This week has been full of delightfully good stuff. Kurt and his dad took off for a Western adventure – think less deserts and cacti and more green countryside and apparently tons of fog – on Sunday and gallivanted around until their return on Wednesday night. I’ll let Kurt fill you in on the rest Monday.

Our sacristan duties have kicked in entirely now, with the four of us taking turns preparing the churches for all the masses. I’ve kind of enjoyed coming early and tending to the bread and wine, candles, and books for the mass. Unfortunately, we’ve also been on call to help with three funeral masses for members of the community who have passed away this week, but being at those masses and seeing the large crowds has shown the Irish people’s great care for coming together to celebrate the lives of those who have passed on.

Jess and I led our second of three nights of adult faith formation on Monday. We prepared a short bit on liturgy about gathering together to answer our baptismal call to community in Christ and taking that all with us into everyday life. However, our input was definitely secondary to the delightful discussion that brewed between the 20-25 people who turned out. Almost everyone got involved in a spontaneous discussion during the open time for questions at the start, and we are hoping that will snowball into more questions for our final Monday night session next week. We will try to answer their tough questions on matters of faith and discern how to keep up adult faith formation going forward for them.

Also this week, Molly and I got to make our first visit to Kennedy Park primary school to work with the children. We had nice meetings with the staff and one of the teachers last week, and we began our work with a class of fifth-graders, preparing them for a mass they will help lead a week from Monday. They were well-behaved and caught on to the music and explanations of the mass very quickly. Also, one of the kids chose Australia as their dream destination just like me, so we might make a side trip to meet kangaroos.

Meanwhile, Jess and Kurt continue their work preparing a fifth-class at Scoil Mhuire for a class mass next week. Additionally, they prepped the sixth-class kids who will make their Confirmation in the spring for their enrollment ceremony this Saturday night at the Vigil mass.

On a personal note, I have finally gotten involved in the local St. Vincent de Paul group. My contact info eventually made its way to the president of the local chapter, who invited me to join their weekly meeting. They come together to receive and discuss requests for financial and other practical assistance from local people in need. Based on decisions at that meeting, the group splits up to make weekly visits to the people’s homes, opting to deliver food vouchers and gift cards in person rather than through the mail. I joined one of the men from the group to make 8 home visits on Wednesday afternoon; we chatted with the people and gave them the help that we could. It was a terrific start to what I hope will be a nice way to share in this community outreach for those in the Clonard area.

There’s more!? Kurt and I joined a few others from the parish last night to brainstorm ideas for the first weekend in November, when the homily and prayers for the mass will emphasis the Word of God – the 2nd of 5 Sundays spread through 2011-12 to prepare for International Eucharistic Congress in Dublin in summer 2012.

AND, the four of us will make final preparations this afternoon for our workshop on Sunday about the new mass. We will talk about some of the changes to the responses and prayers and offer music centered on gathering as well as musical settings of the new mass parts. We have over 40 people signed up, and we’re excited to have them to Clonard for singing, conversation, and of course, tea.

It’s been our pleasure to have Mr. Nowak with us this past week. He’s been a great “dad” presence around the house, joking with us, sitting down for chats, offering a helping hand, and giving us lifts in his rent-a-car. As he would say, our lives right now are “good stuff.”