BIG C CATHOLICS

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) All of the shopping, all of the rushing about, all of the busy-ness of Christmas is now over. Today the streets are deserted. A quiet and peaceful stillness lays over all. Now the religious meaning of Christmas is allowed to emerge from beneath all of the mall music, the shopping, and the frantic preparations for this day. But to what do we turn our attention? To peace on earth toward men of good will? Yes, and something more.  To the sharing of love with family? Yes, and something more. To joining together with the ones we love? Yes, but more. Christmas is more than having a lovely time, more than family sharing, more than the so-called “happy holidays.” We celebrate today what so many are looking for. We focus our attention today on that which will give peace to many who are lonely, uneasy with themselves, and who are searching for meaning in their lives. The centerpiece of the M...

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) The Gospel account for this 4th Sunday of Advent is about two pregnant women, one of whom, Elizabeth, was already in the sixth month of her pregnancy. Mary had only recently received the news that she was pregnant. It was a life-changing announcement and she probably needed some time to herself, time to prepare, time to reflect, time to get herself together. But she didn’t think of her own needs. Instead she set out on an arduous journey to visit her cousin Elizabeth who was six months pregnant and to care for her. That’s not something most women would do. But these were two remarkable women, remarkable in the sense that under ordinary circumstances they would not be pregnant. One was a virgin; the other was beyond, way beyond, childbearing age. Both were not supposed to be pregnant. But God was at work within them. To add to the unexplainable mystery, they both bore within their wombs myster...

The Sermon of St John the Baptist , Pieter Bruegel the Elder , 1566. Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) As we prepare for the Nativity of our Lord the issues that surround us this Advent season are enormous. Once more this year we struggle to find peace – peace among the nations and among ethnic groups, peace in our own homeland, and peace between two civilizations, Muslim and Western. The now forty year old drug problem still plagues us here in our country. On the one side there are those who grow drugs along with those who market them for vast sums of money, and on the other hand there are those who buy and use drugs. How can we put an end to the mutual addiction, this gigantic co-dependency, involving both greed for money and need for drugs? There are other problems too – the decline of the nuclear family, lack of housing for many, abuse of children, dysfunctional families, the control of gun sales, and on, and on, a...

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. Provincial Superior The La Salette Missionaries of North America "They walked with him no longer." John. 6:66 ( Click here for today’s readings ) "Many of his disciples no longer accompanied him." I prefer the classic translation, "They walked with him no longer," as presenting a more forceful image. Not his enemies, but Jesus’ own disciples were falling away from him. They didn’t like what he was saying, and that was that. To be fair, let it be noted that what Jesus was saying was exactly what they called it, "a hard saying." So they applied what we might call "the logic of dislike." We have all seen it. We have all done it. The logic is very simple. It goes a little like this: 1) I try something; 2) I don’t like it; 3) I will never try it again. In the case of today’s Gospel: 1) This Jesus is fascinating; 2) I don’t like this business of eating flesh and drinking blood; 3) Goodbye, Jesus. Th...

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) When you encounter paradox, you’re close to the heart of the Gospel, a message in which we are presented with two statements that seemingly contradict each other. So here, today, we find Jesus speaking about His cross, His path to glory through humiliation, life through death, good through evil. Nothing in human history is so totally paradoxical as the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. About to be displayed in degradation, He speaks of His glory being revealed. In Roman times a crucifixion was supposed to be a public spectacle. Yet it is at the same time a personal matter for you and for me. Your salvation and mine are found in it. Yes, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ on Calvary was a spectacular event. The characters were momentous. Rome was there in her imperial power. One of the world’s great religions was there in an hour of critical decision. Yet it is also true that this historica...

By Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. Provincial Superior, La Salette Missionaries of North America (Jeremiah 31:31-34; Hebrews 5:7-9; John 12:20-33) My child, you have no idea how important it is to me that you allow me to forgive you. Please don’t put it off. Now is the acceptable time. Is there something from the distant past that you have never been able to confess? Now is the acceptable time. Come now, let us set things right. Though your sins be like scarlet, they may become white as snow. They will be totally washed away in the blood of my only Son, who willingly offered himself up for you. Through his suffering, through his obedience, he has paid the full price of your redemption. He is like the grain of wheat. When he died, he brought forth abundant fruit, to be shared by all. The free banquet of grace awaits you. I would like nothing better than to place my Law within you and write it on your heart. Just think! It would then be the most natural thing in t...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) “A body in motion tends to stay in motion, while a body at rest tends to stay at rest.” I’m sure many of you have heard that phrase used in an often-repeated TV commercial that has been airing recently. The phrase has caught my attention especially when I have been a couch potato watching more TV than I should. It’s the “staying at rest” that I am talking about because I am so often afflicted with laziness and lethargy. I resist getting in motion. Well, you may ask, what do those words and that thought have to do with the readings from today’s scripture passages that we just heard? Today is Laetare Sunday. Joy is its theme, joy because we are halfway through Lent and thus very close to the joy of Easter when our Elect will be baptized, confirmed and receive Holy Communion and our Candidates will be received into our Communion of Faith and likewise receive Holy Communion. There is joy, too, because...

Feast Day -  March 10th  (Scotland) March 11th, is the feast of Saint John Ogilvie (1579 – 1615), born in 1579, at Drum, Scotland. Walter Ogilvie was a Scottish noble who raised his son John in the state religion of Scotland, Calvinism. The Ogilvie family was partly Catholic and partly Presbyterian. John eventually converted to Catholicism at the age of 17 in Louvain, Belgium. He initially studied with the Benedictines, but joined the Jesuits in 1597, and was ordained in Paris in 1610. He was then sent to Rouen. Two French Jesuit missionaries returning from Scotland told him of the blatant persecution of Catholics there. He repeatedly requested assignment to Scotland where wholesale massacres of Catholics had taken place, but by this point the oppressors were searching more for priests than for those who attended Mass. The Jesuits were determined to minister to the oppressed Catholic laity. When captured, they were tortured for information, then hanged, dr...

Optional Memorial - March 9th  St. Frances of Rome wanted to be a nun, but her wealthy parents forced her into an arranged marriage with a solider. Her husband Lorenzo Ponziani served as commander of the papal armies. They lived happily together for forty years even though Lorenzo was frequently at war. Frances and her sister-in-law often visited the poor and the sick of the Eternal City giving out food and caring for the ill. Rome in the early 15th century was largely in ruins. Animals roamed the city freely and plague decimated the population. Two of Francis's and Lorenzo's children died from disease. Francis used her family’s wealth to establish a hospital. In 1425, on the feast of the Assumption of Mary, she founded the Oblates of Mary, an order of pious Christian women. The order was approved by Pope Eugene IV in 1433. Today it is known as the Oblates of St. Francis of Rome. Francis was graced with heroic virtue and mystical visions. With her husband's bless...

Saint John of God demonstrated extreme virtue, living self-imposed poverty and ministering tirelessly to the sick and poor. While serving others, in imitation of Our Lord, his great devotion to God and personal humility never wavered. Have charity first towards our own souls, cleansing them by confession and penance; then charity towards our neighbors and our brethren, wishing them that which we desire ourselves. — St. John of God ___________________________________________ O God, who filled Saint John of God with a spirit of compassion, grant, we pray, that, giving ourselves to works of charity, we may merit to be found among the elect in your Kingdom. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

The Church observes the optional memorial of Saint John of God on March 8th. Of Portuguese descent, he was first a shepherd, a dealer and then a soldier. At the age of forty, he was converted, and devoted himself to the care of those sick in mind and body. John proved in various thankless tasks to be a true innovator and a saint of super-human virtue and compassion. He founded the Order of the Brothers Hospitallers, which bears his name. He died at Granada, Spain in 1550. St. John of God was so called because of the great love he had for others. That love was made manifest in the hospitals he established, some of which exist to this day. He once wrote “When I see so many of my brethren in poverty, and my neighbors suffering beyond their strength, and oppressed in mind or body by so many cares and am unable to help them, it causes me exceeding sorrow.” These words show that John of God shared the same love that God has; a love that is sorrowful in the face of human degradation, p...

René J. Butler, M.S. Provincial Superior, La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today’s readings ) It must surely have happened to you that someone gave you as a gift something you already had. You expressed your thanks and later you exchanged the item, or “re-gifted” it. Imagine, however, if someone did that on purpose, giving you a book or DVD or membership, knowing full well that you already had it. Or what about this? I go into your home and take something I have already given you; you think it is lost forever; then I give it back again—as a gift! What could be stranger? And yet, that is exactly the scenario described in today’s first reading. Because of the Chosen People’s infidelity, God allowed their Holy City to be destroyed and sent them into exile. Now he inspires a pagan king to let the exiles return home and rebuild Jerusalem. He gives back the gift he originally gave and took away. What was the difference between the or...

Optional Memorial - March 7th Women have always been important witnesses to the faith and to the sacredness and value of human life. On March 7th the Church honors Saints Perpetua and Felicity, two young mothers of the 3rd century who were martyred because they refused to renounce their Christian beliefs. They are mentioned in the first Eucharistic prayer at Mass and where highly venerated by the early Church. Saint Perpetua was born around 181 A.D. She was a 20-year-old married, well-educated noblewoman, who followed the path of her mother and was baptized a Christian. Her co-martyr, Felicity, was an expectant mother and catechumen who according to tradition was Perpetua’s slave. They both suffered at Carthage in the Roman province of Africa during the reign of Emperor Septimus in 203 A.D. After their arrest and imprisonment, Perpetua and Felicity were led to the amphitheater together alongside fellow professed Christians Revocatus, Felicitas, Saturninus, Secundulus and...

Gilbert Keith Chesterton was an English writer, lay theologian, poet, philosopher, journalist, critic and Christian apologist. Chesterton converted from High Church Anglicanism to Catholicism in 1922. He authored nearly a hundred books and thousands of essays. Below he considers heterodoxy that is embraced as truth. Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions. — G.K. Chersteron ________________________________ A Prayer in Darkness by G.K. Chesterton This much, O heaven--if I should brood or rave,      Pity me not; but let the world be fed,      Yea, in my madness if I strike me dead, Heed you the grass that grows upon my grave. If I dare snarl between this sun and sod,      Whimper and clamour, give me grace to own,      In sun and rain and fruit in season shown, The shining silence of the scorn of God. Thank God the stars are set beyond my power,   ...

Fr. Kevin O'Sullivan, O.F.M. This man Nicodemus had a half-open mind as regards Jesus. He was moved by his teaching and miracles. He defended him when his companions were out to have Jesus arrested. He helped to have him properly buried when his enemies had him put to death, but that was as far as he went, apparently. There is no mention of him in the first Christian community of Jerusalem. What held him back, what kept him from giving himself fully to Jesus who spoke so kindly and told him so clearly that he himself was indeed a teacher who had come from God, that he had been offered by God as the sacrificial victim who would save the world? All Nicodemus had to do was to accept his word, "believe in him" and be baptized and he too would have eternal life. Why did he not do this? The answer is given in the beginning of his story "He came to Jesus by night." He was one of the leading Pharisees and evidently was afraid of what they would think of him had...

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 ...

René J. Butler, M.S. Provincial Superior, La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today’s readings ) I am in charge here! I give the orders. Is that clear? Even if I really believed that, I would be well advised not to say it out loud. But let’s suppose I came into your home or place of work and said the same thing. It wouldn’t be long before somebody said, “And just who do you think you are?” In giving the Ten Commandments, God seems to have anticipated that very question. So he begins by stating, clearly and emphatically, just who he is: “I, the Lord, am your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery.” And in case you missed it the first time, he says, three verses later, “I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God.” The commandments that follow are really, really important, but these statements of who God is are more important still. They are the foundation of all the rest. Why not kill? Because I say so, and ...

Optional Memorial - March 3rd Our Lord said that it is "...easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 19:24).  Though such a thing is difficult, it is, however, not impossible, especially if the rich person, in this case, rich woman, sees their wealth as a gift from God, given to help bring about His kingdom on earth. For them, affluence is an opportunity. Such was the story of Saint Katharine Drexel. Born in Philadelphia into a family of wealth and privilege in 1858, Katharine had advantages that many people then, and even now, could only dream of. Her family’s fortune was made in banking. Her uncle Anthony founded Drexel University in Philadelphia. On her stepmother’s side, Katharine was a distant cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. She received an excellent education, traveled widely in the United States and Europe, and, like other young women in her social class, made a grand debut i...

Unless there is a Good Friday in your life, there can be no Easter Sunday. — Venerable Fulton Sheen ___________________________________________ Prayer for the Canonization of Venerable Fulton Sheen Heavenly Father, source of all holiness, You raise up within the Church in every age men and women who serve with heroic virtue and dedication. You have blessed Your Church through the life and ministry of Your servant, Archbishop Fulton J Sheen. He has written and spoken well of Your Divine Son, Jesus Christ, and was an instrument of the Holy Spirit in touching the hearts of Your people. If it be according to Your Will, for the honor and glory of the Most Holy Trinity and for the salvation of souls, we humbly ask You to move the Church to proclaim him a saint. We ask this through Jesus, our Lord who reigns together with You. Amen.

The Church in Wales and England celebrates the feast of St. David, bishop and patron of Wales on March 1st.. Very little is known about the life of St. David ( Dewi Sant ). He belonged to that great monastic movement which became influential in Wales in the sixth century and which had links with monasticism in Gaul and in Ireland. The earliest references to David are in the Irish Annals. Many churches across South Wales claim David as their founder. His chief foundation was at Mynyw near Dyfed. He was canonized by Pope Callistus II in 1123. Although he was once among the best-known saints of early English Christianity, the factual information which has come down to us concerning St. David of Wales is largely a product of popular piety. Legend has it that he was descended from royalty and was the uncle of King Arthur. Such accounts are nearly impossible to substantiate. What is known is that he was instramental in helping to spread the Christian faith by virtue of his tireless miss...

Editor's note: Occasionally on Tuesday we will feature posts relating to St. John Paul the Great's Theology of the Body; his reflection on our nature and life as persons made in the image and likeness of God, conjugal love, the meaning of celibacy, and the eternal beatitude to which every human being is called. ________________________________________ Saint John Paul II The link between secularization and the crisis of marriage and of the family is only too clear. The crisis concerning the meaning of God and that concerning moral good and evil has succeeded in diminishing an acquaintance with the fundamentals of marriage and of the family which is rooted in marriage. For an effective recovery of the truth in this field, it is necessary to rediscover the transcendent dimension that is intrinsic to the full truth of marriage and the family , overcoming every dichotomy that tends to separate the profane aspects from the religious as if there were two marriages: one ...