Hello everyone.  I hope you are well and keeping safe.   Happy Sunday.  

Today, July 26, would normally be the feast day of St Anne and Joachim, the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  It has become a little tradition on this day to honor and give God thanks for Grandparents.   

Here is a little context of this celebration by Brother Silas Henderson, S.D.S., from Aleteia.org:     Although not mentioned in Scripture, ancient tradition holds that Joachim and Anne were the names of the parents of Mary, the Mother of Jesus. The earliest record of their name is found in the apocryphal second-century text known as the Protoevangelium of James.  Old and childless, it is said that the couple prayed that they would be given a child. While Joachim was in the desert and Anne prayed in their home, an angel appeared to them promising that Anne would conceive a child.   Devotion to the two saints spread quickly throughout the Eastern Church and devotion to Saint Anne became especially strong in the West. Since 1969, Saint Joachim and Anne have been honored together on July 26. 

Friends, let us honor our grandparents today in a special way today.  I only met one of my grandparents, Johanna Rahilly, in County Cork, Ireland when I was a young boy.   I found her so fascinating.  She usually sat by the open fire in her thatched cottage and prayed throughout the day.   She could be stern, but then again, my brothers and I could be unruly!  It is funny the strange things one remembers.  When she let her hair down, it fell far beneath her waist.  She would have a bucket of water from a good and heavy rain and she would use that to clean her hair.  Then all was tied up in a bun.  Just reminiscing, sorry!  

Here is a prayer calling upon St Anne and Joachim for their intercession in our lives.  May we also ask them to bless our grandparents!     

O Lord, God of our Fathers,

who bestowed on Saints Joachim and Anne this grace,

that of them should be born the Mother of your incarnate Son,

grant, through the prayers of both,

that we may attain the salvation

you have promised to your people.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

"Joachim and Anne, how blessed a couple! All creation is indebted to you. For at your hands the Creator was offered a gift excelling all other gifts: a chaste mother, who alone was worthy of him.”—Saint John Damascene