Day30Church Fathers Lenten Reading Plan 3/31/09
St. Cyril of Jerusalem: Catechetical Lectures: Lecture XIX
Day 30 Lite Version
St. Athanasius: Life of Anthony:74-81
Printer-Friendly Version of Outline: Church Fathers Lenten Reading Plan PDF
President Obama seems a man flying in the face of the Holy Spirit and not prone to be moved the Spirit, especially in areas of life, morality and the Natural Law…unless by “natural law” we mean survival of the most well-positioned, power-hungry and powerful.
Modern Medieval writes: “It appears that Joachim of Fiore is still around and voting for Obama.” “From the annals of strange stuff, I ran across this Italian article that has the mayor San Giovanni of Fiore inviting Barack Obama to his town in order to become an honorary citizen. Apparently, according to this article, Obama has invoked the 12th-century mystic and theologian Joachim of Fiore on no fewer than 3 occasions.”
In a Lenten sermon by P. Raniero Cantalamessa, OFMCAP – delivered in the presence of Benedict XVI 3-29-2009 Joachim of Fiore comes up again with regard to Obama and what this Presisent could possibly be doing in Joachim’s corner:
The fact that the recently elected president of the United States referenced Joachim of Fiore three times during his electoral campaign has renewed interest in medieval monk’s teachings. Few of the people who talk about him, especially on the internet, know or care to know just what exactly this author said. Every idea of church or world renewal is offhandedly attributed to him, even the idea of a new Pentecost for the Church, which was invoked by John XXIII.
One thing is certain: whether or not it should be attributed to Joachim of Fiore, the idea of a third era of the Spirit that would follow on the era of the Old Testament Father and the New Testament Christ is false and heretical because it affects the very heart of the Trinitarian dogma. St. Gregory Nazianzen’s statement is entirely different. He makes a distinction between three phases in the revelation of the Trinity: in the Old Testament the Father fully revealed himself and the Son is promised and announced; in the New Testament the Son fully revealed himself and the Holy Spirit is promised and announced; in the time of the Church, the Holy Spirit is finally fully known and we rejoice in his presence.
The Church speaks with the voice of the Holy Spirit teaching and guiding through its Magisterium. In speaking of the Holy Spirit Cantalamessa says:
St. Ignatius suggested practical means to apply these criteria. One is this: when we are faced with two possible choices, it is useful to first consider one of them, as if we must follow it, and to stay in that state for a day or more; then we should evaluate how our heart reacts to that choice: is there peace, harmony with the rest of our own decisions; is there something inside of you that encourages you in that direction, or on the contrary has it left a haze of restlessness… Then repeat the process with the second hypothesis. All this should be done in an atmosphere of prayer, abandonment to God’s will, and openness to the Holy Spirit.
And in closing he says:
When everything is reduced to just the personal, private listening to the Spirit, the path is opened to a unstoppable process of division and subdivision, because everyone believe they are right. And the very division and multiplication of denominations and sects, often contrasting each other in their essential points, demonstrates that the same Spirit of truth in speaking cannot be in all, because otherwise he would be contradicting himself.
It is well known that this is the danger to which the protestant world is most exposed, having built the “interior testimony” of the Holy Spirit as the only criteria of truth, against every exterior, ecclesial testimony, other than that of the written Word.[10] Some extreme fringes will even go as far as to separate the interior guidance of the Spirit even from word of the Scriptures. We then have the various movements of “enthusiasts” or “enlightened” who have punctuated the history of the Church, whether catholic, orthodox or protestant. The most frequent result of this tendency, which concentrates all attention on the internal testimony of the Spirit, is that the Spirit slowly looses the capital letter and comes to coincide with the simple human spirit. That is what happened with rationalism.
In a recent post, I wrote about the vengeance of Jesus. He took Satan and Sin to task on the Cross with the shedding of His Blood, not the blood of others. The God-Man suffered the punishment due our sins. All sin leads to lies, betrayal, murder, and war. Sin percolates and then escalates. It is as though the force of our sins hides beneath the surface of our daily existence and when its ready to show its ugly face, it appears as a slum, a dysfunctional society, a dysfunctional family or a war. Sin with its pride, lust, sloth, greed,envy and the like, ultimately brings havoc in its wake. However, it can be stopped. We know and have the remedy. Like the discovery of a vaccine or cure, it only has to be made known and available, applied and administered. There’s the rub. We are an important part of the remedy. The Good News of Jesus is here and at hand! Where are the penitents?
Monsignor recently gave a sermon in which he spoke of a conversation between a repentant prostitute and St. Francis De Sales. The Saint heard the confession of the woman. It was heartfelt and thorough, leaving out nothing of her past life. Afterwards she asked the Saint, “Now that you have heard my confession, what do you call me? Without hesitation, St. Francis de Sales said, “I call you a saint.” He went on to say that no matter how others saw her or what they called her, God saw her as she now was; as if her past sins never happened. The woman told the story again and again throughout her life. The Saint’s response of the mercy, love and pardon of God came back to her again and again, and strengthened her whenever she was tempted to return to her past way of life.
I tell that story because Rwanda is a nation soaked in the blood of its own people. Finding a way into a future full of hope rests on the Good News of Jesus Christ. Mother Mary as Our Lady of Kibeho predicted the catastrophes that would befall their nation. She also showed them the way back to unity and wholeness. In her numerous apparitions, she showed them that the Mother of God lived with them, cared for them and prayed for them. Her healing presence among them was constant and intimate. Her message is always the same, “Jesus.”
Jesus have mercy on me a sinner.
EWTN’s Sunday Night:Live with Fr. Groeschel featured – Our Lady Appears in Rwanda. Guest: Immaculee Illibagiza
Recently, I wrote about Immaculee , her book, Left to Tell and about the Apparitions of Our Lady of Kibeho that preceded and predicted the Rwandan genocide nine years before it occurred. The images of the apparition were graphic and terrorizing as was the genocide.
In Left to Tell, Immaculee Ilibagiza tells her story of her experience of the Rwandan genocide. In 1981, many years prior to the Rwandan events( to which the world turned a blind eye,) Our Lady made them known through a series of apparitions (approved by the Church) to seven children, Alphonse, Anathalie, Marie Claire, Agnes, Stephanie and Vestine and Emanuel, a young pagan, known as ‘Sagastasha’ at the time of the revelations.
The Shrine of Our Lady of Kibeho has been given Church approval. Sean Bloomfield writes:
Although Rwanda was graced by a divine visitation during the eighties, the nineties brought quite the opposite: a gruesome genocide in which a million men, women and children were brutally killed, often by friends and neighbors, in only 100 days. The message of Kibeho, however, is intrinsically tied to this tragic event.
It was not until after the war that the Catholic Church made a definitive ruling about the apparitions. Only three of the seven alleged visionaries gained Church approval:
Alphonsine Murmureka Nathalie Mukamazimpaka Marie Claire MukangangoThese seers were the first three young people to report experiencing apparitions of the Virgin Mary, who called herself Nyina wa Jambo, which translates to Mother of the Word.
My Imitation of Christ
by Thomas a’ Kempis
Book 4 chapter 9:
With a sincere heart I offer myself this day to You, O Lord, to Your eternal service, to Your homage, and as a sacrifice of everlasting praise. Receive me with this holy offering of Your precious Body which also I make to You this day, in the presence of angels invisibly attending, for my salvation and that of all Your people.
O Lord, upon Your altar of expiation, I offer You all the sins and offenses I have committed in Your presence and in the presence of Your holy angels, from the day when I first could sin until this hour, that You may burn and consume them all in the fire of Your love, that You may wipe away their every stain, cleanse my conscience of every fault, and restore to me Your grace which I lost in sin by granting full pardon for all and receiving me mercifully with the kiss of peace.
What can I do for all my sins but humbly confess and lament them, and implore Your mercy without ceasing? In Your mercy, I implore You, hear me when I stand before You, my God. All my sins are most displeasing to me. I wish never to commit them again. I am sorry for them and will be sorry as long as I live. I am ready to do penance and make satisfaction to the utmost of my power.
Forgive me, O God, forgive me my sins for Your Holy Name. Save my soul which You have redeemed by Your most precious Blood. See, I place myself at Your mercy. I commit myself to Your hands. Deal with me according to Your goodness, not according to my malicious and evil ways.
I offer to You also all the good I have, small and imperfect though it be, that You may make it more pure and more holy, that You may be pleased with it, render it acceptable to Yourself, and perfect it more and more, and finally that You may lead me, an indolent and worthless creature, to a good and happy end.
I offer You also all the holy desires of Your devoted servants, the needs of my parents, friends, brothers, sisters, and all who are dear to me; of all who for Your sake have been kind to me or to others; of all who have wished and asked my prayers and Masses for them and theirs, whether they yet live in the flesh or are now departed from this world, that they may all experience the help of Your grace, the strength of Your consolation, protection from dangers, deliverance from punishment to come, and that, free from all evils, they may gladly give abundant thanks to You.
I offer You also these prayers and the Sacrifice of Propitiation for those especially who have in any way injured, saddened, or slandered me, inflicted loss or pain upon me, and also for all those whom I have at any time saddened, disturbed, offended, and abused by word or deed, willfully or in ignorance. May it please You to forgive us all alike our sins and offenses against one another.
Take away from our hearts, O Lord, all suspicion, anger, wrath, contention, and whatever may injure charity and lessen brotherly love. Have mercy, O Lord, have mercy on those who ask Your mercy, give grace to those who need it, and make us such that we may be worthy to enjoy Your favor and gain eternal life.
I’m not holding my breath but for crying out loud, when does sanity return?
It figures. Obama’s first judicial nominee is a raving lunatic. Judge David Hamilton ruled that prayers in Jesus Name at the Indiana House of Representatives was unconstitutional, but prayers to Allah were not.
via Traditional Values Coalition
Be Holy! 