Wednesday, June 11, 2008

I am so glad you asked...

...and since you seem so interested in what we are doing on July 8th....

We've been invited to Tea with the Queen!!

Well, us and a few hundred others. We're going to a Garden Party At Buckingham Palace.

It is very exciting and I will borrow a hat from my sister-in-law and wear the nice blue dress-and-jacket bought for our Silver Wedding a couple of summers ago.

8 comments:

Phil said...

Very proper and well-deserved, I'm sure.

Mulier Fortis said...

I really hope you have a lovely time! And we can all pray for good weather for you!

Gail said...

I also hope you have a lovely time. Please take pictures of your big day and post them, if you can. Also, your rosary sounds lovely. What a nice present. Please consider writing Lourdes, and the importance of the rosary.

Anonymous said...

That was the day I invited the Queen to a barbecue at my house. Now I understand why she couldn't come.

Mags said...

Hey!!! Joanna....nice one...have a great time, and tell us all about it after the event.....

Oh... and by the way...do pass on my regards to Aunt Elizabeth.....lol.. seriously though...have a great time.

gemoftheocean said...

Say "hey" for me. I'm still wondering how she does the multiplying dog trick. State secret, perhaps?

Anonymous said...

An avowed Catholic and a Royalist?

That you cleave to an institution that would deny your faith is self-contradiction I find hard to fathom, but not surprising. After all, you champion (boldly, and rightly) personal liberty and freedom of expression with one hand while working tirelessly to inhibit any social progression that threatens your cosy notions of family, home and hearth with the other.

I come from a Catholic upbringing myself. As stimulating as your occasional appearances on BBC radio are (it's rare, in a culture you might characterise as secularised but is in fact merely anti-Catholic, to hear such views expressed) they ultimately infuriate, reminding me of the faith's inherent and irreconcilable conflicts, flaws that made my continuing observance untenable.

Phil said...

Schism Schasm, I too am a Catholic and a Royalist; there are more of us out there than you might like to suppose. I don’t think the Act of Settlement, and the tiresome prohibitions it places upon the monarchy, can be laid at the Queen’s door, however. If you want someone to blame for this situation, and its continuance, look no further than Parliament: that great bastion of democracy and human rights, which not only denies the Queen the right to be a Catholic, but has recently re-confirmed the policy of massacring the Innocents.

If, as you posit, our society is not secular, “merely anti-Catholic”, then I would suggest to you that the stable position of the Catholic Church to uphold the Christian faith in this land, brings with it a damning indictment on the other churches and ecclesial groups who have singularly failed to live up to the expectation of the Gospel by making themselves fit society’s mould, rather than the other way around. The Catholic Church unashamedly expects the faithful to live according to the teachings handed down from Christ and the Apostles. If society wishes to change its standards, to become “enlightened” (sic), then it is even more incumbent upon the Catholic Church to continue in its Divine mission of proclaiming the truth and, it must be noted, that message is always in agreement with true human rights. For example, while the homosexual genital act is prohibited, I challenge you to find a better defence of the human rights and dignities of the homosexual person than that given in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

If living the truth of the Gospel creates “irreconcilable conflicts” in your life, you must ask yourself where the “flaws” truly lie. “Me!, me!, me!” leads only one way: to death. Regardless of how able a human being might be, at the end of earthly life, he can do nothing to save himself from the “sting” of death. “God!, God!, God!” opens up the promise of eternity. As Paul says in Galatians, if we live as a people who have been crucified with the Lord (which includes denying ourselves many of the “rights” deemed to be acceptable in our current society), then the Lord will live in us, which is life in the faith of the Son of God. No one said it would be easy. Even Christ suffered; but the difference here, is that he suffered for us and not because of himself.

God bless you