[Magdalen] Happy St. Gertrude’s Day

[Joseph Cirou]

-----Original Message-----
>From: ME Michaud <michaudme at gmail.com>
>Sent: Mar 17, 2018 4:40 PM
>To: "magdalen at herberthouse.org" <magdalen at herberthouse.org>
>Subject: [Magdalen] Happy St. Gertrude’s Day
>
>St. Gertrude of Nivelles,
>patron saint of cats.
>
>We will be celebrating in an Italian restaurant
>since the nearest Belgian restaurant is in Canada I think.
>And, of course, it’s not an evening to go to
>The Corrib
>The Claddagh
>The Black Rose
>McGann’s Pub
>The Kinsale
>The Tam
>McGreevy’s
>or
>MJ O’Connor’s Irish Pub
>-M
I was the deacon (transitional) at St. John Berchmans in the Logan Square Region of Chicago in 1968/1969 I think he is the patron of several Belgian parishes in the Us I the Belgian restaurant in Quebec or Montreal. I would have been interested in going to it on one of my many trips up north. However, I did get to a Tibetan restaurant in Montreal where I made my famous faux pas. I've to the story quite a few times, if you  havent heard it and you are interested I will give you the not quite lurid details

I know nothing of St. Gertrude of Nivelles only the Benedictine Mystic of which Regina is an expert.

There are a number of nationalities whose cuisines, tho excellent, do not support many restaurants. Locally a fusion Filipino/Mexican restaurant has opened. Filipinos have wonderful cuisine, but not very many restaurants. Atteding Sim Bang Gabi in Chicago was always a culinary delight Sim Bang Gabi is the Pilipino Posada with extensive liturgical privileges such as celebrating the Christmas Novena in white vestments. In the Phillipines it usually is celebrated at 5AM because of the climate as many of the South American and MesoAmericans celebrated orchestral matins in the colonial days at the same time.
In the Us it has become an evening event. Cardinal Bernardin would always be the celebrant of the final Mass on December 23.

When I was at St. JOhn Berchmans the Belgian contingent had started to dwindle but showed up en masse for traditional holidays--Similar to the people from Sierra Leone who would do an annual festival for their school with a "march by" and a old boy school service with Anglican Chant Te Deum and a horribly difficult school song.

Joe








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