Teaching is my day-job, and while it’s a quite the rewarding job, it is equally (if not more) taxing. It’s physically and emotionally exhausting, and it sucks the time out of each day like some black hole. I love it. But I love writing too, especially the writing I do here for my Substack, and it’s as meaningful a part of my life as my job. But with my time-consuming work as a teacher (and busy home life after welcoming Baby #3 to the family two months ago) finding the time each day, or even each week, to sit down and write something — anything! — is a difficult task. Yet, I keep striving. Something tangible is missing from my life when I don’t write, and everything else just becomes more dull. So, I refuse to stop writing.
All that to say that to my great sorrow I’ve been away from my Substack for some time now, but I’m coming back around to it. And with my return comes a change (peep the Substack’s name), one that has been long-expected by yours truly since over a year ago. It’s taken a lot of planning, and if I’m honest, I’ve not planned all the details as much as I would’ve hoped. Nevertheless, I’m choosing to keep moving forward, and I’m quite glad to finally start this journey toward realizing the vision I’ve had floating around in my head for so many months.
Here’s to new things! (Read a little more about the changes further below.)
From the Church Calendar
Wednesday after XV Sunday after Pentecost Ss. Denys, Rusticus & Eleutherius, Martyrs 2024 A.D.
Monday was the Feast of the Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The rosary is likely the most meaningful of all spiritual disciplines and devotions in my life, and knowing that the Church chooses to commemorate our Blessed Mother on a feast dedicated to the beauty and power of her intercessory love in the Rosary gladdens my heart.
The feast day commemorates a particular historical event: the victory granted to the Christian faithful over their much stronger adversaries, the Turks, in the Battle of Lepanto in 1571. The upset is credited to the Blessed Virgin Mary and her loving intercession for which the Christian faithful had implored through the prayers of the Holy Rosary.
If you’re unfamiliar with the Rosary, it’s a meditative form of prayer which uses prayer beads (such as the one pictured above) to pray through a series of Our Father’s and Hail Mary’s while meditating on events from the life of Christ and of Mary.
More specifically, the Rosary consists of the following prayers: The Apostle’s Creed which is prayed at the beginning while holding the cross/crucifix), the Our Father prayed at each large bead, the Hail Mary prayed at each small bead, and the Glory be prayed before each Our Father. After the initial prayers, the rosary’s prayers are grouped into what are called ‘decades’ which consist of one large bead and ten small beads. This means that praying a decade would look like: Our Father » 10 Hail Mary’s » Glory Be. This is then repeated several times over (usually five, but the largest rosaries include fifteen decades), and during each decade one reflects upon one of fifteen different mysteries from the life of Christ and his Mother.
If you’re interested, you can find more specific information on these prayers and the list of fifteen mysteries here.
If you’ve never prayed the Rosary, I encourage you to try it out, even just one decade. If you have concerns or qualms about praying to Mary or the saints, you can simply cut out the intercessory prayer at the end of the Hail Mary and only pray the first part which is a quotation of the angel Gabriel and Elizabeth’s divine declarations to Mary in the Gospels:
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
I promise you won’t regret it — and just maybe it’ll become an invaluable part of your regular spiritual devotions like it has mine.
On a different note, St. Denys (commemorated today) met death by decapitation, and we are told that after having his head severed, he proceeded to pick up his head and walk two leagues (four miles) while his decapitated head preached.
From My Reading
A poem about Cheerios and the nobility that comes with age — a dignity often unseen or unrecognized by the young. Read Cheerios by Billy Collins here.
Some Thoughts & Stories
The individual as a human must take priority over the individual as a student if education is to have its intended effect, for it is the individual’s humanity that qualifies and defines what it means for the individual to be a student. Practically, this means content cannot be the primary force shaping a course’s curriculum or the daily classroom experience.
Writing Updates
To all of you who have been following along steadfastly over the last few months, or some of you for almost two months since I started this Substack, thank you for your support! For those who are newly joining this Substack, I hope you’ll all continue to find something of beauty and goodness that serves to enrich your life as you follow along with what I’m doing with Orthodox Pilgrim — or should I say for Catch Me If You Can.
Yup, that’s right. Orthodox Pilgrim is not more. But don’t worry, I’m not scrapping the old. I love writing about Orthodoxy and reflecting on the sacredness of ordinary things, and I will continue to do so. But, what has been Orthodox Pilgrim up to this point will now belong to a grander and more multifaceted vision that makes up my reworked Substack, Catch Me If You Can.
Which begs the question, What exactly is this new ‘vision’ that has inspired changes and a new name? Well, I won’t come out and say it all right now (what would be the fun in that?), but you can be on the lookout for posts in the next few weeks and months that will clarify this vision bit by bit.
For the time being, though, I should probably tell you something so you have an idea of what’s coming to you in the future. So here it goes: In short, Catch Me If You Can is a ‘spiritual memoir.’ More on what that means in a later post.
This ‘memoir’ shall consist of poems, essays, and reflections on various topics, and though a memoir in form, its purpose is much more than logging the life of this inconsequential individual who likes to write on Substack. Among many reasons for the Substack in its new form, one of the primary purposes is to serve as a literary form of dissent and resistance.
Against what or whom? Good question. Stick around to find out!
Closing Out
As I’ve already stated, I’m glad to be initiating the changes to this place that I’ve been thinking and planning for some time. Further adding to my gladness is my family. I’ve been especially blessed in the past few weeks with an overwhelming sense of gratitude and fulfillment when I consider where I am in life and what I have been graciously given by our most merciful Lord. My wife, my children, my little family — they mean the world to me, and they fill my cup to overflowing. Truly, children are a blessing, and inheritance from the Lord; and a virtuous wife more precious than rubies. I am a happy man, daily filled with joy undefiled because God has granted them to me in his gracious favor, and my labors for them is my daily offering of thanksgiving back to Him who has blessed me abundantly.
All that I have thou hast given to me, and I give it back to thee to be disposed of according to thy good pleasure. Give me only the comfort of thy presence and the joy of thy love; with these I shall be more than rich and lack nothing.
Suscipe prayer, St. Ignatius of Loyola
Blessing to all of you. May God bless you beyond measure, as he has so done for me, with the truly rich things of this world — and may he have mercy on our souls.