Sabbath sparrow

Well, we had cold rain and blustery wind for a couple of days, then snow again last night and this morning. It didn't amount to much, but the deck was white again after the rain had washed the other snow away. By early afternoon, the snow was gone from the deck, but there were occasional snow showers.

Tom went to Madison for a meeting this morning and I went into the Dells to pick up a birthday gift and card for Rich. (Happy 58th!) We went over there for cake and coffee this afternoon, just Rich, Peggy the Foster clan and us. That was a fun neighborly time.

On the way back from the Dells I saw two separate hawks with small wiggly things clutched in their claws, but there was on-coming traffic and I couldn't take my eyes off the road long enough to see if it was a mouse or what.

We have a lot of squirrel activity at the feeder right now. In fact, Rich and Peggy have stopped putting out seeds on some of theirs because of all the squirrels. This afternoon I saw a Chipping Sparrow -- another first for our records, although hardly rare. It is easy to distinguish because of the rust-colored cap and the dark eye line.

Snowgo the Possum was back recently, after a long absence. He looked so banged up when he was here in the winter that I had assumed he did not survive all the snow storms, but I guess he did. Still has a noticeable bald spot on his back, but he is not scabby anymore. Assuming it is the same Snowgo, of course.

A bit of Carmelite-related news: I heard from Fr. Anthony Morello this past week. Fr. Mary Philip Wurth, who was the other priest with us all those years at Mt. Carmel Center in Dallas, died peacefully on Easter Sunday morning. He was 82 and had been in nursing homes for the past several years. I also heard from Fr. Vinko Mamic, the Croatian Carmelite whose doctoral dissertation I have been editing. I hadn't heard from him in so long that I thought maybe he had given up, but he has just been busy teaching in Rome. So he is sending me another 50 pages to look at soon. His English is actually quite good, but it has to be good enough for publication and that takes a lot of small corrections on every page. It is about parables, and I find it interesting to read, too.

I also heard from one of the Barrington nuns that three Carmelite monasteries of nuns are in the process of closing their houses and moving into smaller places, usually moving in with other sisters who have lots of empty space. The lack of vocations is beginning to catch up seriously. Msgr. Oerhlein, the pastor here in the Dells, recently said that the diocese of Madison (that's the central part of the state -- there are about eight areas in the state that are dioceses) is down to about 45 priests from a one-time high of over 200. The Catholic population keeps growing, but with fewer priests around, that means some places are going without daily Mass and having fewer Sunday Masses. They are building a bigger church here so that they can get more people at each service. There are about 2000 members of the parish, and the church seats 400 at a time. Because of the tourists in the summer, though, there may be several thousand people at Sunday Mass. They already have Masses in the church and some in the school gym at the same time. A newspaper article quoted one of the parishioners who said that he has lived here forever but hardly recognizes anyone at Mass. The locals get swallowed up in the crowds of tourists. It reminds me a bit of the complaints of the locals who came to the Shrine at Holy Hill as their parish. On a given weekend, 80% of the people at Mass were visitors. Good for the Shrine, but it makes it hard to build a sense of parish community. There they solved it by having a separate service in another building on the property for parishioners who wanted it.

Well, this is what happens when I don't write for a couple of days. Sorry for such a long ramble.