“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” – Mother Goose No serious Catholic would dispute the authority of Mother Goose, at least not with words. But in actions, many a Catholic does go against her advice. One of the great means to combat what  Fr Garrigou-Lagrange called our “predominant fault” is good recreation. But it is missing in the lives of the faithful. When I hear confessions, I often try to pay attention to the amendment of life, which is not unimportant to the Sacrament of Penance, given that many sins call out for an increase or improvement of recreation. Yet if asked about recreation there are often responses which indicate there is little or no recreation in many people’s lives. Our good Lord said that we would have to become like children to enter the kingdom of God, and in fact, it is only with childlike wonder that we can best appreciate the Roman Rite with its symbolism and even the architecture that goes with it. The author Henry Adams once wrote about the great cathedral of Chartres, one of the world’s finest examples of Gothic architecture. He was Protestant, so he had no background in Catholic theology, but he was a good student of architecture. He had heard of the Catholic ability to express theology in stone as much as in a painting or a hymn. So he travelled to Chartres, and by just looking at, reflecting on, and wondering about the cathedral, he was able to understand much about what the theology of the time taught about the Blessed Virgin. Here is an example of what he learned through his keen observation: