celebrating repeal day

There has been a lot for me to celebrate this week.  Monday was Rosario‘s 35th birthday; yesterday was my former roommate Emily’s 30th birthday; and thanks to The Anchoress’ twitter feed, I found out that today is Repeal Day!  So I will celebrate accordingly when I get home.  Also, thanks to that same tweet, I read the most amazing quote by St. John Chrysostom about the fruit of the vine and the beverage it produces:

“For wine was given us of God, not that we might be drunken, but that we might be sober; that we might be glad, not that we get ourselves pain. ‘Wine,’ it says, ‘maketh glad the heart of man,’ but thou makest it matter for sadness; since those who are inebriated are sullen beyond measure, and great darkness over-spreads their thoughts. It is the best medicine, when it has the best moderation to direct it.

The passage before us is useful also against heretics, who speak evil of God’s creatures; for if it had been among the number of things forbidden, Paul would not have permitted it, nor would have said it was to be used. And not only against the heretics, but against the simple ones among our brethren, who when they see any persons disgracing themselves from drunkenness, instead of reproving such, blame the fruit given them by God, and say, ‘Let there be no wine.’ We should say then in answer to such, ‘Let there be no drunkenness; for wine is the work of God, but drunkenness is the work of the devil….”Continue reading to discover the rest of the recommended response.

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Such wise words.

I think I will continue contemplating them over a glass of wine…

Happy Repeal Day!

Drink hearty!