I forget that my kids have a completely different vocabulary than I did growing up. I’m not even talking about “rad,” “dude,” “bodacious,” (can you tell I grew up in California in the 80’s and 90’s?) and the like. No, I mean their Catholic language.
Eucharist, examine, confession, canonized, purgatory, etc. were the smallest of blips on my radar growing up. But for my kids, well, we here them nearly every day.
Most interesting is the way they relate to Mary. I was reminded again of a great quote from St. Maximilian Kolbe recently. “Never be afraid of loving the Blessed Mother too much. You can never love her more than Jesus did.” We talk a good deal about and to Mary and, in doing so, have many names and titles for her.
So it’s easy to see why Lucy would get turned around.
At the park this week, they had a small merry-go-round. Lucy wanted to be brave on it but much preferred the swings. Pen though . . . well, Pen stood up while it was spinning and made it to the center where she head banged and laughed. Yes, she is a spitfire. Pray for us. When we got home I was telling Jac about Penny’s fearlessness and how the teenagers on the merry-go-round had been so patient with her.
“Yeah, when I was on the lady-go-round, those big kids were nice but I was scared.” Lucy explained.
“The what?” we asked to clarify.
“The lady-go-round.”
“What??”
“LADY-go-round.”
“Ooooh! The merry-go-round?”
“Yes! That’s what I said!”
I didn’t laugh, but I did smile. We call Mary by her name but also by her many titles. “Our Lady,” is utilized often. So what’s the big deal about replacing what sounded like her name with this simple title?
I doubt this name will stick as the parks we frequent are lame and don’t have merry-go-rounds. But I want the memory of this mix-up to hang about a while longer.
