Notre Dame High School (West Haven, CT) legend and friend to all Brother Benjamin Sunday, C.S.C., recently celebrated his birthday!
In true Brother Benjamin style, he wouldn’t tell us what day nor how old he is, but we wanted to wish him a happy birthday publically nonetheless! But he can’t be more than 55.
To view a photo album of Brother Benjamin pictures through the years, please visit the ND photo album page .
Happy Birthday and abundant blessings, Brother Benjamin!
How often do we take seriously the Lord’s teaching that we ought to pray (and care for) our enemies? Likely, not often. We allowed our emotions and prejudices and our hurt to get in the way of loving those who oppose even in a small way. It’s been said, “Our simple and profound life, in which every moment of
the day is offered to God, helps them find purpose in their often difficult
life behind bars.” Pope Benedict’s intentions for August draw us closer to what the Lord wants. Let’s join him and the Church in prayer for the human dignity of those in jail.
“Dear friends, it is clear that configuration to Christ is the precondition and the basis for all renewal. But perhaps at times the figure of Jesus Christ seems too lofty and too great for us to dare to measure ourselves by him. The Lord knows this. So he has provided ‘translations’ on a scale that is more accessible and closer to us. For this same reason, Saint Paul did not hesitate to say to his communities: Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. For his disciples, he was a ‘translation’ of Christ’s manner of life that they could see and identify with. Ever since Paul’s time, history has furnished a constant flow of other such ‘translations’ of Jesus’ way into historical figures.”
Pope Benedict XVI
Nothing is more practical than finding God, than falling in Love in a quite absolute, final way.
What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you do with your evenings, how you spend your weekends, what you read, whom you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.
Fall in Love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.”
Father Pedro Arrupe , SJ (1907-91)
Today, we celebrated a friend’s 25th anniversary of priestly ordination. The Very Reverend Canon Matthew R. Maurielo, priest of the Diocese of Bridgeport, was honored by a host of family and friends. His parents were especially joyous.
In the Benedictine Ordo, Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus are commemorated together and recalled for their gift of friendship and hospitality shown to the Lord. The familiar setting of their Bethany home shows us the priority of welcoming the guest, while remembering the need to be attentive to prayer and work. This portion of the biblical narrative gave rise to Saint Benedict writing in his Holy Rule that guest’s ought to be welcomed as Christ. Martha’s word of faith to Jesus is key for us too, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Let us pray through the intercession of Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus that we be hospitable to the stranger, not only to family and friends.
Ross Douthat, the conservative op-ed columnist of the NY Times ought to be on our radar screen. In the Sunday Review of the NY Times he published “Defining Religious Liberty Down” where he nicely pulls back the politics of religious liberty by the round heads, in all walks of life.
Oratorian Father Edoardo Aldo Cerrato, 62, until now Procurator General of the Confederation of the Oratory, has been nominated bishop of Ivrea, Italy. This is a diocese founded sometime in the 5th century and is the Province of Turin. The new bishop will be ordained on September 8 and will be installed on October 7.
Let us praise Joachim and Anne, to whom, in their generation, the Lord gave him
who was a blessing for all the nations. (entr. ant.)
Since the sixth century the Eastern Church has venerated the memory of Saints Joachim and Anne; it was in the tenth century that the Western Church entered Anne’s name into the martyrology and only recently have both been acknowledged together as the grandparents of Jesus.
Let’s pray for grandparents, living and deceased through the intercession of Saints Joachim and Anne.
On grandparents, the Pope has said in 2008,
As regards the family, grandparents continue to be witnesses of unity, of solid values of faithfulness and that singular love from which faith and the joy of living flow…. In the face of the crisis of the family could it not be time to draw even more upon the presence and testimony of those — grandparents — who have a greater richness of values and experience? We couldn’t, in fact, plan the future without recalling a past characterized by significant experiences and spiritual and moral points of reference. Thinking of grandparents, of their witness of love and faith to live, there come to mind the biblical figures of Abraham and Sara, Elizabeth and Zechariah, of Joachim and Anne, just like the elderly Simeon and Anna, or even Nicodemus: in every age, all of these recall for us how the Lord asks each to bring their own talents.
