Keep
your eyes open!...
August
31, 2020
(Mat 25:37-40) Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did
we see thee hungry and fed thee: thirsty and gave thee drink? Or when
did we see thee a stranger and took thee in? Or naked and covered thee?
Or when did we see thee sick or in prison and came to thee? And the
king answering shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did
it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.
TWEET:
Fr. Dan Corrou, SJ, an American Jesuit stationed in Beirut as Regional
Director of Jesuit Refugee Service-Middle East: "During the initial
clean up, I found myself alone in the Jesuit church covered in dust and
broken glass. I sat on a broken pew and stared at the simple red candle
of the tabernacle that had not blown out. In this large, damaged,
dusty, beautiful church, it was the only light. The Lamb of God, broken
and beautiful, with us. Many have said it, but 2020 has been a
difficult year, and it's only August. However, in that quiet moment in
the church, sitting with Jesus, I knew that if Jesus isn't leaving us
in our brokenness, how can we leave one another in our brokenness. The
brokenness is painful and traumatic, but the brokenness must lead to
being given. It would be easy and more comfortable to run away, but God
does not do that. From our chaos, God remains; the least we can do is
linger with God."
FIDES.ORG: Caritas Lebanon: "We are living a nightmare, but we will not give up and will continue to help the most vulnerable"
ACN: ACN is striving to bring hope to Lebanon
Christians in
Lebanon are facing a profound crisis, and in response Aid to the Church
in Need (ACN) has approved three emergency aid projects for the most
vulnerable families and refugees in the region of Zahle and the Bekaa
Valley.
Over the course of many years the
Church in Lebanon has played a vital role in responding to the social,
economic and political needs of its people. “Today all our people are
struggling to obtain their daily bread. We will continue to do
everything in our power to stand by them during these difficult times,”
says Greek Melkite Archbishop Issam John Darwish of Zahle, the
principal city in the Bekaa governorate in Lebanon.
Two of the projects are designed to
supply urgent basic necessities for the neediest families, including
food and basic hygiene articles. Archbishop Darwish has asked ACN to
supply funding for 2,000 basic food parcels to alleviate the suffering
of some 2,000 families in Zahle and the Bekaa Valley. The present
situation is so bad, owing to the coronavirus crisis, that many of
these families cannot even meet their most basic needs. A second
project will help a further 100 families in the parishes of the
Maronite Diocese of Baalbek, in the north of the Bekaa Valley. Thanks
to this aid, the families, who are living below the poverty line, will
at least have some security for the next three months.
In addition to these two projects,
and given the growing number of coronavirus infections and the lack of
testing capacity in the country, ACN is supporting the establishment of
a COVID-19 test center in the Tel Chiha hospital in Zahle, a hospital
established by the Archdiocese of Zahle, an indispensable institution
in the fight to alleviate people’s urgent needs.
“The people in Zahle and the Bekaa Valley are living in a situation of
chaos and fear. In the last two weeks the number of patients has
increased dramatically in every region, and especially in Zahle and the
Bekaa Valley, and our health system is on the point of reaching its
maximum capacity,” Archbishop Darwish explains. The plan is to set up a
test center in the Catholic hospital, to offer assistance to the local
population of 150,000, including refugees and the most vulnerable among
them.
“We hold people’s lives in our hands,” the archbishop continues, “and
we have to offer them a laboratory they can have faith in. At present,
people in the region aren’t even sure if most of the results are
correct, and so there is an urgent need to test them again, so that we
can track the virus more closely.”
There has been no official census in Lebanon since 1932. However, the
most recent study carried out by Statistics Lebanon, puts the current
number of Christians in Lebanon at 44 percent of the total population.
But the country’s grave economic and political crisis has been driving
many Christians to emigrate. Fed up with the corruption, the people
have lost all faith in government. According to ACN’s own most recent
report on international religious freedom, the percentage of Christians
may well have fallen to some 32.2 percent of the total population of
almost 6 million Lebanese. The war in neighboring Syria will have added
around a million refugees, most of them Sunni Muslims.
Yet, despite this influx, Lebanon is still the country in the Middle
East with the highest proportion of Christians, and one of the few in
which they do not suffer problems of social or political
discrimination. Many Iraqi and Syrian Christians have also sought
refuge in Lebanon. Since October 2019 there have been ongoing
demonstrations demanding a radical change of government; the
devastating explosion which shattered Beirut Aug. 4, 2020 has brought
the country to the brink of utter disaster.
MORE: As Lebanon’s central bank teeters on the edge of bankruptcy, the spectre of hunger rises its head
RELATED
Lebanon: Order of St Lazarus helps bind up Beirut's wounds
Knights of Columbus donating $250,000 after Beirut explosion
JRS stands in solidarity with the people of Beirut and Lebanon during this devastating time
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
20. The growth of
fear is the beginning of love,
but a complete state of purity is the foundation of theology.
August
28, 2020
(Joh 19:26-27)
When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom
he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! Then saith
he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple
took her unto his own home.
POPE FRANCIS:
“I cordially greet all Poles. Dear brothers and sisters, today (08/26)
the Church in Poland is celebrating the Black Madonna of Czestochowa.
With a vivid memory in my heart of my visit to this Shrine, four years
ago, on the occasion of World Youth Day, I unite today with the
thousands of pilgrims who gather there together with the Polish
Episcopate to entrust myself, families, the nation and all humanity to
her motherly care. Pray to the Blessed Mother that she may intercede
for all of us, and especially for those who suffer in various ways from
the pandemic, and may she bring them comfort. Please pray for me too.
God bless you!”
CATHOLICTRADION.ORG: Our Lady of Czestochowa
AMERICANEEDSFATIMA.ORG: The Marvelous Story of Our Lady of the Pillar
Venerable Maria of Agreda who was
shown the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary in detail, writes in her
Mystical City of God that St. James, brother of St. John, whom Our Lord
called “Sons of Thunder”, had a special devotion to the Blessed Mother.
Becoming the apostle of what today
is Spain, Saint James was having a hard time evangelizing the northern
region of Zaragoza. One night, as he prayed asking help for his plight,
he suddenly beheld a great light in the midst of which he saw Our Lady
surrounded by a multitude of angels.
The interesting thing is that Mary
was still living in Jerusalem at the time. But as queen of the Church,
she was given to see all that concerned her Son’s work, and being shown
the prayer of her devotee, had obtained from Jesus to help him in a
special way.
On learning of their lady’s wishes,
the angels in her retinue promptly built a throne of luminous clouds on
which they sat their queen, and swiftly carried her across the
Mediterranean, serenading her all the way.
So now, the Blessed Mother consoled
her son James, and assured him help for his endeavors. She asked him to
build a shrine on the spot she appeared, and as a token of her help to
the region, left a marble column or pillar topped by a small statue of
herself holding her Infant Son.
By the pillar, she left an angel to
ensure the safety of the holy image until the end of time. According to
ancient Spanish tradition, this apparition occurred on January 2nd,
40AD. Her Feast day is celebrated on October 12th.
St. James indeed built the first
shrine on that hallowed spot, around which grew the present-day
Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar of Zaragoza.
Not long after, St. James was
recalled to Jerusalem where he was the first apostle to suffer
martyrdom. As he prepared to endure death by beheading, Our Lady and
her angels again were visibly present to him fortifying and consoling
him.
A MOMENT WITH MARY: A holy sheet spread over her and she came back to life!
On August 23, 1994, near the Greek
port city of Thessaloniki, a man and a woman, both doctors (he a
pediatrician, she a dentist), were swimming with their 9-year-old
daughter, Calliopi, when the girl was pulled under the water by a
riptide and drowned. She was taken to a hospital where she was declared
dead.
The father, a devout man,
telephoned a monk friend at an Orthodox monastery to tell him the
tragic news and to ask for prayers. The higumene (abbot) told the
father to hope in the Mercy of God and promised to immediately send a
holy linen sheet that had been used to hold the miraculous icon of the
Mother of God of Andros during the procession on her feast day. The
child’s father said it was too late, but he would gladly accept this
precious gift. He would use it as a shroud and lay it over his
daughter’s body so that the Mother of God would take his child with her
to Heaven.
When the holy sheet arrived,
Calliopi had been dead for almost 9 hours. They covered her lifeless
body with it …and the girl came back to life! The doctors warned the
parents that since she had been dead for so long she would certainly
have brain damage. They gave the parents a bag full of medicine for the
child when she left the hospital.
In the car, on their way home, the
father prayed to the Mother of God, telling her that since she had
brought her little girl back from the dead, she could also make sure
that she would have no after-effects from the accident. He opened the
window of his car and threw the medicine out the window. Calliopi came
out of this adventure without any damage. She was the best student in
her class.
On July 25, 1995, Calliopi went
with her parents to the Monastery of Saint Nicholas of Andros where the
miraculous icon of the Mother of God "Root of Jesse" is located to give
thanks.
OUR LADY OF PROMPT SUCCOR, PRAY FOR US!
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
18. Those who have
reached such an angelic state
often forget about bodily food. I think that often they do not even
feel
any desire for it. And no wonder, for frequently a contrary desire
expels
the thought of food.
August
26, 2020
(2Ti 1:7-8) For God hath not given us the spirit of fear: but of power
and of love and of sobriety. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the
testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but labour with the
gospel, according to the power of God.
AUDIO VIA REGINA PROPHETARUM: The Danger of Becoming Demoralized
The first goal of revolutionary
propaganda, particularly the Marxist variety, is to demoralize. It’s to
depress you and make you believe your civilization and even the Church
herself is somehow lost. People ashamed of their own culture won’t
defend it when it is attacked. Many Americans—particularly younger
ones—have been conditioned to believe that one belief system is as good
as any another. The only exception to this rule is the Western
Christian tradition which, many have been taught, is the source of all
evil. So for a significant number of Americans, the question is not,
How do we defeat the radical left and Liberalism, but rather Do we
really have anything worth defending? Many Americans are unequipped to
fight a war of ideas because they are paralyzed by political
correctness and guilt of so called “white privilege.”
THE CATHOLIC THING: Substitutes for Thought
FIRST THINGS: Keep Christ at the Center by Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.” These words from W. B.
Yeats’s poem “The Second Coming” were first published one hundred years
ago, in a time not wholly dissimilar to ours. The 1918-1919 flu
epidemic had ravaged much of Europe, tearing through communities and
families without discrimination. (Yeats nearly lost his wife and unborn
child to the flu.) The stench of World War I still hovered over the
trenches and new conflicts simmered. People were unsure about the
future, while political leaders grappled with a changing world. Yet
through all these trials the faith remained at the center and held the
Western world together, albeit weakly at times.
Today, however, there is a notable difference. While we do not face the
miseries of World War I or the brewing storms that led to World War II,
a spiritual shift in axis has allowed once firm foundations for our
common life to fall apart.
The demonstrations we observe today against true injustices have in
places been co-opted for an agenda that wants to shatter the center of
Western culture. Rather than protesting peacefully against racial
discrimination, some have turned their energy to destroying churches or
symbols of Christianity. Others are redefining nature to accommodate
moral license. Still others use executive power, legislatures, or
courts to marginalize people of faith and the works of Christian
service. An organized chaos has fractured our common identity and
threatens to unravel the heritage we have been entrusted with to pass
to our children.
Behind all this is the removal of God from the center. It is God—and
for Christians, Jesus—who holds the fallen, fragile world together.
God, however, is no longer the center of our social order. No doubt the
pandemic has revealed our fragility, but the pandemic is not the cause
of the dysfunction, which was already there.
The pandemic has exposed a thinness in soul that can only come from
distancing ourselves from God. By removing God from the center, our
culture has come to the point of societal dissolution. The
prioritization of our physical well-being (as important as that is)
over our spiritual well-being betrays a myopic focus on the temporal
over the eternal, the horizontal over the vertical.
A culture that does not have faith in God and his creation is a culture
that will not hold. Perhaps this moment we face as a nation is just
another moment in history, or perhaps this is a time of epochal change
that will forever alter who we are and how we understand ourselves. The
answer to this question hinges on the question of God. Do we as a
people united in language and place also have common ground with
respect to our place before our creator, or have we abandoned our
heritage and made the individual the measure of all things?
Christopher Dawson wrote frequently about the place of “cult” in a
properly ordered society. The culture of a people is defined primarily
by who or what those people worship or place at the center—what they
identify as the purpose for their existence. From the founding of our
country there was a sense that God was essential to our common life.
George Washington understood that religion and virtue were necessary to
hold an otherwise diverse population together. The cultural center held
because we had a common moral foundation rooted in Judeo-Christian
beliefs—except for slavery, which haunts our national soul to this day.
Now, however, we are becoming a country untethered from the truth that
a loving Father created us to know, love, and serve him in this life,
which is the way to our happiness in the next. Our happiness, temporal
and eternal, depends on turning somewhere else for a vaccine to
inoculate ourselves from the spiritual virus that wreaks much more
damage than anything COVID-19 can inflict. We seem to be forgetting
this. Our physical health is indeed a great dignity that we should
protect, but our spiritual health is what determines our eternal
destination. To let the physical eclipse the spiritual is to surrender
to the devil and his empty promises.
We should turn to a person, Christ. The Church has a unique role to
play in holding the center. It is a visible reminder that Christ lives
and continues to act among us. It is not surprising, then, that statues
of saints have been defaced, church buildings set ablaze, and even
physical harm done against the faithful in the name of progress.
Perhaps those inflicting this new woke morality are not fully aware of
what they do, but the devil is, and he is no doubt using the current
moment to do his work.
The Church—bishops, priests, religious, and all the faithful—must
commit herself in this time of uncertainty to strong witness to the
faith. Only in this way can we stand against the work of the great
spiritual being Christians know as the Adversary. The faithful—and I
speak specifically here to myself and my brother bishops—have a duty to
be a voice of reason in these unreasonable times. At our episcopal
ordination, we entered fully into Christ’s three-fold office of priest,
prophet, and king. As priests we are called to offer sacrifice, the
sacrifice of the Mass but also the sacrifice of our lives. This time of
worldwide pandemic provides new ways for each of us to offer our daily
sacrifices for the sanctification of the world. Today there is no
shortage of ways we must all sacrifice.
We must also make certain the Mass remains the source and summit of our
Christian life. The one, true sacrifice of Christ is the sacrifice that
all other sacrifices should be grafted into. No doubt civil authorities
have a right and duty to protect the population, but the Mass cannot
become a luxury less important than other public gatherings. Should
another shutdown occur, the Church must be prepared to defend the
proper place of worship. The Mass is essential to the spiritual
well-being of every Christian. Certainly, the Church must respect civil
authority and accept limitations to what defines a prudent gathering of
the faithful, but civil authority should also respect the place of a
religious community, at least as much as it tolerates (or promotes)
other public gatherings. The faith, especially safe participation in
the sacraments, is essential.
The prophetic office demands that the Church teach the truth in season
and out of season. While pews may be less full due to safety concerns,
our need to teach the saving power of Christ is no less urgent.
Bishops, priests, and religious should creatively find ways, as has
happened in so many places, to bring the gospel to the faithful.
Technology is a useful tool for this work, but personal contact must
also continue. Calls and emails, proper availability of confession,
evangelization and catechesis must now be done in innovative ways to
bring Jesus into our communities.
The kingly office, or the office of governance, should be exercised to
lead people to Christ. It is not an office of authority over the
faithful, but an authority given to the Church, working through the
bishops, to lead people to Christ. As we move through this pandemic,
hard decisions need to be made due to a whole host of practical
considerations. But they should be made in light of the mission given
to the Church to draw all people to Christ. If Jesus is the measure by
which decisions are made, the Holy Spirit will bring good out of bad.
We must pray that the closing of parishes or schools, as difficult as
this is for the entire community, can mysteriously transform into good
if Christ, rather than financial or legal considerations, is at the
center. My brother bishops and I can only lead if we place ourselves
before Christ every day in prayer and receive the prayers of the
faithful. If the Church is not praying, then the Holy Spirit is not
invited to act. Nature does not permit a vacuum; when we remove Christ
the space is filled with something or someone else—always something
that is not as good for us, and very often something that is evil.
Without specific time dedicated exclusively to God in prayer and
worship, then that time will be filled with things that keep us from
our loving Creator. But when we find time daily to put ourselves before
God to worship him and petition him, then we can hear his voice. It is
then that we are converted and radiate to the world the love that the
Father has for each one of us as his beloved daughters and sons, a love
that is so needed today. In that love the center begins to hold once
again.
Yeats’s words ring true for us today, but they need not be true. Let us
work and pray to keep Jesus at the center to hold this fallen world
together and redeem each of us.
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
15. The effect of
hunger is vague and indefinite;
but the effect of thirst is intense and obvious to all, and indicative
of blazing heat. So one who yearns for God says: My soul thirsts for
God,
the mighty, the living God.
August
24, 2020
(Joh 14:6) Jesus saith to him: I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by me.
MARK MALLET BLOG: Drawing Near to Jesus
PRIESTS FOR LIFE: Open Letter to the Pastors of the United States
An Open Letter to the Pastors of the United States
August
21, 2020
Dear
Pastors,
I
write to you as a fellow preacher of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This
Gospel makes clear moral demands on individuals and on governments
alike. The duty of preaching the Gospel involves not only the urgent
exhortation to personal holiness and salvation, but the equally urgent
exhortation to govern justly. Those responsible for the common good are
obliged to protect the fundamental rights of the citizens and their
freedom to live out their Faith in the way that they – and not the
government – see fit.
Anyone
who has been paying attention over the last six decades has seen an
organized and persistent effort to limit the Gospel to the private
arena of our hearts and within the four walls of our Churches.
Prayer
and Bible reading have been banished from our schools. People of faith
have had to fight in court to display religious symbols in public and
to conduct their businesses and ministries in accordance with their
moral convictions. The right to even talk about our faith has been
attacked on campuses and in the media.
And
as the courts have increasingly upheld religious freedom, haters of
religion have now taken to the streets to show their contempt for our
beliefs by destroying its symbols.
Moreover,
the legal protection afforded to our most fundamental good, life
itself, and to God’s creation of marriage and the family, has been
obliterated by amoral legislators and activist judges. Some 62 million
children have been killed in the name of “freedom.”
Yet
our Founding Fathers, anticipating the extent to which human nature can
fall into error and sin, have provided for us a system of
self-governance that can overcome and correct even these drastic
departures from the laws of nature and of nature’s God.
Our
nation is preparing to engage in two months of voting from September 4th,
when the first absentee balloting begins, through Election Day,
November 3. In this time, some 100,000 electoral races will be decided
at every level of state and federal government.
We
therefore have a choice.
And
the choice we have is as relevant to what kind of church we will be as
it is to what kind of nation we will be.
On
the one hand, we can adopt a mentality that says that we have neither
the duty nor the possibility of changing the course of public policy in
our nation. This mindset takes various forms and utilizes various
excuses.
Some
maintain we cannot really know the difference between what’s good for
the nation and what isn’t, or that morality is up to each church or
individual to decide.
Some
maintain that churches and pastors are to stay far away from any
engagement in politics or public policy, and simply preach a Gospel
that pertains only to individual, interior spiritual life.
On
the other hand, we have the choice to engage the battle, taking on the
same mindset that led pastors to preach the large body of political
sermons of our nation’s Founding Era, giving spiritual and moral energy
and guidance to the very creation of our country.
We
can commit ourselves to the same spiritual imperative that led
believers to fight slavery and that led their descendants to move from
the Churches into the streets to battle segregation.
We
can be convinced of the words Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. preached
on the night before he was assassinated:
"I'm
always happy to see a relevant ministry. It's alright to talk about
'long white robes over yonder,' in all of its symbolism. But ultimately
people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here. It's
alright to talk about 'streets flowing with milk and honey,' but God
has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his
children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's alright to talk
about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preacher must talk about
the new New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los
Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do."
We
can understand that equipping the People of God to elect the right
candidates is not a political task
but a pastoral task,
because we are enabling them to carry out the Great Commission,
teaching all nations to carry out everything our Lord has commanded.
This
is our choice, as we enter Elections 2020.
Our
Lord told us we need to be attentive to the signs of the times. The
problem is not that the Church is becoming too political, but that our
politics have become too pagan.
The
political divide in our nation is no longer between two major parties
that “have the same goals but different ideas of how to get there.”
That was once true, but is no longer.
They
have different goals,
different views of America, totally divergent views of morality, and
completely incompatible views of religion and the Church.
The
Democrat Party platform has not only departed from the Republican Party
platform in matters of policy. The differences are matters of principle. The
Democrat Party platform has abandoned the principle of the God-given
right to life and the liberty our Founders embraced to practice their
Faith in their public life. Moreover, they have made their intentions
clear to write into the laws and into the Courts a worldview completely
devoid of those principles.
This
is not the kind of divide we can “rise above,” nor the kind of battle
from which we can exempt ourselves or our congregations.
This
is a test for us. Either we recognize this problem, and like good
shepherds, warn our people, or we retreat into a ‘neutrality’ so
absolute that it no longer allows us to see, much less neutralize,
threats to the very survival of our nation and our ministries.
When
a political party embraces the destruction of innocent life and the
suppression of the freedom of the Church, it can no longer be treated
in a neutral way by the Church. That Party becomes an existential
threat to the nation to which we pledge our allegiance and to the
Kingdom to which we have pledged our souls.
We
are, moreover, at a moment when our President, Donald Trump, his
Administration, and the Republican Party at every level, have achieved record-breaking
accomplishments to
protect our religious freedom from oppressive mandates at home and
persecution abroad. The President has defended our freedom to preach in
the pulpits, and the freedom of our children to pray in school and
speak up on their campus for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The over 200
federal judges he has put in place, moreover, are men and women
likewise committed to religious freedom.
Dear
pastors, at the founding of our nation, Pastor John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg declared in his sermon on
January 21, 1776, "In
the language of the Holy Writ, there is a time for all things. There is
a time to preach and a time to fight. And now is the time to fight." He
then threw off his clerical robes to reveal the uniform of an officer
in the Continental Army. As one account relates, “Drums began to roll,
men kissed their wives, and they walked down the aisle to enlist. The
next day, Pastor Muhlenberg led
300 men of his church and surrounding churches to join General
Washington's Continental Army.”
Nearly
two centuries later, Catholic Bishop Clemens
von Galen (d. 1946),
preached fearlessly against the Nazi regime and its oppression of human
life and religious freedom. He was not afraid to name and fight the
political threat that was right before his eyes.
It
is not that these men abandoned their pastoral mission in order to
become political. It is, rather, that they saw the demands that their
pastoral mission placed on them in the circumstances of their time, and
courageously rose to the occasion.
That
is the choice, and the opportunity, you and I have before us right now.
The
choice for our nation is not simply about which political party will
have power, but about which kind of America we will be – one marked by
moral chaos, the Culture of Death, socialism and religious oppression,
or one based on the freedom and principles our Founders made clear.
And
the choice for our churches is whether we will retreat in silence and
cowardice out of fear of being ‘too political,’ and hence become
irrelevant to the world around us, or respond clearly and courageously
to this moment of unprecedented conflict, and lead the People of God to
protect their rights, their freedom, their Church and their beloved
country.
Sincerely,
Fr.
Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
12. Even a mother
does not cling to the babe at
her breast as a son of love clings to the Lord at all times.
August
21, 2020
(Deu 30:19) I call heaven and earth to witness this day, that I have
set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose therefore
life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
EXCERPT THE CATHOLIC THING: What Won’t We Tolerate?
Tens of millions of American Catholics
believe that a morally serious person can look at the industrial-scale
slaughter of innocent children in this country – close to a million
abortions performed each year – and say, “I am willing, not only to
defend that butcher’s bill, but I promise to expand it, if doing so
allows me to pursue justice on other fronts.”
VICTIMS
OF ABORTION NEWSLETTER: Broken Branches Issue 138
DAILY COMPASS: "What civilisation? Chemical abortion led me into a
dreadful deception."
NCR COMMENTARY: On Biden, Abortion and Communion
CNA: The Biden Platform: What Catholics should know
THE DAILY SIGNAL:
Two Reports Buttress Trump Policies Banning Abortion
Funding Abroad, Fetal Tissue Research at Home
The government issued two reports
Tuesday evaluating the Trump administration’s pro-life policies that
curb taxpayer funding for abortion-related matters here and abroad.
The State Department issued a status report early Tuesday on the
Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance policy, which requires
foreign nongovernmental organizations getting U.S. taxpayer funding to
agree not to perform or actively promote abortion.
Then, late Tuesday afternoon, the administration released
recommendations by an ethics advisory board to Secretary of Health and
Human Services Alex Azar on alternatives to research using fetal tissue
from abortions.
The restriction on federal funding of abortions by foreign entities
applies to the State Department, the Defense Department, the Department
of Health and Human Services, and the U.S. Agency for International
Development, or USAID.
The new status report found no disruptions to providing health care
abroad, with only eight of the 1,340 prime grantees declining to take
federal funding with the conditions attached. The two largest of the
eight were the International Planned Parenthood Federation and Marie
Stopes International.
“The government worked quickly to transition activity to new partners
in order to prevent and resolve any delays or gaps in health care being
delivered around the world,” a senior Trump administration official
told reporters Tuesday.
That’s contrary, the official added, “to the narrative sometimes pushed
by the left that pro-life policies sometimes stand in the way of
women’s health and wellness.”
RELATED: Is the coronavirus vaccine made from fetal cell lines?
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step
30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
10. As love wanes, fear appears; because he who
has no fear is either filled with love, or is dead in soul.
August
19, 2020
(Joh 16:33) These things I have spoken to you, that in me you may have
peace. In the world you shall have distress. But have confidence. I
have overcome the world.
FATHER V TWEET:
Words from Cardinal Parente summing up the whole of salvation
history: “Man falls miserably into guilt and remains under the
weight of sin and of the Divine malediction for centuries. Eternal Love
does not tolerate so much ruin and, bending over His wayward creature,
He becomes one with it but taking on His flesh; hence the Incarnation
of the Word and the Redemption, which reopens the road to heaven.
And the Word inserts Itself and
continues to rest in the breast of humanity to save it. Thus we have
the Church with its infallible teaching body, with her graces and
sacraments, sources of supernatural life.
The
Church is the marriage between God and man, the prolongation of the
Incarnation in which Christ continues His redeeming work made up of
suffering and love, living in every soul which, through the struggles
and tribulations of the present life, yearns for the light and peace of
life eternal. A true romance: a drama made up of truth, grace and
living reality, in which man, in contact with Christ, redeems himself
from guilt, liberates himself from evil, captures his true being and
moves on to the conquest of God, his beginning and necessary end.”
THE CATHOLIC THING:
An Elusive and Essential Virtue
BLOG: Rosary Blast
Our angry world is on
destruction’s brink.
The Rosary is our lifebelt, not to
sink.
In whatever events are due to fall upon us this autumn and thereafter,
it will be essential for all souls who have the good fortune to believe
in God to be turning in mind and heart to Him, because He is at the
very centre of these events, and they cannot be understood without Him.
That is why the mass of conservatives and liberals alike are today
“walking in darkness.” It is only souls with the Faith that “have the
light of life” (Jn. VIII, 12) who can read what is going on.
For centuries what is called “Western civilisation” has been turning
away from God. Yet He alone could and did create the spiritual and
rational soul which alone gives life and free-will to every man alive,
and this He did to enable man to choose to go to Heaven, if he wants.
If he refuses such an offer, he deserves only to go to Hell, which is
what he in fact wanted in order to get away from God, because he died
in a state of revolt against Him. Thus all souls on earth are all the
time making their way towards Him or away from Him, in accordance with
God’s justice, tempered by His mercy, both infinite in scope. At the
very heart of the most bitter atheist’s being – is God.
And this turning towards or away from God is what human life on earth
is all about, whether men recognise it or deny it. By today, 2020, God
has been driven so far out of the picture that among men both His
friends and His enemies can be more unconscious than conscious of being
such, but that is nevertheless what they are, and what is driving their
lives. The unconscious friends we call “conservatives” because they are
trying to conserve the last remains of Christendom, better known today
as “Western civilisation.” The unconscious enemies of God we call
“liberals” because they are trying to liberate themselves from the same
last vestiges of the Ten Commandments.
It is the greatness of God which gives to conservatives their strength,
incomparably greater when they understand that much, and turn to Him,
but greatly diminished if they want or try to fight for Him without
Him. That is why politics today are constantly shifting to the left,
because the conservatives have ever less of God in them, or to fight
for. This means an ever weaker enemy in the face of the liberals,
crusading with a religious fanaticism for their New World Order without
God. It is only because God is involved that the clash between
conservatives and liberals in the United States is on the brink of
civil war, on the brink of tearing the nation apart.
Things have come so far that as far back as 1973 Our Lady said in
Akita, Japan, “Only I can help you now.” There she also said, “Pray the
Rosary for the Pope, for bishops and for priests.” Indeed the heart of
today’s national and international problem lies in the Catholic Church,
because the one and only true God has one and only one institution on
earth which He Himself instituted to bring men to His Heaven, and that
is the Catholic Church. The world could not possibly be in the terrible
trouble in which it finds itself today had not the agents of the New
World Order succeeded in infiltrating and crippling the Catholic Church
at the Second Vatican Council, held in the 1960’s.
That is why these “Comments” cannot believe in or promote all kinds of
well-meant but inadequate action to save Church or world, but they can
and do believe in a “Rosary Blast” to be held next month, between
Friday and Sunday, September 18 to 20, at the foremost shrine of Our
Lady in England, at Walsingham in Norfolk, 27 miles from the city of
Norwich. Let anyone interested in really helping to solve the problems
of Church and world contact [email protected]
in order to take part in praying five complete Rosaries in some 40
hours. Mother of God, help! Kyrie eleison.
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
8. Love is
essentially the banishment of every
kind of contrary thought, for love thinketh no evil (1 Cor 8:5).
August
17, 2020
(1Ti 2:1-4) I desire therefore, first of all, that supplications,
prayers, intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all men: For kings
and for all that are in high station: that we may lead a quiet and a
peaceable life in all piety and chastity. For this is good and
acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, Who will have all men to be
saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
CARDINAL BURKE: “There is no
question that we are living in the most troubled times. Fundamental
truths about human life about marriage and the family and about the
conscience are being called into question by threatening the lives of
individuals and of our society. But we are full of courage because we
know that our Lord is with us. He’s called us to be His soldiers on the
ground, working with Him for the salvation of the world.
There is a 54 day Novena
beginning on the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
which will be completed on October 7. Your prayer would be even more
efficacious if you would also take part in that 54 day Novena.”
US GRACE FORCE:
In Whose Army Are You?
CRISIS MAGAZINE: Letter From a Pastor About a Presidential Candidate
CATHOLIC LEAGUE: Kamala Harris' Catholic Problem
BILL O'REILLY COMMENTARY:
The Kamala Factor
Like the vicious Covid infection back in February, it is taking a while
for many Americans to understand the danger that is looming. Joni
Mitchell once sang: “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know
what you’ve got til it’s gone ...” So please pay attention for Joni’s
sake.
The Democratic Party, driven by its far-left spear point, senses it
could win the presidency and both houses of Congress in November. The
Dems well understand they have a rare opportunity to control pretty
much every aspect of American life. They have a solid partnership with
the powerful corporate media, an eccentric and unpredictable incumbent
in President Trump, and a brutal weapon in racist and gender
allegations. The “woke” movement is an unprecedented threat to freedom
of expression.
The question then becomes a simple one: do you think most Americans are
aware of the big picture here? The answer is no, by the way.
Let me provide a very vivid example of what I’m talking about.
California and New York have both become one party states because of
the massive influx of new foreign residents. Traditionally, immigrants
favor the political party that “provides” more government assistance
and that, of course, is how Democrats operate. So today, Sacramento and
Albany are ruled by liberal politicians who have imposed their
philosophy: high taxes, less social order, aggressive restrictions and
regulations on the private economy.
The results have been disastrous. All you have to do is travel to New
York City, Los Angeles, and San Francisco to see the anarchy for
yourself. I don’t advise going to Portland, Oregon or Seattle because
law enforcement in those places has collapsed.
The harsh reality on display in liberal precincts should easily put
President Trump back in office. But they will not. Because many voters
are still dependent upon news outlets that provide propaganda, not
facts. Also, Mr. Trump is the most controversial president in history.
So if the Biden-Harris ticket prevails and the Dems gain control of
both houses of Congress, expect a blanket amnesty for undocumented
aliens. In addition, those “legalized” by law will be put on the fast
track to vote by mail. That will mean Texas and Florida, home to many
undocumented folks, will likely become blue states.
And then the federal government will largely be controlled by the left,
just like California and New York.
Enter Senator Kamala Harris who could very well preside over this Brave
New World. She definitely sees the future and it is her. Joe Biden is
Paul von Hindenburg in 1932 Germany. An old guy who is malleable.
Kamala is the ticket, so to speak.
Again, do you think most voters have any clue? Do you think The New
York Times and Washington Post will tell them?
But Joni Mitchell has to know that traditional America and the society
it supports could soon be gone. And Kamala can’t wait.
FROM THE MAILBAG
VIA David J Sheehan:
We are agreed that the country is deeply divided. Evil and Good cannot
be friends, nor can there be peaceful co-existence between these two
forces.
The people of the United States are being given a clear choice between
two very different man, two very different parties, and two very
different set of ideas.
Donald Trump is not a perfect man, but he is the closest thing that we
have to a pro-life leader, despite the ramblings of Bishop John Stowe
of Kentucky.
Joe Biden has made it clear that he is going to go beat up some nuns,
the Little Sisters of the Poor, should he get elected. And here I
thought we should be worried about China, Russia, North Korea and
Iran....................
The choice for anyone who values life, is very simple this year. The
nation is not polarized because of any one person. The nation is
polarized because we have LIFE and ANTI-LIFE in a desperate struggle.
May we choose LIFE this November.
Ladder
of Divine Ascent excerpt: Step 30- "Concerning the Supreme Trinity
Among the Virtues"
7. Love, by reason
of its nature, is resemblance
to God, as far as that is possible for mortals; in its activity it is
inebriation
of the soul; and by its distinctive property it is a fountain of faith,
an abyss of patience, a sea of humility.
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