Funny Guy Friday... Live by the... stats?

     Funny Guy Friday is written by my husband Mark. So, I married a funny guy.,,
     My boys have been altar servers for a few years now. Typically they serve at the same mass but occasionally, one of them will fill in for someone and only one of them will be up on the altar. Several Sundays ago was one of those days. Matthew was a "fill in" at the 8 o'clock Mass.
      I love the 8 o'clock Mass! It is the Reader's Digest version of our weekly obligation. It is quick and typically sans music... except for the concluding hymn. Not that I don't like music, I do. But occasionally, you just want to spend a little quiet time with the Lord, get your blessings, and hit the road.
      Cheryl goes to adoration every Sunday at 8:00 a.m., so it was just Matthew and I. After the Mass, while walking to our car, Matthew was singing the concluding hymn.
      Live by the Cross... Dumdee dum dum dum.  He sang the first line but faked the rest because he didn't know those words. Then it occurred to me that he didn't know any of the words. I gently advised him.
     It's not Live by the Cross, knucklehead. It's Lift High the Cross... Dumdee dum dum dum. I didn't know the rest of the words either, but we both knew Dumdee dum dum dum. But at least I knew it was Lift High and not Live By!
     Matthew insisted he was correct, but he has a habit of singing the wrong words to songs. I correct him all the time because I don't want him embarrassing me when he sings out loud in public. He knows it drives me crazy, so he does it on purpose. At least I think he does it on purpose.
     Anyway, Matthew was pretty insistent so I began to doubt myself  This is not typical because I am right most of the time. Okay, sometimes I am wrong but I am never in doubt. I have heard that song sung hundreds of times. So many times, in fact, that I should probably know the second line.
     There was only one way to settle this... we would ask Cheryl. She knows all the churchy songs. She immediately advised that it is...
     Lift High the Cross
     The Love of Christ proclaimed
     'Til all the world adore
     His sacred name 
     She knew the part in dispute, but she clearly did not know the Dumdee dum dum dum part.
     Vindicated! I won. I beat Matthew. I cherish these victories.
     Why? Because it is becoming clearer and clearer that these victories will occur less and less as he gets older, bigger, stronger and smarter.
   
     It is the middle of summer and Matthew has completed his junior year and is in the middle of summer ball. Matthew played for his high school's varsity team and all things considered, had a pretty good season. The team did well and Matthew had some good games along the way. I believe among his several hits, he finished with five triples and seven doubles. And after a slow start to the summer season, he just went crazy down at a tournament in Florida.
     I love watching him play and breaking the games down afterward.    
     Sometimes, during some of our discussions, he asks me about my high school team, and if we could compete with his current high school team.
     Compete... We would beat you guys! I declare with great confidence.
     No way, he says with equal confidence.
     Yes way... In fact, we could have beaten last year's team. That was a bold statement because that team was pretty good.
     Those guys won three championships... you are crazy!
     Crazy?  Well not to burst your bubble but we were State champs, 22-0, selected as the number one team in the nation by Easton Bat Company in 1981.
      I was told this back in the day by one of our coaches and have repeated this line on numerous occasions but I have never actually fact checked it... I am pretty sure it is true.  Even if it is not true, it has been repeated so many times that I am officially announcing its truthfulness... Sort of like a political talking point.
     Matthew was not convinced by our lofty rankings and demanded that we go position by position and see how you old guys stack up against us.
     I can do that... but you can't! Because between the two of us, I am the only one that saw both teams play and I can assure you that we match up against you pretty well.  I am not sure what you think... we were not all fifty-year-old-out-of-shape men when we were in high school. We were all in shape back then, just like you guys.
     That last line is not necessarily true.
     That is one thing I can say with certainty: These kids work out all year long and they are big. Even the little guys are big. When I was in high school I was 5'9" and 135 lbs. Now that may surprise you if you ever see my high school program listing me at 5'9" and 160 lbs. Matthew is 5'8 3/4" (although he denies it... just a smudge shorter than I... another win for me) and a solid 170 lbs. We had some big kids, but overall, today's kids are much bigger and in much better shape.
     When we ran through the lineups and got to second base, he immediately declares that You were not better than Dave Harding!
     Dave Harding may... and I say may because I like the kid... have been our right fielder! Ultimately, I get to the one thing I love to repeat... We had four guys who were All Met in my senior year... Best players at their position in the entire Washington Metropolitan Area.
     Ah, the All Met card. I love to repeat this because as you might have guessed... I was one of the four.  That's right boys and girls, All Met Second Baseman in the Washington Post and the Washington Star! Lest you think that my brothers let that go to my head, one reminded me that all the real good infielders were playing shortstop!
     As an aside... Unfortunately, I peaked in high school but I don't ever tell that part of the story. And I think the Harding kid was just named a Freshman All American at Princeton!
     Forget what you just read and move on to read more about my high school greatness.
     Every now and then, Matthew will ask if I were better than he.
     Yes, I was! I was as good a fielder as anyone and hit well over .400. I led our team in walks and stolen bases. Yes, I am sorry to say, I was better.
     Now, truth be told... I did hit "well over" .400 (to many .405 is well over .400) but I was kind of a Punch and Judy hitter.  I dinked and dunked my way around. I also had a great relationship with our lovely scorekeeper who may have hooked me up on a hit or two along the way!
     Shout out to Tracy Hooper!
     Matthew, with his five triples during his Junior season had five more triples than I had my senior year and with his seven doubles, had six more doubles than I had my entire senior year.  And truth be told, my one double was a single that I took second on an overthrow... Thanks again Tracy!
     The true story is that every hit my senior year was a single. That would be kind of embarrassing if not for the fact that they were some of the hardest hit singles you ever saw.
     The other thing that Matthew does not understand is that his teams face much better pitching than we did. They see guys throwing in the mid to upper 80's and some in the 90's almost every game. We saw two all year! I am sad to say that I hit well under .400 (.250 is, in fact, well under .400) against those guys.
     Alright, full disclosure... We would have been competitive against Matthew's high school teams but we were not better. And I will agree that if we played in their league, we would not have gone undefeated. But I still like to cling to this delusion.  Why you ask?... Because it is getting to be all that I have. Matthew is bigger than I was, faster than I was, and stronger than I was. I just don't want him to know this. For instance, when he tells me he squatted 265 pounds, I respond that when I was in high school I squatted 270. He may be on to me though because he mumbles... You never squatted in you entire life!
     This is true, but if I had, it would have been 270... maybe even 275!
     I have to stop. This is bad. I have to face reality.
     Okay, I will say it once and for all. Matthew is bigger, Matthew is stronger and Matthew is faster.
     There I did it!
     Wow, that is liberating. I feel pretty good about myself... I think that I have turned the corner.
     Of course,  it easy to feel good about myself because I can say with complete confidence that I was a much better fielder than he will ever be.

Funny Guy Friday... Religion and politics, if you will...

    Funny Guy Friday is written by my husband Mark.  So... I married a funny guy....
    This may be my most controversial FGF ever.
    Full of politics and religion.
    Before I get started, I will acknowledge that some of my opinions might surprise some of you and that this may not be as funny as some of my previous posts. I will further acknowledge that my opinions could be totally wrong... but I don't think so.
     This all started about six weeks ago when Cheryl and the boys went to a Saturday evening Mass.  I stayed home and was not present when it was announced that the pastor from our church for more than eighteen years was getting transferred to a different church. Now, it is not uncommon for priests to get transferred; in fact, it happens every three years or so. But our Father Parry seemed to have dodged this bullet for several cycles.  I always surmised that he had some compromising photos of the Pope or something.
     Apparently, he does not!
     Noah was first to deliver the news to me. I think Noah was able to hold the big news for about three seconds before he blurted it out. I am sad to say that my initial reactions were not shock or surprise, but instead I immediately began to wonder why the archdiocese did not consult with me as head of the Sacred Heart Labor Day Festival before making such a drastic move. Second, why, at this time, would the archdiocese elect to move him... after such a long period of time.
     Father Parry is a good man who did a beautiful job of leading our traditional Catholic parish... he did a beautiful job... I mean it, he did a beautiful, wonderful job of leading our congregation.
      Now I repeated that three times for a reason. Father Parry has this teeny tiny... itty bitty... you wouldn't notice unless you listened real hard... habit of repeating things. Three times. He does... he says things three times if he feels it is important... three times, right out there, he will say it... four if he deems it real important.  Yep, you would hardly notice!
      As far as Father Parry goes, a few things are universal. First, as I repeated three times, he is a good man. Second, he has done a wonderful job of guiding this parish spiritually and financially. I have some inside knowledge of the church finances because as you might have heard, I was the head of the Labor Day Festival that generated tons of cash... well, maybe not tons of cash but a pretty hefty sum... maybe not hefty but nothing to sneeze at... I suppose you could sneeze but we turned a profit... we never lost money... Hey, it was really more of a fun-raiser than a fundraiser.
      Back to Father Parry... Third, and most important, he loved this church.  And by this church I mean both Sacred Heart with its history and its beauty and the Catholic church with her history and her beauty.
      So... back to my original thoughts of why. Well, at this time, there is a contemplated sale of property that surrounds Sacred Heart to developers. My understanding is that it spans more than a hundred acres and involves tens of millions of dollars. The Jesuits own the property, and I had heard Father Parry mention in the past that he would have liked to have had Sacred Heart purchase a portion of that property to expand Sacred Heart's cemetery and to eventually build among other things, a small section of housing for the elderly.  The Jesuits weren't selling.
       For those of you that don't know, Jesuits are an order or congregation of men of the Catholic Church. They engage in ministry, education, intellectual research and cultural pursuits. Unfortunately, they engage in ministry, education, intellectual research and cultural pursuits. I refer to Jesuits as the section of the Catholic Church that doesn't really like the Catholic Church. In my opinion, you rarely
find a conservative Catholic who loves the history and the teachings of the Catholic faith, who defines himself as a Jesuit.
     Pope Francis is a Jesuit.
     I digress.
     I could digress further... but I won't.
     As I mentioned, the Jesuits are now interested in selling this property to developers. It is a bit of a controversy in the city of Bowie because of infrastructure, water rights, and the typical argument of developing and when is enough enough. I am the first to admit that I am not an expert on local
politics, but I read... and I listen... and suffice to say, it is a fairly big debate in the city of Bowie. Preserving the land is probably more of an issue for the people who belong to Sacred Heart Church. And it is probably even more of an issue to Father Parry because of his love for the history and sacred nature of this holy land.
     So my theory is that the archdiocese has no problem with the sale of the land by the Jesuits. My theory is the archdiocese wants no interference with the sale of the land by the Jesuits,  My theory is that the archdiocese is willing to help resolve problems that may hinder the sale of the land by the Jesuits.
      Thus the transfer of the potential fly in the ointment.
      Like I said, I could be wrong but I don't think so. If nothing else, the optics are bad, but I guess the archdiocese does not really care about the optics. There is money to be made and if the local parish suffers, so be it. If a dedicated priest gets inconvenienced (and I think it is more than an inconvenience), so be it.
      Oh by the way, this past week, our associate pastor announced that he too is being transferred. He is actually becoming the administrator of a different church in Bowie, so it appears to be a promotion for him. Not so much a good thing for Sacred Heart, as we are now losing our parish priest from the last eighteen years and our associate pastor.
     Hmmmm, does that make any sense to transfer them both at the same time? Wouldn't you want the associate pastor to stick around for a few months to help with the new priest coming into town. Or if you are going to transfer the associate pastor to a new parish, wouldn't you keep the old priest around to continue his good work and provide consistency to the parish, if you will?
     I have heard we are not getting a new associate pastor so wouldn't that mean keep the old guy who knows how everything works and who in the parish can do what to help out if, in fact, we are not getting a new associate priest? It all could just be one big coincidence but remember the optics of it all!
      Cheryl often says that God has the master plan and Father Parry is going to a church that is also affiliated with an elementary school. It is Cheryl's theory that God knows that the children of that school need Father Parry more than Sacred Heart does. She could be right. I certainly am not going to argue with God... or Cheryl... but I think there could be more to it. I would also point out that Cheryl's point of view and my theory are not mutually exclusive.
     This is not the first time that I have struggled with decisions made by the leadership of the Catholic Church. I often joke with Cheryl that we are one more bad decision away from becoming Lutheran. If you know Cheryl, you know that she hates that joke. If you know me, you know that I like to repeat that joke. But Cheryl always reminds me that no man or men run the Catholic Church and there is going to be a day of reckoning.  Then she mutters something about Vatican II and going to a Latin mass... "The way the Mass was intended."
      So we are not leaving the Catholic Church nor are we leaving Sacred Heart. We love everything about that place and I am sure we will like our new priest. I don't know his name but I lovingly refer to him as Father Everyoneisgoingtohateme.
      This, of course is not true. The people of Sacred Heart Parish will open up their hearts and their homes to the new priest. After all, we have, for the past eighteen years, heard God's message loud and clear. We will accept God's plan because He knows better than we.  God is all knowing and all powerful and he has a plan that may not fit in with Man's plan. Who are we to substitute what we think should happen versus what God knows is going to happen.
     We have heard it once, twice, three times. And if it was really important, we got it a fourth time!
     God bless you Father Parry! We will see you at your farewell Mass this Sunday at noon, but we will miss seeing you every week.