The Husband as Gardener

Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, Brueghel, Jan the Elder

With the acceptance of divorce by Christians, the idea of the husband as gardener has slipped from our imaginations.  This God-given role is a beautiful one, indeed.  It is explained brilliantly in True Men As We Need Them by Rev. Bernard O'Rielly.  I've read the following passages too many times to count, and they always inspire me.

The idea is first introduced in Chapter II, "Creation Of A Home, The First Work":

Adam had been created outside of this Garden of Delights, in some less favored portion of the vast domain reserved for his descendants.  He thus was enabled, when transferred by his Divine Benefactor to the earthly paradise, to judge by comparison of the immense superiority of his new abode to all that his eyes had beheld hitherto.  This brief experience prepared him to improve by his own husbandry even the teeming soil of paradise, and to guard with unwearied watchfulness the untold wealth,--intrusted to him not only in all the produce of this fairy spot, but in his own soul and its destinies, in the companion soon given to him in Eve, in their united innocence and bliss, and in the welfare of their offspring.

Thus, in the Home bestowed on him who first on earth bore the name of father and discharged its duties, we find that there was imposed a double law, regarding solely home-happiness and well-being,--the law of labor and of vigilance.

This law is still the blessed necessity which ennobles the life of man, and creates within his earthly home all that it can possess of bliss and nobleness:  Every true man has to work to create his home, when he has it not; to preserve and increase its stores, where he receives it by inheritance, and he has to watch over its honor, its happiness, its security, with a most loving care.

Then, in Chapter IV, "Paradise As Realized In The Home Of The True Man," I will share three most edifying paragraphs under the subtitle, "How a True Man should Choose his Companion, and Cultivate her Heart."  May that phrase, "cultivate her heart," be the mantra of all young husbands!

We must not, however, anticipate on what has to be treated fully in its proper place.  Suffice it to say at present, that even when parents have solely consulted the Divine Will and the best interests of their son in choosing for him or in directing his choice,--or even when he has been given a woman endowed with all the natural and supernatural graces that make her a treasure beyond price,--much, very much remains for the young husband to do if he would call forth all the wealth of his treasure, and apply it to the best uses.  (emphasis mine)

A rich womanly nature demands to be known, to be appreciated, to be developed by the deep love, the ingenious tenderness, the unfailing devotion, the delicate and respectful attentions, --ever growing in assiduity with each successive year,--of her young husband.

You have chosen, from out the varied wealth of the garden and the forest, the loveliest and rarest flower that attracted your eye; will you have it brighten and perfume your home to the utmost?  Then study its nature, its habits, what soil it likes best, what companions suit it (for plants and flowers also have their preferences), what degree of moisture, of heat, of shade, or of sunshine.  Gardeners will tell you that wild flowers from the meadow, the woods, or the mountains, will seem to change their nature under care of an intelligent and loving hand, and in a few seasons become so beautiful that they seem to have been transformed by culture.  Not that only; but the flowers most beautiful by nature are so much improved by the art of the gardener, that their charms are not only increased tenfold, but varied continually so as to create ever new surprise and delight.  And who does not know that the horticulturist's skill can enhance to a wonderful extent the qualities of the most delicious fruits of our fields or our gardens?

Fr. O'Rielly sums up the importance of "cultivating her heart" magnificently under the subtitle, "This is 'to Dress and to Keep' the Home-Garden":

To you, O man of the world, your home-garden, your paradise,--the source of your purest and dearest felicity on this side of the grave, is the mind and heart and soul of your wife, your companion, the mother of your children.  Her soul, her life, is given you "to dress and to keep;" and on your appreciating her nature and her worth, on your knowing how to call forth by your love, your care, your devotion to her service, by the sunlight of your examples much more even than by your mere love and tenderness,--must depend whether or not you shall have a home-garden, a paradise,--or a hell upon earth.

Is that not incredibly empowering for the young husband?  With loving care he cultivates the rose upon the trellis to burst into bloom and perfume his garden.  It is a labor of love, worthy of his best efforts.  How dramatically we could prune back the number of divorces if we taught young men to be cultivators of their wives' hearts!  This is why I encourage you, dear reader, to share this post.  We all desperately need this instruction on the lost art of husbanding a wife, as we each have opportunities to support Catholic marriages.  Sharing the information is an easy way to help restore the Church.  May God bless you in your efforts.

 

Forget the Election and Celebrate Catholic Thanksgiving

From the movie "Babette's Feast"

Editor's Note: I got the idea and the historical background for this post from reading Dr. Marian Horvat's "The First Thanksgivings Were Catholic."

If you, like I, really detest the whole Puritan/Pilgrim party that is foisted on us every November, right when Catholics should be preparing for Advent and Christmas, your chance to fight back with a holiday that is truly meaningful is coming up: Saturday, April 30.  That's the day the second Thanksgiving was celebrated, in Texas, with Holy Mass and a great feast.  Even better, according to "The First Thanksgivings Were Catholic," after the Mass, the expedition leader, "Don Juan de Oñate, took formal possession of the new land, called New Mexico, in the name of the Heavenly Lord, God Almighty, and the earthly lord King Philip II."

Now that's more like it! 

May Catholic men rise up in the spirit of Don Juan de Oñate and renew the effort that Catholic missionaries began so valiantly long ago, establishing outposts of the True Faith in the midst of our  pagan land.  Why waste time worrying over which narcissist will be the next president of the United States?  It's just another distraction at this point.  Plus, should Catholics aspire to getting back to America's Masonic roots and its godless Constitution as "conservatives" propose?

No, we must build from a solid foundation; we must establish a Catholic order, replacing Lady Liberty with Our Lady of Guadalupe, and it is not going to happen with anyone who is "electable" in the present system.  

The first priority is establishing the Social Reign of Christ the King in our homes and in our communities.  That will provide the rich soil from which the seeds of good government may burst forth and flower.  Catholic mothers, with Rosary in hand, must form Catholic citizens.   And it can start with simple things like celebrating Catholic Thanksgiving on April 30 and again on September 8, the day on which we celebrate the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in a month rich with Marian feasts, when the real first American Thanksgiving was celebrated in Florida by Spanish Catholics.

And by all means invite your non-Catholic friends.

I highly recommend watching Babette's Feast.  It seems the perfect artistic representation of the difference between celebrating Protestant Thanksgiving and Catholic Thanksgiving, and not only that, it is a truly beautiful movie that will uplift and inspire you and increase your sensus Catholicus.

A Home for St. Joseph

Emma brought me a little St. Joseph statue from Italy three years ago this month.  I loved him, and have moved him all around the house, from the kitchen sink window sill to the guest bedroom.

A few weeks ago Emma surprised me with this gorgeous display piece.  She had discovered it at a thrift store and knew I would love it.  She also knew that it would work well with the colors and style of our living room and breakfast area, which are open to one another.

I couldn't believe it when Emma showed it to me.  I loved the detail in the woodwork and the painting!   And the first thing I thought of was little St. Joseph and how perfect this piece would be for him.

As soon as we put him in there we knew it was made for him.  No more wandering for St. Joseph!

I talk to him every day now, and he keeps an eye on all my doings in the kitchen and living room.

This brings me so much joy.

The Young Man's Guide to Building a House

"This is a book about building a house. Plato and Homer and even the Bible may seem too high-minded for that. But I don’t think you can build a house that will stand for long without them. And without a house I don’t see how you could possibly survive in the years ahead. And so this is how I imagine the high and the low meet: what is true, good, and beautiful and what is useful for survival mutually reinforce each other in a well-built house. It is because Aristotle and the Apostle Paul tell us the truth that they are useful. And if MacIntyre is correct and night is falling on the Western World, then our shelters should be filled with light, good and beautiful, like a homely house at the end of the day with windows all aglow." C. R. Wiley, The Young Man's Guide to Building a House: Notes to the Reader

C. R. Wiley, a Presbyterian minister, but more importantly a father who is looking for ways to prepare his children for the future, is writing a book for young men on how to build their own house.  Writing it in installments, it will appear on The Imaginative Conservative in rough draft form before being sent to a publisher.  Wiley expects the book to run 16-24 chapters.

I think this is such a marvelous idea.   We have grown so disconnected from living a real life.  My dad always admonished my sisters and me to know where our food comes from, and he grew a huge garden for many years to make sure we got his point.  Building your own house, your own shelter, that fits right in there too.  Writing the book to young men is perfect.  It is a concrete way of letting them re-claim their God-given roles as providers and helping them to form firm bonds with the home they will establish there.

I can't wait to read it and pass it on to my son.

When Father's Day Was Every Day

I have long been interested in the ways that the Industrial Revolution affected family life and how our society might facilitate the return of the patriarchal family.   To my way of thinking, if you really want to do this, you not only have to bring mothers home, you have to bring fathers home as well, because home loses its importance when its head spends the best part of his day elsewhere.

About six months ago I discovered an article titled "Industrialization and Marriage" by Robin Phillips. 
Its main premise is that industrialization fundamentally changed marriage, and this paved the way for our modern de-functionalized homes and even the feminist movement.

Phillips writes that "prior to 1800, the vast majority of people lived and worked in the same place.  Whatever else a couple's relationship may have involved, they were quite literally in business together.  The home, in turn, was not a place where people 'lived' as a passive activity when they were not doing other things.  Rather the home was a small factory, a bustling hub of productivity."  This is how the wife felt part of something important, and she could truly fulfill her role as helpmeet.  I know that I feel  peaceful and am much more focused on what I need to do when my husband is home the whole day.

This idea of the husband and wife being in business together prior to the Industrial Revolution made me think of how we now have "bedroom communities", "media rooms".  Keeping rooms were a mainstay of Colonial houses because inhabitants lived and worked in them.  Keeping implies activity, as in keeping house.  

Here's the part of the article that really stopped me and made me think:  "The geographical proximity of home and work had an impact on how couples thought of their relationship to each other.  A man and wife did not think of their relationship as something that could be abstracted from their mundane life together in the world." He explained that marital relations and earning a living "were closely bound together, and both were situated within an ecosystem of obligations, responsibilities, priorities and expectations that were bigger than the couple's relationship.  Because marriage was understood to be bigger than the relationship itself, this helped to anchor marriage in a narrative external to the two participates (sic)."

Of course this "in business together" relationship extended to the children as well.  I am listening to an audio book on rhetoric by Professor Michael Drout.  He says that in Sanskrit, the word for daughter means "one who milks the cow".  The professor says that it is believed that Sanskrit and Greek and Latin sprung from a common language, so you can see how deeply-embedded these home-supporting roles were in our culture before Capitalism came along.

 I was stunned to learn about the role government played in promoting modern housing.  Silly me, I thought people just got tired of farm life and wanted to move to the suburbs, but no, the "Industrialization and Marriage" article reveals that "the concept of the family room originated from guidelines that the government issued in the middle of the 20th century when specifying how homes could qualify for insurance.  A new model of the home emerged which deliberately detached it from labor and functionality.  Government planners urged architects and home-owners to get rid of walls and doors, to eliminate various work rooms like the sewing room and the pantry and to focus the house instead around the type of domestic bonding that was supposed to occur in rooms like the family room."

Gee, this sounds like what happened to architecture in the Catholic Church after Vatican II.  The functionality of divine worship that was expressed by things like altar rails was destroyed in order to promote "community".

In the case of housing, this change was necessary to convert independent producers into dependent consumers of industrial goods.  It has taken a long time to accomplish, but we are there.  State governments implemented compulsory schooling to speed this along.  I imagine that once dad was gone from home, taking the children was a lot easier, especially as classical education was swept aside and replaced with the memorize-and-regurgitate-textbooks method.

Clearly we have been duped into destroying God's plan for the family.  If only we could see it.

Birth Trauma: A Dad's Perspective

St. Joseph, protector of the Holy Family, pray for us!

I often think about St. Joseph's experiences trying to protect Mary and Baby Jesus, and how fathers today must empathize with him.   Not finding a room at the inn is the equivalent today of having to choose a less than ideal birth environment.  The flight into Egypt could be escaping today's hospitals to avoid vaccinations or other risky procedures.  I remember when a nurse tried to forcibly take Emma from me and give her a Hep B shot.

I have always guessed that for the husband, the wife's traumatic birth experience must strike right at the heart of his vocation because he can't protect her or his child from inept caregivers, be they midwives or obstetricians.   I was glad to finally read a first-hand account of one man's experience with his wife's multiple difficult pregnancies/births HERE.  He says,

"I was there to support Mrs. BWF, but I never realized I needed someone there to support me."

Poor thing!  My heart goes out to him.

In preparation for being a supportive mother-in-law, I am reading lots of home birth stories, focusing on the difficult ones like (Warning: graphic photos in following link) footling breech, to help me get accustomed to the possibilities and how they are handled by knowledgable midwives.

I may not be needed for anything during labor and delivery other than providing a good dinner, but I prefer to be prepared.

A Pilgrimage and a Procession: The Cabalgata of Christ the King

I never fail to be inspired by Catholic men making an exterior act of faith.

Via Tradition in Action: "From throughout the State of Guanajuato - as well as many other states of Mexico and the U.S. - the pilgrims meet two days before Epiphany to ride together on pilgrimage to honor Christ the King."  Read the entire post HERE.

Something He Can Work On

"Mom?"  Nathaniel called to me the other day.  "Do you have something called distilled white vinegar?"

"Yeeeees," I replied.  "How much do you need?  I have 3 1/2 gallons."

He took the half gallon and disappeared out the back door.  Shortly, he was back with a wide grin.  "Come see," he said.

I followed him out to his Mustang, and he showed me two different sections on the hood of his car.  One had water spots, and the other one didn't.  He was using the vinegar to take the spots out and was really pleased with the way it was working.  He said that he found the vinegar tip on the internet.

The car has been one of the best learning experiences he has had.  Something always needs his attention, and he has been forced to figure it out.  His dad has worked with him on this, trying his best to guide him without taking over and doing it himself, which is really hard for him.   Not only has Nathaniel gained great mechanical knowledge, he has learned a lot about himself and how people approach problems differently.  For instance, when his clutch went out, his dad saw the first step as going under the car and looking at the transmission to see what would need to be done to get it out.  Nathaniel wanted to look it up on the internet.  This led to another "people skills" learning experience, as neither could see at first where the other one was coming from.  To add to the stress, it was Christmas and freezing cold.  They eventually got it worked out and the huge job of changing out the clutch on that car successfully accomplished.  

Once all the pain was over, Nathaniel just swelled with confidence.  The experience was worth every moment of pain and suffering.  It was a rite of passage.

Embracing Fertility

My much-anticipated package of toothpaste ingredients arrived the other day, but the most interesting thing in it had nothing to do with homemade toothpaste.  It was a catalog with a gorgeous photo of an adorable baby, cunningly dressed, with the headline "Making Babies".

"Whew!" I thought.  "Now that's one way to get consumers to open your catalog!"

Of course, "Making Babies" is not about sex.  From what I could discern from quickly reading the sales blurb and watching the YouTube commercial, it teaches women how to eat and take care of themselves in a way that is optimal for having a baby with lifelong health.  This is the hard core approach, the traditional foods method, eating densely nutritious food like grassfed beef liver, fermented cod liver oil and pastured butter.  It is definitely not What to Expect When You're Expecting.  I'm sure it probably covers what the man needs to do as well.   Eating for fertility seems to be the latest hot topic in the health world.  I've seen several health gurus marketing such products.  Another one that comes to mind is Chris Kresser's "Healthy Baby Code".   I think it's great but also a little sad.  Clearly, our culture no longer knows how to "make babies" and needs remedial coursework.  For a long time we have denigrated the role of the nurturing mother.  We protect by law those who kill babies in the womb.  So these new educational products make an important statement.  A small segment of our culture is beginning to value procreation.  This is not to say that they are embracing having large families, but I believe that once a husband and wife make the commitment and the sacrifice necessary to have a truly healthy baby, their whole value system will be righted.  They will be awed by God's plan, whether they believe in it or not.  They will be so blessed by this new life, they will want to do it all over again.  Maybe they will even come to the conclusion that Emma did when she gazed rapturously at the photo of the baby on the catalog:


"Making babies is my favorite thing!"

The King and the Thing in the Wing

My husband heard a mysterious noise in the garage the other night.  It emanated from one of the wings of the airplane he is building.  Until then, dear husband's face had reflected the contentment of a quiet evening at home, where he rules as a benevolent but just king.

What was this thing in his wing, and how dare it be there?

Oh, thing!  Have a care!

THE KING DECLARES WAR

The wings are stored overhead.  They have "skin" on the outside, but the far end, the one that will be the wing tip, is wide open.  Armed with a .22, the king drew a ladder to the wing root.  He climbed up, grabbed the wing spar, a piece of metal that protrudes from that end, and shook the wing.

A furry critter scrabbled out the far end onto a rafter.

Oh, possum!

Pow!  The king nailed the possum in the head just as it realized its life circumstances had grown perilous and it better make a break for it.

Despite the mortal wound to its brain pan, it leaped. . .






back inside the wing.

UTTER DISMAY contorted the king's face.  "He's bleeding out in my wing!" he complained bitterly to me and Emma as we rushed in.  (We had been banished from the garage, but we had pressed ourselves against the side entry door, where we, all a-tingle, watched the proceedings through the window.)

Now that we were inside, we could hear the varmint scratching out a frantic break dance inside the wing.

Ewwww!   My stomach rebelled at this sound and somehow pulled on my tongue, causing me to have to swallow several times, which action caused my eyes to squeeze shut.

At last, all grew still.  The prince was called to assist with the extraction of the deceased. 

His assistance was not needed after all.  The king, unbeknownst to me, managed to grab the possum's tail, and suddenly its bloody corpse, with eyes still bright, swung down into our midst.

Something about the way its body came swinging down overwhelmed my senses, and I gasped and had to turn away shivering.  Emma comforted me.

The body was dispatched to the field morgue.  Yesterday a team of winged medical examiners worked feverishly on the post mortem.

And so happily ends another possum tail in the Kingdom of Haught.

Sullivan Ballou: A Model for Fatherhood

Sullivan Ballou died on this day in 1861 from a wound received at The First Battle of Bull Run.  He has become famous for his letter to his wife Sarah, which he wrote the week before.  It is read by Liam Clancy in the video above and stands out as a marvelous example of the power of the written word.  Ken Burns brought it to the country's attention when he had it read aloud in his PBS Civil War documentary.

What Sullivan Ballou expresses to his wife is his undying love for her and their children but also the rightness of giving his life for what he believes in.  Although he was a Union soldier, and my sympathies are definitely with the Confederacy, his decision transcends "sides".  He was fighting for what he believed to be the greater good.  Though he longed to see his boys grow into "honorable manhood", he chose to risk his life.  

In "The Family Has Lost Its Head", an article in Fatherhood and the Family, Ed Willock explains it this way:

"There is a normal tension between the man and wife in regard to the question of the common good.  It is the kind of tension that makes for balance.  The woman will usually place the good of her family first.  For her to do so is normal.  The man, if he is truly head of the family, realizes that his family's well-being depends upon the common good and thus will make the common good the first end of his work."

Sullivan Ballou epitomized this kind of headship.  I am grateful for his example.  I believe that there were many men like him at the time of the Civil War because our country was populated by families with a traditional understanding of marriage.   Today, those examples are few but needed so desperately.

Mr. Willock points this out admirably:

"The constant and endless regard of today's good husband for the well-being of his family, so that he saves from the time of their birth for the education of his children, while his neighbor's children starve, or while his local political system grows corrupt, or his Faith goes unchampioned, or his brother is exploited, is a sign of the times.  It is goodness measured by the standard of the wife, and thus she is the actual head of the family.  This is not good headship measured by any objective standard.  Such a father may leave an inheritance of wealth to his sons, whereas what they need most is masculine virtue lived out for their emulation."

The Helpmate Who Helps Too Much

One of the fabulous things about being a homemaker is that I have the opportunity to read good books and research important topics.    The down side is, it turns me into an "expert", and I can and sometimes do give too much advice to my husband.  This dilemma grabbed my attention in an article by Ed Willock called "The Father in the Home".  It's from the book, Fatherhood and Family, which is Volume Three of the Integrity Series.  Mr. Willock says, "The father must be the head of the house, and that means if and when he becomes a better man it will be in accordance with his own idea of perfection and not his wife's.  To say other than this is to imply that mother knows best.  If she knows best, then God would have made her the head of the house.  He didn't."


Later in the article, Mr. Willock says, "In order for the man to be the proper head of the family, his wife must continually consent to it.  He cannot effectively force her to consent.  On the other hand, the man must consent to her being his helper or else she cannot truly be helpful.  If he seeks advice for living from some other sources, looking down upon her suggestions, then he is cutting himself off from the most likely source of wisdom."  


These two quotes illuminate why marriage is indeed a dance! 


One of the wonderful things I observed while watching waltzing lessons is that it is the woman's job to make the man look good while recovering from any leadership mistakes.  She must do this without ever leaving her role as follower.  How is this done in a marriage?  Well, I think in the same way that the wife corrects mistakes that she makes in "helping" too much: encouraging and supporting him.  I found this helpful list  today on Betty Beguiles: 15 Ways to Encourage Your Husband.

• Compliment him on his strengths and achievements and acknowledge his victories. 
• Create a peaceful atmosphere within our home. Make it a place that he can lay down his burdens and rest easy.
• Pray for him. Reread The Power of a Praying Wife.
• Write him love letters. Make sure he knows how absolutely swoon-worthy I find him to be.
• Speak well of him to friends and family. It wouldn't hurt if he accidentally overheard from time to time, either.
• When he stumbles, respond with mercy, compassion and encouragement.
• Encourage him to dream big and find ways to support those dreams.
• Try not to give feedback on every single decision he makes.
• Ask him for his opinion and guidance. Make sure he knows how much I value his opinion.
• Be affectionate. Don't be shy about communicating how much I desire him.
• Make sure he has the time to do the things he loves and to pursue his passions.
• Apologize for things I’ve done in the past that have hurt him.
• Thank him for all his hard work and many sacrifices.
• Don’t bring up past failures or hurts or rehash old fights. Truly forgive and forget.
• Have faith in him and let him lead.

Boys to Men: In Search of the Fairy Tale Ending, Part 2

In my first post on the book Iron John: A Book About Men, I said that it's the author's "attempt to explain the importance of traditional rites of initiation into manhood and how those things were expressed in the fairy tale of the same name." Well, that is true, but the book also gives fantastic insight into the problems that have been created by their loss. Strangely, Bly is openly critical and often plain wrong about Christianity, and in my initial reading I waded through much that I considered pure drivel. I definitely do not agree with everything he says, nor does my appreciation for the parts I find to be true imply support for the "men's rights" movement (or anything else for that matter). In fact, the truth I found in this book I understood in terms of traditional Catholicism. I'm sure Bly would be baffled by that!

So I am in the process of re-reading the book with a highlighter because every time I did find an amazing pearl of truth in my first reading, fireworks exploded in my head as my brain blazed with new and interesting connections. I am more than willing to pry open a lot of barren oyster shells in order to discover a few pearls.

Here's one from the preface to the 2004 DaCapo edition:

"The imposition of globalization was an act performed by the Destructive King of the Corporate World--Clinton was a part of that. Now we are experiencing the principles of disorder. Since Iron John was published in 1990, we have seen an extraordinary consolidation of the powers of disorder. The corporate scandals, summed up by the Enron collapse, have become vivid examples of the Dark Father or the Destructive Father. The retirement accounts of his 'children' were destroyed while the father escaped with millions. He draws energy out of his children and pulls it into some black hole that he shelters in himself. The presence of disorder is becoming deeper. George Bush is the Dark Son of a Dark Father.

The great sadness we can feel in the country, the lack of study, the absence of any brilliant new popular music--all of these are characteristic traits of life under the Dark Father. One good quality of the Iron John story, and the amplification of it, is that the story gives us a way to understand this lethargy and this grief without actively blaming ourselves for it."


"A dark father" makes more sense to me that anything I've read by political experts. I no longer actively read about politics, but when I did, I didn't see one party as better than the other. My conclusion was that neither of them had the best interests of the country at heart.

The lethargy Bly speaks of particularly intrigues me. He talks about contemporary men embracing their "feminine" side and how that has not made them more free. Instead, he describes this new gentle male as "a nice boy who pleases not only his mother but also the young woman he is living with."

Now I would not have understood this as well if I hadn't just read, Stop Living for the Approval of Women on the Art of Manliness site. I think it's good to be a pleaser in general. However, the author, Wayne M. Levine, M.A., explains the problem this way:

"First, let’s define approval as it relates to our relationships with women. Approval is her permission for you to take an action. Approval is her acknowledgment that she won’t take you to task for your choice…maybe. Approval is giving away your power to do as you see fit. In other words, needing the approval of women makes you a pleaser."

I can easily see how being a pleaser according to Levine's definition can be bad. If the man has given up his power to do as he sees fit, he can't be the true leader of the family. Bly also uses the term "soft male" to describe these men and says that you "quickly notice the lack of energy in them." Then he says something that really got my attention:

"They are life-preserving but not exactly life-giving. Ironically, you often see these men with strong women who positively radiate energy."

My own interpretation is that the "life-preserving" male preserves his own life, maybe even to the point of avoiding defending things he should, like the Church, hearth and home, women and children. His not being "life-giving" reminds me of the widespread use of birth control. He no longer sees a wife and many children as blessings, rejecting "Thy wife as a fruitful vine, on the sides of thy house; thy children as olive plants, round about thy table." Psalm 127:3 Douay-Rheims.

As I've been writing this, I've been overhearing a "news" show promoting a segment on how women love to watch television shows that feature tough women characters or, as Bly describes, "strong women who radiate energy". These are the women that he says accompany "soft males". It reminded me of something Fr. Zendejas said in a women's conference about the importance of being feminine, that the woman cannot rise above the man, so when a woman is masculine, the man goes below her. In other words, he becomes a soft male.

In this context, it's clear how women have contributed to the destruction of our culture by rejecting femininity. I find that immensely encouraging, because if it is true, we women can begin to turn things around just by wearing pretty dresses. I can do that.

Artwork: My Lady is a Widow by Marcus Stone

From Victorian/Edwardian Paintings:

"This picture, one of Stone's largest, is conceived as a celebration of the joys of family life. A humble labourer, employed in digging a trench beside a wall, is interrupted in his task by the arrival of his family who bring him lunch. A proud and loving father, he tenderly lifts his youngest child into his arms, while his daughter offers him a sheaf of corn. The picnic brought by his wife in the wicker basket promises to be abundant, and each member of the family bears a smile. Though 'lowly born', as the attendant quotation from one of Shakespeare's more obscure plays implies, they are happy, united in their love, and 'content'. The contrast with the widow, observing them from behind the garden wall which forms a barrier between them, is marked. Her gabled mansion can be seen behind her, but the emotional barrenness of her life is emphasised by the dead tree above her head, and the unkempt nature of her garden. She appears stranded, Miss Havisham-like, disengaged from the simple pleasures around her. The quotation from Shakespeare is an injunction to her, and to us, not to shut herself away in a world of books and riches, but to embrace life, marry, have children, and live in community with others. Stone has depicted her young enough to make this still a possibility."

Blogging Makes Me a Better Catholic

Photo via Wikipedia

My pride was considerably deflated this morning when I looked at my blog statistics and saw that of all my posts, the one that received the most hits is one in which I wrote nothing, just provided a link to what someone else wrote.

Humiliation: it's a good thing, especially during Holy Week.

Bring Back the Birds

At Sunday's Women's Conference, Fr. Zendejas talked about the role of femininity in man/woman relationships. Basically, he said that the more women lose their femininity, the more men lose their masculinity. Of especial interest to me was his explanation of how they reverse roles. Because woman comes from man, she can not go above him. Instead, when he becomes feminized, she stays in place, and he goes below her.

I threw this information in the mix with something else I have been thinking about: female adornment. I read recently that the Audubon Society was started to help bring about women's suffrage. Women were wearing birds on their hats, and two Boston ladies believed that they would never be taken seriously and win the right to vote if such practices were continued. By starting a campaign to protect birds, they hoped to achieve major social change. (The global warming folks are using this technique to implement one-world government.)

So we took the birds off the hats, the hats off the heads, and in many cases, the hair off the heads. We shucked the gloves, the skirts, the waists and now blithely promenade around town in less than a 19th-century woman's undergarments. Women have the vote, but they are more bird-brained than ever and not nearly as attractive to look at. Truly, I would take much more seriously a disenfranchised fully-dressed woman with a beautiful bird on her hat than a scantily-clad one with tattoos and piercings and a voter registration card. Besides, I never saw women's suffrage as anything but an attack on the Christian family. If the father is the head of the family, does it not make sense that the head should represent the family and vote for them? It is his duty to have their best interests at heart.

They Danced with Princesses

I never expected it, though I hoped.

Saturday night our Keepers group had its annual Father/Daughter Banquet. This year the theme was a Barn Social. After a delicious catered meal and lively fiddle tunes by our homeschool group's own Katie Byrd, our caller announced the first English Country Dance. I trembled lest all the dads remained seated! But they didn't. They lined up and danced eagerly and happily. They were magnificent. The daughters beamed. Everyone smiled and laughed. The moms who were helping set up the banana split bar in the kitchen peeked out and whispered to each other excitedly: "Look, look! They're having fun!"

I will be forever indebted to Mrs. Susan Addington for her organization/management of the Keepers group and our homeschool 4-H group. She is an amazing woman who blesses every family in these clubs through her hard work and sacrifice. May God bless her and her beautiful family abundantly!

I am grateful also for Mrs. Barbara Attema's careful choice of dances, her excellent calling, and her desire to share the culture of English Country Dancing.

Back to the Classroom after Ike

Today Nathaniel resumes his classes at the local community college. He got a lot of good experience while classes were suspended because of hurricane damage.

He learned a lot about generators, portable gasoline ones and fixed propane ones. He and Herb spent several hours working on the portable gasoline generator before it would run. They built the foundation for a whole house generator and helped get the unit set up.

Herb finally let him use the chainsaw, which Nathaniel has been longing to do for several years. Herb made him wear all the safety equipment, including the regulation Husqvarna helmet with shield, goggles, and chaps. Too bad we didn't have something to protect him from the ants. Our yard flooded the day of the hurricane. Nathaniel discovered, most unhappily, that the ants had taken refuge in the trees in which he had to climb to cut out the broken branches. He has always balked at wearing all the safety equipment that Herb insists upon for every job, but after the first day wielding a chainsaw, he discovered "bite" marks in the chaps that had been in pristine condition when he donned them in the morning.

Not only did he clean up our yard, he worked two days for one of his lawncare customers in Crosby and two days at Mickey's house in Dickinson. Mickey, Herb, and Nathaniel all sing in the schola together.



There was even some inside work. Nathaniel chose the new color for the gameroom, which we are trying to give a more masculine feel. Happy with his choice, he proclaimed himself "a pretty good color dude"! He and Herb struggled with the granite paint. It requires very particular rolling, then very particular paint brush technique to keep the granite from leaving dark patches on the wall.


Oh, I can't leave out his first experience changing a flat on a busy highway at night. A policeman stopped to check on us and told me that he was glad to see I had a big, strapping boy to handle the job. Yes. Deo Gratias!

This Sweet Intermezzo

I am overcome daily with a quiet joy, immersed in luxury, wrapped in security, supported with strength. Herb is home and has been home with me for two weeks now.

No, he is not retired, but I have a foretaste of what it will be like, and it is good.

I read a book once that talked about the role that husbands played in family life before the Industrial Revolution, when the majority of men worked at home as farmers or craftsmen. Their role and resulting impact was huge. Before I read that book I was sure that if we could just get mothers back home, we could restore the family and then the culture. Now I know that the loss of mothers was the second blow to the family. First the fathers were lost to the factories.

I don’t know how much longer Herb will be home while we search for alternative treatments for the chronic pain he has from nerve damage in his shoulder. But while he is here I will treasure each moment and thank God for this sweet intermezzo.

Fathers Turn Their Hearts to Their Daughters

I used the Catholic Bible, Douay-Rheims version, when I needed to quote the Bible.

The CHARIS homeschool home economics group closed the school year with a sparkle by hosting a Father-Daughter Banquet on the evening of May 2 at Moss Hill Pentecostal Church. More than fifty fathers and daughters filled the church hall to honor their relationship and feast on ham, green beans, pasta salad, tossed salad, rolls, potatoes, and a delectable variety of desserts.

Mr. Dwayne Sisk welcomed the attendees to the night's festivities. Remarking how blessed he was for the privilege of raising daughters and being able to homeschool them, he encouraged the fathers to turn their hearts to their daughters.

After the meal, Miss Rebecca Sisk, the young lady who organized the home economics group, recognized the mothers who had helped her present the lessons and gave them each a gift box of Ghiradelli chocolates. Over the course of the school year, the monthly lessons included jam making, bread baking, table settings, a Christmas tea, sewing, and cake decorating. The lesson on table settings was done in the context of setting the tables for and serving Thanksgiving dinner to the residents of the Dayton Retirement Center.

Mr. Sisk then introduced Paul Renfro, the pastor of Grace Family Baptist in Spring, TX. Renfro's talk began with an overview of the situation in which Christian families find themselves today. He explained the importance of the Christian family and how it has been targeted for destruction because it is the only thing preventing communism (in its many forms) from completely overtaking the country.

Pointing out how entertainment and the government schools are used as lethal weapons in the attack, he instructed the fathers to protect and guide their daughters--to preserve their innocence and build a close relationship with them. By building this kind of relationship, the father will elicit in each daughter a strong desire to please him and honor his decisions for her, Renfro said.

He talked about "dating" as a means of daughters finding husbands on their own and asked, "I don't think it's been too successful, do you?" Instead, he asserted that daughters need their fathers to guide them. Renfro challenged the fathers to plan their parenting with their future grandchildren and great grandchildren in mind.

"What is the purpose of a daughter?" he asked. "She is to be a helpmeet," he answered, going on to explain that fathers should prepare the daughters to spread the kingdom of God by teaching them to love children and encouraging them, once they are married, to have a large family. "Do you know what the second most popular name in England is now?" he asked. "It's Mohammed.

As in Proverbs 31, Renfro encouraged fathers to ensure their daughters learn everything necessary to manage a household well and suggested helping them start a small home business.

In concluding his talk, Renfro related the Genesis story of Rebecca. He invoked upon the daughters at the banquet the blessing that was given to Rebecca when she left her home to marry, "Thou art our sister, mayst thou increase to thousands of thousands, and may thy seed possess the gates of their enemies."

The evening closed with happy chatter as the fathers and daughters mixed and mingled and talked of upcoming camping trips, 4-H events, and summer vacation plans.

Father-Daughter Banquet a Dream Come True

I feel pretty, oh, so pretty!
I feel pretty and witty and gay,
And I pity any girl who isn't me today!

I feel charming, oh so charming.
It's alarming how charming I feel
And so pretty that I hardly can believe I'm real!



Emma's preparation for the home economics group's Father-Daughter banquet began at noon with a trip to the hair miracle worker, Stephanie Mason. Emma emerged later with an elegant braided chignon. At 5:30 she donned her dress, and Herb surprised her in the kitchen with a stunning wrist corsage made of five green-tinted roses, green tulle, sheer black ribbon, and small black bead accents. A light dusting of glitter hinted of the magical evening that was to come.


On the front lawn, Emma worked determinedly until she succeeded in pinning on Herb's boutinniere, a single green-tinted rosebud accented with the sheer black ribbon and small black beads.

Herb chose the ribbon himself, refusing to be swayed by the florist. The beads were the florist's idea, but he liked them.














Even going through the buffet line, the smile never left Emma's face.



After a lovely evening and a long ride home, Emma described the event as her "first date and prom" and was so excited that she could not go to sleep until after 1 a.m. This photograph shows her pretending to be dead tired.