NCRegister Blog: The Benefits of Living in a Small House with a Family

It has taken me a long time to get to the point of being comfortable with intentionally living in a smaller house with our potentially large family. There is that point after having a baby, when I start thinking about if/when the next one might come along, and if/when he or she does come along, what we are going to do about bedrooms. I spend hours planning and rearrange mentally where we are going to put which person. Then I start to wonder, how much space does each of my children really need? At what point would it make sense to get a bigger house? Can we just get by with the space we have?

Often in the midst of my anxiety about house size, I have had to be reminded that these material things are passing and what really matters is that we grow in holiness. My own experience of growing up in a smaller house in a family of six, realizing how others have lived in the past, talking to friends who grew up in bigger families, and considering creative, economical uses of home space has all contributed to my husband and my decision to choose purposefully to live in our smaller house with our four children and potentially with any future ones.

Read the rest at the National Catholic Register...

NCRegister Blog: Let's Move Forward to Embrace Tradition and Beauty

As one raised going to the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite who now attends the Extraordinary Form every Sunday, I wanted to respond to Pope Francis’s recent statement about the liturgical reform that happened after Vatican II. He seemed to be addressing Traditionalist Catholics who would like to reverse the changes that occurred to the liturgies of the Roman Rite after Vatican II in a speech in Italy this week to participants in their National Liturgical Week. He said,

"After this magisterium, after this long journey, we can affirm with certainty and magisterial authority that the liturgical reform is irreversible.” (from the Catholic News Service)

But those who have come to love the EF (Traditional Latin Mass) after being raised going to the Ordinary Form of the Latin Rite (Novus Ordo) know that we cannot—we have come too far. The reforms of the council have become part of the very life and heartbeat of the Church. Liturgy is vibrant, living worship of God—it has always been changing and always will until the end of the ages...

Read the rest at the National Catholic Register...