It happens to be over 100 degrees here in the Midwest - heat advisories and all. It happens to be the only day that calendars between two branches of the family coincided, and it happened to be the day that I decided to take my group to The Shrine of Christ's Passion in St. John, IN. Today we happened to fall a few rungs up the ladder from the Duggars - five kids all in purple Totus Tuus T-shirts with rosaries singing Vacation Bible School songs on the journey.

Anyhow, our group included my 91 year old grandmother and her 86 year old sister-in-law, plus two single "different" first cousins once or twice removed. They happen to be very good sons to their mother, never married, vegan, agnostic types.

One of my sons was polite enough to wait until out of ear shot when he asked was is as agnostic. I tried to explain it as nicely as possible (it should be clear that we mostly associate with large like-minded Catholic families). Son #1 said to relative, "It's OK, God still loves you." and Son #2 said, "We're Catholic enough for you, too."

Price for Catholic prayer cards for everyone's collection: $9.00. Definitely well worth it.

And the relatives were only irreverant once when they commented that there were enough of us to fill the places at the Last Supper which began the interactive journey. This Shrine had life-size depictions of the station of the Cross.

We then went out to a very nice luncheon with the relatives, and my children were quite appreciative of "real napkins" and "more than one fork" - we are clearly Culver's and Steak N Shake folks. Older daughter to younger daughter: "Did you hear how eloquently the one missing teeth discussed the wine selection? Maybe he's missing the teeth because he spent so much time with the poor in India." Younger daughter: "Just like Mother Theresa"
Older daughter: "Yes, right. Just like Mother Theresa."