The Church has a custom of blessing homes on the Feast of the Epiphany and the week following. Family and friends gather to ask God’s blessing on their homes and those who live in or visit the home. It is an invitation for Jesus to be a daily guest in our home, our comings and goings, our conversations, our work and play, our joys and sorrows, and a protection against evil.
A traditional way of doing this is to use chalk blessed during the Epiphany Liturgy and write above the entryway of the home: 20 + C + M + B + 21. The letters C, M, B have two meanings. They are the initials of the traditional names of the three magi: Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar. They also abbreviate the Latin words: Christus mansionem benedicat, “May Christ bless the house.” The “+” signs represent the Cross, and 2021 is the year. Chalk is used to inscribe the entryway of our homes because it is a product of clay, which recalls the human nature taken by the Word of God in the womb of the Virgin Mary, by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Following all the Masses this weekend, obtain your blessed chalk and the prayers of blessing in the atrium. If you eventually need to dispose of your chalk, please do so reverently, for once blessed it is a sacramental, burying the chalk in the soil.
Let us together bring our Catholic Faith into the daily rhythm of our lives!
David J. Conrad
A traditional way of doing this is to use chalk blessed during the Epiphany Liturgy and write above the entryway of the home: 20 + C + M + B + 21. The letters C, M, B have two meanings. They are the initials of the traditional names of the three magi: Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar. They also abbreviate the Latin words: Christus mansionem benedicat, “May Christ bless the house.” The “+” signs represent the Cross, and 2021 is the year. Chalk is used to inscribe the entryway of our homes because it is a product of clay, which recalls the human nature taken by the Word of God in the womb of the Virgin Mary, by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Following all the Masses this weekend, obtain your blessed chalk and the prayers of blessing in the atrium. If you eventually need to dispose of your chalk, please do so reverently, for once blessed it is a sacramental, burying the chalk in the soil.
Let us together bring our Catholic Faith into the daily rhythm of our lives!
David J. Conrad
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