Two years ago I sat at this same computer and posted a Monday morning pre go to work post. It was a stalling tactic after a 4 day holiday weekend because, quite frankly, I did not want to go to work. A horrible experience at an employer that I had loved and hoped to retire from just went terribly wrong, all because two or three people were allowed to spew their evil venom.
I have prayed for them before, today I jut don't give them any thought. For, as the old saying goes, a door closed, a window opened. So on this 1st Monday of Advent, I am off to work, at my new employer, with a new attitude, a stronger resolve to let God be God in my life and ready to tackle the day. Then, I join the rest of the Who-dat nation and cheer on my beloved Saints vs. the very talented Seahawks.
On this Monday after Thanksgiving, I love going to work and look forward to a great day; what a difference two years makes!
Monday, December 2, 2013
Sunday, December 1, 2013
Foundress, abbess, beatified by Bl. John Paul II
Bl. Maria Angela Astorch
Feastday: December 2
1592 - 1665
Beatified By: 23 May 1982 by Pope John Paul II
1592 - 1665
Beatified By: 23 May 1982 by Pope John Paul II
Maria Angela Astorch was born in Barcelona on September 1, 1592. In 1603, she entered the Capuchin Poor Clare monastery begun by Angela Serafina Prat. Because of her young age she waited five years as an aspirant before beginning the novitiate on 7 September 1608.
As novice master, she went to Zaragoza on 9 May 1614 to found a new monastery there. In 1624, she was vicar and three years later, abbess. On June 2, 1645, she went with four other sisters to found a new monastery at Murcia, under the title "The Exaltation of the Blessed Sacrament." The new monastery suffered frequent floods, especially in 1651 and 1653. Maria Angela remained abbess until 1661. Maria Angela Astorch died in 1665 at the age of 75.
Bishop faced relentless Soviet persecution; beatified bt Bl. John Paul II
Bl. Ivan Sleziuk
Feastday: December 2
1896 - 1973
Beatified By: 27 June 2001 by Pope John Paul II
1896 - 1973
Beatified By: 27 June 2001 by Pope John Paul II
Ivan Sleziukwas born on January 14, 1896 in the village of Zhyvachiv, Ivano-Frankivsk District. In 1923 he was ordained to the priesthood. In April of 1945 Bishop Gregory Khomyshyn ordained him as his co-adjutor with right of succession. On June 2, 1945, Bishop Ivan was arrested and deported for ten years to the labor camps in Vorkuta, Russia. After his release on November 15, 1954, he returned to Ivano-Frankivsk. In 1962, he was arrested again and imprisoned for five years in a camp of strict regimen. After his release on November 30, 1968, he had to go often to the KGB for regular "talks." The last visit was two weeks before his death, which occurred December 2, 1973, in Ivano-Frankivsk.
Today's 1st Sunday of Advent readings DO NOT endorse the "rapture" because there is no such thing; read this carefully so you wont be left behind. LOL!
The “Rapture.” The reading from Romans contains a disputed reference to the so-called "rapture," an event in which, it is supposed, some people will be taken up from life on earth directly into the air to meet the returning Christ. This concept of “dispensationalism," proposed by Rev. Nelson Darby an Irish Anglican lawyer -pastor in A.D. 1800, is a misinterpretation, however. The belief in the Rapture is rooted in the fourth and fifth chapters of 1 Thessalonians, which are placed into an elaborate chronology of "end-time" events based on other passages from Revelation, Daniel, and Matthew 24. In this scheme, the Rapture was called the "day of the Lord" which would come like “a thief in the night" (1 Thess. 5:2). After this secret removal of believers would come the rise of the Antichrist and the placement of the "Mark of the Beast" on his followers during seven years of Tribulation. At the end of those seven years, the second coming of Christ and Armageddon, the final battle between good and evil, would take place. The passage in Matthew (24: 40-41), does, indeed, talk about some people being "taken" and some being "left behind,” but the word for "taken" (paralambanomai) means, not "to go up" but rather "to go along with.” It isn't a magical word about the “born again and saved” people floating up in the air as many of our Protestant brothers believe. It is much more like Jesus' words to the apostles by the Sea of Galilee: “follow me” or “come along with me."
Be alert even while you work: The man working in the field and the woman working at the mill will be “left", because they won’t leave their work. True enough – work is important. We need to provide food and shelter for ourselves and our families. But there is something more important than our work: the coming of the Son of Man. God will arrive unexpectedly. We don't know when a thief might break into our house, so we are prepared for him at all times. We lock our doors and windows. We leave a light on when we're gone. We put in an alarm system. We insure our possessions. We do these things now because a thief could come at some unknown time. Hence, even during this busy Christmas season we must keep our daily life centered on Christ.
Read the whole article here: http://cbci.in/Sunday-Reflections.aspx
Pope Francis Advent message on this 1st day of Advent
Pope Francis: Advent is a journey towards horizon of hope
By Kerri Lenartowick
Pope Francis begins his popemobile tour of the May 15, 2013 general audience in St. Peter's Square Credit: Stephen Driscoll/CNA.
“For the great human family it is necessary to renew always the common horizon toward which we are journeying. The horizon of hope! This is the horizon that makes a good journey,” Pope Francis said on Dec. 1 to the crowds in St. Peter’s Square.
“The time of Advent that we begin again today returns us to the horizon of hope, a hope that does not disappoint because it is founded on the Word of God. A hope that does not disappoint, simply because the Lord never disappoints! He is faithful!” the Pope emphasized.
The time of Advent that the Church celebrates in preparation for Christmas, explained the Pontiff, is “a new journey of the People of God with Jesus Christ, our Shepherd, who guides us in history towards the completion of the Kingdom of God.”
“Let us rediscover the beauty of being together along the way: the Church, with her vocation and mission, and the whole of humanity, the people, the civilizations, the cultures, all together on the paths of time.”
“But on the way to where?” queried Pope Francis.
In the Old Testament, the People of God journeyed toward Jerusalem where the temple of the Lord was, “because from there, from Jerusalem, came the revelation of the face of God and His law.”
At the fullness of time, however, “revelation found its fulfillment in Jesus Christ, and the ‘temple of the Lord’ became God himself, the Word made flesh.”
It is the Lord himself who guides our journey, the “pilgrimage of all of the People of God; and by its light even the other peoples can walk towards the Kingdom of justice, towards the Kingdom of peace.”
“What a great day it will be, when the weapons will be dismantled in order to be transformed into instruments of work!” the Pope reflected, noting the scripture passage from the prophet Isaiah which referred to such peace.
“And this is possible! We bet on hope, on the hope of peace, and it will be possible!” he exclaimed.
“The journey is never finished,” advised Pope Francis. “Just as in each of our own lives, there is always a need to restart, to rise again, to recover a sense of the goal of one’s own existence.”
Mary serves as a “model of this spiritual attitude, to this way of being and of journeying in life.”
Although she was just a “simple girl,” she “carried in her heart the hope of God,” explained the Holy Father.
“In her womb, the hope of God took flesh, became man, and made history: Jesus Christ.”
Mary’s song of praise in the Magnificat “is the canticle of the People of God on the journey, and of all men and women who hope in God, in the power of his mercy.”
“Let us be guided by her, she who is mother, she is a ‘mama’ and knows how to lead us. Let us be guided by her in this time of waiting and active vigilance.”
Pope Francis then led the crowds in the traditional Angelus prayer and closed by greeting the various groups who had come to pray in the Square.
He took a moment to remember those who are affected by HIV and AIDS, since “today marks the World Day for the fight against HIV/ AIDS.”
“We express our closeness to the people who are affected, especially children, a closeness that is very concrete in the silent work of many missionaries and workers. We pray for everyone, also for physicians and researchers. That every sick person, without exception, may have access to the care they need.”
Indeed, he preaches a Gospel of Love
Pope Francis a phenomenon by preaching gospel of love
Photo: Getty
There was another gun in a mall — and a school.
Another young man, loved but painfully depressed, kills himself.
There’s debt, death, pain, blindness, filth.
It’s in our politics, culture, family life.
So much of it can tempt us to despair.
And yet over the last eight months, many — of varied and no creeds — keep taking note of Pope Francis with a hopeful curiosity. They’re inspired. They’re consoled. They’re surprised.
People see him embracing the sick, living humbly and engaging people from all walks of the Church and life. People see a man of joy. And they want something of it, they want to follow. They see an evangelizer.
In his first solo major document, “The Gospel of Joy,” released last week, Francis wrote primarily about joy. He was writing specifically — although clearly not exclusively, given everyone seems to be watching him — to Catholics doing the work of evangelization. It’s a transparently pastoral document where he calls out “the gray pragmatism of the daily life of the Church, in which all appears to proceed normally, while in reality faith is wearing down and degenerating into small-mindedness.”
He exposes what he refers to as a “tomb psychology” that develops among the faithful that “develops and slowly transforms Christians into mummies in a museum.”
While Christians are “[c]alled to radiate light and communicate life,” we can wind up “caught up in things that generate only darkness and inner weariness, and slowly consume all zeal for the work of the Gospel.” In one of many themes that Pope Francis keeps repeating, he pleads: “Let us not allow ourselves to be robbed of the joy of evangelization!”
These are not just words but snapshots of and exercises for a Church in renewal. The images out of Rome and his apostolic journeys that keep captivating the Internet are windows into this. During a celebration of the family this past month, a young boy ran up to and stayed with this Holy Father during his sermon; it went viral as we were enchanted by the innocence, the playfulness, and an image of fatherhood on display.
It was a refreshing, even healing, sight after priest scandals, and for a culture that seems to have lost a love of the most simple, natural gifts.
Francis does a lot of pleading. He wants people to know they are loved by a Creator; that this Father sent His Son and offers a mother who knows the deepest pain of this world as a human model of sanctity; that He never leaves us alone.
Pope Francis has become a phenomenon. Elton John praises him. The Italian Vanity Fair puts him on its cover. He’s an undeniable man of the year.
There is also some skepticism, fear and disappointment. Media and critics can run wild with two paragraphs of more than 40,000 words or a sidebar to a long conversation.
But what Pope Francis is saying to Catholics and the world is so much more than a headline about capitalism or abortion.
When he talks about meeting the needs of the poor, for instance — as he sounds alarms over our use and abuse of one another as disposable, as he warns against indifference — he is not only talking about material poverty. We are bodies and souls! And that’s the pope’s business: Changing lives and saving souls.
If we’re going to look to Pope Francis as a sage among international pundits, then we can keep looking for hot headlines that miss the point. But if we’re looking for something more fulfilling, if we’re looking for an alternative lifestyle to secularism, there is a challenge to accept.
Like any good Jesuit, Pope Francis is trying to stretch the Christian heart, so that we might live examined lives of discernment, recognizing good and evil, nourishing the former and rejecting the latter. If you actually believe Christ is God among us who conquered death, your life ought to be radically different than the frequently and epidemically low expectations we seem to set for ourselves and one another (even as we all too often have an opinion about everyone and everything).
“May God give us the grace to commit our hearts again totally to the proclamation of the Gospel,” the man we now know as Francis wrote in a reflection on hopelessness before he got called to a new duty in Rome.
This is what he is urging. This is what he is modeling. This is what we can expect more of. It’s about conversion: not to be satisfied simply identifying as “Christian,” but to be transformed by sacramental, prayerful, self¬-sacrificial encounter with Christ.
Nothing is truly Catholic without this. That’s his point.
Sin and scandal comes when this is not the heart of a Catholic life. That’s why Francis summons the world to a “revolution of tenderness.” Overwhelm the world with love, mercy and justice and we just make see how God eradicates the hopelessness which batters the human heart, robbing our lives, our politics and our culture of cohesion, coherence and joy.
Another young man, loved but painfully depressed, kills himself.
There’s debt, death, pain, blindness, filth.
It’s in our politics, culture, family life.
So much of it can tempt us to despair.
And yet over the last eight months, many — of varied and no creeds — keep taking note of Pope Francis with a hopeful curiosity. They’re inspired. They’re consoled. They’re surprised.
People see him embracing the sick, living humbly and engaging people from all walks of the Church and life. People see a man of joy. And they want something of it, they want to follow. They see an evangelizer.
In his first solo major document, “The Gospel of Joy,” released last week, Francis wrote primarily about joy. He was writing specifically — although clearly not exclusively, given everyone seems to be watching him — to Catholics doing the work of evangelization. It’s a transparently pastoral document where he calls out “the gray pragmatism of the daily life of the Church, in which all appears to proceed normally, while in reality faith is wearing down and degenerating into small-mindedness.”
He exposes what he refers to as a “tomb psychology” that develops among the faithful that “develops and slowly transforms Christians into mummies in a museum.”
While Christians are “[c]alled to radiate light and communicate life,” we can wind up “caught up in things that generate only darkness and inner weariness, and slowly consume all zeal for the work of the Gospel.” In one of many themes that Pope Francis keeps repeating, he pleads: “Let us not allow ourselves to be robbed of the joy of evangelization!”
These are not just words but snapshots of and exercises for a Church in renewal. The images out of Rome and his apostolic journeys that keep captivating the Internet are windows into this. During a celebration of the family this past month, a young boy ran up to and stayed with this Holy Father during his sermon; it went viral as we were enchanted by the innocence, the playfulness, and an image of fatherhood on display.
It was a refreshing, even healing, sight after priest scandals, and for a culture that seems to have lost a love of the most simple, natural gifts.
Francis does a lot of pleading. He wants people to know they are loved by a Creator; that this Father sent His Son and offers a mother who knows the deepest pain of this world as a human model of sanctity; that He never leaves us alone.
Pope Francis has become a phenomenon. Elton John praises him. The Italian Vanity Fair puts him on its cover. He’s an undeniable man of the year.
There is also some skepticism, fear and disappointment. Media and critics can run wild with two paragraphs of more than 40,000 words or a sidebar to a long conversation.
But what Pope Francis is saying to Catholics and the world is so much more than a headline about capitalism or abortion.
When he talks about meeting the needs of the poor, for instance — as he sounds alarms over our use and abuse of one another as disposable, as he warns against indifference — he is not only talking about material poverty. We are bodies and souls! And that’s the pope’s business: Changing lives and saving souls.
If we’re going to look to Pope Francis as a sage among international pundits, then we can keep looking for hot headlines that miss the point. But if we’re looking for something more fulfilling, if we’re looking for an alternative lifestyle to secularism, there is a challenge to accept.
Like any good Jesuit, Pope Francis is trying to stretch the Christian heart, so that we might live examined lives of discernment, recognizing good and evil, nourishing the former and rejecting the latter. If you actually believe Christ is God among us who conquered death, your life ought to be radically different than the frequently and epidemically low expectations we seem to set for ourselves and one another (even as we all too often have an opinion about everyone and everything).
“May God give us the grace to commit our hearts again totally to the proclamation of the Gospel,” the man we now know as Francis wrote in a reflection on hopelessness before he got called to a new duty in Rome.
This is what he is urging. This is what he is modeling. This is what we can expect more of. It’s about conversion: not to be satisfied simply identifying as “Christian,” but to be transformed by sacramental, prayerful, self¬-sacrificial encounter with Christ.
Nothing is truly Catholic without this. That’s his point.
Sin and scandal comes when this is not the heart of a Catholic life. That’s why Francis summons the world to a “revolution of tenderness.” Overwhelm the world with love, mercy and justice and we just make see how God eradicates the hopelessness which batters the human heart, robbing our lives, our politics and our culture of cohesion, coherence and joy.
Why did the Auburn victory give me such joy?
I really need to address this question; I was overcome with great joy and emotion last night as the seemingly impossible played out before my very eyes. Auburn was going to beat Alabama on something you just don't see everyday; returning a missed FG attempt as time expired on the play clock. Auburn stopped Alabama's dream season with their second miracle last play of the game in as many weeks. Remember Auburn vs. Georgia?
The bigger question for me is why did this give me such joy? As a football fan, I really did not realize how much I hate the Alabama Crimson Tide. Now before you get all nuts on me; I really don't hate anybody; and hating the Alabama football team is all football talk; no real hate exists(I hope) and nothing is really meant personal at anybody. But I truly never yelled like this at one single play with the exception of the Tracy Porter interception which sealed the deal for Saints Super Bowl victory 2010.
I even wondered aloud a few times if my sheer ecstasy at Alabama's loss was worthy of a trip to confession. Eventually, I decided no.
So if my joy turns you off or I offended anyone last night; well, just view this:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/30/auburn-return-alabama-field-goal-attempt_n_4365811.html
The bigger question for me is why did this give me such joy? As a football fan, I really did not realize how much I hate the Alabama Crimson Tide. Now before you get all nuts on me; I really don't hate anybody; and hating the Alabama football team is all football talk; no real hate exists(I hope) and nothing is really meant personal at anybody. But I truly never yelled like this at one single play with the exception of the Tracy Porter interception which sealed the deal for Saints Super Bowl victory 2010.
I even wondered aloud a few times if my sheer ecstasy at Alabama's loss was worthy of a trip to confession. Eventually, I decided no.
So if my joy turns you off or I offended anyone last night; well, just view this:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/30/auburn-return-alabama-field-goal-attempt_n_4365811.html
Pray with Pope Francis' intentions for December 2013
DECEMBER
Victimized Children. That children who are victims of abandonment or violence may find the love and protection they need.
Prepare the Savior's Coming. That Christians, enlightened by the Word incarnate, may prepare humanity for the Savior's coming.
Victimized Children. That children who are victims of abandonment or violence may find the love and protection they need.
Prepare the Savior's Coming. That Christians, enlightened by the Word incarnate, may prepare humanity for the Savior's coming.
Our first Saint for December is actually a Blessed; Beatified by Pope Benedict XVI
Bl. Charles de Foucauld
Feastday: December 1
Died: 1916
Beatified By: November 13, 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI
Died: 1916
Beatified By: November 13, 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI
Blessed Charles de Foucauld Little Brother Charles of Jesus Charles Eugene, (Vicomte de) Foucauld 1858 - 1916 Died Age 58 Charles was left an orphan by the age of six, and he and his sister were brought up by their grandfather. By the time he was fifteen, less than a year after his First Communion, Charles had ceased to be a Christian and was an agnostic. In 1878, his grandfather died. Love for the old man had prevented Charles from indulging in the worst excesses, but at his death, Charles began to "live." On receiving his inheritance, he set about spending it in riotous living. For a time he lived in Paris, where he took an apartment near a cousin, Marie de Bondy. Marie, who had first entered his life when he was about eleven, was a deeply spiritual young woman. Gradually, through her example, the gay and reckless young man began to change. His religion, when he rediscovered God, was a highly personal discipleship and love of the Person of Jesus Christ. Regarding his conversion, Charles said, "The moment I realized that God existed, I knew I could not do otherwise than to live for him alone." For a time after his return to the sacraments, Charles lived as a Trappist monk. Although he is remembered as an exemplary religious, the conviction grew that this was not his vocation. After being released from his temporary vows, Charles went to the Holy Land where he became a servant for the Poor Clare nuns. Mother Elizabeth, the Superior of these Clarist sisters, was a woman of uncommon wisdom. She helped Charles to the realization that he should become a priest in order to serve God better. Charles finished his studies for the priesthood and was ordained in 1901. Later that year, he left for Algeria to take up the life of a hermit in the desert. Little Brother Charles of Jesus, as he called himself, thought up and wrote down a plan for two religious orders. The members of these orders would live a life patterned on the life of Jesus at Nazareth. At the time of Brother Charles' death, neither his missionary contacts nor his designs for new religious orders had borne visible fruit. In 1916, living among the fierce Tuaregs of Tamanrasset, Charles de Foucauld was murdered in an attempt to warn two Arab soldiers of danger from a group of Senussi rebels. The life of Charles de Foucauld was like the biblical seed which had to die before it sprouted into a healthy plant. Within twenty years after his death, there appeared three congregations which derived their inspiration, purpose, and Rules from Charles de Foucauld. These Little Brothers of Jesus, Little Sisters of the Sacred Heart, and Little Sisters of Jesus live in small groups all over the world, preaching by the lives they lead. Two other Orders, founded later, trace their heritage to Little Brother Charles of Jesus. Each of these groups bases its apostolate on the ideas of the Orders which the martyr of the desert had planned, but did not live to see. Knowledge of the life of Charles de Foucauld has spread throughout the Church. After preliminary investigations, all proved positive, and he was declared Venerable on April 13, 1978.
De Foucauld was beatified by Pope Benedict XVI on November 13, 2005, and is listed as a martyr in the liturgy of the Catholic Church.
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