Calendar Class of October 9, 2025

A Carpe Diem Snapshot:

Carpere ambulationem! Seize the stroll! This school year we've begun a new weekly tradition of a Nature Study Club that involves lots of strolling. Over the years I've become convinced, based on both personal experience and mounting scientific studies, that the daily leisurely stroll (the passeggiata, in Italian) has so many benefits for mental and physical health that it should be prioritized over more productive type of activities. Leisure is the basis of culture, as Josef Pieper famously wrote, and history has demonstrated this to be true time and time again. My own Dad, a great chronicler of culture, was known to undertake long solitary hikes when he lived in Scotland and while traveling, which was actually the most productive period of time for him as his mind then had the right environment to contemplate ideas and process his studies, which later resulted in weighty books, such as The Conservative Mind and The Roots of American Order. If we want our little scholars, or ourselves, to cultivate this kind of intellectual depth, it is necessary to create an atmosphere of leisurely learning, a scholé, in which a scheduled stroll plays a crucial role.

Liturgical: Thursday of the Twenty-Seventh Week in Ordinary Time

"And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find;

knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives;

and the one who seeks, finds;

and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened."

Sanctoral: —St. Denis, a third-century apostle of Gaul, became first bishop of Paris. He suffered martyrdom there, together with his priest Rusticus and his deacon Eleutherius. He is one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers.

—St. John Leonardi (1543-1609), a zealous Italian apostle, founded the congregation of the Mother of God, whose priest-members traveled throughout Tuscany urging the people to a stronger interest in their religion. Fr. John Leonardi longed to convert pagans, but his spiritual director, St. Philip Neri, told him to remain in Italy. So instead he founded a seminary in Rome to train young men for the priesthood from all the mission lands.

--England and Wales celebrate the Feast of St. John Henry Newman (1801-1890), who was canonized on October 13, 2019. At his beatification Pope Benedict XVI noted Newman's emphasis on the vital place of revealed religion in civilized society but also praised his pastoral zeal for the sick, the poor, the bereaved and those in prison. Newman will become the Church's newest doctor on November 1, 2025.

--The Roman Martyrology also commemorates St. Louis Bertrand (1526-1581), a Spanish Dominican who preached in South America during the 16th century, and is known as the "Apostle to the Americas."

Human: In A.D. 1000, long before Columbus, Eriksson led a Viking voyage westward from Greenland and reached the coast of North America, in what is now Newfoundland. He named his discovery Vinland. Although Eriksson is not officially credited with the European discovery of America, ever since 1964 U.S. presidents have had the option of proclaiming October 9 as Leif Eriksson Day.

Natural: What the Chickadee Knows

A small bird and the saint who heard all creation sing (from Nature Notes by Sheila Carroll)

Italian: Invano (in vain / to no avail)

The first commandment in Latin in the Bible reads: Non assumes nomen Domini Dei tui in vanum, which translates as Non nominare il nome di Dio invano (Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain) in Italian.

Book of the Day: Leisure, the Basis of Culture by Josef Pieper

Quote: "To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often."

--St. John Henry Newman

Other great quotes and info here.