BIG C CATHOLICS

René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) I presume all the adults reading this have made a will, your “last will and testament.” Perhaps you made it a long time ago and it is no longer serves the purpose you had in mind. Nothing prevents you from changing it if you so choose. And if you do, you will then have your very own “old testament” and “new testament.” For many years now, the word formerly translated as “testament” in the Bible is more often given as “covenant.” The meaning, in English at least, is actually quite different. When you write a will, you can do that on your own, with or without the help of a lawyer, but you are not required to involve the persons to whom you will be leaving that jewelry or that moose head or your millions. There is no covenant, no contract with them. A contract or covenant, on the other hand, implies at least two parties who agree to its terms, preferably in writin...

The following is from Pope Benedict XVI's homily  delivered during the Mass for the solemnity of Corpus Christi, in the square of the Basilica of St. John Lateran on May 26, 2005. Afterward the Pope led the Eucharistic procession to the Basilica of St. Mary Major. He explains how the feast of Corpus Christi relives the events of Holy Thursday, but in the light of the Resurrection. Benedict reflects upon the gift of the Eucharist, in which we truly receive the body of the Lord.   Homily of Pope Benedict XVI on the Feast of Corpus Christi It is not possible to "eat" the Risen One, present under the sign of bread, as if it were a simple piece of bread. To eat this Bread is to communicate, to enter into communion with the person of the living Lord. This communion, this act of "eating", is truly an encounter between two persons, it is allowing our lives to be penetrated by the life of the One who is the Lord, of the One who is my Creator and Redeemer. The purp...

The Visitation of Our Lady, May 31, 2021  By Msgr. Bernard Bourgeois “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.” (Lk 1:45)  In Catholic tradition, May is reserved as a month in which the faithful honor Mary, the Mother of God. As a student at Sacred Heart School in Bennington, each May we took part in the “May Crowning,” a ceremony in which a statue of Mary would be crowned with a wreath of flowers. It was a way to honor her presence and remember our devotion to her. The ceremony was followed by a “Living Rosary,” in which each student would take one prayer of the Rosary. In my sixth-grade year, I was designated by Sister of St. Joseph Mary Ancilla, our teacher, to carry the cross into the Church, and then to start the Rosary in praying the Apostles’ Creed. I was nervous! While the event began with me, thankfully Sister Ancilla was right there directing our efforts. The final day of May is the feast of the Visi...

Disputation of the Holy Sacrament, Raphael, 1509-1510 Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today’s readings ) Do you like jigsaw puzzles? Do friends and family give you “the world’s most difficult” puzzles? Amazon.com has one called “Dalmatians,” with dozens of virtually identical black-and-white dogs filling the entire picture. It’s also two-sided, by the way. Now imagine a futuristic puzzle in which the pieces keep changing shape, and the picture on the box is never the same twice. And let’s make the pieces slippery while we’re at it. We might think the Trinity is like that. If our goal is to understand how one God can exist in three “persons,” when even the word “person” in this context is not at all what we usually think of when we say it, we are doomed to failure. We will never get the pieces to fit. Yet here we are, as always on the Sunday after Pentecost, celebrating the Solemnity of the Most Holy Tr...

The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity is May 30th. The Divine Family that is God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit is the central mystery of our Christian faith. The mystery of the Trinity is the life that dwells in us and sustains us. ___________ "God in his deepest mystery is not a solitude but a family, since he has in himself fatherhood, sonship and the essence of the family which is love." — St. John Paul II The Exchange of Persons in the Trinity The three-leaf clover used in religion classes to explain the mystery of three Divine Persons in one God does not begin to penetrate the incomparable majesty, boundless love, and total communion, which the Church in her Tradition and creeds ascribes to the Trinity. To the early Church Fathers the idea of perichoresis (the exchange of Persons in the Trinity), was indispensable to understanding God. This sublime, metaphysical concept is central to John Paul’s Theology of the Body. The inner life of Fa...

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today's readings ) There is a famous story about the prophet Elijah in chapter 19 of the First Book of Kings. He has made powerful enemies and is hiding in a cave. The Lord tells Elijah to stand outside and wait for the Lord to pass. There is a strong violent wind, followed by an earthquake, followed by fire, but the Lord is not in any of these. Then comes a “light silent sound,” which is the New American Bible equivalent of the better known “still small voice” of the King James version. Sometimes, especially at a retreat, for example, there is a tendency to take this story to mean that God always comes quietly. Nothing could be further from the truth. Look at what happened at Pentecost. There was “a noise like a strong driving wind,” and “there appeared to them tongues of fire... and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.” What about the earthquake? In chapter 4 of Act...

"When the Lord told his disciples to go and teach all nations and to baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, he conferred on them the power of giving men new life in God. He had promised through the prophets that in these last days he would pour out his Spirit on his servants and handmaids, and that they would prophesy. So when the Son of God became the Son of Man, the Spirit also descended upon him, becoming accustomed in this way to dwelling with the human race, to living in men and to inhabiting God’s creation. The Spirit accomplished the Father’s will in men who had grown old in sin, and gave them new life in Christ." — St. Irenaeus _______________________________________________ Prayer in Honor of the Holy Spirit God our Father, let the Spirit you sent on your Church to begin the teaching of the gospel continue to work in the world through the hearts of all who believe. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your So...

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today's readings ) (NOTE: In New Hampshire, this is the Seventh Sunday of Easter. For the Solemnity of the Ascension, celebrated this day in many other dioceses, see Matthew Coffin’s excellent reflection " Why Satan Hates the Ascension of Christ ".) And Matthias was never heard from again. Well, as far as that goes, he was never heard from before, either. This story of his “election” as an Apostle is the only time he is mentioned by name in the whole New Testament. We know, from the criterion established by Peter, that both he and Barsabbas were among the first disciples of Jesus. Replacing Judas was apparently a big deal for the author of the Acts of the Apostles, the evangelist St. Luke. Everything inclines the reader to expect great things of Matthias. And then, nothing. What happened? Did he fail? Did Peter and the assembled community make a mistake? Did ...

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut "Love one another." (John 15:17) Duccio‘s Maestà alterpiece, 1308-11 ( Click here for today’s readings ) Many years ago when I was in college, I remember being involved in a pseudo-intellectual debate on whether charity was an obligation. On one side the argument was that charity, by definition, implies something done freely, from the heart. On the other side the claim was that being a Christian, by definition, implies a way of life that must include charity. The last words of today’s Gospel could lend themselves to a similar discussion. “This I command you: love one another.” On the one hand love, as we understand it, like Shakespeare’s “quality of mercy,” cannot be “strained,” i.e., constrained, forced. Imagine trying to bully someone into loving you! Part of the mystery of love is precisely that we are not able to make it happen. And when it does take hold of us we...