Calendar Class of September 21, 2025

A Carpe Diem Snapshot:

The past 24 hours have provided a plethora of potential Carpe Diem snapshots, each with its own story. In this shot here, Cordelia waits behind a small group of Amish women on a girl friends' trip in the U.P. We breakfasted at the same local eatery as they did, the Goat Locker, and then ran into them again later in the day at the Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point. In this photo, they are looking at an exhibit of the salvage of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, one of the 550 ships that sank to the floor of Lake Superior over the years. There is so much info to share regarding our scientific and historic discoveries in the U.P., that I am obliged to create a category for it below, just for today.

Liturgical: Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Gospel Excerpt, Luke 16:1-13:

Jesus said to his disciples: "The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones. If, therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth? If you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another, who will give you what is yours? No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and mammon."

Today is Catechetical Sunday.

Pope Leo's Sunday Mass and Angelus today.

Bishop Barron's Sunday Sermon: The Use and Abuse of Power

"Courage, justice, and temperance are wonderful virtues, but without prudence, they are blind and finally useless. For a person can be as courageous as possible, but if he doesn’t know when, where, and how to play out his courage, that virtue is useless."

Fr. Plant's Homily-Scripture Lesson: God or Money

Sanctoral: Feast of St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist

At the time that Jesus summoned him to follow Him, Matthew was a publican, that is, a tax-collector for the Romans. His profession was hateful to the Jews because it reminded them of their subjection; the publican, also, was regarded by the pharisees as the typical sinner. St. Matthew is known to us principally as an Evangelist. In the early Church, Matthew’s Gospel was thought the first to be written, which explains its position in the New Testament.

Human: International Day of Peace--A day to support peace and non-violence throughout the world. Observed on the opening day of the annual regular session of the United Nations.

Birthday of Louis Joliet, who was a French-Canadian explorer, cartographer, and fur trader, best known for his 1673 expedition with Fr. Jacques Marquette to explore the Mississippi River (an expedition that began in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan). Born near Quebec, he was educated as a Jesuit but left the seminary to become a trader and explorer. His later career included a Royal Hydrographer appointment and a significant mapping of the Labrador coast.

Death of Sir Walter Scott (poet) – 1832

Stonehenge was sold to a local landowner for 6,600 pounds – 1915

J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit published – 1937

19 BC– Virgil, at the age of 51, died in Brundisium. Roman poet, author of Aeneid – the Roman national epos. The works of Virgil became school books during the author’s lifetime. At least until the early nineteenth century, they were at the center of the literary canon, exerting enormous influence on European culture, science and even politics.

37 AD – Roman Emperor Caligula was proclaimed the Father of the Country by the Senate.

454 AD – Roman Emperor Valentinian III murdered Aecius Flavius during an audience at the Palatine in Rome. Eunuch Heraclitus participated in the plot, probably along with senator Petronius Maximus.

Natural: What are "Yooperlights"?

Yooperlites were discovered in 2017 by rockhound Erik Rintamaki along the shores of Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Rintamaki, using a UV light, noticed glowing rocks that appeared ordinary in daylight and later trademarked the name "Yooperlites" for the fluorescent sodalite-rich syenite rocks. The discovery brought attention to the rocks, and Rintamaki now gives tours to help others find them on the beaches.

Italian: Entrare a gamba tesa (to do something in a confrontational way)

Entrare a gamba tesa literally translates to “to enter with a stretched leg.” It evokes the image of someone forcefully stepping into a situation, often with a noticeably lack of subtlety. As you might expect, this expression is frequently used in business contexts or situations where meetings involve individuals with differing opinions.

Quote: “But the seas of the world are salty, this lake is like a colossal diamond–clear, pure, sparkling, lying like a heaven-lighted gem in a bowl of rich greenery fringed with a lace-work of chromatic rocks that take on the most weird and enchanting shapes."

From "Along the Bowstring of Lake Superior" by Julian Ralph

The Upper Peninsula (specifically, Paradise and environs):

The "Root Beer Effect" in Tahquamenon Falls

The unique qualities of Lake Superior and Whitefish Bay, the "Graveyard of the Great Lakes" and the Shipwreck Museum