What is a Home? Pope Pius XII Speaks to Married Couples…

From Dear Newlyweds, Pope Pius XII Speaks to Married Couples, January 27, 1943

What is a Home?

The joy we always experience in receiving the young husband and wives who come to ask our benediction arises, among other reasons, from the hope we derive in reflecting upon the vast and holy work which God entrusts to them: to restore and promote a strong and healthy society, motivated by a deeply practical Christian spirit and feeling.

Is not the vocation to found a home what He really asks of them?

Home! How many times, dear newlyweds, especially since you have thought of marriage after your engagement, has this word resounded in your ears in the chorus of felicitations and good wishes from your relatives and friends!

How many times has it risen spontaneously from your hearts! How many times has it filled you with ineffable sweetness, embodying an entire dream, an entire ideal, an entire life!

A word of love, a magic word, which all good souls understand and delight to hear, whether they be tasting its actual intimacy, or whether they be thinking of it painfully at great distance, in absence, in prison or whether they joyously greet the hope of its quick return!

And yet perhaps this very magic easily leads us to conceive of the home in a vague way, as if it were wrapped in a rosy and gilded cloud.

This morning, therefore, we would like to have you probe its meaning. An accurate concept will detract nothing from its poetry; rather will it better reveal its beauty, its grandeur and its fruitfulness.

But this beautiful name must be merited by fulfilling two conditions: concentration of heat and radiation of light.

Surely it is not a home where the only satisfaction of young husbands and wives consists in going out of the house as often as possible and where they are discontented without holidays, visits, journeys, vacations, and worldly or more than worldly amusements. No.

A dwelling that is neglected, cold, deserted, silent, dark, and without the serenity and bright warmth of family living, is not a home.

Nor are those dwellings true homes if they are too closed up, barred and almost inaccessible, as if they were prisons or solitary hermitages, where light and heat neither enter from outside nor radiate outward.

And yet, an intimate home is so beautiful if it radiates!

May yours be like this, dear sons and daughters, in the image and likeness of the home of Nazareth! There was never a home more intimate but at the same time more cordial, more lovable, more peaceful in poverty, or more radiant; why does it not live on even now and illumine all Christian society by its radiation?

To the degree in which it is forgotten, you see, to that degree the world grows dark and cold.

But what are these rays which must originate in your home and there find the power to expand into broad flashes of light and heat? Like those which emanate from the sun, they vary in an infinite range of colors and gradation—some brighter, others warmer.

They are the graces and the attractions of the spirit, of the heart, and of the soul; we call them qualities, gifts, talents.

The qualities are the treasures of a two-fold ancestral heritage; the talents have been acquired by work, energy and struggle; the most precious are the gifts, those virtues mysteriously infused into human nature by the gracious love of the Holy Ghost and increased by the practice of Christian life.

Until yesterday your two families were still strangers to each other. Each family had its own traditions, its own memories, its own particular traits of spirit and heart which gave it its own character; each had its own relationships among parents and friends.

And now, on the day of your marriage, your two hearts are joined in a new harmony which will extend through your descendants but which has already begun to resound around you.

Enriched by this two-fold heritage, you take pleasure in your combined personal attainments.

The events and encounters of your domestic, professional and social lives, your conversations, your reading, your studies in literature, in science and art, perhaps even in philosophy, and above all in religion, bring you a most worthwhile return in your hours of intimacy, like bees, heavy with nectar, returning to the hive.

And in your confidences you can distill the sweetest honey, nourishing yourselves and sharing it, perhaps even unconsciously, with all who come in contact with you.

In your daily relationships and the needful meeting of minds which is attained through innumerable little concessions and innumerable little victories, you will acquire and raise to a higher level all the moral virtues: strength and mildness, enthusiasm and patience, frankness and tact.

They will unite you in an overgrowing love, will place your imprint on the education of your children, and will give your dwelling a fascinating attraction which will never cease to radiate to the social circle you frequent or which surrounds you.

These should be the virtues of a family home. In Christian husbands and wives and in Christian families, these are sanctified and elevated to a supernatural order and are therefore incomparably superior to all natural capacities, for when you become children of God there were instilled in your souls, through grace, faculties of a divine order which no purely human effort, however heroic, would be able to generate even in the lowest grade.

Intelligent choice of a mate must not look only to mutual physical attraction, but more so to harmony of tastes, feelings, desires, aspirations, and of temperament. It must weigh spiritual more than physical values.

What has begun as a mere sex intimacy is not likely to end in a happy marriage.

In courtship you must be honest and honorable towards your partner. -Fr. Lovasik, Clean Love in Courtship https://amzn.to/2OIKwye (afflink)

NEW!

Make a statement with this lovely and graceful handcrafted “Blessed Mother” apron….fully lined, lace overlay….made with care. Aprons tell a beautiful story…..a story of love and sacrifice….of baking bread and mopping floors, of planting seeds and household chores. Sadly, many women have tossed the aprons aside and donned their business attire. Wear your apron with joy….it is a symbol of Femininity….”Finer” Femininity! 🌺 💗

LIGHT AND PEACE is a handbook for getting to Heaven a short and practical course in proper Christian living that covers all the important aspects of our religious duties. By far, the most telling feature of this little book is its immense common sense and good advice.

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.

Heart of Hearths

by Solange Hertz

No one insisted more than St. Margaret Mary that devotion to the Sacred Heart must not be limited to individual piety, profound as this might be. Nor was Our Lord’s “burning thirst to be honored by men” to be restricted to worship in churches.

“He has much greater plans,” she wrote, “which can be put into effect only by His almighty power, which can accomplish whatever it wills. It seems to me He wishes to enter with pomp and magnificence into the homes of princes and kings, to be honored there to the extent He has been outraged.”

In other words, He wished to establish His loving rule over human society by being acknowledged as true Head of every family, from the highest one down. The divine request was supposedly transmitted at the time to King Louis XIV, but if so, nothing came of it.

The King continued on the disastrous course of secular glorification which eventually produced the French Revolution, and now Marxist tyranny. One by one the nations of the world have said, “We will not have this Man to reign over us!” (Luke 19:14).

The world has now reached the point that the very laws of nature are being ignored, if not outright repealed. Based on the false principle that power comes from below, a giant mechanism of organized disorder has been erected where the bond-woman Hagar habitually and by law dictates to her mistress Sarah. No one knows his proper place, because it can’t be found.

Money manipulators who should be the hired servants of politics and economics are in fact formulating government policies—and that on an international level. Schools are laying down the law to parents, the family itself now the puppet of the state designed by God to serve it. Publishers determine what authors shall write. Manufacturers condition the consumer to the goods they produce.

Agriculture, the sovereign human art, is indentured to industrial production, made to follow factory methods and objectives. The sovereignty of nations themselves is being absorbed into an artificial super-State organized on purely rational lines.

Needless to say, the members of Holy Mother Church, already weakened and divided by the “reforms” of the so-called Reformation, are falling prostrate before the scourges of the New Order, apparently powerless to rise and protest. How to establish the rule of the Sacred Heart in such contrived chaos?

As St. Margaret Mary saw long before the French Revolution, only God’s omnipotence can accomplish a task of this proportion. Exactly how He will do it is His secret, but do it He will.

“What are you afraid of?” He asked her. “I shall reign in spite of Satan and all opposition.”

If His past methods are any precedent, however, He will use as His instruments the same “little ones” in all ranks of society He has always used to confound the wise of this world. St. Margaret Mary in fact predicted this: “He gave me to understand,” she wrote to her Superior Mother de Saumaise, “that He does not need human power for that, because the devotion and reign of the Sacred Heart will be consolidated only by subjects poor and contemptible, amid contradictions, so that none of it can be attributed to human potential.”

As always, He will scatter the proud in the conceit of their heart, putting down the mighty from their seat and exalting the humble, filling the hungry with good things and sending the rich away empty (Luke 1:51-53).

Until then they need only remain in His Sacred Heart, attentive to its every beat, careful to follow its manifest directives. He will tell them what to do, even though for the time being the fulfilment of His magnificent promises remains blocked by the malicious authority of the great ones of this world.

Things being as they are, about the only unit of temporal government left to us that can be brought under the sway of Christ is the private home. Furthermore, for some of us it may be the only place of worship we have left outside the privacy of our own souls. For which God be thanked, for that is exactly what a home is designed by God to be: a domestic economy over which God presides, where He is praised by its members.

If home is where the heart is, then the Christian home must be where the Sacred Heart is.

Rediscovering this truth may be one of the greatest blessings He means to draw from the wanton destruction of parishes and parliaments. It’s a beginning.

At home Christians can still share the “one heart” which God promised Jeremiah He would give His people, “and one way, that they may fear me all days: and that it may be well with them, and with their children after them” (32:39).

The Acts of the Apostles relate how “the multitude of believers had but on heart and one soul; neither did any one say that aught of the things which he possessed was his own; but all things were common unto them” (4:32). This “one heart” of saints who lovingly share all they possess is today in open confrontation with the “one world” of androids intent on robbing one another of even the most elementary right to private ownership. There can be no co-existence between the two.

We cannot repeat too often that devotion to the Sacred Heart, promulgated from the very first as a devotion for the latter times, is now only beginning. What has been achieved so far is the merest preparation or predisposition for a fullness yet to be even suspected. It would be ridiculous to think our Lord hasn’t foreseen and provided for all the deprivations we are facing—the desecration of Churches, suppression of sacred images and sacramentals, the defections from the priesthood…

We have noted already that devotion to the Sacred Heart has established once and for all the primacy of the interior life. What it does for the individual in his own soul it is equally prepared to do for society, in the home. We start where we can.

Is there any reason why what our Lord requested of worldly monarchs can’t be accorded Him by lesser heads of families? Let those who preach “power to the people” beware of that power when it is brandished in the service of God! What is to prevent exposing and honoring the picture of the Sacred Heart in our homes—is only because “wherever this holy picture should be exposed to be honored He would lavish His graces and blessings”?

Better still, why not satisfy at home our Lord’s longing to be adored in the Blessed Sacrament? That Benediction has all but disappeared from the liturgy, or that the Church doors are locked, or that the Sacrament itself may no longer be reserved, can be seen to be no excuse at all when we look deeply into the matter.

One of the first to see this was the late Fr. Mateo Crawley-Boevey, of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, who initiated the movement for Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the home. With truly prophetic insight he began preaching Eucharistic Adoration as a practice most proper to the home. Already in the late 1920’s he was signing up families for one hour a month of night adoration, at a time when the Real Presence was taken for granted in every Catholic church and expected to continue there until the end of the world.

Fr. Mateo may not have been so sure. He wrote, “We are in fact on the brink of an abyss of social corruption; the home already undermined in its very foundations by this upheaval of immorality; a good part of the portion of society which by right is considered the best, the most Christian, seriously affected by the contagion of unbridled sensuality… What is sadder still, the enemy has now penetrated into our own ranks; the wolf is encountered with unheard of cruelty in a full sheepfold. More, he is tolerated there, even encouraged by the cowardice of friends. This Satan and the world have without pity struck and scourged their God and their Lord. His very bones might be counted through His wounds, for there is no soundness in Him.

Urging reparation to the Sacred Heart, his practical suggestions for domestic adoration are very instructive: “In large families the adoration may be arranged in such a way that each member of the family watches in turn before a picture of the Sacred Heart. If the Sacred Heart has been enthroned in the home, then the adoration should take place before the enthroned picture of the Sacred Heart, around which lighted candles and flowers have been placed, if this is possible and practical…

The adoration should be made as far as possible on one’s knees, in a spirit of salutary penance… It should be throughout a Eucharistic Adoration, in spirit and in truth. It makes His Passion ours: “The same love which made Me suffer such extreme pains and affliction for the salvation of men, makes Me also suffer now in your heart, immortal and impassible as I am, by the intimate compassion with which it is penetrated for the salvation of my elect, in consideration of my afflictions and bitterness. Therefore in return for the compassion which you have had for my sufferings, I give you the whole fruit of my Passion and death, to insure your eternal beatitude.”

Spoken to St. Gertrude, these words make plain what meditation on the Sacred Heart is meant to lead to. Fr. Mateo suggested prayers for the following intentions during hours of home adoration: “our Holy Father and Pope, peace, the clergy, the members of your family who may have gone astray, those in their agony this night, the Social Reign of the Sacred Heart, particularly through the Enthronement of the Sacred Heart in the home. Oh, be true angels of Gethsemane in this nocturnal adoration, you who have an advantage over the angel from heaven, since you are able to suffer and to weep in union with the agonizing Heart of Jesus!”

Most significantly, Fr. Mateo urged adorers to begin their hour by uniting themselves in spirit with the priests who at that moment might be offering the Holy Sacrifice anywhere in the world. He wished them if possible to recite the Canon of the Mass in view of a spiritual Communion, all the while adoring, praising, petitioning and atoning “through Him, with Him and in Him.”

Aware of the importance of Fr. Mateo’s latter day apostolate, Popes Benedict XV, Pius XI and Pius XII each accorded the Apostolic Benediction to those engaging in it. In his enthusiasm Pope Pius XI dubbed it “the actualization of my Encyclical” Miserentissimus Redemptor, on the Sacred heart.

With such encouragement from the highest Authority, why not adore at home kneeling in spirit before our Lord’s true sacramental Presence in all Churches or places where It may still be found? Isn’t it this Real Presence that the image of the Sacred Heart is precisely meant to evoke in our homes? Wouldn’t our Lord intend to follow His Heart’s image personally into any place where it was lovingly exposed? If not, how could devotion to the Sacred Heart make any real sense?

Happy Easter Wednesday!

Saints Louis & Zelie Graceful Religious Pendant and Earring Set…Wire-Wrapped, Handcrafted.

Available here.

In the words of this humble seventeenth-century lay Carmelite, “we must trust God once and for all and abandon ourselves to Him alone.” This difficult task necessarily requires perseverance and continual conversation with God in all activities great and small: “speaking humbly and talking lovingly with Him at all times, at every moment, without rule or system…” In reading these conversations, letters, and spiritual maxims, we learn the key to endless joy.

In short, this little spiritual classic — in its fresh, contemporary English translation — renders the simple wisdom of Brother Lawrence accessible to every Christian who yearns for the fullness of life….

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you kindly for your support.

Say Your Grace! – Meal Prayer

-Father Arthur Tonne, The Big Book of Sacramentals

“Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, distributed them to those reclining” – St. John, 6:11.

A Catholic Army chaplain of World War Two was relating some of his experiences. Speaking of starvation in war-torn Europe, he described what he saw in an American Army camp in France. Every day a group of boys and girls of all sizes and ages, but with one common longing for food, would search among the empty food cans thrown out from the Army kitchen.

With painstaking perseverance the children would scrape every speck of food from the cans. After they had gathered whatever they could find, each child placed his precious findings on the ground, knelt down, made the sign of the cross, and said a prayer before his miserable meal. Many of the soldiers were touched to tears.

A Holy House

Two wonderful articles on the atmosphere of a Catholic Home……

From Plain Talks on Marriage by Rev. Fulgence Meyer, O.F.M., 1927

The parents of the family will at once take it upon themselves to give their home the air of a house of God.

In other words, they will supply it with those emblems that ought to have a place in every Catholic home.

Of these emblems the first and foremost is the crucifix of which mention was made before.

Besides it there ought to be other representations of our Lord, his mother, and the Saints, discreetly placed about the home.

Whilst the house needs not to be turned into a holy picture gallery, yet a prudent selection of holy pictures will become a Catholic home. They are indicative of faith, and of a certain gratitude for, and pride in, the faith.

In the meantime they are a continuous reminder of God and his saints, the heroes and heroines of virtue, to the family, and thus provide it with a potent stimulant to piety and goodness.

Religious Practices in Your Home/A Little Update…

Before the post….

We wish to thank you so much to those who have given to Rosie’s Get Well Fund. We have hit our goal and we are overcome with gratitude with your monetary gifts…and especially the gift of your prayers!

Although Rosie is going through a lot, her attitude is quite refreshing! She does not complain about her sickness and accepts it as God’s will. We are so grateful for that!

We are working hard at getting her well and waiting on test results.

We have received so many kind offerings of prayers! And people have written us, sent us sacramentals, etc. Thank you, thank you! Please know how much it is appreciated and that you will be remembered each day in our prayers…especially the daily rosary!

Please continue to keep us in your prayers…

I will keep you updated!

Saying “Hi!”

Religious Practices in the Home

In order to provide an environment where your child will grow to love God and the things of God, make your home a little sanctuary–a place where he will be constantly reminded of the Lord, and where family devotions will instill habits of deep and lasting Christian piety.

Patience, Nagging, Sincerity – Catholic Family Handbook

Painting by Al Buell 1910-1996

by Father Lovasik, Catholic Family Handbook

Ask God to help you be patient

Even people who constantly strive to please God have a goodly share of hard things to bear. This is the reason patience is so necessary for happiness in marriage.

Be constantly prepared to bear disagreeable things.

When there is an abundance of the good things, there is danger of becoming too occupied with passing and material considerations.Be grateful to God for them.

When disagreeable things, reverses, sorrows, and disappointments come your way, put your confidence in God, who will strengthen you.

Ask for patience. In the mercy of God, reverses are sometimes sent to awaken your wayward conscience or to test your love of God. When God so tests you, you must never be wanting in love and confidence and patience.

Be honest and sincere

You owe your spouse truth and sincerity. Our Lord is the greatest example of these virtues. He wished everyone well and was never anything but kindness itself in word and deed. He never made use of men for selfish ends, but spoke and acted openly, sincerely, and uprightly.

Honesty and sincerity bring about confidence and a spirit of loyalty. Few things contribute more to the success of a marriage.. Such confidence bolsters a husband’s flagging courage and inspires him with the will to win and to measure up to the high opinion that his wife and children have of him and his abilities.

The enemies of honesty and sincerity are nagging, miserliness, jealousy, and in-law trouble.

Avoid nagging

Nagging is not always the fault of women, yet it seems that they often fall victims to this disagreeable habit that spoils family happiness. Do not be a nagging wife.

Do not try to remake your husband. Prize your own individuality and be willing to put up with his.

Do not expect your husband to render daily reports on where he was, why, when, and with whom. Be an eager listener, but a reluctant inquisitor.

You must assure yourself of your husband’s unwavering devotion. The result of your placing implicit confidence and trust in him will not incline him to take advantage of your refusal to snoop or pry, or to step out of line.

He will be won by decency, gratitude, loyalty, and trust, but never with fear.

A sincere and trusting wife will have a great influence in shaping her husband’s life. Stand by your husband and share with head and heart his successes and failures.

Give him due encouragement, but have the courage to drive home a sometimes unpleasant truth.

Never be afraid of responsibility, but be prepared to embark on a new course of life with your husband, should the need arise.

You will bring to your husband the love and inspiration he needs in the many problems of life, and that love and inspiration will weave threads of gold in his life’s pattern.

Wealth, fame, and power are no satisfactory substitutes for the hard-earned joys of the married life, for not one of them can satisfy the hunger of the heart for love.

When your husband knows he is married to his most trusted confidant, your influence soars. -Matthew L. Jacobson https://amzn.to/2MtbcTT (afflink)

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe today to get the Finer Femininity email notifications!

Sign up here.

 

All 5 Maglets! Catholic Young Lady’s Maglet, Catholic Wife’s Maglet, Sunshiny Disposition, True Womanhood and Advent/Christmas Package of 5!

Available here.

Description

Finer Femininity is a small publication compiled to inspire Catholic women in their vocations. It consists of uplifting articles from authors with traditional values, with many of them from priests, written over 50 years ago. These anecdotes are timeless but, with the fast-paced “progress “of today’s world, the pearls within the articles are rarely meditated upon. This little magazine offers Catholic womankind support and inspiration as they travel that oftentimes lonely trail….the narrow road to heaven. The thoughts within the pages will enlighten us to regard the frequently monotonous path of our “daily duties” as the beautiful road to sanctity. Feminine souls need this kind of information to continue to “fight the good fight” in a world that has opposing values and seldom offers any kind of support to these courageous women. Inside the pages you will find inspiration for your roles as single women, as wives and as mothers. In between the thought-provoking articles, the pages are sprinkled with pictures, quotes and maybe even a recipe or two.

****************************************************************
REVIEWS!!!

“I enjoyed this book so much. These are articles that can be read and reread many times especially when your spirits need a ‘pick-me-up’. I especially liked the little thoughts and sayings sprinkled throughout the book. So full of wisdom!” -Julie S.

“Oh it’s purely delightful to cuddle up with a cup of tea and my Finer Femininity Maglet. 🙂 I LOVE IT! Can’t wait for the Christmas edition!!” -Elizabeth V.

“This book is very refreshing to read. It is very beautifully written and easy to read. This book encourages you that your efforts are worth it, enlightens you to do better in a positive way and gives you confidence that you can be good in a not-so-good world. If you want an all-around good book this is it. I look forward to each new publication!” -Emily

“Love it! this is something I will pick up over and over to read.” -Sarah

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.

 

Building a Happy Home

I remember my dear aunt (God rest her soul) say to my mom, “It’s very hard, Beulah, to be a good Catholic.”

I’ve given that a few thoughts through the years and my own thoughts are, “It’s very hard NOT being a good Catholic!”

All mothers struggle. But I can’t imagine being a mom without the Faith.

There are many of these moms who are juggling careers and motherhood and spinning their wheels.

They feel they are wasting their degrees if they are staying home and just changing diapers, and at the same time they feel inadequate as a mom, not knowing where to turn.

It’s a confusing and empty life without our Faith to guide us.

We, as Catholic mothers, struggle. But we have all the helps, all the guidelines, the Sacramental grace at our fingertips. We must count ourselves very fortunate.

That being said, it is a good thing to listen to the commonsense advice of veteran moms.

Charlotte Siems is a mother of twelve and has learned some lessons along the way! Thank you to her for this lovely post that should give you some inspiration in your own journey!

Before having children, many women worry about what kind of mother they will be. Nothing unusual about that, but a difficult childhood instilled in me a fear that I wouldn’t know how to have a normal family home life. I worried about how I would handle discipline or how I would treat possible future children. On the other hand, that same childhood experience made me determined to create a marriage and home that was stable, warm and peaceful.

Early in my mothering career I attended a parenting conference and heard Dr. Herbert Ratner make the following statement: “The 20 years between 20 and 40 (years of age) are just as long as the 20 years between 40 and 60. What you do in the first 20 years determines how happy you will be in the second 20 years.” That idea stuck with me. I determined to live life with the end in mind.

Not knowing how to have a happy home, I set out to learn how. Here are a few things I figured out:

Books don’t magically solve problems. Sometimes we deceive ourselves into thinking we’re doing something because we read about it and agree with it. Close the book and do what it says.

Surround yourself with what is true and lovely. Protect yourself from ugly input. Don’t live in a bleak, cluttered environment. Bring beauty, warmth, and neatness to all of your life. Be very careful what you allow to enter your mind and eyes. Constant exposure to beautiful ideas and noble goals will transform your thought life.

We all know that thoughts determine actions, don’t we?

Do the things you don’t want to do. Do them cheerfully and well. Edith Schaeffer wrote, “Somebody has to get up early, stay up late, do more than the others, if the human garden is to be a thing of beauty.” At first glance it doesn’t seem fair, but there are hidden and precious rewards for dying to self and serving. Stomping and self-pity cancel the reward points.

Choose your hard things. Do your laundry and put it away. That’s hard. Get ready to go somewhere and realize no one has clean clothes to wear. That’s hard. You pick.

Take the time. Yes, I know you’re busy. Throw a meal on the table and get on to the next thing. No time for a tablecloth and candles and flowers. You’ll do that when you have time. But before you know it, the weeks, the months and the years pass, and the children leave home and you never had time.

Lest you think I’ve sailed through life with clean laundry and beautiful meal tables, I assure you these lessons were hard earned. Many times I felt inadequate to the task. It was like trying to pour water from a dry bucket. Giving your children what you didn’t have as a child is not easy. Creating a happy home life from scratch will take everything you’ve got and even that won’t be enough…

That’s why I’m so glad for the strength Jesus gives me. His favor and loving-kindness supply what I don’t have. He will gladly do that for you, too, for He knows all about love and building beautiful homes…

It turns out that giving your family what you didn’t receive, gives it back to you.

This is the time of year that you should be able to get some Epiphany Water in your home! It is very powerful (and who doesn’t need some good power going on in their homes)! The blessing of Epiphany water has special exorcism prayers that no other holy water has. Use it often….teach your children the value of it and get them used to blessing themselves with it.

Reviews on Gin’s Aprons:
“I highly, highly recommend these aprons. Purchase one for yourself as a treat. I have two of these aprons, one for Fall and one for Advent/Christmas. They are soft, lined on the backside in a coordinated fabric, and they are sewn together with much love and attention to all the details. The ties are long enough to wrap around your back and tie in front if you like that style. The Autumn one I’ve used for a couple of months now washes up well for me on delicate cycle with Woolite.”

“Gorgeous quality and detail. I purchased it as a gift and the recipient cried. Seems like it was a match :)”

“It’s perfect! I love it and received it very quickly!”

“A beautiful tribute to Our Lady and a reminder of what it means to be a woman! Incredibly high quality. I look forward to ordering from this company again!”

A lovely gift! Beautiful aprons made by Gin! Fully lined, hand-embroidered, quality material, made with care and detail! Available here.

Make a statement with these lovely and graceful handcrafted aprons! Aprons tell a beautiful story…..a story of love and sacrifice….of baking bread and mopping floors, of planting seeds and household chores. Sadly, many women have tossed the aprons aside and donned their business attire. Wear your apron with joy….it is a symbol of Femininity….”Finer” Femininity!

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.

 

Guide Your Children and Shape Their Character

From The Catholic Family Handbook by Fr. Lovasik

As the father is the head of the family, the mother is its heart. Just as Pope Pius XI speaks of the father as “strong in faith and manly in virtues,” he speaks of a mother as “pure and devoted.”

Elsewhere he says, “As the father occupies the chief place in ruling, so the mother may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love.”

But the Holy Father speaks of supernatural love, not of the tender maternal love-instinct upon which the supernatural is built.

Natural love, which is excellent in itself, and offers the possibility of untold good, may even at times be a hindrance when you are imprudent and cannot keep your children truly obedient, cannot refuse what is harmful, and cannot punish if necessary.

It may be abused if it is made a wedge to separate the children from their father. Supernatural love exercises the strongest appeal. Of it are born piety, modesty, purity, and fear of the learned at the mother’s knee.

Every person has a supernatural destiny, to be worked out in time. He must be educated for what he must be and what he must do here below, in order to attain the sublime end for which he was created.

That education is the result of the combined efforts of both parents. But in his youngest years, the child is almost exclusively under the mother’s guidance.

Your efforts are to produce effects that will have their final reckoning in eternity. Although your educational influence is of a nature entirely different from that of the father, your vocation as mother is equal in importance to your husband’s.

Most adults attest that mothers have had far more to do with the shaping of their character than fathers have.

But so necessary are both that if either is lacking for any cause whatever, the education of the children is seriously, and sometimes fatally, handicapped.

As far as possible, be at home with your children. As you nourished your child before he was capable of eating solid food, so in the early formative years, nature has determined that you must nourish your child in virtue.“We often live with this illusion. With the impression that all would go better, we would like the things around us to change, that the circumstances would change. But this is often an error. It is not the exterior circumstances that must change; it is above all our hearts that must change.” -Fr. Jacques Philippe, Searching For and Maintaining Peace, http://amzn.to/2oqVOv8 (afflink)

Make a statement with these lovely and graceful “Sunny Sunflowers” handcrafted aprons….fully lined….made with care. Aprons tell a beautiful story…..a story of love and sacrifice….of baking bread and mopping floors, of planting seeds and household chores. Sadly, many women have tossed the aprons aside and donned their business attire. Wear your apron with joy….it is a symbol of Femininity….”Finer” Femininity! 🌺 💗

Available here.

 

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.

 

 
amzn_assoc_placement = “adunit0”;
amzn_assoc_search_bar = “true”;
amzn_assoc_tracking_id = “meaofgra-20”;
amzn_assoc_ad_mode = “manual”;
amzn_assoc_ad_type = “smart”;
amzn_assoc_marketplace = “amazon”;
amzn_assoc_region = “US”;
amzn_assoc_title = “My Amazon Picks”;
amzn_assoc_linkid = “c9ca608e8d129d25a6d66c1b63bc73ad”;
amzn_assoc_asins = “1928832865,1933184272,1928832172,B0007EFK3Q”;

//z-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/onejs?MarketPlace=US

Insignificant Duties?

From Christ in the Home, Fr. Raoul Plus, S.J., 1950’s

Apostolic work, if carried on inopportunely or immoderately, can take a woman away from her home too much.

Beyond a doubt, there are immense needs: help for the sick, catechetical instructions, guild meetings for the Sisters, spiritual conferences, and in all of these, great charity can be exercised.

It is much better for a woman to spend her time in such things than in lounging, or in numerous and useless visits, in exploring for the hundredth time some enticing department store.

Nevertheless, the duties of the home remain her principal work: To plan, to arrange, to mend, to clean, to sew, to beautify, to care for the children.

 Insignificant duties?

But what would that matter if they represented the Will of God? Are we not too often tempted to want a change?

Impetuous zeal, poorly directed service, caprice under the guise of generosity seek to substitute for daily duty which perhaps has not much glamour about it but which is just the same wanted by God.

Would not the greatest charity in such a case be not to engage in works of charity but to remain faithfully at home and devote oneself to works which no one will speak of and which will win no one’s congratulations?

Later when the children have grown up and settled, there may be leisure; then a large share in the apostolate will be open according to one’s strength and time.

Until then, my nearest neighbor, without being the least bit exclusive about it but merely judging with a well instructed understanding, will be this little world that has established itself in my home….

Another danger besides excessive apostolic works that might ensnare some wives and mothers of families would be to give exaggerated place to exercises of piety.

Did not one of the characters in a novel by George Duhamel lament this tendency:

“I have heard priests say that some women have spoiled their married life by excessive attendance at religious ceremonies and they sighed, ‘Why did they get married if they had a religious vocation.'”

There are unfortunately some husbands so superficially Christian that they see exaggeration in the most elementary and normal practice of piety on the part of the wife and mother.

That is only too sadly true!

Their judgment is worth nothing.

We are referring only to an actual excess which would really be considered such by a competent judge.

There is no doubt that a married woman, if she is a good manager and is not encumbered by some job outside the home, can find time for normal religious exercises and can even provide for meditation, spiritual reading and a relatively frequent assistance at Mass and reception of Holy Communion; time, after all, is something that varies in its possibility for adaptations and compressibility and woman excels in the heart of putting many things into a small place….

If she suspects that her husband finds certain exterior acts of piety exaggerated, attendance at weekday Mass for instance, let her increase her private devotions somewhat, a little more meditation or spiritual reading when he is not around; whether he is right or not, it is better not to irritate him if grave consequences might result.

That is how Elizabeth Leseur managed; never did she betray the least annoyance when disturbed in her devotions; she always answered her husband’s call or his outbursts of irritation with a pleasant face.

Never neglect a duty but observe the order of their importance.

Be sure to treat all alike. Nothing is so disrupting to home life as favoritism for one or the other child. The same measure for all! – Christ in the Home, 1950’s, Fr. Raoul Plus, S.J

God Bless our Country Aprons! Feminine and Beautiful! Fully lined, quality material, made with care! Available here.

 

Download the Finer Femininity App on Androids or Iphones!

A nice perk on the app for you non-Facebook users is you can see all the daily quotes and inspirations on the FB icon without going to Facebook!

This post contains affiliate links. Thank you kindly for your support.

amzn_assoc_placement = “adunit0”;
amzn_assoc_search_bar = “true”;
amzn_assoc_tracking_id = “meaofgra-20”;
amzn_assoc_ad_mode = “manual”;
amzn_assoc_ad_type = “smart”;
amzn_assoc_marketplace = “amazon”;
amzn_assoc_region = “US”;
amzn_assoc_title = “My Amazon Picks”;
amzn_assoc_linkid = “c9ca608e8d129d25a6d66c1b63bc73ad”;
amzn_assoc_asins = “1928832865,1933184272,1928832172,B0007EFK3Q”;

//z-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/onejs?MarketPlace=US

Reflections on the Holy Family

Fr. Francis Filas, S.J., 1947

“WHEN God in His mercy decided to carry out the work of man’s redemption, so long expected through the centuries, He arranged to perform His task in such a way that in its beginnings it might show forth to the world the august spectacle of a divinely founded family.

“In this all men were to behold the perfect exemplar of domestic society as well as of all virtue and holiness.

“A benign Providence established the Holy Family in order that all Christians in whatever walk of life or situation might have a reason and an incentive to practice every virtue, provided they fix their gaze on the Holy Family.” Thus did Pope Leo XIII write in 1892.

A divinely founded family…the perfect exemplar of all virtue and holiness…for all Christians in whatever walk of life.

“Why!” you say, “my family life is to make me holy? Did Pope Leo mean that ordinary people can be and should be saints? We who live in the world, who have to spend most of our time watching the budget and earning enough to support ourselves and our children?

Our ideals are subjected to continual battering by the un-Christian teachings and practices of so many of our neighbors. We can’t spend our whole day in prayer like the saints of old.

Evidently the Pope did not realize how ordinary we are. We try to live a good Catholic life, but we don’t deserve special credit for that. Holiness is something reserved for a few select laymen, for priests and religious, for monks and nuns in austere monasteries and convents.”

But the Pope did mean you–you and your husband or wife as well as your whole family. You can be and should be saints, for saints are those common-sense people who act according to their realization that all their happiness lies in obeying God’s law perfectly as it is shown them by the Church and by their conscience.

Holiness means happiness. Holy people are happy people at peace with God, with others, and with themselves.

There is only one requirement. You must do God’s will. This embraces various obligations and gives you corresponding rights and privileges.

God’s will in your regard is not something frightening and preternatural, brought down to you by angels amid trumpet blasts, thunder, lightning, and earthquakes.

No, it consists in the observance of the commandments, the frequent reception of the sacraments, and the practice of certain virtues in your everyday life. That is all. Call it homely, call it an everyday, ordinary, humdrum rule of life if you wish; but you can’t call it difficult and beyond your strength.

God’s grace is with you at every turn, sufficient and more than sufficient to help you serve Him.

Sometimes in your efforts you perhaps will fall out of weariness or discouragement; but you rise quickly, and trusting in God’s abundant grace, you go forward again.

Your goal must ever be the perfect love of God manifested in perfect love for His creatures, your “neighbors”–your husband or your wife, your children, your friends, all with whom you come into contact.

You look for inspiration to attain such an ideal. You ask for a proof to convince yourself that everyday joys can be the means to serve God perfectly; or on the other hand you are possibly too close to the earthly conditions of daily work attended with monotony, disappointment, worry, and fatigue.

This makes it hard to believe that in so ordinary a way you can become someone so extraordinary as a saint, known to God as His special image, His temple in whom He loves to dwell.

You want proof and inspiration? You wish to see everyday life made into a steppingstone to the very heights of heaven? Then you need only look at the Holy Family.

You must contemplate Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. They not only possessed human nature like yours, but they performed workaday tasks as you do. They ate and drank and slept and cleaned house and earned a living and prayed and had their neighbors just like you. Yet who were they?

They were Jesus Christ, God, Second Person of the eternal Blessed Trinity, who took to Himself a body and soul like ours: Mary, the blessed Virgin Mother of God, all-perfect, in whom there was never the slightest sin or imperfection; and Joseph, he whom Jesus called “Father,” the virginal husband of the Mother of God.

Have you ever stopped to do a little arithmetic in studying Christ’s life? Jesus had a tremendous mission to accomplish. He was to teach mankind the new and difficult law of brotherly love; He was to redeem us by means of intense suffering and a painful and disgraceful death; He was to found a Church that would last for all time as the only certain road to salvation.

Nonetheless, with such a task before Him, the Son of God spent ten times as much of His life in obscurity as in His public apostolate.

We are told of no miracles, no preaching, no teaching of the multitudes during that period.

There was merely a hidden and ordinary family life with two lovable persons as His intimate and chosen companions, Joseph and Mary.

No human being has ever been or will ever be holier than this husband and wife. Yet these two souls did not help Jesus in His preaching and teaching, for Joseph was already dead when Jesus left Nazareth to begin His career; and as far as we know, Mary stayed quietly at home during almost all of the Public Life.

Actually, then, Joseph and Mary gained their immeasurable holiness by offering Jesus the love of a father and mother in a true family, while Jesus in His turn tendered them the homage of a son. Could any lives have been more ordinary than those at Bethlehem, Egypt, and Nazareth–yet were any lives ever more holy?

This is the lesson of the Holy Family. The will of God must count for everything in our daily lives. Prosaic deeds done for God can lead to spectacular holiness.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph were human, intensely human in the best sense of the word. They show us how our lives, too, should be human–truly warm and Godlike.

By this means we can be sanctifying ourselves more and more. The method is simple. Perhaps we have been following it all along without realizing the fact. At any rate, the leaders are set before us. All we need do is follow.

Catholic Hearth Stories are tales filled with traditional, old-fashioned values. They are about everyday situations in the life of a Catholic family…Tales about home, friends, fun, sacrifice, prayer, etc. These are full-color books (approximately 40 pages each) sure to capture the heart of your children. For more information and availability visit here.

If you purchase items through my affiliate links, I receive a small commission but your price doesn’t change. Thank you for your support.

 
amzn_assoc_placement = “adunit0”;
amzn_assoc_search_bar = “true”;
amzn_assoc_tracking_id = “meaofgra-20”;
amzn_assoc_ad_mode = “manual”;
amzn_assoc_ad_type = “smart”;
amzn_assoc_marketplace = “amazon”;
amzn_assoc_region = “US”;
amzn_assoc_title = “My Amazon Picks”;
amzn_assoc_linkid = “69a31a357fadfef3ee3598024e4ea549”;
amzn_assoc_asins = “0692293175,1515145174,1979030553,1974317447”;

//z-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/onejs?MarketPlace=US