BIG C CATHOLICS

Reading:  Saint Paul's Letter to the Galatians 5:18-25 Brothers and sisters: If you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law.  Now the works of the flesh are obvious: impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, rivalry, jealousy, outbursts of fury, acts of selfishness,  dissensions, factions, occasions of envy,  drinking bouts, orgies, and the like.  I warn you, as I warned you before,  that those who do such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God. In contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity,  faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.  Against such there is no law.  Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their flesh  with its passions and desires.  If we live in the Spirit, let us also follow the Spirit. Reflection: The final selection from Paul’s letter to the Galatian Christians softens the tone of the earlier chapters.  We hear in this final chapter a beautiful passage of the Ho

Lord God, I thank you today for the gift of my life, And for the lives of all my brothers and sisters. I know there is nothing that destroys more life than abortion, Yet I rejoice that you have conquered death by the Resurrection of Your Son. I am ready to do my part in ending abortion. Today I commit myself Never to be silent, Never to be passive, Never to be forgetful of the unborn. I commit myself to be active in the pro-life movement, And never to stop defending life Until all my brothers and sisters are protected, And our nation once again becomes A nation with liberty and justice Not just for some, but for all, Through Christ our Lord. Amen!

St. Athanasius Thought of the Day Devils take great delight in fullness, and drunkeness, and bodily comfort. Fasting possesses great power and it works glorious things. To fast is to banquet with angels. -- St. Athanasius.

BISHOP FULTON J. SHEEN Christian love bears evil, but it does not tolerate it. It does penance for the sins of others, but it is not broadminded about sin. The cry for tolerance never induces it to quench its hatred of the evil philosophies that have entered into contest with the Truth. It forgives the sinner, and it hates the sin; it is unmerciful to the error in his mind. The sinner it will always take back into the bosom of the Mystical Body; but his lie will never be taken into the treasury of His Wisdom. Real love involves real hatred: whoever has lost the power of moral indignation and the urge to drive the buyers and sellers from the temples has also lost a living, fervent love of Truth. Charity, then, is not a mild philosophy of "live and let live"; it is not a species of sloppy sentiment. Charity is the infusion of the Spirit of God, which makes us love the beautiful and hate the morally ugly. H/T Catholic Education: www.catholiceduction.

By Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori The practice of recommending to God the souls in Purgatory, that He might mitigate the great pains which they suffer, and that He may soon bring them to His glory, is most pleasing to the Lord and most profitable to us. For these blessed souls are His eternal spouses, and most grateful are they to those who obtain their deliverance from prison, or even a mitigation of their torments. When, therefore, they arrive in Heaven, they will be sure to remember all who have prayed for them. It is a pious belief that God manifests to them our prayers in their behalf, that they may also pray for us. It is true that these blessed souls are not in a state to pray for themselves, because they are atoning for their faults. However, because they are very dear to God, they can pray for us, and obtain for us the divine graces. Saint Catherine of Bologna, when she wished to obtain any grace, had recourse to the souls in Purgatory, and her prayers were heard immediate

Most people know that St. Elizabeth Ann Seton was the first American-born person to be declared a saint (she was canonized on September 14, 1975) and that she is regarded as being one of the driving forces behind the rise of parochial education in the United States. They are also aware that she was the foundress of the American Sisters of Charity, which was the first order of sisters native to the U.S. What many may not realize, however, is that her road to sainthood was paved with difficulties that sound quite modern in their familiarity. Born the second daughter of a prominent Anglican family in New York in 1774, she suffered the death of her mother in 1777, most likely as a result of childbirth. The woman that her father married in 1778, Charlotte Barclay, never accepted the children from her husband’s first marriage. That marriage eventually ended in a separation due to irreconcilable conflicts. Elizabeth suffered greatly as a result of all this, to the point of being