Catholic Apologetics Summer Camp sponsored by the Envoy Institute & Belmont Abbey College

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Come enjoy deepening your faith and learning how to better defend it from some of America’s leading Catholic apologists, while having a blast in the great outdoors in a setting that’s close to heaven: nestled in the Pisgah National Forest in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. (Go to www.2FunCamps.com to check out our gorgeous conference site. Boys and girls will sleep in separate camps, but will be together during the day.)

 

Our first-ever Envoy Institute Summer Apologetics Camp is open to students ages 16-19 and will be held August 15-21, 2010. Sessions will be led by Dr. Ben Wiker, Jim Burnham, Ken Hensley, Dr. Paul Thigpen, and your host Patrick Madrid, Director of the Envoy Institute of Belmont Abbey College. Other speakers will be finalized over the summer, and all reading materials, etc. will be supplied. And in between sessions you’ll have ample opportunities to enjoy fun activities like whitewater rafting, rock climbing, hiking, or just reading in the shade of a
tree.
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Early registration discounts are available, but space is very limited. So register online today!

Saint Peter of Verona, martyr

Let us rejoice in celebrating the victory of Saint
Peter Martyr. On earth he proclaimed St Peter Verona martyr.jpgChrist’s love for us. Now Christ leads him
to a place of honor before his Father in heaven.


Almighty God, you crowned our
brother Peter with martyrdom for confessing the true faith with perseverance.
Give to us, your people, that same faith that we too may receive the gift of
salvation.


From a Vita

“He [Saint Peter of Verona, martyr, 1206-1252] was marked
by great perfection as a Friar: so watchful was he over the purity of his body
and soul that he never felt himself defiled by a mortal sin. He chastened his
body by fasting and watching, and ennobled his soul by the contemplation of the
things of God. He was constantly busied in works for furthering the salvation
of souls; and had a peculiar gift of grace for clearly convincing heretics.
Such was his power as a preacher, that countless crowds were drawn together to
hear him, and many were moved to repentance.”

In the history of the Dominican order Saint Peter of Verona was among the first generation of followers of Saint Dominic. Peter’s own family were adherents to the Cathar heresy which prompted the founding of the Friars Preachers. While not the first martyr among the Dominicans he is the first saint of the Order. The working of God’s grace in men’s hearts saw the conversion of Peter’s murderer, Carino of Balsamo, and his admission to the Dominican Order as a lay brother. What beauty there is in the conversion of sinners and growth of grace to the point of fully dedicating one’s life to God under the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. Since we are all created for communion with God and others Peter’s killer was brought into that communion. One can say that Saint Peter of Verona’s was the condition of another’s full communion with God. Brother Carino recalled his crime but confessed his sin and did penance for the rest of his life; he is buried at the Cathedral of Forli. Brother Carino is a beatus of the Church; Blessed Carino’s liturgical memorial is April 28, the date of the translation of his relics.

Fr Ragheed Aziz Ganni: 3rd anniversary of death

ragheed.jpgJune 3rd is quickly becoming a date that most Christians will not forget too easily: 1) the liturgical memorial of Saint Charles Lwanga, 19th century African martyrs; 2) the death of Blessed Pope John XXIII; 3) the murder of Father Ragheed and his companions; and now 3) the murder of Bishop Luigi Padovese, OFM Cap.

Father Ragheed Aziz Ganni’s death with the three subdeacons is still a rather moving memory for me, not just on the anniversary but throughout the year when thinking of the plight of the Eastern churches. But why? Because he could’ve gone the other way, avoided the situation of his people and saved his life. Instead he confronted evil head-on with courage. Like other things one remembers, the deaths of people who unknowingly become incredible, beautiful witnesses to the Presence of Christ right now (not some time ago).
Father Ragheed was a Catholic priest of the Chaldean Church in the Diocese of Mosul. Ganni was ordained a priest October 13, 2001. He was 35 years old, a young priest, and a collaborator in Truth for the Kingdom of God. He was convinced in the beauty of God’s Word and His enduring Presence in the world and that we ought not to be scared away.
More on Father Ragheed can be read here.

Luigi Padovese murdered by Turk

Luigi Padovese.jpgBishop Luigi Padovese, OFM Cap, 63, was murdered today at about 1pm local time by his driver who it is claimed had psychological problems and history of violent outbreaks was supposedly a convert to Christianity but some news agencies are naming the driver a Muslim. At the moment no one is claiming political motivation for the murder.

Bishop Padovese was born at Milan, Italy and a member of the Capuchin Franciscan order. He was ordained a priest for nearly 37 years and a bishop for 5.5 years. He was the Vicar Apostolic in Anatolia.

Bishop Padovese was to meet Pope Benedict XVI with other Middle East bishops in Cyprus to receive the Instumentum laboris, the working document for the forthcoming Synod of Bishops, scheduled to meet in October.

The Minister General of the Capuchins posted this brief bio for Bishop Luigi.

The BBC story noted here and Spero News here.

May God grant mercy Bishop Luigi Padovese mercy and may his memory be eternal.

Saint Charles Lwanga & companions, Martyrs of Uganda

St Charles Lwanga.jpgToday’s the liturgical memorial of some of the most evocative witnesses to Jesus Christ who gave their lives for the Christian Faith of the 19th century. I pray that Saint Charles and companions intercede not only for Africa but for all who claim the Church as mother and family and who find it difficult to truly live their faith. More on Saint Charles here.

Saint Charles and his companions (22 of them) were killed in Namugongo, Uganda between 1885-1887. They ranged in age between 13 and 30. They were beatified in 1920 and canonized in 1964. At the revision of the Roman liturgical calendar Saint Charles’s feast day was added. The Church calls these saints the “Protomartyrs of Black Africa.”

In his 1964 homily at the canonization of Saint Charles and his companions, Pope Paul VI said:
“The African martyrs add another page to the Church’s roll of honor –an occasion both of mourning and joy. These African martyrs herald the dawn of a new age. If only the mind of man might be directed not toward persecutions and religious conflicts but toward a rebirth of Christianity and civilization! Africa has been washed by the blood of these latest martyrs, and the first of this new age (and, God willing, let them be the last, although such a holocaust is precious indeed). Africa is reborn free and independent.”

Where are you?

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The
very first question that God asks man in the Bible is, where are you?  “The Lord called to the man, and
said to him, where are you?” (Genesis 3:9)  It is not a question that demands sophisticated answers nor
are there multiple answers to this question. Rather, it is a question of concern from a loving
father and the only demand placed upon this question is that one answers
truthfully, even if the truth exposes something to us that highlights our selfishness
and our need for God.

Before God asked Adam this question Adam had committed a
sin by disobeying God’s commandment and ate from the tree God had forbidden him
to eat from. Adam had forgotten
about God’s love and choose to place his own will and desires over the will and
desires of God. Now Adam, ashamed
and afraid (which is always the fruit of sin) tries to hide from God because he
realizes something dramatic has occurred in his relationship with the Lord. The Lord simply asks him, Adam, where
are you?

This question, as old as the Bible itself, God continues to ask us
today. Throughout our lives,
throughout each day, and often several times a day, God is continually asking
us, “My son or my daughter, where are you?  In other words, where is your heart right now?  Is it tired, frustrated, angry?  Is it overwhelmed by the demands of
life?  Is it engrossed in selfish
activities?  Is it immersed in lust,
pride, envy, jealousy, etc?  Is it
distracted by the things of this world?

When the Lord asks us this question it
is an invitation from him to turn our eyes away from the many distractions we
often promote and to turn our eyes once again towards Him. It is our Father, gentle tapping us on
the shoulder and calling us back to Him. 
Rather than living in future events, or reliving past wounds over and
over again it is an invitation to experience God in the present moment, the
only place where we can be guaranteed to encounter God.

Brother Jeremiah Myriam
Shryock, CFR, a Fourth Year Seminary Student Saint Joseph’s Seminary-Dunwoodie,
Yonkers, NY. Brother Jeremiah was ordained a deacon on May 29, 2010 with three
other Franciscan Friars of the Renewal by the Most Reverend Manual Cruz, an
auxiliary bishop of Newark. A poem of Brother Jeremiah’s, “After Eden,”  was published here.

Pope Benedict’s prayer intentions for June 2010

Pope Benedict XVI formal.jpgUnited with Pope Benedict in prayer for the needs of the Church, for the month of June we keep in heart and mind with the Pope the following:

The general intention

That every national and international institution may strive to guarantee respect for human life from conception to natural death.

The mission intention

That the Churches in Asia, a “little flock” among non-Christian populations, may communicate the Gospel well and give joyful witness to their faith.

Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Visitation.jpgEternal Father, You inspired the Virgin Mary, mother of Your Son, to visit Elizabeth and to assist her in her need. Keep us open to the working of Your Spirit, and with Mary may we praise You for ever.

 

Sometimes it may seem to us that there is no purpose in our lives, that going day after day for years to this office or that school or factory is nothing else but waste and weariness. But it may be that God has sent us there because but for us Christ would not be there. If our being there means that Christ is there, that alone makes it worthwhile. … It is not necessary at this stage of our contemplation to speak to others of the mystery of life growing in us. It is only necessary to give ourselves to that life, all that we are, to pray without ceasing, not by a continual effort to concentrate our minds but by a growing awareness that Christ is being formed in our lives from what we are. We must trust him for this; because it is not a time to see his face, we must possess him secretly and in darkness, as the earth possesses the seed. We must not try to force Christ’s growth in us, but with a deep gratitude for the light burning secretly in our darkness, we must fold our concentrated love upon him like earth, surrounding, holding, and nourishing the seed. We must be swift to obey the winged impulses of his love, carrying him to wherever he longs to be: and those who recognize his presence will be stirred, like Elizabeth, with new life. They will know his presence, not by any special beauty or power shown by us, but in the way that the bud knows the presence of the light, by the unfolding in themselves, a putting forth of their own beauty.

Caryll Houselander (1901-1954), The Reed of God, p. 77