With the Church in her Liturgy we pray to the Lord:
“…we may serve You with love and obtain perfect joy.”
Vocations: “…everyone will know that you are my disciples…”
Released earlier today, the Pope gave the Church his thinking and hopes for the living and the promotion of vocations. Very clear is the Pope’s insistence on one’s being familiar with the Scriptures, friendship with the Lord cultivated through personal and liturgical prayer. Also, one’s own self-awareness factors into the discernment of one’s vocation, whether to religious life, priesthood or to the lay state. May the Lord of the Harvest grant an increase.
The 48th World
Day of Prayer for Vocations, to be celebrated on 15 May 2011, the Fourth Sunday
of Easter, invites us to reflect on the theme: “Proposing Vocations in the
Local Church”. Seventy years ago, Venerable Pius XII established the Pontifical
Work of Priestly Vocations. Similar bodies, led by priests and members of the
lay faithful, were subsequently established by Bishops in many dioceses as a
response to the call of the Good Shepherd who, “when he saw the crowds,
had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd”,
and went on to say: “The harvest is plentiful but the labourers are few.
Pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his
harvest!” (Mt 9:36-38).
Continue reading Vocations: “…everyone will know that you are my disciples…”
Lubomyr Cardinal Husar, MSU, Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, retires
His Beatitude, Lubomyr Cardinal Husar, MSU, 78, retired from serving the Ukrainian Catholic Church today. The Holy Father accepted the Cardinal’s request to retired due to health concerns. He has served the Church in his present position since 2001.
His Beatitude has been a bishop since 1977. Husar has done a terrific job for the Church these past years and is owed a debt of gratitude.
The Cardinal has a terrific sense of humor, friendly and insightful. My sadness is that he never was granted the title of Patriarch, a title he’s entitled to use given the state of his Church but the pope’s have been reticent to grant the patriarch’s title in fear of what the Russian Orthodox Church would say.
CNS’ Cindy Wooden’s article on His Beatitude’s resignation; looking to the future…
Saint Maron
In honor of the 1600th anniverssary of the death of Saint Maron, the Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI blessed and unveiled a new statue of the saint at the Vatican basilica of Saint Peter’s.
For the past year, Maronites and others around the world have been observing a jubliee year called by His Beatitude, Patriarch Nasralla Peter Sfeir. In a letter to the Maronite Church around the world he said, in part,
Our Church was not built after a name of a See or Apostle, but rather took its identity from the radiance of a man and a monastery: the Maronite Church, a Church of asceticism and adoration attached from the beginning to a solitary man, not a man of rank or a Church leader.The faith lived out by the hermit Maron became the inner strength of a people’s history. As for the successive migrations from Syria (in the 5-10th centuries), the Maronites gave them one meaning, that is, giving up land, wealth and comfort in Syria moving toward a poor land where anxiety and austerity prevail, so they could preserve their faith and remain attached to their freedom … This event is not a simple historical fact among others … it is the very beginning of a new history, the history of the Maronites.
The Jubilee Prayer
Lord, Jesus, You called Your chosen one, Saint Maron, to the monastic life, perfected him in divine virtues, and guided him along the difficult road to the heavenly kingdom.
During this jubilee year, commemorating 1600 years since the death of Your chosen one, Saint Maron, when he was called to the house of Your heavenly Father, we ask You, through his intercession, to immerse us in Your love that we may walk in Your path, heed Your commandments, and follow in his footsteps.
May his holy example resonate throughout our lives. With Your love, may we achieve that final distination reached by our father, Saint Maron, and carry Your Gospel throughout the world.
Through his intercession, may we attain the glory of the resurrection and everlasting life in You.
Glory and thanks are due to You, to Your blessed Father, and to Your living Holy Spirit, now and forever. Amen.
Saint Josephine Margaret Bakhita
Jesus left his throne in heaven,
Humbly coming as a slave,
Here his love and his obedience
Were the ransom that still saves:
Strong the song the Church now raises
For this humble virgin’s day,
Praising God that, through all struggles,
She was led to Christ, the Way.
As a child torn from her fam’ly,
Made a slave, great suff’ring bore,
And by those who took her childhood,
Named “Bakhita” everymore.
Brought to Italy and rescued
By Cannosian sisters there,
She found Christ and then was baptized,
Lived in service and in prayer.
As the virgins in the Gospel,
Josephine was filled with light,
Daily serving at her convent,
Greetings all with heaven’s sight;
Loving all with Jesus’ mercy,
Treating each as she would him–
Persevered through pain and sorrow,
Making life her off’ring-hymn.
Glory to the loving Father
Who has made us for his own;
Glory to the Son, who saves
And who lifts us to his throne;
Glory to the Holy Spirit,
Never-ending font of love!
With our saint, the “one most blessèd,”
We raise songs to God above!
J. Michael Thompson
Copyright © 2010, WLP
8787D; BEACH SPRING
Saint Colette
Saint Colette is the famous 15th century reformer of the Poor Clare nuns. You see her reform noted as the Colettine Poor Clares. She follows to a “T” the rigorous life set down by Saint Clare herself in hearing the words “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” She did; so did others.
King Henry VIII would compare Saint Colette to “a diligent bee that gathers exquisite honey from the precious flowers of the most rare virtues.”
The Prayer Over the Gifts for Saint Colette’s Mass reads:
Lord, may the gifts we bring You help us to follow the example of Saint Colette. Cleanse us from our earthly way of life, and teach us to live the new life of Your kingdom.
Here the Church wants us to receive the gift of singular focus on the new we’ve received already through Baptism, Confirmation and the Holy Eucharist. The new life preached by Christ and the Church today.
According to the Roman-Franciscan Sacramentary of 1974, February 7 is the liturgical memorial of Saint Colette, not March 6 as noted in other places. A previous blog post on Saint Colette can be read here.
Saint Paul Miki and his companions, martyrs
The Church observes the liturgical memorial of Saint Paul Miki and his companions, martyrs for believing in Jesus. The only thing a person of true faith in Christ can say is what the Apostle Paul said in his letter to the Galatians: “I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me.”
A beautiful for the feast
O Christ, the source of endless life,
We bring you thanks and praise today
That martyrs bold your name confessed
And, through their pain, held to your Way.
The gospel preached within Japan
Converted both adult and child,
And flourished there by your rich grace
Despite oppression fierce and wild.
When hatred for this infant church
Broke out in persecution’s might,
Your martyrs knew you as their Lord
Who shined in darkness as their light.
O Father, Son, and Spirit blest,
To you all glory now is due.
As were the Martyrs of Japan,
May we to Christ be ever true!
J. Michael Thompson
Copyright © 2010, World Library Publications
LM; TALLIS’ CANON, BRESLAU”
Real change in history not administrative but of the heart, Discalced Carmelite superior says
Personal and corporate renewal is always a timely topic. Recently, the Superior General of the Discalced
Carmelites, Father Saverio Cannistrà, speaking about the hope of renewing his
order answered a question in what he saw as essential to renewal. I think the renewal is not only for the Carmelites but for all us. Don’t you think?
In part Father Cannistrà said:
“it is rather like the way of prayer Saint Teresa [of Avila] talks about: a growth that
happens day by day, passing through moments of consolation and desolation, but
with the determination to forge ahead, without giving up. The real changes
which have had an effect on history, are not mere administrative reorganizations:
they are changes of heart, as Scripture tells us. If we do not expose our heart
to the beneficial tempest of the Spirit, then generous and prophetic
initiatives cannot be born from it. Formation, both initial and ongoing, would
probably be the sole help that we could offer, as an institution, to tread this
path.”
“it is rather like the way of prayer Saint Teresa [of Avila] talks about: a growth that
happens day by day, passing through moments of consolation and desolation, but
with the determination to forge ahead, without giving up. The real changes
which have had an effect on history, are not mere administrative reorganizations:
they are changes of heart, as Scripture tells us. If we do not expose our heart
to the beneficial tempest of the Spirit, then generous and prophetic
initiatives cannot be born from it. Formation, both initial and ongoing, would
probably be the sole help that we could offer, as an institution, to tread this
path.”
Cybertheology
Cybertheology is not one of the sub-sections of systematic theology. At least not yet. But it is a promising idea that will likely have a positive influence in the lives of those who surf the web religiously and for those searching for God and who are not ready (willing?) to be personally involved in the Sunday celebration of the Mass or any other organized religious program that requires one to be physically present.
The originator of the Cybertheology project, Jesuit Father Antonio Spadaro, one of the editors at La Civiltà Cattolica, started a blog to investigate the new, dynamic and complex influence of the Net and the challenages it poses to our relationships with others, language, thinking and the Divinity. I take Father Spadaro’s interest and work in this subject on the impact of the digital world to be wholly consistent with what Pope Benedict talked about in his January 2011 letter on social communications where he said “new technologies must be placed at the service of the integral good of the individual and of the whole of humanity. If used wisely, they can contribute to the satisfaction of the desire for meaning, truth and unity which remain the most profound aspirations of each human being.” And, “This dynamic [the digital world] has contributed to a new appreciation of communication itself, which is seen first of all as dialogue, exchange, solidarity and creation of positive relations.”
Reno new editor of First Things
The Chairman of the Board of First Things, Robert Louis Wilken, announced that Russell R. Reno is the new editor of First Things.
RR Reno is the sometime professor of theological ethics at Creighton University. He earned a doctorate from Yale University.
Reno recently published Fighting the Noonday Devil and Other Essays Personal and Theological (Eerdmans, 2011).
The appointment is effective April 1.
RR Reno’s the second successor to Father Richard John Neuhaus. Jody Bottum left the editorship a few months ago.
