BIG C CATHOLICS

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) The gospel account we’ve just heard is part of St. Mark’s introduction of Jesus. It has to do with Jesus’ identity, as have the gospel accounts over the past few Sundays. From the Sunday we celebrated the Baptism of the Lord through the Sunday before Ash Wednesday St. Mark is presenting us with the question: “Who is this Jesus?” Mark’s answer? “The One who has come to bring outcasts back in.” He has come for the outcasts, the outsiders, the lepers, the sinners, and those we disdain. The great irony is that Jesus, the One who came for outcasts, Himself had to get out of town. Note that in several of these gospel accounts we’ve heard, St. Mark reports: “Jesus could no longer go openly into any town, but had to stay outside in places where nobody lived.” That’s true even today in our surrounding culture. It is not politically correct, we are told, to talk about Jesus in public. He has to be kept from wher

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America (Job 7:1-7; 1 Corinthians 9:16-23; Mark 1:29-39) “Woe to me,” writes St. Paul, “if I do not preach the Gospel.” He is not complaining, just stating the fact that this responsibility, laid on him without his being consulted, had become the all-consuming purpose of his existence. Jesus says something similar: “For this purpose I have come,” namely his preaching. Job takes us to the other extreme. His life has become a drudgery, and he finds no purpose in it. He expects that he will never know happiness again. The tears of Mary at La Salette, such a beautiful and powerful image, are troubling in a way. They can make us repent our sins; that is good. But some wonder how Mary, in heaven, can experience unhappiness. And yet she talks about the trouble her people’s infidelity have caused her personally: “How long a time I have suffered for you! … You pay no heed… You will never be able to recompense the pains

Solemnity - December 8th Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, "full of grace" through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception solemnly affirms, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854: "The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin." ( Catechism of the Catholic Church , no. 492) The Prince of Peace and the Lord of Lords chose Mary for the singular grace and honor of being His beloved mother. By the power of His Cross, He preserved her from all sin. Therefore, by His holy Benevolence and Love, we possess hope and bold confidence in God’s loving Will for our lives and the salvation of all humanity. Significantly in the first reading, the liturgy recalls the figure of Eve

Memorial - November 17th  There are people who make a lasting impact on the world even though their earthly lives are very short. Saint Elizabeth of Hungary or Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia was just such a person. Both a king’s daughter and a king’s wife, her love and care for the poor led her to be beloved by the common people during her life, and resulted in her canonization a mere four years after her death. Elizabeth, daughter of the king of Hungary, was born in 1207. In 1221, at the age of 14, she married Louis IV of Thuringia (Germany), He ascended the Thuringian throne at the age of 16. Over the next six years Elizabeth would bear him three children. The couple were deeply in love and very devoted to each other. Louis fully supported his young wife in her spiritual life and in her prodigious efforts aiding the destitute. This included selling state treasures to assist the needy. Tragically, in 1227, Louis died on the Sixth Crusade after promising Emperor Frederick II he wo

Memorial - September 23rd Saint Pio of Pietrelcina, (1887-1968) better known as Padre Pio, was the 20th century Capuchin priest, stigmatic and mystic, who during his lifetime, was a spiritual father to innumerable souls. He is the only priest in the history of the Church to receive the stigmata — the divine marks of predilection — from our Lord’s Passion and Death. Thus, for much of his priesthood, Padre Pio suffered the spiritual, emotional and physical anguish of Christ’s holy wounds. In addition, he was given the miraculous gifts of bilocation, transverberation, (a divine piercing of the heart indicating union with God) the odor of sanctity, the ability to read souls, the ability to see and communicate with spiritual beings, (i.e. guardian angels, demons, the departed) and the capacity to write and comprehend languages foreign to him. Moreover, his brother Capuchins testified under oath that he levitated, healed by touch, and experienced divine ecstasies while praying, as w

Memorial - September 9th There are not many who would willingly make themselves slaves, but Saint Peter Claver, the 17th century Jesuit priest and missionary did. What is particularly noteworthy about this young Spaniard’s servitude in the New World is that he took it upon himself willingly, declaring himself , "the slave of the slave." Popular piety holds, in addition to his prodigious efforts, he worked tremendous miracles like raising people from the dead and prophesying the future deaths of others. Peter Claver was born in Verdu, Spain, in 1581. Although the family line was one of the oldest and most distinguished in that country, by the time Claver was born, his own family consisted of impoverished farmers. Nevertheless, he entered the Jesuit college of Barcelona and soon entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1602. It was while studying philosophy that he was inspired by the college’s doorkeeper, the future saint Alphonsus Rodriguez to become a missionary in the New W

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S.  La Salette Missionaries of North America  Hartford, Connecticut  ( Click here for today’s readings ) Isaiah was surely an honest prophet, but he doesn’t seem to have grasped the economic principle of an honest profit. “You who have no money,” he says, “come, receive grain and eat; come, without paying and without cost, drink wine and milk!” Imagine if you owned a restaurant in town, and someone set up a local charity serving the same menu, or maybe even better, and offering it free of charge to one and all. At the very least, you would object that the charity was making a mess of the local economy. Jesus wasn’t helping the local economy either. Surely local farmers and vendors were counting on a banner day when they saw the huge crowds gathered in the area. Earlier in Matthew’s Gospel there is an account of Jesus’ casting out demons from two possessed persons into a large herd of swine. The entire herd ran down into the Sea of Galilee and drowned. When the loc

July 24th is the optional memorial of Saint Charbel Makhlouf. He was born in the mountain village of Biqa-Kafra, Lebanon, the fifth child of a poor Maronite Family on May 8, 1828. Charbel exhibited preternatural spiritual abilities at an early age especially contemplation, prayer and solitude. At 23, over his parent’s objections, he entered the monastery of Our Lady of Lebanon and became a novice. After two years of novitiate, in 1853, he entered the Monastery of Saint Maroun. Ordained a priest in 1859, he spent sixteen years there, totally dedicated to Christ, performing his priestly and monastic duties in an exemplary way. He practiced self sacrifice, ministering with an undivided heart before receiving permission from his superiors to live in the hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul. Charbel's companions at the hermitage were Christ, as encountered in the Scriptures and in the Eucharist, and the Blessed Mother. The Eucharist became the center of his life. He consumed the Br

Optional Memorial – July 18th St. Camillus' mother was nearly sixty years old when he was born [in 1550]. As a youth, he gave himself to the sinful pleasures of this world. His conversion dates from the feast of the Purification, 1575. Two attempts to join the Capuchin Order were frustrated by an incurable sore on his leg. In Rome, Camillus was placed in a hospital for incurables; before long he was put in charge due to his ability and zeal for virtue. There, he provided the sick every kind of spiritual and bodily aid. At the age of thirty-two he began studying for Holy Orders and was not ashamed of being numbered with children. After ordination to the holy priesthood he founded a congregation of Regular Clerics, the "Ministers to the Sick." As a fourth vow the community assumed the duty of caring for the plague-ridden at the risk of their lives. With invincible patience Camillus persevered day and night in the service of the sick, performing the meanest and most

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) When it comes to facing failures in life, the farmer in today’s Gospel parable sounds a lot like many of us. We work hard, and only sometimes succeed. Most of the best things that we give to others are not by them well received. Most of what we want to plant in the lives of those around us doesn’t “take”; it doesn’t become rooted and permanently planted in their lives. All of us have to deal with failure, those areas where the best we’ve given to others comes up lacking, falling short of our hopes, our dreams, and our great expectations. There are some biblical commentators who suggest that the parable of Jesus we just heard was autobiographical. That may well be true. Jesus certainly had to face a whole lot of apparent failure. He knew full well the pain of failure: •  He was born and raised in Nazareth and his own hometown folks rejected Him. •  His own Hebrew countrymen rejected His message

The Fifth Sunday of Lent (A) March 29, 2020 By Msgr. Bernard Bourgeois Ezekiel 37:12-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:8-11; John 11:1-45 "Untie him and let him go."  (John 11: 44)  Nearing the end of the season of Lent, the Church this Sunday is knocking at the door of Holy Week (which begins next Sunday, April 9, with Palm Sunday), seeking entrance to the events that together form the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is the annual reminder of God’s love for His people! During Holy Week, the faithful will visit the Upper Room during the Passover. At this meal, Jesus takes bread and wine and declares it to be His body and blood, which will be poured out for the many. Good Friday is the next stop on the journey. Kneeling at the foot of the cross, the people of God will adore that wood on which their Savior died. The story does not end there! At the Easter Vigil Mass, the people will stand in awe and wonder at the empty tomb. Jesus is risen! All

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) We are all quite conscious of the fact that only one of the cured lepers returned to give thanks to Jesus. And we are conscious, too, that the one returning was a Samaritan, one of those people despised by the pious and orthodox Jews of Jesus’s time. But have we given any thought at all to what happened to the other nine? Well, what DID happen to them? Did their families receive them back into their homes or was there a lingering fear that they were still diseased and so they faced a frosty and unwelcome return home? Did their children recognize them? Did those who were cured experience greater devotion to God? Were they more consciously religious in how they lived their lives? Did any of them become followers of Christ and join the early Christians of their day? We don’t know the answers to these questions. But we can have answers to a question I want to put to you now. My question is:

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) Here we are at the beginning of a new year with high hopes that this year will be better than 2015. We have our hopes even though we know that there is much in our world that is wrong. Without going into a long dismal list of the many things that are wrong let me point out just a few of them. The gap between the rich and the poor is widening, not closing. Political corruption and the politics of gridlock darken our perceptions of those we have elected to office. Terrorism and abortion along with ISIS murders cause us to realize that in the minds of many, human life is cheap and regarded as disposable. We face much that is sinful, evil, and criminal in our world. All of these things we know quite well are exceptions to the way things ought to be; they are out of the general order of what should present in our relations with others. How do we know that? What gives us this perspective and rec

The Fourth Sunday of Lent is called Laetare Sunday in the Extraordinary Form, since its theme is one of rejoicing and expectation that Easter is near. It occurs just over half way through the penitential season of Lent. Laetare Sunday, takes its name from the first word in the entrance antiphon (introit) for that Sunday’s Mass, "Rejoice" [Latin: laetare ]: "Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together all you that love her; rejoice with joy you that have been in sorrow: that you may exult, and be filled from the breasts of your consolation" (Isaiah: 66:10, 11). In anticipation of the joy of Easter, Laetare Sunday is meant to provide hope and encouragement as we progress towards the Paschal Feast. The great Solemnity of Easter for which we have been faithfully preparing prefigures our joy in Heaven, when we shall see God face to face. [Laetare Sunday is also the occasion of the second scrutiny in preparation for the baptism of adults at the Easter Vigil.] This day

Optional Memorial - March 4th  (In 2018, this feast is superseded by the Sunday liturgy.)  This patron saint of Poland, Lithuania, and Russia made his mark on the hearts of his people even during his teenage years. Though born into high nobility in 1458, Saint Casimir, third child and second son of the King of Poland, never sought worldly honors or wealth. He is often depicted in iconography as having three hands, which is meant to emphasize his exceptional generosity toward the poor. While Casimir was known to be particularly pious and disciplined, there is no doubt that his education at the hands of a Polish priest named Jan Dlugosz helped develop these traits even further. Dlugosz was strict and conservative in his teaching, and emphasized ethics, morality, and religious devotion in his young pupils (both Casimir and his brother Vladislaus II were entrusted to his care). As a result, Casimir spent long nights in prayer, often sleeping on the ground as a form of mortifica

On February 20th, dioceses in Portugal (together with others around the world) observe the feast of Sts. Francisco and Jacinta Marto. They are the youngest saints not to die as martyrs recognized by the Catholic Church. Francisco and Jacinta’s courageous witness to the faith teach us that even young children can become saints. The brother and sister who tended to their families’ sheep with their cousin Lucia Santo, witnessed the apparitions of Mary, Our Lady of Fatima. The Blessed Virgin Mary’s six appearances between May 13th and October 13th, 1917, at Cova da Iria, near Fatima, Portugal, to three poor shepherd children, was a defining moment in salvation history, presaging several significant events in the 20th century and beyond. Our Lady's urgent message speaks to us today. Mary told the children that she was sent from heaven by God with an urgent message for humanity. At that time, World War I was raging, and Europe was being torn apart by violence and bloodshed. Our La

(In 2018, this feast is superseded by the Sunday liturgy.) This feast commemorates the first of eighteen apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary witnessed by St. Bernadette Soubirous. On February 11, 1858, Bernadette a poor, sickly child of a local peasant family, first glimpsed, "something white in the shape of a girl" in a grotto near Lourdes, France. Later questioned by Church officials, Bernadette stated that she saw, "a pretty young girl with a rosary over her arm." The girl, Bernadette said, was "lovelier than I have ever seen." Perhaps because of her lowly background, Bernadette was deeply impressed by the polite and dignified way the Lady treated her. On March 25, 1858, during her sixteenth appearance, the Lady identified herself as "the Immaculate Conception," a dogma solemnly proclaimed by Pope Pius IX, on December 8, 1854, in Ineffabilis Deus . ________________________________________________ Fourteen-year-old Bernadette Sou

Fr. Charles Irvin  Senior Priest  Diocese of Lansing  ( Click here for today’s readings )  The gospel account we’ve just heard is part of St. Mark’s introduction of Jesus. It has to do with Jesus’ identity, as have the gospel accounts over the past few Sundays. From the Sunday we celebrated the Baptism of the Lord through the Sunday before Ash Wednesday St. Mark is presenting us with the question: “Who is this Jesus?” Mark’s answer? “The One who has come to bring outcasts back in.” He has come for the outcasts, the outsiders, the lepers, the sinners, and those we disdain. The great irony is that Jesus, the One who came for outcasts, Himself had to get out of town. Note that in several of these gospel accounts we’ve heard, St. Mark reports: “Jesus could no longer go openly into any town, but had to stay outside in places where nobody lived.” That’s true even today in our surrounding culture. It is not politically correct, we are told, to talk about Jesus in public. He

Memorial - February 10th It is certainly not unusual for siblings to develop similar interests or to spend time, either together or apart, pursuing the same activities. This is particularly true when the siblings are twins. Such was the case with St. Scholastica and her twin brother, St. Benedict. Between them, they helped found the tradition of Western monasticism, he for men and she for women, that persists to this day. Scholastica and Benedict were born into a wealthy Italian family in the town of Nursia in 480, and while twins are often close, the fact that their mother died in childbirth may have strengthened the bond between them even further. Little is known of the details of Scholastica’s early life, but she and her brother were raised in their father’s house until Benedict left for Rome to pursue his studies. Scholastica’s social class, young women often lived in their father’s home until they either married or entered religious life. We do know, thanks to the writi

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. Provincial Superior, La Salette Missionaries of North America (Job 7:1-7; 1 Corinthians 9:16-23; Mark 1:29-39) “Woe to me,” writes St. Paul, “if I do not preach the Gospel.” He is not complaining, just stating the fact that this responsibility, laid on him without his being consulted, had become the all-consuming purpose of his existence. Jesus says something similar: “For this purpose I have come,” namely his preaching. Job takes us to the other extreme. His life has become a drudgery, and he finds no purpose in it. He expects that he will never know happiness again. The tears of Mary at La Salette, such a beautiful and powerful image, are troubling in a way. They can make us repent our sins; that is good. But some wonder how Mary, in heaven, can experience unhappiness. And yet she talks about the trouble her people’s infidelity have caused her personally: “How long a time I have suffered for you! … You pay no heed… You will never be able t