Today, I’d like to offer you an Easter Giveaway!!

The winner will receive this lovely book to add to your book collection!

Raising Your Children

Confusion prevails about the job of bringing up children. Integrity magazine, a post-WWII journal by lay Catholics for living an integral Catholic life, has been sifted for insightful articles on every aspect of raising children:

• Teaching Children to Pray
• Purity and the Young Child
• Creative Activity
• The Dating System
• Crisis of Faith in Youth
• The Vocation of Parents
• Marriage for Keeps

and MUCH more all in short easy to read article-chapters.

Beautiful Lacy Veil

This “Sheer Rose” Veil can be worn as a chapel veil or as a lacy scarf! What a beautiful color for Easter and spring! 🌺🌺🌷🌷

Just leave a comment here, and your name will be added! It is always great to hear from you. I will announce the winner next Tuesday, April 11th!

Quotable Quotes

Teach your children to show great respect to the clergy. Mary, Queen of the Clergy, pray for us. (Picture of Pope Pius XII)

“Religious have no need of particular friendships, but those living in the world need them as a mutual strength and aid in the many difficult passages that have to be crossed.
For those who live in the midst of the world and yet strive for true virtue, it is necessary to ally themselves to one another by a holy and sacred friendship through which they stimulate, assist and encourage each other toward good.Those who walk on level ground do not need to hold hands, but those who climb steep and slippery roads need to hold on to each other in order to progress more securely.” -St. Francis de Sales, Friendship http://amzn.to/2oamBi4 (afflink)

“In establishing your home, adopt the characteristics of the holy house of Nazareth. In proportion as you do so, you will have fashioned for yourselves a replica of the happiest home that ever was on earth.” -Fr. Lovasik, Catholic Family Handbook http://amzn.to/2pUoQE9 (afflink)

“At the hour of death the Holy Masses you have heard devoutly will be your greatest consolation.”
(Illustration: Angelo von Courten,1848 – 1925)

“Be patient with everyone, but above all with yourself…do not be disheartened by your imperfections, but always rise up with fresh courage.”
― St. Francis de Sales

“This art of housekeeping is not learned in a day; those of us who have been engaged in it for years are constantly finding out how little we know, and how far we are, after all, from perfection. It requires a clever woman to keep house; and as I said before there is ample scope, even within the four walls of a house (a sphere which some affect to despise), for the exercise of originality, organizing power, administrative ability. And to the majority of women I would fain believe it is the most interesting and satisfactory of all feminine occupations.” -Annie S. Swan http://amzn.to/2mSz6gA Courtship and Marriage And the Gentle Art of Home-Making (afflink)

“Modern mothers have been relying on psychology books to interpret child behavior for so long now that if all the psychology books were burned to a crisp, few mothers could relax with the conviction that God’s love, the maternal instinct, and divine grace could take their place. What we all — little or big — want is God; if we do not realize it, however, we choose many ignoble things in His place. And if we want to teach children to be good with a goodness that’s lasting, we must teach them to be good for the love of God.”
Mary Reed Newland, How to Raise Good Catholic Children, 1954 http://amzn.to/2qCq6Md (afflink)

At any rate, she has by nature the power, the art, and the disposition to please, to soothe, to charm, and to captivate. It is a wonderful power; and we see daily women exerting it in a wonderful way. Why will not women who are truly good, or who sincerely strive to be so, not make it the chief study of their lives to find out and acquire the sovereign art of making their influence as healthful, as cheering, as blissful as the sunlight and the warmth are to their homes? – Rev Bernard O’Reilly, True Womanhood, 1894 http://amzn.to/2mPm81e (afflink)

“Boys and girls must be taught as tiny tots to love modesty. Even though they are too young to sin, they can and ought to be impressed with the beauty of modesty. Training in modesty is pre-eminently the function of the home, to be begun from earliest childhood.” -Archbishop Meyer of Milwaukee, Dressing With Dignity, Colleen Hammond http://amzn.to/2qpQB6H (afflink)

One who, in order to please God, perseveres in prayer although he finds no consolation in it, but rather repugnance, gives Him a beautiful proof of true love. –Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, Divine Intimacy

This booklet contains practical advice on the subjects of dating and choosing a spouse from the Catholic theological viewpoint. Father Lovasik points out clearly what one’s moral obligations are in this area, providing an invaluable aid to youthful readers. Additionally, he demonstrates that Catholic marriage is different from secular marriage and why it is important to choose a partner who is of the Catholic Faith if one would insure his or her personal happiness in marriage. With the rampant dangers to impurity today, with the lax moral standards of a large segment of our society, with divorce at epidemic levels, Clean Love in Courtship will be a welcome source of light and guidance to Catholics serious about their faith.

A Frank, Yet Reverent Instruction on the Intimate Matters of Personal Life for Young Men. To our dear and noble Catholic youths who have preserved, or want to recover, their purity of heart, and are minded to retain it throughout life. For various reasons many good fathers of themselves are not able to give their sons this enlightenment on the mysteries of life properly and sufficiently. They may find this book helpful in the discharge of their parental responsibilities in so delicate a matter.

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A Book Giveaway!!

Today, I’d like to offer you a Pre-Lenten Giveaway!!

The winner will receive these lovely books to add to your book collection!

You will get…

~Motherhood and Family…Gleaned from the INTEGRITY magazine series in the 1950’s, the 16 chapters of Motherhood and Family can be summarized in the following lines.

Get out of the way while God sanctifies your child through danger and suffering.
Avoid the discouragement of reforming your husband according to your ideas of (feminine) holiness.
Multiply the spiritual goods coming from homebirth and breastfeeding.
Debunk worldly notions of love and romance for your growing girls.
Use the watchwords of common sense and courage to help your family.
Invite poverty to be a necessary part of your Family Rule.
Serve the Church, family, and parish as a single woman.
Understand the similarities between marriage and consecrated religious life which advance holiness.
Prepare for the end of active motherhood and the beginning of a gracious old age.

Motherhood and Family is the book for girls, young ladies, and women of all ages who look to enjoy the privilege of being a woman, or who are prayerfully desiring to discover it or to recover it.

~The Catholic Mother’s Traditional Lenten Journal to help keep you and your family on track this Lent.

Lent is that special season wherein we teach our children the value of sacrifice and of discipline. This journal will lay out some simple activities in which your children will be doing their sacrifices and will have a tangible means of “counting” them for Jesus. You, Mom, will have a place to put a check mark if that the activity is remembered and completed for the day.

This journal also includes a place for you to check off whether you are fulfilling your own personal resolutions…your Spiritual Reading, your Family Rosary, etc. It makes it more palpable if you can check it off at the end of the day….there’s just something about putting pen to paper when an accomplishment has been fulfilled! My hope is that this journal may help you stay focused on making this Lent fruitful for your own soul and the souls of those little people entrusted to your care!

~The Precious Blood and Mother Prayer Booklet, a little book full of beautiful prayers that I have used all through my married life…

Just leave a comment here, and your name will be added! It is always great to hear from you. I will announce the winner next Friday, February 25th!

It IS interesting, isn’t it, how, in the last decades, women are made to feel as if they are being “losers”, “nobodys” if they are dedicated to the home..They are not using their talents if they aren’t out working in the world.

Truly, I find that illogical. How many talents does it make to run a pleasant home, raise good children, have a healthy relationship with someone you rub shoulders with night and day? That, in itself, is a full-time job…not to mention if some are homeschooling, seeking out healthy alternatives, helping with their parish life, etc., etc.

No, it takes a brave, committed, responsible, hard-working adult to do what it takes to raise a Godly family in today’s society. -Finer Femininity, Painting by Alfred Rodriguez www.finerfem.com

Oh Queen, my Mother, I give you my whole self. And to show my devotion to you, I offer to you my eyes, my ears, my mouth, my heart, my whole being. Wherefore, as I am your own, keep me, defend me, as your property and possession. By holding your hand, you lead me to your Son, and I have the surest and easiest path to heaven.

If we could get people to work together without jealousy, it would help God’s work immensely. . . .

Are there any against whom I feel tempted to bear a grudge? Any of whose misfortunes I feel a little pleasure in hearing? Why am I willing to listen to conversation disparaging to someone else? Can I cleanse my soul of touchiness and jealousy? How can I become more and more unselfish, and efface myself?

Let me put aside considerations of my own satisfaction. . . . Ask Our Lord in Holy Communion to free you from touchiness and jealousy. -Fr. Daniel Considine, 1950’s

Home is the place where a man should appear at his best. He who is bearish at home and polite only abroad is no true gentleman; indeed, he who can not be considerate to those of his own household will never really be courteous to strangers. There is no better training for healthy and pleasant intercourse with the outer world than a bright and cheerful demeanor at home. It is in a man’s home that his real character is seen; as he appears there, so he is really elsewhere, however skillfully he may for the time conceal his true nature. -Fr. Lovasik, Painting by Alfredo Rodriguez

“The very presence of a woman who knows how to combine an enlightened piety with mildness, tact, and thoughtful sympathy, is a constant sermon; she speaks by her very silence, she instills convictions without argument, she attracts souls without wounding susceptibilities; and both in her own house and in her dealings with men and things, which must necessarily be often rude and painful, she plays the part of the soft cotton wool we put between precious but fragile vases to prevent their mutually injuring each other.” – Monseigneur Landriot, Archbishop of Rheims, 1872 -Loreto Publications

In a happy home, parents often hold firm against other allurements which tempt them to put the needs of their children in an inferior place. Such allurements include the desire for an overly active social life, the constant pursuit of pleasure in the form of commercial entertainment and the exclusive choice of hobbies (golf, cards, dancing clubs, etc.) from which children are excluded. -Fr. George Kelly, 1950’s

“The Rosary is a powerful weapon to put the demons to flight and to keep oneself from sin…If you desire peace in your hearts, in your homes, and in your country, assemble each evening to recite the Rosary. Let not even one day pass without saying it, no matter how burdened you may be with many cares and labors.” – Pope Pius XI

In happy families, father and mother occupy a position of equality, but there is no misunderstanding that he is the head. The importance of the mother is an accepted fact. She is the heart of the family–the custodian of love and warmth, the first comforter and educator of the children. In according her a just status, however, we must not weaken the father’s traditional position. -Fr. George Kelly, 1950’s

“If the wife makes the first effort at reconciliation, her humility will make it difficult for the husband to nurse his pride. Pride cannot face up to humility. It is shamed out of existence. – Fr. Leo Kinsella http://amzn.to/2iF5UJR (afflink)

Alice von Hildebrand – “St. Francis de Sales tells us that pious women should be well-dressed, but this doesn’t mean they must become slaves of fashion. There’s a way of dressing which is attractive, even elegant, but at the same time modest and simple. More importantly, attractiveness shouldn’t be reserved for guests and those you meet outside the home, while you ‘let yourself go’ when you’re at home. The moment a couple marries, they should begin to try always to be at their best for each other, physically (and above all) spiritually.” The Privilege of Being a Woman, http://amzn.to/2p2Oyrr (afflink)

“A mother holds her baby in her arms, looks up to God, and knows that she, by months of suffering and patience, has co-operated with Him in making and bringing into the world a little body housing a priceless soul. A father stands above his new-born son resting in the arms of his wife, and knows as he picks him up and weighs him tenderly that he has shared with God the Father His very fatherhood; for this mite of humanity, immortal in destiny, is truly his son. Mother and father together have co-operated with God in the astonishing creation of a human being.” -Fr. Daniel A. Lord, 1950’s

If you really want to be a penitent soul –both penitent and cheerful – you must above all stick to your daily periods of prayer, which should be fervent, generous and not cut short. And you must make sure that those minutes of prayer are not done only when you feel the need, but at fixed times, whenever it is possible. Don’t neglect these details. If you subject yourself to this daily worship of God, I can assure you that you will always be happy. -St. Josemaria

Make a statement with one of these lovely and graceful handcrafted apron….fully lined….made with care.

Aprons tell a beautiful story…..a story of love and sacrifice….of baking bread and mopping floors, of planting seeds and household chores. Sadly, many women have tossed the aprons aside and donned their business attire.

Wear your apron with joy….it is a symbol of Femininity….”Finer” Femininity! 🌺 💗 Available here.

The role of fatherhood — Catholic fatherhood — has been diminished in three ways. First, it has become smaller. Fewer things are defined as a father’s distinctive work. Secondly, fatherhood has been devalued. Third, and most important, fatherhood has been decultured – stripped of any authoritative social content or definition.

The question is, “What do fathers do?” The tragedy of our society is that it can’t answer the question and neither can most Catholics. Forward – thinking Integrity Magazine gives answers:

• Men, Mary, and Manliness
• The Family Has Lost Its Head
• Economics of the Catholic Family
• Afraid to Marry?
• Glorifying the Daily Grind
• The Heroism of the Big Family
• Bringing the Church into Work
• Forward to the Land.
• Holiness for Men
• The Confirmed Hero
• What Is a Grown-up?
• The Father in the Home
• A Man’s Work
• Our Work Can Help Us to Pray
• Money, Money, Money!
• The State, Our Common Good

Archbishop Sheen knew that no matter what our circumstances may be, the deadliest enemy we face is armed not with a gun but with temptation. In dangerous, uncertain times like ours, the Devil lures us quickly into lust, anger, hatred, and despair. Fulton Sheens Wartime Prayer Book will help keep you from these vices so that you, too, can put on the armor of God and triumph over evil in our day.

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