Drew Downs

Make a New Normal

Sacraments

  • The old argument goes children need to understand the sacrament before they receive it. I am still surprised to hear this. As a priest, I hear it from people of all sorts. When they do suggest such a thing to me, I simply ask them Even after they were baptized as infants? The look I…

  • [This is the second of three posts about the sacraments. Check out the first and the third.] As we explored yesterday, our Sacraments, primarily Holy Eucharist and Holy Baptism, are a physical and spiritual means of receiving grace. Today, we’ll have a small taste of the messiness around the living out of the Sacraments. There is…

  • That is the question I have for Monday. For the liturgical snobs out there, I know that it is Lent and we aren’t encouraged by Michno to bless in Lent, but to recite a “prayer over the people,” as was the most ancient custom of what would become the blessing much later.  It is a…