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“This blog is like a fusion of the Baroque ‘salon’ with its well-tuned harpsichord around which polite society gathered for entertainment and edification and, on the other hand, a Wild West “saloon” with its out-of-tune piano and swinging doors, where everyone has a gun and something to say. Nevertheless, we try to point our discussions back to what it is to be Catholic in this increasingly difficult age, to love God, and how to get to heaven.” – Fr. Z
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Father W—- : “Christ came to earth precisely for this: so that we wouldn’t have to waste time.”
7:30 AM Sunday Mass (NO)—A very powerful sermon by our pastor: God offers His Mercy to us but we must act to accept it. Without repentance there can be no mercy. God gives us His Grace and the Sacraments but we must utilize them. Hell is real; yes, you can go to hell; yes, your sins can bring you to hell. God offers us the remedy of the grace of repentance and the absolution of the sacrament of Penance; take advantage of them. You don’t know the day or hour of your death; don’t be complacent;
go to confession and live in God’s grace.
(He must be reading Fr Z’s Blog!)
For the Gospel of the 17th Sunday after Pentecost: how do you know if love God with your whole heart, mind and soul? You look forward to praying, you keep His commandments and you do charity.
The Administrator spoke on the Mystical Body of Christ, but took care to show how this differs from the physical limbs of a human, biological body. Parts will separate, a pastor might make a point poorly, but it does not result in the Mystical Body failing.
Father spoke of the prodigal son’s ‘imperfect contrition’, and compared it to how we often repent of our sins because of the consequences to us if we die rather than because we have offended God. He spoke of the forgiveness that God offers us but how we must first repent and then seek forgiveness in Confession. He stressed that we are not to receive Communion when in a state of mortal sin so that it is important to go to Confession often so that we may keep receiving Communion.
About the first reading and appropriate for 9/11, it went something like this….
The Israelites and Moses all knew that they got out of Egypt with God’s help. So, when the Israelites down off the mountain were talking about the golden calf and saying “this your God who brought you out of the Egypt”, they must have been worshiping the true God – they just did not have a full understanding of Him – right? Up on the mountain, Moses and God did not believe that line, and neither should you. Just because somebody “says” they worship the God of Abraham, doesn’t mean they actually do. They might actually be on the other team.
All said without actually mentioning who might be making that claim.
No man, whether priest, bishop, cardinal, or pope; can give a penitent permission to sin. To do so makes himself an enemy of Christ.
I went to the Anglican-Use Ordinariate today, 16th Sunday After Trinity.
You can’t be Catholic and not go to confession.
The best answer to evil in the world is a Christian life well lived. Christ’s Church will prevail in the end. In the meanwhile we must persevere. Remember we have recourse to the Mass and the Sacraments.
While the son is still far off, the Father runs to meet him. This is shocking as no paterfamilias would behave in such an undignified manner, especially towards the son who had wished him dead. Remember, the son hasn’t even apologised yet, he has simply turned towards…
Even more unthinkably, God runs to meet us in the Incarnation. God runs to meet us here, on the altar.
Simple message: confess, repent, follow Christ. . .
http://hancaquam.blogspot.com/2016/09/confess-repent-follow-christ.html
Fr. Philip Neri, OP
If you have non-Catholic friends who ask you why you go to a priest for confession to have your sins forgiven, look no further. The answer is in this parable.
And then he went on to relate the father running to meet his son and blessing him…that’s when your priest greets you with a blessing in the confessional and then when the father called for sandals to be put on his feet, only free men wore shoes….and the ring and the robe had significance as well. The ring was what showed that he belonged to this family.
There was so much more, all good stuff, but my memory is poor…
He asked, can you go straight to God to confess your sins? Sure you can. He’ll hear it. But it’d be presumptuous for you to then turn around and call for the celebration and the fatted calf to be slaughtered for the feast, don’t you think?
You can do your part to confess, but you have to allow the Father to do his part to forgive you, which is done through the priest.
It was a really beautiful homily and interesting.
We are blessed to have such wonderful priests!
In the 3 stories told in the Gospel – the woman finding a small coin probably worth about a nickel and celebrating, the shepherd abandoning his flock of 99 to go after one stray sheep, and the father running to his son in an undignified manner (as Precentrix described) all have one thing in common. The actions seem crazy – the woman probably spent more celebrating than her coin was worth. But these stories describe how God loves us, in fact he is madly in love with us, and acts the way someone in love does.
17th Sunday After Pentecost:
Gospel is Jesus answering the question posed by doctor of the law, which is the great commandment of the Law?
Love the Lord your God with your whole heart, your whole soul and your whole mind. Love your neighbor as your self.
“But Father, I don’t really love myself, so how can I love my neighbor?” Even if you don’t feel it, involves an intellectual acceptance of how much God loves you, in faith.
Father spoke of plethora of songs and movies with distortions of love— ( Body and Soul, Somewhere in Time) The idea being that you love someone else promising them “body and soul”, no mention of God’s supernatural love in the equation.
In true marriage, it’s a triangle (God at the top) with both spouses loving God first, and then you love your spouse with the love which God loves both of you. Even if unhappy marriage, or separated, you still pray for the good of the other’s soul. Have Masses said for them, pray for their salvation. Your main job is to help your spouse get to heaven, and vice versa. Not easy, but you trust in God’s supernatural love for you to fulfill this.
Here, it was the 24th Sunday in O.T., and the readings were about mercy. I developed three points: 1. Gods mercy is shockingly generous. 2. His mercy requires a response. 3. That response (I.e., conversion) is both hard and easy: go to confession.
Eucharistic Congress in my Diocese. The Bishop’s homily was poignant. He mentioned the reason the Congress was started was because over half of Catholics in a survey in the early 90’s did not believe that the Eucharist, the source and summit of Christianity, was the real body, blood, soul, and divinity of Our Lord. Audible gasps could be heard across the Convention Center floor. It was a sobering reminder that we have a long way to go, and it stressed the importance of perseverance in this day and age.
Fr. Greg Markey gave the Silver Spring Maryland Latin Mass community a well needed history lesson. Why the Muslims under Osama Bin Laden attacked the US on 9 -11- 2001. How the King of Poland Jan Sobieski arrived at besieged city of Vienna with his army on the octave of the Nativity of Mary in 1683. How Jan Sobieski called upon our Lady to guide and protect his the vastly out numbered forces. How Sobieski and his fellow Poles rallied the forces of the Holy Roman Empire and crushed the Muslim infidels at the Battle of Vienna on 9-11 and 9-12 . Why Pope Innocent XI established the feast of Most Holy Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary on 9/12/1684 in gratitude for this great victory, which halted the advance of the Turks in to Europe. Why America needs to follow Jan Sobieski’s example and pray for the intersession of the Blessed Mother if we want to defeat the Muslim infidels of today. A very timely and inspiring sermon for Sunday 9/11/2016.
Oh, my! Our priest apparently talked with FrankWalshingham’s Fr. Markey — we got much the same sermon — a kind of “history of 9-11”. Fr. Gary also included the battle of Lepanto. It was fascinating, especially to be reminded of the role the Blessed Virgin Mary played in some critical battles against the foe. . .
We must not be attached to spiritual goods because Sanctity involves being detached from everything.
While visiting my parents this weekend, we attended their rural NO diocesan parish for Mass where they recently received a new priest. I’ve prayed that they would receive a solid priest when time came for a new assignment, and boy were my prayers answered!
The priest spoke about true mercy, using the Gospel of the Prodigal Son as the backdrop. He made several points from the parable.
– The father, just like God the Father, is always waiting for us to return to Him with merciful, open arms.
– The son couldn’t truly receive his father’s mercy until he himself had recognized his sins and repented of them, just as we can’t receive the Lord’s mercy until we repent of ours, and we do this through the Sacrament of Confession.
He then went on to point out the false teachings of mercy which are so prevalent today (the idea that God will accept us as we are, no questions asked and nothing demanded of us) and talked about Luther’s false version of God’s mercy.
As a side note, this new priest made several improvements to the Liturgy over the past priest.
– The plain bed-sheet chasuble was replaced with a beautifully ornate Gothic chasuble.
– The deacon was now wearing an equally beautiful Dalmatic, whereas in the past he simply vested with his stole over top of a alb.
– The altar, while still Versus Populum had a semi-Benedictine altar arrangement (a standing cross, but no candle present).
I couldn’t be happier with the fact that my parents received this priest. This rural community badly needed a priest with a spine.