Kathleen M. Basi's Blog, page 88

Welcome, Risen Jesus (Giveaway!)

[image error]Today I would like to welcome Sarah Reinhard back to the blog to answer everything you ever wanted to know about her Lent/Easter devotional for families, Welcome Risen Jesus.

The last book of yours we talked about was Welcome Baby Jesus, your devotional book for families to use with children during Advent and Christmas. I think everybody knows on some fundamental, gut level that December is badly skewed and that we are in desperate need of resources to help us cling to what really counts. But the same can’t necessarily be said for Lent and Easter. Why is it just as important to take time for devotions during this spring season?

The earth is springing to life all around us (at least here in central Ohio), or we are at least ready for that. And there’s something renewed about me when the days are longer.

I’m an Advent dropout. Every year–and this year was no different–I walk away from Advent as though I have a hangover, and the hangover was a whole season long, and it’s a baby’s fault. Hey! I’ve been through this before!

Every year!

So Lent is almost a palate cleanser. I know I need to do all that stuff I was supposed to do at Advent, and I failed. Again. So here I am with Lent ahead of me. Again.

I’ll fail. But it’s not about what *I* plan, is it? It’s not about what *I* have in mind, is it?

Or that seems to be the lesson I need to learn.

Every day during Lent, you offer a scripture, a reflection (“Think”), and sections titled “Act,” “Fast,” and “Pray.” Some of these “fasts” are really hard-hitting: give your favorite part of the meal to someone else. Give up some play time to do two chores around the house. Be cheerful today, even when you’re annoyed. You’ve really nailed some tough things for kids to do! What’s the key to getting kids to keep a good attitude, so they don’t say, “Oh, no, LEEEEEEEENNNNNNNT!”?

Wait a minute: I have to get my KIDS to do this stuff?

Oh yeah. Riiiiiight.

Well, Kate, truth is: it’s all been a theory to me. This is the year when I put my book where my mouth is. (Actually, I’m going to use YOUR book. I need a bit more distance from my own words.)

I can only tell you what I do for myself: I just buckle down. It’s like exercise: you know you have to do it, but it doesn’t have to be THAT bad. Sometimes the dread of a thing is WAY worse than the actuality.

Most books seem to focus only on the penitential season. Why do you think it’s important to continue the devotions through Easter?

What I love about being Catholic is that we take our celebrations seriously. Like 40 days of partying seriously.

In college, when I thought a party had to come with a hangover afterward, I would have been stunned to consider this kind of serious partying. 40 DAYS! FOR REAL!

Now, granted, we’re not supposed to get sloshed and silly: this is a time to draw closer to God. And what better way to do that than continue those things we were striving to do during Lent–minus the fasting, OF COURSE.

How important is it to do this every single day?

I don’t think it matters. At least, it can’t matter for ME, because I’ll get all obsessive and focused on that. And that is NOT what the focus is to be!

If you miss a day–and chances are, if you’re anything remotely like me, you will!–forgive yourself and pick it up the next day. It’s okay. Jesus understands. And he will be there risen in all his glory for you on Easter. Period.

Do you envision these reflections as self-directed, in other words, for older kids who can read the book themselves, or for younger kids who need the devotions read to them? Since the “act” and “fast” sections are meant to be day-long activities, how do you make sure you carve out time to do them as a family?

The first thing that comes to mind for my family is to do the reflections the night before, perhaps as part of an after-dinner (or even during dinner) discussion. I’ve even thought about making it part of our before bed ritual during Advent.

Then, the next morning, you can just remind each other of what the day’s focus is, maybe pray the prayer together, and out the door you go with your crazy day!

Thanks, Sarah, for taking time to visit with us about your book. Everybody, I hope you can get a sense of the down-to-earth approach she takes to faith. We all need some of that! Welcome, Risen Jesus can be found at your local Catholic bookstore or by going online at Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or direct from Liguori.

AND…..just as we did during Advent, Sarah and I are giving away a set of our books. She’s giving away a set, I’m giving away a set. To enter, leave a comment below (or on Facebook!), and check out Sarah’s post by clicking below.

Not Yet

Every January there’s a day or two like this: shorts weather in the middle of frozen weeks. Days when we open the windows and let the humidity in, sniffing the air and saying, “Oh right, that’s what that feels like.” In the afternoon, I put shoes on the kids and we trek outside to scooters and tricycles and Nicholas’ new adventure, training wheels.

Michael adores being outside, and he’s been deprived of it by cold weather. Now, he’s in heaven. He comes to me with graham cracker crumbs clinging to his mouth, and I open my arms and he hurtles into them breathing vanilla and honey on me. He stays only for a moment; there are chalk drawings to explore, and trucks to push, balls to throw and mayhem to cause.

But he comes running back every minute or two to drop his head on my shoulder from behind for a couple of seconds before running off again. A miniature hug from a miniature boy who, really, is no longer a baby.

It surprises no one when a child grows, except his mother. That’s what they’re supposed to do. In the past I’ve embraced every change; there was always another child planned, no need to weep over what was lost, because there are sure to be more coming down the line. This time, it’s different. I’m so ready to be done with diapers and cribs and high chairs and having to carry a heavy child whose weight causes my shoulders to lock up (a daily battle I’ve fought for the last eight years with stretches, massages and Tiger Balm, but never managed to win). But I love babies, and it’s bittersweet to see Michael careening headlong out of babyhood. My heart whispers, Not yet.

Tomorrow he’ll be fourteen months. Alex and Nicholas weaned at fourteen months. Julianna lasted a couple more because she did everything late, including feed herself. But the time is near. I’ve led the weaning every other time, ready to be done with the extra time sucker at bedtime and first thing in the morning–the last two nursings to go. This time, I’m hanging on tight. Two nights ago, when I came home from my novel critique group, the kids were already in bed. I knew Michael didn’t really need to nurse, and I debated letting it go. But the whisper came again: not yet.

I’m holding on, drawing every drop of sweetness out of the experience, even as he proves ten times a day that toddlerhood is at hand. There’s the interest in cars, and the fact that he rolls around on the floor shrieking when he’s crossed. Things like that.

Ready or not, here it comes. And it’ll be beautiful, I know; Alex, long and lean and up to my shoulder, building pinewood derby cars and chasing his little siblings around to make them laugh, shows me that.

But it won’t be babyhood anymore. So I’ll hold on as long as he lets me.

Power Down

English: Goadby Road Looking towards Eastwell. The old mineral railway line once crossed the road on the horizon but the bridge is long gone, see [66875] (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One of my blog friends has helped start a new meme. It’s called Power Down. This group of women felt that the glut of connection demanded a response, and that response was to take a step back–to disconnect from the Great WWW for a period of time every week.

When Amy first introduced this idea, I felt, as I’m sure many others did, a bit intimidated, even threatened. I mean, we’re all trying to create relationships, build a following, and get work done, and the reality is that for most of that,  the internet is crucial. I told myself I’ve already declared the after school/evening time off-limits to writing time, so I can focus fully on my family. I’ve already backed off the blog, dropping one day and allowing the rest to be less polished, more free-written. And yet I recognized what she was describing: this feeling that I’m never quite fully present in my life as long as my attention is directed at the screen.

As the week went on, I began to recognize how much wasted time there is in my day. I blamed it on other things, namely distraction. I can’t get into a groove of writing when I only have five minute blocks, when Nicholas is yelling “Mommy, Michael is getting near me!” and Michael’s reaching up and wreaking havoc by pulling on my arm and banging on the keyboard. What I really needed was time without the kids. But then Nicholas went to school, Michael went down for nap, and I was still playing catchup: blog reading, another crack at making Twitter a useful tool, and so on. After all, I didn’t have enough time to really get my brain in the game on that short story revision, and I didn’t even know where to begin working on the novel again. Besides, I have a book coming out in five weeks, and it’s almost Lent–shouldn’t I be working on promotion?

In the end, I completely flipped out. I need more uninterrupted time, I wailed to Christian. I’m not getting anything done!

That’s not strictly true, of course. I’m getting a lot done. But I have such a wide scattering of projects, from magazine to book promo to bulletin inserts and short fiction and long fiction and writing music. Not to mention the flute practice. The up side of having so many irons in the fire is that there’s always something to work on, and always some way to draw income. But the flip side is lack of focus. Momentum doesn’t get rolling very well when you’re jumping from one thing to the next.

Thursday I listened to Gennifer Albin speak about the writing process and her debut novel, Crewel. She wrote, edited, submitted and sold that sucker in less than a year. How? She left the house and wrote 25 hours every week.

Twenty. Five. Hours.

What do I do with twenty-five hours? Not that much!

Friday afternoon, I had a sitter. I resolved to go to church and work on a song text (these take me longer than anything else I write). But the weather was gorgeous…well, marginally warm, anyway. And I’ve been scolding myself for not taking the time to go out and meditate, be quiet and pray when I can.

I had two hours. Not enough time to get away from the city. So I went to the back of the park and walked five minutes down a trail to a little hollow with a wooden bridge, where a dozen robins were flitting around, drinking from the spaces between the ice. I sat for fifteen minutes, listening to the low gurgle of water beneath ice, watching the birds. Not long enough to completely quiet my mind, but enough to release the tension. And then I went on to church, sat down in front of the Tabernacle, and worked on that song text for twenty minutes.

And I made progress. As in several couplets finished. So I pulled out my NEO and the short story I was revising, and worked on it, too.

I accomplished more in that two hours than in any other two-hour block in the last several months–and I spent half an hour of it driving.

What an eye-opener! I realize now I’m staring at a yet another paradigm shift in my life. I don’t know what all the implications are. Since I sat down to write this post, I’ve had to change out the bread machine dough, help a little boy count to twenty-five, and put Michael down for a nap. This is reality; for the foreseeable future, distraction-free writing time is not in the cards. What I can control is the online part. And so I, too, am going to be seeking times to Power Down this week, along with Amy & co.

Care to to join in?

Sunday Snippets

Time for another get-together of Catholic bloggers at RAnn’s place. This week’s contributions:

Losing Our Religion: A Response

Pathways To Heaven (expanding on last week’s post on vocations, which went a bit off track)

A fiction piece: Flash

Scouts, Flannery, & Everybody Loves Michael

Scouts, Flannery & Everybody Loves Michael: A 7QT post

___1___

Last night Alex had a Cub Scout pack meeting. His den was supposed to hold doors for everyone upon arrival. As I walked by on the way to the bathroom, I saw six boys wrestling over control of one set of doors…and Alex calmly, without fuss, holding the other set open all by himself.

___2___

It was my first Cub Scout meeting, and it was so interesting as a parent to see renewed proof of the way my firstborn wears his heart on his sleeve. Most notably his enthusiasm and fervor for what he’s doing. He was the only person (adult or child) in the whole building who held his hand above his head as he recited the scout salute.

___3___

Speaking of Scouts, recently my mother has been sharing with our family some information about a connection (at the national level as well as in certain badge requirements) between Girl Scouts and Planned Parenthood. I’m wondering how others have weighed this in their families and parishes. Another friend told me that the American Heritage Girls, a faith-based scouting organization, is now partnering with Boy Scouts. We have a troop at another parish in our town. Considering Alex is already involved in BSA, this seems like a good solution for us. But I’m still curious about how others have handled this.

___4___

Wednesday nights are always very late nights in our house–choir practice–and everyone knows perfectly well that upon returning home it is toilet, teeth, jammies and bed. Yet every week we have to tell Nicholas again why we are not reading bedtime books. Then he pulls a martyr face and drags out his sense of injustice as long as possible. It frequently comes down to a countdown. You know: “FIVE! FOUR!”

Well, this week Nicholas started moving at that point, so Christian stopped counting. Silence fell in the upstairs for a moment, and then Julianna, perched happily on the toilet, got tired of waiting. “WEEEEEEEE,” she yelled (three).

Well, that didn’t come out funny. Sorry. It was funny at the time.

___5___

Katharine, of Plume of Doom, started Tweeting Flannery O’Connor quotes this week. It was the nudge I needed to go to the library and check out her complete short stories. It’s so illuminating to the process of writing short stories, which is what I’m working on right now. But Katharine shared this quote in a Goodreads review yesterday, from a letter written by O’Connor: “”There is a question whether faith can or is supposed to be emotionally satisfying. I must say that the thought of everyone lolling about in an emotionally satisfying faith is repugnant to me. I believe we are ultimately directed Godward but that this journey is often impeded by emotion.”

Zing.

___6___

Are you ready for Lent yet???

___7___

And finally, some photos, which I will simply call “everybody loves Michael…but Michael doesn’t always love everybody’s love!”

Love this shot

Roommates always have a love-hate relationship, right?

As an aside, Nicholas loves that hat. Which is good because it’s a) super cute, and b) super warm.

Alex loves making Michael laugh by getting right in his face and SHOUTING!!!!!!! It works…usually.

Enough already!

Fiction: Flash

[image error]In the moment before the first shot was fired, Clarissa’s entire life passed before her. The present and past and future fused into an image compressed so tightly it seemed to catch fire. She saw herself run, her fists pummeling a pathway through the press of screaming humanity. Her shoulders bruised against the doorframe as she and three others burst through an opening built for one. She stumbled on a cracked step and nearly tumbled down the concrete flight. The sound of gunfire cracked the facade of the still morning, like a whip pursuing her beneath the boughs of a brilliant sweet gum.

She wept as she ran…ran until one high heel broke and her ankle twisted painfully; then, stripping off her shoes, she ran more. Ran beyond the power of strength. Ran, until at length the screaming of police sirens barricaded her from the madman, and she collapsed against the sun-warmed red brick of a parking garage.

Nylon snagged on the branches of a burning bush as she slid to the ground, releasing a rain of crimson that brushed her face and hid the ruined pantyhose, but she was safe. Safe to feel the throb in her ankle. Safe to contemplate what she hadn’t noticed before fleeing: the faces of those who were on the wrong side of the gunman. The ones who couldn’t get out.

There was Maddy, who had four little ones at home. Rick, the volunteer firefighter. Yun, whose parents had scrimped for years to send her to America to find a better life. Aaron, who spent his evenings teaching swim lessons to kids with special needs.

In the moment before the first shot was fired, Clarissa saw her entire life pass before her, past and present and future, and she knew if she could save only one person, that single moment would give her life more meaning than all the hours she’d spent in this grand old building combined.

As the press of people stampeded toward safety, Clarissa stepped forward and faced down the barrel of a gun. She could see her own heart poised there like a target he couldn’t miss. She thought of the empty loneliness of her life, the solitary movie nights, her lackadaisical relationship with what was left of her family. For a wistful moment, she wondered if her sister would weep, hearing the news.

In the moment before the first shot was fired, Clarissa’s entire life passed before her. The present and past and future rolled into an image compressed so tightly it seemed to catch fire and race toward her, riding a wave that crashed upon her with an unstoppable force: all that was, all that could have been, and all that now would never be.

*

When I saw the picture for this week’s prompt, my instantaneous impression was of a heart being targeted. At first I dismissed the idea, but then I heard a news story about people running away from a gunman, and it crystallized.

This story is a an experiment for me, structurally, so I’m wondering how it works. Is it clear that the first flash, in which she runs away, is not actually happening; she’s just seeing it in her mind? I’m afraid it might not be, and if that’s the case I’d love some feedback on how to make it clearer.

Pathways To Heaven

Photo by VISION Vocation Guide, via Flickr

We had a pretty good discussion here last week on the topic of marriage and whether there is only one man for one woman. As I was writing, I knew I was spending too much time on one part of what I was trying to communicate, but not until later did I realize I had buried the really important point. So I decided to revisit it today–briefly. (No epic-length post today, I promise!)

The quotes I shared about marriage were actually made in the context of a discussion of vocation to consecrated life:

“Usually, in refusing (a vocation) from God, a person finds his or her path to heaven more difficult. It is not so much that there is only one way to heaven for each of us. But it seems that God calls us to the best possible vocation suited to our personalities and talents.

“God would never violate his own creative act by compelling human persons to act in a certain way. This is why God tolerates the choice to sin. … Therefore, there must be more than one possible path to heaven for each of us, although for each of us there is a best vocation.” (ToB/Hogan, p. 155)

This is the point I was hoping to make last week, and I got off-track by spinning out my neurosis about marriage as an example. It’s a big deal to discern a vocation, but sometimes we leave kids with the impression that if we incorrectly identify GOD’S WILL FOR MY LIFE, we’re just basically screwed (pardon my language). Like, if we get it wrong, we’ll never be able to get to Heaven because we aren’t following GOD’S WILL FOR MY LIFE.

Once you put it in those terms it’s kind of obviously nonsensical, but does it ever occur to us that maybe people resist the idea of discerning a religious vocation because we make it such a big deal? That maybe they’d rather not risk asking the question and getting the answer “wrong”?

Hogan went on to explain “best vocation” by saying that God calls each of us to our vocation based on our talents and interests; a person who isn’t good with kids might not be well-suited to marriage, for instance…but all is not lost if that person does get married–it’s just that the path to Heaven is harder, because the daily demands of life are going to push their buttons more. Likewise, someone called to marriage might not function as well in the priesthood, because loneliness might be a heavy burden–but it’s not impossible, it’s just harder. So it’s okay to step out and discern, because that’s the point of seminary or novitiate–to ask the question, and learn by living out the life whether it is or isn’t meant for you.

That, in the end, was what I was getting at by saying this was such a liberating idea.

Related articles

Vocation: Whatever You Do, Do It For the Lord and Don’t Worry About the Consequences (patheos.com)
National Vocation Awareness Week (lancasterdominicans.wordpress.com)

Losing Our Religion: A Response

Religious symbols (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

NPR did a series last week called “Losing Our Religion.” In this story–the only one I heard in full–the interviewees talked about their ambivalence and in some cases rejection of faith. The ones that really struck me were those who experienced suffering and untimely death in their families, and concluded that God couldn’t exist, because deity is not compatible with suffering.

“So at some point, you start to say, why does all this stuff happen to people? And if I pray and nothing good happens, is that supposed to be, I’m being tried? I find that almost – kind of cruel, in some ways. It’s like burning ants with a magnifying glass. You know, eventually, that gets just too hard to believe anymore.”

It’s hard for me to put my thoughts together on this, so it may be a bit disjointed, but here goes.

In some ways I understand doubt very well. Like many others in the modern world, I respect reason and am skeptical when people claim things just are because they are. I want to know things for certain, and the things taught by faith cannot be known for certain.

Another quote that really stuck me was this one, from Daniel Radcliffe:

“I have a problem with religion or anything that says, ‘We have all the answers,’ because there’s no such thing as ‘the answers.’ We’re complex. We change our minds on issues all the time. Religion leaves no room for human complexity.”

How did he come to that conclusion? In my experience, religion is excruciatingly nuanced and complex, if you take the time to dig into it. And yet an awful lot of faithful people do paint religion exactly as he says.

Maybe it’s human nature to try to simplify the world so you don’t have to wrestle with it anymore. But faithful people have done the faith a real disservice by trying for so long to make it into something that provides “all the answers.” Because Christianity is a constant wrestling match between belief and doubt, between the best and the worst of your nature as a human being.

Here’s what I know about faith:

I doubt all the time. It seems irrational to believe there could possibly be Somebody out there bigger than everything, with a Capital-P Plan. And yet there are moments in each of our lives, regardless of religious belief, when we suddenly become overpoweringly aware of something Bigger Than Me. Motherhood provides those moments to religious and non-religious women alike. And I have found that when my brain quiets and I become open to the power of nature around me, I can feel God. Perhaps one reason faith has suffered such a beating in the modern world is the fact that we are never quiet, never free of music and texts and tweets.


Faith that you can claim by words (“Are you a Christian? Have you been saved?”) or wearing a pretty little cross, is okay as a first step, but if it doesn’t challenge you and make you uncomfortable two or three dozen times a day, then it’s pretty immature. Faith is something that should always be needling you, challenging you to be more than you are. Not affirming your own self-righteousness.


Faith can be a comfort, but that’s not its purpose. Anyone who thinks religion’s purpose is to make us feel better, I submit, is completely stagnant in their faith, and when tough times come calling, it will shake the foundations of that faith. Why do bad things happen? Because people do bad things. Blaming God for it is a copout. But if people–especially children–are given an insipid, watered-down, feel-good kind of Christianity, how can we be surprised when they recognize it as woefully insufficient for the real world?


There is much more commonality between faith and science than the current monologue would lead you to believe. Faith and reason do not stand at odds. The underpinning of my advocacy of natural family planning is the belief that a human’s body and soul/mind are connected. That where the body goes, the mind tags along for the ride. How often does science demonstrate the same thing? All the time. Thus, a woman who is raped has not only bodily injuries, but injuries to the mind and soul. And how many times have studies shown that when you exercise and eat healthier (physical), you feel better, too (spiritual/mental)?

Even many people who have sworn off formal religion still recognize the inherent spirituality of these last two examples. Shouldn’t this tell us something important? Namely, that there is something beyond us in this universe? Whether it’s God or The Force, something is out there, built into the very fabric of our beings. Let’s at least start from that point of commonality, and seek truth beginning from that point.

Sunday Snippets

Weekend and time for Sunday Snippets again, hosted by RAnn of This, That and The Other Thing.

This week, my contributions are:

Reality Beats the Fairy Tale All To Pieces, my “meaty” post for the week.

One of THOSE stories (parents, you know what I mean…)

Nicholas Moments (along with a first look at my new book!)

And a fiction piece, “For Love Of A Child.”

Now, it’s off to the park to enjoy this unseasonably warm day with my kids! And then Confession with Alex. (It’s so good for me to have a child old enough to receive the sacraments…keeps me going regularly myself.)

Nicholas Moments (and A Bit of Shameless Self-Promotion)

We’ve reached a wonderful day in our house, when I can sigh with relief and say, “I think we’re finally past THAT stage with Nicholas.” You know, the testing toddler stage that turns everything into a battle. Instead, we’ve passed into the goofball stage. So much so that today, Nicholas gets his very own post full of funnies. Or at least, cute-ies.

#1: in which he takes a Lego Mater, puts him on his dinner fork, and begins carrying him around the house. “It’s a forklift,” he explains.

#2 & 3: in which he’s picking up all the nuances of polite grownup interaction, such as:

“Mommy, how’s your Jazzercise?”

and

“Mommy how many calories do you have?”

#4: in which he comes out of preschool and starts with “Mommy, I like yoy hair. Mommy, I like yoy ears.” But then he hits the gold mine: “Mommy I like your eyeballs!” And there’s no going back.

#5: in which he comes over to check me over with the magnifying glass and concludes, “Yeah, you look a little strange.”

#6: in which he puts on a hand-knit baby cap made by my cousin when Alex was a baby and comes over to say, “Mommy, I’m the guy who shakes the trees!” (You get that, right? Maybe not. Maybe most of you have fake trees or go get them from a tree lot in the grocery store parking lot. But when you go cut down a Christmas tree from a tree farm, they shake the needles off it with a loud, gas-powered shaker.)

7: And although this can’t compare with the moments above, I have to conclude the day with this, due out in March 2013:

[image error]I think this is my favorite cover of all three of my books. I love the color. I’m a sucker for color. And although the subtitle says “Beatitudes,” that’s only the jumping-off point. This book connects the Beatitudes with things like the Ten Commandments, the fruits and gifts of the Spirit, and so on, and offers thoughts for both adults and kids–in fact, even more for the adults than for the kids–to help make these big, Sunday-morning kind of concepts connect concretely with feet-on-the-pavement real life. Because anyone who’s read more than a few of my posts knows I’m convinced that faith languishes when it is compartmentalized or not lived out in concrete action. But now I’m encroaching on what I have planned for Monday. In any case, you can read more about the book here.