Thank you, Mother!

My last post was a shout out to my biological mother. This post is about EWTN's Mother Angelica.

Although we do not have cable, we are fortunate enough to have EWTN. I will sometimes catch a bit of a rerun of her show, and I am always left laughing and feeling uplifted.

I often retreat to the living room after cleaning up the dinner dishes. I like to have a cup of coffee (to have energy for the bedtime routine and hopefully a little post-bedtime energy too!) while watching the evening news. The kids are winding down at this time of evening and often play around me or climb in and out of my lap (with a cup of hot coffee, this is much more stressful than relaxing!).

My oldest daughter is the only one who pays any attention to the news. Lately, she has been asking me in a quiet voice if the people on the screen have died. My answer is often yes. This is new for me...discussing serious matters with a child who is just beginning to realize that there is a world beyond her family. I try to answer her innocent questions truthfully and simply without dismissing her fears. Her world is going to become bigger when she steps on that bus to go to kindergarten in a few weeks...ready or not!

The other children tend to only tune in during the weather and commercials with animals.

On a recent evening, I got sick of the news and turned to EWTN. There was Mother Angelica. For whatever reason (maybe because of the presence of someone holy!?), all 5 children instantly stopped playing and looked at the screen (even the infant!).

Their questions made me laugh. After a moment of silence:

Joseph (age 4): "Is that Noah's wife?"

Gianna (age 5 1/2): "Did she used to be a bad guy?"

Cecilia (age 3): "Is her hat for the Olympics?" (we had just been talking about why the swimmers wear swim caps for races).

So, thank you Mother Angelica. Mostly for sharing your faith and for your memorable pearls of wisdom...but also for the additional entertainment (of course, their questions were dead serious...but I was too busy laughing to answer!). The laughter refreshed me more than the cold coffee.