Finally…

…interview questions for Stephanie.

1. How has having a brother serving in the military affected your view of the War?


2. Have you managed to sort out this annoying and confusing message? I have my ideas about it.


3. What impact does music have on your spiritual life?


4. How has your relationship with your mother colored your relationship with the Blessed Mother?


5. What are your three favorite movies? Feel free to choose from three different genres, or to expand entirely. I certainly expanded/hedged myanswers!

It's probably too late to get this meme rolling again, but I've been SOOOOOOO slack about interviewing you, and I wanted to do it before Easter.

Für Deutschfähigen…

…die dem Abendmahlfeier zuhören möchten.

In other words, if you understand German, even a little, you can tune in to Radio Stephansdom, the radio service of the St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna. They will be broadcasting the Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper today at 1:00 PM Eastern Standard Time; Cardinal Schönborn is the Celebrant.

Finally, if your Real Player is already open, you can just hit File-Open and paste the link below into the dialog box:

http://193.171.50.209:8080/ramgen/encoder/wkstmk/stephan/stephan.rm

A happy and holy Easter Triduum to everyone out there in blogland! As these mysteries unfold before us, let us all remember one defenseless woman who is being slowly starved to death in a manner that would be subject to prosecution if done to an animal. If she does pass on this weekend, may the Lord Jesus receive her in his arms. Certainly in her suffering she shares in the redemptive mystery of his Passion.

Warum Gründonnerstag?

Why is Holy Thursday called "Green Thursday" in German-speaking countries? After all, we wear white in the Church that day, not Green.

Apparently because Jesus wept in the Garden that night, and the older word for weeping is Greinen; but the sound got changed to Grienen, hence the exchange with Grün. In earlier times, it was also the custom to wear green vestments for this day, but perhaps only in German-speaking countries.

According the link above, it was also common for the excommunicated to adorn themselves with green branches on Holy Thursday so that, if they had shown proper penitence, they could be admitted to the Lord's Table again.

All very interesting! Kind like the way Maundy Thursday is a mangling of the Latin word Mandatum. Until I learned that, I had always wondered why they thought it was Monday in the Episcopal Church . . .