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Greetings! Welcome!

Thank you for joining us!

In this week’s issue of Life’s Joyful Mystery, I am very excited to introduce my colleague from Our Lady of the Fields Camp & Retreat Center - Jan Klemm. Jan agreed to write a reflection on her favorite scripture for this issue. (Spoiler alert: It’s from Jeremiah) Thank you, Jan!

I would like to start inviting our readers to send me their favorite Bible verses or even things like their favorite Catholic memory from growing up. I would love to share them with our audience! I’m open to ideas!

I’m also launching a brand new feature this week that I think will be a lot of fun - “Why Do Catholics Do THAT?!” This is a light-hearted look at the reasons behind our customs and traditions that make Catholic folks so darn interesting.

We’re continuing with our regular feature “Double Dog Dare of the Week”. As this newsletter is taking shape, I really think this particular concept (The Double Dog Dare) is at the heart of our mission at Our Lady of the Fields Camp. As a Catholic retreat center, it is one of our goals to encourage people to live out the tenets of our faith in the real world. But, doing that can often be challenging. The Double Dog Dare is a (hopefully) catchy way to remind readers throughout the week that devotion to the Lord is a minute-by-minute commitment. We don’t get to take time off. We’re always “on the field” for God’s team!

Please enjoy this issue of Life’s Joyful Mystery, and PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE share our newsletter with your friends, family, neighbors, members of your church, your priest, your dentist, and your best friend from elementary school who now lives in California!

Sincerely Yours In Christ,

Jim Berigan

Double Dog Dare of the Week: WWJD - The "Micro" Edition

It is often said that “God is in the details”. This means that the true beauty, quality, or significance of something lies in the small, intricate details, emphasizing the importance of paying attention to even the seemingly minor aspects of a project, situation, or creation.

And so it is with the way God calls us to live. It’s just not the big commandments like “THOU SHALL NOT KILL”. It’s also the accumulation of the little things we do every day that are also important in how we lead our lives.

Several times each day, we are presented with “micro” decisions that impact not only our own lives, but the lives of other people around us. Sometimes, we blow right past these little forks in the road, ignoring them completely. Other times, we may realize we made a bad choice, but for some reason/justification, we take the easy way out.

This is where those WWJD bracelets come in. I’m old enough to remember when these colorful wrist bands came out back in the 1990s. They were EVERYWHERE!

Of course, WWJD stands for “What Would Jesus Do?”

This “challenge” is often applied to weighty moral quandaries that arise in a person’s life.

However, the Double Dog Dare of the Week this week is to apply this “WWJD Challenge” to the “micro” decisions I alluded to earlier.

For instance, imagine it’s Friday evening, 5:30, and you had to rush into the grocery store to grab a few things for dinner. It’s cold and raining outside. You’re exhausted. The grocery cart corral is like 10 cars away from where you are parked. Do you make the effort and push your cart all the way to the collection point so some poor teenager doesn’t have to do it later? Or do you just tuck it in the upper corner of your parking space? What Would Jesus Do?

This is great, isn’t it? I know you want to find out what happens next! Click here to read the rest of the story!

Catholic Vocab Word of the Week: Popular Piety

Hey! That's actually TWO words!

“Popular piety” is a way for Catholics to express their devotion and faith to God through prayers and rituals that are not part of the official liturgy. 

These practices are often called "devotions" and can include prayers, rituals, and other expressions of piety.

• Popular piety is often inspired by the cultural traditions and practices of a particular nation or people.

• It's a way for people to connect with their spiritual roots and their community.

• Popular piety is a way for people to express their faith through gestures and symbols that are meaningful to their culture.

• Popular piety is a way for Christianity to exchange cultural treasures with other cultures.

• Popular piety is a way for the faith to be passed on from one generation to the next.

Popular Piety can be characterized by:

• Appealing to emotions

• Simplicity

• A communal aspect

• A traditional connection to a venerated person

Some examples of popular piety include:

Click here if you’d like to learn MORE about popular piety!

Why Do Catholics Do THAT?!

Burying a statue of St. Joseph for help selling your house

Imagine you are an alien from a distant galaxy, and you land on Earth after a very long journey through the stars. Upon your arrival, you meet some wonderful and welcoming Catholic folk. They invite you to Mass, and you even stick around for coffee & donuts after. You like these Catholics. One of them actually invited you to something they call “Bingo!” later on this week. They also asked you to buy a book of raffle tickets for their parish auction, but you didn’t have any money. Or pockets.

As you get to know these people better, however, you start to notice some curious rituals that make you scratch your green and scaly head.

What are these Earthlings called Catholics doing?

For instance, this week, you found out that your “host family” is preparing to sell their house and move to a new house. But, the mother of this family took a small statue of a man called St. Joseph and buried the poor guy in the front yard.

You asked her why she did that.

To find out what happens to poor St. Joseph, click here!

My Favorite Scripture Verse

By Jan Klemm

My name is Jan Klemm, and I have the honor of working with Our Lady of the Fields Camp and Retreat Center as a grants writer to secure funding for camp projects. I’m semi-retired and live in Shelby Township with my wonderful husband, Harold. God blessed me with two children, Jesse and Megan.

My favorite scripture is Jeremiah 29:11: “For I know the plans I have for you, says, the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

Although set during the Babylonian exile of the Israelites in the 6^th century BC, this scripture verse speaks to each of us today, as well. I’ve carried this verse close to my heart for most of my adult life, and it’s given me hope during many trials.

In a nutshell, this verse is not a promise of wealth or of instant relief from hardship, but a promise of hope. It serves as a reminder that God stands with us through our trials and suffering. And although we may not understand His timing, we must trust in it. He sees the big picture that we do not.

When we lost Jesse in May of 2020 during the COVID pandemic, many people asked me how I could pray to God after my 28-year-old son died. The answer is simple; how could I not? It is in our trials that God calls us to be faithful to Him, to trust Him. I miss Jesse every single day, and I don’t understand his death at such an early age, but our Lord does, and I trust Him. He loves Jesse more than I ever could, which is hard as a mother to think about but so very true for each and every one of us.

So, I pray this verse each day as a reminder that God has wonderful things planned for me, and I keep my eyes focused my forever home, Heaven. I know that until I get to hug Jesse again, our Blessed Mother is taking care of him in my absence.

Know that God has great plans for you, too. Stay hopeful, trust God, and keep your eyes on your forever home. God bless you.

Why is St. George So Important to the Chaldean People?

As I have written about before in this newsletter, Our Lady of the Fields Camp is under the direction and guidance of the Chaldean Catholic Church of the United States of America.

Not too far from the camp is the predominately Chaldean parish called St. George (Shelby Township, Michigan). The chapel at Our Lady of the Fields is called St. George Shrine. Overall, it’s not uncommon for St. George to pop up here and there in the Chaldean world.

Why is that?

From just basic general knowledge, I knew that St. George was the saint who supposedly killed a dragon, but I didn’t know much beyond that. And how did the dragon relate to the Chaldean people? I needed to do some digging.

So, it turns out that dragons are not real. If you have a subscription to HBO Max, you might not have known that. Therefore, St. George didn’t REALLY slay a dragon. It is a METAPHOR! St. George slayed (slew?) a metaphor.

All kidding aside, St. George was a high-ranking officer in the Roman army's Praetorian Guard. He was also a Christian in a time and place when being a Christian was not exactly good for one’s health. So, when George saw the Roman army severely persecuting his fellow Christians, he resigned his commission.

His refusal to participate in the torture and killing landed him in prison, where the Roman Emperor Diocletian ordered him to renounce his Christian faith. Under the threat of death, George would not recant. So, Diocletian had George beheaded. The date was April 23, 303 AD. This is how St. George became a martyr for the faith.

The Chaldean people have also faced severe religious persecution in their home county of Iraq - even up through today. Many Chaldeans have died or have been forced to flee to America simply because they are Christian and refuse to renounce their faith. The courage that St. George showed under similar circumstances resonates deeply with Chaldeans and has inspired them for generations.

So, back to the metaphor: it seems the “dragon” is the Roman Empire and their persecution of Christians at the time. Even though St George was eventually killed, by refusing to renounce his Christian faith, he claimed a victory for the Lord.

And, after everything is said and done, isn’t that what we all want anyway? Victory for the Lord?

Here is a cute animated video of the Legend of St. George. Enjoy!

Suggested Links You Might Enjoy:

Fruits from the Fields video podcast on YouTube, which is also produced by Our Lady of the Fields Camp & Retreat Center and features great Catholic content.

Song of Mary - a new music ministry that some folks at OLF have recently started. Song of Mary has just published a Christmas “Album” called “A Savior is Born”. Please listen to it HERE!

If you like what you see at either one of these sites, I encourage you to please subscribe to their YouTube channels, so you can see all of the new videos!

To learn more about the mission and the needs of Our Lady of the Fields Camp & Retreat Center, please click the link below.

www.GiveSendGo.com/OurLadyoftheFieldsCamp

See you next week!

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