Monday, May 19, 2014

Reflection on the Hail Mary

The prayer "Hail Mary"
May being the month of Mary, I decided to focus today on that daily prayer to Our Lady which is so familiar but bears a little examination so that we can make the best use of it.
Hail Mary
At the beginning of the prayer, we can put ourselves in the frame of mind to talk to our Blessed Lady. We can do so because she is the Mother of Jesus, she is the Queen of Heaven and Our Lord wants us to go to her. “Son, behold your mother”, he said. We are greeting Our Lady personally: this reminds us that prayer is not simply the saying of words in a formula, but a personal encounter in which we converse – primarily with God, but also with the angels, Our Lady and the Saints.

We can imagine ourselves bowing with the deepest respect before our Queen and Mother as we try to imitate the reverence shown to her even by such a great being as an archangel. We know that if we are sincere, we will not be held at fault for our clumsiness or lack of knowing how we should speak properly. Our Lady listens with great kindness and attention to our humble words.

Full of grace
Our Lady is sinless and perfect. This does not distance her from us; on the contrary, it makes her the perfect friend for us, someone who is always seeking our good. Our own faults and sins sometimes make us ashamed or fearful of someone who is so much superior to us in holiness and goodness, but that very goodness is itself a guarantee of her graceful understanding.

We need not expect Our Lady to be anything but horrified by sins against chastity. However, like a good mother, she knows that temptations are rife, and that these sins exist. After we have repented, she guides us to seek God’s mercy and grace in the sacrament of confession, and does not despise us. The very thought of her can help us to resist temptation to such sins.
The Lord is with theeOur Lady was constantly listening to God and his voice in her heart. He was with her by grace but this was an active presence, an exchange in which she was in continual peace and companionship with God. Even when distracted by worldly chores and business, God’s presence was the backdrop of her life.

Our Lady followed her conscience – only her conscience, unlike ours, was perfectly formed. Not only was she instructed in the law of God, her judgements on what to do here and now were unsullied by that self-seeking and inclination to our own desires that mark our own struggles to choose what is right and good.

The Lord wishes also to be with us, not only at our fixed times of prayer or in the Church itself, but at all times as He is always present whatever we do, wherever we are. The Hail Mary can remind us of this constant truth that God is indeed everywhere.

Blessed art thou among women
St Elizabeth recognised Our Lady’s greatness straight away when she came to visit her after being told of her exalted vocation by the angel Gabriel. “Why should I be blessed by a visit from the mother of my Lord?”

At the same time, St John the Baptist leapt in the womb – an unborn child making an act of faith in the presence of his cousin as an embryo of only a few days implanted in the womb of the Blessed Virgin.

The recognition of these great saints teaches us the fundamental reason why we give so much honour to Our Lady. She carried God the Son in her womb for nine months and was chosen for the supreme privilege of nursing and nurturing Him in His childhood. If we really reflect on this great truth, played out on the world of whose history we are a part with her, we can only bow down in love and awe at the greatness of this woman who acknowledge in humility “All generations shall call me blessed.” How fortunate we are to know this and to respond with our hearts.

Blessed is the fruit of thy womb
Our Lady leads us always to Christ. It is one of the saddest mistakes of the reformation to think that somehow Our Lady detracts from our devotion to Jesus Christ. On the contrary, she draws us to Him, shows Him to us, and teaches us how to be His disciples. If sometimes we find that we are distracted at Mass, it is a sure way back to true devotion to ask the assistance of Our Lady to help us to make our own offerings at Mass, of adoration, thanksgiving, sorrow, and petition for the grace of God. This is also true for the priest. He can ask for no greater assistance in His attempts to celebrate the Eucharist with due reverence and devotion than to ask the help of that holy Mother who stood by the foot of the Cross and can guide Him at the altar.We should pray for priests who have grown lukewarm – it happens – that Our Lady will set them on fire anew with the genuine devotion of true disciples who will bring Our Lord to others
Holy Mary, Mother of God
Being the Mother of God is the source of all Our Lady’s other titles. They are not simply nice thoughts but they tell us the truth. Mary also safeguards the truth about Jesus Christ. Because she is the Mother of God, it shows us that he is truly God and truly Man. For this reason, Our Lady has been called the “Destroyer of heresies.” As Mother of the Church, she gives her protection to those who ask for it, enabling them to teach what is true and orthodox concerning Christ.

In our secular culture it is easy to be swayed by popular opinion, to water down the teaching of Christ and His Church to make it more acceptable, to avoid arguments or sneering, or to make things easier in our own lives. Our Lady’s total fidelity at the Passion can shame us to stand up and be counted, to defend the faith at the cost of ridicule, to be known as disciples of Christ, to be proud to be such – not of course though any self-congratulation considering our weakness, but that legitimate pride in being under the banner of the Cross, of being His men.

Pray for us sinners
Our Lady never sinned but she knew more than anyone the damage caused by sin. We call her co-redemptrix because of her share in the passion of Christ. Her perfection in grace means that she above all is the terror of demons who flee in terror from her very name as exorcists testify.

Yet she is also compassionate towards us, affected by the wound of original sin, and weighed down by our own past sins and habits of sin. We beg her prayers for us as sinners because they are most powerful, both in helping us to resist temptation and in putting new heart into us when we have fallen. She also knows well the infinite mercy of her Son “with whom there is fullness of redemption” and the folly of ever despairing of this mercy.

Now and at the hour of our death
Every Hail Mary is a way of preparing for the time when we die so that we are not lost at that moment. This is something we should remember often: it is why the Church in her wisdom has placed this petition at the end of the prayer.

Many people live as if death were not a fact of our lives. But our life here on earth is short, we have one soul to save, and an eternity to enjoy the presence of God or to lose Him for ever. Nothing is more important than our eternal salvation.

Therefore we ask Jesus, Mary and Joseph to help us to prepare for our death by a good life. We also pray for a happy death, which means dying in a state of grace, fortified by the sacraments of the Church.

The Hail Mary is a simple but very rich prayer. We should sometimes take a little time – it is after all only a short prayer – to say it more slowly, to savour the sweetness of the words, to ask Our Blessed Mother to grace us with her prayers, and to form us anew as the disciples of her Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ.

Hail Mary…
 

WHILE MOST CONCEPTS OF HELL INVOLVE HEAT AND FLAMES, MORE DEPICTIONS FOCUS ON PITS AND CAVES OF DARKNESS

Hell Cave By NatMonney Wallpaper

What is hell like?
Few would want to find out first-hand.
But hell there is.
It's where the soul that rejects God gravitates: to a place with no direct Presence, where there is the frightening absence of God.
Mostly, we associate fire -- flames -- with sheol. The seers at Fatima, Portugal, saw it as such: roaring fires that flamed up into themselves. We all are familiar with the term "hellfire." This was also described at the apparition site of Medjugorje: fire into which a beautiful woman entered and came out half-human, half-beast (the classic depiction, too, of a demon).
The Bible described a netherworld called Gehenna. Jesus described the "outer darkness" (Matthew 22:13).
When one rejects the Light of God, there is darkness.
That darkness is often described both in the mystical literature of Catholicism as well as recent alleged near-death experiences as a place of pits, of caves, of dungeons.
We just viewed a video of a man who nearly drowned (his heart had stopped for nine minutes), and while they tried to revive him, found himself heading to a dark place and two torches. There was a heap of gold (coins, goblets) and sitting atop of this tall pile of gold was the devil or a major demon, with a bull's head but a human face, and curved horns.
It was a dungeon. So many describe a thick blackness -- more than flames.
One of the most sobering such accounts comes to us from the great doctor of the Church, Saint Teresa of Avila.
"I was at prayer one day when suddenly, without knowing how, I found myself, as I thought, plunged right into hell," she wrote in her autobiography. "I realized that it was the Lord's Will that I should see the place which the devils had prepared for me there and which I had merited for my sins. This happened in the briefest space of time, but, even if I were to live for many years, I believe it would be impossible for me to forget it.
"The entrance, I thought, resembled a very long, narrow passage, like a furnace, very low, dark, and closely confined; the ground seemed to be full of water which looked like filthy, evil-smelling mud, and in it were many wicked-looking reptiles. At the end there was a hollow place scooped out of a wall, like a cupboard, and it was here that I found myself in close confinement."
There was an "interior fire and despair" that were "the worst things of all."
Went on the saint: "In that pestilential spot, where I was quite powerless to hope for comfort, it was impossible to sit or lie, for there was no room to do so. I had been put in this place which looked like a hole in the wall, and those very walls, so terrible to the sight, bore down on me and completely stifled me. There was no light and everything was in the blackest darkness." This reminds us too of the account from a Protestant named Angie Fenimore, who said the darkness was "alive" and so thick she felt she could form things from it.
Darkness. Pits. Caverns.
There is also the amazing account (in Struck By Lightning) by the dentist Gloria Polo, who said after a life of materialism, lack of compassion, and sexual sin she found herself in a place of "emptiness" and "headed toward several tunnels that went down toward the bottom. At the beginning, there was still a little light, like a beehive in which there were many people: young and old, men and women who were crying and grinding their teeth with frightening screams... I roamed in those tunnels, in the frightening darkness, until I arrived to an obscurity that cannot be compared to anything else. I can only say that a comparison would be the darkest corner on earth compared to the full sunlight at midday. Down there, the darkness generates pain, horror, and shame. It smells terribly. It is a living obscurity, yes, it is alive."
How many people might we know who may be at similar risk (especially non-believers) -- and what can we do to inform them of that risk?
Are we ourselves cleansed?
Next, we'll take a look at more recent experiences.



http://www.spiritdaily.com/pits.htm

Bishop Bernard Fellay contradicted by Archbishop Thomas E.Gullickson, John Martignoni : Vatican Council II does not contradict extra ecclesiam nulla salus

The same declaration (LG, 8) also recognizes the presence of “salvific elements” in non-Catholic Christian communities. The decree on ecumenism goes even further, adding that “the Spirit of Christ does not refrain from using these churches and communities as means of salvation, which derive their efficacy from the fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the Catholic Church.” (UR, 3)
Such statements are irreconcilable with the dogma “No salvation outside of the Church,” which was reaffirmed by a Letter of the Holy Office on August 8, 1949.-Bishop Bernard Fellay, Letter to Friends and Benefactors (April 13,2014)
 
Does  LG 8 and UR 3 refer to an an explicit exception to extra ecclesiam nulla salus ? Is implicit desire and being saved in invincible ignorance an exception to the traditional interpretation of extra ecclesiam nulla salus ? -L.A

BISHOP FELLAY'S DOCTRINAL ERROR CONTRIBUTES TO THE TLM BEING TARGETED

http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/03/bishop-fellays-doctrinal-error.html#links

http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/03/sspx-priests-contradict-catechism-of.html#links

Catechism of Pope Pius X and Catechism of the Catholic Church 1993 do not state there is known salvation outside the Church

ARCHBISHOP LEFEBVRE, MICHAEL DAVIS MADE AN OBJECTIVE MISTAKE: TRADITIONALISTS ARE STILL REELING http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/02/archbishop-lefebvre-michael-davis-made.html#links


Doctrinal crisis within the SSPX and they don't know how to handle it

http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/03/doctrinal-crisis-within-sspx-and-they.html#links

NEW REVELATION IN THE CHURCH WITH VATICAN COUNCIL II FOR FATHER PIERPAOLO PETRUCCI : EXPLICIT-IMPLICIT MIX UP

http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/03/new-revelation-in-church-with-vatican.html#links

___________________________________________________
 
CATHOLIC PRIESTS IN ROME AGREE WITH FR.LEONARD FEENEY: THERE IS NO BAPTISM OF DESIRE THAT WE CAN KNOW OF

IRRESPECTIVE IF THE BAPTISM OF DESIRE RESULTS IN JUSTIFICATION OR JUSTIFICATON AND SALVATION IT IS NOT AN EXPLICIT EXCEPTION TO THE DOGMA EXTRA ECCLESIAM NULLA SALUS.

JOHN MARTIGNONI SAYS VATICAN COUNCIL II IS IN AGREEMENT WITH EXTRA ECCLESIAM NULLA SALUS AND THE SYLLABUS: WHEN WILL THE SSPX AND THE VATICAN CURIA ACKNOWLEDGE IT?

Implicit intention, invincible ignorance and a good conscience (LG 16) in Vatican Council II do not contradict extra ecclesiam nulla salus –John Martignoni

 
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The Holy Spirit can not teach the Church to interpret Vatican Council II using an irrational premise


Letter to Friends and Benefactors no. 82 ( with comments )

 
Dear friends and benefactors,
If on April 27th John XXIII and John Paul II are canonized, the act will present a double problem to the Catholic conscience. Firstly, the problem of the canonization itself: how can it be possible to offer to the whole Church as an example of sanctity the instigator of Vatican Council II and the Pope of Assisi and human rights?
Lionel: Note he is correctly criticizing Vatican Council II interpreted with the false inference.However he is not aware of the false inference. He himself uses it in this Letter to reject the Council.
 
But there is also the deeper problem of what will appear to be an unprecedented recognition of catholicity: how is it possible to put the Church’s stamp of approval and sanctity on the teachings of such a Council,
Lionel: He is not aware of the cause of the irrationality and break with Tradition in Vatican Council II. Vatican Council II interpreted with the false premise must present teachings which are a break with the past.He is not aware of this.
 
which inspired all of Karol Wojtyla’s action and whose rotten fruits are the indisputable indication of the Church’s self-destruction?
Lionel: The Council was there before Pope John Paul II became the pope.The Council was interpreted also by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre with a false premise.Without the false premise the Council is traditional on other religions and exclusive salvation in the Catholic Church.
The enemies of the Church have used a false premise in the interpretation of Vatican Council II (1965) and the Letter of the Holy Office 1949.
 
This second problem offers the solution: the errors contained in the documents of Vatican Council II and in the reforms that followed, especially in the liturgical reform, could not possibly be the work of the Holy Ghost, who is at once the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Holiness.
Lionel: The Holy Spirit can not teach the Church to interpret Vatican Council II using an irrational premise.
Without the false premise Vatican Council II is in agreement with the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus.
 
That is why it seems necessary to us to recall the principal errors and the fundamental reasons for which we cannot subscribe to the novelties of the Council and of the reforms that came of it, any more than to these canonizations that hope to “canonize” Vatican II.
Lionel: The principal error is assuming all salvation in mentioned in Vatican Council II as being visible to us on earth. This is a contradition. In general we humans cannot see those who are in Heaven in 2014. So these persons  who are saved are not exceptions to the traditional teaching of the Catholic Church on salvation, as now held by Bishop Fellay and the SSPX.
-Lionel Andrades
 

Letter to Friends and Benefactors no. 82 (text)

Dear friends and benefactors,
 
If on April 27th John XXIII and John Paul II are canonized, the act will present a double problem to the Catholic conscience. Firstly, the problem of the canonization itself: how can it be possible to offer to the whole Church as an example of sanctity the instigator of Vatican Council II and the Pope of Assisi and human rights?
But there is also the deeper problem of what will appear to be an unprecedented recognition of catholicity: how is it possible to put the Church’s stamp of approval and sanctity on the teachings of such a Council, which inspired all of Karol Wojtyla’s action and whose rotten fruits are the indisputable indication of the Church’s self-destruction? This second problem offers the solution: the errors contained in the documents of Vatican Council II and in the reforms that followed, especially in the liturgical reform, could not possibly be the work of the Holy Ghost, who is at once the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Holiness.
That is why it seems necessary to us to recall the principal errors and the fundamental reasons for which we cannot subscribe to the novelties of the Council and of the reforms that came of it, any more than to these canonizations that hope to “canonize” Vatican II....(continued)
 
 

Bishop Bernard Fellay made a factual mistake in Letter to Friends and Benefactors no. 82 : we cannot see the dead

http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2014/05/bishop-bernard-fellay-has-made-factual.html#links
 

The Catholic Church will be taken over by the enemies of God from within...

The Catholic Church will be taken over by the enemies of God from within and this will lead to the greatest apostasy of all time.  1
 
“My wish for the Italian Church is that it is able to listen without any taboo to the arguments in favour of married priests, the Eucharist for the divorced, and homosexuality ...- Bishop Galantino


Tuesday, 13 May 2014

My open letter to top Italian bishop on pro-life prayerful witness outside abortion clinics 2

I am deeply troubled by the reported intervention of Bishop Galantino (pictured), the secretary-general of the Italian bishops' conference, who, according to "The Tablet" has said:

“My wish for the Italian Church is that it is able to listen without any taboo to the arguments in favour of married priests, the Eucharist for the divorced, and homosexuality ... In the past we have concentrated too much on abortion and euthanasia. It mustn’t be this way because in the middle there’s real life which is constantly changing ... I don’t identify with the expressionless person who stands outside the abortion clinic reciting their rosary, but with young people, who are still against this practice, but are instead fighting for quality of life, their health, their right to work.”

I am writing to Bishop Galantino today as follows:

Your Excellency,

I have read your reported comments, quoted today by The Tablet, saying, amongst other things, that you "don't identify with the expressionless person who stands outside the abortion clinic reciting their rosary".

I do hope you have been misreported. Please let me know if that's the case.

I thought I would let you know that I do identify with the person outside the abortion clinic praying their rosary, whether or not the person is expressionless.

Just 30 minutes ago I received the following message from a wonderful group in England which organizes, at great personal sacrifice, people to stand outside an abortion clinic in Twickenham, west London. The message said: "Pray hard for "Lucia", 20 weeks pregnant. Her abortion is booked for next week in Twickenham."

I have prayed for Lucia. I did so before writing to you. Whilst writing, may I ask that you pray for her too and ask others to do so?

In my experience, these prayers work. I am constantly getting messages from the same source, the wonderful group in England,which tell me about young women who, seeing the people outside the abortion clinics praying, change their minds and keep their baby.

If I may, I will send you a full report on the work of this group.

Also, may I ask you a question in relation to what you reportedly say: "In the past we have concentrated too much on abortion and euthanasia"? (Again, I hope you have been misreported. Please let me know if that is the case.)

It's probably fair to say that tens of thousands of unborn children, each one made in the image and likeness of God, are killed every day throughout the world. For example, there are 500 killed daily in Britain, thousands in the US, thousands upon thousands in China, to name just three of the world's 193 countries.

Your Excellency, if it were Catholic priests or Jews who were being killed, or threatened with being killed, by national laws in Britain or in other parts of the world – would we expect, any day of the week, ever to enter a Catholic Church for Mass without the matter being mentioned, or being prayed about at that Mass? Would we not be denouncing, and rightly denouncing, the killing of Catholic priests or Jews, in every pulpit in the world – notwithstanding the past sins and scandals associated with members of the Catholic Church? The Jew, the priest, the unborn child are all created in the image and likeness of God.

I really don't think you would be saying, if national laws had allowed the killing of Catholic priests or Jews over the past few decades: "In the past we have concentrated too much on the killing of Catholic priests or Jews...". Indeed, you would probably be saying: "We can never do enough to denounce this grotesque evil".

Your Excellency, please reconsider your reported position.

May I come to meet you, in the company of one of my colleagues who has had an abortion, and discuss the whole matter with you?

Assuring you of my prayers.

God bless

John Smeaton
Chief Executive


1.
 http://www.thewarningsecondcoming.com/about/
2.
http://spuc-director.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/my-open-letter-to-top-italian-bishop-on.html