Corpus Christi in Rome

From Asia News Italy:

“The Eucharistic Mystery is the gift Jesus Christ makes of Himself, whereby he reveals God’s infinite love for every man,” Benedict XVI said during the mass at the beginning of the procession. “Hence Corpus Domini is a unique festivity that represents an important moment of faith and praise for each Christian community.” It is a celebration “that brings us back to the spiritual atmosphere of Holy Thursday, the day when on the eve of His Passion Jesus established the Holy Eucharist in the Cenacle.”

It is “a gift” that “the Apostles got from the Lord in the privacy of the Last Supper but which was meant for all, i.e. the entire world. Hence it must be proclaimed and openly displayed so that everyone can meet ‘Jesus walking by” as it was once possible in the streets of Galilee, Samaria and Judea. This way, as they receive it, His love can make each one whole and new again.”

The Pope quoted a passage from the Gospel of Luke about the loaves and the fish that ends with “They all ate and were satisfied” (cf Lk, 9:11b–17). “First of all,” he said, “I would like to emphasise ‘all’. The Lord wants everyone to eat the Eucharist because the Eucharist is for all” since “Christ sacrificed himself for the whole of humanity. With him in the streets and in between the houses of our City residents will be offered joy, immortal life, peace and love.”

San Antonio Nuns

Show their support:

From the Sun Sentinel:

Sister Rosalba Garcia, wearing a San Antonio Spurs jersey, center, Sister Angelina Gomez, holding a Spurs flag, and several other nuns of the Salesian Sister of Mary Immaculate Province gather for a photo in front of their San Antonio Spurs banner in San Antonio, Tuesday. Each Sister is praying for an individual player and had been throughout the NBA basketball play-offs.

The Plains of Niniveh, a Trap for Iraqi Christians!

From Asia News Italy:

On the eve of the meeting between the Pope and Bush, the Archbishop of Kirkuk analyses the risks of the project to assign Christians an autonomous region in the Plains of Niniveh, a solution already rejected by authoritative figures in the Vatican.

Christopher Hitchens Hates You and Wants to Make War with You

If you are a believer...and he thinks belief in God poisons everything...jeez I guess he is an example of what nonbelief does.

Heard him speak today at BEA...more about it when I'm home.

UPDATE: Since I've been so remiss in completing my take on this, I offer another person who was in attendance's summary:

Hitchens minced no words: "I hate religion, and I want there to be a war on it." Hitchens has been called an "atheist evangelist," Sheler said, and while rejecting the terminology, Hitchens said he was proud to join Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins, calling them "the three horsemen of the counter-apocalypse."

Man Tries to Jump in Popemobile

Pope unfazed by the incident...(Asia news had said it was a woman, must be the pink shirt that threw them)...here is the picture:

Video of the incident.

Man Tries to Jump in Popemobile

Pope unfazed by the incident...(Asia news had said it was a woman, must be the pink shirt that threw them)...here is the picture:

New Books You Will be Interested In

Should you read Harry Potter? Find out what a homeschooling mom has to say:



Want to meditate on the mystery of the Creed with a trusted spiritual advisor?



You've read Jesus of Nazareth, now read what the Pope has to say about the origins of the Catholic Church and the Apostles:



Want to reinvigorate your spiritual life by making a good confession?


Have a question about your spiritual life?


Want the perfect gift for that teen or young adult faced with the big questions of what life is all about anyway?

From a Year Ago

A Church for China

From Atlantic Online:

In 1577, the Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci left Italy on a mission to bring the Christian faith to Ming dynasty China. He was neither the first Christian, nor the first Catholic, to arrive in the Middle Kingdom. But his arrival marked the beginnings of a Jesuit presence that would survive erratically in China for nearly four centuries.

Everything changed in 1949 when the Communists came to power. Western religion—along with all else foreign—was unwelcome welcome in the PRC. Although Pope Pius XII had established an official independent hierarchy for China’s Church back in 1946 (making the China Jesuit Mission null and void), European bishops still retained control over more than 80 percent of the country’s dioceses. In 1951, the Communist Party expelled all missionaries and severed diplomatic relations with the Vatican. Chinese priests tried to convince the Communist government that the country’s Catholic Church could operate independently, but by 1955, Chinese Catholics had become targets as well, and over the course of two weeks that fall, more than 1,200 Catholic priests, nuns, and laypeople were arrested and detained.

Read the rest

Woman Jumps the Fence at Papal Audience

From Asia News Italy:

Before the beginning of the audience, while Benedict XVI was travelling the square in his open topped popemobile to greet the faithful, a woman climbed over the barriers in an attempt to near the Pope, but was stopped by security.

New Books Coming Out This Summer and Fall

Book Expo of America--People Spotted

The BEA (Book Expo of America) is widely attended by people in the publishing industry and you never quite know who you are going to run into, like this fellow (no introduction needed) ...



who of course is an avid reader and believer in God or this guy who doesn't believe in much including buttoning up his shirt (Christopher Hitchens)...



Sometimes you run into movie stars or a person who once played one on Gilligan's Island (Tina Louise who now writes children's books)...



A current day movie star (Juliann Moore)...



Or a famous New Yorker having a bite...

Franz Jagerstatter to be Declared a Martyr

Excellent, excellent, excellent!!!

I've used his story in some of my books and have always thought that his resistence is the example that needed to be praised publicly. Pope Benedict has authorized the promulgation of his cause. From Vatican Information Service:

- Servant of God Frank Jagerstatter , Austrian layman, born 1907 and killed in Berlin, Germany in 1943.

His story by Robert Royal at the Catholic Education:

Austrian Farmer Franz Jagerstatter ROBERT ROYAL

"That might (have been) our worst game of the year,"

...said Cubs manager Lou Piniella.

I once taught Lou's son Derek, and have met him a few times back then.

But I am a Florida Marlins fan and so I was happy to be at Wrigley Field to witness what Lou calls "their worst game of the year!"

There is no better place to watch a baseball game, then Wrigley. The fans are into baseball, there is electricity to the place. There is no video scoreboard or much of anything else to distract you from the game.

I sat a few seats away from where Bartman sat when he became the billy(scape) goat for the Cubs losing to the Marlins the last time that the Marlins ultimately won their second World Series Championship.

A pleasant visit if you are like me, one of the very few faithful Florida Marlin's fans!

Motu Proprio This Week?

I know we've heard this before, but this actually makes sense--to link it to the Letter to China as an outreach to the traditionalist church there...

Father Z has the goods:

Der Spiegel: Motu Proprio THIS WEEK

Back to Ordinary Time (8th Week)

But not so in the old days, as Father Mark points out, in an excellent post on the "suppression" of the "Octave of Pentecost" (similar to the Octave of Christmas and Easter) that was celebrated up unto 1969, He includes this anectdote:

The story goes that on the Monday after Pentecost in 1970 His Holiness Pope Paul VI rose early and went to his chapel for Holy Mass. Instead of the red vestments he expected, green ones were laid out for him. He asked the Master of Ceremonies, "What on earth are these for? This is the Octave of Pentecost! Where are the red vestments?" "Your Holiness," replied the Master of Ceremonies, "this is now The Time Throughout the Year. It is green, now. The Octave of Pentecost is abolished." "Green? That cannot be," said the Pope, "Who did that?" "Your Holiness, you did." And Paul VI wept.

Paul VI did not weep alone. Many wept with him. It was reported that Catherine de Hueck Doherty of Madonna House was inconsolable. Faithful the world over were speechless at the brutal removal of one of the Church Year’s most cherished moments. In some countries the hierarchy were frightfully embarrassed: the civil calendar had retained the Monday and Tuesday after Pentecost as holidays, while the Church had erased them from hers. Little by little, the voices of those seeking the restoration of the Pentecost came to be heard in high places.

The Pope's New Book

Our Sunday Visitor will release the new book--The Apostles: The Origin of the Church and Their Co-Workers sometime this summer (July or August). It takes up where Jesus of Nazareth leaves off, but unlike that book which the Pope did not want to be considered part of his magisterial office--this one is and contains some of the same teachings as well as many others concerning the origins of the church and the Apostles. It will please any reader of Jesus of Nazareth. The cover of the book has a tie in with this week's feast. Here is the image that is used:

Solemnity of Pentecost

From Vultus Christi

Those lacking in understanding

find themselves standing under tongues of fire.

Those once dark are illumined from within;

the flame over every head dances its way into every heart

and faces once abashed shine as they have never shone before.

Unveiled now, they “behold the glory of the Lord” (2 Cor 3:18)

and in every mouth there is the taste of new wine

and the sound of a new song: “Alleluia!”

Pentecost at the Pantheon in Rome

Red roses fall from the sky!

Father Z has the details and pictures:

There is a tradition in Rome on Pentecost Sunday. At the Church S. Maria ad Martyres, the Pantheon, at the end of Mass red rose petals are let fall in great abundance through the oculus, the dome’s "eye" which is completely open to the sky. Fireman from Rome’s fire department scale the exterior of the dome and let the petals fall.

Open Book/Annunciation's Bestseller's List

For May 2007

(as of May 27, 2007)

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

1. Jesus of Nazareth by Pope Benedict XVI

2. The DVD: Into Great Silence (Two-Disc Set)

3.A Pocket Guide to the Mass (A Pocket Guide to)

4. An Infinity of Little Hours: Five Young Men and Their Trial of Faith in the Western World's Most Austere Monastic Order

5. The Feast of Corpus Christi