As Kendra Tierney looked at the liturgical year wall calendar in her kitchen, ideas of how to bring the traditions of the church to life for her children percolated in her mind. Gradually, the recipes, crafts and activities she came up with became a blog and then a book called “The Catholic All Year Compendium: Liturgical Living for Real Life.” “(Liturgical living) had really revolutionized my understanding of the Catholic faith and the way that I was able to share it with my kids and our neighbors and friends,” said Tierney, a California-based mom of 10.
Miles away in Virginia, Emily Tate, a mother of three and parishioner of Holy Trinity Church in Gainesville, picked up Tierney’s book. It was the feast of St. Martin de Tours, and in honor of when he cut his cloak in half for a beggar, the book suggested cleaning out the family coat closet. “(It) was an activity that was so appropriate for the day and it served a purpose in my house,” said Tate. “I was so inspired by the outcome that we tried to add in more and more moving forward.”
Tate had a small business creating gift boxes filled with wares from Catholic makers, and she wondered if Tierney would be interested in creating Catholic All Year subscription boxes containing the types of things families could use to celebrate the feasts. So she messaged Tierney on Instagram and soon the Catholic All Year Marketplace was born.
To their surprise, hundreds of people subscribed to their initial Lent box. “We were packing them from my kitchen table, it was all my family helping,” said Tate. “We thought, it seems like the Lord has opened this door so let’s run with it. My family moved to be able to accommodate the business and we specifically chose a property that had this detached garage space which we renovated and moved the business into.”
The collaboration of two Catholic moms from different coasts became a brick-and-mortar shop open for business Aug. 12. Tierney joined Tate for the grand opening of the Catholic All Year Marketplace in Marshall. “We’re super excited to show the community that we built this little local Catholic shop,” said Tate.
On the sunny summer afternoon, whole families walked through the marketplace, checking out Tierney’s books and the goodies included in the subscription boxes — cards, candles, stickers and craft kits. Outside on the lawn, vendors sold cookies, flowers and religious art. Tierney signed books and posed for selfies with fans. “It’s really fun to get to meet people who said they’ve read the book and that it has made a difference in their family life,” she said. “This is such a counter-cultural way to live and it makes it feel so much more doable when we can actually meet other people who have the same goals for their family that we do. You want your family to know other people’s kids who also put their shoes out for the feast of St. Nicholas and who also observe Lent.”
Maggie Ciskanik, a parishioner of Holy Trinity and a mother of four, came to the opening to support the mission of liturgical living and local Catholic vendors. “Everything is beautiful inside and I’m very impressed with how it’s all come together,” she said. “I’m so happy to see that there’s such a good turnout for them.”
Megan Gibson, a mother of three and a parishioner of Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in Winchester, has found ways to incorporate liturgical living into her family life ever since she discovered Tierney’s blog two years ago. The family made ice cream sundaes on Divine Mercy Sunday, baked a honey cake for the feast day of St. John the Baptist, who famously ate honey and locusts, and fashioned a heart out of strawberries on the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
At the marketplace, she bought Marian toys to put into her daughters’ shoes on the feast of St. Nicholas. She hopes to celebrate their baptism days this year. “There’s so many different days that I didn’t even know about — different saints’ days, solemnities and feast days,” said Gibson. “It’s been a pretty cool way to grow in our faith that’s also really fun at the same time.”
