Happy 86th Birthday Mother Angelica!

I posted yesterday about my new discovery of Mother Angelica, not even knowing her 86th birthday had just passed. Click here for Raymond Arroyo's tribute to Mother Angelica:
http://origin.ewtn.com/news/blog.asp?blog_ID=2

Walking on Water

When there are 900 channels on your Direct TV channel guide, it is easy to ignore scores of valuable channels among lots of junky ones. So I never knew I had EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network) until I was channel-surfing late one night and stumbled upon it. Some of my more saintly (I mean that as a compliment although they are too modest to accept the description) Catholic friends say they received their deep education in the Catholic faith from this channel.

It must have been God’s divine plan for me to find the “Mother Angelica classic” episode from 1995 entitled “Walking on Water”. In it Mother Mary Angelica (the foundress of the channel), addressed many issues that had lately been on my mind: Saint Therese the Little Flower, the End Times, and how to “walk on water” during stormy times.

She read from the accounts of both Mark and John (Matthew and Luke also mention the incident) of how the disciples were rowing their boats in stormy water and were afraid when they saw Jesus walking towards them on the water. “Be not afraid; it is I,” Jesus said to them.

She spoke about how we all have to suffer in our own way, and all must bear Jesus’ words in our minds each day to have courage.
· When you are persecuted for Jesus’ sake
· When you or your loved ones face sickness and/or death
· When you, like the disciples that night, are just plain irritable with the day’s work at hand

I am not facing any grave crises at the time but do need the courage to ask for God’s Grace to handle all the daily demands of raising four children. He always brings me the words I need to hear, exactly when I need to hear them. I know that, had I come upon this program in 1995, I would not have been open to hearing them. God’s ways are so mysterious and awesome.

"Clean House" is Not So Clean!

Not that I am on a letter-writing campaign, my next letter will be to The Style Network regarding their show Clean House.

I used to watch Home and Garden Television’s “Mission: Organization” when my baby was a newborn and I was nursing approximately one-third of the day and night. Now I am no longer able to afford a half hour on the couch at 2:00 in the afternoon. One night while channel surfing, I discovered Clean House and found it extremely entertaining. Many of these homeowners have living rooms that look worse than my garage!

After watching several shows, however, I soon became disenchanted as I noticed off-color humor that was degrading to the people they were apparently trying to help. Frequently, a messy bedroom is shown, followed by the embarrassing question to the couple, “Is anything going on in this bedroom with all this clutter?” In one show, a filthy fraternity house was shown, attention being brought to an unsightly, unplumbed commode and stains of questionable origin. Was that really necessary? Another show highlighted the sale of a “vintage Playboy” magazine collection at a yard sale.

They apparently thought these were funny vignettes, and I dismissed them as one-time occurrences. But when a pregnant woman revealed that her Jacuzzi had been used for home birthing, the hosts feigned disgust. On another show, the final straw for me, the hosts said that the almost-two-year-old was still sleeping in the parental bed – and “more than must sleeping was going on” – she was still breastfeeding! Apparently this woman had a problem with “letting go” of more than just things, was the message they were trying to convey.

The practices of homebirthing and extended breastfeeding (which I am hoping to continue past the second year) are becoming increasing mainstream, and Style is going to lose a good portion of their audience if they keep up such antics.

The Pro-Life Channel

I was channel-surfing last night and caught an awful idea of George Carlin’s for an unmentionable [anti-life] reality channel. It gave me a rather good idea that could save thousands of lives per day.

Imagine “The Pro-Life Channel: All Life, All the Time”.

Victor sits back in his easy chair after a long day. He has just come home from his girlfriend’s house, where they had come to a unified decision about her unplanned pregnancy. They both needed to finish graduate school, and it seemed like the rational thing to put off having children until they had gotten their degrees, stable professional positions, and a nice house.

He flicks through the channels and stopped at an amazing picture on PLC. He sits mesmerized by Lennart Nilsson’s photography featured in the documentary “The Miracle of Life”.

A commercial comes on for Pampers. They were all too happy to support such an effort. The more babies were born, the more bottoms needed to be covered.

He picks up the phone and calls his girlfriend.

“Turn on your television set.”

“What?”

“Just stop whatever you’re doing and turn on channel 726.”

“Okay, whatever.”

“You found it yet?”

“Oh my God….”

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“[sobbing]”

“I guess we’re having a baby, honey.”

“[sniff] Yeah.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Congratulations, Mommy.”

I hope my idea makes it around because I would love to see it come to fruition!