22 Thursday Feb 2018
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Have you ever thought of your marriage as a foretaste of heaven? When marriage is lived as God intended – with permanence, partnership, fidelity, and fruitfulness – your marriage is the image of the love that unites the three persons in the Holy Trinity.
Pope Benedict XVI offered high praise for the family in one of his audiences. Here is what he had to say about the gift of marriage and family:
11 Sunday Feb 2018
In honor of the 50th anniversary of Blessed Pope Paul VI’s visionary letter Humanae Vitae, Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila of Denver has issued a pastoral letter The Splendor of Love. Archbishop Aquila states that Blessed Paul VI “prophetically defended the integrity of married love and warned us against the danger of reducing sexuality to a source of pleasure alone” (SL, 1).
Archbishop Aquila states that his purpose in writing the pastoral letter is “to affirm the great beauty of the Church’s consistent teaching through the centuries on married love, a love that is so desperately needed today” (SL, 5). He goes on to say:
The family is the foundation of society, and when it is undermined, society itself is threatened with collapse. Therefore, it is crucial to reaffirm our commitment to the truth, goodness, and beauty of Christ’s teaching on marriage and sexuality. SL, 6
31 Sunday Dec 2017
The Two Trinities, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, c. 1675-82
Today the Church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Family. Through the Incarnation, the Divine Word assumed a human body, entering into every aspect of human life, including family life, sanctifying it and making it a path to holiness.
Teacher and author Scott Hahn says,
The family is the key to Christmas. The family is the key to Christianity…When God came to save us, he made salvation inseparable from family life, manifest in family life. Since the family is the ordinary setting of human life, he came to share it, redeem it and perfect it. He made it an image and sacrament of a divine mystery. Salvation itself finds meaning only in familial relations.[1]
17 Friday Nov 2017
Venerable Solanus Casey, an American-born Capuchin priest who died in 1957, will be beatified November 18, 2017 in Detroit, Michigan. The Mass is expected to draw upwards of 70,000 people. Fr. Solanus Casey was known for his great faith, attention to the sick, and ability as a spiritual counselor.
This week we have the privilege of sharing with you a reflection by Cristin Woodsum on motherhood in light of the beatification of Fr. Solanus. Cristin and her husband Jon have nine children (two in heaven). They attend Our Lady of Good Council parish in Plymouth, Michigan where they are a fixture in the front pew. Cristin and Jon’s marriage makes present Christ’s love for His bride, the Church, giving witness to His self-sacrificial love.
02 Thursday Nov 2017
The Makonde people of Tanzania in Africa are known for intricate wood carvings. One style of carving is called the Ujamaa, which means community and family. Also known as “Tree of Life” carvings, they are fashioned from a single piece of African Blackwood (mpingo), and can be as high as six feet tall. They depict past and present generations of a family, supporting each other around a central family ancestor. The sculpture poignantly illustrates that each person’s life is built upon the lives of those who have gone before them.
So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. Ephesians 2:19-22
The image of the Ujamaa is helpful in thinking about the souls of the faithfully departed that have gone before us. Our Christian faith has been built on generations of faithful disciples who have kept the flames of the faith burning for more than two millennia. We are truly “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets… [with] Christ himself being the cornerstone” (Eph 2:20). Our ancestors are part of this foundation along with countless saints and unrecognized champions of the faith. This “great cloud of witnesses” (Heb 12:1) is praying for us, urging us to “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil 3:14).
13 Friday Oct 2017
Today marks the 100th anniversary of last of six apparitions of Our Blessed Mother to three shepherd children – Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta – at Fátima, Portugal. She first appeared to the children on May 13, 1917. In her subsequent appearances, the Virgin Mary requested conversion, prayer (particularly the recitation of the Rosary), and sacrifices on behalf of sinners. She also revealed a three-part secret regarding the fate of the world.
The Children of Fátima: Lúcia dos Santos, Francisco Marto, Jacinta Marto
As word of the apparitions spread, Mary promised a sign from heaven. On October 13, 1917, the “Miracle of the Sun” occurred. The crowd of some 70,000 witnesses reported that the sun began to spin, twirling in the sky, and at one point appeared to veer toward earth before jumping back to its place in the sky.
07 Saturday Oct 2017
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Blessed Virgin Mary, Catholic, Christ, family, holiness, John Paul II, peace, prayer, rosary, unity
Today is the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary in the Roman rite of the Catholic Church. Since the sixteenth century when St. Dominic was inspired to develop the devotion, the Rosary has been used to combat both physical and spiritual enemies.
This feast was instituted by Pope St. Pius V to honor Mary for the Christian victory over the Turks at Lepanto on October 7, 1571. He attributed the victory to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who was invoked through praying the Rosary throughout Europe for protection from the Turkish invasion.
15 Friday Sep 2017
Seven Swords Piercing the Sorrowful Heart of Mary
Iglesia de la Vera Cruz
Church of the Holy Cross – Salamanca, Spain
Today the Church celebrates the Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. From the cross, Jesus pronounces “Behold, your mother!” (Jn 19:27). As Jesus was dying, He entrusted us, the Church to the care of His mother. While He was on earth, Mary comforted and strengthened Jesus, especially at the foot of the cross. Jesus knew that we would need the maternal closeness of the Sorrowful Mother to sustain us during the trials in our lives. As a mother, Mary especially desires to comfort us during difficulties in our families. She comforts us in our suffering and shows us how to offer our suffering back to God.
08 Friday Sep 2017
Christ Rescuing Peter from Drowning, Lorenzo Veneziano, 1370
Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.
Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear.
But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”
“Come,” he said.
Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”
Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?” Matthew 14:22-31
01 Friday Sep 2017
Tags
Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron, charity, Evangelization, family, forgiveness, grace, love, mercy, prayer, reconciliation, scripture, Unleash the Gospel
Tawas Point Lighthouse, Michigan, USA
Photo Credit: Dennis Wingfield
Families that live their lives according to Joshua’s proclamation are beacons of light in their neighborhoods. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says “the family home is rightly called ‘the domestic church,’ a community of grace and prayer, a school of human virtues and of Christian charity” (CCC, 1666). If your family is a school of virtue and Christian charity, people will take notice. They will see that your family is different. They will be attracted to what you have.
St. John Paul II is his Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio (On the Role of the Christian Family in the Modern World) had this to say about families:
