Happy St. Patrick's Day!

St. Patrick’s Prayer:

Christ be with me,

Christ within me,

Christ behind me,

Christ before me,

Christ beside me,

Christ to win me,

Christ to comfort me and restore me,

Christ beneath me,

Christ above me,

Christ in the hearts of all that love me,

Christ in the mouth of friend and stranger.

There seems to be more than a few versions of this prayer, at least from what I’ve seen in my travels, but all seem to contain the above lines as the central, unifying idea.  Which I kinda like.  I used to think that this type of absolute immersion in Christ is something only for the saints, but the older I get (and particularly the more I deal with children and co-workers) the more I think it is an attainable goal for the majority of us regular joes here on planet earth, a.k.a. the Church Militant. 

Anyway – this holiday used to be an excuse for me to get drunk.  Still is for vast swaths of the population.  Nowadays, I’m calmer and wiser (at least, I hope), so I intend to have a little cupcake celebration with the little ones followed up with some good reading (C.S. Lewis, baseball, and the history of the Catholic Church).

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, everyone!