A Slice of Liturgical Life: Celebrating a Few October Feast Days

This post contains affiliate links.

As we enter a new Fall season on our calendars, I've been thinking a lot about another type of calendar: the liturgical Catholic calendar . Similar to our traditional calendars that are marked with four seasons, 12 months, 365 days, holidays and celebrations, the liturgical year is also marked with special seasons and feast days.

However, the difference between our traditional 12 month calendar and the liturgical Catholic calendar is summed up well  HERE at cyberfaith.com, "The purpose of the Liturgical Year Calendar is not to mark the passage of time, but to celebrate and understand more fully the entire mystery of Jesus Christ, from his incarnation and birth until his ascension, the day of Pentecost, and the expectation of his return in glory. During the course of a year, the paschal mystery—the passion, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus—is viewed from different angles, in different lights."

I hope one day to be more organized with the celebrations and feast days in our family's life and here on my blog.  I especially love how Nicole at Just Like Mary organizes her blog with the Liturgical Year icons and tabs!  Hmmmm...that gets me thinking on even more changes I want to make to my corner of blog land here!

Here are a few October feast days we have celebrated in our home in hopes that we can make these celebrations a yearly tradition.  

October 1: Feast day of St. Therese of Lisieux (one my favorite Saints and we named our 5th child after St. Therese) 

This was the first year I made small homemade chocolate cupcake "roses" with my children.  We whipped up some homemade cream cheese icing and swirled a little red food coloring in them to get the flower effect.  They were delicious! 

October 2: Feast Day of our Guardian Angels

 

Here is a simple art project my 10 year old and 6 year old daughters made for this feast day that I saw Patty do with her children from Reasons for Chocolate. Thank you Patty for the inspiration!

Our guardian angels lighting and guarding and ruling and guiding to celebrate this Feast Day of our Guardian Angels! They work over time in our house. :)   

Angel of God,
My guardian dear,
To whom God's love commits me here,
Ever this day,
Be at my side
To light and guard
To rule and guide.
Amen.

October 4:  Feast Day of Saint Francis of Assisi. 

I really enjoyed reading The Good Man of Assisi to my 6 year old to celebrate this Saint who loved all of God's creatures, great and small!  We also watched Saint Francis, The Knight of Assisi DVD produced by CCC of America.  

October 7: Our Lady of the Rosary

I first saw this idea with chocolate chips and M&M's on Kendra's blog at Catholic All Year and it inspired me to try it this year for the first time.  We used 2 pretzel sticks with a dab of peanut butter to keep the pretzels together for the cross.  Each of my children said a decade of the rosary and as they said each prayer they ate the candy piece.  I must say I had a difficult time not eating the entire decade all at once, just like my children!  :)

I found a Facebook link from Word on Fire Catholic Ministries about this feast day.  Click HERE as "Father Steve Grunow explains the unexpected origins of this feast of our Blessed Mother and how we are to understand the invocation of Our Lady in the midst of conflict."  

One of the many reasons I love being Catholic is that we have feast days and celebrations throughout the entire year!  It is my hope that by remembering special Saints like Saint Therese, Saint Francis of Assisi and our Blessed Mother in the Holy Rosary, our family will grow in our faith with many liturgical year celebrations and traditions!

How do you celebrate the liturgical year?  I'm always ready to learn how other families celebrate the Church calendar in so many fun and creative ways!

Have you signed up to receive my posts in your email inbox to keep up with "A Slice of Smith Life" happenings?  If not, just enter your email address here:

Enter your email address:


Delivered by FeedBurner

You can also follow my blog page on Facebook HERE!

Catholic Bloggers Blitz