A neat article by National Catholic Register’s Mark Shea recounts how the miracles of Lourdes can bestow faith to an atheist or reveal his hardened heart.
“Miracles Happen,” or “Atheism Can be a Dogmatic Faith”
January 23, 2014Metamorphosis: A True Story of Pain, Transformation, and Hope
January 20, 2014“Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.” (Isaiah 49:15)
In the United States, for every four babies born alive, there is one whose life is ended by abortion. (In other words, look around a room and divide the number of people by four–that’s how many people are missing.) What leads a woman to this terrible choice? How can God save a soul from the darkness?
Katie, a hometown friend of mine, whose post-abortive testimony became the subject of a 30-minute film, will be coming to speak in Sacred Heart’s parish hall in Wauzeka, Wisconsin at 7pm this Wednesday, January 22, 2014.
All are welcome, especially young people who are mature enough for themes of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and abortion. If you cannot attend, the film can be viewed online.
An Introduction to St. Francis de Sales
January 16, 2014St. Francis (1567-1622) defines “true devotion” as the love of God in its highest form. He notes that our devotional practices will vary according to our state of life (be it bishop, monk, husband, wife, maiden, widow, etc.) yet he insists that true devotion perfects every sort of Christian life. In An Introduction to the Devout Life, his most famous work, this Doctor (or “teacher”) of the Church lays out lessons for growing in the love of God.
After stating the importance of having a spiritual guide, he describes how the soul can be purified from mortal sins and affections for them; through a thorough general confession and using ten evocative meditations: on God’s creation, our purpose, God’s mercies, our sins, our death, our judgment, Hell, Paradise, our choice for Paradise, and our choice for a devout life. He says we must next lay aside our attachments to venial sins, and purify ourselves from even neutral things which are unhelpful or potentially dangerous for our souls. The remainder of his book is full of good counsel on prayer, practicing virtue, and the soul’s trials and consolations; such as:
»Devote one hour to mental prayer daily, preferably in the morning at a church (where, unlike home, you won’t be interrupted.)
» Realize God is ever with you and within you.
» At night, review your day: thank God, ask for mercy, make resolutions, and request help.
» “Your chief aim in Holy Communion should be to advance, strengthen, and comfort yourself in the Love of God.”
» Choose a specific virtue to focus on growing.
» The more you appreciate God’s mercies, the more you will love Him.
» Good recreation becomes harmful when given excessive time, energy, or importance.
» “Put yourself into your neighbor’s place, and him in yours, and then you will judge fairly.”
» The world opposes true devotion and is an unjust judge; partial and indulgent to its own children, harsh and rigorous toward God’s.
» Feeling a temptation is not the same as yielding or consenting to it (which is sin.)
» As a frightened child flees to her parent’s arms, so fly to God amid temptation for mercy and help.
The March for Life: A Reason for Hope
January 16, 2014In the days of Elijah, the people of Israel were divided between commitment to the Lord and to the cult of Baal. Baal worship entailed intoxication, heterosexual and homosexual immorality, self-harm, and the human sacrifice of children. The prophet Elijah, even after his victory against 450 prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18), despaired for his people and his nation. He felt all alone. He felt like giving up. But the Lord God reassured him that there were still 7,000 in Israel who had neither bent the knee to Baal nor kissed him. There was reason for hope in Israel.
This Wednesday, January 22nd, pro-life Americans will march in Washington D.C., as they have for 40 years. The major news media will largely ignore this event, or perhaps mention the “thousands of abortion rights supporters and opponents” in a ten-second blurb (despite pro-lifers outnumbering the abortion supporters there literally on the order of 1,000 to 1.) Yet the estimated half-million people who will be marching down Constitution Avenue this week provide reason for hope for the future of our country and our culture.
Ten (Very Easy) New Year’s Resolutions For Your Soul
January 1, 20141. Put a Bible next to your bed (where you will be more likely to read it.)
2. Put a bookmark in your Bible.
3. Ask your guardian angel to remind you to pray in the morning and before you sleep.
4. Pick a patron saint for 2014. (Can’t think of one? Try this.)
5. Change your computer desktop wallpaper to a holy image (like a saint or religious painting.)
6. Take a brochure from the back of church on a topic that interests you.
7. Check out a religious movie from our parish to see at home.
8. Check out an audio CD from our parish to listen to while you drive.
9. Pray for someone in our prayer request book.
10. Light a votive candle next to St. Mary or St. Joseph for your personal prayer intentions.
The BVM Gets Results
December 31, 2013Injunctions granted on the eve of the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God, in three lawsuits against the contraception mandate. (Including one from Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor.)
Happy St. Nicholas Day!
December 6, 2013St. Nicholas (270-343 A.D.) was the Greek bishop of Myra (in modern-day Turkey.) He is remembered for his generous, secret gift-giving. In our window, he holds three sacks. This recalls how he once helped a loving father who could not afford dowries for his three unmarried daughters—destining them to a life of destitution, or worse. Under the cover of night, St. Nicholas threw 3 bags of gold coins through their window. (Alternate tellings of this story have him dropping them down the chimney or placing them in the daughters’ drying stockings.) He is also known as the saint who punched the heretic Arius at the council of Nicea in 325 AD. His feast day is December 6th.
Prayers of the Faithful / Petitions / Intercessions (Year C)
December 5, 201314th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (July 7, 2013)
15th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (July 14, 2013)
16th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (July 21, 2013)
17th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (July 28, 2013)
18th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Aug 4, 2013)
19th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Aug 11, 2013)
Solemnity of the Assumption, Year C (Aug 15, 2013)
20th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Aug 18, 2013)
21st Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Aug 25, 2013)
22nd Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Sept 1, 2013)
23rd Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Sept 8, 2013)
24th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Sept 15, 2013)
25th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Sept 22, 2013)
26th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Sept 29, 2013)
27th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Oct 6, 2013)
28th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Oct 13, 2013)
29th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Oct 20, 2013)
30th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Oct 27, 2013)
Solemnity of All Saints, Year C (Nov 1, 2013)
All Souls Day, Year C (Nov 2, 2013)
31st Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Nov 3, 2013)
32nd Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Nov 10, 2013)
33rd Sunday Ordinary Time, Year C (Nov 17, 2013)
Solemnity of Christ the King (Nov 24, 2013)
Answering Evangelicals
November 16, 2013Evangelicals are often some the finest non-Catholic Christians. They get many things right, but they regrettably do not understand Catholicism very well. (If they did, they would become Catholic.) Here is how you can answer some of their most common misunderstandings:
“Why do you Catholics worship Mary?”
Nobody worships Mary, she is only a creature, but she is highly honored as the Mother of God. In this we follow Jesus, who surpassingly fulfilled the commandant “Honor your Father and Mother.” Indeed, Mary is our mother too. (See John 19:27 & Revelation 12:17)
“Why do you pray to Mary and the saints when we can pray to Jesus directly?”
Have you ever asked someone to pray for you? Of course you have, and rightly so. The Bible tells us to “pray for one another” because “the fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful.” (James 5:16) We can always pray to Jesus, but sometimes we also ask the saints, our holiest friends, to offer prayers with us and for us (as we see them doing in Revelation 5:8.)
“Have you been ‘born-again?'”
Yes, because I am baptized. As Jesus told Nicodemus, one enters the kingdom of God by being “born of water and Spirit.” (John 3:5) Demonstrating what he meant, “After this, Jesus and his disciples went into the region of Judea, where he spent some time with them baptizing.” (John 3:22) Indeed, as St. Peter wrote, “baptism now saves you.” (1st Peter 3:21)
“Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?”
Yes. For example, I often receive him as my Lord and Savior in the Eucharist. As Jesus said, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.” (John 6:56)
“Do you believe you can earn salvation by your works, rather than by faith alone?”
No one can earn the initial grace of salvation by their works. (Ephesians 2:8-9) But once God has brought us into his friendship we must cooperate with his grace in our actions, “otherwise [we] will be cut off.” (Romans 11:22) “Faith without works is dead.” (James 2:17)
“How can you believe that the Pope, a sinner like every man, is infallible?”
The Holy Spirit used sinful men to write the inspired Scriptures. Likewise, God protects the Pope from teaching in error about Christian faith and morals lest the whole Church be led astray. Jesus made St. Peter both the Church’s rock foundation and its chief shepherd on earth. (Matthew 16:18-19) The Pope is St. Peter’s successor in that office.
Who Were The Sadducees?
November 16, 2013In the Synoptic Gospels, some Sadducees come forward to challenge Jesus about his teachings on the resurrection. The Sadducees were an upper class Jewish sect of Jesus’ day. Despite disbelieving many popular Jewish beliefs, they dominated the Jews’ religious and political leadership in Jerusalem.
The Sadducees only accepted the Bible’s first five books as inspired and rejected any religious teachings they could not find there; including angels, life after death, and the resurrection of the dead. This is why when the Sadducees try to use an absurd (polyandrous) example to mock Jesus’ belief in the resurrection, he replies by citing the scene of Moses and burning bush from Exodus—a book of Scripture they accept.
The Sadducees administered in the Temple, often served as its priests, and were numerous on the Jewish high counsel—the Sanhedrin—which would go on to condemn Jesus to death for blasphemy. Jesus, however, would go on to demonstrate his contention that “the dead will rise” in his own person.
12 Reasons Why I Quit Going to [Sporting Events]
November 7, 2013As seen on Facebook
12 Reasons Why I QUIT Attending SPORTS Events
- The coach never came to visit me.
- Every time I went, they asked me for money.
- The people sitting in my row didn’t seem very friendly.
- The seats were very hard.
- The referees made a decision I didn’t agree with.
- I was sitting with hypocrites—they only came to see what others were wearing!
- Some games went into overtime and I was late… getting home.
- The band played some songs I had never heard before.
- The games are scheduled on my only day to sleep in and run errands.
- My parents took me to too many games when I was growing up.
- Since I read a book on sports, I feel that I know more than the coaches, anyway.
- I don’t want to take my children because I want them to choose for themselves what sport they like best.
John Paul II & 153 Fish
October 22, 2013After the Great Robot Wars, I imagine pretty much everything we know about John Paul the Great will be dismissed as pious legend.
Blessed Pope John Paul the Great Quotes
October 21, 2013“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.”
“A person’s rightful due is to be treated as an object of love, not as an object for use.”
“War is a defeat for humanity.”
“As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.”
“Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and ‘hallelujah’ [“Praise the Lord”] is our song.”
“Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.”
“Faith and Reason are like two wings of the human spirit by which is soars to the truth.”
“Do not be afraid. Do not be satisfied with mediocrity. Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” “
The future starts today, not tomorrow.”
How Christianity Would Be Deprived Without St. Luke
October 18, 2013- No Gospel of Luke or Acts of the Apostles.
- No stories about the Annunciation, Visitation, Presentation, the Finding of Jesus in the Temple, the Ascension, or Pentecost.
- No parables about the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the Rich Man & Lazarus, and others.
- Mary, the mother of Jesus, would go unquoted in the Bible (apart from the Wedding Feast of Cana.)
- We wouldn’t know where John the Baptist came from, his parents’ names, or that he was related to Jesus.
- We wouldn’t know about the Good Thief’s conversion.
- We wouldn’t know of Jesus’ appearance on the Road to Emmaus.
- We would have no unified Bible narrative about the emergence and spread of the Early Church.
However, thanks to St. Luke, we are blessed with all of these things today.
Parishable Items 