At dinner the other day I was laughing about the mop situation at our parish. The padre I was eating with suggested I write about the mops, and all the other things that move around the parish. Pots and pans, wringer buckets, mops, hammers and screwdrivers. They all walk around (and sometimes out the door,…
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We have recently lost a beloved parishioner and neighbor, Marie Martincic. Please keep her husband and family in your prayers. Arrangements are as follows: There will be a visitation here at St. Paul beginning at 9:00 on November 19th. We will have a funeral Mass for Marie at 10:00. After the funeral Mass everyone is…
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St. Paul Parish was one of the first parishes in the Archdiocese of Chicago to undergo the Renew My Church process. It involved a merger of St. Adalbert, St. Ann and St. Paul parishes that resulted in the closure of two churches and the unification of the parishioner base at the St. Paul campus. The…
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“Their ships were tossed to the heavens and plunged again to the depths; the sailors cringed in terror. They reeled and staggered like drunkards and were at their wits’ end. “LORD, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress. He calmed the storm to a whisper and stilled the waves.”(Ps…
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This morning the plan was to go back sailing with a few more kids, in addition to the ones who went yesterday. The wind was right, enough to push the boat around but not enough to kick up waves. I called Ernesto early and let him know the plan. He told me he’d let the…
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What a blast. A perfect day for sailing. Not too much wind, clear skies, and no big waves on the lake. You don’t want someone’s first experience on boat to be throwing up over the side! We arrived at the boat at a little before 10 this morning, and did the usual drill. There were…
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What about Children? It must have been 20 years ago when this subject first caught my interest. I’ve been writing and talking about fertility for years! I first looked at this question when my dad pointed out to me that the world wasn’t overpopulated. He was a science guy, so when he said that I…
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I had a conversation a couple of weeks ago with some Polish immigrants. We were talking about parishes and I am sure they don’t know the history of national parishes here in Chicago. Maybe you’ve never heard of a “national parish” either. I’m old enough to remember some of this history, and I thought I’d…
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What? I guess thinking about thinking is philosophy. Or metacognition. Talk about a big word! In her re-issued book on thinking (Mindset), Carol S. Dweck writes about a couple of different kinds of mental structures we might have in our heads. She calls them “mindsets,” and in the book she describes what she calls a…
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