Father Carl
Sep27
on 09/27/2016
at 12:01 am
I loves me some stained glass. I get so inspired when looking at stained glass in churches (and church statues and art in churches, etc). And I have a tendency to draw when I am inspired… so I draw whilst in church. It is a God-given talent, so I know God doesn’t mind.
And, yes, there is a real Father Carl.
I was kind’a hoping that there really was a Saint Swinnerton of Shropshire, since there is a Swinnerton’s of Staffordshire. There was a Patron Saint of Heathens, whose name I cannot not recall. And my favorite, Saint Gern of the Cows, the Patron Saint of Wayward Women.
I will decline to ask if Randie is really Catholic. I’m not Jewish by any stretch (jokes about lost tribes notwithstanding) but Rabbi Bob (as we call him) is a frequent visitor in my house. He organized a secret fund-raiser to donate a Hummer H1 Alpha for our work in wildlife rescues.
Judy Reminded me that there is a “Shropshire Slasher” … which I forgot about. Ooo, Saint Gern of the cows… was she Canadian?
You can ask about Randie’s Catholicness. She doesn’t believe that religion is exclusive. She could walk into an Episcopalian service or Lutheran or Baptist and feel at home. I myself, have Catholic transplanting… but have been to Baptist and other denominations and feel that God really doesn’t care as long as you…”Love God with all your heart and mind… and love your neighbor as yourself.”
Rabbi Bob and Father Carl should get together.
Everyone on my street is Jewish but us, which is how Rabbi Bob discovered us. Since I’m training as an Apache medicine man married to a medicine woman, he keeps telling is that we should list ourselves as ‘Religious Professionals’ on our tax forms. That would seem to require actually getting paid for doing it. His two favorite jokes on the subject – ‘Jewish mothers want their children to go into medicine. It means something different for Native American mothers’ and ‘A Rabbi and a Medicine Man walked into a bar. Neither of us saw it coming!’
It gets a little complicated. Aside from English, my kid speaks the Mescalero Apache dialect and the Cherokee language and, from helping her friends with their Hebrew lessons, may be the only Native American who is fluent in Hebrew. Even worse, we know Native American Sign Language and are now learning American Sign Language because we seem somehow to find ourselves adopting a deaf Navajo girl.
There’s “A Shropshire Lad”—A. E. Housman—as well.
An interesting side of Randie. There is always comfort to be gotten from those whose faith is well-anchored.
As a person of faith… I will agree. Randie’s faith could use some strengthening, but don’t we all need help in that area? Those who choose faith-anchoring.
Inside Catholic joke: there is a patron saint for *everything*, garden gnomes included.
Myself, I would be inclined to ask Sts. Patrick, Columba, and Brigit for help with those: the Irish saints would know how to deal with the nastier Wee Folk…and Columba was, frankly, a badass.
joke response… just walk into any Catholic gift store. There IS a saint for everything.
St. Brigid gave away cows… kinda made her dad angry as he was the owner.
A quick story… My Gram has had diabetes for years. Her foot had gotten really bad and it got to the point where her doc wanted to get rid of it… she refused. It was infected to the bone. Now, I have not been a Catholic person who prays to saints. I believe you go to the Head Honcho on those matters. However, I visited The Grotto in Portland this summer. It’s a Catholic place of peace with statuary and quiet places to meditate… I encountered a shrine to St. Peregrine, who was miraculously healed of cancer on his leg. I recognized the semblance to my Gram’s situation… so I did some praying for Gram via St. Peregrine… and God.
I am serious when I say that not long after my visit, Gram’s foot healed and was no longer in danger. And the nurses tending her foot were amazed! I believe St. Peregrine had something to do with that. I leave you to your conclusions.
I am Catholic…and I have seen some pretty amazing things happen after the saints were asked for help. So yeah, I have no trouble at all believing St. Peregrine gave your Gram a hand there.
According to my old and probably outdated copy of “Saints Preserve Us,” your best bet might be to invoke Saint Eustace (Difficult Situations), or possibly Saint Januarius (against the Evil Eye).
Brilliant! Why not employ both… ? That’s what I’d do.
I suppose invoking Saint Dymphna is right out…
Uh… well, I guess it depends on whether or not you think Randie was mentally disturbed or not.
From the outside looking it, it’s *real* difficult to say for sure…
I think you need less saintly protection and more shotgun shells and hammer swings against the gnomes. God helps those who help themselves, after all!
Hahahah…. Agreed…. I think you need to throw all you got at those pesky gnomes… yayzzzz… And God helps those who start with the idea that help is on the way.
Hmmm, Swinnerton…I should have chosen a different Confirmation name!
You Catholic? Now all the gothic-boy stuff makes sense.