‘Contraception is the achilles heel of the pro-life movement’ January 28, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Abortion, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, North Deanery, Society.comments closed
WOW!
A question – is posting these RealCatholicTV videos redundant for most folks? Are you seeing them elsewhere? If these are posts most folks blow past, I will scale back posting the videos unless I want to say something specific about the subject Voris addresses. Which, I usually do, but anyways…..
Thinking about this more, the link between the ‘contraceptive mentality’ and abortion is something that a person who accepts all the Doctrine of the Faith will readily accept. I have no problem with trying to improve knowledge of the links between contraception and abortion within the pro-life ‘movement.’ But this will have to be done with great charity, because so many people have come to be very wedded, if you will, to their use of contraception and acceptance of its necessity. It’s a cornerstone of modern American culture, and it’s going to take much prayer and effort to roll this acceptance, this reliance, back. Suddenly blasting protestants for using contraception (or, the vast majority of Catholics, for that manner), within the context of pro-life activities, is going to be a challenging task. It’s one thing to follow the Doctrine of the Faith, personally. It’s one thing to get fellow Catholics to accept that. It’s an entirely different issue to try to gain adherence to that doctrine by non-Catholics. That’s going to take some serious prayer.
Jesus and His Father’s Will January 28, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, North Deanery.comments closed
From the really very good Divine Intimacy, Chapter 60:
For us also, as adopted children of God, the way to sanctity, the rule of our actions must be our Heavenly Father’s Will. Like Jesus, we must be nourished by this holy, sanctifying Will; we must feed on it at every moment, we must seek it and desire to live by it alone, making it the one great motive for all our actions. “We must fully conform our will to God’s,” so that, as St. John of the Cross says, “there will be nothing in our thoughts or actions which is contrary to the Divine Will” (Ascent of Mt. Carmel I, 11, 2) [this implies conformity to all the Truth revealed by Christ through His Church – ED].
Conformity to God’s Will and the growth of Grace in us are the two constituent elements of sanctity and of a life of union with God. These two elements are inseparable, for one depends upon the other. Our increase in grace corresponds to our degree of conformity to God’s Will [as revealed through His Church, and the Truths revealed through the Church – ED]. Jesus said, “If anyone love Me, he will keep My word….and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him” (Jn 14:23). Keeping His Word, that is, obeying God’s Will as manifested in the commandments, is the condition necessary for living in a state of Grace, and, hence, for enjoying the presence of the Blessed Trinity in our soul [and goes beyond the commandments to all the 418 dogmas of the Faith]. The more complete our confromity to God’s Will becomes, the more the life of Grace grows and develops within us. The three Divine Persons, on Their part, give Themselves more and more to our souls, establishing their in-dwelling ever more fully and profoundly, thus drawing us to greater union with Themselves.
“O Good Master, You know that nothing is of more profit to me than to consecrate my will to the Father’s. You teach me to do this, knowing that it will win Your Father’s heart, and You also teach me how to serve Him…….
“O Divine Father, after your Son has consecrated to You my will, together with the wills of all, it would be unreasonable for me to refuse to give what He has offered.
“O Lord, what power there is in this gift of my will! If made with due determination, it cannot fail to draw You, Almighty God, to become one with our lowliness, to transform us into Yourself, and to unite the creature with the Creator……O my God, the more You see by our actions that the words we use when speaking to You are not words of mere politeness, the more You draw us to Yourself and raise us above all petty earthly things. Not content with having made our soul one with Yourself, You begin to cherish it and to reveal Your secrets to it……
“At this very moment, O Lord, I consecrate my will to You, freely and unreservedly!” (St. Teresa of Jesus, The Way of Perfection, 32).
Today is the feast day of St. Thomas Aquinas January 28, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, General Catholic.comments closed
In the new calendar, anyway. Some comments by the esteemable Fr. Robert Barron:
Truth is One. If you haven’t read any of St. Thomas Aquinas, you should try, even though it is quite challenging.
A beautiful hymn for Mary January 28, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, General Catholic, Our Lady.comments closed
I believe this was composed by the great Thomas a Kempis. It is in the book The Imitation of Mary:
Tender Girl
How beautiful you are, tender girl!
How gentle and how spotless!
How powerful an everlasting Queen,
as your miracle attest!Winter is now past……..
You were the fleece on the threshing-floor,
the ark of the covenant, the ivory tower:
be the shielf that saves us,
O pure wheat without chaff!And come…….
Worthiest daughter of David,
Virgin, most beautiful of women,
royal city and strong tower,
defend us against a bad death.Hear us………
I’ve never heard this hymn sung. I’m sure it has a Latin origin – anybody have any idea if this hymn is extant in any hymnals anywhere?
Here’s another hymn for Mary you are probably more familiar with:
How “dissent” affects the Church January 28, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Basics, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, sadness, sickness, Society.comments closed
From Dom Prosper Gueranger’s excellent The Holy Mass. First, a note regarding the prayers for the Church recited after the Sanctus during the consecration:
…..In order that all her members without exception may be named, Holy Church here speaks of all the Faithful….that is to say, those who are faithful in observing the Faith of Holy Church, for to be included in those mentioned here [those prayers preceding the Consecration, some of the most solemn prayers of the Church – ED], it is necessary to be in this Faith; it is necessary to be Orthodox, as she takes care to specify, omnibus orthodoxis, which means, those who think aright, who profess the Catholic Faith, -the Faith handed down by the Apostles. By laying such stress on these words: omnibus orthodoxis atque Catholicae et apostolicae fidei cultoribus, Holy Church would have us see, that she excludes from her prayer, on this occasion, those who are not of the household of the Faith, who do not think aright, who are not orthodox, who hold not their Faith from the Apostles [in other words, those who reject aspects of the revealed dogmas of the Church – ED].
The terms in which Holy Church expresses herself, throughout, show very clearly how far Holy Mass is alien to private devotions. She, then, must take the precedence, of all else, and her intentions must be respected. Thus does Holy Church give all her members a participation in the Great Sacrifice; so true is this, that were the Mass to be done away with, we should quickly fall again into the state of depravity in which pagan nations are sunk; and this is to be the work of Antichirst: he will take every possible means to prevent the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, so that this great counterpoise being taken away, God would necessarily put an end to all things, having now no object left in their further subsistence. We may readily understand this, if we observe how, since the introduction of protestantism, the inner strength of Society has materially waned. Social wars have been waged on after another, carrying desolation along with them, and all this solely, because the intensity of the Great Sacrifice of the Mass has been diminished…….[and, I would add, as the reverence with which the Mass is celebrated has waned in many locales, and with many of the abuses that have come on the scene over the past 40-50 years, there is an even further weakening of the Graces God provides with the celebration of the Mass, so that society is made doubly ill – ED].
Is the above too harsh? Too judging and legalistic? Or is it a valued part of the deposit of Faith, something that has perhaps been lost in many quarters of the Church? We can never know how much the Church, and the world, has been affected by the fragmentation of Christianity (there are now something like 50,000 protestant denominations), we can never know how much has been lost by lack of Faith within the Church. We shall never know, in this earthly exile, anyway, how much better, happier, more Grace filled, the world could be. Vatican II called for a great increase of devotion to all those Truths the Church has always held, but an illusory spirit rose up and crushed that increase in its nascent stages. I don’t know if some of the Council documents played a role in giving rise to that spirit – perhaps, but I do know if the Council documents had been interpreted in light of the constant Tradition of the Church, the Church, and the world, would be a far better place today.
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