Divine Mercy Sunday

This Sunday is Divine Mercy Sunday.  It is an extraordinary opportunity to receive Christ's Mercy, and a Plenary Indulgence.

http://www.ewtn.com/devotionals/mercy/

http://www.MassTimes.org

St. Pius V, Pope

The Saint of the Day for April 30 is St. Pius V, Pope.

Born Michele Ghisleri, at Bosco, near Alexandria, Lombardy, Jan. 17, 1504, elected Pope, Jan. 7, 1566; died May 1, 1572.

St. Pius V was born Michele Ghislieri in 1504 to poor parents of noble lineage. He worked as a shepherd until the age of 14 when he encountered two Dominicans who recognized his intelligence and virtue. He joined the Dominicans and was ordained a priest at 24. He taught philosophy and theology for 16 years during which he was elected prior of many houses. He was known for his austere penances, his long hours of prayer and fasting, and the holiness of his speech.

He was elected Bishop of Sutri in 1556, and served as an inquisitor in Milan and Lombardi, and then as inquisitor general of the Church and a cardinal in 1557. He was known in this capacity as an able, yet unflinching man who rigorously fought heresy and corruption wherever he encountered it.

He was elected Pope in 1566, with the influential backing of his friend St. Charles Borromeo, and took the name Pius V. He immediately put into action his vast program of reform by getting rid of many of the extravagant luxuries then prevalent in his court. He gave the money usually invested in these luxuries to the poor whom he personally cared for, washing their feet, consoling those near death, and tending to lepers and the very sick. He spent long hours before the Blessed Sacrament despite his heavy workload.

His pontificate was dedicated to applying the reforms of the Council of Trent, raising the standard of morality and reforming the clergy, and strongly supporting foreign missions. The Catechism of the Council of Trent was completed during his reign, and he revised the Roman Breviary and Missal, which remained in use until the reforms of Vatican II.

His six year pontificate saw him constantly at war with two massive enemy forces; the Protestant heretics and the spread of their doctrines in the West, and the Turkish armies who were advancing from the East. He encouraged efforts to battle Protestantism by education and preaching, and giving strong support to the newly formed Society of Jesus, founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola. He excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I, and supported Catholics who were oppressed and intimidated by Protestant princes, especially in Germany.

He worked hard to unite the Christian armies against the Turks, and perhaps the most famous success of his papacy was the miraculous victory of the Christian fleet in the battle of Lepanto on October 7, 1571. The island of Malta was attacked by the Turkish fleet, and nearly every man defending the fortress was killed in battle. The Pope sent out a fleet to meet the enemy, requesting that each man on board pray the Rosary and receive communion. Meanwhile, he called on all of Europe to recite the Rosary and ordered a 40 hour devotion in Rome during which time the battle took place. The Christian fleet, vastly outnumbered by the Turks, inflicted an impossible defeat on the Turkish navy, demolishing the entire fleet.

In memory of the triumph he declared the day the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary because of her intercession in answering the mass recitation of the Rosary and obtaining the victory. He has also been called ‘the Pope of the Rosary’ for this reason.

Pope Pius V died seven months later of a painful disease, uttering "O Lord, increase my sufferings and my patience!" He is enshrined at Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, and was beatified by Clement X in 1672. He was canonized by Clement XI in 1712.

John Paul II remains moved in front of St. Peter’s tomb

Preparation for his Beatification on Sunday May 1.

The casket containing the mortal remains of Pope John Paul II has been exhumed ahead of his beatification this Sunday.

The brief ceremony of exhumation took place in the early hours of this morning in the grotto situated beneath the high altar of St. Peter’s Basilica.

The tomb of Pope John Paul was opened and his casket placed on a cart. The casket, however, remained unopened throughout and was covered with a large pall embroidered with gold.

Papal caskets are comprised of three components. The outside box is a wooden one, inside of that is a lead container, and the final casket--which contains the remains of the Pope--is also made of wood. Those present at the exhumation say the wooden outer layer of the casket had slightly deteriorated with age.

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video: Returning Angel

Bishop Paporcki has brought back something very traditional, and very wonderful.

Congratulations William & Kate!

St. Catherine of Siena

The Saint of the Day for April 29 is St. Catherine of Siena.

St. Catherine was a third-order Dominican, peacemaker and counselor to the Pope. She singlehandedly ended the Avignon exile of the successors of Peter in the 14th century.

She is the co-patron of Italy and of Europe.

Born in Siena, on the feast of the Annunciation, March 25, 1347, Catherine was the 23rd of Jacopo and Lapa Benincasa’s 25 children. Her twin sister died in infancy.

She exhibited an unusually independent character as a child and an exceptionally intense prayer life. When she was seven years old she had the first of her mystical visions, in which she saw Jesus surrounded by saints and seated in glory. In the same year she vowed to consecrate her virginity to Christ. When, at the age of 16, her parents decided that she should marry, she cut off her hair to make herself less appealing, and her father, realizing that he couldn’t contend with her resolve, let her have her way.

She joined the Dominican Tertiaries and lived a deep and solitary life of prayer and meditation for the next three years in which she had constant mystical experiences, capped, by the end of the three years with an extraordinary union with God granted to only a few mystics, known as ‘mystical marriage.’

St. Catherine suffered many intense periods of desolation alongside her mystical ecstasies, often feeling totally abandoned by God.

She ended her solitude at this point and began tending to the sick, poor, marginalized, especially lepers. As her reputation for holiness and remarkable personality became known throughout Siena, she attracted a band of disciples, two of whom became her confessors and biographers, and together they served Christ in the poor with even greater ardor.

The Lord called her to a more public life while she was still in her 20s, and she established correspondences with many influential figures, advising and admonishing them and exhorting them to holiness, including the Pope himself who she never hesitated to rebuke when she saw fit.

Great political acts which are attributed to her include achieving peace between the Holy See and Florence who were at war, to convince the Pope to return from his Avignon exile, which he did in 1376, and to heal the great schism between the followers of the legitimate Pope, Urban VI, and those who opposed him in 1380. She achieved this while on her deathbed.

Her Dialogues, one of the classics of Italian literature, are the record of her mystical visions which she dictated in a state of mystical ecstasy.

In 1375, while visiting Pisa, she received the stigmata, even though they never appeared on her body during her lifetime, owing to her request to God. They appeared only on her incorruptible body after her death.

She died in Rome on April 29, 1380, at the age of 33.

Book Review: "Worst Case" by James Patterson

NYPD Detective Mike Bennett teams up with FBI Agent Emily Parker to find out who is kidnapping and killing the children of wealthy New Yorkers.  Mike also

Very suspenseful and captivating; as they say in the ads, 'unputdownable'.  

I like the way that character development is integrated with the story.

As usual. Patterson gives us a unique, quirky villain.

Content warnings include some language, and a couple of violent scenes.

Father Michael Pfleger suspended

It's about time.  KUDO's to Cardinal George.  He certainly gave "Father" Pfleger plenty of chances to stop attacking the Church he is supposed to be serving.

Controversial Chicago priest Father Michael Pfleger was suspended by the archdiocese on April 27 after making public statements threatening to leave the Church if he were reassigned from his current parish.

“If that is truly your attitude, you have already left the Catholic Church and are therefore not able to pastor a Catholic parish,” Cardinal Francis George wrote in a letter Wednesday suspending Fr. Pfleger's priestly faculties.

“A Catholic priest’s inner life is governed by his promises, motivated by faith and love, to live chastely as a celibate man and to obey his bishop,” emphasized the cardinal. “Breaking either promise destroys his vocation and wounds the Church.”

Fr. Pfleger's recent comments added to his controversial stance in the Church, given his public support for President Obama's presidential campaign as well as for mocking remarks against Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her run for office in 2008.

In April of last year, he made waves for speaking in favor of women and married priests during a Divine Mercy Sunday homily.

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Bishop: feds increasingly treating religious freedom as government ‘carveout’

Bishop Lori demonstrates why he is one of our better Bishops.  Religious freedom is guaranteed in the constitution...it is not at the whim of the government.

Americans must be on guard against the government’s tendency to treat Christians’ right to stand for the truth as a “carveout” granted or taken away by legislators at will, said Bishop William Lori of the diocese of Bridgeport on Wednesday.

“Increasingly, religious freedom in our country is viewed as a carveout, an exception built into laws that are otherwise an affront to human dignity,” said Lori, addressing hundreds at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., during his keynote address.

“This tends to reduce religious freedom to a grant by the state, rather than an inalienable right by the Creator,” said Lori, who is supreme chaplain of the Knights of Columbus. “What is granted by the state can be taken away by the state

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video: Easter Misreadings

The Easter Vigil readings present not only the truth of Salvation History, but the truth that ONLY the Catholic Church can authentically interpret Sacred Scriptures. Protestantism has no business in this arena.

St. Louis-Marie de Monfort

On April 28, the universal Church celebrates the feast day of St. Louis-Marie de Monfort, a 17th century saint who is revered for his intense devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

St. Louis-Marie is perhaps most famously known for his prayer of entrustment to Our Lady, “Totus Tuus ego sum,” which means, “I am all yours.” The late-Pope John Paul II took the phrase “Totus Tuus” as his episcopal motto.

Born in Montfort, Brittany, on January 31, 1673, St. Louis-Marie possessed a strong devotion to the Blessed Sacrament as a child was and intimately devoted to the Blessed Virgin, especially through the Rosary. He took the name Marie at his confirmation.

The saint manifested a love for the poor while he was at school and joined a society of young men who ministered to the poor and the sick on school holidays. When he was 19, he walked 130 miles to Paris to study theology, gave all he had to the poor that he met along the way and made a vow to live only on alms. After his ordination at 27, he served as a hospital chaplain until the management of the hospital resented his reorganization of the staff and sent him away.

St. Louis-Marie discovered his great gift for preaching at the age of 32, and committed himself to it for the rest of his life. He met with such great success that he often drew crowds of thousands to hear his sermons in which he encouraged frequent communion and devotion to Mary.

But he also met with opposition, especially from the Jansenists, a heretical movement within the Church that believed in absolute Predestination, in which only a chosen few are saved, and the rest damned. Much of France was influenced by Jansenism, including many bishops, who banished St. Loius-Marie from preaching in their dioceses. He was even poisoned by Jansenists in La Rochelle, but survived, though suffered ill health after.

While he recuperated from the effects of the poisoning, he wrote the masterpiece of Marian piety, "True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin," which he correctly prophesied would be hidden by the devil for a time. His seminal work was discovered 200 years after his death.

One year before he died, St. Louis-Marie founded two congregations: the Daughters of Divine Wisdom – which tended to the sick in hospitals and the education of poor girls, and the Company of Mary, missionaries devoted to preaching and to spreading devotion to Mary.

Gingrich: ‘crisis of secularism’ threatening U.S.

In remarks delivered at Wednesday morning’s National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich said he believes a “terrible parallel” has arisen between the emerging militant secularism of the United States and the communist efforts to remove and replace Christianity in the fabric of European life and identity.

Gingrich, a powerful Republican leader from the 1990s and author of the GOP’s 1994 Contract with America, is a relatively recent convert to the Catholic faith.

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video: The Pope Is Worried

The Pope is worried, deeply worried about the current state of the world and especially the state of many Catholics' souls. His Holy Week homilies are proof of his paternal concern.

Divine Mercy image in Chicago's Daly Plaza reaching thousands

Divine Mercy Sunday is May 1.

One of the fastest-growing devotions in the Catholic Church is reaching the heart of downtown Chicago through the work of the Heralds of Divine Mercy. The organization is publicly displaying a large image of Christ during a nine-day campaign of 24-hour prayer and evangelism.

“The Divine Mercy Project is really about having an opportunity to witness to the culture, in environments we're normally pushed out of,” said Michael C.X. Sullivan, a 40-year-old lawyer who developed the idea earlier this year. “It's specifically for the conversion of Chicago, America, and the world.”

The prayer vigil is taking place in Daly Plaza, a crowded area that features a number of civil administrative buildings. There, the Heralds of Divine Mercy are displaying a large cross along with a ten-foot-tall image of Christ based on the visions of St. Faustina Kowalska. While some participants remain in prayer, others take their turn distributing cards that promote the message of God's mercy.

Sullivan said his five-year-old son had become an enthusiastic evangelist, along with the many other participants who have manned the image in shifts all day and night. “He shoots out across Daly Plaza,” Sullivan said, “running right up to people and giving them the card.”

“Most people receive it, and look at it, and you see their countenance shift – there's a kind of a brightening. However, you also see a real darkness in some people, a hardness in them. So we say a prayer for them, if they don't want to receive this gift.”

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John Paul II to be listed in Guinness Book of Records

St. Zita of Lucca

The Saint of the Day for April 27 is St. Zita of Lucca.

St. Zita is the patron saint of domestic workers. She was born into a poor, Christian family. At the age of 12, she became a housekeeper for a rich weaver in Lucca, Italy.

Despite her great workload, she attended Mass and prayed everyday. She believed her work would lead to personal holiness. She would say: "A servant is not holy if she is not busy."

She was very generous with gifts of food for the poor, and she would make time in her work schedule to visit with the sick and with prisoners.

Zita also experienced heavenly visions. She died in 1278, at the age of 60, having worked as a housekeeper for the same family all those years. The local people recognized her holiness and considered her a saint at her death.

Rome Full of souvenirs of Pope John Paul II

video: Vaguely Supreme

Barry doesn't even pretend to care about our Christian faith.

Easter is the supreme moment of all human history - it is THE moment! And the reason is very clear. But for the President of the United States, it's still kind of vague.

Kansas Governor Brownback: Zap Planned Parenthood Funding

It's pretty clear that Barry and Reid are going to keep fighting to protect using taxpayer money to fund the nation's biggest abortionist, Planned Parenthood.  So the states are going to have to defund it themselves.

Kansas Governor Sam Brownback wants his state to become the next to yank taxpayer funding from the Planned Parenthood abortion business. He says the money should be diverted to places that provide legitimate health care for women.

The current budget the Kansas legislature is considering would redirect about $300,000 in federal family planning funds Kansas receives that are normally directed to the abortion giant and send them to state and local health clinics that provide health care without doing abortions.

“Gov. Brownback, along with the overwhelming majority of Kansans, opposes taxpayer subsidy of abortions,” Brownback spokeswoman Sherriene Jones-Sontag told the Kansas City Star.

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Carrie Underwood w/ Vince Gill How Great thou Art

Our Lady of Good Counsel

April 26 is the feast of Our Lady of Good Counsel.

On the Feast of St. Mark, April 25, 1467, at the close of a festival in Genazzano, Italy, a cloud descended upon an ancient 5th-century deteriorated church, dedicated to Our Lady of Good Counsel. When the cloud disappeared, the festive crowd found a small, fragile image of the Blessed Virgin and Child on a thin sheet of plaster. The painting hung in mid-air, suspended without support, floating, on a small ledge. This particular fresco is said to date to the time of the Apostles. It had long been venerated in Albania’s capital city, Scutari.

Much of the church of Our Lady of Good Counsel was destroyed in World War II, but the image remained intact and in place. The miraculous image is still today, after more than 500 years, suspended in the air by itself. Countless miracles have been attributed to the prayerful intercession of Our Lady of Good Counsel.

Many pilgrims visit the church in Genazzano, and take part in the annual spring celebration, observed on April 25. Elsewhere in the world, the feast is celebrated April 26.

Book Review: "Run For Your Life" by James Patterson

NYPD Detective Mike Bennett is pursuing a new killer who calls himself the Teacher, because he is supposedly teaching society a lesson on how to treat people by killing those who are on his his list for being offensive in some way.  Although Mike is trying to deal with his 10 kids, who all have the flu at once, he must stay focused on the Teacher, because he only has hours to stop his deadly plan.

Patterson expertly integrates his character development with his story.  I especially enjoy the uniqueness and quirkiness of his villains.

There is plenty of action. suspense, and violence, but Mike's family keeps us grounded through it all.  Unfortunately, the teacher poses a threat to them directly, as well.

Easter Mass...in German

This is  the beautiful church we went to for Easter Mass.  It is Old St. Mary's in Cincinnati, OH. It was a beautiful Mass, in German.

Happy Easter!

He is Risen! Alleluia!

Holy Saturday

Divine Mercy Novena

Today is also the beginning of the 9-Day Divine Mercy Novena, which concludes on Divine Mercy Sunday (May 1). It is an extraordinary opportunity to obtain a plenary indulgence, which is like a free "Get out of Purgatory" card. For information on the Novena, and how to say the Divine Mercy Chaplet, please see the link and the video below.

http://www.ewtn.com/devotionals/mercy/index.htm

Good Friday

"It is accomplished; and bowing his head he gave up his spirit."

Fast and Abstinence

N. Carolina bishop calls for prayers and support after deadly tornadoes

Bishop Michael F. Burbidge of Raleigh has asked the faithful to pray this Holy Week for the victims and survivors of the deadly April 16 tornadoes which struck parts of his diocese.

In a video message to the faithful of the Diocese of Raleigh, he said the storms left “death, injury and destruction.”

“The pictures of the devastation are dramatic, but much more significant are the people who have been so traumatically affected,” the bishop said. “In just a few seconds many lost all their possessions. Some were badly injured and, sadly, several lost their lives.”

“If you know of a need for immediate assistance in your community, please contact your local Catholic Charities office,” he added.

He also announced a special collection and asked Catholics to participate.

Some 60 tornadoes killed at least 21 people and left hundreds homeless in the worst storm in the state since 1984.

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Baby Joseph is home: defies critics by breathing completely on his own

Baby Joseph and his family arrived in Windsor, Ontario on a medical transport flight from St. Louis, Missouri this morning. He is now at the family home, according to Brother Paul O’Donnell.

On behalf of Baby Joseph’s family, Brother O’Donnell told LifeSiteNews that that their son was weaned off ventilator support 12 days ago and has been successfully breathing on his own since then.

Baby Joseph, who has been at the center of an international right-to-life debate over the past few months, has defied critics by responding so well to treatment. After the Ontario hospital treating Joseph’s progressive and terminal neurological disease threatened to remove his life support against his parents’ wishes earlier this year, pro-life groups rallied to Joseph’s cause.

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state-funded Web site: "abortion is much easier than it sounds”

Are you kidding me?

What kind of person would want to tell kids how easy an abortion is?

A state-funded sex education Web site that tells teens an abortion is “much easier than it sounds” has drawn fire from outraged pro-lifers who say mariatalks.com is glossing over ugly truths, steering teens toward the controversial procedure and counseling them how to keep mom and dad in the dark.  If it's so good, why keep the parents in the dark?

“The commonwealth is using taxpayer money to tell kids how to get a secret abortion, and that’s wrong,” said Linda Thayer, a former Boston schoolteacher who is vice president for educational affairs of Massachusetts Citizens for Life, which this week took aim at the site.

“This is a misuse of state funds, especially for parents who are taxpayers,” said Thayer, who also blasted the Web site for “deception by omission” for describing abortion simply as “when the contents of the womb (uterus) are removed.”  

'contents of the womb' = a baby = a human life. 

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Holy Thursday

video: Pontius Pilate and The TRUTH

When the truth is denied, Charity is sacrificed. Just ask Pontius Pilate.

Wednesday of Holy Week (Spy Wednesday)

This Wednesday is known as Spy Wednesday because on this day Judas made a bargain with the high priest to betray Jesus for 30 silver pieces (Matt 26:14-16; Mark 14:10-11; Luke 22:1-6). In Poland, the young people throw an effigy of Judas from the top of a church steeple. Then it is dragged through the village amidst hurling sticks and stones. What remains of the effigy is drowned in a nearby stream or pond.

This is also the day that Jesus was anointed with an expensive jar of alabaster by the woman at Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper (Matt 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; John 12:1-19).

New Abby Johnson Television Ad Takes on Planned Parenthood

Actor Patrick Stewart: assisted suicide should be a ‘right’

Disappointing, but not surprising.  It always bothers me to see some people place such little value on life.

Patrick Stewart of Star Trek fame has come out as a proponent of assisted suicide.

In an interview with the Sunday Times yesterday the actor expressed his support for Dignity in Dying, a group campaigning for a change to the UK law banning assisted suicide, saying the choice to have an assisted death “should be a right.”

“A lot of it has to do with my age,” he said. “I had a heart procedure five years ago. I was 70 last year and there is something about achieving threescore years and 10, isn’t there? Then I had a family member who had been very ill and quite recently I’d heard the story of an illness and a death.”

“I have the strong feeling that, should the time come for me, having had no role in my birth, I would like there to be a choice I might make about how I die,” Stewart, best known for his role as Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek, told the newspaper.

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The Election of Pope Benedict XVI

Today is the 6th anniversary of the election of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as Pope Benedict XVI. Habemus Papem!

video: Kneel Before God!

Are people who receive Holy Communion on their knees just pious, self-righteous, show-offs? That's certainly how some like to portray them, but the Pope has a different thought.

Blessed James Oldo

The Saint of the Day for April 19 is Blessed James Oldo.

James Oldo experienced a radical conversion that led him to become a Franciscan tertiary and then a priest.

He was born in 1364 into a rich family in Lodi, Italy. He married young, and he and his wife were both self-indulgent. One day, a traveling reproduction of the Holy Sepulchre came to town. As a joke, James lay down on it to compare his height to Christ's.

He was instantly converted.

At first, his mother and wife were opposed to the change but they soon became tertiaries as well. The family turned their mansion into a chapel and worked with the sick and with prisoners.

When James’ wife died, he became a priest. His acts of penance were so severe that his bishop had to order him to eat at least three times a week. He was a celebrated preacher, who inspired many to enter the religious life. He also prophesied wars and his own death. He died at the age of 40 in 1404. When his body was moved seven years after his death, it was found incorrupt.

video: The Crisis within the Crisis!

There is one question that is dividing faithful believing Catholics these days. It is this - do you believe that the Church is in crisis at this very hour, or do you not?

Douglas Kmiec resigns as U.S. Ambassador to Malta

I am so glad Kmiec never became Ambassador to the Vatican, which is what he really wanted  (see earlier posts linked below).  He would only have been an embarrassment.

Douglas Kmiec, U.S. Ambassador to Malta, plans to resign from his post on August 15. Kmiec's resignation follows the release of a State Department report which criticized him for a number of alleged infractions, including spending, "an inordinate amount of time reviewing his writings, speeches, and other initiatives."

In a letter addressed to President Obama, dated April 13, Kmiec wrote, "With the highest respect for your leadership and with some understanding of the difficulty and complexity of the challenges that you and Secretary Clinton face each day, I ask that you accept my resignation effective on the feast of the Assumption, 2011."

While his resignation does follow criticism from the State Department, Kmiec expressed in a statement to the people of Malta that his resignation is completely voluntary: "I know it is popular to think that all resignations are forced or motivated by some hidden reason. Anyone who has ever played cards with me knows I cannot keep the happiness of an Ace quiet anymore than I can disguise the disappointment of an unneeded or disappointing deuce. My resignation is not a product of force unless one means by force – the force of principle."

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Kmiec: Obama’s views are ‘catechism come to life’ 

Kmiec proposes end of legally recognized marriage

Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin

The Saint of the Day for April 18 is Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin.

April 18 commemorates the feast of Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin, a Canadian woman whose life was a story of obedience in the face of personal setbacks.

Esther Blondin was born in 1809 to a pious, French-Canadian farm family in southern Quebec. When she was old enough, she began to work as a domestic servant for a merchant and later for the Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame. While she worked for the sisters, she learned to read and write.

During that time, Esther decided to enter the congregation as a novice. However, her health forced her to abandon the pursuit. Nevertheless, the literacy she had obtained opened doors for her and she became a teacher, and eventually a director at a parochial school.

She was aware of the high levels of illiteracy in the area, and when she was 39 years old, she sought to found an order that taught both boys and girls in the same school. The year was 1848 and her idea was radical, as schools taught boys and girls separately.

Eventually, the pioneering woman received the requisite permission, and the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Anne was founded. Esther was the superior and took the name Marie-Anne. Though she was the founder and superior, Sister Marie-Anne faced much oppression from the congregation’s chaplain. He eventually had her removed from her position, and she was prohibited from holding any administrative roles for the rest of her life.

She spent her last 32 years without complaining, working in the order’s laundry and ironing room. Despite her demotion, her order continued to grow and spread across Canada and the United States.

Blessed Marie-Anne Blondin died in 1890. She was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 2001.

Happy Birthday Pope Benedict!

“Happy Birthday Holy Father!” That was the rousing chorus serenading Pope Benedict XVI April 17 as he concluded this year’s Palm Sunday ceremonies in St Peters Square. The Pope, who turned 84 Saturday, had earlier used his Sunday sermon to warn the world that advances in technology won’t necessarily save mankind from future catastrophes.

“With the increase of our abilities there has been an increase not only of good. Our possibilities for evil have increased and appear like menacing storms above history,” he said. “Our limitations have also remained: we need but think of the disasters which have caused so much suffering for humanity in recent months.”

The Palm Sunday service recalls the triumphal entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem nearly 2000 years ago. In imitation of those events, today’s papal ceremonies began with a solemn procession of bishops, cardinals and the Holy Father himself carrying palm leaves. This is how the Jerusalem crowd welcomed Jesus himself.

Over 50,000 pilgrims basking beneath the Roman sun joined the churchmen in waving palms.

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Video: Christians Mark Palm Sunday

St. Bernadette Soubirous of Lourdes

The Saint of the Day for April 16 is St. Bernadette Soubirous of Lourdes.

St. Bernadette Soubirous is the renowned visionary of Lourdes. She was born into a poor family in Lourdes, France, in 1844 and was baptized with the name Mary Bernard.

Mother Mary first appeared to the 14-year-old Bernadette Feb. 11, 1858, in a cave on the banks of the Gave River near Lourdes. The visions continued for several weeks. Two weeks later, a spring emerged from the cave and the waters were found to miraculously heal the sick and the lame. One month later, March 25, the vision told Bernadette that she was the Immaculate Conception and that a church should be built on the site.

Civil authorities tried to frighten Bernadette into retracting her accounts, but she remained faithful to the visions. They also tried to shut down the spring and delay construction, but Empress Eugenie of France intervened and the church was built.

In 1866, Bernadette entered the Sisters of Notre Dame in Nevers. She was diagnosed with a painful, incurable illness soon afterward and died in 1879 at the age of 35. Pope Pius XI canonized her in 1933.

video: Holy Communion in the hand

House De-Funds Planned Parenthood, Senate Allows Funding

Harry and the Dem's are hell-bent on funding abortion.

The House of Representatives voted today for the Continuing Resolution funding the federal government that contains a ban on abortion funding in the nation’s capital. House lawmakers also supported efforts to de-fund Planned Parenthood, but senators voted no.

On a 260-167 vote, lawmakers approved a funding bill that reinstates the abortion funding ban in the District of Columbia that President Barack Obama and Democrats overturned in their budget bills last year.

Following that vote, House members voted 241-185 for a resolution that would prohibit the Planned Parenthood abortion business from qualifying for family planning funds. The vote saw almost all Republicans supporting de-funding while Democrats generally opposed it. (See vote tallies below.)

After the House voted, members of the Senate voted 58-42 against the resolution to de-fund Planned Parenthood. The vote was mostly partisan — with Republicans supporting de-funding and Democrats voting no — though pro-abortion Republicans Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Mark Kirk of Illinois, and Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine voted no as well.

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St. Damien de Veuster

April 15 is the feast day of St. Damien de Veuster, better known as St. Damien of Molokai.

Damien de Veuster was born in Belgium to a poor farming family. Answering God’s call, he joined the Fathers of the Sacred Heart, and spent the rest of his life as a missionary in Hawaii.

After being ordained in 1864, Fr. Damien was sent to the peninsula of Kalawao on Molokai, an isolated area of the Hawaiian island where the panicked government of the time quarantined people suspected of having leprosy. Arriving in 1873, he lived on the island for the rest of his life, dying in 1889 of the very disease whose suffering he sought to alleviate in others.

Fr. Damien dedicated his life to the native Hawaiians he found suffering in exile on Molokai. When he arrived, there were very few structures in the area. Many people slept on mats, covered by only a thin blanket as protection against the rain. Though there was a small, preexisting chapel, dedicated to St. Philomena, Fr. Damien set up his first rectory in the shade of a tree. He was a skilled carpenter and a hard worker. Quickly, he worked to build coffins, a rectory, houses, a school, and eventually a new chapel for the community.

Fr. Damien ministered to Catholics and non-Catholics alike. His primary aim was to restore dignity to the people who had been robbed of everything through no fault of their own. Thus, one of his first accomplishments was to build a fence around, and clean up, the cemetery. Then, by building coffins and encouraging the creation of a Christian Burial Society, Fr. Damien gave dignity to the leprosy victims.

Children were especially close to the Belgian missionary’s heart. As was the law of the time, families were split up, and often children with leprosy were sent to Molokai while their parents were forced to remain at home. Fr. Damien set up a dormitory for boys, and eventually one for girls as well. He worked hard to keep the children away from the depravity that had become commonplace in the rather lawless society that had sprung up on Molokai. The children became so devoted to him that they wrote a song in their native Hawaiian, calling him their father, which they used to stand outside his house and sing.

Fr. Damien also worked tirelessly to bring in outside supplies and funding. The Hawaiian government considered him to be a stubborn nuisance as he sent letter after letter petitioning for food and building materials. He also wrote to his superiors and the local bishop to increase awareness of the conditions, sufferings, and needs of the people to whom he ministered.

Ultimately, Fr. Damien contracted leprosy himself. However, he did not allow it to put an end to his ministry. As frustrating as the situation may have been at times, he never lost hope and continued to think of the people, who he made his own.

He died on March 28, 1889 and was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on October 11, 2009. Every schoolchild in Hawaii is familiar with his story.

Book Review: "Double Cross" by James Patterson

Detective Alex Cross is back, and this time he faces two serial killers: DCAK (DC Audience Killer) and Alex's arch nemesis Kyle Craig, who recently escaped from the maximum security prison Alex had put him in four years ago  Of course, both have targeted Alex.   Alex is a therapist, but now he is back on the force and working with his friend John Sampson and his girlfriend Bree, who is also a  homicide detective,. to stop DCAK's killing spree and find out how/if it is connected to Kyle Craig,   Alex's team becomes both the hunters and the hunted.  And DCAK is closer than Alex realizes.

The plot is pretty engaging, but the best part of James Patterson's stories, whether Alex Cross or Michael Bennett, is the villains.  The overall character development is typically pretty strong, but the villains are so off the wall they make for intriguing and entertaining reading.

Content warnings include language, 1 bed scene, and of course the murders that are committed.

Special working group created to revise 'YouCat'

The Vatican is to create a special working group to review the content of the youth catechism “YouCat.” The book, launched April 13 in Rome, made headlines earlier this week when CNA revealed its Italian language edition appeared to endorse the use of contraception.

A faulty translation from the original German youth catechism was found to be at the root of the error.  Gee...I wonder how that happened?..I'm glad it was caught.

At today’s launch Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, who oversaw the creation of “YouCat,” told journalists that after a meeting with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith it had been decided “that a little working group will collect all the observations, all the corrections that will arrive from the various translations, also from the German original. They will do it immediately, and then they will make a list of corrections.”

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Top choral director calls modern Church music 'ecclesiastical karaoke'

I couldn't agree more...sometimes I wish I had ear plugs at Mass.

A Grammy winning music director has delivered a stinging attack upon modern Church music. Joseph Cullen, choral director at the London Symphony Orchestra, says that since the 1960s there has been a “glaring lack of sympathy” for “worthy sacred music.”

Writing in the April 9 edition of the English weekly The Tablet, he praised the music used during last year’s papal visit to the United Kingdom. But he added: “Sadly such excellence is untypical of the vast majority of our Catholic churches. There is a glaring lack of sympathy for the heritage which should be the bedrock of worthy sacred music in today's Church.”

In recent years Joseph Cullen has risen to prominence due to his close collaboration with some of the world’s leading conductors including Sir Simon Rattle, Valery Gergiev and Sir Colin Davies, with whom he won a Grammy Award in 2006 for their recording of Verdi's “Falstaff.”

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St. Peter Gonzalez

The Saint of the Day for April 14 is St. Peter Gonzalez.

Public humiliation led Peter Gonzalez to a true conversion experience and set him on the road to sainthood.

Peter was born into a noble family in Castile, Spain, in 1190, and he became a priest as a step to high office. One Christmas Day, during a grand entrance into the city before all the townspeople, the young priest was thrown off of his horse and onto a dung-heap.

Embarrassed and knowing that his parishioners thought he was a fake, Peter withdrew from the world for a period of prayer and meditation. During this time, he had a conversion and spent the rest of his life making up for his lost youth. He joined the Dominicans and shunned those who tried to convince him to return to his old ways, saying: "If you love me, follow me! If you cannot follow me, forget me!"

He served as the confessor and court chaplain to King Saint Ferdinand III of Castile, and reformed court life. He also worked for the crusade against the Moors, went into the battlefields, and worked for humane treatment of Moorish prisoners.

Fearing that the honors and easy life offered by the king’s court would lead him to return to his previous ways, he left the court and evangelized to shepherds and sailors.

He died in 1246 and was canonized in 1741.

video: Pagan Easter!

The global warming fanatics try to take over Easter?

There is no other way to describe this other than, 'A Pagan takeover of Easter'. When will leaders in the Church learn that if you lay down with dogs, you\'re gonna get fleas?

Martin Sheen reveals wife was conceived in rape, talks about ‘strong’ anti-abortion views

Well-known for his role as President Bartlet in the television drama “The West Wing,” actor Martin Sheen, born Ramon Estevez, has given an interview in which he reveals the startlingly personal reasons for his ‘strong’ anti-abortion stance. In the interview he also discusses his Catholic faith, which he says includes praying the Rosary, belief in trans-substantiation, and the communion of saints.

Sheen, a complex character whose Catholic devotional life and pro-life views have not stopped him from backing the presidency of Barack Obama, was interviewed by Gay Byrne; the interview was released on Irish broadcaster RTE’s website April 3.  If he is so pro-life, he should not have supported the most pro-abortion president in history.

Byrne asked Sheen: “The liberal causes that you espouse are readily identifiable with people in the movie business, but your anti-abortion stance is very strong indeed. And tell me what you told me on the late late show in 1987 as to why that is.”

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UN document would give 'Mother Earth' same rights as humans

What a farce...

The UN is one of the most pro-abortion organizations on the planet, and now they want to give "the Earth" the same rights that they deny to unborn babies.

Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving "Mother Earth" the same rights as humans — having just passed a domestic law that does the same for bugs, trees and all other natural things in the South American country.

The bid aims to have the UN recognize the Earth as a living entity (duh!  it's unborn babies that are living human beings...what about their rights?)  that humans have sought to "dominate and exploit" — to the point that the "well-being and existence of many beings" is now threatened.

The wording may yet evolve, but the general structure is meant to mirror Bolivia's Law of the Rights of Mother Earth, which Bolivian President Evo Morales enacted in January.

That document speaks of the country's natural resources as "blessings," and grants the Earth a series of specific rights that include rights to life, water and clean air; the right to repair livelihoods affected by human activities; and the right to be free from pollution.

It also establishes a Ministry of Mother Earth, and provides the planet with an ombudsman whose job is to hear nature's complaints as voiced by activist and other groups, including the state.

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St. Martin I

The Saint of the Day for April 13 is St. Martin I .

The unfortunate victim of Constans' wrath was the virtuous Martin. Born in Todi of noble birth, he had served as nuncio to Constantinople under Pope Theodore, gaining experience in dealing with the Byzantine court and familiarizing himself with the Monothelite teachings so prevalent in the East. Without waiting for the necessary imperial mandate, Martin proceeded with his consecration on July 5, 649. This independent act so enraged the emperor that he refused to acknowledge Martin as the legitimate pope.

A staunch defender of the orthodox, Martin immediately convened a synod in the Lateran. Attended by 105 Western bishops, the synod studied all aspects of Monothelitism and the emperor's Type. After nearly a month, the synod reached a conclusion. They determined that there were two wills in Christ, condemned the One Will heresy, and further condemned Constans' Type for boldly prohibiting the truthful teachings of the apostles. In an effort to pacify the emperor, Martin acknowledged Constans' good intentions in trying to unify the Church and placed the burden of responsibility on the poor advice of Constantinople's patriarchs.

Constans, far from appeased, was determined that his religious policies would not be ignored. Appointing his chamberlain Olympius as exarch to Italy, he dispatched him with the order to obtain the signatures of acceptance from all Italians without exception. Olympius proved to be a dismal failure, both in his mission and in an attempted assassination of the popular pope. The exarch prudently abandoned his post and fled to Sicily to fight the invading Muslims.

In the summer of 653, the furious emperor appointed yet another exarch, Theodore Calliopas, with orders to escort the inflexible pontiff to Constantinople. Calliopas and his officers boldly entered the Lateran, arrested the bedridden Martin, and presented the clergy with Constans' edict deposing the pope who had been consecrated illegally. The voyage, which took nearly three months, subjected the sickly pope to humiliation and abuse. Arriving in Constantinople, racked with dysentery and disabled by gout, Martin was placed in solitary confinement. On December 19, 653, Martin was brought to trial on trumped-up charges of treason and sacrilege. The pope, near death and realizing his position futile, could only laugh at the ridiculous accusations and beg the emperor to excuse the fumbling witnesses before they added perjury to false witness! Constans pronounced the predetermined verdict of guilty on the pontiff and sentenced him to public flogging and death. The disapproving crowd watched, horrified; and it was only by the dying Patriarch Paul's intercession that Martin's sentence of public execution was commuted to banishment.

For nearly three months, the pope suffered under the worst conditions in a Byzantine prison before he was exiled to the Crimea. There, on September 16, 655, suffering from cold and starvation, Pope Martin gratefully met his God. Pious Martin had been disgraced in life but later became honored as a martyr. Today he is venerated as a saint

video: Why Can't There be More Like Him?

Who says there aren't good bishops? Among the many that are good, one in particular is distinguishing himself by more than his words.

Movie Review: Truth Be Told

 "Truth Be Told"  airs Saturday April 16 on Fox 8:00 p.m. EST.

Marriage counselor Annie Morgan has an opportunity for her own talk show, but she  feels that it would improve her chances if she were married.  She convinces her friend Mark, a widower with two children, to pose as her husband during a weekend with her potential boss.   Their efforts to keep up the charade have some comedic results, but things turn more serious as they determine when/how the truth be told.

The character development is very good, and adds to the story.  We really get to know the characters and how they feel, and why they feel how they do.  The scenery is beautiful also.

This was an entertaining family-oriented movie.  I will definitely be showing it to my nephews. 
KUDO's to Walmart and P&G for sponsoring it.

http://familymovienight.com/truth-be-told/