Saturday, May 12, 2007

Taking the Sacrament


Last month I had to visit our state capital and our state capitol. I took pictures, and I never got around to posting them.


The decoration is supposed to remind you of the frugality with which the legislature allocates our hard-earned wages, collected in the form of various taxes.


I don’t remember ever being in this building before, or even noticing it. It’s about a block west of the Capitol. I happened to run across it because it was between my parking garage (and my morning stop) and the Capitol.


Our state capital, like so many other cities in the state, is named with Christian intent. The Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament celebrates the ritualization of the Last Supper. It lends its name to the city.

In California the church and the state government are separated by about a block and a half.

It was my mother’s birthday, so I paid a dollar and lit a candle in the chapel dedicated to Our Lady and the Saints of the Americas, which presumably would include both Mary and Father Serra. (Well, it may one day. Technically he’s only been beatified so far, not canonized. Never let facts stand in the way of a worthless pun.)

Actually, I was specifically interested in this cathedral because after an extensive renovation it recently won an award for its woodwork. I was in the capital on woodworking business, so it seemed appropriate to have a look.


Ecclesiastes is one of my favorite books of the Bible, for various reasons. These words come from that book.

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