BIG C CATHOLICS

Assumption of the Virgin , Francesco Botticini, 1475-1476. Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) What awaits us in our future? Today’s scripture readings put that question to us. What does the future hold in store for us? What awaits us when we die? Is what is awaiting us when we die determined by what we did or didn’t do in this life? These are the big questions we face today and in all of the days of our lives. Jesus talked with His disciples (and we are His disciples) about the future, telling them they were to face it not with fear but with hope and in a spirit of positive expectancy. He spoke to them in terms of making investments, investments in their future. “Sell what you have,” He told them, and buy into the sort of retirement plan I am offering you, a never-failing treasure with my Father and with me in heaven.  “Wherever your treasure lies,” Jesus told us, “there you heart will be.” Stated the other way around he’s

In preparation for the upcoming March for Life, we will begin praying the novena of reparation for the Roe vs. Wade decision and an end to the evil of abortion. While legislation and public witness are essential to defeat the abortion culture, our most powerful weapon remains prayer. From the Priests for Life website: "The Catholic bishops of the United States have designated January 22nd as a special day of prayer and penance in atonement for the massive killing that has resulted from the Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision [handed down January 22, 1973] which allows abortion through all 40 weeks of a woman's pregnancy." "We at Priests for Life invite you to prepare spiritually for that day by joining a Novena that starts on January 14 and concludes on the 22nd . We invite you to say the following prayer each of those days, and to let us know [see end of post] that you have committed to say it." Prayer of Reparation [ Click here for Spanish – En E

Will you march to end abortion, the greatest human rights abuse of our time? The 45th annual March for Life is Friday, January 19, 2018, in Washington D.C. The gathering is the largest pro-life rally in the world. Please consider attending or supporting this event in person to help protect those who cannot speak for themselves. Even if you are not able to attend your voice is still important! Here are a few things that you can do: Show your support on social media. Support the March for Life and the pro-life cause on Friday using #whywemarch. We want our friends, family, and the world to know why we are marching. All of your #whywemarch and #marchforlife posts will be compiled at WhyWeMarch.org. ______________________________________________ Here is the schedule for the 2018 March for Life and a partial list of speakers. Schedule  11:30 a.m. Musical Opening featuring Plumb! 12:00 p.m. Rally Program. 1:00 p.m. March up Constitution Avenue to Supreme Co

By Father Thomas Mattison It does not take much thought to come up with the names of a half-dozen of political heroes whose sexual adventuring has been quietly ignored so that their marble memorials need not be torn down because of their exploitation of others and the hurt visited upon families who need fathers – no matter how bad they may be as husbands, and movements that need leaders – no matter how sleazy and seamy their “private” lives may be. The recent spate of revelations about what goes on in the upper reaches of the entertainment and news industries in this country may seem disconcerting, but these folks have almost always moved from marriage to marriage to marriage and no one batted an eye. The priests who have exploited and even assaulted minors and needy parishioners are no better. Wouldn’t you think that the rich and powerful could get along without such unseemly and shameful exploits? Or maybe that is just the problem! Behind the public face that each of us

Enter any given high school and you will encounter students wearing all black clothing, makeup and accessories often featuring Satanic or Wiccan imagery. Such is the morbid ensemble of the "Goth culture", a subculture marked by rebellion against authority, rejection of morality and experimentation, whose adherents typically embrace death metal, drugs and all things occult. "Goths" may celebrate their contrarianism by reveling in vice and flaunting convention. Not all millennial’s share in the Goth culture’s tastes or sentiments, but increasing numbers have abandoned Christianity in favor of Satanism, witchcraft, the occult and astrology. Since the turn of the century doubt about God has grown steadily among millennials. Their rejection of Judeo-Christian morality and concomitant embrace of moral relativism has left many millennials searching for meaning. Dr. Joseph Atkinson of the St. John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage explains : Within the last 4

By Father Thomas Mattison When thinking about childlessness and celibacy and voluntary renunciations of various sorts, let us take note, too, of those deprivations, hurts, injustices and differences that seem to be visited so unjustly on so many. Even the most basic human concern asks: Must one suffer these lacks? When so posed, the question begs the answer: One must not so suffer. In an age that worships technology’s – medical, pharmacological, legal – ability to ‘fix’ what is judged to be broken. The clear implication of that response is that one who suffers has a right to be fixed, to be changed, to have others changed, to have the whole culture changed and to have the ‘justice’ system arrange for the costs to be borne by someone else. And if that cannot be arranged, then they right to be helped to die! There are so many remedies for those who suffer unjustly that we have begun to imagine that suffering itself is wrong. Worse! We begin to think that those who suffer willi

Catholic Cultures' Philip Lawler, (the editor of Catholic World News ) has written a most insightful commentary about dissenters from the Church. He sums up the motives of so called "Progessive Catholics" who insist on spreading their errors within the Church. At least Martin Luther, Lawler notes, had the decency to leave: "Whatever else you might think or say about Martin Luther, give him credit for this much: having broken with Catholic teaching, he broke away from the Catholic Church. Today’s dissenting Catholics rarely show the same consistency. Even after rejecting the fundamentals of Catholic doctrine, they continue to masquerade as Catholics. Do you ever wonder why? Take the case of Donna Quinn, the object of a sympathetic profile last week in the Chicago Sun-Times . She describes the Catholic priesthood as a 'hoax.' She sees no difference between the Eucharist and a grandparent’s embrace of a grandchild. She is, however, absolutely firm in her

Earlier this week, in a blatant display of political suppression, Twitter censored an ad by pro-life U.S. Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn announcing her candidacy for the U.S. Senate. On Monday, her campaign was informed by Twitter that it cannot advertise a video wherein Blackburn mentions Planned Parenthood and its sale of aborted baby body parts . Here is the part that merited the Twitter ban: "I know the left calls me a wing-nut or a knuckle-dragging conservative. And you know what? I say, that’s all right, bring it on. I’m 100-percent pro-life. I fought Planned Parenthood and we stopped the sale of baby body parts, thank God." Twitter told Blackburn’s campaign that it will run the video ad only if they remove the language about Planned Parenthood. She still may promote the video on her Twitter account. [Evidently, the first amendment does not apply to pro-lifers.] According to LifeNews , "The Tennessee Republican has established herself as a champion for the

Charlie Gard is an 11 month old baby in the UK who suffers from a genetic disorder known as mitochondrial DNA depletion syndrome. His condition is caused by a disruption in the mitochondria, the part of the cell that provides energy to his muscles, kidneys and brain. There is a new treatment available which is a nucleoside bypass therapy, which could potentially repair Charlie’s mtDNA and help it synthesize again by providing him the naturally occurring compounds that his body cannot now produce. Charlie's Situation is Dire "According to press accounts, Charlie is terminally ill at this point. His parents have raised more than $1 million to try an experimental treatment to help him, but hospital officials—backed by British and European courts—have forbidden his parents to take him from the London hospital where he currently is." [ Source ] England's National Health Service has repeatedly denied Charlie this potentially lifesaving treatment despite the pleas

The Most Reverend Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap. the Archbishop of Philadelphia presented this Brigham Young University forum address on March 22, 2016. He discusses the difficulties faced by believers in America today and the assaults on religious freedom perpetrated by the government and secular forces. Below is a partial transcript of Archbishop Chaput's remarks. They are well worth your time. Starting at 4:32: I want to begin by giving you some background on the Catholic experience in this country. I’ll do that through the lens of a particular Catholic bishop – me. I don’t claim to speak for all or even most Americans who describe themselves as Catholic. But my comments do reflect the views of many Catholics who rank their Catholic faith as the most precious thing in their lives — and actually live that way. So let’s start with a simple fact: Catholics have never entirely “fit” in America. We’ve tried, but the results are mixed. In fact some years ago Stanley Hauerwas

In an exchange that has gone viral, the conservative commentator Ben Shapiro brilliantly articulates the pro-life argument in cases of rape, and in the process, eviscerates the abortion dogma of pro-abortion advocates. LifeSiteNews reports : "During an April 3 talk at the University of Florida, a female student asked how Shapiro would advise a woman who’s been raped and has no access to abortion." Shapiro replied, "The answer is that [rape] doesn't actually change the calculus, meaning that obviously, what happened to this person is an awful, awful horrible thing. And as I said earlier, the person who raped her should be tracked down, captured, killed or castrated. So that's number one,"  "If you don't think it's a life, then you can do whatever you want with it. If you do think it's a life, then you can't do anything with it." "As far as what she does with the baby, that's up to her. It's obviously go

As the moral and linguistic confusions, subterfuges, and just plain falsehoods surrounding a bill to legalize physician-assisted suicide in Colorado graphically illustrate, euthanasia kills more than a disturbed human being facing life’s most challenging moment. The proponents of the culture of death are persistent and assiduous in their efforts to undermine and replace Christian values. George Weigel, Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, in an article for National Review Online , explains what is at stake as Colorado voters prepare to decide on Proposition 106, the "End-of-Life Options Act," that would legalize physician-assisted suicide in the Centennial State. Weigel notes that the citizens of Colorado should bear in mind the unintended consequences and implicit dangers of such a law. He writes: "The more apt mot about all of this lethality masquerading as compassion, however, is from the quotable quotes of... [Fr.] Richard John N

Assumption of the Virgin , Francesco Botticini, 1475-1476. Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) What awaits us in our future? Today’s scripture readings put that question to us. What does the future hold in store for us? What awaits us when we die? Is what is awaiting us when we die determined by what we did or didn’t do in this life? These are the big questions we face today and in all of the days of our lives. Jesus talked with His disciples (and we are His disciples) about the future, telling them they were to face it not with fear but with hope and in a spirit of positive expectancy. He spoke to them in terms of making investments, investments in their future. “Sell what you have,” He told them, and buy into the sort of retirement plan I am offering you, a never-failing treasure with my Father and with me in heaven.  “Wherever your treasure lies,” Jesus told us, “there you heart will be.” Stated the other way around he’s

Fr. Barron on the SCOTUS Same-Sex Marriage Ruling  Ryan Anderson: The Marriage Debate Fr. Barron on Gay Marriage and the Breakdown of Moral Argument How Can Catholics Approach the Topic of Same-Sex "Marriage"? Made for Each Other