Epiphany Blessing

I once heard Mother Angelica say that if you're Catholic, people ought to be able to tell when they walk into your house. When she said it, we had one single cross (Risen Christ) in the house. These days, you sure can tell we're Catholic, especially if you take a look at our school area! Saints, crucifixes, statues, Rosaries, missals, Bibles, hymnals, pictures of John Paul II and Jesus all over the place.

And now, we have another thing to show our faith: Epiphany blessings above the door lintels. I love being Catholic! There are just so many hands-on things we can do to bolster our faith! I love that the Church gives us things that engage all of our senses!

What you are supposed to do for this blessing is have your priest bless a piece of chalk for you. (I suppose your deacon could also do it.) Remember that your chalk should not be thrown away if it is blessed! Blessed items should be either burned or buried respectfully if they are to be disposed of. Apparently, you should also get some fresh holy water. I forgot to do this, but we did have holy water from our parish that I had stored in a small bottle. You use the chalk and holy water to bless the lintels of your home. With the chalk, the father of the family writes:

20+K+M+B+08

that is

20 (century), cross, K (Kaspar), cross, M (Melchior), cross, B (Balthasar), cross, 08 (year)

(Note: I have also seen a "C" used for "Caspar" for this blessing.)

Soccer Dad had to use our holy water to bless our chalk today because I wound up teaching CCD at the last minute. I had the chalk in my purse, and Father R. never came to my classroom during class. By the time I was finally finished, Father was getting ready for the 11:30 Mass. So I missed him!

Basically, Soccer Dad asked God to please bless the chalk, then he sprinkled a little holy water on it. Hopefully, that was fine because I couldn't find anyone with holy orders around after Sunday school! (I'm sure God didn't mind. It's Him Who does the blessing, anyway, but the priest or deacon is specially suited for this because of his ordination.)

Soccer Dad used the Ephiphany blessing found here to bless the lintels in the house. The chalk shows up best above our front door, but he blessed the lintels of every bedroom and all the doors that lead outside. He also sprinkled holy water in each room of the house.

I really like this tradition! We'll definitely be doing this every year!