Veiling Sacred Art During Passiontide in Lent

The Fifth Sunday of Lent traditionally marks the beginning of Passiontide, the week before Holy Week, and Holy Week itself. Inspired by the Gospel for the Fifth Sunday of Lent, the Church veils sacred images in the sanctuary and chapel the evening before Passion Sunday.

We hear, “Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.” (John 8:59) In an effort to unite all of our senses to this mystery, where Christ hid himself from those who would stone Him when it was not yet His time, we “hide” our sacred images and statues with purple cloth. The statues remain covered until the Gloria on Holy Saturday, and the unveiling signifies Christ’s revealing His Risen nature and victory to all!

When we work to integrate the liturgy into our own homes, we help keep our spirits recollected to God and united to the mysteries of the season. To keep in step with what is happening on the altar, many Catholic families bring the veiling of sacred pieces into the home. This is such a beautifully edifying tradition to bring into Lent, and can be very simple! You do not have to veil every single image, crucifix, icon, and statue in your whole house. One of the objectives in veiling in the home is to bring to the forefront the stark change as we draw closer to Holy Week and Good Friday, so even veiling a handful of the most prominent pieces is sufficient. If you’re wondering where to start, veil the pieces in the room that you pray in as a family most often!

Below, veiled statues during Passiontide at the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles monastery in Gower, MO, and Clear Creek Abbey in Hulbert, OK.

“At Midnight in Bethlehem” Advent Activity DIY

“…at midnight in Bethlehem in the piercing cold..”

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Several years ago we incorporated a new Advent activity for the children, inspired by the Saint Andrew Christmas Novena. If that’s new to you, this is the prayer:

Hail and blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born Of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold. In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God, to hear my prayer and grant my desires through the merits of Our Savior Jesus Christ, and of His blessed Mother. Amen

It is recited 15 times a day from the Feast of Saint Andrew till Christmas Eve, and is truly such a wonderful meditation for Advent.

Wanting to make tangible the concept of the striking line, “at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold,” as well as the concept that the whole earth and all its creatures were forever changed by this singular moment when the Light of the World came to us, our Night Sky activity came into being!

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With a simple, homemade ombre dark blue to lighter blue painted canvas and a roll of gold stickers, this simple and inexpensive activity creates a visual impact as the darkness and emptiness of the canvas is filled with gold stars over the course of Advent.

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During Advent, we are waiting and preparing for the Nativity of Christ, and sometimes called a “little lent,” Advent is marked by an intensification of prayer, fasting, and penance in order to make room in our hearts for His Coming. When my children, unprompted, say extra prayers, take on a little fast for the day, or do a good work, they may add a star to the canvas. At the end of Advent, the canvas filled with stars is a beautiful reminder of the little works they did to prepare their hearts for Christmas morning, little gifts to offer our Infant King!

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The DIY is so simple, you don’t need a tutorial - but sometimes a list of supplies can help!

  • Canvas to fill your intended space (you can use cardboard or poster board too!)

  • Shades of blue acrylic paint (you can go much darker than I did, I wanted to match the tones of the icons it gets placed under!)

  • 1-2inch foam paint brush

  • gold sticker roll (from Amazon) or wooden star stickers (we found these this year at Hobby Lobby!)

A Benedictine Retreat for Catholic Families - How to Visit Clear Creek Abbey!

Recently I shared through Instagram (@littlelightfamily) that we spent a few days at Clear Creek Abbey near Tulsa, Oklahoma, making a family spiritual retreat at the end of May. I had an overwhelming number of questions - it’s like all of us are eager to find Our Lord and take a step out of this current world atmosphere, or something. ;-) Here I hope to give a picture of how our family retreat worked this time, and share how you can make your own family retreat happen with the Benedictine monks at Clear Creek!

We have been visiting Clear Creek for two years; I have been on my own once, my husband and oldest son have been a number of times, and we’ve gone now twice as a family. This visit was our first to stay in the Clear Creek guesthouse as a family (men and boys are able to stay with the monks, women are able to stay at the women’s house, and there is another family-owned property families can utilize if the guesthouse is booked). After my husband and I each had gone for the first time, we decided we would aim to do a family retreat to Clear Creek at least once a year, with a few specific goals in mind. First, we simply love it. Being able to attend the Conventual Low Mass (where each monk priest is offering his daily Mass down in the Crypt after Matins and Lauds, at the same time), to pray the Divine Office along with the monks, to attend daily High Mass, and to fully immerse yourself in Benedictine spirituality are reasons enough to make the retreat. We also have chosen this as our “vacation” style; we aren’t big campers, world travelers, sight-seers, etc. All of that is lovely, we just want to be at Clear Creek more than any of those options! So for our go-to family vacation aside from traveling to visit extended family, the monastery is it. Our aim is also to make use of the peace and atmosphere of the monastery to focus on specific spiritual goals each visit, having that immersion you would get from a structured retreat, just more of a DIY and laid back version centered around attending Liturgy. That’s our “why” for the family retreat - now for your “what” and “how!”

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When you visit Clear Creek Abbey as a family, you simply email through the contact link on the website to discuss availability and make plans with Father Guestmaster. You can peek at the details for visiting, the monk’s schedule, etc right on their website. There are plenty of beds for a family, or two or three families, to stay together at the guesthouse! The monastery requests a $60 per night donation per family.

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The priority, I think, for those visiting, is the Liturgy. It’s helpful to know what you can attend and what to expect when planning for children of different ages to go along! First, men and boys who are staying with the monks have the ability to attend non-public Divine Office (Matins, Lauds, and Compline), eat with the monks for meals, and work alongside them during their work periods. This is different for whole families attending, naturally! The public Liturgy begins with the Conventual Low Mass, the masses offered simultaneously, after Matins and Lauds. The Masses often begin around 6:45, but it changes daily based on when the morning Office ends; the week you attend, there will be a schedule published. In our experience, the monks are faster at Matins and Lauds than they predict, so aiming to be in the Crypt by 6:30am is ideal! Public access Divine Office begins with 8:00am Prime, followed by 10:00am Terce and High Mass. Sext, None, and Vespers follow, later in the afternoon (12:50pm , 2:35pm, 6:00pm). Lay men, women, and children are welcome to attend any of the above Public Divine Office, Low Mass, and High Mass! For our family, I am the early riser - we plan for me to attend the Low Mass alone, stay to read and pray, attend Prime, and return to the cabin to help finish getting the children ready for Terce and High Mass. As a family we attend Terce and High Mass, and then my husband chooses which of the other Liturgy hours he’ll attend. Another opportunity the visiting family has is to work alongside the monks and caretakers, during the work hours. For men and boys, letting Father Guestmaster know on which days of your visit you’d like to help the monks with will allow him to plan for work time during your stay. For women and girls, the caretaker of the Bethany House can be called or emailed; she is able to plan for work opportunities for just mom, mother and girls, the whole family, etc. While at Clear Creek, you are unplugged by choice and by necessity - the service is weak, accessible in a few places; and the request of the monks is that you do not use media/technology while staying in the guesthouse. This allows for a lovely, peaceful break from our worldiness…space for playing outside, walks, reading, puzzles…all of those things that too often get rushed right off our lists when we are home.

Above, Clear Creek after morning Low Masses and Prime, with the dew and mist starting to clear. Click through for a peek at the Abbey!

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One of the most common requests for learning more about visiting as a family was centered around understanding what the guesthouse and overall experience there would be like. Benedictine hospitality means that you are about as covered as you could possibly be while staying there - you just need to bring your own food to prepare meals in the kitchen! We meal plan by the week anyway, so we simply brought those things along for four days of meals plus travel snacks. If you click through the above gallery of images, you can get a pretty good idea of what the guesthouse will be like - perfectly welcoming, charming, and cozy. Upon leaving, you will do the housekeeping to prepare the guesthouse for the next family. We brought lots of books, play dough, a puzzle, and a few games, as well as our food, clothing, and toiletries - things you’d bring on a week away anywhere!

Our children absolutely LOVE Clear Creek. The Liturgy is the highlight, and the rest is simply lovely as well. Our spring 2020 trip included lots visits to the livestock, walks and creek trips, puzzles and fort building, lots of devotional candle lighting, a little bit of gardening at The Bethany House. And as you can imagine, we are counting down the months till we go back. ;-)

If there’s a question I missed, feel free to reach out through the contact button or on Instagram @littlelightfamily!

Welcoming John Henry Fulton!

Introducing our newest little love, John Henry Fulton Dodge! He was born on December 21st at home, and is our biggest newborn yet, at nine pounds even! We have been soaking up his newness and sweetness over the last eight weeks. Our transition from family of six to seven has been wonderful, overall! With the holidays and a break from teaching, Daniel was able to be home quite a bit in those first few weeks. I also experienced the quickest, smoothest recovery of all of my births - I had no idea recovery could be so good! The children have also transitioned incredibly well, keeping each other busy and helping mama out at every opportunity. Every mother of larger families will tell you “it gets easier as they get older” and when you are in the middle of number three or four with all the children under the age of five, that concept is just hard to understand! This is the first new baby where I truly feel that - older children helping to prepare breakfast, helping with toddler needs while mama is nursing, even just being able to play independently during the high needs first few months! Deo gratias! Sweet John Henry is definitely a higher needs baby, so we are dealing with a good deal of fussiness and sleepless nights. Again, being baby number five, we know these tougher months are a short season, and we are all working together in the midst of them. John Henry has begun to smile and interact more with us, and we just can’t wait to see his little temperament begin to show itself!

I’ve got a flood of photographs to share, because we just adore Aly Renee Photography and all of the precious images she has captured of our family over the years!

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All Saints Day Costumes 2018

All Saints 2019 is around the corner - so clearly a post that is 11 months late is perfect timing? We’ll go with that, friends! I have shared through Instagram that while I love many types of making and crafting, sewing is NOT a love of mine. It’s…well. I sew about once a year, about a week before All Saints Day, and even then, minimally. As in, if I can hot glue it instead, I will for sure do that. So this post is our costumes from last year, as simple as I could muster!

First, a share on how we currently celebrate Halloween and All Saints Day, simply because many people ask! We have no objections to celebrating Halloween with costumes and trick or treating (excluding secular music events/festivals, morally questionable or objectionable costumes, etc). We happily celebrated both for years, with a purchased or homemade costume for Halloween, then a saint costume for November 1st. Our last year of doing both was only two years ago! Our current parish has a outstanding event, however, on All Saint’s Eve - on Halloween night. The younger children dress up, while the older teens put on the event, dressed up and handing out candy from the decorated classrooms around the parish office building. The families bring candy to be passed out, but each piece of candy has a name of a deceased loved one on it; as the children collect candy, they collect names of the dead to pray for (referential to the old “a’souling,” which is where we get trick or treating from!). When the children are at home eating their loot, they are to pray at least a Hail Mary for that person by name before they eat the piece of candy! We know our children well enough to know that rather than trick or treat door to door, they want to be with their friends; they are excited for this event about six months in advance. For simplicity’s sake, opting for this one big event rather than a number of events just brings the busy season that begins in October more peace. We also are invited to visit the Discalced Carmelite sisters that our parish has a history with; one morning near All Saints Day, the sisters “guess the saint” from behind the grille! We got to do that for the first time last year, and it was so much fun! I am also not a fan of spending twice as much on costumes, and if my homeschool budget for that month is going to go toward secular Halloween costumes or saint costumes, it’s not even really a question! So yes, we ‘only’ do All Saints costumes and we don’t celebrate Halloween - that often has the stigma of the ‘holier than thou’ judgment. If you want to judge that, consider me lazy and cheap, instead. ;-)

Without further pomp: our inexpensive, simple, Amazon-bought if possible, All Saints costumes from 2018!

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Miss Violet Lisieux, wearing her name saint’s hand-me-down costume that her sister wore the year before! I had to re-make the black head covering for Saint Therese, but all of the sewing followed my “straight lines only” rule. Did I mention I hate my sewing machine?!

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Charlotte Rose, I hope you remember how awesome it was that four of your other little girlfriends were also Amazon-bought Saint Kateri’s, and not that you actually wanted to be Saint Lucia dos Santos and your mother persuaded you into a non-thrifting, non-sewing, order online saint instead. At least I let you wear my jewelry? We were in the middle of a read aloud chapter book about Saint Kateri, too, I’ll give myself a pass. ;-)

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Anyone else have wonderful male saint suggestions, but your sons just pick the ones with the best weapons? Having just finished a read aloud chapter book about Saint Martin de Porres, I was so excited for Charlie to be Saint Martin and for Pax to be a mouse. NOPE, I’ll take a Saint Martin, but the one with a sword. Another Amazon friendly costume, plus half a cape made with fleece, hot glue, and ribbon!

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Little brother was Saint Martin’s beggar. He kept the cape on for about eight seconds!

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This year, we have a Saint Longinus (spear, obviously), a Saint Brigid of Ireland, a Saint Scholastica, and a Saint Benedict planned. As you can imagine, Amazon will be providing as much as possible, and we will DIY a Saint Brigid accessory and a tiny 2T monk habit (why don’t you make that, Amazon?).

Are you prepped (or at least planned!) for All Saints costumes this year?

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Tie Breaker Number Two - Baby Dodge Number Five!

We have a new baby on the way, due at the end of December!

At the beginning of end of August, we found out whether our second tie-breaker is a boy or girl, and had a mini family Gender Reveal during our Sunday family brunch.

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Baby Dodge number five is a BOY! Everyone was excited to see blue inside their reveal cupcakes, but they were, truth be told, more excited to play with their giant balloons.

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We’ve never done a “reveal” party before! Our first three were surprises, we did not know gender until birth. With baby four, we found out, but told the children very simply, showing them the ultrasounds. With this new one, we have all been so excited to find out and begin calling the baby by it’s name, so my family humored me in putting together a mini party to let the kids find out together as a celebration! It was a blast, and brought us a lot of joy - I’d love to continue to do little reveals for our children if God sends more baby Dodges our way.

Sharing our simple family reveal:

  • pink and blue mylar balloons, the #5 was hidden in a trash bag from the siblings until after the cupcakes!

  • inexpensive gender reveal decor (team boy/girl glasses, colored paper straws, confetti)

  • cupcakes (we love Simple Mills grain-free box mixes, especially the chocolate!) with blue icing hidden in the middle

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We’ve also shared baby’s name! He is John Henry Fulton, named primarily for Saint John the Evangelist, who’s feast day is also baby John Henry’s estimated due date! He’ll also be able to claim Saint John Henry Newman as a name saint, and will have the special connection of knowing Saint John Henry was canonized when he was 29 weeks old! My husband, Daniel, chose Fulton as the middle name, being drawn recently to the wonderful Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen. Baby John Henry’s pregnancy is flying by, and around Christmas, God willing, we will welcome him to our wild crew! If you think of us, please offer a Hail Mary for baby’s birth and our transition from family of six to family of seven. Deo Gratias!

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