Putting up a new calendar in the kitchen is a bit of an event.
Sometimes the kids are given cute little puppy dog calendars as Christmas gifts, but I have a special preference for mine. Most years I have a Catholic calendar made by TAN publishers. There are a variety of versions: Saints and Angels, Mary, The Life of Christ. The artwork is beautiful, and often by artists I recognize.
For some reason, the holes at the top are weak, and if I’ve been lazy in January, they start to rip around April. I might try taping the edges for a few weeks, but I know, inevitably, I will have to dig out that little package of reinforcement stickers from the bottom of some drawer, somewhere in the kitchen, and fortify each and every month. But in my heart, it’s worth it, because no other calendar I’ve seen is quite as good and Catholic as this one.
Not only is every month’s dedication mentioned (January is to The Holy Name of Jesus, and February is to the Holy Family), so is every day of the week. Did you know that Sunday is dedicated to the Holy Trinity, Monday to the angels, Tuesday to the apostles, Wednesday to Saint Joseph, Thursday to the Holy Eucharist, Friday to the Passion, and Saturday to Our Lady?
The Fridays of my calendar have little fish on them, reminding us to abstain from meat, but solemnities have a special marking, so we never miss our chance to eat steak. If we could afford to eat steak, of course.
I think, though, that my favourite part of these calendars is that each and every day lists the feast days. Some Catholic calendars have a scarcity in this. There will be a few Canadian patrons, and a seemingly arbitrary variety of canonized popes and martyrs noted every few days. This is simply not enough. My calendar lists multiple. Everyday. And it still includes Saint Christopher. I mean, come on, how else would I ever know to celebrate both the feasts of Saint Saturninus and the Ebsdorf Martyrs this week?
So, come January, I get to pull down the old reinforced calendar and go through the new one, month by month, and while I copy in the birthdays, baptism days, and anniversaries, I also get a reminder of what the past year looked like.
This month while I was doing this I started to think about time. I took note of the busyness of the past year: the deadlines, the celebrations, a few funerals, the reminders to make payments and fill out paperwork, who needed to be where, and by when.
The passing of days was before me, and I had to ask myself how well spent those days were. I mean, my calendar was certainly Catholic, but was our day to day life? Had I become more Catholic, seeking holiness, and the face of God, in the same way that those holy saints listed there had?
Catholicism has this sacred gift to offer called the sanctification of time. To grow in holiness, we are invited to make each and every moment, of each and every day, an offering to God. Every human moment that we experience, each dish we dirty or wash, every cup of coffee with a friend who needs to talk, every quiet walk in the garden, every emotion, for good or bad, is something that can unite us to God when we have intentionally offered it to him.
The practice of making a Morning Offering is an ancient one in the Church, and it goes beyond a simple piety. As we pray out to God, “Through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I offer you my prayers, works, joys and sufferings of this day for the intentions of your Sacred Heart,” we are turning an ordinary day into a devotion.
Of course, it may take some time repeating this prayer before we actually remember that we’ve said it throughout the day. It doesn’t do much good to say the prayer and then to move on to berating people, watching a filthy movie, or voting for pro-choicers. I’m sure those kinds of works aren’t exactly what Our Lord is hoping for.
But bit by bit we’ll start to remember the promise we made, and moment by moment our days can become a more and more worthy gift to him, if we make a deliberate choice to sanctify our time in the everyday ordinary things of life.
So, when we pick up another pair of discarded socks on the floor we take a brief moment to pray for the one who left them. When we make dinner we think of those who are doing without. When we take our walk around the garden we give thanks to the Creator of beauty, and perhaps we cut a flower for a neighbour. We can make it a priority to pray with our children this day, or stop in at adoration as we pass the parish this day.
Our lives are made up in days, and in moments. 2022 has the potential of being a great and holy year, if the days and moments within it are sanctified and offered to God.
“So teach us to number our days, that we may get a heart of wisdom.” Psalm 90:12
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