The Archangels

Today is the feast of three of the seven archangels. Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael are the only angels specifically named in the Bible. Gabriel was the angel at the Annunciation and received Mary’s acceptance of God’s will to bear the Savior. Raphael appears in the book of Tobit and assists his son Tobias. He’s also thought to be the angel that appears in the Gospel of John to stir the pool where the first one lowered will be healed of his affliction.

Michael is the Prince of the Heavenly Host and is the leader of God’s army against Satan and all evil. This, I must admit, is my idea of an angel. The good angels have been in battle with the fallen angels since creation and personally, I’d rather be protected by an angel with armor and a sword, not a soft pink being with a cute halo and fuzzy wings. This statue of St Michael about to do away with Lucifer is the statue we have in the entry way of our apartment. We take him with us, figuratively, when we go and thank him when we come home safely.

There’s been evil in the world before Adam and Eve sinned in the garden and it just keeps getting worse. On this feast day – and every day – say this prayer to St Michael for protection and thank God that He provides such a powerful army to defend us. St Michael, pray for us. St Gabriel, pray for us. St Rafael, pray for us. Guardian angels, pray for us.

St Michael the archangel defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him we humbly pray and do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, cast into Hell Satan and all the evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.

 

St Vincent de Paul

Today is the feast of St Vincent de Paul, patron saint of charitable societies. This story of his life comes from the website franciscanmedia.org from their saint of the day section.

The deathbed confession of a dying servant opened Vincent de Paul’s eyes to the crying spiritual needs of the peasantry of France. This seems to have been a crucial moment in the life of the man from a small farm in Gascony, France, who had become a priest with little more ambition than to have a comfortable life.

The Countess de Gondi—whose servant he had helped—persuaded her husband to endow and support a group of able and zealous missionaries who would work among poor tenant farmers and country people in general. Vincent was too humble to accept leadership at first, but after working for some time in Paris among imprisoned galley slaves, he returned to be the leader of what is now known as the Congregation of the Mission, or the Vincentians. These priests, with vows of poverty, chastity, obedience, and stability, were to devote themselves entirely to the people in smaller towns and villages.

Later, Vincent established confraternities of charity for the spiritual and physical relief of the poor and sick of each parish. From these, with the help of Saint Louise de Marillac, came the Daughters of Charity, “whose convent is the sickroom, whose chapel is the parish church, whose cloister is the streets of the city.” He organized the rich women of Paris to collect funds for his missionary projects, founded several hospitals, collected relief funds for the victims of war, and ransomed over 1,200 galley slaves from North Africa. He was zealous in conducting retreats for clergy at a time when there was great laxity, abuse, and ignorance among them. He was a pioneer in clerical training and was instrumental in establishing seminaries.

Most remarkably, Vincent was by temperament a very irascible person—even his friends admitted it. He said that except for the grace of God he would have been “hard and repulsive, rough and cross.” But he became a tender and affectionate man, very sensitive to the needs of others.

Pope Leo XIII made him the patron of all charitable societies. Outstanding among these, of course, is the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, founded in 1833 by his admirer Blessed Frédéric Ozanam.

May we all have the love in our hearts for our neighbors as St Vincent de Paul did. St Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

American Popular Song 4

Although he wasn’t always the first one to record a particular song, once he did it was his from then on. Frank Sinatra recorded “It Was a Very Good Year” for his 1965 album September of my years. The song was written by Ervin Drake in 1961 and recorded that year by the Kingston Trio for their album Goin’ Places. Their version inspired Sinatra to record the song, Sinatra’s recording using a very similar arrangement (Sinatra’s chart was written by Gordon Jenkins). As usual, Sinatra’s interpretation and vocal technique bring the nostalgia of the piece to life – a man looking back at the special women he knew throughout his life. He won a Grammy for best male vocal performance. And rightly so.

I love this lyric and it’s form. The last four lines of each verse are rhyming couplets that describe the memory of the singer beautifully. Here are the lyrics followed by Sinatra’s recording. 

It Was a Very Good Year

When I was seventeen

It was a very good year

It was a very good year for small town girls

And soft summer nights

We’d hide from the lights

On the village green

When I was seventeen

 

When I was twenty-one

It was a very good year

It was a very good year for city girls

Who lived up the stair

With all that perfumed hair

And it came undone

When I was twenty-one

 

When I was thirty-five

It was a very good year

It was a very good year for blue-blooded girls

Of independent means

We’d ride in limousines

Their chauffeurs would drive

When I was thirty-five

 

But now the days are short

I’m in the autumn of the year

And now I think of my life as vintage wine

From fine old kegs

From the brim to the dregs

It poured sweet and clear

It was a very good year

 

 

 

Alice Meynell Birthday

 

We first met Alice Meynell on December 30, 2020. (You can look at the right to see Blog Archives, click on December and scroll down to see this post.)

Since today – September 22 – is her birthday, I thought we’d enjoy another of her poems. This, appropriately, is called “In Autumn.”

In Autumn

The leaves are many under my feet,

And drift one way,

Their scent of death is weary and sweet.

A flight of them is in the grey

Where sky and forest meet.

 

The low winds moan for dead sweet years;

The birds sing all for pain,

Of a common thing, to weary ears, -

Only a summer’s fate of rain,

And a woman’s fate of tears.

 

I walk to love and life alone

Over these mournful places,

Across the summer overthrown,

The dead joys of these silent faces,

To claim my own.

 

I know his heart has beat to bright

Sweet loves gone by.

I know the leaves that die tonight

Once budded to the sky,

And I shall die from his delight.

 

O leaves, so quietly ending now,

You have heard cuckoos sing.

And I will grow upon my bough

If only for a Spring,

And fall when the rain is on my brow.

 

O tell me, tell me ere you die,

Is it worth the pain?

You bloomed so fair, you waved so high;

Now that the sad days wane,

Are you repenting where you lie?

 

I lie amongst you, and I kiss

Your fragrance mouldering.

O dead delights, is it such bliss,

That tuneful Spring?

Is love so sweet, that comes to this?

O dying blisses of the year,

I hear the young lambs bleat,

The clamouring birds i’ the copse I hear.

I hear the waving wheat,

Together laid on a dead-leaf bier.

 

Kiss me again as I kiss you;

Kiss me again;

For all your tuneful nights of dew,

In this your time of rain,

For all your kisses when Spring was new.

 

You will not, broken hearts; let be.

I pass across your death

To a golden summer you shall not see,

And in your dying breath

There is no benison for me.

 

There is an autumn yet to wane,

There are leaves yet to fall,

Which, when I kiss, may kiss again,

And, pitied, pity me all for all,

And love me in mist and rain.

 

Well Read Mom

We revisit today one of the helpful links found at the right of the screen. Well Read Mom is an international book club founded in Minnesota some ten years ago. Here’s what I said in that post from November 18, 2020:

A book club that knows that time for reading is precious and difficult to come by. The website describes the group thus: “Well-Read Mom accompanies women in the reading of great books and spiritual classics to encourage personal growth, friendship, and meaningful conversations in order to explore the human condition and reorient ourselves to what is good, beautiful, and true.”

I bring it up again now because we’re just about to start the current season and there’s still time for you to visit the website and see if you’d like to find a group near you. Not all the books will be to everyone’s liking, but it is interesting to read a book by an author you haven’t heard of. And I’m blessed to be part of a group of women who are smart and nice and a joy to be with.

I highly recommend Well Read Mom – and you don’t have to have children to join and appreciate what you can give and receive. Click on the link to the right to check it out.

William Carlos Williams

William Carlos Williams (17 September 1883 – 4 March 1963) wrote plays, novels, essays, short stories, and especially poetry. His primary occupation though was as a physician, both general medicine and pediatrics. Work all day, write all night.

 

His mother was a painter and paintings influenced Williams’s writing. Besides individual poems connected with paintings, Williams wrote a book called Pictures from Brueghel, written pictures of the artist’s paintings. Even poems not associated with specific pictures still brought a vivid image to mind. In fact, his early work was of the Imagist movement before he abandoned it for Modernism.

 

The Red Wheelbarrow

 

so much depends

upon

 

a red wheel

barrow

 

glazed with rain

water

 

beside the white

chickens.

 

 

Throughout his life he maintained close friendships with artists and writers such as Man Ray, Wallace Stevens, Marianne Moore, Marcel Duchamp, and Charles Demuth. In a turnabout, Williams wrote the poem The Great Figure, inspiring Demuth to create a painting “I saw the figure 5 in gold.”

 

The Great Figure

 

Among the rain

and lights

I saw the figure 5

in gold

on a red

firetruck

moving

tense

unheeded

to gong clangs

siren howls

and wheels rumbling

through the dark city.

 

 

Galileo's Daughter

Galileo Galilei had three children, all illegitimate, although the youngest Vincenzio was legitimized when he was thirteen. The daughters, Virginia and Livia, were placed in a convent when they were thirteen and twelve. Although this sounds as though Galileo was a distant and uncaring parent, he loved his children dearly, especially Virginia. The convent was probably the best he could have done for them since they would not have been able to make good marriages. Virginia, who took the name Maria Celeste at her profession of vows, adored her father. Their letters throughout Suor [the word for Sister] Maria Celeste’s life told the story of their deep and abiding love for each other and it was these letters that provided so many details of their lives.

Galileo didn’t have it much better than his impoverished daughters. Through the money he earned from his teaching and tutoring and from stipends that he was awarded, he was able to help out the convent from time to time. However, he suffered greatly from many afflictions that would keep him bedridden for months at a time. He also suffered at the hands of the Inquisition, being accused of teaching and publishing heretical material. Deeply devoted to his Catholic faith, but at the mercy of the enemies who spread rumors and lies, Galileo adhered to the restrictions the Office of the Inquisition put on him. Although he had many friends in Italy and all over Europe who were devoted to him personally and professionally, he spent the last decade or so of his life imprisoned in his house, slowly going blind. As bad as his physical ailments were, it sorrowed his soul more that he was kept separated from his daughter. Eventually, Galileo was proven right in his scientific discoveries and acknowledged as the genius he was. 

Dava Sobel, author of Galileo’s Daughter, also wrote Longitude, another book I very much enjoyed. She has a real gift for making science understandable and for making the story gripping.