One skit was a take-off on Fr. David May’s after-breakfast weather report and on the endless putting on and taking off of boots and layers of clothing that living here necessitates.

For the temperature range both outdoors and indoors within any given day can be wide. And the temperature indoors varies not only from building to building but even from room to room. It’s not unusual to go down a flight of stairs and go from a wool sweater to a T-shirt.

On Shrove Tuesday, we had the opportunity for confession during the day and the traditional pancakes for supper.

Then Lent began with ashes and the beautiful song with which we begin prayers every morning of that season, “Open to me the doors of repentance, O Life-Giver.”

Lent here includes Stations of the Cross, and this year every Thursday evening a video of The Passion of the Christ is being shown for whoever wishes to see it.

Pysanky

One beautiful feature of Lent in Madonna House is the making of pysanky, the exquisite Ukrainian Easter eggs. Lessons are given every Sunday afternoon, and many are made every Lent by guests and staff alike.

As I was looking over the events of the last while in preparation for writing this column, I was struck by how many talks and classes we have been having.

Michael O’Brien, a friend, neighbor, writer, and painter whose articles have occasionally appeared in Restoration, gave us a talk. Well, actually he ended up telling us three beautiful stories illustrating the perception of beauty.

Dr. Sue McKay, a psycho-geriatric specialist from the Royal Ottawa Hospital, gave a talk entitled, “A Day in the Life of Someone with Dementia,” one of a few talks and workshops here and elsewhere on the elderly that we’ve attended over a period of time to help us in understanding our elderly members.

Desert Fathers

And just today and yesterday, a couple, Dr. Charles Kannengiesser and Dr. Pamela Bright, gave us two talks on the Fathers of the Church focusing on St. Athanasius and St. Anthony of the Desert. They really made the desert fathers come alive!

And this is the time of year we have what we call the “Staff Study Program,” six weeks or so of studying something in a small group every Friday afternoon.

God is in everything, and as our foundress Catherine used to say, “Nothing is foreign to the apostolate except sin.” So over the years the topics we studied have ranged far and wide.
This year, as has been the case generally in recent years, we submitted topics, the directors compiled a list of them, and then we each signed up for one.

Here are some of the topics this year: the constitution of Madonna House, computer for beginners, Byzantine liturgy, French conversation, the Book of Exodus, The Church in the Modern World (a document of Vatican II), wood carving, Shakespeare, the care and use of basic hand tools, Pope John Paul II’s encyclical on the New Millennium, and a series of videos on the history of the countries of Southeast Asia.

Our Library

Since we are in a fairly isolated rural area, one crucial factor that enables us to study such a variety of subjects, not only in these organized groups but individually throughout the year, is our library.

The library is a work department that we don’t often talk about in this newspaper, but it’s the librarians, anywhere from two to five or six of them at any given time, who classify and catalogue and shelve these books, so that we can find what we are looking for. They also make available and do whatever needs doing with magazines, newspapers, tapes, CDs, etc., etc. etc.

The library was the main resource for our celebration of the anniversary of the foundation of Harlem Friendship House, which Catherine Doherty founded in this large African-American section of New York City in 1938.

It is a day we celebrate in connection with Black History Month, which is celebrated in the United States. This year we had a wonderful display of books and other writings on black history and culture and we saw two videos, To Kill a Mockingbird and Ghosts of Mississippi.

These days, at a time when the forces of light and darkness are in such a battle, it is more critical than ever that Christians be informed. And in connection with the fact that recent elections in both Canada and the United States were so vitally important and are likely to be so in the near future, we recently had a staff meeting on the topic, “Participating in the Democratic Process as a Catholic.”

Democracy

At that meeting Fr. Bob Pelton gave a clear teaching on the history of democracy and our obligation to be informed as to the vital issues and to vote and otherwise participate in the democratic process. He also gave us guidelines for deciding whom to vote for.

Individually we also wrote to our prime minister and our member of parliament before the session of parliament that was to deal with the question of changing the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples.

And recently about 15 of us took part in a prayer rally organized by our member of parliament to show support for traditional marriage.

Some briefer items of news are as follows: The men have been doing major renovation of one of their work areas which contains the maintenance and electrical workshops, the shipping and receiving department, and the shoe repair shop. They have also laid a new floor in the farm chapel.

Fr. John Burchat, who took part in 1984 in our spiritual formation program for men discerning priesthood, came and gave a talk to those currently in the program about what this program has meant to him as a priest.

Some members of the Korean community living in Peterborough about two hours away invited all the Koreans here, applicants and guests alike, for the celebration of Lunar New Year.

May each of you have a blessed, grace-filled, joyous Easter season.