Lenten Offerings and The Clothesline

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In anticipation of Ash Wednesday I've been doing a lot of "inner searching" about what to do for Lent. What will my sacrifice(s) be?

Last year, when my blog was fairly new, I wrote this about Lenten Sacrifices. I still firmly believe that it's not for one person to decide whether or not another's sacrifice is worthy. Only I need to know whether my sacrifice is real.

I plan to give up my annual sacrifice of diet soda. It's real, concrete. Even when I let other intentions slip, even temporarily, I know I can keep my sacrifice of diet soda. But, my intent is to make other offerings, as well.

One, is to lighten up on blogging about my family and myself. For these forty days, I intend to use this blog, if not completely, then primarily, for the greater glory of God.



And that brings me to the other part of this post, The Clothesline.

When our mothers and grandmothers were raising their families, they were, by and large, doing it amongst like-minded people. It is one aspect of our society that I am sad we have lost. We're such a diverse nation these days, that we have no like-minded people amongst us. I live on a small cul-de-sac, in a smallish neighborhood, in a medium-sized suburb of a medium-sized big city. I know that, as a Catholic mother, I am a minority in my community. Catholics, especially stay-home mothers, and on top of that, home schooling mothers, are becoming fewer and farther between.

Where mothers used to go out to the yard to hang their laundry and visit with their like-minded neighbors, now we have to get on our computers to seek out like-minded neighbors. Our mothers and grandmothers used to get their fill of inspiring faith-filled stories and ideas from their next door neighbors, or maybe even their mother or sister who lived next door. Now, we seek each other out over the World Wide Web.

So, I've decided to seek out inspiring stories, or maybe just good ideas, and share them with you "under the clothesline." We might not be able to see each other's clean laundry blowing in the breeze, but we can still share good stuff.

The first clothesline chapter is this "neighborly" story I found last night while looking for a little Lenten reading. I hope you enjoy it.

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