Author: Daniel

Tomorrow morning, Thursday, Aug. 19, I’ll be featured for about 10-12 minutes on a radio station in Kansas City. I had a nice conversation with host Ken Billinger yesterday, to be broadcast between 7:35 and 7:50 a.m. Thursday on his program.

He’s also welcomed me to come back periodically to update him on the trip.

Here’s the link below if you’d like to listen live. And many thanks to Ken for reaching out to me to set this up.

https://streamdb8web.securenetsystems.net/v5/CRN3&embedOpened=true&embedOpenedApp=song&embedOpenedSong=Get%20Out%20Now%20-%2060&embedOpenedArtist=Regnery%20Publishing&embedOpenedAlbum=

The first day of August took me to Dexter, Michigan, eventually to the right location.

I headed up early in the morning, plugging St. Joseph into my phone. I arrived at about 20 after 8, giving me enough time to patrol the grounds and snap some photos before Mass. By 8:30, it dawned on me there was no way Mass was taking place there at 9 a.m., given the complete absence of any other human beings. I was at the Village Church, which is still home to daily Masses but gives way to the Country Church on Sundays.

I hightailed it a few miles east (I think) to the new facility. As you’ll see from the photos, each church is beautiful in its own way. I guess that’s always the case.

I had a nice morning at St. Joseph, meeting a host of parishioners after the 9 and 11 a.m. Masses, while enjoying lunch with a handful of folks from the parish’s music ministry. All in all, a satisfying trip.

I’m be back on the road at the end of the month, hitting up three parishes in the South. I pray the COVID surge there, and everywhere, is on the wane by then.

The Country Church

It’s been a long three weeks, but I’m finally getting back on the road this weekend. I’m heading to Cabot, Arkansas, to worship at St. John the Baptist.

St. John the Baptist serves as the Latin Mass parish for the Diocese of Little Rock, with all services being performed in the form. I’ll be writing about the appeal of the form to those Catholics who prefer it.

This won’t be my first Latin Mass. When my oldest son, Ian, graduated from Johns Hopkins, I woke up early on graduation day to take in a daily Mass at National Shrine of St. Alphonsus Liguori, which just happened to be sitting across the street from our hotel. Here are a few photos of that beautiful church, once home to St. John Neumann.

OK, as our most recent trip had to be postponed for a few weeks, I’m going back to before the beginning for this entry.

On June 5, while on my way to St. Patrick in Nashua, N.H., I realized I was going to arrive much earlier than I anticipated. So early, in fact, the church wouldn’t be open by the time I arrived.

Given an extra half-hour to play with, I thought it would be neat to visit a different church beforehand, one with a pretty meaningful connection. Just across the state line from Nashua sits Lowell, Massachusetts, where my father was born and raised before moving to New York.

I’d only made one previous trip to Lowell, when I was a child and my dad drove us past his boyhood home. This time, I made a pit stop at his childhood parish, St. Margaret of Scotland.

It seemed kind of a nice way of informally kicking things off, and something I know my late grandparents, Edward and Marie Markham, would have been most delighted with. Truth be told, I’m pretty sure those daily Mass attendees would have been extraordinarily pleased with this entire endeavor.

Interestingly enough, since my visit, St. Margaret has combined with two other local parishes, St. John the Evangelist of North Chelmsford and St. Mary of Chelmsford, to form the Holy Rood Collaborative. The Holy Rood refers to any image of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and John, standing together at the foot of The Cross.

The name of the new collaborative is quite fitting, as each has a connection to the Holy Rood. St. Mary and St. John the Evangelist’s connections are obvious. As for St. Margaret, I’ll let the collaborative’s website take it from here…

“It is said that when 21-year-old Margaret had to flee to Scotland following the conquest of England in 1066, she brought her most valuable treasure with her… a true relic of the specific wooden cross upon which Christ was crucified and died. In 1070, her husband, Malcom III,  founded the Abbey of Dunfermline, where she kept this relic enshrined in an ebony colored crucifix—this is how the term Black Rood came into being, which it is often referred to. In 1093, as she lay dying, it was this relic to which she clung.

“Her great love and devotion of this relic inspired her son, King David I, the youngest of St. Margaret’s children to erect the Holy Rood Abbey in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1128. It was here that the relic continued to be safeguarded until it was regained by the English in 1346,” the website notes.

Over the course of the year, I’m going to worship in a number of places outside the traditional parish setting. Last Friday’s Mass was one of those, though in this case it was unplanned.

I spent much of the day Thursday and Friday at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. My mother-in-law had been admitted to the hospital on Wednesday, and I ferried Kem down to the capital city to spend time with her mom.


While Kem and her dad visited Mary Lou in the two-person capacity ICU room, I took in Mass with Father Patrick Nwokeogu, who has spent the last three years as chaplain at the hospital. This won’t be the last time I’m worshiping in the healthcare setting. Later this year, I will profile Father Timothy Regan as he fulfills his duties with the University of Iowa hospital system.

In the meantime, please say a prayer for my mother-in-law, who has been a wonderful presence in my life these last 30 years.