America.

Well, this day had to come.

oodbye…. But this is it, folks! It’s Moving Day!

I live my life in an organizational crisis.
Just ask my husband: When’s the last time I could tell you, right off without a frantic search through purse and pockets and junk drawer, where my car keys are?
Just ask my co-workers: When’s the last time I filed notes from a meeting as soon as I got back to my desk?

For information enthusiasts like me, Moving Day brings risks: the risk that I’ll drop stuff or break stuff or forget stuff, the risk that I’ll lose my way on unfamiliar turf, the risk that my old friends won’t ever visit me in my new digs….

But you will, won’t you? Visit, that is. We’ve shared so many stories! I’ve laughed with you, I’ve learned from you, and I always thought it would go on forever.

If we’ve become friends here at Seasons of Grace, then come along with me to the NEW Seasons of Grace, in the Catholic Portal over at Patheos. If you love links, you’ll find me here. If you want to scribble my new address in your spiral bound tablet in purple ink, it’s http://www.patheos.com/blogs/kathyschiffer. There, now—write it down! If you don’t have paper, the palm of your hand will work just fine.

I’ll be hanging around over there with some writing greats like Elizabeth Scalia (The Anchoress), Deacon Greg Kandra, Mark Shea, Kathryn Jean Lopez, and bunches of other great Catholic voices. As they said in the old Girl

Scouts song, “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other’s gold.” You, my friends, are the gold. So come on over!

Oh, those crazy Occupy folks!

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strong>Just when you think there’s nothing new under the sun, Occupy Seattle protestor Babylonia Aivaz, a Duke University graduate, married an abandoned warehouse at 10^th and Union Street in Seattle.

Yes: I said “married.” The bride, radiant in a white wedding gown, posed beside a bulldozer as fellow occupiers swayed to the strains of Bill Withers’ 1972 hit “Lean On Me” strummed by a ukelele.

The wedding, Aivaz’ friends report, was a lesbian wedding because the warehouse, like Aivaz, is “female.”

The 107-year-old building had been occupied by 200 Occupy Seattle protestors, who sought to reclaim it as a community center with communal art displays, or possibly free child care.

Aivaz wrote about her bulky spouse on a Facebook event page created especially for the wedding, complete with photos:

“The moment we entered the warehouse we became a true community. We became self-motivated. We worked co-operatively. We explored 36,000 square feet like children, giggling and dreaming at the possibility of all that space. We played with conveyer belts, riding up and down. The kind you always want to sit on in the airport luggage dispensers. We strung up lights…. We removed pounds and pounds of unnecessary building materials…. We dreamed.”

The dream was short-lived, however. The building is slated to be torn down to make room for a new apartment complex; and demolition has already begun.

I read once that when a neurosurgeon touches a spot

ith a probe, he elicits memories. All kinds of memories: a moment in childhood, a school day, a family vacation from years past. Sights, sounds, tastes, smells, feelings. Pain and pleasure, fear and fury and fun. Whatever is stored on that particular neural tract, on the slender, myelin-wrapped pathway, is revealed by the surgeon’s gentle touch.

It’s a sobering thought. That means that everything we have thought and said and done—little kindnesses and base betrayals, virtues and sins—is still there somewhere. We think we’ve gotten over the hurt of a high school rejection, we’ve quit smoking, we’ve left behind our childish habits; but those things are part of the mix, kneaded into the dough of our experience and contributing to the flavor of our very being.

We are who we are today—but just as surely, we are who we have always been.

The story was brought to mind recently by news reports of Maggie Meier, a young hoops star from Blue Valley Northwest High School in Overland Park, Kansas. Maggie became ill in 2008 with mycoplasma meningoencephalitis, a rare, intense form of meningitis. She was in a coma for nearly three months; and during that time, she couldn’t speak or write or recognize family or friends.

What Maggie could do, though, was shoot basketballs. The movements required to drive a basketball into the hoop were “so ingrained as one of Maggie’s basic instincts,” explained her neurologist, that her body remembered how to do it before she could walk or even stand.

The point I’m trying to make here is that for Maggie, the repetition of shooting hoops—the feel of the basketball in her hands, the swoop of her arms toward the basket—had been deeply imprinted in her brain.

You are what you do.

Lent is a good time to reflect on this—to realize that on the Day of Judgment, we will stand before God and, like the surgeon touching a probe to our myelin strands, He will expose all that we have done, all that we have been. Words spoken in haste, lies told to protect our reputations, traffic laws violated when no one’s looking, schemes to move up the social ladder: Like Adam and Eve, we will be aware of our nakedness and will blush in shame.

How can we evade this fate? We can’t.

But starting today, starting right now, we can begin to paper over the weaknesses, the embarrassing trivia of our lives, with memories that will stand up to Christ’s scrutiny.

We can give freely of ourselves to friends and strangers. We can smile at small children and at the homeless man on the street. We can say “I love you” whenever possible. We can murmur prayers, sweet ejaculations of praise, as we go about our day. In time, we will find those prayers on our lips as we open our eyes to the morning sun; and it is then that they will be imprinted on our neural pathways, etched in myelin.

And when the day comes—when our life on this earth is over and when at last we rest in the arms of the Father—we will have a great blanket of love to cover over the offenses and shortcomings. We will still blush, as any imperfect thing blushes in the presence of great purity and light. But we will hold up our gift of love, grateful to have something to offer—glad to have, in our lives, magnified the meager talents we were given.

Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.

–Philippians 4:8

Once upon a tim

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e, Zombies were fictional beasts—corpses brought back to life by mystical means, such as witchcraft, prowling the earth in books and on film, striking terror into the hearts of men. Drawn from West African voodoo or Haitian Creole, the zombie was a great plot device in terror films such as George Romero’s 1968 cult classic, Night of the Living Dead.

That was then. Now—at least, beginning on May 14—zombies are big business on the university campus. That’s because students in Michigan State University’s School of Social Work will be able to take a two-credit course on “Surviving the Coming Zombie Apocalypse—Catastrophes and Human Behavior.”

The seven-week course will explore how human behavior and human nature change after catastrophic incidences, both historical and hypothetical. There will be traditional coursework, online forums and (Note this!) a catastrophic event simulation. During the simulation, students will work together as members of “survivor teams.” They will hypothecate about (Now watch: Here’s the “sociological” stuff) how catastrophic events may affect individuals, families, societies, civilizations and the Earth itself.

Glenn Stutzky, creator of the course, explains that as the course continues, students will also study catastrophes like the Black Death and meteor strikes. There will be extensive use of social media to promote the course, including Facebook, Twitter and a dedicated YouTube channel.

“Surviving the Coming Zombie Apocalypse” is part of a new venture called Summer Online Electives Initiative in Social Work. It and other courses in the program are intended to appeal to a “broader segment” of students, including students from other universities and new students from the general public.

(Does anyone hear: “Easy money! Free college credit!”?)

We lost a mighty tree in our front yard last year.

was an ash, and yes, it was already dead—defeated by Michigan’s pernicious emerald ash borer. When it toppled during a windstorm, it brought down the electrical wires, snapping a wooden pole, pulling the meter off our house and taking out the cable and internet in one fell swoop. The weight of the massive trunk wrestled the roots from the damp earth, and 80 feet of bark and bole and branch sprawled across the lawn.

Looking at the snarl of boughs and branches, at the mess of roots at its base, I couldn’t help but wonder what God had been thinking when He’d assigned such a small rootball the task of holding up this lofty log.

* * * * *

In contrast to the ash’s scant support, I remembered the ample root system of the banyan tree.

I first saw a plastic and steel “banyan” at Walt Disney World, where the Swiss Family Robinson made their home in its welcoming branches. Years later, on a stroll through historic Coral Gables, Florida, I got to see the real thing. Some 1,200 non-native banyan trees stretch across Coral Gables’ narrow streets, where chameleons (and sometimes children) hide amid their massive trunks and aerial prop roots, and colorful birds rest in the panoply of waxy green leaves.

The banyan, or ficus benghalensis —which is the national tree of India and is considered by some to represent eternal life—stretches the imagination with its complex root system and its spreading canopy. This colossal relative of America’s native mulberry can reach 100 feet tall and more than 600 feet wide. In India, where birds spread the banyan by carrying its seeds across fields and forests, the townspeople often gather under its broad branches. It is said that Alexander the Great once camped with 7,000 of his men under a great banyan tree, which provided shade and shelter for all.

But beyond its amazing breadth, the banyan is remarkable for the many gifts it gives.

■Its fruit, the fig, is an edible treat.

■The bark and wood are used for making paper.

■The roots are used to make rope.

■The sap is used as a soothing ointment which treats skin inflammations and bruising, and as a conditioner which softens hair and skin.

■The bark and seeds serve as a tonic, and also help patients suffering with diabetes.

■The roots and sap can be used to treat skin disorders, dysentery, and toothaches.

■Industrial products gleaned from the banyan are shellac, glue, a polish for copper and brass, and even rubber.

■The large, waxy leaves are fed to livestock.

■Lastly, the slender twigs of the banyan are sold as toothpicks in India and Pakistan, to promote dental health.

* * * * *

LORD, let me be like the banyan tree. Let my roots grow deep, so that my faith will remain steady and safe when the winds blow. Let me give profusely of myself, sharing with all according to their need. Let my home be always a place of shelter and safety, and let me bask in the sunlight of your grace.

Amen.

Tomorrow is primary election day in Michigan, and th

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e stakes are high. At issue is nothing less than the future of our country.

“What!” you say, “Politicians are all the same! Looking out for themselves, raising taxes for the little guy, while padding their own nests! Standing there, a figurehead president, stymied by a deadbeat Congress, effecting whatever little change he can….”

Not this time. This time, at stake is America As We Have Known It. America as the Founding Fathers envisioned it.

If you read my blog, you know that over here, we’re not even considering reelecting Mr. Obama. The whole scandal of urging the approval of killing babies born in Chicago in a failed abortion attempt is beyond thinkable; add to that the usurpation of individual rights, the disdain for people of faith, the sincere apologies to Afghanistan while ignoring the Catholics’ Constitutional rights, the sixteen vacations—well, no, he’s not my guy.

There remain four candidates, each of whom deserves consideration. If a candidate’s attitude toward the Constitutional right to life is paramount (and it should be), all four Republicans are still in the running.

But Ron Paul… Well, his non-interventionist foreign policy is just too extreme to be believable.

And Newt Gingrich… There’s a guy with plenty of Washington experience; but there’s too much ego there, too. There’s too much philandering in his past (Oh, I know, he’s changed….). Too much Freddie Mac. Too much moon base.

Mitt Romney? Well, I’m just not sure. His recent speech before the Detroit Economic Club (“I love Michigan! The trees are just the right height!” “And cars! I love cars!”) demonstrates his eagerness to woo a crowd, but stops short of demonstrating believability. Despite his protestations to the contrary, his RomneyCare apparently did, in fact, require Catholic hospitals in Massachusetts to do exactly what the Obama Administration is requiring now: Provide insurance covering abortion, sterilization and abortifacient drugs, all of which are morally repugnant to the Catholic Church.

Then there’s Rick Santorum. Known for his social conservatism, Santorum has a 100% pro-life voting record. His vision for America is to restore America’s greatness by fighting for faith, family and freedom. He doesn’t get tongue-tied when asked a question, because he always tells the truth—not what he thinks the pollsters want to hear.

Rick Santorum is committed to celebrating the family by reviving our economy and creating jobs in Americaagain with a smarter and simpler tax code. Santorum will roll back job-killing regulations, force the federal government to shrink and live within its means by passing a Balanced Budget Amendment and reinvigorate our domestic manufacturing and energy potential.

Here in Michigan, I’ll be heading to the polls in the morning to cast my vote for Rick Santorum. I hope to be able to do that once again in November, at that time voting for Santorum as President of theUnited States.

L

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ooking for a way to deepen your Lenten experience this year? If you’re in southeastern Michigan, consider attending a performance of The Living Stations of the Cross at Detroit’s Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament. Read the story:

The music minister opened the door of the confessional, and it was stuffed top to bottom with garbage bags. The smell and dust was horrible. As I moved one of the bags, a small, wooden suitcase fell out from the top of the bags and landed on my foot. I sat down on the floor and opened it.

What I saw next will be with me until the day I die. Sitting in that dusty old suitcase, for over fifteen years, was a bloody crown of thorns and a purple sash. I started sobbing. God is so good!

In addition to the crown of thorns, Kelly Garver Nieto found over 60 costumes that day, piled in an unused confessional in an eastside Detroit area church. That was the beginning of the Living Stations of the Cross.

Nieto, a former Miss Michigan, Miss America Runner-Up, and Miss America Talent Winner, has performed as the opening act for Garth Brooks, Willie Nelson, and Charlie Daniels. She is a former atheist who embraced the Catholic faith after exploring the occult and the New Age.

Kelly explains that Living Stations is a “vision” that God put on her heart while praying the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday in 2000. She felt a great spiritual pain during the Sixth Station. When Kelly looked at the altar, she saw Living Stations and heard God’s voice say, “This is why you are here.” She knew she had been called for this work, but didn’t know how

she could ever make it happen.

God heard her prayers; and with the help of many, Kelly created and produced The Living Stations of the Cross in her local parish for over ten years. To bring the story to the masses, Kelly brought Living Stations to Detroit’s Blessed Sacrament Cathedral in 2011. Over 11,000 people experienced this epic theatrical event last year; and in 2012, attendance is expected to reach over 22,000.

Living Stations has been described as the “Broadway version of the Passion of Christ” because of its professionalism, original musical score and epic theatrical production! Don’t miss this powerful prayer on the altar of the historic Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Detroit, Michigan during Lent 2012. Living Stations is based on the Stations of the Cross celebrated by Pope John Paul II in 1991 on Good Friday. These Stations reflect deeply on the Scriptural accounts of Jesus Christ’s Passion to prepare Christians, both Catholic and Protestant alike, for Holy Week.

Living Stations is an experiential musical journey through Christ’s Passion and an interactive prayer engaging all of the senses. It is a spiritual wake-up call; a visual realization of what Christ went through on the Cross. The music envelops and propels the participants through the story and each feels truly present at the foot of the cross, not just as an observer, but as an active participant in salvation history. School children and seniors enjoy the convenience of the matinee show times, while families, church groups and individuals attend the weekend performances. Catholic couples also find Living Stations to be an ideal way for them to grow in love for each other and for Christ. But not all of the participants are Catholic, or even religious. Some attend simply in search of a cultural experience.

Performances run from March 16 through April 1. For ticket information, visit their website.

Even Better! Experience the Living Stations and Help a Pro-Life Organization

Some of you may know that I serve on the board of Mother and Unborn Baby Care. Since 1984, Mother and Unborn Baby Care has been dedicated to stopping abortions by helping women continue their pregnancies in a normal, healthy manner through peer counseling which is pro-life, persuasive, informative and honest, but sensitive to the emotional and material needs of the mother.

Plan to attend the Living Stations on Saturday, March 17, at 5:00 p.m.—and 15% of your ticket price will help this pro-life organization to continue their important work. Reserve your tickets through the MAUBC button on the website to reserve your tickets for the March 17 performance. I look forward to seeing you there!

Today, I had

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the pleasure of meeting Cardinal Dolan at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and I can say that the Empire State Building is missing out! Cardinal Dolan is an exceptional individual all New Yorkers can be proud of. I am thrilled that the PANYNJ has stopped up to honor him by lighting One WTC in red!

Congressman Mike Grimm was a hometown hero before this current accomplishment: a graduate (Magna Cum Laude) from New York School of Law, a U.S. Marine who fought in the Persian Gulf, an FBI Special Agent, then an Undercover Special Agent investigating corruption in politics and beyond, and finally an entrepreneur.