The Sheepcat

My Father's Sacrificial Love

On this the anniversary of my father's death, I honour his memory and ask for prayers for the repose of his soul. He was a minister of the United Church of Canada, and I now find it fitting that his anniversary coincides with the Feast of the Presentation, with its Gospel reading "Lord, now let your servant depart in peace" (Luke 2:29).

Several years ago I recalled the huge fight I had with my parents over their prayers for my deliverance from homosexuality. That post was gruelling to write, and I finally delivered the promised follow-up to it this past June over at Reclaim the Rainbow – Toronto in the form of a reflection on how my father's sacrificial love helped me become the man I am today. Thank you, Dad, and thank you, God, for all you have given me.

A Post-Abortive Father's Coventry Carol

On this Feast of the Holy Innocents as we commemorate the little children executed by King Herod, I have adapted the 16th-century Coventry Carol to reflect the spiritual journey of a father complicit in the abortion of his own innocent child.

Lully, lullay, thou little tiny child,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.
Lullay, thou little tiny child,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Child I begot, what have I wrought!
Cursed be that fateful day
Thy blood I shed. O shame and dread!
Beyond all hope I stay.

That woe is me, poor child for thee!
And ever mourn and sigh,
For thy parting neither say nor sing,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Yet grace anew approaches through
Bethlehem’s lowly Babe
Who came to save e’en me, wretched knave
Who my own offspring slew.

Forgive me, Lord! Have mercy, Lord.
Renew my heart today.
I scorned in hate Thy providence great,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Now cleansed of guilt for blood I spilt
All of it washed away,
Absolved of sin, I know peace within,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Lully, lullay, thou little tiny child,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.
Lullay, thou little tiny child,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Note: This is a work of imagination on my part. No child of mine or Mrs Sheepcat's has been aborted. But I used to march for "choice" on abortion, on International Women's Day and other occasions. And like many members of the gay and lesbian communities, I looked forward to severing the link between sex and procreation, imagining that this would bring liberty.

Instead we are now Co-Workers of Life promoting authentic freedom through Jesus Christ. The Sisters of Life offer days of prayer and healing for post-abortive men as well as for post-abortive women (separately). For post-abortion healing we also recommend Second Chance Ministry, Rachel's Vineyard Ministries, and Silent No More Awareness Campaign.

Have Yourself a Marian Little Christmas

Call me schmaltzy, but I've long thought the secular Christmas chestnut "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" has been crying out for a Catholic parody, so here it is. Not ha-ha parody, I mean, just imitative use.

Have yourself a Marian little Christmas:
Magnify the Lord.
Join His Mother and His saints in one accord.

Have yourself a Marian little Christmas:
In her "Fiat" see
The model of perfection in humility.

As we walk through this vale of pain,
Still our joy remains undimmed,
For She who bore the Holy Child,
Intercedes for us with Him.

In your longing for a sweet reunion
Turn to God and pray,
Worship Mary's Baby nestled on the hay
And have yourself a Marian little Christmas Day.

In 2001 the original songwriter, Hugh Martin, a Seventh-Day Adventist, co-wrote new, Christian lyrics under the title "Have Yourself a Blessed Little Christmas." Sorry, Mr Martin, I couldn't find a way to keep a second internal rhyme in the third stanza.

Click to listen to

Marian Little Christmas

Update: Thanks, Curt Jester, and sorry, everyone, for the technical difficulties here. If you can't get the player to play just by clicking, try right-clicking to open the mp3 in a new tab.

Apologies for the sound quality. Christmas comes once a year, so I thought I really should strike while the iron was hot. In my defence, let me cite Chesterton: "If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly."

Meanwhile, for more than a decade I've been writing parody songs (and the occasional original one) about pharmaceutical research and other topics. So please spare a prayer for my dear wife, who--bless her--puts up with a lot when I feel a song coming on. She knew and she married me anyway!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to you and your loved ones! Christ is born, alleluia!

 

Catholics and Protestants alike have loved this carol, "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen" in the original German and now in many translations. The earliest text, dating from around 1580, was found in a Carthusian monastery. The video is based on the harmonization by the German composer Michael Praetorius (1571–1621) and the familiar 1894 translation by Theodore Baker.

One might wonder why in Baker's version the ending of the second verse, "She bore to men a Savior / When half spent was the night," repeats that of the first. So to emphasize the hour of Jesus' birth seems out of keeping with the overall structure of the hymn.

It turns out that Praetorius, who was Lutheran, and Baker played down the Marian nature of the hymn, which like the 16th-century Litany of Loreto, identified the rose with Mary rather than Jesus. And one form of that second verse literally ends, "She has borne a child / Remaining a pure maid," which of course reflects the Catholic conviction that Mary remained ever-Virgin. The carol in its Protestantized version is still very lovely, but it shows the long history of needing to ask "What does the hymn really say?"

Dear readers, whatever you believe or practise, we appreciate your interest in our occasional remarks here on the blog. Special thanks go out to those of you who pray for us and our family members, one of whom remains in particularly poor health. Rest assured of our prayers for you.

Note: Please visit again later today for a Christmas treat that isn't quite ready to post yet.

Solemn High Mass for Candlemas

On Tuesday, St Brigid's in the east end of Toronto saw its first Solemn High Mass in probably 45 years or more. Fr Venette of the FSSP was the celebrant, and two transitional deacons from St Augustine's Seminary filled the roles of deacon and subdeacon.

All told, the celebrant and his assistants and we singers in the choir loft together with the people in the pews numbered more than a hundred. Not a bad turnout for a first-time event on a snowy night.

The occasion was Candlemas: in the 1962 Missal, the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary; and in the Ordinary Form, the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord.

When some of our family members attended a United Church service on Christmas Eve, the people processed around the church with lit candles. Our relatives hadn't heard of such a thing being done; surely this ultimately came from the Catholic tradition of a Candlemas procession.

Tuesday being the twentieth anniversary of my father's death, I found the Tract particularly poignant:

NUNC dimittis servum tuum, Domine * Secundum verbum tuum in pace: Quia viderunt oculi mei * salutare tuum Quod parasti * ante faciem omnium populorum: Lumen ad revelationem gentium, * Et gloriam plebis tuae Israel.

[NOW dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, * in peace, according to Thy word: For mine own eyes hath seen * Thy salvation, Which Thou hast prepared * in the sight of all the peoples, A light to reveal Thee to the nations * and the glory of Thy people Israel.]

For more pictures, see the FSSP Toronto Facebook group.

How Can Anyone Be "Mother of God"?

The title of Mary as "Mother of God" was one of those puzzling peculiarities of Catholicism, as far as I was concerned back in my Baptist days. Jesus was God, and Mary was Jesus' mother, but how could she be mother of, well, all of God (who is infinite and timeless)? Catholic moral teaching had a reassuring solidity to it, even if not all its rules then struck me as necessary, but the Catholic way of thinking about the Virgin Mary I found downright disquieting.

Part of the answer is that Mary is in fact not mother of God the Father, nor of the Holy Spirit. But because Christ's divine nature, "eternally begotten of the Father," is united with his human nature in a single person (as solemnly affirmed by the fifth-century Council of Ephesus), his mother is truly the Mother of God.

The best short summary I've found of the doctrine is a General Audience by Pope John Paul II on 27 November 1996. And Jeff Mirus has a lovely compilation of reflections on Our Lady.

Suffice it to say a devotion to Mary, Mother of God, is an aspect of my faith I now treasure.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.

The Holy Family, Icon and Model of Every Human Family

Mrs Sheepcat and I wish you a happy Feast of the Holy Family.

This day is extra-special to us because our parish is Holy Family Church, and we applied the theme to our wedding. After we signed the register, we consecrated our marriage to the Holy Family with the following prayer and left the bridal bouquet for Our Lady at the icon.

Photo by Greg Schilhab.

O Jesus, our most loving Redeemer, who having come to enlighten the world with Thy teaching and example, didst will to pass the greater part of Thy life in humility and subjection to Mary and Joseph in the poor home of Nazareth, thus sanctifying the Family that was to be an example for all Christian families, graciously receive our family as it dedicates and consecrates itself to Thee this day.

Do Thou protect us, guard us and establish amongst us Thy holy fear, true peace and concord in Christian love: in order that by living according to the divine pattern of Thy family we may be able,
all of us without exception, to attain to eternal happiness.

Mary, dear Mother of Jesus and Mother of us, by thy kindly intercession make this our humble offering acceptable in the sight of Jesus, and obtain for us His graces and blessings.

O Saint Joseph, most holy Guardian of Jesus and Mary, help us by thy prayers in all our spiritual and temporal needs; that so we may be enabled to praise our divine Savior Jesus, together with Mary and thee, for all eternity.

(Recite the Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be 3 times.)

Amen.

Through prayer cards based on this image and quotation, we asked our guests to pray for us. We ask for your prayers and assure you of ours.

The Holy Family is the beginning of countless other holy families.

The history of mankind, the history of salvation, passes by way of the family. The family is placed at the center of the great struggle between good and evil, between life and death, between love and all that is opposed to love. To the family is entrusted the task of striving to unleash the forces of good, the source of which is found in Christ ... so that their family will be strong with the strength of God.

I speak to all people of our day, so that they will come to appreciate the grandeur of marriage, family and life; so that they will come to appreciate the great danger which follows when these realities are not respected, or when the supreme values which lie at the foundation of the family and of human dignity are disregarded.

May the Holy Family, icon and model of every human family, help each family unit to grow in understanding of its particular mission in society and the Church. May Mary and Joseph accompany us all with their constant protection.

With these sentiments I bless every family in the name of the Most Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Pope John Paul II
from Letter to Families, 1994

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, everyone!

No, we haven't dropped off the face of the earth since the wedding. We've just been getting used to married life. More about that some other time, but for tonight, let us turn our gaze to Bethlehem and recall with "exceeding great joy" (Matthew 2:10 KJV) the birth of our Lord Jesus. As St John Chrysostom put it, "He became what we are, that we might become what He is."

Blessed Apparition of Saint Michael Day

Update: Welcome, readers from Catholic and Enjoying It! and Post-Darwinist and (a new one to me) Iliocentrism. Don't miss our engagement story--pretty remarkable for a guy who used to want to marry his boyfriend.

A guest post by Miss (for now) Blanche, M.I.

Four years ago this Sunday, May 10, The Sheepcat got started here with his new Web adventure. Since then he has experienced some rather significant changes.

Along the way he has continued to enrich the lives of his numerous readers, both local and international. I should know, because when he introduced himself online, I was able to learn plenty of good things about The Sheepcat before I replied. Subsequently I have learned countless more good things about The Sheepcat (not least that he's even better-looking in person, girls!), and I very much look forward to being his wife.

For as long as I've known The Sheepcat, we have shared a devotion to Saint Michael, for whose intercession we pray when passing by psychic shops. We know of two that closed on The Sheepcat's watch, one that closed on mine, and two more since we began dating and praying together daily – a total of five psychic shops closed to date following our prayers to the Prince of the Heavenly Host. In thanksgiving to God we are having a Mass offered at 5:30 this afternoon at Holy Family Church.

While we chose this date for its liturgical significance, we honour Saint Michael every day. We invoke him as our protector in spiritual battle and as the patron of our city.

This date also comes after The Sheepcat recorded 50,000 page views.

We would like readers to know that this blog is a gift to the Church, and that we pray for your intentions daily. On a personal note, May 8 happens to be the six-month anniversary of the pub night after he and I had The Conversation. We have been so blessed to experience a courtship within a community fostered by the Oratorian Fathers.

If you booked your spot for tonight's Sheepfold dinner, get ready for a great meal and some beautiful fellowship at our new headquarters. If you aren't joining us tonight, please save the date to celebrate the patron saint of The Sheepcat, Cardinal Cooke, with dessert on October 6, 2009. Again, please respond through the blog e-mail. And, whether or not we can meet in person, please use the comments section below for your shout-outs. Happy Anniversary, Sheepcat!

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter, everyone! Christ is risen, he is risen indeed, alleluia!

The Easter Vigil at St Vincent de Paul Church was glorious. Please pray that it might bear good fruit in the hearts of all who attended, especially those who are not in full communion with the Catholic Church.

I've been off-line for several days, taking a much-needed sabbatical from the computer. Next year I'll see if I can queue up something to get published automatically in my virtual absence.