Offering a Mass

 Most of the time when one goes to Mass, the announcement may say that the Mass is being offered for a certain intention.  What does that mean?

It means that someone has asked the priest to offer a Mass for "their deceased parent," for thanksgiving for a healing, for...whatever.

How does one get the priest to offer a Mass for your intention?  You go to the parish office and ask the person who answers the door.  In my parish, the secretary will invite you in and you fill out a form. You will be given a date and time of the Mass to be offered.  This information will be in the church bulletin the week of the said Mass and the intention will be specifically included in the Prayers of the Faithful on the chosen date.  You then make a special effort to go to that particular Mass.  

What if they don't do that?  I know that the monastery I go to doesn't do that.  In that case, ask them to direct you somewhere that will offer a Mass for your intention.

Does it cost a lot of money?  It doesn't cost anything.  BUT!  It is customary to give a free will offering, I'd say $ 5---$ 20.  

If you don't have anything, that's fine.

God bless you.

My Response to Steve

 Steve is a friend.  He's a valuable member of the Franklin Senior Scribblers.  He's valuable because of his technical expertise.  He records our sessions once a month on Franklin's radio station and podcast.

Steve, besides being a "man about town," is a poet extraordinaire.  He created his own poetry genre, sherku.  Sherku's inspiration is haiku, but he adds two more syllables to the traditional haiku. 

Steve has numerous blogs--he loves to write.  On his sherku blog he welcomes responses and comments.  Thus, I respond to his sherku:

rethinking right

The attachment to being
Right is as much a sin
As lusting for something

   ______________________________________ 

Rethinking rethinking

     Why would I argue
     if I thought I was wrong?
     Do you posit, not believing?

The Six Trials of Jesus

 Did you know that Jesus went through six trials?

1.  Annas, the high priest.

2.  Caiaphas. a higher priest.

3.  Sanhedrin, Jewish jury.

4.  Pilate, Roman authority.

5.  Herod, Jewish king.

6.  Pilate, Roman authority.

You Do What You Have To Do

 To Have and Have Not, is my latest Ernest Hemingway's book.  Again, the booze drinking makes me sick.  No matter how broke the characters are, they always find the means to drink!

In To Have and Have Not, Henry Morgan is a captain of a fishing charter.  He's married with three daughters and is always conscious of his responsibilities as a husband and father.  It keeps him searching for the means to support them, and this leads him to take on illegal jobs.

The setting is depression era, Florida.  To Have and Have Not started with a good charter, but the customer skips out without paying. Henry needs money. His next job is to smuggle people into Cuba.  Unfortunately, Henry kills the ringleader who was double-crossing the poor people needing help.

Henry sneaks illegal rum into prohibition Florida.  He almost gets caught and does get his arm shot.  He loses his boat, too; it was confiscated by federal agents.  Henry's arm had to get amputated.  

Lastly, Henry agrees to transport four Cuban revolutionaries to Cuba.  While waiting for these passengers, a bank is robbed.  This was all planned and Henry's boat is the get-away boat! 

Away they go and go.  Henry's friend and first mate, Albert is shot, by these revolutionaries.  It was really unnecessary and Henry is enraged.  He goes below deck and gets his gun and shoots all his passengers.  In the melee, Henry is shot in the stomach.

When the coast guard find them, they see everyone is dead and Henry is dying.  Henry's family is so bereft, that his wife can't get herself together to go to his funeral.  The novel ends with her resolved to carry on, just as Henry always did.

The Same But Different

 Yesterday morning, I fell.  I tripped over the electrical cord to the hair blower.  I fell flat on the floor.  Only my knees got hurt.  But my memmory was shook.  My father once fell in his bedroom, and I remember thinking very negative thoughts about him.

I was an older teenager.  My grandmother had died (my father's mother).  The previous day we had the Wake.  The morning of the funeral Mass and burial, my father's toe got caught up in the intricate bedspread fringe.

He fell.  The corner of the bedside table went into his sternum.  It cracked the sternum--very painful.  It hurt him to breathe.  Don't feel too sorry for him; he was drunk.

As I was getting up from the floor, I immediately thought of Dad.  No, I didn't feel too  sorry for him.  He hurt himself.  He missed his own mother's funeral and burial.  

Addictions are terrible.  Please pray for addicts to get the grace they need to overcome their addictions.  Plus, pray for their families who have to put up with them.  

Life's Blessings

 As a follower of Father Gordon MacRae's "Beyond These Stone Walls", I came across this book, Drinking From the Saucer, A Memoir, by Charlene C. Duline.  

Father Gordon happened to mention that Ms. Duline, besides being a supporter of his, she was a Foreign Service Officer.   This interested me because I wanted to be a Foreign Service Officer.  She became what I pictured myself doing.  I enjoyed her life.  What stopped me from continuing on with my dream was the requirement to speak three languages and that you needed a bachelor's degree in some sort of related international study.  I only had access to a teacher's college, so that shot down that dream, besides the language requirement. Duline's journey to the Foreign Service once again proved to me that if God wants you to take that track, you will. I believe you are what you were meant to be.  

Back to the book: Drinking from the Saucer means that her cup of life was so full that it over flowed and she had to drink from the saucer.  The reader sees Duline's early life.  She was lucky to get out but she moved away and joined the Peace Corps.  That gave her a taste of living in a foreign country and she loved it.  Also, when her tour was over, she lived in New York.  There she worked at the United Nations, which whetted her interest in working for the US government.

Her government jobs led to the foreign service.  The main part of the book tells Duline's experiences in Haiti, Liberia, Tanzania, Swaziland, Panama, and Washington DC.  She had to deal with race relations, different cultures, revolutions, and other tense situations. Everything I ever imagined.

I'm not too jealous.  My life was really different.  Although, I did work for the government in a Municipality.  I never left my home town.  However, I have three happy and productive children and a fifty-two year marriage, to show for it.  As I always claimed, God puts you where you are meant to be.  

Death is the Beginning

 Most people hope for life after death.  I would think that most people see that here and now, life isn't just and many live in terrible situations.  This can't be it.  There must be something else.

Hence, pyramids were built.  Treasures and useful objects were buried with people.  Many spiritual people have been in touch with the dead. Near death or after death experiences speak of another life.   I think all religions teach that people live on, after they die. Life goes on--better.  

Personally, I look at Jesus' resurrection, as proof.  He also promised His disciples life with Him in His father's house.  St. Paul is very clear that we will be with Jesus.  (1 Thes 4: 14-18)

Rendered Speechless

 

                    How can anyone answer heart beats?  Each beat speaks volumes.

The pregnant women are holding amplifiers on their babies to broadcast their babies' heartbeats.

Praying From the Heart

 Offhandedly, in talking about praying with the love of Jesus meaning more than glibly spouting off words, this quote was used:

Si cor non orat, in vanum lingua laborat.

"If the heart does not pray, then the tongue labors in vain."

St. Bernadine of Siena is reputed to have said this.  These words are over the entrance to one of the four Franciscan hermitages in the Rieti Valley in Italy.  St. Francis established four hermitages in this beautiful Italian village, in the shape of a cross.

The Lord says:

     "These people come near to me with their mouth
           and honor me with their lips,
           but their hearts are far from me.
      Their worship of me
           is made up only of rules taught by men..."
                                       Isaiah 29: 13

A Cup of Suffering

 All the Apostles were martyred, except John.  He died in exile on the island of Patmos.  This is history.  This fact, made me often wonder what Jesus meant when he said to John and his brother, James (sons of Zebedee), You will indeed drink from my cup...". Matt 20: 23.  Is living in exile a martyrdom?  Maybe.

However, today I was reading about churches in Rome and came across the mention of a small church near the Basilica of St. John of the Latin Gate.  This church commemorates St. John being boiled in oil!  How's that for drinking a cup of suffering? Matt 20:23 

From the Breviary of St Pius V: “In ferventis olei dolium missus beatus Joannes Apostolus, divina se protegente gratia, illaesus exivit, alleluia. - Cast into a pot of boiling oil, the blessed Apostle John, protected by divine grace, came out unharmed, alleluia.” From its first appearance in the late 8th-century, it is known as the feast of St John “before the Latin Gate”, even though the walls of which the Latin Gate are a part were built 200 years after St John’s time. 

Just the fact that this is not well known, has me wondering about its veracity.  The Eastern Catholic Churches seem to have a lot of traditions and legends which seem implausible to me.  However, that's me.

What about you?

Next door to the Basilica of St. John of the Latin Gate, is the small oratory known as “Saint John in oleo”, said to be on the very spot where the pot of oil was set up; it is attributed to Donatello Bramante, the original architect in charge of rebuilding St Peter’s Basilica in the early 16th-century.

All You Wanted To Know

 The authors are what first attracted me to the book, The Devil..."alive and active in our world."  Corrado Balducci wrote the book and Jordan Aumann, O.P. translated.

Carrado Balducci is a well know theologian, whom I pay attention to, especially on UFOs.  Jordan Aumann is no slouch as a theologian, either, but the fact that he's a Dominican, made me choose this book to read.

Balducci tells us that God created the universe and that includes UFO's and angels.  This book has nothing to do with UFOs, but I like to point out how diverse and open Balducci is.  Although, when it comes to devils, it doesn't take much convincing. Satan's always prowling around like a roaring lion...

The Devil..."alive and active in our world," explains how we are all vulnerable to temptations.  But thanks to God, we have the grace and means to resist the fallen angels. The devil doesn't win, unless we let him. That's the beginning.

Part One of the book, explains the Fall, the nature of devils, and evil.  Part Two proves the existence of devils through Sacred Scripture and the Magisterium of the Church. The rest of The Devil..."alive and active in our world," explains the work of the exorcist--diagnosis, procedures, and suggestions.  You could say this book has all you wanted to know about the devil.  I found it interesting and useful.

George and Michael

 The prayer to St. Michael has always been a favorite of mine.  I first heard it as a child in the 1950's.  We prayed it at the end of every Mass.  Then with the liturgical changes brought by the Vatican II Council, it didn't fit in the liturgy.  

I still pray it now and then.  And sometimes, since my friend, Jordi, introduced to St. George, I also invoke the intercession of St. George.

St. Michael the Archangel, 
defend us in battle. 
Be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil. 
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray, 
and do thou, 
O Prince of the heavenly hosts, 
by the power of God, 
thrust into hell Satan, 
and all the evil spirits, 
who prowl about the world 
seeking the ruin of souls. Amen. .

The prayer to St. Michael was inspired by a dream Pope Leo XIII had.  The dream was so horrific that when the pope awoke, he composed this prayer and asked that everyone pray it.

The prayer was more or less forgotten until the reign of Pope John Paul II.  He tried to promote interest in the prayer, again.  He once went on a pilgrimage to Monte Sant'Angelo in Foggia, Italy, where he said, "I have come to venerate and invoke St. Michael the Archangel, that he may protect and defend the Holy Church at a time when it is difficult to give authentic Christian witness without  compromise and accommodation."

I hope and pray that the entire Church will once again regularly recite the prayer to St. Michael.  

Plus, it wouldn't hurt to ask the intercession of St. George, the martyr and soldier of God.  St. George is the patron saint of over 100 countries.  If he can protect countries, surely he can protect people.  He is depicted riding a horse spearing a dragon with a lance.  St. Michael doesn't ride a horse.  He spears Satan with a lance, too.

O St. George,
faithful servant of God and invincible martyr;
favored by God with the gift of faith,
and inflamed with an ardent love of Christ,
You fought valiantly against the dragon
of pride, falsehood, and deceit.
Neither pain nor torture, sword nor death
could part you from the love of Christ.
I fervently implore you
for the sake of this love
to help me by your intercession
to overcome the temptations that surround me,
and to bear bravely the trials that oppress me,
so that I may patiently carry the cross
which is placed upon me;
and let neither distress nor difficulties
separate me from the love of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Valiant champion of the Faith,
assist me in the combat against evil,
that I may win the crown promised to those
who persevere to the end.

Some enterprising business person, please make a holy card that depicts both saints together.

Overwhelming Love

 Once again, I tried reading Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross.  Someone said if I read the first nine chapters, my life would be changed.  So, I tried, again.

The edition I read was published in 2002 by Riverhead Books, New translation by Mirabai Starr.  My first problem was that I didn't know if the introduction, the forward, the Preface, the Prologue, and/or John's introduction, were included in the nine chapters.  

I start with the forward and read for half an hour.

Nothing.  No change in my life.

The next day, I skipped everything and began reading at chapter one, page 35.  The chapters are my style--a page or a page and a half.  I read for half an hour.

Nothing.  What am I missing?  St. John of the Cross waxes poetically about what union with God is like.  Doesn't everyone know this and want this? 

He doesn't tell us how.  Where do we get the ticket to ride?

I guess, keep praying for an intimate relationship to the Lord.  Pray, read scripture, read spiritual books, listen to homilies, and podcasts, and other religious themes, and hopefully one day, you will feel God's love overwhelm you.

It is quicker to go to a charismatic revival and get slain in the spirit.  Sorry, St. John of the Cross.

Influencers

Art lives in the world.  Most of the time, society influences art.  Once in a while, someone has eyes that see, and ears to hear, and creates something that will influence society.     

The Code of Hammurabi is the first artwork that I can remember.  This was the first complete legal code written on a sculpture.  Hammurabi lived 1792-1750 BC. 

                                                                                 I also think of Guernica by Pablo Picasso.  This was an anti-war protest painting that vividly depicted the horror of war during the Franco and Nazi era.

There is also the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe.  Many believe that this story laid the groundwork for the American Civil War.

Recently, I was reading about the Albigensian and Cathar heresies.  They believed that mankind was basically bad.  Dominicans preached against this heresy.  All that God created is good.  Dominicans preached with words.  St. Francis wrote a poem and sang.  His way of preaching influenced more people.  Maybe, it was both ways.  Some people are influenced by speeches, sermons, and arguments.  Others by art.

Canticle of Brother Sun and Sister Moon of St. Francis of Assisi

 Most High, all-powerful, all-good Lord, All praise is Yours, all glory, all honor and all blessings. 

To you alone, Most High, do they belong, and no mortal lips are worthy to pronounce Your Name.

Praised be You my Lord with all Your creatures,
especially Sir Brother Sun,
Who is the day through whom You give us light.
And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendor,
Of You Most High, he bears the likeness.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Moon and the stars,
In the heavens you have made them bright, precious and fair.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brothers Wind and Air,
And fair and stormy, all weather's moods,
by which You cherish all that You have made.

Praised be You my Lord through Sister Water,
So useful, humble, precious and pure.

Praised be You my Lord through Brother Fire,
through whom You light the night, and he is beautiful and playful and robust and strong.

Praised be You my Lord through our Sister,
Mother Earth
who sustains and governs us,
producing varied fruits with colored flowers and herbs.
Praise be You my Lord through those who grant pardon for love of You and bear sickness and trial.

Blessed are those who endure in peace, By You Most High, they will be crowned.

Praised be You, my Lord through Sister Death,
from whom no-one living can escape. Woe to those who die in mortal sin! Blessed are they She finds doing Your Will.

No second death can do them harm. Praise and bless my Lord and give Him thanks,
And serve Him with great humility.

The Absolute Futility of War

 Whoever said "youth is wasted on the young," knew what they were talking about.  I just finished reading A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway.  As a youth, I wasn't impressed.  Now, older and hopefully wiser, I enjoyed the novel.

What was I thinking?

A Farewell to Arms has romance, action, beauty, travel, and many of the travails of life.  I understand the novel to be semi-autobiographical.  Isn't all writing? The narrator, Frederick Henry, is an American ambulance driver in the Italian army during World War I.  He is wounded and sent to a hospital where he falls in love with an English nurse.  They are very much in love.

The scenery is beautiful.  The war is ugly.  Hemingway depicts the reality of fighting in explicit language.  That's what he is good at.  The sex is not explicit.  He will just make it inherently obvious--they spent the night in bed.  Eventually, the nurse gets pregnant. 

Hemingway reveals how war time erodes morality.  The nurse and Frederick talk of marriage but it's not important.  Having a baby and not married should have been an important consideration, during those times, but they don't marry.  A group of Italian soldiers disobey Frederick's commands.  He shoots and kills the sergeant.  The rest of the soldiers run away.  Frederick, himself eventually runs away.  He deserts.

He and the nurse escape to Switzerland.  Here the novel ends.  I won't spoil the end for you, but this is a war story and war inflicts horrific endings for all involved.  

Interesting, Italy banned the book because it showed Italians retreating.  Ireland banned the book because of the sex.  The Nazis banned the book because they weren't portrayed as heroic Aryans.  These are reasons alone for reading A Farewell to Arms.  

Let All Nations Praise

 

      LECTIO:                                                                                    Ps 67:2-3, 5, 6, 8

R. (4) O God, let all the nations praise you!
May God have pity on us and bless us;
may he let his face shine upon us.
So may your way be known upon earth;
among all nations, your salvation.
R. O God, let all the nations praise you!
May the nations be glad and exult
because you rule the peoples in equity;
the nations on the earth you guide.
R. O God, let all the nations praise you!
May the peoples praise you, O God;
may all the peoples praise you! 
May God bless us,
and may all the ends of the earth fear him!
R. O God, let all the nations praise you! 

STUDIUM: LECTIO:

A Middle Eastern king revealed by his facial expression whether he liked what he saw and heard.  A shining face shows favor.  An angry face shows displeasure.  A puzzled face shows confusion.  Here the psalmist is praising the Lord's shining face. 

MEDITATIO: 

Since God sees all, I can just imagine He changes facial expressions fast.  Oh wait!  God is God.  He sees all and so understands the reasons for our actions, stupid as they may be. I hope I please God more than not.  I hope I see Him turning His shining face on me.  

ORATIO: 

Lord, I love You.  You are my everything.  I praise You and worship You forever.

CONTEMPLATIO: 

I lift up my voice to worship You.

RESOLUTIO:

 I must tell Jesus that I love Him, more often.

He Talks Like a Persian Rug

 This book is perfect for an intergenerational book club.  It is written for middle school and up.  Khosrou is Daniel's real name but no one in America can pronounce it, so his mother renamed Khosrou, Daniel, after the kid in the Bible story, who was thrown in the lion's pit.  Daniel's mother is a Christian, which is very important to the story, although the story isn't religious.  It's pretty secular.  This is one of the reasons why I enjoyed the book, Everything Sad is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri. 

Although Daniel comes from Iran, the story starts in a middle school classroom in Oklahoma.  The students have a writing project and this book turns out to be the stories Daniel tells his classmates.  Think (Scheherazade's 1001 Nights)  

Daniel's parents were both doctors in Iran.  So the family was pretty well-off. Everything changed when Daniel's mother became Christian.  This was/is bad, in Iran.  She sacrificed her safe and respected career for Christianity.  She was going to be killed, so she ran.  She escaped, taking her two children with her.  No matter where she went, she still had the fatwa sentence of death above her.  That's why they chose to live in Oklahoma--no Muslims.  

Obviously, Daniel is Christian, otherwise, he would be blaming his mother for all the bad and sad things that had happened to them.  Instead, his mother is the hero.  She survives a fatwa, deprivation, humiliation, poverty, violence, and abuse.  She still carries her dignity as a child of God and clings to hope that heaven awaits her.  What a witness!

She lost her husband, too.  He didn't come with the family, in fact, he remarried.  Consequently, so did Daniel's mother.  This stepfather was abusive, but she does stand up to him, as do the children. 

I chose the title, "He Talks Like a Persian Rug," because Daniel often refers to the beautiful Persian rugs they left behind.  They were handmade, and when they were perfectly finished, one mistake would be made, because only God is perfect.  (See, Kafka.)  Daniel wove his story as a rug maker weaves a rug.  And what a beautiful story he wove.

Mercy is an Irrevocable Gift

 

LECTIO:

Rom 11:13-15, 29-32

Brothers and sisters:
I am speaking to you Gentiles.
Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles,
I glory in my ministry in order to make my race jealous
and thus save some of them.
For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world,
what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?

For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable.
Just as you once disobeyed God
but have now received mercy because of their disobedience,
so they have now disobeyed in order that,
by virtue of the mercy shown to you,
they too may now receive mercy.
For God delivered all to disobedience,
that he might have mercy upon all.

STUDIUM:

Interesting that sin and disobedience is the means by which God is able to show us His mercy.  Here, St. Paul is talking to the Gentile Christians in Rome.  He hopes he can bring some Jews to Jesus when they see how the Gentiles have adopted the Jew, Jesus Christ.  

     Also, Paul talks of God's irrevocable gifts to His people.  Mercy is one of them because the Gentiles didn't even know to ask for mercy.  But Paul says God will have mercy on the Jews too, as well as all people.

MEDITATIO:

Oh boy do I need mercy.  How many times have I never given God a thought and just went along my merry way having fun and doing whatever whim entered my silly head.  I never gave a thought to what was right, or what I was doing to others. My smart alec comments turn some people off, yet I snap hurtful retorts regardless.  I just think of myself.

ORATIO:

Lord put Your hand over my mouth.  Slap me still, so I will think of others before my foolish inclinations.  I really want to please You, not me.  Help me, Lord.

CONTEMPLATIO:

Be with me Lord.

RESOLUTIO:

I need to spend some regular, dedicated time with Jesus.