Holy Housewifery ~ Chapter 5, 8, & 9

Be prepared for a long post here.  I just thought I would sum up the final three chapters of the book in one post.  I have begun a new book already that I am really excited to share, so I need to finish up my thoughts on this one. =D

Chapter 5 ~ Water on the Knee is Good for the Brain

• "The Church says: 'Let the glorious beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and direct the work of our hands for us... O do thou direct the work of our hands.'"
• Ora et labora- "Pray and work"
• Work "is our prayer, penance, therapy, a release for the intellect." 
• For the love of God
• This is the day which the Lord has made.  Let us work and be glad in it.

Since I have been at home more recently, this chapter was good for me to recognize how I can find holiness and meaning in the chores I have around the house.  This chapter made me think of St. Teresa of Avila who said "the Lord is also to be found among the pots and pans," in the midst of our daily duties and not only in church.  I will write more about this later in regard to the new book I am reading.

Chapter 8 ~ Sophia Loren vs. The Boy Scouts

• "We have become so inured to the plethora of the ABZ Manual Of Love type sex instruction books that our minds are dulled."
• "I come to talk to you about being sexy, full of sex, your sex.  I come to equate sexiness with womanliness, a state of being which takes in more than creativity in the bedroom.  A sexy woman exudes her womanliness at all times, when she presses pants, cleans chickens, pots a hyacinth, reads Stuart Little, bakes a cherry pie, or nags."
• "The definitions of womanliness are as varied as those who wish them.  I feel that it is exemplified best in the valiant woman of the Proverbs, she who sheathed a supple steel in her apron scabbard and 'looked well to the paths of her house.'  Whatever your idea of the womanly woman, when you see her, you know her."
• "Sexiness and holiness aren't such incompatible bedfellows; as a matter of fact, they should work pretty good together in bed.  But a sexy housewife needs a new image; or rather, she just needs an image... The sexy woman stereotype is usually the 'other' woman who indulges in dressing cheap, acting cheap, wearing false eyelashes and bosoms, and dallying with other women's husbands.  You never see her as the demure wife, saintly, faded and slightly starched..."
• "How you accomplish this sexiness is up to you.  You've got to try a bit of this, some of that, something borrowed, something blue, even a rinse by Miss Clairol if you honestly believe that blondes have more fun."
• "For most of us, our womanly potential has hardly been scratched."
• "My own theory, not original, is that the sexiest woman is she who covers up the most."
• In regard to the ever changing trends and fashions: "We should make our own judgements and not run lemming-like into the (New Breed) sea of fashionable ugliness."
• "Being a woman every inch, or curve, of the way won't hinder your being holy.  It may even get you there faster."   

Chapter 9 ~ Anyone Who Goes Gathering Nuts in May is Crazy

(I'm actually not sure what this title has to do with the content of the chapter...)

• Be honest about yourself.  "Your honesty will touch all the vital organs of your marriage."
• "If you can acknowledge that there are times when you and your beloved are moons apart in understanding, there is a quicker bounce back from depression."
• "Even if marriages are made in heaven, they are lived on earth and subject to the stresses of this world."
• "We must accept the advice and pronouncements of friends with good grace, for most of them mean well, and then go about our own decisions."
• "No matter how good friends are, they can never understand the mysterious alliance that is being enacted by you him, and God, simply because they see with their very specialized and limited view, as we all do.  We do not know the sins and sacrifices that go on in the inner city of that couple's community."