Celebrating Holy Days

Yesterday a morning Mass, or rather, at Eucharistic Service in the Absence of a Priest, my mind wandered a bit...

The Feast of the Transfiguration.

Wow.

Just wow.

How is that not a bigger deal in the Roman Catholic Church?
Of course, thanks to our conscientious deacon, we had a Gloria which we do not on most Solemnities, but still....

But then, I also thought - "Domestic Church."
Whose job would it be to make a bigger deal of a Holy Day?

That's right.

I have no children, so this is easy for me to say, but I think if I did.... (and I can say, I have been primary care-giver for weeks at a time of quite a number of rugrats
Well, to start, I would be broker than I am now.
And secondly, summer vacations, at least when I was growing up, were almost de rigeur, but also touch and go, what with thirteen mouths, and all that.
And "stay-cations," an inelegant neo-logism but an idea whose time has come, are more feasible for any struggling with pecuniary matters.

SO...

Why not make Holy Days, holidays?
Imagine celebrating next Friday by getting up before dawn and going out somewhere beautiful, or at least unusual to watch the sun rise? and then going with your family to whatever is the earliest Mass around? perhaps at a Church to which you've never been before, and will have new windows and statues and architecture to take in? and then going out to a celebratory brunch or breakfast, even if it's just fastfood? (remembering, if you abstain from meat on Fridays during the year that there is no fast on a feast?)

Wouldn't that be enough out of the ordinary to be something for children to actually look forward to? (and not too ruinously expensive, which I know really matters when you've got scads of kids.)

And if you really planned it, talking about it ahead of time, wouldn't that help solidify the fact of the Holy Day? (which is something quite lacking in most world views, even for Catholics alas...)

I dunno, just an idea...