Gene reminded me from his Facebook page that we have started a new liturgical calendar.  I feel as if I have just concluded the previous year limping and begging to be placed on injured reserve… How ’bout you?

This is as good a day as any to refocus in our our own spiritual health.  My home office, in an evangelization effort, is encouraging me to Embrace the Divine Within.  Seems like a starting point.

I seek to be more consistent in my spiritual life, finding a home church and being a less vagabondish stranger in the back pew. I seek to be more poetic and inspirational in my verbal communication and e-mails and less utilitarian. I seek God time and me time.

Advent and December bring the gift of family time, conference time with friends, desk time, beach time, and, frankly, breathing time. May God grant me (and all of us) the grace enough to take full advantage of it!

Pixar Rocks!

Their movies capture a sense of adventure like so few other – - yes, always entertaining the kids, but the critics’s food-sensatory flashback in Ratatouille and the wordless expressions of love in Wall-E. . . well, that is the adult stuff that goes beyond a PG rating.

So, needless to say, I’m excited about the next movie which takes an unlikely hero in an unlikely setting (rat in a kitchen, robot waste compactor on a deserted planet) and makes a story.

Turkey stuffing has taken on great implications within our family traditions. 

A few years back, youngest daughter Meghan was up for the holiday and we were ad-libbing turkey stuffing – the bread crumbs (of course) but some celery, onion, raisins, dried cranberries, sausage – - all chopped up and thrown in.  Added some soup, and (just being silly) chopped up a chocolate chip cookie (just one) and added it as the "secret ingredient."

Not sure if either Jeb Bartlett or the operators of the Butterball hot-line would approve.  The older kids do not and just roll their eyes at Meghan and me.

Happy Thanksgiving to all catholicYMblog readers and friends!

 It’s an all local version of the news today, as I have been spending a majority of my post-BYCC times establishing a BYCC follow-up page.

Over 740 attended the Baltimore Youth Catholic Conference on November 21-23 in Ocean City, MD.  The conference theme “Search and Rescue” was developed from the reading of the Feast of Christ the King.

The Catholic Review reported on the conference

> Rescue mission: Youths called to evangelize here

> New Orleans youth leader challenges young people here

> Hydes teens take faith-filled jump in Ocean City here

There are five moments from the conference that were captured on video: (go to the BYCC page to watch)

> Saturday evening beach prayer

> Singing Lean on Me

> Ansel Augustine, part 1

> Ansel Augustine, part 2

> Archbishop Edwin O’Brien

Upcoming youth events that were previewed at the conference include:

> The Archdiocesan Youth and Young Adult Pilgrimage (see the Compass page)

> National Catholic Youth Conference http://www.nfcym.org/ncycpromo.htm

I’m back after the BYCC conference.   Hope to be posting video throughout the day (but didn’t shoot much as it was busy.)   Whew . . .   am very tired!

Meanwhile, Father Austin did blog while at the conference and had these wonderful three conference-related blog posts for you to review and update yourselves.

We are concluding the series of videos from the the National Symposium on Adolescent Catechesis.

This video played during the Closing Blessing and Commissioning session of the National Symposium on Adolescent Catechesis, November 5 – 8, 2008 in Baltimore, MD.

Learn more about the National Symposium at www.adolescentcatechesis.org

Throughout this week we will be running the videos from the the National Symposium on Adolescent Catechesis.

Here is the video video for Session 18 in which teens respond to the following specific questions: What gifts do young people bring to the Church?

Learn more about the National Symposium at www.adolescentcatechesis.org

And, so, we are off and, as a Baltimoron would say, we be down the ocean, hon!  About 740 will be gathering for the Baltimore Youth Catholic Conference in Ocean City, MD.

We’ll do our best to post a video or two over the weekend and definitely into next week.

I invite your prayers for safe travel, open hearts, and generous spirits.

Throughout this week we will be running the videos from the the National Symposium on Adolescent Catechesis.

Here is the video for Session 14 which was designed to lead us into our next steps for the future.

Learn more about the National Symposium at www.adolescentcatechesis.org

We are packing up for this weekend’s Baltimore Youth Catholic Conference (BYCC) which is this weekend with Ansel Augustine down in Ocean City, MD.

And, yes, we will be posting up some videos after the weekend… (I know, this web site has become very video-centric lately… What the heck ~ you’re getting less spelling and grammatical errors!)

Anyway, we will be promoting NCYC at our conference and our mass collection will be going to the Catholic Youth Foundation USA in support of NCYC scholarships.