BIG C CATHOLICS

August 23, 2017 Today we pray for all those who feel abandoned by God for whatever reason, for those waiting for answers to prayer, and for those who are suffering and do not yet see the reasons behind what God is working in their lives. May they be granted the grace of unwavering faith through Saint Monica's holy intercession. St. Monica Novena - Day 6 Dear Saint Monica, you were once the mournful mother of a prodigal son. Your faithfulness to prayer brought you and your son so close to God that you are now with him in eternity. By your intercession and God’s grace, your son St. Augustine became a great and venerable Saint of the Church. Please take my request to God with the same fervor and persistence with which you prayed for your son. (Mention your intentions here) With your needs, worries and anxieties, you threw yourself on the mercy and providence of God. Through sorrow and pain, you constantly devoted yourself to God. Pray for me that I might join you in suc...

Optional Memorial - August 23rd Saint Rose of Lima, (1586-1617), a member of the Third Order of St. Dominic, was the "first blossom of sanctity that South America gave to the world." Hers was a life heroic in virtue and penance. She expiated the evils perpetrated by the conquerors of the land in their lust for gold. Her life was a silent sermon of penance. Pope Clement X stated in the bull of canonization: "Since the discovery of Peru no missionary has arisen who effected a similar popular zeal for the practice of penance." Already as a five-year-old child, Rose vowed her innocence to God. While still a young girl, she practiced mortifications and fasts that vastly exceeded ordinary discretion; during all of Lent she ate no bread, but subsisted on five citron seeds a day. In addition, she suffered repeated attacks from the devil, painful bodily ailments, and from her family, scoldings and calumnies. All this she accepted serenely, remarking to a friend that...

Devotion to Our Lady is an important part of spiritual life. In our prayer, we should not fail to turn to her, confident that Mary will intercede for us with her Son. Looking upon her, let us imitate her faith, her complete openness to the loving plan of God, her generous welcoming of Jesus. We learn to live from Mary. [Mary is continually] watching over us, her children, the children who come to her in prayer, to thank her or to ask for her maternal protection and heavenly help, perhaps after having lost their way, burdened with grief or anguish amid the sad and troubled vicissitudes of life. — Pope Benedict XVI, address to pilgrims, August 22, 2012 ________________________________________ Prayer For Our Lady's Intercession Almighty ever-living God, who made the Mother of your Son to be our Mother and our Queen, graciously grant that, sustained by her most loving intercession, we may attain in the heavenly Kingdom the glory you promised to your children. This we humb...

For those familiar with monarchy like the kind predominate in Europe, the idea that the Blessed Virgin Mary is Queen of Heaven and Earth might seem odd. In Western monarchies, the king and queen are typically husband and wife. By this standard, Mary the Mother of God would have no claim to such a designation. That Catholics have long accorded to her the solemn title "Queen" has even prompted Protestant accusations that Catholics divinize the Mother of Christ. In ancient Middle Eastern monarchies, kings had numerous wives as well as concubines. The greatest kings of the Davidic Kingdom were no exception. The Bible names eight wives of King David and acknowledges many more – although the exact number is not known. 1st Kings 11:1-3 indicates King Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines. Amid such rampant polygamy, to bestow upon a wife the honor of being queen would doubtless cause envy, disappointment and recrimination among those in the royal harem not chosen. Israel...

August 22, 2017 Saint Monica's son, Saint Augustine, rejected the Faith for many years. Monica had such a strong devotion to Christ that she persevered in hope that her son would one day return to God. Her faithfulness was rewarded. Today we pray for those who have fallen away from the Faith. May they return soon to the Church. St. Monica Novena - Day 5 Dear Saint Monica, you were once the mournful mother of a prodigal son. Your faithfulness to prayer brought you and your son so close to God that you are now with him in eternity. By your intercession and God’s grace, your son St. Augustine became a great and venerable Saint of the Church. Please take my request to God with the same fervor and persistence with which you prayed for your son. (Mention your intentions here) With your needs, worries and anxieties, you threw yourself on the mercy and providence of God. Through sorrow and pain, you constantly devoted yourself to God. Pray for me that I might join you in suc...

WARNING :  Illogic Alert!  If you value logical, empirically based argumentation, the dignity of persons as made in the image of God, or just plain human decency, the following video will offend you in multiple ways. Viewer discretion is advised. Philosophy Time is a social media Q & A program aimed at Millennials covering everything from the nature of metaphor to the intricacies of how our society defines beauty. Here Prof. Liz Harman of Princeton University discusses the ethics of abortion with actor and director James Franco and Eliot Michaelson, a lecturer in the Department of Philosophy at King’s College London. It is painful to watch. Prof. Harman employs circular reasoning, a logical fallacy in which one begins with what they are trying to end with - i.e., her premises and conclusion appear to be the same or nearly indistinguishable. Moreover, if you were to use the word "slave" instead of "fetus" in the professor's torchered argument, people...

Memorial -  August 22nd With the certainty of faith we know that Jesus Christ is King in the full, literal, and absolute sense of the word; for He is true God and man. This does not, however, prevent Mary from sharing His royal prerogatives, though in a limited and analogous manner; for she was the Mother of Christ, and Christ is God; and she shared in the work of the divine Redeemer, in His struggles against enemies and in the triumph He won over them all. From this union with Christ the King she assuredly obtains so eminent a status that she stands high above all created things; and upon this same union with Christ is based that royal privilege enabling her to distribute the treasures of the kingdom of the divine Redeemer. And lastly, this same union with Christ is the fountain of the inexhaustible efficacy of her motherly intercession in the presence of the Son and of the Father. Without doubt, then, does our holy Virgin possess a dignity that far transcends all other ...