The Lenten Ember Fast Starts Today

Ember Days are set aside to pray and/or offer thanksgiving for a good harvest and God's blessings. If you are in good health, please at least fast during these three days and pray the additional prayers. Remember the words from the Gospel: "Unless you do penance, you shall likewise perish" (Luke 13:5).  Ember Days are days of fasting and abstinence.

Ember Days this Lent: March 8, 10, and 11

From New Advent:

Ember days (corruption from Lat. Quatuor Tempora, four times) are the days at the beginning of the seasons ordered by the Church as days of fast and abstinence. They were definitely arranged and prescribed for the entire Church by Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085) for the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after 13 December (S. Lucia), after Ash Wednesday, after Whitsunday, and after 14 September (Exaltation of the Cross). The purpose of their introduction, besides the general one intended by all prayer and fasting, was to thank God for the gifts of nature, to teach men to make use of them in moderation, and to assist the needy. The immediate occasion was the practice of the heathens of Rome. The Romans were originally given to agriculture, and their native gods belonged to the same class.

At the beginning of the time for seeding and harvesting religious ceremonies were performed to implore the help of their deities: in June for a bountiful harvest, in September for a rich vintage, and in December for the seeding; hence their feriae sementivae, feriae messis, and feri vindimiales. The Church, when converting heathen nations, has always tried to sanctify any practices which could be utilized for a good purpose. At first the Church in Rome had fasts in June, September, and December; the exact days were not fixed but were announced by the priests. The "Liber Pontificalis" ascribes to Pope Callistus (217-222) a law ordering: the fast, but probably it is older. Leo the Great (440-461) considers it an Apostolic institution. When the fourth season was added cannot be ascertained, but Gelasius (492-496) speaks of all four. This pope also permitted the conferring of priesthood and deaconship on the Saturdays of ember week--these were formerly given only at Easter.

Before Gelasius the ember days were known only in Rome, but after his time their observance spread. They were brought into England by St. Augustine; into Gaul and Germany by the Carlovingians. Spain adopted them with the Roman Liturgy in the eleventh century. They were introduced by St. Charles Borromeo into Milan. The Eastern Church does not know them. The present Roman Missal, in the formulary for the Ember days, retains in part the old practice of lessons from Scripture in addition to the ordinary two: for the Wednesdays three, for the Saturdays six, and seven for the Saturday in December. Some of these lessons contain promises of a bountiful harvest for those that serve God.

From Catholic Culture:

Since man is both a spiritual and physical being, the Church provides for the needs of man in his everyday life. The Church's liturgy and feasts in many areas reflect the four seasons of the year (spring, summer, fall and winter). The months of August, September, October and November are part of the harvest season, and as Christians we recall God's constant protection over his people and give thanksgiving for the year's harvest.

The September Ember Days were particularly focused on the end of the harvest season and thanksgiving to God for the season. Ember Days were three days (Wednesday, Friday and Saturday) set aside by the Church for prayer, fasting and almsgiving at the beginning of each of the four seasons of the year. The ember days fell after December 13, the feast of St. Lucy (winter), after the First Sunday of Lent (spring), after Pentecost Sunday (summer), and after September 14 , the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (fall). These weeks are known as the quattor tempora, the "four seasons."

Since the late 5th century, the Ember Days were also the preferred dates for ordination of priests. So during these times the Church had a threefold focus: (1) sanctifying each new season by turning to God through prayer, fasting and almsgiving; (2) giving thanks to God for the various harvests of each season; and (3) praying for the newly ordained and for future vocations to the priesthood and religious life.

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Book Review: Saint Junipero Serra's Camino by Stephen Binz

Back in 2014 I spent a week visiting southern California - specifically Los Angeles down to San Diego. As part of my journey, I visited several missions including the Mission Basilica of San Diego de Alcala and Mission San Juan Capistrano.

Flash forward to early 2017.  I was contacted by Pete Socks in January with an opportunity to review one of Franciscan Media's newest books entitled Saint Junipero Serra's Camino by Stephen Binz.  As someone went on a pilgrimage to Rome last year, I jumped at the chance.  I found travel guide books very helpful in making the most out of pilgrimage in Rome, and I was excited to see how a guidebook would help in promoting the Catholicity of the California missions.  I was excited to have the chance to read Stephen Binz's book for myself.

And the result?  I wish I had this book back in 2014 when I first went to California.  In fact, I have not seen a book that so appropriately and usefully summarizes the missions.  This book importantly goes further than merely presenting the facts as to what is in each mission.  The book highlights the history of the missions and includes relevant prayers, litanies, and Scripture readings in each chapter, thus making this an ideal companion for those on pilgrimage in Southern California.

The book is easy to read, spiritually uplifting, and conveniently fits in your travel bag.  As a result, I'm happy to recommend this book to all.  To learn more, please check out Saint Junipero Serra's Camino by Stephen Binz on Amazon.com.

For those interested in journeying with this book to the missions founded by St. Junipero Serra, the following are just a few of the images from my travels there:

St. Junipero Serra, pray for us and for the Church!

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31-Day St. Joseph Daily Reflection Manual: Free PDF

Did you know that the Month of March is dedicated to St. Joseph?

31-Day St. Joseph Daily Reflection 

Originally composed by St. Alphonsus Liguori, the text in this booklet was adapted by Hugh J. O'Connell, C.SS.R. Printed with an Imprimatur in 1962, it is now difficult to find. The text was recently arranged as a pdf download, ready to print at home for family devotions. The booklet is composed of 31 short but fervent devotions to St. Joseph, arranged for each day in the month. Every line bears testimony to the respect, confidence, and love which St. Alphonsus felt for the foster father of Jesus.

http://sspx.org/sites/sspx/files/dailydevotionsstjoseph-liguori.pdf

Via: SSPX Website

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Archbishop Purcell on Papal Infallibility

"If the Pope, for instance, were to say that the belief in God is false, you would not be obliged to believe him, or if he were to deny the rest of the creed... The supposition is injurious to the Holy Father in the very idea, but serves to show you the fullness with which the subject has been considered and the ample thought given to every possibility.  If he denies any dogma of the Church held by every true believer, he is no more Pope than either you or I; and so in this respect the dogma of infallibility amounts to nothing as an article of temporal government or cover for heresy" (Archbishop Purcell in "The Vatican Council")

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Do Penance Now Rather Than in Purgatory

We must ask ourselves before we soon begin Lent: Is our process of purification a priority now or are we putting everything off until Purgatory?

The meditation themes for improvement of the "requisite qualities" of Christian heart, to make it worthy to receive the seeds of Divine Sower, Our Lord Jesus Christ. Fragments taken from "Divine Intimacy" by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, OCD.

"The Night of the senses"

PRESENCE OF GOD - O lord, strengthen my desire for union with You, so that I may have the courage to face, for love of You, the total purification of the senses.

MEDITATION.

1. "In order to attain to divine union with God, the soul must pass through the dark night of mortification of the appetites and the denial of pleasure in all things" (J.C. AS I, 4,1). St. John of the Cross calls the total mortification of the senses the "dark night", because the soul that renounces every irregular attachment to creatures and to pleasure it might find in them, remains "unoccupied and in the darkness" (ibid., 3,1) as far as the senses are concerned.

It is to help us to enter this night, through which we must pass in order to attain to union with God, that the Saint tells us to mortify our inordinate tendencies toward sensible satisfactions. However, it is evident that even if we sincerely wish to mortify our senses, we cannot always avoid seeing agreeable things, listening to interesting news, eating appetizing food, and so forth. Sometimes sensible satisfactions will be imposed on us by the necessities of life, by the duties of our state, or even by our superiors. It is absolutely necessary, even in these cases, that our soul remain wholly free from all attachment to creatures and to sensible satisfactions. It will suffice to desire not to have this pleasure, and promptly to "mortify our senses, voiding them of such pleasure," depriving them of everything, "as though they were in darkness" (cf. ibid., 13,4).

In other words, we should not stop at the selfish enjoyment of what pleases our senses, but try to raise our heart at once to God by offering Him the enjoyment we feel and which He permits for the renewal of our strength, so that we may be able to take up again with greater generosity the practice of mortification.

In this way even natural joys will help to bring us to God and to increase our love. This is what St Therese of the Child Jesus called "to rejoice for Love." This is the pure doctrine of St. Paul, who said, "Rejoice in the Lord always"; and again, "Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God" (Phil 4,4 - 1 Cor 10,31). If, on the contrary, we stop at the enjoyment of sensible things, we shall never be able to enter the night of the senses.

2. "The soul ordinarily enters this night of the senses in two ways: the one is active, the other passive. The active way consist in that which is the soul can do, and does of itself, in order to enter therein. The passive way is that wherein the soul does nothing, and God works in it, and it remains, as it were, patient" (J.C. AS I, 13,1). The active way include everything that we can do on our own initiative to rid ourselves of every affection for and attachment to creatures. For example, it is in our power to apply ourselves to the practice of poverty, corporeal mortification, penance, and chastity - all of which are virtues that detach the soul from the goods of earth and the satisfaction of the senses.

If we want to do all that we can to enter the night, we must practice these virtues generously, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, our divine model, who wished to give us an example in everything. But no matter how much we do, our own practices will never be sufficient to destroy completely all the roots of attachments. If we examine ourselves carefully, we shall see that, even in the practice of voluntary mortification, a little complacency may enter in because of what we have chosen, which is to our liking and according to our wishes. In order that our purification be complete, the work of God must intervene, that work which will bring us passively into the night of the senses. He does this by means of trials and contradictions both exterior and interior.

It is a time of submission rather than of action; we must accept with humility and docility all that God permits, without trying either to escape the trial or to lessen or change it. In the Ascent of Mount Carmel St. John of the Cross gives the picture of a soul which, "kindled in love with yearning, sings of the happy fortune which befell it to pass through the dark night. "In fact, to be brought into the passive night is one of the greatest graces the soul can receive, because then God Himself is preparing and disposing it for divine union. If we wish to obtain this grace, we must do everything we can to enter the active night, that is, we must practice renunciation and total detachment.

COLLOQUY

O Lord, deign to come to me with Your grace and inflame me with Your love, that I may be able to plunge enthusiastically into the dark night which is to prepare me for union with You. Night does not please my nature which loves the light, the sun, the full radiant daylight. But with your help, and for love of You, why should I not be willing to deprive my senses of all satisfactions and to annihilate them in the night, when all it amounts to is the giving up of a few worthless trifles in order to have the enjoyment of You, in whom are all light, all joy, all happiness? .......

"O Lord, keep far from the heart of Your servant the thought that any kind of joy will bring happiness! On the contrary, there is a joy which is not granted to the wicked, but to those who honour You unselfishly. You are their joy. All happiness consists in this: to rejoice in You, because of You and through You; there is no other. He who believes that any other happiness exists is pursuing a strange and false joy" (St Augustine)

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An Act of Charity for Souls

Eternal Heavenly Father,
Through the Immaculate Heart of Mary,
I offer Thee the most precious Body and Blood,
Soul and Divinity of Thine Only begotten Son, our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ,
With the merits and prayers of all Thy Saints,
And my whole self as victim-soul and holocaust,
In union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass,
Offered throughout the world,
For all the Holy Souls in Purgatory,
And for the souls of all poor sinners on earth,
Especially bishops, priests, and religious,
And those within my home and family,
According to Thy most holy Will,
In Jesus’ Name and in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
One God forever and ever.
Amen.

Mary, Mother of Jesus and my Mother, pray for us.
Holy Angels and Saints of the Living God, pray for us.

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Pamphlets Defending the Catholic Faith to Distribute

As we prepare to enter the holy season of Lent, we have to begin preparing ourselves.  What penance will you be doing?  Besides prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, there are a lot of options.  Click here for my prior Top 20 Pious Practices for Lent article.

In addition to what I shared in that article, consider distributing flyers promoting the Catholic Faith to those who need to hear these words - fallen away Catholics, protestants, those in doubt, etc. 

Below is a list of various pamphlets available from St. Paul's Street Evangelization.  It's a good place to start.  Make it an effort to distribute some of these this Lent and keep them in stock in your home and car to distribute to people, on bulletin boards, in protestant bibles, and anywhere else you can when the opportunity presents itself:

Permission Guidelines: “Individuals may print specific pages, such as tracts from this website for personal use. Permission needs to be obtained for large-scale distribution (more than 20 copies).” See the full text here. 

Click here to see their pamphlet inventory and order some today.

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• Tract 1 – Divinity of Christ
• Tract 2 – Contraception and Sterilization
• Tract 3 – Petrine Primacy and the Authority of Popes
• Tract 4 – How to Pray the Rosary
• Tract 5 – The Covenant of Marriage and Annulments
• Tract 6 – Suffering
• Tract 7 – True Worship
• Tract 8 – Sexual Purity
• Tract 9 – Short Answers to Common Objections
• Tract 10 – The Last Things
• Tract 11 – Becoming Catholic
• Tract 12 – Homosexuality
• Tract 13 – Mary
• Tract 14 – Salvation
• Tract 15 – Reasons to Return to the Catholic Church
• Tract 16 – Existence of God (available by pamphlet only)
• Tract 17 – The Trinity
• Tract 18 – Praying to the Saints
• Tract 19 – Abortion
• Tract 20 – Confession
• Tract 21 – About SPSE
• Tract 22 – Bible Alone?
• Tract 23 – Marian Doctrines
• Tract 24 – Scriptural Reference Guide
• Track 25 – Jesus: Pagan God?
• Tract 26 – Salvation by Faith…Alone?
• Tract 27 – The Good News
• Tract 28 – The Truth of the Bible
• Spanish Tracts

Our Lady of the Rosary Library (OLRL) also offers excellent pamphlets and prayer cards for distribution. They, unfortunately, do not have an online checkout option but you can order via a check in the mail and they will ship you the items for an extremely low price, making it very affordable to distribute these. They offer wonderful prayer cards to give to family members, friends, those who have suffered a loss, those in the hospital, and anyone else you meet in life.

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Nicola Boccasini: 9th Dominican Master

Continuing my articles on the Masters of the Dominican Order, we arrive at the 9th Dominican Master: Nicola Boccasini.  Nicola Boccasini, who would become Pope Benedict XI, governed the order after Stephen of Besançon.

For a quick recap on the previous Masters of the Order, please click here.

Blessed Pope Benedict XI was born Nicola Boccasini in 1240 in Treviso, Italy, in the Holy Roman Empire.  He would live 64 years until his death on July 7, 1304.  

At a young age, his father died and left his mother, Bernarda, a widow.  It was at that time a Dominican friar left a sum of money in his will to Bernarda and the children.  And part of the will stipulated that if Nicola were to enter the Dominican Order, he would receive half of the legacy.  Bernarda worked as a laundress for the Dominican Friars in Treviso so the family was well familiar with the Order.

Even at a young age, the future Pope Benedict XI was preparing for a life of a monk.  His teacher was his uncle who was a priest of St. Andrea. And in 1254, at the age of 14, Nicola entered the Order of Preachers.   For the next seven years, Nicola pursued his basic education in Venice. In 1262, Nicola was transferred to Milan where he spent the next six years of his life.  At that time, he became a professed member of the Dominican Order. He served as lector for fourteen years, from 1268 to 1282.

The next greatest change took place in 1286 when Fr. Nicola was elected the Provincial Prior of Lombary. Instead of being firmly attached to a single convent for years, he would instead become peripatetic, moving from one convent to another on visits of inspection, encouragement and correction. In Lombardy at the time there were some fifty-one convents. After his tiring three year term was completed in 1289, he was released from the office of Provincial of Lombardy.  However, he was elected Provincial Prior of Lombardy again at the Provincial Chapter held at Brescia in 1293.

In 1296, Nicola was elected as the Master of the Order of Preachers, a role he would serve in until 1303.  During this same time, on December 4, 1298, he was made a Cardinal by Pope Boniface VIII.  He also served as Papal Legate to France.

When Pope Boniface VIII was seized at Anagni in September, 1303, Nicola was one of only two cardinals to defend the Pope in the Episcopal Palace itself.  He would be imprisoned for three days before being liberated.

On October 22, 1303, Nicola was elected to succeed Boniface VIII as the Supreme Pontiff. He took the name Benedict XI and reigned not one year until his death on July 7, 1304. Historians speculate he may have been poisoned.  It was after his death that the Papacy moved to Avignon from Rome and thus began the long and trying time known as the Avignon Papacy.

Pope Benedict XI, the first Dominican Pope, was widely regarded for his holiness.  And in response to his life and the miracles attributed to pilgrims who journeyed to his tomb, Pope Clement XII beatified him on April 24, 1736, and assigned his feastday to July 7th.

Blessed Pope Benedict XI, 9th Dominican Master, pray for us!

Pater Noster.  Ave Maria.

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Pope St. Urban I

Pope St. Urban I. Photograph on Wikipedia by User: Pleple2000.  Taken July 12, 2006.

Next in the continuing series of posts on the History of the Sovereign Pontiffs, after the death of Pope St.  Callistus I on October 14, 222, St. Urban I was elected as the Supreme Pontiff.

Pope St. Urban I was a Roman who served as the Successor of St. Peter for nearly nine years.  According to legend, St. Urban baptized Valerian, the husband of St. Cecilia.  But little is known with certainty of his life.  He died in 230 and is buried in the Cemetary of Callixtus.

Concerning St. Urban, Butler's Lives of the Saints offers the following:

The notice in the Roman Martyrology reads : "At Rome on the Via Nomentana, the birthday of Blessed Urban, Pope and Martyr, by whose exhortation and teaching many persons, including Tiburtius and Valerian, received the faith of Christ, and underwent martyrdom therefor ; he himself also suffered much for God's Church in the persecution of Alexander Severus and at length was crowned with martyrdom, being beheaded." 

It is to be feared that even this short notice is mainly apocryphal. The reference to Tiburtius and Valerian is derived from the very unsatisfactory Acts of St Cecilia, from which also the account of Urban in the Liber Pontificalis has borrowed. It is quite certain in any case that Pope Urban was not buried on the Via Nomentana, but in the cemetery of St Callistus, on the Via Appia, where a portion of his sepulchral slab, bearing his name, has been found in modern times. 

Not far from the cemetery of Callistus on the same main road was the cemetery of Praetextatus, and there another Urban, a martyr, had been buried. Confusion arose between the two, and an old building close beside the Praetextatus catacomb was converted into a small church, afterwards known as St Urbano alia Caffarella. The confusion of the two Urbans and the muddle hence resulting in the notices of the Hieronymianum are points full of interest, but too complicated to be discussed here. 

Collect (from his feastday on May 25th):

O Eternal Shepherd, who appointed blessed Urban shepherd of the whole Church, let the prayers of this martyr and supreme pontiff move You to look with favor upon Your flock and keep it under Your continual protection. Through our Lord . . .

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Feast of The Prayer of Christ (Masses in Some Places)

Each year on the Tuesday after Septuagesima there was celebrated a "Mass in Some Places," according to the 1955 Missal. This special Mass is for The Prayer of Christ and has been around for several hundred years.  The Catholic Encyclopedia summarizes this special feastday that is worthy of our meditation:

This feast occurs on the Tuesday after Septuagesima (double major). Its object is to commemorate the prolonged prayer which Christ offered in Gethsemane in our behalf in preparation for His Sacred Passion. 

The Office insists on the great importance of prayer. The feast is placed at the beginning of Lent to remind us that the penitential season is above all a time of prayer. The Office probably was composed by Bishop Struzzieri of Todi, at the suggestion of St. Paul of the Cross (d. 1775), and, together with the other six offices by which the mysteries of Christ's Passion are celebrated (see Moveable Feasts in Some Places), was approved by Pius VI. 

The hymns were composed by Fatati (Schulte, "Hymnen des röm. Brev."). Outside the Congregation of St. Paul this feast was adopted later than any of the other feasts of the Passion. It is not found in the proprium of Salerno (1793) nor in that of Livorno (1809). Other dioceses took it up only after the city of Rome had adopted it (1831). It has not yet been inserted in the Baltimore Ordo.

Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ, who in the garden, with words and example, taught us to pray to overcome the dangers of temptations, grant us, that, always intent on prayer, we deserve to obtain copious fruit: You who are God and live and reign with God the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit for ever and ever. Amen.

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