Blessings on Independence Day to the United States of America!
Some don’t like separation.
Benedict XVI receives honorary doctorate
Earlier today at Castel Gandolfo Pope-emeritus Benedict XVI received honorary degrees from the Pontifical John Paul II University in Krakow and from the Krakow Music Academy.
Vatican Radio ran this story.
“We do not know what will be the future of sacred music, but one thing is clear: wherever the encounter with the Living God, who in Christ comes close to us really occurs, there is born anew and there again grows the answer, the beauty of which arises out of truth itself.”
Benedict XVI, 4 July 2015
Saint Thomas the Apostle
Saint Thomas the Apostle is celebrated by the Christian Churches today. Not much is known of Thomas but John’s gospel plugs us in at some very key moments in the Lord’s mission.
He’s the apostle –one of the 12– that tradition says brought the Good News to is today called India. Thomas died a martyr’s death. Likewise, Thomas is famous for wanting to see, to have concrete proof of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. But I wonder if this is the most important part of Thomas’ life. Something tells me there is more than this apostle’s famous query: “not unless I probe the side of Jesus will I believe…” This 13th century German illumination illustrates the biblical narrative.
The Lord blesses us, in his beatitude as he prepares to return the Father: he gives the grace to know at some fundamental human level that those who do not have such sight and tactile proof may believe. That’s Good News for which to give thanks. Thomas had his God-mission; what is your mission for the Kingdom?
Francis and Benedict
Everyone needs a summer a vacation! Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI went on holiday for 2 weeks at the Papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo. The summer residence is a very familiar place for Benedict. Before Benedict left, Pope Francis paid a visit to his predecessor.
Among the notables, are the others who make up Benedict’s household.
Photo courtesy of L’Osservatore Romano: www.photo.va
Sts Peter and Paul
A meditation on the feast of Saints Peter and Paul
“Conduct yourselves with fear in the time of your sojourning” (1 Peter 1:17).
These are the words of the great Apostle Peter, words that have a dual foundation: heavenly inspiration and personal experience. By divine inspiration, Peter, a simple fisherman, became a teacher of the people, a pillar of the Faith and a powerful miracle-worker. According to his own experience he learned that all of his wisdom and power was of God and, because of that, one should possess the fear of God. No other fear, except the fear of God.
The foolish one becomes frightened only when lightning flashes and thunder cracks but the wise man fears God every day and every hour. The Creator of lightning and thunder is more awesome than both of them and He does not appear before you, from time to time, as lightning and thunder rather He is continually before you and does not move away from you. That is why it is not enough, from time to time, to have fear of God, but one must breathe in the fear of God. The fear of God is the ozone in the suffocating atmosphere of our soul. This ozone brings purity, easiness, sweet fragrance and health. Until he had become strengthened in the fear of God, Peter was only Peter and not an apostle, hero, teacher of the people and miracle-worker.
O my brethren, let us not rejoice before the harvest. This, our life, is not a harvest but rather, it is a sowing, labor, sweat and fear. The plower lives in fear until he has gathered the fruits from the field. Let us also delay our rejoicing for the day of harvest, for now is the time for labor and fear. Will I be saved? This question should torment every one of us, in the same way that the plower is tormented by the question: “Will I reap the fruit of my labor in the field?” The plower labors and fears everyday. Let us also labor and fear “all the time of our sojourning” on earth.
O awesome and powerful Lord, sustain us in Your fear.
To You be glory and thanks always. Amen.
Take from the Prologue from Ochrid
Saints Peter and Paul
We honor the great apostles of the Church, Saints Peter and Paul. Across the Christian community they are celebrated today. The Gospel reveal the wonderful words to Jesus, such as “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” and “Lord you know that I love you.”
Peter and Paul set the standard: they sometimes get relationship wrong, as in the denials (and persecution) of Christ. Both reject the Jesus at first but the Lord has the final say. Both show their willingness to be open to grace which I find striking and inviting. My patron, Paul, on the other hand, gives us sublime spiritual theology about Jesus Christ, the Church, grace, generativity, and much more for the Christian life.
The dual feast today gives us a clear example of how to live in a profound complementarity with Christians so that our witness can deeply nourish the spiritual life of the Church and generate the hundredfold Christ promised us.
Let us pray for the unity of the Church!
Sister Nirmala, who succeeded Mother Teresa, died
Sister Nirmala Joshi, MC, the woman who succeeded Mother Teresa as the leader of the Missionaries of Charity, in 1997, has died at the age of 81. She had been suffering from a heart condition.
Sister Nirmala was the superior of the order until 2009, when she stepped down because of ill health. Before that she held positions of leadership in the congregation including being a founding member of the contemplative branch of the Missionaries of Charity. Sister Mary Prema Pierick, a German sister, was elected superior general.
Historically, Sister Nirmala was born the second of 10 children on July 23, 1934 to a Nepalese Hindu family in the Bihar state. Her given the name Kusum, meaning flower. Sister graduated with an undergraduate degree from Patna Women’s College, administered by Apostolic Carmel nuns and later earned a Master’s degree and a law degree.
We carry our cross
Daily I am reminded that life is not easy for others, and for me. We carry burdens of health, the spiritual life, economy, of relationship and psychology. How is our heart affected? The burdens we carry are only lightened when we make a connection with Jesus who first carried the cross for us.
Remember that each of us has his own cross. The Golgotha of this cross is our heart: it is being lifted or implanted through a zealous determination to live according to the Spirit of God. Just as salvation of the world is by the Cross of God, so our salvation is by our crucifixion on our own cross.
St. Theophan the Recluse
Saint Anthony of Padua
God has given us a saint that is more important merely a person who finds loss items. Saint Anthony of Padua is really the model of being pure of heart. A rare virtue these days.
The liturgical memory of Saint Anthony of Padua (1191/5-1231), recalls for us that one of the most renowned Franciscans of history can be real, humble and call all to greater freedom in Christ. No one was immune to the preaching of Anthony: even the fish were converted to the Lord. The record gives us:
Historically, he was baptized Ferdinand into a family of knights in Lisbon, Portugal, then on the frontiers between the Christian and Muslim cultures, he entered the canons regular of St. Augustine as a young man, first stationed in Lisbon and then in Coimbra, where he received an excellent education in the Scriptures. The Friars Minor arrived in Portugal in 1217, and Ferdinand, inspired by five friars who were martyred in Morocco in 1220, joined them, taking the name Anthony after the small Franciscan hermitage outside Coimbra. He ended up in Italy, and within a few years, became a noted preacher in Northern Italy and in Southern France. Given permission by Saint Francis to teach theology to the friars, in 1227 he became provincial minister of Northern Italy and developed a strong association with the city of Padua. His preaching made a strong link between conversion to the Gospel and social justice. He died on this day in 1231 and was canonized the following year.
A thought from Saint Anthony’s homily for the Fifth Sunday after Easter. “Brothers and sisters, let us pray that the Lord Jesus Christ pour his grace into us by means of which we ask for and receive the fullness of true joy. May he ask the Father for us; may he grant us true religion so that we may merit to come to the kingdom of eternal life.”
For a more detailed popular biography click on this link.
If you look at the picture you’ll notice that Saint Anthony holds the lily, the symbol of purity of heart. The presence of the Christ child in the saint’s scripture book is meant to indicate that Saint Anthony discovered the living Christ in the pages of Scripture.
Sacred Heart of Jesus
Today is the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. So many things to think of and to pray for to the Heart of Jesus. We ought to sing with Scripture “With joy you will draw water from the fountain of salvation” (Isaiah 12:3). For that, in fact, is the key to open the door to this feast: Christ wants to give so many graces as a fountain of salvation.
What an intense day of prayer already! I am reminded that Saint John Marie Vianney considered “The priesthood is the love of the heart of Jesus .”
All are welcome into His Divine Friendship.
The reflection comes from the Franciscan Saint Bonaventure:
“’They shall look on him whom they pierced.’ The blood and water which poured out at that moment were the price of our salvation. Flowing from the secret depths of our Lord’s heart as from a fountain, this stream gave the sacraments of the Church the power to confer the life of grace, while for those already living in Christ it became a spring of living water welling up to eternal life.”
It is traditional to pray this prayer today:
COMING to Jesus and seeing that He was already dead, they did not break His legs, but one of the soldiers opened Jesus’ side with a spear and immediately there came forth blood and water.
V. You shall draw waters with joy.
R. From the fountains of the Savior.
Let us pray:
O God, who in the Heart of Thy Son, wounded for our sins, dost mercifully lavish upon us the treasures of Thy love; grant, we beseech Thee, that with our devout homage we may also offer Him worthy reparation. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.