Lotus D.

So Lotus and Ken went to the First Communion retreat on Saturday.  The kids went off to do activities with the PRE instructor, while the parents (of which there were supposed to be two, but karate classes happily got me off the hook) attended a lecture on the origins of the Mass led by Father.

When I asked Ken how his class went, he took a deep breath, studied some point up on the ceiling and tried to find a charitable response. 
"Well,"  he finally said, "I think it was mostly for people who've never given a thought about what the Mass is before.  It wasn't really for people who've, you know, studied anything about it."  I raised an eyebrow at him. 

I asked Lotus how her part went.  She had Ken show me a picture on his cell phone.  Lotus and some boy, standing in front of the Tabernacle, wearing Father's vestments.  Lotus, of course, had chosen the purple ones.  She then presented me with three pieces of artwork.  The first had two footprints, with the title "We Follow Jesus:  We Follow Jesus at School".  Inside the footprints, Lotus drew pictures of how she follows Jesus at school.  There was a picture of her and Maryjohn playing, of Lotus brushing Harvey (which I'd like to see in real life), and an elephant with the word "Share" above it (I don't understand it either).

The next picture was an outline of Lotus' foot (I sent up a quick prayer of gratitude that I'd made her shower before the retreat, since naked feet were seemingly involved) with a prayer I'm pretty sure she was made to copy down, since it was far too bland for a Lotus creation.

The last piece of artwork was a collage.  From various magazines, Lotus had selected and cut out the following items:  a meringue cookie with chocolate chips on it, a birthday cake, three ice cream cookie sandwiches, a scary-looking dog, and an even scarier-looking cat.

"What's this?"  I ask her, eyeing the cat with growing alarm (it was a really, really scary looking cat)
"This is a poster of what I would do if Jesus came to my house,"  she said.
"Oh.  So this is...?"  I said, pointing vaguely at a picture.
"These are the foods I would serve Him,"  she said, pointing at the picture.  I hoped Jesus wasn't diabetic.
"And this?"  I said, pointing at the dog.  "This is a very scary dog.  What are you going to do?  Turn the dogs out on Jesus?  I think that might be a mistake."

Lotus looked at me in absolute horror.  What?  I thought it was funny.

"No, Mommy,"  she said, using The Voice.  "Those two are me showing Him how thankful I am for His creation."  She studied the picture again.   "But I hope He's not allergic to cats like you, Mommy."

I bet He is.  I bet not even Jesus can stand to be around cats.