Happy Feast of St. Rita – our village’s patroness. The
church is hosting a fiesta this weekend with the traditional na' taotao tumano to follow. We went to a high school graduation party last weekend and the food was never ending, so I assume there will be plenty to eat here. Our dive instructor, who is not a small guy, said he lived for a month without buying food when he was single. I asked if that was because he was eating coconuts and mangoes. No, he said, he just kept going to rosaries and fiestas. He'd show up near the end and bring home balutin, or leftovers.
Here's a description of the fiesta from the local paper:
OUR VILLAGE GOALS
- Revive the tradition and celebration of our patron Saint, “St. Rita” that has been part of our village identity since the original people of Sumay Bay were relocated there during World War II.
- Invite local and foreign people to partake in a weekend of music, games, food, and good Guam vibes for all ages.
- Remind and inspire our community the importance of keeping these village traditions alive.
FEATURES AND ENTERTAINMENT
- Fiesta Sponsored by Host (Fiesta Food/Drinks)
- Classic/Custom Car & bike show
- Live Entertainment with Guam’s top Music and Dance Performers
- Sponsor & Raffle give-aways
- Live Cultural Performances
- Saturday Night Movies in the Out-Field
- Cock Fight displays
We’ve been reading a
selection from Saints for Young Readers for Every Day every morning, and from it the kids were startled to
hear that Rita prayed for the death of her sons to prevent them from avenging
their father’s murder and becoming murderers themselves. She didn’t want them
to go to Hell, I told the kids. But a part of me wonders why she didn’t pray
for their conversion, instead of their death. A troubling story. Is this a
story of extreme love – that a mother prays for her children to die rather than
suffer eternal hell? Makes me think of Toni Morrison’s Beloved, in which the
baby is killed to avoid suffering slavery. But isn’t this the thinking behind
abortion? “I’d rather my child avoid suffering…” One of the things I enjoyed in
Simcha’s Fisher’s chapter in Style, Sex and Substance was the reminder that we
have to let our children go and make their own mistakes, if they must. It was a
timely read, as we are beginning to see our teens asserting their independence.
So while the older boys are pulling away, the nine year old
and I have had a string of bonding moments. First there was the trip to my
grandmother’s funeral, and now we are reading The Mother-Daughter Book Club
books by Heather Vogel Frederick. My daughter picked one up at the library and read it before I had a chance. While they
aren’t great literature, and there’s more talk of boyfriends and fashion than I
normally would care for, they have a tone of refreshing innocence. And we
are actually talking about books!
Our library only has the last two, so the girls in the book
club are in 8th grade and 9th grade. Some of them are
interested in boys and fashion, but beyond some mistletoe kisses, there’s
nothing heavy. And I love all the quotes from the books that begin the chapters
and are interspersed in the narrative, showing how clearly books and life
intersect.
In the first one we read, Pies and Prejudice, (the titles initially
turned me off checking them out myself) the girls read Pride and Prejudice, and
one of the girls moves to England. My daughter was tickled that I picked it up
to read after her and enjoyed it. And I’m tickled to think she’s beginning to
discover an interest in things Anglo. She even has mentioned starting a mother-daughter
book club.
The second book we read is actually the last in the series.
In Home for the Holidays, the girls read the Betsy Tacy books. Like Emma, the
bookworm in the club, I haven’t ever read these books. They weren’t at my
library when I was growing up. But now my curiosity is piqued, and I’m going to
hunt some down. Some of the details mentioned make me wonder if I’ll really
like them – Betsy may be too boy and party crazy. But I love quotes like this: “Betsy returned
to her chair, took off her coat and hat, opened her book and forgot the world
again.” And from the descriptions in this book, I wonder if Betsy’s experience
of her world is similar to my grandmother’s growing up years, with her social
clubs and parties.
Since finishing these books, while waiting for me to decide
whether to buy the next or for the library to get more, my daughter has moved
on to The Penderwicks, which is thrilling because I loved it so much. More
to share!
5 comments:
It's been a long time ago, but I remember hearing of some Evangelical parents who prayed for their unborn babies similarly, that if God in his foreknowledge knew that their child was going to be rebellious, He would make the mother miscarry. I think you are right that this is faulty thinking. Is rebellion ever irredeemable, as long as God's mercy is as high as the heaven is above the earth? And as for Rita's sons, if they were already contemplating vengeance, they had already sinned plenty, according to what Christ said about sins of the heart.
I notice some saints in our Orthodox tradition as well whose stories are disturbing for one reason or another. It must be that their lives, though not perfect or perfectly wise, demonstrate something in their zeal and love for God, and are meant to draw us not to follow the humans' example to the letter, but to seek God ourselves and love Him with our whole heart.
I read the Betsy-Tacy books over and over when I was growing up, and as a teen traveled down to southern Minnesota to see the town in which they were set. My daughter was not interested at all, but I think you will love them!
We just finished reading the first of the Betsy Tacy books and my girls loved it. But we're going to read the first few books and then stop when the characters get too beyond where my girls are in age. I've never read them before either, so I'm curious to get to the later books.
The St Rita bit made me think of St Louis' letter to his son in which he says, "And you ought especially to be resolved not to commit mortal sin, no matter what may happen and should permit all your limbs to be hewn off, and suffer every manner of torment, rather than fall knowingly into mortal sin." I suppose it exhibits the same intense repulsion toward mortal sin, though of course a slightly different cast to it.
I was curious to find out more about St Rita, so I googled around. One site said that fearing that her sons would lose their souls, Rita tried to persuade them from retaliating, but to no avail. Her sons died of dysentery a year later, which pious Catholic beliefs claims was God's act to rather take them by natural death than risk living an immoral life punishable by Hell. I wonder if the idea of her praying for them to die wasn't a sort of clumsy misreading backward from the pious belief about the nature of their death or if there really is evidence that she actively prayed for their death. The same article said that a condition was set before she was allowed to enter the convent that she had to resolve the feud between her family and the other family, which she did.
The Catholic Encyclopedia also says: "she appealed to Heaven to prevent such a crime on their part, and they were taken away by death, reconciled to God." So maybe she wasn't so much praying for death as that they not be allowed to commit murder and her prayer was apparently answered with their deaths. That seems a much more satisfactory reading.
Melanie - I looked online, too, and nowhere was the wording the same as the book for kids: "Rita prayed that they would die rather than commit murder. Within several months, both boys became seriously ill. Rita nursed them lovingly. During their illness, she persuaded them to forgive, and to ask God's forgiveness for themselves. They did, and both died peacefully." Since she nursed them, she didn't really want them to die with sin on their souls. The wording is just unfortunate.
I've been able to find Betsy-Tacy and Tib, but not the first Betsy Tacy at the library. The problem with series books is that I'm tempted to either buy them all or none. And in this case, it's a lot of books.
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