Monday, April 02, 2007

Flashback to December

Whom do you choose?

Now at that feast the governor was wont to release unto the people a prisoner,
whom they would. And they had then a notable prisoner, called Barabbas. Therefore when they were gathered together, Pilate said unto them, “Whom will ye that I release unto you? Barabbas, or Jesus which is called Christ?” For he knew that for envy they had delivered him.

(From Matthew's Gospel, not Luke which you heard at Mass yesterday)

The choice of Barabbas slips most of us who don't understand that "Barabbas" literally means the "Son of the Father" and that some ancient texts also included "Jesus" as Barabbas' first name.

So when you know that, the interpretation of this event gives much food for thought.

Who does the crowd want? The insurrectionist, violent, attacker of the Romans to be freed or the one who preaches "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar" and "Turn the other cheek"?

Which "Son of the Father" do we follow or choose?

Another insight is that at the very moment that Our Lord takes up his cross a sinner is freed--the Son of the Father, symbolic of all of us "Sons and daughters of the one Father."

Sunday, April 01, 2007

Palm Sunday and the Pope's Appeal to the World



Pope Benedict appeals to the world to look to Christ:

“If God’s words and the Church’s message leave you indifferent – then look to me, to the God who made himself flesh to suffer for you and with you, - see that I suffer for your love and open yourself to me and God the Father”.

A summary of his homily...

First of all, the procession of the Palms, is “an expression of joy because we can know Christ, because he allows us to be his friends and gifts us the key to life”. The Pope added “Yes, we have seen and still see the wonders of Christ, how He leads men and women to give up the comfort of their own lives and put themselves completely at the service of those who are suffering, how He gives men and women the courage to oppose violence and lies and make room in the world for truth; how He, in secret, leads men and women to do good for others to seek reconciliation where there was hate, to make peace were there was conflict”. The Pope said that the procession is a profession of “Jesus Christ King”, asking for the “grace to follow Him”.

The Pope then explained “what “following Christ” means in concrete terms”. He said “It means changing our interior existence. It requires us not to close in on ourselves considering our own relationship with the exterior world our principal reason for living. It requires that we gift ourselves to Another – for truth, for love, for God who, in Christ precedes us and shows us the way. It means making the fundamental decisions to no longer consider utility and earnings, career and success as the ultimate aim of my life, but rather to recognise as authentic criteria truth and love. It means deciding between a lives spent living for oneself or a life gifted – for a greater cause. It means taken into serious consideration that truth and love are not abstract values; they became flesh in Christ. By losing myself in Him, I find myself”.

Benedict XVI then commented on one of the hymns sung during the procession of the Palms, psalm 24 [23], which speaks of “going up the mountain of the Lord”, as an expression of going up towards God, in an “interior” and “exterior” sense. The Pope highlighted the “two essential conditions” to in becoming a disciple of Christ, and to “go up the mountain of the Lord”. The first is to “search for God, to look for his Face”. He referred himself particularly to the young people “Dear young friends – how important this is in today’s world: don’t let yourselves be simply led without direction in life; don’t content yourselves with what others think or say or do. Look intently around yourselves in your search for God. Don’t allow the call to God to dissolves itself in your souls. Desire that which is the greatest of all. Desire to know Him – his Face”.

“The other concrete condition in rising up to God is this: only those of “innocent hands and pure heart” may stay in the holy place. Innocent hands - are hands that are not used for acts ofviolence they are hands that are not sullied by corruption and bribes. Pure hearts – when is a heart pure? Hearts are pure when they are not stained by lies and hypocrisy. Which remains as clear as spring water because it does not know duality. A heart is pure when it is estranged from the intoxication of pleasure; a heart for which love is true and not just the passion of a moment. Innocent hands and clean heart: if we walk together with Christ, we will rise and find the purifications which truly bring us to that height to which man is destined: friendship with God Himself.

Benedict XVI then recalled another symbol – now no longer in use – of the Palm Sunday procession, when the priest on his arrival at the door “smote the closed door with the processional cross, which then opened before him” . The Pope explained “the image beautifully depicted the mystery of Christ who, with the wood of his cross, the strength of his love gifted to us, knocked from the world on God’s door; a world that was failing to find access to God”.

The Pontiff concluded “with the cross Christ burst open the door to God, the door between God and humankind. Now it is open. But also from the other side our Lord is knocking with his cross: he is knocking on the world’s door, on the door to our hearts, which all too often and often in great numbers remains closed to God”.

Almost in an appeal to all of the world’s “indifferent” – made so by too much science or too much pain – Benedict XVI added that Christ “ speaks to us more or less in this way: if the proof that God gives you of His existence in creation fails to open you to Him; if God’s word and the Church’s message leave you indifferent – then look at me, at the God who made himself flesh to suffer for you, with you – see that I suffer for your love and open yourself to me and God the Father”.

Saturday, March 31, 2007

Rapping Catholic Priest hits Brisbane

From Brisbane Times:

A rapping Catholic priest from New York will be "wording it up" to the converted in Brisbane tonight and Sydney on Sunday.

Father Stan Fortuna, from New York's South Bronx district, brings his Activ8 concerts to warm up Australia prior to the World Youth Day event in Sydney in July next year.

Father Stan is known for his "unique musical style and inspirational lyrics".

His musical style is said to draw inspiration from contemporary jazz, folk, reggae and rap.

Vatican Treasures Found In Illinois House?

From CBS Channel 2 in Chicago:

There's something strange going on in a west suburban neighborhood. As CBS 2’s Rafael Romo reports, rumors are flying that priceless art from the Vatican may be inside a Berwyn home.

“By the time I came home from work the place was just swarming with police inside and out and they've been staking the place out each and every night since then,” said Greg Baroni, who lives next door to the house that may be holding a mystery.

Berwyn police have been standing guard outside the house, on Elmwood Avenue, for the last three days.But they are not saying what has been found inside the home that belonged to an Italian man in his late 70s who died last Thursday.

“He was a bank teller at Taylor Street for his whole life, as far as I know. I think he came here in the late 50s and I believe he owned the house since 1963,” Baroni said.

Friday, March 30, 2007

Search Inside My Novena Book

I would recommend taking a look inside my novena prayer book and reading the history behind some of these prayers...

Go to...

The Church's Most Powerful Novenas

Then do a search of:

St. Gaspar

Rosary Novena

Mother Teresa's Quick Novena


I think you'll be impressed and see that this isn't your normal prayer book.

"I was ill and now I am cured"


The irony that the miracle would be a cure from Parkinsons, from which the pope suffered himself, horribly.

From Monsters and Critics:

'I was ill and now I am cured,' French Catholic nun Sister Marie Simon-Pierre said Friday as she recounted how praying to the late Pope John Paul II helped cure her of Parkinson's disease in 2005.

'I am cured. It is the work of God through the intercession of John Paul II,' the 46-year-old woman told journalists in the southern French city of Aix-en-Provence. 'It is something very powerful, very difficult to put into words.'

Sister Marie's recovery from the degenerative disorder of the central nervous system, for which no known cure exists, is to be described as a miracle that the late pope performed, two months after his death, and could be used as a basis for his eventual beatification.

On Sunday, an announcement to that effect is scheduled to be made in Sister Marie's diocese of Aix-en-Provence.

Sister Marie, who is a member of an order of nuns working in Catholic maternity hospitals, was diagnosed with Parkinson's in 2002. She said Friday that her disease worsened after Pope John Paul II's death, on April 2, 2005.

She went on to say how she and her entire order then prayed for her continuously, using the late pope as an intermediary, and how she was suddenly cured on the night of June 2, two months after John Paul II died.

'It is up to the Church to make a declaration and to acknowledge that it is a miracle,' Sister Marie said.

The Way of the Cross from Brooklyn to Manhattan

From The Brooklyn Paper:

Walking from Brooklyn to Manhattan is always an experience. On April 6, however, a procession over the bridge will be a religious one.

The Catholic lay group Communion and Liberation will, for the 12th year, bring the “Good Friday Way of the Cross Procession” from St. James Cathedral to St. Peter’s in Lower Manhattan.

The march is led by Brooklyn’s Bishop Ignatius Catanello and Bay Ridge resident Jonathan Fields, who will carry a four-foot, 10-pound wooden cross across the bridge. Along the way, it will include songs from the Communion and Liberation choir as well as readings from the Gospels.

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Hearing Confessions


From Zenit:

The Holy Father presented the penitential service as "an encounter around the cross, a celebration of the mercy of God that each of us can experience personally in the sacrament of confession." "In the heart of every person," there is "thirst for love," the Pope said in the homily. "The Christian cannot live without love. Moreover, if he doesn't encounter true love, he cannot even call himself fully Christian." State of grace Benedict XVI explained that, in approaching the sacrament of confession, "love and the mercy of God move your hearts. … You experience in this way the forgiveness of sins, reconciliation with the Church, and recovery of the state of grace, if you have lost it. "Christ attracts you to himself, to unite himself with each one of you so that, for our part, we learn to love our brethren with that same love." "There is great necessity for a renewed capacity to love our brothers and sisters," the Pope said. He invited the young people "to dare to love in your family, in your relationships with your friends, and also with those who have offended you."

Mystery nun the key to Pope John Paul II's case for sainthood

From the Guardian Unlimited:

The nun's identity is supposed to be a closely guarded secret, but a French newspaper named her last night as Marie-Simon-Pierre. On its website, Le Figaro said she was from a congregation near Aix-en-Provence, and worked in a maternity clinic in Paris. Slawomir Oder, a Polish cleric living in Rome who is the official advocate of John Paul's cause, declined to confirm or deny the report, saying he had been sworn to secrecy.
But, he had earlier told a press conference in Rome that the recovery of a French nun of "about 45 years old" was the main evidence that the late pope had miraculous powers. Among the thousands of documents in the dossier were two handwritten by the nun, he said. The first was written when she was in the grip of Parkinson's disease. Monsignor Oder said that in begging for the late Pope's intercession she had "written the name of John Paul II in an illegible hand, because of the illness".
He added: "On the morning of the miracle, however, the sister picked up a pen and wrote an entirely comprehensible letter." He said evidence from handwriting experts formed a crucial part of his file. The nun had also undergone a psychological examination. Monsignor Oder said she had been cured "two months after the Pope's death" in April 2005. "All the symptoms of her illness disappeared from one moment to the next," he said.

Schiavo Brother Denounces Bishop

From the North Country Gazzette:


"Speaking on behalf of my family, my intention was to write you a letter subsequent to my sister Terri Schiavo's death in order to explain to you why I hold you more accountable for her horrific death than Michael Schiavo, his attorney, and even the judge that ordered her to die.

"In something of a bitter irony, however, it wasn't until I came across your recent article in the Tampa Tribune, where your own words succeeded in saying much of what I wanted to say, that I was finally motivated to write.

"In the opening paragraph of your commentary, "The Homeless Are Challenge To Our Cities And Our Faith," you said "The challenge of the homeless in St. Petersburg has made national news and it has been embarrassing to many people. I am convinced that both on Judgment Day and in history, we will most likely be judged not by the things which we might have considered personally important to ourselves in life but how we took care of others less fortunate." A prophetic statement indeed - and one in complete conformity with the words of our Lord in Matthew 25:31-46.

"You then went on to say in the beginning of the next paragraph, "The faces which may haunt each of us on Judgment Day may well be those of Bishop Lynch, I couldn't have said it better myself. Instead of writing a lengthy letter explaining the hypocrisy of your words, let me just say the following:

"The barbarism and nightmare of Terri's two week death by thirst and starvation will be forever seared into my family's memory. It is incomprehensible to us that a nation supposedly built on basic Judeo- Christian principles would allow something so wicked to happen. That is, until one realizes that just as the Culture of Death made a triumphal entry into our nation in 1973, via legalized abortion, without so much as a whimper of protest from those with the God-given authority to stop it, so now our disabled and elderly are being targeted for death. The bottom line is, when apostolic grace and responsibility are abdicated, innocent people die.

"Fortunately, my family was provided much needed comfort and strength by an enormous outpouring of prayers of support, including the unwavering support of the Holy See, which to this day continues to arrive for our family.

"Even more uplifting are the stories we receive almost daily of how my sister has, in a special way, touched the hearts and changed the lives of so many people, not only in our country, but all over the world. So much so that there are efforts being made by people world-wide to promote Terri's cause for beatification.

"Terri's legacy is one of life and love. Sadly, your legacy will be that of the shepherd that stood silently by as one of his innocent disabled lambs was slowly and needlessly slaughtered by removing her food and water - while you persistently ignored the cries of her family for help ("her family" being the ones who merely wanted to care for her.)

"You should not need to be reminded of the many passages of Scripture that condemn the shepherds that "pasture themselves on their sheep," or Christ's admonition to St. Peter to "feed My lambs," etc. As my family and I dedicate the remainder of our lives to saving other innocent lambs targeted by the Death Culture, I beg the Lord to spare us another successor of the apostles who would exhibit the same scandalous inaction and silence by which you remain complicit in my sister's murder via euthanasia.

"I realize that for the sake of my salvation I must come to a point to at least want to forgive you, Bishop Lynch, for aiding and giving comfort to the evildoers who took my sister's innocent and vulnerable life (and yes, she was objectively more innocent and more vulnerable than perhaps any homeless person.) The Catholic Church however, has spoken on Terri's case, and she has decreed in favor of Terri's right to life and everything our family did to try to save her.

"Your behaviors, in contrast, have brought scandal to the Universal Church and to the faithful, particularly here in Florida. Your indifference toward the Truth is appalling, but seems to be indicative of the all-too prevalent corruption of priestly formation in the 1960's and 70's, so perhaps your culpability is somewhat mitigated. Even so, the fact of my sister's murder under your "pastoral care" is a fact you should acknowledge publicly.

"This season of Lent is one well suited to seek public forgiveness and make public reparation for public scandal. At least until that happens, I regret that I must remain, as you said, the face that haunts you as someone that did approach you for assistance and was turned away.

"May God have mercy on you, and may my holy sister Terri pray for us all".

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Latest Rumor on Motu Proprio

From a friend in Rome, who says that a respected female professor who had an audience with the pope, and asked specifically about the release of the Motu Proprio, reports to me that she was told by Pope Benedict XVI that it was coming "in May."

Catholic Nuns Murdered in Iraq

From Breitbart

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Words of Benedict Anger Left

Do a blog search of "hell" and you'll find those who claim that the Pope has put us back into the dark ages because he uttered this truth of the Christian faith:

Jesus came to say that he wishes all [to be] in Heaven and that hell, which is barely spoken of in our age, exists and is eternal for all those who close their hearts to his love.

I guess their hearts are closed to God's love...

Of Churches Closing

Sad to see that such fine churches as this:

can't be saved.

Places: St. Nicholas is spared, but what about its windows?

Monday, March 26, 2007

Solemnity of the Annunciation of Our Lord


Patronal Feast of this blog...


ANGELUS (Latin)

V. Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae.
R. Et concepit de Spiritu Sancto.

Ave Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum: benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui Iesus. * Sancta Maria, Mater Dei ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

V. Ecce ancilla Domini,
R. Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum.

Ave Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum: benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui Iesus. * Sancta Maria, Mater Dei ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

V. Et Verbum caro factum est, (genuflect)
R. Et habitavit in nobis.

Ave Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum: benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui Iesus.* Sancta Maria, Mater Dei ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

V. Ora pro nobis, sancta Dei Genetrix,
R. Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus Christi.

Oremus.

Gratiam tuam, quaesumus, Domine, mentibus nostris infunde; ut qui, Angelo nuntiante, Christi Filii tui incarnationem cognovimus, per passionem eius et crucem ad resurrectionis gloriam perducamur. Per eumdem Christum Dominum nostrum.
R. Amen.

In Michigan, Disappearing Parishioners--Deported Ones

Hundreds of parishioners are gone; Albanian immigrants deported

Open Book/ Annunciations Bestseller's List

Our Bestseller's List

What Books People who Read Amy's Open Book blog and Michael's Annunciation blog are buying this month.



March 2007 (3/25/07)

1. A Pocket Guide to the Meaning of Life (Peter Kreeft)

2. The Roman Catholic Church: An Illustrated History

3 (tie) Those Terrible Middle Ages: Debunking the Myths

3. (tie)A Stay Against Confusion: Essays on Faith and Fiction

3. (tie) By Way of Grace: Moving from Faithfulness to Holiness

3. (tie) The Holy Way: Practices for a Simple Life

Last Month's Bestseller's

February 2007


1. The Power of the Cross: Meditations for the Lenten Season

2. The How-To Book of the Mass: Everything You Need to Know but No One Ever Taught You

3. The Gift of Faith

4. The Best American Catholic Short Stories: A Sheed & Ward Collection

5. Those Terrible Middle Ages: Debunking the Myths

Jesus a Vegetarian in PETA Campaign

We know he ate fish, (see the last chapter of John's Gospel where he is cooking "breakfast" for the disciples...He is the original tailgator)...supose He ate lamb at the pasch, but probably did eat meat sparingly. Soloviev has an excellent meditation on how Christians should do likewise, that he brings out in a reflection on Fasting.

From World Net Daily.

Protestant, Catholic Parties Announce Historic Deal

In Northern Ireland...