Another One Of Those Days...

Like I said, my car broke down yesterday. In the middle of a traffic junction. In the middle of the rush hour.

Not good.

I won't know if it's fixable before Monday afternoon. When I say "fixable," I actually mean fixable without having to pay more than twice what the car is worth...

This morning I got up extra early because I needed to catch two buses to get to Mass.

I saw one bus whizz past just as I left my house. Checking the timetable, I discovered that it was actually running early. I then waited for the next bus... which arrived just over half an hour afterwards, as it was running late.

The bus then broke down...

Obviously, this is nothing compared to what the Holy Father is going through. And yes, I have offered it up...

I still get the feeling that someone, somewhere, is out to get me...

One Of Those Days...

... this morning was not a good one. I got up early, went to collect my car from where I'd left it last night (I had allowed myself a festal drink after the Confirmation Mass) and drove off.

I pulled up at traffic lights, and, as they changed, put my foot down to drive away. No movement. Lots of horrible whirring, grinding noises. And there I was, stuck at the traffic lights, being honked at and sworn at by rather a lot of irate motorists.

I called my breakdown service, and a very nice chap said that it was probably the gearbox... which, on an automatic, isn't good. I rang a local garage, told them the car would be on its way, and then continued on my way to work... by bus.

I was not a happy bunny. I might have to go and look at cars this weekend...

Happy Feast Day...

Ecce ancilla Domini fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum...

An awesome event. Quite simply mind-blowingly awesome. Enjoy!

Maybe This Is Apocryphal...

Apparently, Bill Gates gave a speech at a school, in which he recounted the following 11 things that students wouldn't learn in school. If it isn't true (I seriously doubt its veracity) it ought to be. Rule 8 caused great mirth among my colleagues...

Rule 1: Life is not fair - get used to it!

Rule 2: The world doesn't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time..

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life.. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs..

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

That CSF Bill...

It is worth noting that the majority of parents are unaware of the sort of thing that passes for sex education in this country.

Less than five years ago, during a sex education lesson, I heard the school nurse tell the class that the age of consent ought to be brought down to 12 or even lower...

And this is what is going to be taught to our five year-olds?

Filth...

Paulinus has a hard-hitting post on some of the abuse scandals to hit the Church.

As he says:

What is it that non-Catholics don't get? The teaching of the catholic Church is explicit and stern:

2389 Connected to incest is any sexual abuse perpetrated by adults on children or adolescents entrusted to their care. The offense is compounded by the scandalous harm done to the physical and moral integrity of the young, who will remain scarred by it all their lives; and the violation of responsibility for their upbringing.

Her Master was sterner still:

It were better for him, that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should scandalize one of these little ones. Luke 17:2

And then comes the hard-hitting bit. What are we doing to combat the mess? Before we can demand holiness from our priests, we must demand it of ourselves. We need to turn back to lives of prayer and penance... to mortify ourselves.

But we as lay people should also demand a little more of ourselves. Do we pray the Rosary for priests? Do we pray for good vocations. Do we fast and do penance? Do we pray for the victims of abuse. Are we faithful in our own lives? Do we hold the teaching of the Church in public and in private. Do we support priests and appreciate them? Are we willing to stand up for the Holy Father when the sneers come at work or at dinner parties or in the pub?

It's time to clear up the mess. And it starts with all of us.

Amen to that.

Congratulations...!

...to His Hermeneuticalness, on achieving 2,000,000 visits earlier this month.

I believe that he gets around 2500 hits each day, and that's not counting all the people who read the blog via blog aggregates (some of these don't appear on the SiteMeter stats.)

That is seriously impressive for a busy Parish Priest.

Alas, I have yet to hit even my first half million...