For your Sunday...

stolen from our dear Bunkerville who always posts something wonderful on Sunday - and we thank her. 

Bunk has been under the weather, but has been sprung from the hospital and is home now. You may want to add her to your prayer list and pop over to wish her well.

Please watch in full screen...



Today is the fourth Sunday of Lent also known as Laetare Sunday. It takes it name from the opening words of the Mass, the Introit's "Laetare, Jerusalem" - Rejoice, O Jerusalem. It's a break in the penitential season of Lent.

 Next Sunday will be Passion Sunday marking the beginning of Passiontide in the traditional calendar of the Catholic Church and lasts until Holy Thursday,

Let's do our best to keep Sunday's holy. As Shawn Carney, of 40 Days for Life, says:

 God is not boring; He invented rest and rested Himself. There is not a more pro-life day than Sunday. When it starts to slip away as just another day for getting things done or getting a jump on the week, we need to reevaluate and reclaim our commitments to God and one another. 

I know there are people who have to work on Sunday. I understand that. However, I've always mourned the loss of the "Blue Laws" from my younger years.  Blue laws stopped businesses from being open on Sunday.  I honestly don't remember if restaurants were exempt since we always had a large Sunday family meal after Mass.

Maybe after the Wuflu madness is done with we could return to a time when businesses closed on Sunday and people could spend time honoring the Sabbath. Does anyone really need to hit up Macy's or Wallyworld on Sunday?  Before you accuse me of being all "holier than thou" there have plenty of times I've gone to Wallyworld on Sunday.  Non piu! 

Sunday / Agnus Dei ...

beautiful...

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.
Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.
Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, grant us peace 

The Agnus Dei from Tomás Luis de Victoria’s Missa O magnum mysterium, sung at Christmas Midnight Mass by the Mary Immaculate Choir of St. Stephen of Hungary Parish, the FSSP’s apostolate in Allentown, Pennsylvania. 

Choir directed by Eric McWhirter. Photo by parishioner Mary Schwartz.

Remember...

A Soldiers Deck of Cards...

for Sunday.



H/T Stacy McCain and Smitty of The Other McCain - and we thank them.

It's Sunday...

and the living is easy.

Apologies for not answering all the fine comments.  I have read them all and appreciate my blogger buddies more than you will ever know.

  Yesterday we worked 10 straight hours outside mowing (with our ancient push mower - my poor lawn tractor has the flu), weeding, burning huge piles of debris, washing cars, and cleaning the house. 

Our reward?

Sunday Brunch!

We'll be walking off breakfast shopping for a new lawn tractor at Lowe's. 

And, as always, visit Reaganite Republican for the finest in Sunday Funnies

It's Sunday...

and bloggers need their rest.


Today you can worship the Lord

Take time for a leisurely breakfast

Go for a walk

Take the kids to the park

Go for a bike ride

Do some spring garden cleanup

Write a letter

Read a book

Sew something

Make something

Paint a picture

and even read the funnies at Reaganite Republican

It's Sunday...

and time for Reaganite Republican's

Sunday Funnies

- and we thank him for a particularly good batch!  We laugh to keep from crying, doncha know.

I have more but we're headed out to our favorite Sunday brunch.  See you in a bit...

It's Sunday...

and I don't have the heart or the inclination to post anything disturbing.

Please offer your Sunday worship to the people of Japan as well as all the Christians who suffer persecution.  It is mind numbing that in the 2011 AD there are people being slaughtered for being Christians. 

Regular snarky posting will resume tomorrow. 

For today I'm going to make an effort to lift up my heart and hopefully bring a bit of joyfulness into yours.

May God bless all my readers (even the loony lefty trolls.)  

Father Speekman  has a homily for the first Sunday of Lent that brings the concept of true power into laser-like focus - and we thank him.

In  Thanking the Devil  Father Powell carries out the same theme and also garners the coveted

Quote of the Day

Lent is our chance to do what Jesus does. While in this desert for forty days, we take the devil’s false promises to us and turn them into the fulfilled promises of God’s love and care for us. God will love us against our will, but He will not prevent us from taking the devil’s deal if we will to do so. He will give us everything we need to say No to the devil, but He will not say No for us. We must act; we must say to the devil’s face, “It is written…” God and His promises come first.

Terry at Abbey Roads brings us the message of Our Lady of Akita    The Marian Shrine at Akita, Japan

Matt over at Conservative Hideout posted a   A Message From God  from Pastor Terry.  Excellent!

Carol's Closet is celebrating  Spring is here!

Music for Sunday

Quite Rightly over at Bread Upon the Water   Just a Closer Walk with Thee - Ella Fitzgerald

Nice Deb   Your Sunday Hymn: Attende Domine  the sound of angels

Always on Watch   Musical Interlude a must see!!! Really!

and no Sunday would be complete without our 

Sunday Funnies from Reaganite Republican

For Bunni:

It's Sunday...

and I have nothing to say.

Charlie Sheen, Obummer, and the teacher's unions will just have to slog along without my input.  

And so (never start a sentence with "and so" if you wish to be taken seriously) I'm headed to the gym, followed by a movie (Unknown.)  This will be the third movie in two months which is more than we've attended in the last 5 years.  After the movie we'll be checking out some things for our closet redo, a quick pop into Costco (I heart Costco), and a lovely dinner out compliments of a gift certificate from a student. (Thank you, student!)

As always on Sunday:

Reaganite Republican:  Sunday Funnies
and
Amusing Bunni amuses us - and we thank her.

It's still Sunday...

so I have little desire to post anything about those crazy teachers up in Wisconsin, even though the very thought of how they're acting, and the demands being made leaves me in such a state of rage I can hardly breath.

No siree - never mind that a public sector union is inherently immoral.  Strong words?  Not at all.  When your wages are negotiated with an elected official that your union dues helped elect, and that elected official is not required to show a profit - hell, they don't even have to break even,  in order to tax producers to fund your own lifestyle, and the producers don't have any say so about  the aforementioned wages, not to mention the cushy benefits and hot-dang pension - it is called stealing.  Simple as that!

Ok - moving on now.

With special thanks to Reaganite Republican for providing us with our Sunday Funnies (and for making little old me his featured blog.)  Let me be the first to say my devotion to RR does not stem from the fact that he is a handsome hunk, but rather from his fine and talented blogging, although the handsome part doesn't hurt.

Reaganite's Sunday Funnies 

And our always delightful Bunni has graced us with a fun and informative weekend post 

I'm gratified to know that the First Woman and her daughters are enjoying a long ski weekend in Colorado.   I guess when Obama said we all have to have some "skin in the game", he was referring to anything she may scrap off her rear patoot while on the slopes. 

Some Sunday thoughts...

It is not by privileges, special graces, or mystical experiences
that souls are perfected in love;
it is by a total adhesion to my Will,
and by a real death to all that is not my Will.


This life of yours will pass quickly.
In the end, you will take comfort in one thing only:
in the "Yes" that you will have said to my Love for you,
and in your adhesion to my Will as it will have unfolded
minute by minute, hour by hour, and day by day in your life.

Tell me, then, that what I will, you will.
Tell me that all that is outside of my will for you is so much rubbish.
Ask me to cleanse your life of the accumulated rubbish of so many years.
Ask me to make you clean of heart and poor in spirit.
Seek nothing apart from what my Heart desires you to have.
Ask only for what my Heart desires to give you.
Therein lies your peace.
Therein lies your joy.
Therein lies salvation and glory.

Your plans, your desires, and your anxieties
are but puffs of smoke blown away by the wind.
Only what I will endures.
Only what I will gives you happiness.
Seek then what I will, and trust me to give you what you seek.

Souls who chase after rainbows
pass by the treasures that I have laid beneath their feet,
leaving them behind to pursue a future that is not,
and that will not come to be.

This is an exhausting exercise for you
and for so many souls like you,
who, enchanted by an ideal,
fail to see my work, and the splendour of my Will for them,
revealed in the present.

Live, then, in the present moment.
Choose to be faithful to me
in the little things that I give you
and ask of you from minute to minute,
from hour to hour, and from day to day.
It is foolish to pin your hopes and to spend your energy
on an imaginary good,
when the real good that I offer you is here and now.

It is not forbidden you to dream dreams
or to imagine a future that you think will make you happy
-- I give you your imagination and I am not offended when you use it.
The imagined good becomes an evil, however,
when it saps you of your energy;
drains you of the vitality
that I would have you offer me in sacrifice
by being faithful to the reality that is here and now;
and when you use your imagination
to flee from obedience and submission to me
in the circumstances
and in the places where I have placed you at this time.

Plan for the future by living in the present.
Open your heart to my voice each day,
and cling to the smallest manifestations of my Will.
Renounce all that springs from your own desires and imaginings,
and say "Yes" to all that springs from my most loving and merciful Heart.
Therein lies your peace, your joy, and your salvation.

From In Sinu Iesu, The Journal of A Priest

H/T and many thanks to Father Mark of Vultus Christi

It's Sunday...

Some Sunday Links:

Recommended by Terry:  Catholic Spiritual Direction
Homilies and Reflections from Australia:  Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

and

Sunday wouldn't be Sunday without Reaganite Republican's funnies - and we thank him...

Reaganite's Sunday Funnies

Sunday...

I just realized that there are probably several generations of people that have never eaten a true vine-ripened tomato and have never heard O Sanctissima.

How sad...

H/T Four Right Wing Wackos

The Lord's Day with Live Chat Update

 The blogosphere is quiet for now.  Deadly quiet.  I'm sure that won't last.

I have nothing to say except we have done all that we can do - for now.  As I've said before, this in not the end, but just the beginning. 

Reaganite Republican will have live streaming video starting at 1:00 pm ET. We thank him.

The Other McCain will also be updating regularily.  We thank Stacy and Smitty.

Gateway Pundit will also be doing his usual great job.

For now, I will render unto God. Caesar will have to punt for awhile.

Update:

Live Chat hosted by Stacy McCain

Sunday

*****Mass, breakfast out, and off to an art show.

****Have a wonderful Sunday. See you later...