Spiritual Bouquet

 When I was a little Catholic boy, I used to give my Mom and Dad “Spiritual Bouquets.”  These were not flowers, which I could not afford.  And if I could afford the flower, it was simply me buying a flower and giving it to my Mom.  Easy peasy.  But a Spiritual Bouquet is a lot of work on my part.  I would promise to say all number of prayers and going to mass and doing good for others, as a gift to the one who receives the Bouquet card.  I am still paying off on all I said I would pray and do.  Over the years of Bouquet card lists I must have a gazillion masses to attend and rosaries to say, and good works to do, and so on.  But the good news is I was giving a gift of what I would do, not what I would ask someone else to do.  Well we have the custom of having a mass said for someone, say a dead person, I am not doing anything but paying the stipend for the mass intention.  But if I were to include doing some good for someone who is suffering the loss of that dead person, then I am into action that will change me for the better.  I have to go now to say yet one more rosary, though my Mom is already in heaven.  A promise is a promise.