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guitarnan
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You know, this is a truly great thread. I wish my s-i-l had a computer at home so she could read it. So often, we come to the Faith with some gaps in our understanding...and it's so hard to find a friendly place to ask our questions. This is just wonderful.
Holy water by the front door...hmmm...I like this...
(But, I think of all the Italian holy water fonts I saw, lovely ceramic pieces, but they could only hold, really, TWO DROPS! What were they thinking? That's why I never bought one!)
The questions are great, ladies...
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Nancy in MD. Mom of ds (24) & dd (18); 31-year Navy wife, move coordinator and keeper of home fires. Writer and dance mom.
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alicegunther
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guitarnan wrote:
Holy water by the front door...hmmm...I like this...
(But, I think of all the Italian holy water fonts I saw, lovely ceramic pieces, but they could only hold, really, TWO DROPS! What were they thinking? That's why I never bought one!)
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Isn't that the truth?! The water evaporates immediately it seems, plus I am always worried about the little ones knocking them off the wall and breaking them. That is why I loved Pope John Paul II's mother's bowl on the table. It seemed so much more practical to me.
Holy water fonts, btw, are the easiest craft projects in the world, especially with the inexpensive planters available at the craft store these days. If you or anyone else are interested in links to show how we've made these, please pm me.
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alicegunther
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Cay Gibson wrote:
Alice, do you or anyone else know if holy water has to be kept in a blessed vessel or not? I've only placed holy water in the fonts throughout the house. Never a bowl. But I love the idea. And if you and JPII's mother did it then I'm sure it's okay.  |
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Not to my knowledge, Cay. I use a beautiful crystal bowl received on our wedding, and I think it is fine. (I know what you are all thinking--why isn't she worried about that breaking? I guess the table seems a better support than the nail on the wall somehow.)
It's an interesting question though!
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Love, Alice
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alicegunther
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Marianne, I am glad to say, just so happens to have begun a thread on Offering up Our Sufferings. (It seems the Holy Spirit wants us to talk about this in detail, especially with Lent coming up). Helen has already chimed in there, and I expect a very fruitful discussion!
offering up our sufferings
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ALmom
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From what I understand, the vesssel for Holy Water does not need to be Blessed but it should be reserved for Holy Water and not for common use, once you begin using it for Holy Water. I know someone who cleaned out a great big glass food jar and then wrote Holy Water on it in marker on the outside. She uses this to collect the Holy Water at church and then pours from it into various Holy Water fonts. This is one of the jobs her children do.
I'm glad someone mentioned about evaporating, cause that is what happened to us, so we have the nailed up Holy Water fonts and I tried to remember to fill them for a while - but it would have taken so many times per day, that we just never got going on it. I need to re-think what to use for making the Holy Water available in the house - and how to make sure that my children do treat this with respect - and I don't end up with toddlers playing in it.
One of the things about the male priesthood that might help is that the priest is standing in the person of Christ - and Christ was born man - male not just human being.
I'm also wondering about the adding plain water to Holy Water thing. It just doesn't sound correct - but I am not all that knowledgeable here. I know as a Sacristan, we were instructed to leave a note for Father when the water got low, so he could bless some more. I'm vague now since it has been a while ( I was a very poor sacristan), but I think we were instructed to empty the small remainder of Holy Water either by watering church flowers or plants with it or pour it into the sacrarium (a special sink in the church that goes to ground and not to the sewer) and then tape a note to Father on the container that this water needed blessing. We emptied the water from the fonts in the church in the same manner and then rinsed them in the Sacrarium.
One time I accidently mixed Holy water in the altar candles (I thought it was oil. It wasn't discovered until the poor altar boy really had trouble with the candles for Mass -there was fortunately just enough oil left to get through Mass and that sort of triggered a - gee did I get the right container so I double checked after Mass), I had to figure out what to do since the oil could not go down the sacrarium and the Holy water couldn't be just dumped down the sink and I didn't want to kill the altar flowers. I "watered" the plants outside with it. Yes, I was a disaster of a sacristan.
I know sacramentals (old scapulars, etc.) are either burned and used on fields, etc. or buried. Anyways, many of us cradle Catholics need help too as we were not always exposed to a lot of the traditions of the church during the turbulent 60s and beyond. Do you know if there are any special instructions for blessed candles as these would be harder to bury and certainly wouldn't burn away to be sprinkled over the garden?
Janet
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Lisbet
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To help with evaporating Holy Water, put a small sponge in the bottom of the font, it slows the process a bit.
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Paula in MN
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ALmom wrote:
| Anyways, many of us cradle Catholics need help too as we were not always exposed to a lot of the traditions of the church during the turbulent 60s and beyond. Janet |
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Thank you, Janet, for expressing what I have been feeling for months while reading all the posts on this forum!
I'm a cradle Catholic -- and I am LOST when everyone is discussing tradition! And I attended Catholic grade school and high school!
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 Paula
A Catholic Harvest
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Joann in AL
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Retraction: Since Janet brought it up, and my information on mixing holy water was decades old, I checked with a priest friend. His reply:
"I never heard it that way. I heard that you could add less than half of the volume of the holy water and it would all be holy water. But only once. I know of nothing official and it sounds like skirting superstition. I will try to find out more."
So sorry about that.
When I find out more, I will post an update.
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mary theresa
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Erin wrote:
My brother who doesn't practice  asked me 'Why can't women be priests" I know the tradition thing he said but what else?
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Alice already answered this so perfectly  but I just wanted to say that something that helped me to see the unnaturalness and wrongness of women priests was to think of it this way:
The priest stands in for Christ, the Bridegroom in the mass. And the Mass/Eucharist can be thought of as the marital union between Christ and His Bride the Church -- and, being a bride, is the "woman" to Christ/the priest's "man." If the priest was a woman . . . well, it would be . . . lesbian.
Hope that was okay to say!
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enjoythejourney
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The particular protestant denomination I'm currently in (southern baptist evangelical) doesn't allow women to be pastors either.
It is very scriptural that men are to be priests/pastors/etc.
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JennGM
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Just adding a few cents worth to Alice's already wonderful answers.
alicegunther wrote:
Finally, KC's questions!
KC in TX wrote:
Okay, here are some questions.
What is a collect? |
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There are several "collects" during the Mass, but the term is most often used to describe the prayer just before the readings. It sometimes changes depending on the feast being celebrated. Here is the best explanation I was able to find: New Advent Encyclopedia. Catholic Culture lists some beautiful examples of Collects for specific feast days. |
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Collect is the old name for the Opening Prayer of the Mass. So in older Missals it will say collect, in present day missals, it will sometimes say Opening Prayer.
alicegunther wrote:
KC in TX wrote:
| What is the morning office? Is that like the morning offering? |
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Morning Office is morning prayer. Here is a beautiful example of the Morning Office of the Franciscans of the Divine Compassion:
A Daily Morning Office. (I do not know anything about this group, but found it as a good example.) |
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The Liturgy of the Hours is a public, common prayer, the Liturgy of the Church. It is praying the psalms, enriched with readings.
Priests, nuns, monks, brothers...religious are obligated to recite the Liturgy of the Hours, which is basically praying the Psalms at certain hours of the day. It is also called "The Divine Office" or sometimes the breviary.
The hours are divided into various parts, called Canonical Hours. The old Liturgy of the Hours had these times in the Latin names. Lauds and Vespers are the two hinges upon the day. I have put the new versions in parentheses.
Matins (originally at sunrise, now Office of Readings which can be said anytime of day)
Lauds (Morning Prayer)
Prime (No longer, abolished)
Tierce (These next three are classed into Daytime Prayer, but have individual hours. This is now midmorning)
Sext (midday/noon)
None (midafternoon)
Vespers (Evening Prayer)
Compline (Final Night Prayer)
Depending on the state of life, some religious are obliged to pray all the hours of the Office, such as contemplative/cloistered religious. Others only have to pray Morning and Evening Prayer.
It is optional but a beautiful thing for laity to enter into the Prayer of the Church and try to pray part of the Liturgy of the Hours, even if only incorporated on Sundays or special feast days.
To Pray Always: The Liturgy of the Hours
General Instructions on the Liturgy of the Hours
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alicegunther
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JennGM wrote:
| Just adding a few cents worth to Alice's already wonderful answers. |
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Jenn, it's good to have you back!!! 
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
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alicegunther
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Joann in AL wrote:
Retraction: Since Janet brought it up, and my information on mixing holy water was decades old, I checked with a priest friend. His reply:
"I never heard it that way. I heard that you could add less than half of the volume of the holy water and it would all be holy water. But only once. I know of nothing official and it sounds like skirting superstition. I will try to find out more."
So sorry about that.
When I find out more, I will post an update.
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Thanks for passing along this information, Joann. I had always heard this too and wondered if it was true. Thank you so much for asking a priest on our behalf!
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
Cottage Blessings
Brew yourself a cup of tea, and come for a visit!
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KC in TX
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Thank you so much everyone!!! I read online about each of these things (except for the offering up of things), but could not understand what I was reading (it could be that I was just tired). I have more questions, but need to get to sleep if I want to get up early enough to exercise.
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marianne
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My question is about Mary. I have heard references to Our Lady of Guadalupe or other places - are these just other names for Mary? Why are there so many feast days for the different names for Mary, if that is the case? Confused..... 
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Paula in MN
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Marianne, I'm probably not the one to answer this but I'll give it a shot. Our Lady of Guadalupe, Our Lady of Lourdes, etc, these are all referring to visions of Mary in specific places to specific people for specific reasons. Typically the feast days are celebrated on the actual day of the occurence of the vision(s).
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Paula
A Catholic Harvest
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4Real Forums : Domestic Church
Topic: A Peek Inside the Cradle
