{"id":61202,"date":"2022-12-12T12:05:39","date_gmt":"2022-12-12T18:05:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=61202"},"modified":"2022-12-26T06:26:51","modified_gmt":"2022-12-26T12:26:51","slug":"when-christmas-hurts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2022\/12\/12\/when-christmas-hurts\/","title":{"rendered":"When Christmas Hurts"},"content":{"rendered":"

A colleague of mine knows two couples who have sustained miscarriages this autumn.\u00a0 Neither couple requested celebration of the Order for the Blessing of Parents after a Miscarriage (found, inter alia, in the Book of Blessings<\/em>).\u00a0 I cast no aspersions here.\u00a0 People have any number of valid reasons for dealing with grief in the ways that they do.\u00a0 My point, rather, is to wonder how many Catholics (especially married Catholics in child-bearing years) are even aware of this blessing.\u00a0 For example, there are parishes which during Advent invite expectant couples to receive blessings in view of the upcoming celebration of the birth of Christ.\u00a0 How often do our parishes acknowledge pregnancies that fail?<\/p>\n

As near as I can discern, at Pray Tell there have been two posts mentioning miscarriages.\u00a0 They were in 2014<\/a> and 2020<\/a>.\u00a0 The 2014 post contains a helpful link to the Miscarriage Awareness Committee<\/a> of the Diocese of Saskatoon, SK.\u00a0 I invite readers to post here information about similar organizations in their communities.<\/p>\n

The Sacred Triduum at the high point of our liturgical year reminds us that God is no less present on Good Friday than on Easter Sunday.\u00a0 As we turn to celebration of the incarnation and the joy of the new era inaugurated in the life and ministry of Jesus, let us bear in mind those among us for whom the recollection of this birth touches raw and hurting places.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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