Being the Feast of All Saints today, I thought I would take a few minutes and tell you all a few ways in which we honor the Saints on a monthly basis in our home.
Each morning, before we begin school, the children get to place a magnet on their calendar
During dinner each night my dear husband reads a short story of the Saint of the day from Saints for Young Readers for Every Day of the Year. He had one of them (Vol 2 – covering the second half of the year) from his childhood, and after much searching I was able to find the orignal edition of Volume 1. I was SO excited! Pauline Books has reprinted these books (with a few revisions and new pictures), so here is a link to Saints for Young Readers Vol 1
On special feasts days, we try to do something “extra” to foster a greater love of the saints in our children. Cay Gibson has published a beautiful guide called Catholic Mosaic, which I mention often, and absolutely LOVE!! I am working on building up our personal library with the suggestions in her book.
I also LOVE A Year with God by Catholic Heritage Curricula. It is rather expensive, but I have gotten so many wonderful ideas out of it. A couple other books I draw from are: Cooking with the Saints
Women of Faith and Family has a great page that has info on the current liturgical year that is also very helpful!
I also find so many wonderful ideas from a few of my favorite blogs including: By Sun and Candlelight, Sweetness and Light (she just did a wonderful post on this very topic!) and Real Learning. These women never cease to amaze me!
Here is a bit of what the Church teaches on the Saints as quoted from “The Catechism of the Catholic Church”:
957. Communion with the saints. It is not merely by the title of example that we cherish the memory of those in heaven; we seek, rather, that by this devotion to the exercise of fraternal charity the union of the whole Church in the Spirit may be strengthened. Exactly as Christian communion among our fellow pilgrims brings us closer to Christ, so our communion with the saints joins us to Christ, from whom as from its head issues all grace, and the life of the People of God itself.
We worship Christ as God’s Son; we love the martyrs as the Lord’s disciples and imitators, and rightly so because of their matchless devotion towards their King and Master. May we also be their companions and fellow disciples! (Martyrium Polycarpi, 17:Apostolic Father II/3,396)
The Catechism also says:
956. The intercession of the Saints. Being more closely united to Christ, those who dwell in Heaven fix the whole Church more firmly in holiness…they do not cease to intercede to the Father for us, as they proffer the merits which they acquired on earth through the one mediator between God and men, Christ Jesus….so by their fraternal concern is our weakness greatly helped.
So, this is a bit of what we do over here to learn about, and hopefully imitate, the Saints of the Church… I would love to here what you do! Feel free to leave any ideas or links to your own posts in the comment section!
Wonderful post Jessica, and I’m ordering the sticker album, I absolutely LOVE your calendar idea!! We have that magnetic calendar but I have never found it very useful as we’ve always kept a separate and more elaborate Saints calendar, but I am in love with combining the two, my dc will love it!! I’m linking you on my resources page so others can share in your beautiful post!! Thank you so much and many blessings to your beautiful family 🙂
Awesome! I am getting those stickers too!
Did you see however how much they were asking for those saint books on Amazon? One as over $200! I wish I could get them, but yikes!!
Oh! I found them here: http://www.pauline.org/store/moreinfo/stseveryday.html
for $15.95! Much better, lol.
Thank you Meredith and Amy! You are both so sweet!
Thanks Amy for pointing out Amazon’s prices… I didn’t notice they were sold out. I updated the link to Adoremus Books. The Saints books are available there, and you can get free shipping with a $25 oder. Often they send out coupon codes as well, so it is nice to be on their mailing list!
Have fun making your Saint calendars!!
Jessica, I absolutely love those stickers, thanks for sharing the idea. We already do something like that, with a printed calendar and saints for the day penciled in, but this will be SO much nicer!
Jessica, You are so sweet to mention my book. I’m thrilled it has been such a blessing to you. 🙂
Hi again Jessica. I was just about to follow through with ordering the stickers, and noticed that Angelus Press is affiliated with the SSPX. Now I’m not sure whether to order or not, as I do not wish to financially support a schismatic group. Just a heads up to you as well …
Thanks Heather. I will update the link in my post to Aquinas and More. They have a “good faith guarantee” that lets you know everything you purchase is in line with official Church teaching. The actual publisher, http://www.tridentine.com, gives a listing of all the places that sell their Sticker Album as well.
Also, I probably should have mentioned it in my post, but I didn’t think about it till now. The stickers are based on the old liturgical calendar (before the reforms of 1955-1962). Pope Benedict XVI has recently made it clear that the “Tridentice Rite” including its calendar, is and has always been approved by the Church and is referred to as the “extraordinary calendar of the Roman Catholic Rite”.
I use a great daily planner that is put out by Tan that lists the New (NO-1970), Traditional (Tridentine-1962) and Historical Feast days. This really helps me keep track of the different feast days, you could even move the magnets/stickers around to the new feast days if you so wish. Hope this helps!
Oh, all of that is really good to know. I was wondering about those very things you mentioned.
FYI – I tried the new link, and it points to the good faith guarantee, not the sticker album.
I just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE your blog – so many wonderful ideas and inspiration. God bless!
Oh my! I sure do have a lot of problems with my links! Hopefully one of these days I will get the hang of it. 🙂 Thank you! It should be fixed now…
Also, thank you for your sweet comment about my blog! I am glad that you find ideas you are able to use! I know that I myself find so much inspiration and motivation from so many blogs myself, including yours!
I have a technical question. How did you attach the stickers to the magnets? What kind of magnets did you use and have you found them peeling up at all? I was trying to replace some of my daughter’s unused Melissa and Doug magnets with some Catholic ones using stickers but they eventually peeled up. Any advice would be appreciated!
Hi Matilda! I buy the magnets in the craft section, the ones that are sticky on one side, and are business card sized — you can fit about 6 stickers on each sheet. I used quite a few magnets, but bought them in increments each month as I needed them. I don’t have a package here to look at, so I can’t give you a brand. Sorry…
I have never had a problem with them peeling. Maybe it is because I am sticking the stickers onto an already sticky surface. 🙂
Hope this helps!
How have the stickers held up? Such a good idea! How do you think of these things? I'd love to do this for our family. – Genevieve (P.S. also looking for those books on eBay — I want the old version!)
They have held up really well! Though I do have a backup sticker collection just in case… And I totally recommend trying to find the old version of the books if you can! 🙂
Jessica…. it seems that the saints here from hte older missal don't line up well– I"m not talking just about dates being different but it seems like they have many different saints than are used in the novus ordo nad vice versa… any suggestions for someone who would like to stick with only the novus ordo saints of the day?