Suggested Intentions for the June 17 prayer warriors are:
(Note: As practicing Catholics, we are filled with compassion and pray for those who struggle against violent temptation to homosexual sin. We pray for those who fall into homosexual sin out of human weakness, that God may assist them with His grace.)
1. That Americans who still defend a moral law be victorious in their efforts to protect marriage from the attacks of the homosexual revolution and its secularist allies.
2. That America resist the imposition on our country of “morals” opposed to those of Christ.
3. That our resistance be accompanied by sincere, ardent, and persevering trust, since, as the Savior admonished us, “without Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)
4. That since the legalization of homosexual “marriage” is a public sin that can draw God’s punishment upon our country, we sacrifice and do penance, for God does not despise “a contrite and humbled heart.” (Ps. 50:19)
5. That by taking energetic and faithful action in this struggle, we can heed the Blessed Mother’s maternal warning at Fatima, recognize and correct our failings, and rightly be one nation under God.
6. That Our Lady help us all to do our duty, in full and faithful compliance with the perennial and immutable teaching of Holy Mother Church on the intrinsic evilness of homosexual acts.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Prayer and Sacrifice Today - For Sanctity of Marriage
from American Needs Fatima
The Sacrament of Marriage
The following are quotes by Francis Xavier Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan on the Sacrament of Marriage:
The love of marriage has the power to stir the human heart to great courage, confidence, and generosity.from The Road of Hope: A Gospel From Prison., Pauline Books and Media
Love helps your spouse to grow and gives your spouse the means for growth. To force your spouse to change by making that change a prerequisite of your love completely removes the very means of bringing about change.
The unique way to secure a change in one's spouse is to accept him or her in love-just as when that love was new. Change is effected only when one knows and feels oneself to be loved.
If a person does not love the 'flesh of his flesh and bone of his bones' and cannot bring happiness to this fundamental unit of society-upon which every other society is based-then how can such a person think of reforming the world?
Are you surprised to hear of the 'vocation to be parents of a family'? People are mistaken when they restrict the idea of a vocation, that is, a calling to perfection, to the priest or religious alone. When, by means of the sacrament of Matrimony, two people solemnly sear to love one another in Christ for their entire lives, is this not a profession of faith a profession of vows?
It is truly regrettable that the civilized world's comprehension of the Catholic doctrine concerning marriage is limited to some of its prohibitions. From these the world does not gain the slightest inkling that Jesus came to redeem humanity through love, and that through the sacrament of Matrimony humanity is enriched in an extraordinary way. Therefore, study and present the beautiful and positive aspects of Catholic Marriage.
To love your spouse is to act according to the will of God. When you realize this, you will understand that you can fulfill your vocation in the most ordinary circumstances of your life by perceiving God's call even in the most trifling sanctify. This is a revelation that will revolutionize your whole life.
The love between husband and wife is an image of the love of Christ for the Church (cf. Eph 5:31-32). In this mystery you will discover dignity, strength, and unity. The love that exists between a husband and wife is an extension of God's love. How uplifting and supportive is this love of the partners!
God has given you a loving spouse and beautiful children to help each other to become holy. What have you done with this gift?
You must discover that you can and indeed have the responsibility to become holy in marriage and through marriage.
The unity between husband and wife has to be absolutely complete: unity of body, love, mind, and spirit, through the presence of Christ. To love ach other in God is very beautiful, and doing this for God's sake is even more beautiful; then, the whole family listens attentively to God and advances together toward greater intimacy with him.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Happy Father's Day!
Picture source here
to my dear father whom I speak call "Daddy",
my dear husband,
my dear brothers,
my dear father in law,
my dear brothers in law,
my dear uncles,
our dear priests all over the world,
and to all of my dear blog visitors who are fathers.
What is a father's great task?Source here
To bring himself and his family to God.
That task requires self-discipline, wisdom, patience,
strength and understanding.
Small minds and hearts of children are not easy to guide;
adolescent minds and hearts are bewildered and battered at times;
the minds and hearts of young adults are often lost
or too embarrassed to seek guidance.
For them a father is a steady example
of perseverance and good,
a beacon for wondering and wandering minds.
How could a father's task be done
unless he remembered his children were created
by a loving, wise and merciful God
who is with his children - and with him?
Friday, June 13, 2008
Mother's Day and Father's Day
Fine Art Friday - Pietro Perugino
Pietro Perugino (1446–1524) was the leading painter of the Umbrian school, who developed some of the qualities that found classic expression in the High Renaissance.Source Wikipedia
He was born Pietro Vannucci in Città della Pieve, Umbria, the son of Cristoforo Vannucci; his nickname characterizes him as from Perugia, the chief city of Umbria.
Pietro painted at Arezzo, thence moved to Florence. The date of this first Florentine sojourn is by no means settled; some make it as early as 1470, others push the date to 1479. According to Vasari, he apprenticed in the atelier of Andrea del Verrocchio alongside Leonardo da Vinci. He may have learned perspective from Piero della Francesca. In 1472 he must have completed his apprenticeship, for he was enrolled as a painter in the confraternity of St Luke.
Perugino was one of the earliest Italian practitioners of oil painting. Some of his early works were extensive frescoes for the convent of the Ingesati fathers, destroyed during the siege of Florence, 1537; he produced for them also many cartoons, which they executed with brilliant effect in stained glass. A good specimen of his early style in tempera is the tondo (circular picture) in the Musée du Louvre of the Virgin and Child Enthroned between Saints.
Feast Day of St. Anthony of Padua
My Grandma Juanita would have turned 95 today. Instead, she celebrates her birthday in Heaven.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Battling for America’s Soul - The Danger of Homosexual "Marriage"
H/T to my mom.
The Christian moral system is no minor part of Christianity, any more than the heart or lungs are minor parts of the human body. Overthrow the Christian moral system and you will have overthrown Christianity itself. Therefore, those who are pushing for the institution of same-sex marriage are ipso facto pushing for the elimination of the Christian religion... Prof. David R. CarlinHow Homosexual “Marriage” Threatens Our Nation and Faith—TFP Urges Lawful and Conscientious Resistance
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Can a Catholic Vote for Obama?
Picture source here. Be sure to visit their site to see other prolife T-shirts, etc.
I found the following article at the Roman Catholic Blog
Catholics for Obama?
May I remind you the 5 non-negotiable issues a Catholic must consider when voting:
FIVE NON-NEGOTIABLES
These five current issues concern actions that are intrinsically evil and must never be promoted by the law. Intrinsically evil actions are those that fundamentally conflict with the moral law and can never be deliberately performed under any circumstances. It is a serious sin to deliberately endorse or promote any of these actions, and no candidate who really wants to advance the common good will support any action contrary to the non-negotiable principles involved in these issues.
1. Abortion
The Church teaches that, regarding a law permitting abortions, it is "never licit to obey it, or to take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or to vote for it" (EV 73). Abortion is the intentional and direct killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it is a form of homicide.
The unborn child is always an innocent party, and no law may permit the taking of his life. Even when a child is conceived through rape or incest, the fault is not the child’s, who should not suffer death for others’ sins.
2. Euthanasia
Often disguised by the name "mercy killing," euthanasia is also a form of homicide. No person has a right to take his own life, and no one has the right to take the life of any innocent person.
In euthanasia, the ill or elderly are killed, by action or omission, out of a misplaced sense of compassion, but true compassion cannot include intentionally doing something intrinsically evil to another person (cf. EV 73).
3. Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Human embryos are human beings. "Respect for the dignity of the human being excludes all experimental manipulation or exploitation of the human embryo" (CRF 4b).
Recent scientific advances show that often medical treatments that researchers hope to develop from experimentation on embryonic stem cells can be developed by using adult stem cells instead. Adult stem cells can be obtained without doing harm to the adults from whom they come. Thus there is no valid medical argument in favor of using embryonic stem cells. And even if there were benefits to be had from such experiments, they would not justify destroying innocent embryonic humans.
4. Human Cloning
"Attempts . . . for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through ‘twin fission,’ cloning, or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union" (RHL I:6).
Human cloning also involves abortion because the "rejected" or "unsuccessful" embryonic clones are destroyed, yet each clone is a human being.
5. Homosexual "Marriage"
True marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Legal recognition of any other union as "marriage" undermines true marriage, and legal recognition of homosexual unions actually does homosexual persons a disfavor by encouraging them to persist in what is an objectively immoral arrangement.
"When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic lawmaker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral" (UHP 10).
Above is from Catholic Answers' A Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics
Sunday, June 08, 2008
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