Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Happy liturgical new year that is. No you dont have to break out the Auld Lang Syne or the champane just yet, but this is still a cause for celebration. No only because it is a chance to begin again, to make resolutions of prayer and faithfulness but we begin advent (in latin, adventus) or "coming" again. We being the time of joyful patience where we await our Savior coming into our poor land, our lonely broken world to give us hope! (And as an extra bonus, us english speaking Catholics get a new translation of the mass - just enough of a change to perk our ears and make us pay attention to the words we say once again!)
A friend shared with me the words of Pope Benedict XVI during his homily last Saturday on the first First Sunday of Advent. Here are few lines that I thought were delightful.

"Man, in his life, is in constant waiting: When he is a child he wants to grow, as an adult he tends to his realization and success, growing in age, he aspires to his deserved rest. However the time comes in which he discovers that he has waited too little if, beyond his profession or social position, he has no choice but to wait. Hope marks the path of humanity, but for Christians it is animated by a certainty: The Lord is present in the course of our life, he accompanies us and one day he will also dry our tears...Dear brothers and sisters, let us live the present intensely, when we already have the gifts of the Lord, let us live it projected to the future, a future full of hope. The Christian Advent thus becomes an occasion to reawaken in ourselves the true meaning of waiting, returning to the heart of our faith which is the mystery of Christ, the Messiah awaited for long centuries and born in the poverty of Bethlehem. Coming among us, he has brought us and continues to offer us the gift of his love and of his salvation. Present among us, he speaks to us in many ways: in sacred Scripture, in the liturgical year, in the saints, in the events of daily life, in the whole of creation, which changes in aspect if he is behind it or if it is obfuscated by the mist of an uncertain origin and an uncertain future. In turn, we can speak to him, present to him the sufferings that afflict us, impatience, the questions that spring from the heart. We are certain that he always hears us!...Dear friends, Advent is the time of the presence and the expectation of the eternal. Precisely for this reason it is, in a particular way, the time of joy, of an internalized joy, that no suffering can erase. Joy because of the fact that God became a child. This joy, invisibly present in us, encourages us to walk with confidence. Model and support of this profound joy is the Virgin Mary, through whom the Child Jesus has been given to us. May she, faithful disciple of her Son, obtain for us the grace to live this liturgical time vigilant and diligent in waiting. Amen."

Megan's Bday!

So I realize this is way overdue, like a month, but these are some pictures from Megan's Birthday party. It was near Halloween so we had both our families over and made some crafts with the kids and had them wear their halloween costumes. The kids looked so cute and we had such a good time on her 26th birthday (as you can see by her picture with the Birthday sign and the Holy Father). 

A Perfect Dinner