Pope Francis, Catholics, and Christians in the news worldwide
The whole world watching the courage of Pope Francis.
mtierney said:
The whole world watching the courage of Pope Francis.
I pray for his continued health.
Seventy plus years ago, this was predicted.....
https://www.ncregister.com/blog/joseph-pronechen/did-fulton-sheen-prophecy-about-these-times
From da Pope:
"Where can the nonbelievers find consolation and encouragement?"
“I don’t want to make a distinction between believers and nonbelievers. We are all human beings and as human beings we are all in the same boat. And no human thing must be alien to a Christian. Here we cry because we suffer. All of us. What helps us is synergy, mutual collaboration, the sense of responsibility and the spirit of sacrifice that is generated in many places. We don’t have to make a distinction between believers and nonbelievers, let’s go to the root: humanity. Before God we are all children”.
Speaking as your local heathen, is it ok to say that the consistent kindness of this pope often brings me close to tears.
(and i love his old beat-up shoes, too)
Suggestions for surviving life without the Mass..
How to pray with the Pope on Friday
From 6pm Rome time, the ceremony will be broadcast live to the world by Vatican Media and can be followed in several languages on our website, on our Facebook page via Facebook Live and on our YouTube channel.
It will consist in readings from the Scriptures, prayers of supplication, and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament; and will conclude with Pope Francis giving the Urbi et orbi Blessing
6:00 pm Rome time is 1:00 pm SOMA time.
nohero said:
How to pray with the Pope on Friday
From 6pm Rome time, the ceremony will be broadcast live to the world by Vatican Media and can be followed in several languages on our website, on our Facebook page via Facebook Live and on our YouTube channel.
It will consist in readings from the Scriptures, prayers of supplication, and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament; and will conclude with Pope Francis giving the Urbi et orbi Blessing6:00 pm Rome time is 1:00 pm SOMA time.
Photo from this afternoon -
Pope Francis offers guidance...
BLOGS | MAR. 27, 2020Pope Francis’ Homily at Extraordinary ‘Urbi et Orbi’ Blessing“You ask us not to be afraid. Yet our faith is weak and we are fearful. But you, Lord, will not leave us at the mercy of the storm.” POPE FRANCIS
“When evening had come” (Mk 4:35). The Gospel passage we have just heard begins like this. For weeks now it has been evening. Thick darkness has gathered over our squares, our streets and our cities; it has taken over our lives, filling everything with a deafening silence and a distressing void, that stops everything as it passes by; we feel it in the air, we notice in people’s gestures, their glances give them away. We find ourselves afraid and lost. Like the disciples in the Gospel we were caught off guard by an unexpected, turbulent storm. We have realized that we are on the same boat, all of us fragile and disoriented, but at the same time important and needed, all of us called to row together, each of us in need of comforting the other. On this boat... are all of us. Just like those disciples, who spoke anxiously with one voice, saying “We are perishing” (v. 38), so we too have realized that we cannot go on thinking of ourselves, but only together can we do this.
It is easy to recognize ourselves in this story. What is harder to understand is Jesus’ attitude. While his disciples are quite naturally alarmed and desperate, he stands in the stern, in the part of the boat that sinks first. And what does he do? In spite of the tempest, he sleeps on soundly, trusting in the Father; this is the only time in the Gospels we see Jesus sleeping. When he wakes up, after calming the wind and the waters, he turns to the disciples in a reproaching voice: “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” (v. 40).
Let us try to understand. In what does the lack of the disciples’ faith consist, as contrasted with Jesus’ trust? They had not stopped believing in him; in fact, they called on him. But we see how they call on him: “Teacher, do you not care if we perish?” (v. 38). Do you not care: they think that Jesus is not interested in them, does not care about them. One of the things that hurts us and our families most when we hear it said is: “Do you not care about me?” It is a phrase that wounds and unleashes storms in our hearts. It would have shaken Jesus too. Because he, more than anyone, cares about us. Indeed, once they have called on him, he saves his disciples from their discouragement.
The storm exposes our vulnerability and uncovers those false and superfluous certainties around which we have constructed our daily schedules, our projects, our habits and priorities. It shows us how we have allowed to become dull and feeble the very things that nourish, sustain and strengthen our lives and our communities. The tempest lays bare all our prepackaged ideas and forgetfulness of what nourishes our people’s souls; all those attempts that anesthetize us with ways of thinking and acting that supposedly “save” us, but instead prove incapable of putting us in touch with our roots and keeping alive the memory of those who have gone before us. We deprive ourselves of the antibodies we need to confront adversity.
In this storm, the façade of those stereotypes with which we camouflaged our egos, always worrying about our image, has fallen away, uncovering once more that (blessed) common belonging, of which we cannot be deprived: our belonging as brothers and sisters.
“Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” Lord, your word this evening strikes us and regards us, all of us. In this world, that you love more than we do, we have gone ahead at breakneck speed, feeling powerful and able to do anything. Greedy for profit, we let ourselves get caught up in things, and lured away by haste. We did not stop at your reproach to us, we were not shaken awake by wars or injustice across the world, nor did we listen to the cry of the poor or of our ailing planet. We carried on regardless, thinking we would stay healthy in a world that was sick. Now that we are in a stormy sea, we implore you: “Wake up, Lord!”.
“Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” Lord, you are calling to us, calling us to faith. Which is not so much believing that you exist, but coming to you and trusting in you. This Lent your call reverberates urgently: “Be converted!”, “Return to me with all your heart” (Joel 2:12). You are calling on us to seize this time of trial as a time of choosing. It is not the time of your judgement, but of our judgement: a time to choose what matters and what passes away, a time to separate what is necessary from what is not. It is a time to get our lives back on track with regard to you, Lord, and to others. We can look to so many exemplary companions for the journey, who, even though fearful, have reacted by giving their lives. This is the force of the Spirit poured out and fashioned in courageous and generous self-denial. It is the life in the Spirit that can redeem, value and demonstrate how our lives are woven together and sustained by ordinary people – often forgotten people – who do not appear in newspaper and magazine headlines nor on the grand catwalks of the latest show, but who without any doubt are in these very days writing the decisive events of our time: doctors, nurses, supermarket employees, cleaners, caregivers, providers of transport, law and order forces, volunteers, priests, religious men and women and so very many others who have understood that no one reaches salvation by themselves. In the face of so much suffering, where the authentic development of our peoples is assessed, we experience the priestly prayer of Jesus: “That they may all be one” (Jn 17:21). How many people every day are exercising patience and offering hope, taking care to sow not panic but a shared responsibility. How many fathers, mothers, grandparents and teachers are showing our children, in small everyday gestures, how to face up to and navigate a crisis by adjusting their routines, lifting their gaze and fostering prayer. How many are praying, offering and interceding for the good of all. Prayer and quiet service: these are our victorious weapons.
“Why are you afraid? Have you no faith”? Faith begins when we realise we are in need of salvation. We are not self-sufficient; by ourselves we flounder: we need the Lord, like ancient navigators needed the stars. Let us invite Jesus into the boats of our lives. Let us hand over our fears to him so that he can conquer them. Like the disciples, we will experience that with him on board there will be no shipwreck. Because this is God’s strength: turning to the good everything that happens to us, even the bad things. He brings serenity into our storms, because with God life never dies.
Palm Sunday Mass from St. Joe's in Maplewood.
10:00 am, Sunday April 5
BYOP
(Bring Your Own Palms)
Thank you, Nohero, for this link. Also, I understand the show, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is free on “YouTube/The Shows Must Go On” today.
My son’s father-in-law passed away in CT on Friday in the hospital. As is the medical practice, he was not admitted to a hospital until he was unable to breathe, ie needing a ventilator. He had suffered terribly for seven days — very high fevers, coughing, chills, hallucinations, etc.
My son and his family have been at his in-laws home for three weeks — they went to CT to be safer —afraid of remaining in their NYC apartment during this crisis. So, all have been exposed.
Very sorry to hear about what your son and his family are going through, and especially his wife losing her father.
Pell’s conviction has been overturned. He’s to go free.
I haven’t read the full details as I’m very busy and also incredibly disappointed; I think there’s a technicality involved that has negated a lot of evidence. Several more traumatised ‘boys’ (older men now) revealed their harrowing cases over the weekend; a couple had previously, on condition of anonymity but now revealed their names.
This is an awful lead-up to Easter especially with a pandemic raging, and all faith communities focused on personal repentance, study and prayer.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-07/george-pell-high-court-of-australia-full-judgment-summary/12128468
joanne said:
Pell’s conviction has been overturned. He’s to go free.
I haven’t read the full details as I’m very busy and also incredibly disappointed; I think there’s a technicality involved that has negated a lot of evidence. Several more traumatised ‘boys’ (older men now) revealed their harrowing cases over the weekend; a couple had previously, on condition of anonymity but now revealed their names.
This is an awful lead-up to Easter especially with a pandemic raging, and all faith communities focused on personal repentance, study and prayer.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-07/george-pell-high-court-of-australia-full-judgment-summary/12128468
Please say a prayer: Son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter in recovery stage, in quarantine for another two weeks. Mother-in- law asystematic , her husband succumbed last Friday. Funeral on hold. All living under the same roof since mid-March.
Included in our memorial prayers, mtierney; and in our prayers for healing. May this holy season bring comfort and peace.
The National Catholic Register has an article about a prospective new saint and poet, Marie Noel. An excerpt from her poem on Holy Saturday seems particularly appropriate for today, as we are desperate to be cleanse of the devastating virus surrounding us all...
Song of Easter
Holy Saturday.
Hallelujah! Make, O sun, the house new!
My sisters, let each of you move
With the hands of a housewife and cheerful fingers...
It’s Easter! Let's throw out the dark dust,
Let's scrub the keys and locks with fine sand,
So that the door can open in peace.
Wax gently, wax lively the cupboard doors,
The window laughs in their shimmer!
Scrub! Let it gleam in the glow of the floor.
Let's dress her curtains in fresh muslin...
What a work! Did we bake the filbert cake
And put a bouquet on the table?
Hallelujah! We are done being dead,
From fasting, from closing our doors,
The heart closed and guarded by pious fears.
The priest delivered the flame and the wild waters,
Our soul goes out and has fun with our words
And our youth in our eyes.
Open wide the door to Holy Week.
My heart inside me skips and rings
As well as a bright gold bell that fell silent
And returns from Rome after the mystical times
Giving me flight and the tone of the hymns
For the joy of salvation.
For Orthodox Easter weekend, let’s be kind to each other please and not think of the evil out there.
It’s bad enough some of us have lived with that announcement and its implications for over a week.
Instead, let’s remember Bill/author and his delight in this season’s traditions (red eggs!, tzoureki!), and delight in the Byzantine chants.
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HUGE Rummage sale to benefit the Bloomfield High School Robotics Team Sale Date: Apr 27, 2024
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Stephen Whitty Presents - Hometown Movie Stars: The Celebrated Actors Of CHS
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Would love if my present parish, St Mary’s, would do that —it would seem more familiar. However, EWTN offers the opportunity, as do the Passionates in New York, Comcast Channel 10.