Let Freedom Ring: Freedom from Consumerism
At a word from You the devil and his minions flee in terror.
You are the source of all truth. You are the source of all strength.
By the power of your Cross and Resurrection, we beseech You, O Lord
To extend Your saving arm and to send Your holy angels
To defend us as we do battle with Satan and his demonic forces.
Exorcise, we pray, that which oppresses Your Bride, The Church,
So that within ourselves, our families, our parishes, our dioceses, and our nation
We may turn fully back to You in all fidelity and trust.
Lord, we know if You will it, it will be done.
Give us the perseverance for this mission, we pray.
Amen
St. Joseph...pray for us
St. Michael the Archangel...pray for us
(the patron of your parish )... pray for us
(your confirmation saint)...pray for us
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. Amen.
__ Daily reflection and prayers
__ Litany of the day
__ Pray a Rosary
__ Divine Mercy Chaplet
__ Spiritual or corporal work of mercy
__ Fast/abstain (according to level)
__ Exercise (according to level/ability)
__ Refrain from conventional media (only 1 hr. of social)
__ Examination of conscience (confession 1x this week)
Friday In the Third Week of Lent
FAST
DAY
Deuteronomy, Chapter 6, Verse 13
The Lord, your God, shall you FEAR; him shall you serve, and by his
name shall you swear.
Whom
do you serve? What is the first thing you think of when you get up or the last
thing before you sleep? We all serve something; whom or what do you serve?
FOLLOW ONE MASTER ONLY
Whom do you serve?[2]
What is meant by serving God? Doing the will of God in all
things which He requires of us, in whatever state of life we may be placed, and
doing this with fidelity, with unwearied zeal, and out of love for Him.
Who are the two masters whom we
cannot serve at the same time? God
and an inordinate desire for worldly gain. One cannot serve both, because they
demand things that are contradictory.
Who are they that serve mammon, or worldly
wealth? The avaricious, who, impelled by their longing for riches, offend
God by manifold transgressions of His commandments.
Why does Christ refer us to the
birds of the air and the lilies of the field? To awaken in us confidence in Divine Providence. If
God feeds the young ravens (Ps. cxlvi. 9) and the birds of the air if He decks
so beautifully the flowers of the field, how much more will He not care for
men, whom He has created after His own image, and adopted as His children.
Are we, then, to use no care or
labor? That by no
means follows from what has been said. The Savior forbids only that anxiety,
proceeding from little faith, which, in striving for maintenance, neglects God’s
honor and commandments, and the good of one’s soul. For the rest, God Himself
has commanded man to labor (Gen. iii. 17-19); and St. Paul says, “If any man
will not work, neither let him eat” (n. Thess. iii. 10).
What should preserve us from
excessive anxiety?
A firm and living faith that God can and will help us. That He can is clear,
because He is almighty; that He will is certain, for the reason that He is love
that He has promised it to us, more than once, most expressly, and that He is
faithful in keeping His promises.
Let
us, then, trust in God, and daily renew our confidence in Him, particularly
when we say the Creed, or when, in the Our Father, we pray, Give us this day
our daily bread.
Consolation
in Poverty
In
your misery and poverty, say often, with Job: “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath
taken away; as it hath pleased the Lord so it is done; blessed be the name of
the Lord (Job i. 21). Or seek comfort in these words: “We lead indeed a poor
life, but we shall have many good things if we fear God and depart from all
sin, and do that which is good” (Job iv. 23).
Warning
against Usury
Usury
is that mortal sin which takes advantage of our neighbor’s poverty and need to
extort from him what is justly his own. Would that usurers might bear in mind
what the Lord says: “What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and
suffer the loss of his own soul?” (Matt. xvi. 26.)
Friday in the Third Week of Lent[3]
Prayer. LOOK down on
our fasts, we beseech Thee, O Lord, with merciful favor, that, as we abstain
from food in body, so we may fast from vice in mind.
EPISTLE. Numbers xx. 2-13.
In those days, the children of Israel came together against Moses
and Aaron: and making a sedition, they said: Would God we had perished among
our brethren before the Lord. Why have you brought out the Church of the Lord
into the wilderness, that both we and our cattle should die? Why have you made
us come up out of Egypt, and have brought us into this wretched place which
cannot be sowed, nor bringeth forth figs, nor vines, nor pomegranates, neither
is there any water to drink?
And Moses and Aaron leaving the multitude, went into the tabernacle
of the covenant, and fell flat upon the ground, and cried to the Lord, and
said: O Lord God, hear the cry of this people, and open to them Thy treasure, a
fountain of living water, that being satisfied they may cease to murmur. And
the glory of the Lord appeared over them. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
Take the rod, and assemble the people together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and
speak to the rock before them, and it shall yield waters. And when thou hast
brought forth water out of the rock, all the multitude and their cattle shall
drink. Moses therefore took the rod, which was before the Lord, as He had
commanded him. And having gathered together the multitude before the rock, he
said to them: Hear, ye rebellious and incredulous: Can we bring you forth water
out of this rock?
And when Moses had lifted up his hand, and struck the rock twice
with the rod, there came forth water in great abundance, so that the people and
their cattle drank. And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: Because you have not
believed Me, to sanctify Me before the children of Israel, you shall not bring
these people into the land which I will give them. This is the water of
contradiction, where the children of Israel strove with words against the Lord,
and He was sanctified in them.
GOSPEL. John iv. 5-42.
At that time Jesus came to a city of Samaria which is called
Sichar; near the land which Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob’s well was
there. Jesus therefore being wearied with His journey, sat thus on the well. It
was about the sixth hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus
saith to her: Give Me to drink. For His disciples were gone into the city to
buy meats. Then that Samaritan woman saith to Him: How dost Thou, being a Jew,
ask of me to drink, who am a Samaritan woman? For the Jews do not communicate
with the Samaritans. Jesus answered, and said to her: If thou didst know the
gift of God, and Who He is that saith to thee, Give Me to drink; thou perhaps
wouldst have asked of Him, and He would have given thee living water. The woman
saith to Him: Sir, thou hast nothing wherein to draw, and the well is deep:
from whence then hast Thou living water? Art Thou greater than our father
Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and
his cattle?
Jesus answered, and said to her: Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst
again; but he that shall drink of the water that I will give him shall not
thirst forever: but the water that I will give him shall become in him a
fountain of water springing up into life everlasting. The woman saith to Him:
Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come hither to draw. Jesus
saith to her: Go, call thy husband, and come hither. The woman answered and
said I have no husband. Jesus said to her: Thou hast said well, I have no
husband: for thou hast had five husbands: and he whom thou now hast is not thy
husband. This thou hast said truly. The woman saith to him: Sir, I perceive
that Thou art a prophet. Our fathers adored on this mountain, and you say that
at Jerusalem is the place where men must adore. Jesus saith to her: Woman,
believe Me, that the hour cometh when you shall neither on this mountain nor in
Jerusalem adore the Father. You adore that which you know not: we adore that
which we know; for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is,
when the true adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and in truth. For the
Father also seeketh such to adore Him. God is a spirit, and they that adore Him
must adore Him in spirit and in truth. The woman saith to Him: I know that the
Messias cometh (Who is called Christ): therefore, when He is come, He will tell
us all things. Jesus saith to her: I am He Who am speaking with thee. And
immediately His disciples came: and they wondered that He talked with the
woman. Yet no man said: What seekest Thou, or why talkest Thou with her?
The woman therefore left her water-pot, and went her way into the city, and saith
to the men there: Come, and see a man Who has told me all things whatsoever I
have done. Is not He the Christ?
They went therefore out of the city and came unto Him. In the
meantime, the disciples prayed Him, saying: Rabbi, eat. But He said to them: I have
meat to eat which you know not. The disciples therefore said one to another:
Hath any man brought Him to eat? Jesus saith to them: My meat is to do the will
of Him that sent Me, that I may perfect His work. Do not you say. there are yet
four months, and then the harvest cometh?
Behold I say to you, lift up your eyes, and see the countries, for they are
already to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit
unto life everlasting: that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice
together. For in this is the saying true: that it is one man that soweth, and
it is another that reapeth. I have sent you to reap that in which you did not
labor, others have labored, and you have entered into their labors. Now of that
city many of the Samaritans believed in Him, for the word of the woman giving
testimony: He told me all things whatsoever I have done. So, when the
Samaritans were come to Him, they desired Him that He would tarry there. And He
abode there two days. And many more believed in Him because of His own word.
And they said to the woman: We now believe, not for thy saying: for we
ourselves have heard Him and know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.
Lenten Calendar
Read: The Seven Penitential Psalms, Day Four:
(During times when we wish to express repentance and especially
during Lent, it is customary to pray the seven penitential psalms. The
penitential designation of these psalms’ dates back to the seventh century.
Prayerfully reciting these psalms will help us to recognize our
sinfulness, express our sorrow and ask for God’s forgiveness.) Today we will
focus on Psalm 51.
Reflect: Read this reflection on Psalm 51—The Miserere: Prayer of
Repentance.
Pray: “Have mercy on me, God, in accord with your merciful love; in
your abundant compassion blot out my transgressions.” (Ps 51:3, NABRE)
Act: In this chapter, the psalmist acknowledges his sins to the Lord,
and asks God to cleanse him from sin and unrighteousness. With faith in God’s
purity and faithfulness, he asks to be washed and cleansed, so that his heart
may be made pure. Listen to a recording of Psalm 51 as you follow
along with your Bible.
Aids
in Battle[4] Demons are not a figment of your
imagination
The Devil and other demons
would like us to believe that they are outdated, unenlightened superstitions,
but the Catholic Church remains firm, clear, and consistent in her teaching
about this reality.
·
Our
heavenly Father has placed over each of us an angel under whose protection and
vigilance we may be enabled to escape the snares secretly prepared by our
enemy, repel the dreadful attacks he makes on us.
·
Never
was anyone, conceived been liberated from the Devil’s dominion except by faith
in our Lord Jesus Christ, the mediator between God and humanity, who was
conceived without sin, was born and died. He alone by His death overthrew the
enemy of the human race, cancelling our sins, and unlocked the entrance to the
heavenly kingdom, which the first man by his sin had locked against himself and
all his posterity. COUNCIL OF FLORENCE (ECUMENICAL, 1431– 1445), SESSION 2
·
Men
are separated into two diverse and opposite parts, of which the one steadfastly
contends for truth and virtue, the other of those things which are contrary to
virtue and to truth. The one is the kingdom of God on earth, namely, the true
Church of Jesus Christ; and those who desire from their heart to be united with
it, so as to gain salvation, must of
necessity serve God and His only begotten Son with their whole mind and with an
entire will. The other is the kingdom of Satan, in whose possession and control
are all who follow the fatal example of their leader and of our first parents,
those who refuse to obey the divine and eternal law, and who have many aims of
their own in contempt of God, and many aims also against God. POPE LEO XIII,
HUMANUM GENUS (PAPAL ENCYCLICAL, 1884), 1
·
Satan
manages to sow in man’s soul the seed of opposition to the one who “from the
beginning” would be considered as man’s enemy— and not as Father. Man is
challenged to become the adversary of God! The analysis of sin in its original
dimension indicates that, through the influence of the “father of lies,”
throughout the history of humanity there will be a constant pressure on man to
reject God, even to the point of hating Him: “Love of self to the point of
contempt for God,” as St. Augustine puts it. POPE JOHN PAUL II, DOMINUM ET
VIVIFICANTEM (PAPAL ENCYCLICAL, 1986), 38
Thanks to Fear of the Lord, there is no Fear
of Evil[5]
History, in fact, is not alone in the hands of dark powers,
chance or human choices. Over the unleashing of evil energies, the vehement
irruption of Satan, and the emergence of so many scourges and evils, the Lord
rises, supreme arbiter of historical events. He leads history wisely towards
the dawn of the new heavens and the new earth, sung in the final part of the
book under the image of the new Jerusalem (cf. Revelation 21-22).
·
It must be reaffirmed, therefore, that God is
not indifferent to human events, but penetrates them realizing his
"ways," namely his plans and his efficacious "deeds."
·
According to our hymn, this divine intervention
has a very specific purpose: to be a sign that invites all the peoples of the
earth to conversion. Nations must learn to "read" in history a
message of God. Humanity's history is not confused and without meaning, nor is
it given over, without appeal, to the malfeasance of the arrogant and perverse.
There is the possibility to recognize divine action hidden in it. In the
pastoral constitution "Gaudium et Spes," Vatican Council II also
invites the believer to scrutinize, in the light of the Gospel, the signs of
the times to see in them the manifestation of the very action of God (cf. n. 4
and 11). This attitude of faith leads man to recognize the power of God
operating in history, and thus to open himself to fear of the name of the Lord.
In biblical language, in fact, this "fear" does not coincide with dread,
but is the recognition of the mystery of the divine transcendence. Because of
this, it is the basis of faith and is joined with love: "the Lord your God
requires of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to
love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your
soul" (cf. Deuteronomy 10:12).
·
Following this line, in our brief hymn, taken
from Revelation, fear and glorification of God are united: "Who will not
fear you, Lord, or glorify your name" (15:4)? Thanks to fear of the Lord
there is no fear of the evil that rages in history and one takes up again with
vigor the journey of life, as the prophet Isaiah declared: "Strengthen the
hands that are feeble, make firm the knees that are weak, say to those whose
hearts are frightened: ‘Be strong, fear not!’" (Isaiah 35: 3-4).
Daily Devotions
·
Manhood of
the Master-week 4 day 3
·
Offering to
the sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
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