• We get to dive into October feasts right away on the 1st with the celebration of Saint Therese of Lisieux (also known as St. Therese of the Child Jesus).  Your kids may find it interesting to know she’s modern enough that we have actual photos of her.  It’s likely you have a holy card of her holding a bunch of roses and this is because of her promise to spend her time in heaven interceding for those of us on earth.  These good deeds have become like a “shower of roses” dropping down on all who ask for her help.  Put a rose on your prayer table today in her honor.

“My mission to make God loved will begin after my death.

I will spend my heaven doing good on earth.

I will send a shower of roses.”

• October 2nd is the day we celebrate the gift of our guardian angels and if you have a copy of this print somewhere in your home, move it to your prayer table for a while.You can also find lots of high quality, printable art on the internet.  I highly recommend the Web Gallery of Art and can spend way too much time enjoying the beautiful works available there.  I printed this image for my prayer table this month.  I love how the angel has such a firm grip on the child in his charge.  Even though the child is on a narrow, dark path (with kind of creepy things in the background), his angel is helping him keep his eyes fixed on heaven, “to light, to guard, to rule, to guide.”
• October 4th is the feast of St. Francis of Assisi and he’s often remembered as a patron of animals and nature-related things.  Don’t underestimate him as a 13th century hippie though.  Francis gave up a comfortable life and lived according to Christ’s call to “leave everything and follow Me.”  He wore rough clothes, lived in poverty, and cared for lepers.  He attracted many followers and started a major religious order that continues to this day!  For the last two years of his life, he bore the stigmata (the wounds of Christ) and accepted this constant suffering out of love to share the pain of His Saviour.  You can get double duty on your prayer table by displaying one of these prints of the suffering Francis being comforted by an angel.

• October 16th is the feast of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque who is best known for her visions of Christ and the promises he made to those who meditated on His Sacred Heart.  The image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is enormously popular, and it’s pretty likely you have some version of it on a holy card, in a children’s book, or on that old framed print you got from your grandmother.  This would be a good time to display it and to spend some time thinking about God’s love!  (Actually, spend the rest of your life thinking about God’s love.  You’ll never be able to exhaust the topic!)”You also may want to add this quote from Saint Margaret Mary to your prayer table:

“Let every knee bend before Thee, O greatness of my God,

so supremely humbled in the Sacred Host.

May every heart love Thee, every spirit adore Thee

and every will be subject to Thee!”