Holy Name of Mary

Thumbnail image for Humility of Mary ZStrozzi.jpgYou have been blessed, O Virgin Mary, above all other women on earth by the Lord, the Most High God, for God has so exalted your name that human lips will never cease to praise you.

Lord our God, when Your Son was dying on the altar of the cross, he gave us as our mother the one he had chosen to be His own mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary; grant that we who call upon the holy name of Mary, our mother, with confidence in her protection may receive strength and comfort in all our needs.
This feast was restored an optional memorial in our sacred Liturgy by the Servant of God Pope John Paul II when he published the 2002 Roman Missal (the translation is due out this century). The Preface of today’s Mass is worth adding to our examination of conscience today and I highly recommend using the liturgical texts to assist us here. In part the Preface reads:
“… But by Your loving providence the name of the Virgin Mary also should echo and re-echo on the lips of the faithful people who turn to her with confidence as their star of hope, call on her as their mother in time of danger, and seek her protection in their hour of need.”
The sentiments expressed by the Church’s Liturgy ought to call to mind the venerable prayer of the Memorare in which we ask Mary in confidence to be at our side at all times. Those who remain close to Mary, the Mother of God are always helped.

Saint Anselm’s prayer for the Birth of Our Lady

In Honor of Our Lady’s Nativity

Saint Anselm of Canterbury


Thumbnail image for Nativity of the Theotokos.jpg

Vouchsafe
that I may praise thee, O sacred Virgin; give me strength against thine
enemies, and against the enemy of the whole human race. Give me strength humbly
to pray to thee. Give me strength to praise thee in prayer with all my powers,
through the merits of thy most sacred nativity, which for the entire Christian
world was a birth of joy, the hope and solace of its life.

When thou wast born,
O most holy Virgin, then was the world made light. Happy is thy stock, holy thy
root, and blessed thy fruit, for thou alone as a virgin, filled with the Holy
Spirit, didst merit to conceive thy God, as a virgin to bear Thy God, as a
virgin to bring Him forth, and after His birth to remain a virgin.

Have mercy
therefore upon me a sinner, and give me aid, O Lady, so that just as thy
nativity, glorious from the seed of Abraham, sprung from the tribe of Juda,
illustrious from the stock of David, didst announce joy to the entire world, so
may it fill me with true joy and cleanse me from every sin.

Pray for me, O
Virgin most prudent, that the gladsome joys of thy most helpful nativity may
put a cloak over all my sins. O holy Mother of God, flowering as the lily, pray
to thy sweet Son for me, a wretched sinner. Amen.

Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Nativity of BVM PCavallini.jpgIt is the nativity of the glorious Virgin Mary, sprung from the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Juda, of the renowned family of David.

We beseech Thee, O Lord, grant to Thy servants the gift of Thy heavenly grace, that as the childbearing of the Blessed Virgin was the beginning of salvation, so the joyful festival of her nativity may bring us an increase of peace.
Today is one three days on the liturgical calendar that the church celebrates someone’s birth; the other two are Jesus and John the Baptist. What we know of the birth of Mary comes from the extra-canonical gospels: The Gospel of the Nativity of Mary and the Proto-evangelium of Saint James. This is one of those feasts that came from Eastern Church, likely in Syria in the 6th century. It gained popularity that in the 7th century it was added to liturgical calendar of the Church of Rome (It was Pope Sergius I who wrote a Litany and organized a procession for the feast.) and the collects are found in various missals. Various dioceses may have some type of observance beginning in the 8th to the 10th centuries. That said, in some parts of the Church where the missals included the collects of the Assumption, this feast of Nativity of Mary is absent. 

Ted Kennedy: mercy or damnation? What do real Christians think?

In the week since the obsequies for Edward Kennedy, Senator, not a few self-appointed ministers of God’s justice and mercy have rendered their judgement: the Senator should not have been buried using the rites of the Catholic Church. Interesting.

The sacred Liturgy tells us what we who are baptized believe: we are sinners and God’s mercy is in abundance. Sinners need and want mercy from God almighty. I want and need His forgiveness and His tender embrace. I am sure Ted Kennedy wanted the same. Since I was not at his bedside when he was sick, nor did I hear the Senator’s confession and nor was I present when his priest gave him the Sacrament of the Sick, Viaticum and the Apostolic Pardon. Presumably he received these sacred rites before his death. In short, I don’t know the state of his soul. I do know that he wrote to the Holy Father and a kind reply was received.
Cardinal Sean O’Malley has been criticized for being a pastor of souls; he explains as much on his blog this week. The bishop of Madison, WI, Robert Morlino, has a wonderful piece on this subject and I highly recommend your reading it. Use it for you lectio. Bishop Morlino’s reflection is found here.
Is a lack of mercy to a sinner the demonstration of Christianity’s decay? What virtues are being taught and lived when Christians so violently pontificate that mercy is not possible for the sinner, even such a public sinner? Does Christianity have any real meaning left? If we break mercy from the Christian life then we no longer have a Christian religion that leads one to salvation in Christ. To whom do we witness: Christ or the self?

Blessed Mother Teresa: 12th anniversary of death

If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other. (Blessed Teresa of Calcutta)

MT & PD.jpg

26 August 1910 to 5 September 1997

“This
celebration of Mother Teresa should remind us that the work of mercy, charity
and compassion still have a fundamental place in our being disciples of Jesus
today. During her life Mother put into practice in many ways Charity in
Truth (Fr Cedric Prakash, SJ, Sept. 5, 2009).

7 to be ordained to the Order of Deacon for Archdiocese of New York

2 signing Oath of Fidelity.jpgTonight 7 men made the Profession of Faith and the
Oath of Fidelity (which I encourage you too read) at Vespers. These 7 men will be ordained to the Order of
Deacon tomorrow here in the Saint Joseph Seminary Chapel by Bishop Dennis
Joseph Sullivan, VG, auxiliary bishop of New York: James H. Ferreira, George
LaGrutta, Steven R. Markantonis, Fredy P. Montoya, Thomas Roslak, Enrique J. Salvo,
Daniel P. Tuite.


Please keep these men in your prayers and sacrifices tomorrow
and in year ahead as they prepare for ordination as priest on 15 May 2010 for service in the Archdiocese of New York by Archbishop Timothy P. Dolan, PhD.

Our Lady of Dunwoodie, cause of our joy, pray for us.
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Saints John Vianney, Pio of Pietrelcina, John Eudes, pray for us.