snuggles in between us. Cute and sweet, right? Well, yes, but then he rolls toward me and proceeds to kick either my face or my back, depending on his dream. My guess is that he’s dreaming of kung fu because he beats me up. I feel like, and it pains me to say this, Chuck Norris was beat to death by Bruce Lee in “Return of the Dragon/Way of the Dragon”. Thank goodness the boy hasn’t seen the movie, or I would be missing a big patch of chest hair and we’d have a yelling cat running around the house. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Watch the movie.

My Hermeneutics class got off to a good start last night. All registrants did not show up for the first session, so we’ll see how they do catching up with the rest of the class. It’s not too late to start. We had a good time last night, and I enjoyed meeting folks from other parishes. There are so many good formation opportunities in our diocese, I’m glad to know that people are taking advantage of them and that some have chosen this particular course.

Votes are in:

Last night I did pop over often to see how the election results were shaping up. In my state, we elected a new Republican senator and gave another term to our Democrat governor. Our House representatives now stand at 4 Republicans and 5 Democrats. Most of the incumbants won their races. In the US House, now the Democrats have the majority. I think Virginia and Montana are still working out their results which will determine if the Demos get control also of the Senate.

What will happen? I don’t know. Being unhappy with both parties, my outlook is pessimistic. I am, however, always pleased to see pro-life candidates get elected/re-elected, regardless of their political party.

How did the voting go in your state? What changes, if any, do you forsee?