Feast Day of the Guardian Angels

"See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven always look upon the face of my heavenly Father." (Matthew 18:10)

 
Memorial (1969 Calendar): October 2
Greater Double (1954 Calendar): October 2

Just a few days after the The Dedication of St. Michael the Archangel, we have the Feast of the Guardian Angels. Dom Gueranger writes:

Although the solemnity of September 29 celebrates the praises of all the nine glorious choirs, yet the piety of the faithful, in the latter ages, desired to have a special day consecrated to the Guardian Angels. Several churches having taken the initiative, and kept the feast under various rites and on different days, Paul V (1608) authorized its celebration ad libitum. Clement X (1670) established it by precept as a feast of double rite on October 2, the first free day after Michælmas, on which it thus remains in some way dependent. [Note: After his work was written, Pope Leo XIII raised the feast to the rank of Greater Double].

Each of us has a specific guardian angel to watch over us night and day (Ps 34:7, Mt 18:10, Ac 12:15), but what do we do concerning them? Do we ask for their guidance daily or ignore them? Everyday when we rise to go about our day and make a morning offering let us thank God for His mercy and pray that our guardian angel protects our body and soul in the day ahead. Please take advantage of this - for we are not alone in life! Our guardian angel is always with us! As stated in the Baltimore Catechism, "Our Guardian Angels pray for us, protect and guide us, and offer our prayers, good works and desires to God" (223).

And each of our parishes and countries has its own individual guardian angels as well. St. Frances de Sales writes of this:

"The great Peter Faber, the first priest, the first preacher, and the first proposer of divinity in the Holy Society of Jesus, and the companion of St. Ignatius, its founder, returning from Germany, where he had done great service to the glory of our Lord, and travelling through this diocese, the place of his birth, related, that having passed through many heretical places, he had received innumerable consolations from the guardian angels of the several parishes, and that on repeated occasions he had received the most sensible and convincing proofs of their protection. Sometimes they preserved him from the ambush of his enemies, at other times they rendered several souls more mild, and tractable to receive from him the doctrine of salvation: this he related with so much earnestness, that a gentlewoman then very young, who heard it from his own mouth, related it but four years ago, that is to say, about threescore years after he had told it, with an extraordinary feeling. I had the consolation last year to consecrate an altar on the spot where God was pleased this blessed man should be born, in a little village called Vilaret, amidst our most craggy mountains. Choose some particular saint or saints, whose lives may please you most, and whom you can best imitate, and in whose intercession you may have a particular confidence. The saint, whose name you bear, is already assigned you, from your baptism."

Above all, get to know your guardian angel. Request their aid even in computer and Internet trouble or traffic jams. Angels are spiritual creatures with remarkable intelligence yet no free will. As stated in the Baltimore Catechism Q 216: "Angels are pure spirits without a body, created to adore and enjoy God in heaven." They serve God completely and devotion to our guardian angels can only lead us closer to Jesus Christ. Early Christians were devoted to angels. Origen writing in 225 AD declared: "Every believer — although the humblest in the Church — is said to be attended by an angel, who the Savior declares always beholds the face of God the Father. Now, this angel has the purpose of being his guardian." 

And as a reminder, we do not become angels as some people seem to believe. Angels are completely different creatures; what we hope to become is a saint (no matter how old we are when we die), and then we will be in Heaven with the angels praising God: "Hoshana in the Highest, Lord God of Peace." People can't be angels just like they can't be dogs after they die - we are completely different creatures.

For more information, please see my post: What are Angels? A Summary & Exposition on Angels for Catholics

No evil shall befall you, nor shall affliction come near your tent, for to His Angels God has given command about you, that they guard you in all your ways. Upon their hands they will bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone (Psalm 91: 10-12) 

From St. Bernard:

"And so, that nothing in heaven should be wanting in your concern for us, You send those blessed spirits to serve us, assigning them as our guardians and our teachers. 'He has given his angels charge over you to guard you in all your ways.' These words should fill you with respect, inspire devotion and instill confidence: respect for the presence of angels, devotion because of their loving service, and confidence because of their protection. And so the angels are here; they are at your side, they are with you, present on your behalf. They are here to protect you and to serve you. But even if it is God who has given them this charge, we must nonetheless be grateful to them for the great love with which they obey and come to help us in our great need.

"So let us be devoted and grateful to such great protectors; let us return their love and honor them as much as we can and should. Yet all our love and honor must go to Him, for it is from Him that they receive all that makes them worthy of our love and respect. We should then, my brothers, show our affection for the angels, for one day they will be our co-heirs just as here below they are our guardians and trustees appointed and set over us by the Father. We are God's children although it does not seem so, because we are still but small children under guardians and trustees, and for the present little better than slaves.

"Even though we are children and have a long, a very long and dangerous way to go, with such protectors what have we to fear? They who keep us in all our ways cannot be overpowered or led astray, much less lead us astray. They are loyal, prudent, powerful. Why then are we afraid? We have only to follow them, stay close to them, and we shall dwell under the protection of God's heaven."

Votive Mass of the Angels:

Missa Cantata on a side altar at St. Josaphat's Church in Detroit Michigan, said by Fr. Hrytsyk

Daily Prayer to Your Guardian Angel:

Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom God's love commits me here, ever be at my side to light and to guard, to rule and to guide. 

Collect:

O God, Who in Thine ineffable Providence hast deigned to send Thy holy Angels to keep watch over us: grant to us Thy suppliant people, that we may always be defended by their protection, and may rejoice in their fellowship for ever. Through our Lord.

Prayer Source: 1962 Roman Catholic Daily Missal

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Today is the Sanctity of Life Day!

Today is finally the Sanctity of Life Day. Please, pray the Rosary today. Pray it for all those that are thinking of abortion, have had one, and the children in the womb. Today is our chance to make a difference - our chance to help others in carrying their crosses - our chance to help Our Lord. Did He not say thus:

"Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me. . . . Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me." -- Jesus Christ (Matthew 25:40, 45)


Wouldn't you help our Lord if He were in the womb? If you answered yes then PLEASE pray the Rosary. Through the Rosary, Mary will pray for us and her prayers can only lead to her Divine Son - Our Lord, Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us.

Peace be with you all

Image Sources: Created by a user of Phatmass Phorums. Used with permission.

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St. Thérèse of Lisieux

Memorial (1969 Calendar): October 1
Double (1955 Calendar): October 3

Known as the Saint of the Little Flower as well as the greatest saint of modern times, St. Thérèse of Lisieux (also called St. Therese of the Child Jesus) died at a young age in a monastery but lived her short life with great love. She was born on January 2, 1873, to a watchmaker and a lace maker. Her mother, the lacemaker, died when Thérèse was only 4 years old. Both of her parents were canonized in 2015.

St. Thérèse became a Carmelite nun at age 15. She described her simple path to sanctification and spirituality as "The Little Way". Read her autobiography, Story of a Soul, as well as Maurice and Therese, a book of letters between St. Thérèse and a struggling young priest. At 7pm on Thursday, September 30, 1897, St. Thérèse died of tuberculosis.

She is the patron saint of France, missionaries, florists, and the concerns of children to name a few. She has been called the greatest saint of modern times. There are nearly a countless number of people claiming her intercession in their lives including Mother Angelica, founder of EWTN. Countless numbers of miracles have been attributed to her. After all, Thérèse said that she wished to spend her entire time in Heaven by doing good on earth.

"Our Lord does not come down from Heaven every day to lie in a golden ciborium. He comes to find another heaven which is infinitely dearer to him - the heaven of our souls, created in His Image, the living temples of the Adorable Trinity." --Saint Thérèse of Lisieux

For a virtual tour of the National Shrine of St. Therese of Lisieux, please click here.

Traditional Matins Reading:

Teresa of the Child Jesus was bom at Alençon, in France, of respectable parents noted for their singular and constant piety. She was imbued with the grace of the divine Spirit from earliest childhood and desired to lead the religious life. She made an earnest promise that she would deny God nothing which He seemed to ask of her, and strove to observe it faithfully until death. She lost her mother when she was only five years old and committed herself wholly to divine providence, under the watchful care of her affectionate father and her elder sisters. Under such teachers Teresa exulted as a giant to run the way of perfection. At the age of nine, she was placed in the school of the Benedictine nuns at Lisieux, where she was remarkable for her progress in the knowledge of divine things. In her tenth year she suffered from a serious and mysterious illness, from which, as she herself relates, she was delivered by the Blessed Virgin, who appeared to her smiling, during a novena which she made to her under the title of our Lady of Victories. Then, filled with an gelie fervour, she began to prepare herself with all care for that sacred banquet “wherein Christ is received.”

After her first communion she felt an insatiable hunger for this heavenly food and, as if by inspiration, besought Jesus to turn all earthly consolation to bitterness for her. She was filled with a tender and burning love for Christ and the Church, and desired with all her heart to enter the Order of Discalced Carmelites, in order by self-abnegation and self-sacrifice to help priests, missionaries, and the whole Church, and to gain innumerable souls for Jesus Christ: all which, when at the point of death, she promised that she would obtain from God. Her extreme youth was the source of many difficulties for her entrance into religion, but she overcame them by her incredible fortitude of soul, and entered the Carmel of Lisieux at the age of fifteen. God disposed the heart of Teresa in a wonderful manner to ascend to Him by steps, and, imitating the hidden life of the Virgin Mary, she brought forth, like a well-watered garden, the flowers of all virtues, particularly charity towards God and her neighbour.

She read in the Holy Scripture the words: “Whosoever is a little one, let him come to me,” and desiring to please the Most High, determined to be a little one in spirit, and thus committed herself with childlike confidence to God as to a most loving Father. This path of spiritual childhood, according to the Gospel, she taught to others, especially the novices, whose training in the religious virtues she undertook out of obedience; and thus she set the way of evangelical simplicity before a world full of pride and of the love of vanities. Her heavenly Spouse inspired her with the desire of suffering in soul and body. Moreover, seeing that the love of God was almost everywhere neglected, she was filled with great grief, and two years before her death offered herself as a victim to the love of the merciful God. Then, as she herself relates, she was wounded by a flame of heavenly fire. At last, consumed by charity, rapt in ecstasy, and murmuring with all fervour the words: "My God, I love thee," she passed to her heavenly Spouse on September 30, 1897, at the age of twenty four. When dying she promised that she would let fall a ceaseless shower of roses upon the earth, which promise she has actually fulfilled since her entrance into heaven, and continues still to fulfil by countless miracles. Therefore, Pope Pius XI enrolled her in the catalogue of blessed virgins on April 29, 1923, and two years later, after more wonderful miracles, proceeded on the sixteenth of the kalends of June (May 17), to her solemn canonization.

Prayers:
 
Dear Little Flower of Lisieux, how wonderful was the short life you led. Though cloistered, you went far and wide through fervent prayers and great sufferings. You obtained from God untold helps and graces for his evangelists. Help all missionaries in their work and teach all of us to spread Christianity in our own neighborhoods and family circles. Amen.

O Little Flower of Jesus, ever consoling troubled souls with heavenly graces, in your unfailing intercession I place my trust. From the Heart of Our Blessed Savior petition these blessing of which I stand in greatest need (mention here). Shower upon me your promised roses of virtue and grace, dear Saint Therese, so that swiftly advancing in sanctity and in perfect love of neighbor, I may someday receive the crown of eternal life. Amen.

O Lord, Who has said: Unless you become as little children you shall not enter into the Kingdom of heaven: grant unto us, we beseech Thee, so to follow in humility and simplicity of heart the footsteps of Saint Teresa, the Virgin, that we may obtain everlasting rewards: Who livest and reignest.

Prayer Source: 1962 Roman Catholic Daily Missal

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Images of God

I recently was asked by another blogger to post on what I view as my image of God. In our heads we all have different images of God's presence in our natural world, so what is your image?

I could find no picture of the image of God that I had; the closest I could find of my image of God was a website with the sun. My image of God is one set early in the morning when the sun is just rising over the distant and beautiful purple and red streaks blaze across. And as the sun rises a deep, golden Cross shines upon the sun - the sun though is shaped as the Eucharist. And finally as the bright orb reaches its peak the sky clears into soft blue - a lasting reminder of God's love of the cross and the glory in the Resurrection.

Add links to your images below.

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Pope Benedict XVI Visits a Children's Hospital

Today Pope Benedict XVI visited the main children's hosptial in Rome: Bambino Gesu. It was an extremely poignant trip.

His Speech:

Hospital Administrators and Distinguished Authorities,
Dear Children,

At the end of my Visit, I am glad to speak to you and to thank you for your warm welcome. I am grateful to the President of the "Bambino Gesù" Paediatric Hospital for his words on behalf of you all, words of faith and true Christian charity. I greet the Presidents of the Region and of the Province, the Mayor of Rome and the other Authorities gathered here.

My gratitude then goes to the Administrators, Directors and Coordinators of the Hospital Wards, and to the doctors, nurses and all the personnel. I address you in particular with affection, dear children, as well as your relatives who are beside you to care for you. My heartfelt thanks go to your representative who has paid me a kind tribute on behalf of the entire family of the "Bambino Gesù". I am close to each one of you and want to make you feel God's comfort and blessing. I would like to express these same wishes to those in the branches of this hospital at Palidor and Santa Marinella, who are equally close to me.

I chose the "Bambino Gesù" for my first Visit to a hospital for two reasons: first of all, because this Institution belongs to the Holy See and is caringly watched over by the Cardinal Secretary of State, who is present here. Passing through several wards, meeting so many suffering little ones, I thought naturally of Jesus who loved children tenderly and wanted them to be allowed to go to him. Yes, like Jesus, the Church too expresses a special fondness for children, particularly when they are suffering.

And this is the second reason why I have come to see you: to witness personally to Jesus' love for children, a love that wells up spontaneously from the heart and that the Christian spirit nurtures and strengthens. The Lord said: "As often as you did it for one of my least brothers, you did it for me" (cf. Mt 25: 40, 45). In every suffering person, especially if he or she is little and defenceless, it is Jesus who welcomes us and is expecting our love.

Consequently, dear friends, the work you do is important. I am thinking of the advanced surgery that has made the "Bambino Gesù" famous. But I am also thinking above all of the ordinary everyday work: of the welcome, hospitalization and painstaking care provided to the small patients - and there are so many of them! - who have recourse to your health-care structures. This requires great availability and a constant effort to increase the available resources; it demands attention, a spirit of sacrifice, patience and disinterested love to ensure that parents find here a place where they can breathe hope and serenity, even in moments of the most acute anxiety.

Permit me to say another word precisely about the welcome and care that is given to those who are sick. Here you are concerned to guarantee excellent treatment, not only from the medical but also from the human point of view. You seek to give a family to the patients and those who are with them, and this requires a contribution from all: the directors, doctors, nurses and staff in the various wards, the personnel, and the many praiseworthy Organizations of volunteers who daily offer their precious service.

This approach, which is effective for every clinic, must be a special feature of those inspired by Gospel principles. For children, then, no resources should be spared. May every project and programme, therefore, always be centred on the good of the sick, the good of the sick child.

Dear friends, thank you for your collaboration in this work of great human value that is also an especially effective apostolate. I pray for you, knowing that this mission of yours is far from easy. However, I am convinced that everything will be easier if, in devoting your energy to all your little guests, you are able to recognize in their faces the face of Christ.

When I went to pray in the chapel I met the priests, women religious and all those who accompany your work with their dedication, assuring in particular an appropriate spiritual animation. May the Church herself be the heart of the Hospital: draw from Jesus, truly present in the Eucharist, from the sweet Doctor of body and soul, the spiritual strength to comfort and care for all who are hospitalized here.

Lastly, as Bishop of Rome, may I be permitted to make a supremely pastoral reflection. The "Bambino Gesù" Hospital, in addition to being an institution of the Holy See that directly provides practical help for sick children, is an outpost of the Christian Community's evangelizing activity in our City. Here a practical and effective Gospel witness can be offered in contact with suffering humanity; here, the power of Christ, who with his spirit heals and transforms human existence, is proclaimed through deeds.

Let us pray that together with their treatment, the love of Jesus may be communicated to the little ones. May Mary Most Holy, Salus infirmorum - Health of the sick, whom we feel yet closer as Mother of the Child Jesus and of all children, protect you, dear sick children, and your families, the administrators, the doctors and the entire Hospital Community. I impart my Apostolic Blessing with affection to you all.

© Copyright 2005 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

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Human Cloning

The Church is intrinsically opposed to human cloning because human cloning takes God out of our lives and we make false gods of ourselves. We can't create life. Can we create a soul? No, and for this reason human cloning (research and experimental) is entirely wrong; only God, the author of all life, can create an immortal soul.

Recently, in a Sept. 29, 2005, article I read that Wisconsin just passed a bill banning all human cloning but will be vetoed by the governor. I will keep readers updated if I hear more on the bill in the future. Please, let's all pray that Wisconsin can overturn the veto and this bill can still become law.

Right now in the US 6 states have banned all forms of human cloning: Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, North Dakota and South Dakota.

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St. Jerome

Memorial (1969 Calendar): September 30
Double (1955 Calendar): September 30

Today the Church remembers St. Jerome (347 - 419). St. Jerome was born to a wealthy pagan family, and he spent his youth in pursuit of worldly values before going to study law in Rome. In 365 AD, St. Jerome was baptized and converted to the Catholic Faith, the only Christian Faith at the time. After his interior conversion, St. Jerome began to live as a monk. He lived for many years in the Syrian Desert as a hermit.

It is said that on one occasion, St. Jerome removed a thorn from a lion's paw, and the animal stayed loyally at his side for years. St. Jerome was a student of Saint Gregory of Nazianzen and became a priest. He was also the Secretary to Pope Damasus I, who commissioned St. Jerome to revise the Latin text of the Bible. After 30 years, the Latin Vulgate was created. St. Jerome was also the friend and teacher of Saint Paula, Saint Marcella, and Saint Eustochium. After all of this, St. Jerome returned to live as a hermit in the Syrian deserts and remained there for the last 34 years of his life.

St. Jerome wrote translations of Origen, histories, biographies, and much more. He is also a Doctor of the Church as well as a Father of the Church. St. Jerome died in 419 AD, and his relics reside in the Basilica of Saint Mary Major in Rome.

We can learn from Saint Jerome, not that sainthood is only for hermits, but that sainthood is made of many paths that all intersect in the one to come on the narrow road. We can be hermits, priests, layman, etc. But we can still find Christ. The most important thing though is that no matter what title we have in front of our name (Mr., Fr., etc) we remember that we have a more important title - Catholic. And we should live the Catholic life in its entirety by not only going to Mass but by prayer to God and love for Him and others. Love is the road to Heaven.

Spiritus Paraclitus:

Since the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, had bestowed the Scriptures on the human race for their instruction in Divine things, He also raised up in successive ages saintly and learned men whose task it should be to develop that treasure and so provide for the faithful plenteous "consolation from the Scriptures."[1] Foremost among these teachers stands St. Jerome. Him the Catholic Church acclaims and reveres as her "Greatest Doctor," divinely given her for the understanding of the Bible. And now that the fifteenth centenary of his death is approaching we would not willingly let pass so favorable an opportunity of addressing you on the debt we owe him. For the responsibility of our Apostolic office impels us to set before you his wonderful example and so promote the study of Holy Scripture in accordance with the teaching of our predecessors, Leo XIII and Pius X, which we desire to apply more precisely still to the present needs of the Church. For St. Jerome -- "strenuous Catholic, learned in the Scriptures,"[2] "teacher of Catholics,"[3] "model of virtue, world's teacher"[4] -- has by his earnest and illuminative defense of Catholic doctrine on Holy Scripture left us most precious instructions. These we propose to set before you and so promote among the children of the Church, and especially among the clergy, assiduous and reverent study of the Bible.

ENCYCLICAL OF POPE BENEDICT XV ON ST. JEROME SEPTEMBER 15, 1920

Prayer:

O God, Who in blessed Jerome, Thy Confessor, didst vouchsafe to provide for Thy Church a great teacher for expounding the Sacred Scripture: grant, we beseech Thee, that through his merits and prayers we may be able, by the help of Thy grace, to practice what he taught by both word and example. Through our Lord.

Prayer Source: 1962 Roman Catholic Daily Missal

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Humility

It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels. – St. Augustine

Humility is called the greatest virtue from which all other virtues arise. It is precisely by priding ourselves that we deceive ourselves the most. In truth, compared to Christ we are nothing at all. But, still as slaves to sin, Christ came and was not born in a kingdom but rather as a young child in a stable in swaddling clothes. This is precisely the great paradox of Christianity - Christ humbled himself to die for us while He is deserving of all glory and praise.

So, if we are to carry our crosses and walk with Christ to His Resurrection we must follow Him. We must love Him and through the best of our abilities love and serve Him. Above all, we must love and how can we love if we don't care? How can we love if we make ourselves worth more than others?

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Adult Stem Cells Cure Paraplegic

It's true. Adult stem cells have cured a paraplegic after living in this condition for 19 years. These cells are supported by the Church because they came from umbilical cord cells that didn't result in any death unlike embryonic stem cells.

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Archbishop Oscar Romero

"Peace is not the product of terror or fear. Peace is not the silence of cemeteries. Peace is not the silent result of violent repression. Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all. Peace is dynamism. Peace is generosity.It is right and it is duty."

You may know him as Archbishop Oscar Romero, but he was not only a Catholic Archbishop in El Salvador but rather an instrumental person in the peace of the country. And the price for his work in the peace led him to his death in 1980 - he was shot at the Consecration of the Eucharist during Mass.

Right now I'm watching the video, "Romero," a movie on his life and will be posting more in the next few days.

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