On A Saturday Afternoon

innerchurch2

“The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love; It signifies Love, It produces love. The Eucharist is the consummation of the whole spiritual life.”

~ Saint Thomas Aquinas

innerchurch

“We become what we love and who we love shapes what we become. If we love things, we become a thing. If we love nothing, we become nothing. Imitation is not a literal mimicking of Christ, rather it means becoming the image of the beloved, an image disclosed through transformation. This means we are to become vessels of God´s compassionate love for others.”

~ St. Clare of Assisi

“Patience attains All that it strives for. He who has God Finds he lacks nothing: God alone suffices.”

“It is love alone that gives worth to all things”

~ St. Teresa of Avila

I don’t know that these quotes have anything to do with these pictures, but they’re certainly great quotes, and they happen to be on my desktop at the moment.

St. Jane is a beautiful little Church, and it’s surprisingly not as small as it looks. And it’s a very loving and friendly community.

Off into the weekend ~~~ Pax Christi.

Life at St. Jane's

St. Jane de Chantal Church

Yes, you guessed it: I’ve been walking around with my camera again.

And then going for that startling, vibrant look which is so ‘in’ in photos these days.

Oh, wait… you’ve not been seeing startling and vibrant photos which look quite like these?

Well. On a separate note, we really need to do something about these power lines in front of the Church, like run them underground.

That’s a joke by the way.

On the right side of the choir loft is a little belfry type room with windows; the first Pastor used to spend his nights there. I guess he more or less lived in the choir loft, which no doubt made for an interesting life. (I used to do that, but I was an organist.) The little room is about ten feet by eight feet, at the most.

And that’s no joke.

St. Jane's

The rain here has been amazing. The dry, dry earth from the past few years has been soaking it up, and everything is green as could be and beautiful. Lots of dramatic clouds, too.

One of my seminary friends (now Dr. Jerry Harrington,) took up the photo a day contest that I bailed on recently, which inspired me to get back to it. Why not give it a try… what could happen?

Px, out.

Exploring

the pearl river

As you recall, I’ve been transferred over to St. Jane de Chantal, in Abita Springs; which has been taking up a lot of my time. Which is a good thing, of course, seeing as I’m the new Pastor.

But yesterday I decided to drive around the Parish to see what territory we have… talk a bout a large land area! We include parts of the Bogue Chitto, and the Pearl River.

So, whilst driving over the Pearl I got out and snapped his shot from the bridge near Bogalusa (since it’s the only bridge that crosses the river anywhere near here.)

A few things about that:

  1. That bridge is very high, and no one stops on it to take pictures.
  2. The view down to the water is terrifying.
  3. The river had a very industrial and muddy look right below the bridge which made my stomach churn.
  4. The thing’s I’ll do for a photograph are starting to amaze me.
  5. I’d do it again in a flash.
  6. It’s been so rainy, it’s like living on Venus. And this captures some of that Louisiana cloudy, dreamlike, dark green, and watery landscape that we have so much of, and that I love so much.

On that note, the time has come to head to retire for the eve. Splash, out.

History is Amazing

Awhile ago I came across this very old picture of our Church here, as it looked almost 100 years ago in 1917. That’s during the time of WWI, the Russian Revolution, and all of the amazing things that happened in that year so long ago.

Here it is…

SMM 1917
St. Mary Magdalen Church, Metairie - 1917

Then just the other day I decided to check out the very same view as it looks now…

SMM Today
St. Mary Magdalen Church, Metairie - 2012

Fascinating I tell you.

Good Times

Because there’s nothing else to do with these random photos — it’s either delete them, have prints made so they can sit in a box on a shelf, or store them on yet another hard drive — I’ve decided to share them with you.

These type of demanding, cutting edge editorial decisions need to be made daily here, to keep this website spinning like a top.

These cool cats were the hit of the Bacchus route in our neck of the woods. I asked to take their picture, and one day that spread could make a great photo essay just watching the changing group dynamics

ballerina

Winning smile, wonderful costume.

Mardi Gras

It was a pretty relaxed morning…

Adele

My good friend Adele.

Flowers

The Japanese Magnolias were in bloom again… Such a strange flower, suitable to any occasion.

costumes

There’s a story here. I think these costumes are great for many reasons. I posted the pic on a Facebook page, and someone said “What’s so great about this?” Then I second guessed myself, un-posted it and curled into a ball and sucked my thumb for twelve hours. But I’m perfectly fine now, thank you.

The Creole Queen… It’s such a beautiful boat. Years ago a friend dragged me onto this boat to play the slot machines. I had a quarter on me, and walked out with $31 and was on top of the world.

mardi gras

We hit it off immediately, and nodded knowingly as we passed on the street.

St. Joseph

And this is St. Joseph’s Church, which I post pics of every now and again. It’s grand and beautiful, but it needs a huge pipe organ way back there. Still, it makes me glad to be Catholic whenever I walk in.

Well, it re-affirms my gladness… it… you know what I mean.

And that’s it for now… but exciting things are happening, and it’s all good.

The Rev. Kenneth Allen