Day 39-Let Freedom Ring: Freedom from Presumption
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We have allowed the temptation of the devil to move our hearts toward Presumption.
We think we are good enough.
We can recognize our attitude of Presumption whenever we simply do not show up for practice - whenever we do not make the effort to spend an hour a day with You.
At times we justify our Presumption because we have so many other things we "need" to do.
We ignore the plain truth that "if satan can't make you bad, he will make you busy."
At times we do not recognize in ourselves that we are the Pharisee who said "thank God I'm not like all those sinners back there."
Too infrequently do we approach the Sacrament of Confession of sins.
Too infrequently do we examine our conscience and see we really are sinners.
Too infrequently do we say to ourselves that we are unprofitable servants; for we have done only what we were obliged to do.
So often we just do not recognize our Presumption.
We turn to You Lord, in our weakness, and beg Your forgiveness for our Presumption, and especially for all the times we have failed to practice with and for Your Team, for all the times we have let down our teammates.
We love You, Lord, and we beg for the wisdom and strength to love You more.
We know, Lord, if You will it, it will be done.
Trusting in You, we offer our prayer to You who live and reign forever and ever.
Amen.
In Your power and goodness, You created all things.
You set a path for us to walk on and a way to an eternal relationship.
By the strength of Your arm and Word of Your mouth
Cast from Your Holy Church every fearful deceit of the Devil
Drive from us manifestations of the demonic that oppress us and beckon us to faithlessness and fear.
Still the lying tongue of the devil and his forces so that we may act freely and faithfully to Your will.
Send Your holy angels to cast out all influence that the demonic entities in charge of fear have planted in Your church.
Free us, our families, our parish, our diocese, and our country from all trickery and deceit perpetrated by the Devil and his hellish legions.
Trusting in Your goodness Lord,
We know if You will it, it will be done in unity with Your Son and the Holy Spirit, One God for ever and ever.
Amen.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, hear us.
Christ graciously hear us
God the Son, Redeemer of the world, have mercy on us.
God the Holy Spirit, etc.
Holy Trinity, One God,
Heart of Jesus, Son of the Eternal Father,
Heart of Jesus, formed in the womb of the Virgin Mother by the Holy Ghost,
Heart of Jesus, united substantially with the word of God,
Heart of Jesus, of infinite majesty,
Heart of Jesus, holy temple of God,
Heart of Jesus, tabernacle of the Most High,
Heart of Jesus, house of God and gate of heaven,
Heart of Jesus, glowing furnace of charity,
Heart of Jesus, vessel of justice and love,
Heart of Jesus, full of goodness and love,
Heart of Jesus, abyss of all virtues,
Heart of Jesus, most worthy of all praise,
Heart of Jesus, king and center of all hearts,
Heart of Jesus, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,
Heart of Jesus, in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Divinity,
Heart of Jesus, in whom the Father is well pleased,
Heart of Jesus, we have all received,
Heart of Jesus, desire of the everlasting hills,
Heart of Jesus, patient and rich in mercy,
Heart of Jesus, rich to all who invoke Thee,
Heart of Jesus, fount of life and holiness,
Heart of Jesus, propitiation for our sins,
Heart of Jesus, saturated with revilings,
Heart of Jesus, crushed for our iniquities,
Heart of Jesus, made obedient unto death,
Heart of Jesus, pierced with a lance,
Heart of Jesus, source of all consolation,
Heart of Jesus, our life and resurrection, .
Heart of Jesus, our peace and reconciliation,
Heart of Jesus, victim for our sins,
Heart of Jesus, salvation of those who hope in Thee,
Heart of Jesus, hope of those who die in Thee,
Heart of Jesus, delight of all saints,
Spare us, oh Lord.
Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world,
Christ graciously spare us.
Lamb of God who takest away the sins of the world,
Have mercy on us.
Make our hearts like unto Thine.
Almighty and everlasting God, look upon the Heart of Thy well-beloved Son and upon the acts of praise and satisfaction which He renders unto Thee in the name of sinners; and do Thou, in Thy great goodness, grant pardon to them who seek Thy mercy, in the name of the same Thy Son, Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with Thee, world without end.
ST. MAXIMILLIAN KOLBE
On
hearing this, Jesus answered him, “Do not be afraid; just have faith and she will be saved.”
When
we ask something of our Lord, make it big, and believe He can do it. For the
measure of faith that you have determines the measure of the healing from the
Lord. I remember over 40 years ago I was a young man stationed in Barbados and
became involved with a Christian cult of sorts, where a small group practiced
faith as a measure of power. The leader taught that as men we are created in
the image of God and we have the power to create miracles if we have the faith
to do it. It was explained that even evil men can tap this power provided they
believe which explains why some non-Christian’s can-do feats or miracles. As I
evolved in Christ, I drifted away from this group but still today I believe all
is possible via faith. This group I was in was called, “The Way.” I did an
internet search for it but could not find it, but I did find an interesting
Catholic resource written by Saint Jose Maria Escriva called “The Way.” “You
feel a gigantic faith. He who gives you that faith, will give you the means.”
The Way[1]
The strength,
the attraction of The Way is largely due to the fact that it is based on real,
living experience, being the fruit of the author's work as a priest which began
in 1925. The book appeared first in 1934 under the title Consideraciones
espirituales and later (in 1939) received its definitive title, after being
greatly expanded. Over the years, more than four and a half million copies have
been sold, in 43 different languages. This is one of the main attractions of
the book-its direct, conversational style, its personal and deeply human
character. As a reviewer in Osservatore Romano (March 24, 1950) put it:
"Msgr. Escriva de Balaguer has written something more than a masterpiece;
he has written straight from the heart, and straight to the heart go the short
paragraphs which make up The Way."
St.
Maximillian Kolbe[2]
Born Raymond Kolbe in
Poland, Jan. 8, 1894, he entered the Conventual Franciscan Order where he was
ordained a priest in 1918. Father Maximilian returned to Poland in 1919 and
began spreading his Militia of the Immaculata movement of Marian consecration
(whose members are also called MIs), which he founded on October 16, 1917. In
1927, he established an evangelization center near Warsaw called Niepokalanow,
the "City of the Immaculata." By 1939, the City had expanded from
eighteen friars to an incredible 650, making it the largest Catholic religious
house in the world. To better "win the world for the Immaculata," the
friars utilized the most modern printing and administrative techniques. This
enabled them to publish countless catechetical and devotional tracts, a daily
newspaper with a circulation of 230,000 and a monthly magazine with a
circulation of over one million. Maximilian started a shortwave radio station
and planned to build a motion picture studio--he was a true "apostle of
the mass media." He established a City of the Immaculata in Nagasaki,
Japan, in 1930, and envisioned missionary centers worldwide. Maximilian was a
ground-breaking theologian. His insights into the Immaculate Conception
anticipated the Marian theology of the Second Vatican Council and further
developed the Church's understanding of Mary as "Mediatrix" of all
the graces of the Trinity, and as "Advocate" for God's people. In
1941, the Nazis imprisoned Father Maximilian in the Auschwitz death camp. There
he offered his life for another prisoner and was condemned to slow death in a
starvation bunker. On August 14, 1941, his impatient captors ended his life
with a fatal injection. Pope John Paul II canonized Maximilian as a "martyr
of charity" in 1982. St. Maximilian Kolbe is considered a patron of
journalists, families, prisoners, the pro-life movement and the chemically
addicted. Militia
of the Immaculata
Things to
Do:
·
From
the Catholic Culture library, read The Holy
Spirit and Mary,
an explanation of St. Maximillian's Marian theology and Maximillian
Kolbe, Apostle of Mary
by Fr. John Hardon.
·
Offer
a Mass.
·
Say
a rosary for those who suffer in the world today from man's inhumanity.
·
Pray
for an end to abortion, our nation's own holocaust.
·
Read
about Auschwitz and ponder the modern gas chambers
(abortion, euthanasia, public school, cnn) in every state of our Union and
resolve to do all that you can to end the killing.
Blessing of Herbs and Fruits[3]
The Church
"baptized" an old pre-Christian belief in the great healing power of
herbs picked in August by instituting a ritual for the blessing of herbs and fruits
on the Feast of the Assumption. Since that time, Christians from both East and
West have blessed herbs and fruit on the Feast of the Assumption in the belief
that these sacramentals provide protection against harm and danger. But this
custom also hearkens back to the Hebrew observance of the harvest, and more importantly, it teaches us something
about our Lady's role in the economy of salvation. Eve foolishly used herbs
(fig leaves) to hide and aggravate her sin, thereby bringing about a disorder
of body and soul (Gen. 3.7). By contrast, Mary, the new Eve whose soul and body
are untouched by sin or the decay of death (as we celebrate on this day),
foreshadows a healing of our corporeal frailties, a healing represented by
herbs. Likewise, fruits are an appropriate symbol for the new Eve because she
never ate of the forbidden fruit but brought forth only the fruit of good works
and, most importantly, the Fruit of
her womb, Jesus Christ. The blessed fruit thus betokens the fruit of a holy and
generous life which we are called to enjoy from our Lord through the patronage
of His mother. In any case the solemn blessing of herbs and fruits on this day
became so popular that in central Europe August 15 was simply called Our
Lady's Herb Day. Usually these blessings would take place before
Mass and would involve whatever was brought by the congregation to the church.
Afterwards the herbs would be kept for medicinal use while the fruit would be
served at dinner. The following is one of the special blessings from the Roman
ritual that is used for herbs and fruits on Assumption Day:
O God, who by Moses Thy servant didst
command the children of Israel to carry their sheaves of new fruits to the
priests for a blessing, to take the finest fruits of the orchards, and to make
merry before Thee, the Lord their God: Kindly hear our supplications, and pour
forth the abundance of Thy blessing upon us and upon these sheaves of new
grain, new herbs, and assortment of fruits, which we gratefully present to Thee
and which we bless on this feast in Thy name. And grant that men, cattle,
sheep, and beasts of burden may find in them a remedy against sickness,
pestilence, sores, injuries, spells, the poison of snakes, and the bites of
other venomous and nonvenomous creatures. And may they bring protection against
diabolical illusions, machinations, and deceptions wherever they are kept or
carried, or with whatever arrangement is made of them: that with sheaves of
good works and through the merits of the Blessed Virgin Mary whose Feast of the
Assumption we celebrate, we may deserve to be lifted up to heaven. Through our
Lord Jesus Christ, Thy son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of
the Holy Spirit, God unto endless ages. Amen.
The blessing of herbs and
fruits has also led to the lovely custom of giving and receiving baskets
of fruit on the Feast of the Assumption, a custom which was
especially popular in Sicily.
Blessing
of Nature[4]
August
15th is the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and just
as Mary's assumption into heaven signifies her purity of body and soul, so too
does it remind us of her freedom from the curses of the Fall, such as having to
live by the sweat of one's brow on a land that yields only thorns and thistles
(Gen. 3.18,19). It is perhaps for this reason that the Feast or the Octave of
the Assumption was a favorite time for blessing the scene of man's labors,
especially those related to the production of food. In Western Europe, for
example, fields would often be blessed by the parish priest, while in America
and Latin countries Assumption Day is traditionally the occasion for blessing
the fishing fleets of coastal towns. Also tying into this theme of nature is
the German and Austrian time Mary is invoked for assistance or thanked for the
autumn harvest of grains. This period lasts from Assumption Day until September
15, the Feast of the Seven custom of Our Lady's Thirty Days (Frauendreissiger), during which Sorrow of the
Blessed Virgin. Legend states that nature is particularly benign during this
time: snakes do not bite, wild animals do not attack, and food picked within
the thirty days is especially wholesome. Finally, parts of England and Ireland
observe Our Lady's Health Bathing, where bathing in rivers, lakes, the
ocean, or any natural body of water is considered particularly good for one's
health.
Total Consecration
to St. Joseph-Day 26[5]
On
Day 26 Father Calloway underscores that virginity and chase purity is the
greatest gift a man or woman can give back to God.
Lord,
have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.
God,
the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.
God
the Son, Redeemer of the world, Have mercy on us.
God
the Holy Spirit have mercy on us.
Holy
Trinity, One God, have mercy on us.
Holy
Mary, pray for us.
Saint
Joseph, Pray for Us.
Noble
offspring of David, Pray for Us.
Light
of Patriarchs, Pray for Us.
Spouse
of the Mother of God, Pray for Us.
Chaste
Guardian of the Virgin, Pray for Us.
Foster
Father of the Son of God, Pray for Us.
Zealous
Defender of Christ, Pray for Us.
Head
of the Holy family, Pray for Us.
Joseph
Most Just, Pray for Us.
Joseph
Most Chaste, Pray for Us
Joseph Most Prudent, Pray for Us.
Joseph Most Courageous, Pray for Us.
Joseph Most Obedient, Pray for Us.
Joseph Most Faithful, Pray for Us.
Mirror of Patience, Pray for Us.
Lover of Poverty, Pray for Us.
Model of Workmen, Pray for Us.
Glory of Domestic Life, Pray for Us.
To Joseph virginity
is a treasure.
Saint Joseph, father and guardian of virgins, to whose faithful keeping Christ Jesus, innocence itself, and Mary, the virgin of virgins was entrusted, I pray and beseech you by that twofold and most precious charge, by Jesus and Mary, to save me from all uncleanness, to keep my mind untainted, my heart pure, and my body chaste; and to help me always to serve Jesus and Mary in perfect chastity. Amen.[6]
A Miraculous
Staircase in New Mexico[7]
Legend
says that to find a solution to the seating problem, the Sisters of the Chapel
made a novena to St. Joseph, the patron saint of carpenters. On the ninth and
final day of prayer, a man appeared at the Chapel with a donkey and a toolbox
looking for work. Months later, the elegant circular staircase was completed,
and the carpenter disappeared without pay or thanks. After searching for the
man (an ad even ran in the local newspaper) and finding no trace of him, some
concluded that he was St. Joseph himself, having come in answer to the sisters'
prayers.
The
stairway's carpenter, whoever he was, built a magnificent structure. The design
was innovative for the time and some of the design considerations still perplex
experts today.
The
staircase has two 360 degree turns and no visible means of support. It is said
that the staircase was built without nails—only wooden pegs. Questions also
surround the number of stair risers relative to the height of the choir loft
and about the types of wood and other materials used in the stairway's
construction.
Over the years many have flocked to the Loretto Chapel to see the
Miraculous Staircase. The staircase has been the subject of many articles, TV
specials, and movies including "Unsolved Mysteries" and the
full-length movie titled "The Staircase", starring William
Petersen and Barbara Hershey.
·
If the carpenter were St. Joseph; I contend that as a father, he
would have to have needed help to construct this staircase and as a dad would
he not have called on his son to help him?
Pray the Litany of St. Joseph.
Daily Devotions
·
Offering to
the sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
[2]http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2017-08-14
[5]https://catholicexchange.com/now-is-the-time-to-consecrate-yourself-to-saint-joseph
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