Catholic Roundup

For several years, whenever I wanted to find new Catholic Blogs, I have turned to Saint Blog’s Parish Directory. Of course there is no Saint Blog, and it is not a real parish. It is however one of the longest running Catholic blog directories on the internet. They also maintain a Webring, RSS Aggregator of all the St. Blogs Feeds, and the St. Blog’s Parish Wiki. It is great way to get to know other Catholic bloggers and become part of the community. In fact, I signed up for the St. Blog’s parish directory this weekend.

I have also been listed in the Catholic Blog Directory and as I mentioned earlier, I also have been participating in the weekly Catholic Blog Carnival as a way to become acquainted with and join in the conversations in the Catholic blogosphere.  Edit:  In fact this week’s Catholic Carnival is up over at A Third Way.

Finally, the nominations are open for the annual Catholic Blog Awards. I would be thrilled if one of my readers nominated me in the Best New Blog category. It’s not that I think what I’m doing is exceptional here. I’m just another voice in the St. Blog’s Parish choir. However, a nomination would help introduce me to a number of other Catholic bloggers and potential readers, and ultimately I ain’t to proud to beg.

The other day, I talked with Zina Gomez Liss about the spiritual and cultural significance of places. Zina has been exploring the Catholic heritage of Boston in her videocast, Catholic City with Zina. My town of Midland also has a rich Catholic heritage. Our community is where some of the first Jesuit missionaries to Upper Canada lived and died. It was the home of Saints, St. Jean de Brebuf, St. Isaac Jogues, St. Gabriel Lalament, St. Antoine Daniel, St. Charles Garnier, St. Noel Chabanel, St. Rene Goupil, and St. Jean de LaLande.

The Canadian Martyrs’ Shrine now sits on a hill just outside of the town of Midland. It is the only national shrine in Canada outside of Quebec. People from all over the world come to the shrine on pilgrimage. Our family regularly makes the short pilgrimage (10 min) to the shrine in the summer time for masses. Besides the beauty of the shrine and its grounds, and its spiritual heritage, it is also helping us to teach our daughter about the universal church. Midland itself is a small town with a fairly homogeneous community, but at the shrine we encounter people from all races and nations– all a part of the Body of Christ. This summer we met a priest from Africa, who was fluent in about 6 languages including French, but came to the Martyr’s Shrine for about 6 weeks to learn English. Even in that short time, as he carefully read through the parts of the mass in English, we saw him growing in skill and confidence in the English language. What a gift he has, to be able to communicate The Good News in 7 languages!

Over this 40 Days of reflection on Catholic websites, resources, and media, I’d like to explore more special and sacred places, but I’d also like to hear about your sacred places. Send me your comments or email me at ductapeguy (at) hotmail (dot) com .

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (13.3MB)

Zina Gomez-Liss has just launched, Catholic City with Zina

a wonderful video podcast which explores the Catholic culture and heritage of her hometown Boston. It is done in a lighthearted humorous fashion with loads of pretty graphics and special effects.

I spoke to Zina for quite a while about her videocast and the spiritual significance of one’s hometown. You can also check out Zina’s Online Live Journal page.

Here is Episode 1 of Catholic City.