BIG C CATHOLICS

The Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy begins Dec 8. As with other jubilee years, Pope Francis has instructed that special indulgences be available for the faithful. They may be obtained for oneself or for individuals who have died. For able-bodied Catholics ◗ Take a pilgrimage. Make a journey to your local Holy Door (a physical portal in your local cathedral, shrine or other designated Church) or to one of the Holy Doors in the four papal basilicas in Rome. Crossing through a Holy Door is a spiritual journey that signals, as the Holy Father said, "the deep desire for true conversion." ◗ Go to confession. ◗ Receive the Holy Eucharist "with a reflection of mercy." ◗ Make a profession of faith. ◗ Pray for the pope and for his intentions. For the elderly, confined and the sick ◗ Pope Francis said that they may obtain the indulgence by "living with faith and joyful hope this moment of trial." ◗ Or by attending Mass and community prayer, &quo

Devotion to the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady has its roots in Sacred Scripture and in Christian piety, which always associates the Blessed Mother with her suffering Son. Today's feast was introduced by the Servites in order to intensify devotion to Our Lady's Sorrows. In 1817 Pius VII — suffering grievously in exile but finally liberated by Mary's intercession — extended the feast to the universal Church. This feast is dedicated to the spiritual martyrdom of Mary, Mother of God, and her compassion with the sufferings of her Divine Son, Jesus. In her suffering as co-redeemer, she reminds us of the tremendous evil of sin and shows us the way of true repentance. May the numerous tears of the Mother of God be conducive to our salvation; with which tears Thou, O God, art able to wash away the sins of the whole world. As Mary stood at the foot of the Cross on which Jesus hung, the sword of sorrow Simeon had foretold pierced her soul. Below are the seven sorrows of Mary: 1

In Part 1, we introduced C. S. Lewis' trilemma in which he demonstrates the divinity of Christ. His argument has been formulated several ways. Consider these: Jesus could be either: A liar  — who deceived mankind by conscious fraud, A lunatic —  who was deluded and self-deceived or The Lord —  the Son of God Incarnate Formulated another way it sometimes appears as: Jesus was either: Bad  — someone who deceived mankind by conscious fraud, Mad —  someone who was deluded and self-deceived or God —  really and truly the Son of God Incarnate __________________________________ Many today see Jesus as, an enlightened teacher, or a philosopher, who was deified by his followers. Lewis' contention seeks to overcome this line of thinking. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus declares that he is God. In Mere Christianity , Lewis recounts Jesus' assertions: - to have authority to forgive sins — the exclusive preserve of God, - to have always existed, and - to r

Peter Kreeft calls C. S. Lewis' trilemma, "the most important argument in Christian apologetics." Lewis describes it thusly: Christ either deceived mankind by conscious fraud, or He was Himself deluded and self-deceived, or He was Divine. There is no getting out of this trilemma. It is inexorable. In his seminal work Mere Christianity , Lewis further elaborates his argument outlined here: I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. Director, La Salette Shrine Enfield, NH Get thee behind me, Satan , James Tissot c 1890 ( Click here for today’s readings ) An interesting phenomenon in modern times is how brand names have become verbs. In our computerized culture we google, we skype, we tweet. Long before that we were xeroxing. What would it be like if we did the same with personal names? Take some of the more popular Bible names. If you were to say someone is “Ruthing” or “Samsoning,” anyone who knows the stories of Ruth or Samson would know exactly what that means. The same with recent popes: “Francising” and “Benedicting” and “John Pauling” would conjure up very specific and typical activities associated with each one. It’s a little like when we might say about a friend, “Oh, that’s just Pat being Pat.” Try it with your own name. In my case, “René-ing” would, for those who know me, imply a whole range of behaviors and attitudes that might please some or annoy others, such

Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, c 1928 The following ominous quote is attributed to Cardinal Pacelli concerning the future of the Church from Msgr. Georges Roche and Philippe Saint Germain's Pie XII devant l’Histoire (published in 1972 by Robert Laffont, Paris) p. 52. I submit it for your awareness/consideration. For more information see here  and here . I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to Lucy of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a Divine warning against the suicide of altering the Faith, in Her liturgy, Her theology and Her soul. … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the true Faith of the Church, reject Her ornaments and make Her feel remorse for Her historical past. A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians

Since its inception, this blog has featured the Christ Pantocrator icon on its sidebar. Here is everything to know about this most beautiful and majestic depiction of our Lord and Savior. The Origins of This Image: The word Pantocrator is Greek, meaning "Ruler of All." The image expresses the central reality of the Christian faith; the Divine Majesty of the creator and ruler of all the world, made flesh and therefore visible to us in the person of Christ Jesus our redeemer. The oldest known icon of Christ Pantocrator was written in the sixth century and preserved in the remote monastery of St. Catherine in the Sinai desert. The location enabled the image to survive the destruction of most icons during the iconoclastic era in Byzantine history. (726 to 815 AD) On the inside of the central dome in Orthodox churches is frequently found an immense mosaic or painting of Christ Pantocrator . The Pantocrator image typically found in church domes is very stern and formidabl