A Carpe Diem Snapshot:
It has arrived! The sweetest, most melancholy month of September is here. Cobalt blue skies, deliciously warm sunshine, brisk breezes, foggy morning mist, towering sunflowers, fields of goldenrod, circling flocks of honking geese... In Michigan, this may arguably be the most beautiful month of them all. It is sweet, or perhaps bittersweet, because it marks the beginning of the last few weeks of the warm, sunny season and the advent of the far too long cold season ahead. It is also sweet because it is honey month, when the bees are at their busiest as they gather the last nectar of the year and the beekeepers extract their final harvest.
Autumn is a favorite theme for poets and philosophers, finding in it a beautiful expression of the changing seasons of a human life. I myself am at the end of the "summer season", looking forward to the Autumn of Life when I turn 50. Fortunately, this is actually my favorite season of the year, so let's hope that this season of life is just as vibrant.
Liturgical: Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time
Dearest brothers and sisters:
All good giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change. He willed to give us birth by the word of truth that we may be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is able to save your souls. Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
Bishop Barron's Sunday Sermon: The Goodness and Dangers of the Law
Fr. Plant's Homily: Lip Service Only
Sanctoral: Giles, France +710
Human: Overview of the month of September! September is National Happy Cat Month as well as National Honey Month.
The Writer's Almanac edition today.
Natural: Harvest Home
“Harvest Home” (September 1 to 30) is an old tradition that some U.S. regions keep alive (e.g., the Pennsylvania Dutch, some New England towns). In Britain and other parts of Europe, this marked the conclusion of the main harvest and a period of festivals for feasting and thanksgiving.
It was also a time to hold elections, pay workers, and collect rents. These festivals usually took place around the autumnal equinox. It was also a time for family members and workers to return to their towns for festivities.
Even today, notice that elections and Thanksgiving feasts are held in the fall! This is a continuation from long-ago traditions.
September’s birth flowers are the aster and the morning glory. The aster signifies powerful love, and the China aster expresses variety or afterthought in the language of flowers. The morning glory symbolizes affection. It can also mean coquetry, affectation, or bonds in the language of flowers
Italian: The Best Italian Language Resources
English: Internalize--to accept or absorb an idea, opinion, belief, etc. so that it becomes part of your character.
Quote: "Autumn"
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 –1926)
The leaves fall, fall as from far,
Like distant gardens withered in the heavens;
They fall with slow and lingering descent.
And in the nights the heavy Earth, too, falls
From out the stars into the Solitude.
Thus all doth fall. This hand of mine must fall
And lo! the other one:—it is the law.
But there is One who holds this falling
Infinitely softly in His hands.
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