Communio – Page 305 – …bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

The dogma of Mary’s Immaculate Conception was given to us by Pope Pius IX and proclaimed in the document, Ineffabilis Deus (1854), solemnly defining a clear and consistent teaching of the Church since 33 AD.

If you ask the question: What can you tell me about Mary as Patroness of America? Boston’s Archbishop (later Cardinal) Richard Cushing wrote an answer.

Famously, the 23 US bishops in 1846 (note: nearly a decade before the dogma’s definition) wrote to the Pope asking for Mary under the title of the Immaculate Conception to be bestowed on the country’s young Church. The bishops wrote:

We take this occasion, brethren, to communicate to you the determination, unanimously adopted by us, to place ourselves and all entrusted to our charge throughout the United States, under the special patronage of the holy Mother of God, whose Immaculate Conception is venerated by the piety of the faithful throughout the Catholic Church.

By the aid of her prayers, we entertain the confident hope that we will be strengthened to perform the arduous duties of our ministry, and that you will be enabled to practice the sublime virtues, of which her life presents the most perfect example.

Pastoral Letter of the Bishops of the United States
Sixth Provincial Council, Baltimore, 5 May 1846

Pearl Harbor remembered: 70 years later

The words of FDR still ring in the ears: “a date which will live in infamy.”

Today is the 70th anniversary of the Attack on Pearl Harbor. 2402 Americans were killed, 1282 injured.

Let us pray for those who perished and those who continue to be burdened with the tragedy. May God be merciful and loving.

Show us, Lord, the immense power of your goodness, that, as we weep for our brothers and sisters taken from us by a sudden death, we may be confident that they have passed over into your eternal company.

Saint Ambrose

O God, who made the Bishop Saint Ambrose a teacher of the Catholic faith and a model of apostolic courage, raise up in your Church men after your own heart to govern her with courage and wisdom.

Let’s pray for Cardinal Angelo Scola and the Church in the great Archdiocese of Milan.

Saint Nicholas

The liturgical memorial of Saint Nicholas observed today is an opportunity to reflect on our reliance on others as we go onto the Lord as a community, people who have regard for another. The sainted bishop Nicholas of Myra (Turkey) reminds us of our reception of unmerited grace given by God.

Let us pray for sailors, orphans and pawnbrokers. I’d also like to remember Melkite Bishop Nicholas Samra on his feast day.

The Church prays…

We humbly implore your mercy, Lord: protect us in all dangers through the prayers of the Bishop Nicholas, that the way of salvation may lie open before us.

(RM 2011)

Are we engaged in reality?

This blog is dedicated to communion theology. What brings us a Christians–Catholics– in communion of the Trinity, the Church and one another. The trusted witness of another gives me certitude that Faith in Jesus Christ and His the Sacrament, the Church, is real and worthy of belonging, not just following. The head of the Communion and Liberation in the USA, Chris Bacich, wrote the following letter to us today. I offer it for your reflection in these days of Advent. Emphasis given is mine.

Dear Friends,

I’ve been wanting to write to you for some time (since
mid-November, really) about the opportunity I had to be with Fr. Carrón and a
few other friends from around the world in Italy.

He invited us to a
“mini-vacation” over a weekend and we spent a good amount of time
speaking about the Movement and the radical nature of its proposal. In
particular, Fr. Carrón wanted to hear from us what change the work on the
school of community on chapters 10 and 11 of the Religious Sense and the flyer produced in Italy on
the crisis had wrought in us. He pointed, in particular, to the very
recent death (it had happened less than a week before we were with him) of a
young man from the CLU [Communion & Liberation University Students] in
Italy who had died in a motorcycle accident. He held an assembly with the
university students, regarding this event, where he boldly insisted that
reality is always positive. (This assembly will be featured in the next
issue of Traces.)
Indeed, the theme of the CLU Spiritual Exercises in Italy will be “The
Inexorable Positivity of Reality.” His boldness in front of such a
tragic event, as well as the insistence of our charism at this time that the
crisis in which the world has fallen at this moment is something positive
encapsulates for me the clash of mentality that exists between us and the
mentality generated by the popular culture that so often rules our hearts and
minds, as well.

Continue reading Are we engaged in reality?

Read the Pope’s address to the Pontifical Council of the Laity

Communion and Liberation posted a new flyer entitled,
“Laity, that is, Christians.” It is a selection from the Pope
Benedict’s address to the Plenary of the Pontifical Council for the Laity that he gave on 25 November
2011.

The Pope’s address is a remarkable confirmation of what Father Julián
Carrón, President of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation has proposed to
us since January: that Christ’s companionship reawakens the depths of our “I” (that
is, our entire person).

I highly recommend that you read the flyer attentively
and to reflect upon the deep communion between our CL charism and the
leadership of the Pope at this historical moment witnessed by it. As someone of
the CL movement said, “We are truly being led by the Good Shepherd in this
moment of such great difficulty for so many!”

Flyer: Laity, that is Christians.pdf

Papal address is available in Italian and Spanish at the moment. Here is the Italian version. Hopefully the English edition will be available soon.

Mercies Remembered: Reflections and Reminiscences of a Parish Priest

A recently published book of a parish priest, Mercies Remembered: Reflections and Reminiscences of a Parish Priest, is being presented at Waterbury’s Silas Bronson Library (267 Grand Street) December 6 at 6:30pm.

Mercies Remembered is described as a collection of “heartfelt stories of mercy from his 22 years as a priest with the simplicity, humility, humor and profundity of a faith-filled life.”

Father Matthew R. Mauriello, STL, is a native of New Jersey and a priest of the Diocese of Bridgeport and is currently the pastor of the Church of Saint Roch (Greenwich, CT). Moreover, he is the president of the North American Congress on Mercy. Father Mauriello was given the honor of being an Honorary Canon of the Cathedral Basilica of Orvieto.

The book is available at the link above on Amazon or from the author, Father Matthew.

Contact:

Father Matthew R. Mauriello

Church of Saint Roch

10 St Roch Avenue

Greenwich, CT 06830-6234

203-243-8343

frmattmaurie@aol.com

Saint Francis Xavier

Today, we take inspiration from the life and work of a great missionary of the Church in the person of Saint Francis Xavier. He got of the classroom and did something for Christ and the Church. Let’s take time today to pray for missionaries and a rejuvenation of the missionary work of the Church.

Xavier wrote…

Brethren, We cease not to pray for you, and to beg
that you may be filled with the knowledge of the will of God, in all wisdom and
spiritual understanding; that you may walk worthy of God, in all things
pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of
God; strengthened with all might according to the power of His glory, in all
patience and long suffering with joy; giving thanks to God the Father, who hath
made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light:
who hath delivered us from the power of darkness,
and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have
redemption through the His Blood, the remission of sins.

(Epistle for the Last Sunday after Pentecost, Col. i, 9-14)

Dolan inaugurates Project on Human Dignity at Notre Dame

Timothy Michael Dolan, PhD, Archbishop of New York and President of the US Bishops’ Conference will deliver a lecture entitled, “Modern Questions, Ancient Answers: Defining and Defending Human Dignity in Our Time” on Tuesday, December 6, @ 7:30pm inaugurating a new venture of the University of Notre Dame called “Project on Human Dignity.” There will be Protestant and Catholic responses by Ann Astell and Gerald McKenny.

Project on Human Dignity is the latest work of my alma mater is part of several new efforts to be consistent with the Church’s teaching on life, particularly Blessed John Paul II’s landmark encyclical Evangelium Vitae with a project called University Life Initiatives.

Joseph Ratzinger’s “The pastoral approach to marriage should be founded on truth”

From a little known text by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger published in 1998

The pastoral approach to marriage should be founded on truth

Concerning some objections to the Church’s teaching on the reception of Holy Communion by divorced and remarried members of the faithful

In 1998 Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, introduced the volume entitled “On the Pastoral Care of the Divorced and Remarried,” published by the Libreria in the CDF’s series (“Documenti e Studi”, 17). Because of its current interest and breadth of perspective, we reproduce below the third part along with the addition of three notes. The text was published today by L’Osservatore Romano.

The Letter of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith of 14 September 1994 concerning the reception of Holy Communion by divorced and remarried members of the faithful was met with a very lively response across wide sections of the Church. Along with many positive reactions, more than a few critical voices were also heard. The fundamental objections against the teaching and practice of the Church are outlined below in simplified form.

Several of the more significant objections – principally, the reference to the supposedly more flexible practice of the Church Fathers which would be the inspiration for the practice of the Eastern Churches separated from Rome, as well as the allusion to the traditional principles of epicheia and of aequitas canonica – were studied in-depth by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Articles by Professors Pelland, Marcuzzi and Rodriguez Luño 2, among others, were developed in the course of this study. The main conclusions of the research, which suggest the direction of an answer to the objections, will be briefly summarized here.

Continue reading Joseph Ratzinger’s “The pastoral approach to marriage should be founded on truth”