There are many dates that we all celebrate in different ways (if we can remember them!). Some are easy, like New Year’s Day, because most people share them, but then we remember and ask: “What about Chinese New Year?”
It can get complicated. Most of us need a notebook to remember all the birthdays that we should be celebrating, especially if we have a large family or lots of expectant friends, but for most of us there are likely a few dates that make it into a special category of automatic remembrance. One of those dates for me is today; it’s my parents’ wedding anniversary.
We joke about the fact that although they probably knew in high school that they had found “the one” with whom they would spend the rest of their lives, it took them until the age of 31 years to formalize the commitment (They were born 20 days apart). It’s true that there were complications: the Great Depression where, as young people they needed to help support their families, the Second World War when they wrote enough letters to fill a trunk the size of a post office, etc. We have so many stories and images of the nearly 50 years of their marriage! My siblings and I often speak of how blessed we are to be considered among “the lucky ones.”
At a time when so many people suffer from a lack of love in their lives, those of us who have been blessed by loving relationships of any description ought to be mindful of those who have not been similarly blessed. Is there someone you know who might enjoy a visit, a call or even a hug today? Why wait?
Happy Anything Day to all!
Today our Church remembers Simon and Jude, both apostles who are only known by their names or titles. Jude (not to be confused with Judas Iscariot) is mentioned in the gospel with the others chosen by Jesus as his close followers. Simon, known as the Zealot, was one of a sect of extreme Jewish nationalists who believed in the Old Testament concept that God alone was their king so that they were not to be subject to the Romans. Simon was converted by Jesus to a new and gentler way of living, it seems, but that is all we know of him. I didn’t know of him at all in my youth. As far as I knew October 28th was the feast of St. Jude alone, and I knew that much because it was – is – my sister’s birthday. By custom (way back then) she might have been named Judith but circumstances and the fact that we already had a close cousin with that name resulted in the fact that she is Paula.
I have lots of people whose birthdays I remember and I celebrate them at least in my mind if not with a card, a call, or (these days) with an e-mail. Today Eastern and Western Catholic Churches celebrate the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary – a birthday I always mark with a smile and/or a prayer of gratitude for her role in our life. This morning I wondered who came up with this date as probably no birth certificate exists to prove her arrival and most of what we know from that time is less than an exact science. What I found was that the first written mention of Mary’s birth was in the apocryphal text called the Protoevangelium of James, a document probably in its final written form in the early second century. It speaks of her parents, Joachim – a wealthy member of one of the tribes of Israel – and Anna, but is not clear about where or when she was born. Some accounts speak of Nazareth as her birthplace and some say it was a house near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem. The date for commemoration of her birth was logically set, but not until the sixth century, as nine months after the celebratory date of the Immaculate Conception.
