First Saturday
ST BONIFACE
2 Samuel, Chapter 12, Verse 18
On the seventh day, the child
died. David’s servants were AFRAID to
tell him that the child was dead, for they said: “When the child was alive, we
spoke to him, but he would not listen to what we said. How can we tell him the
child is dead? He may do some harm!”
Even
today advisers and courtiers of powerful men and women dread to tell bad news
or to tell the unfortunate truth to their leaders. David has fallen by killing
Bathsheba’s husband Uriah and the child of their unholy union has died. David
and even modern leaders forget the law of sacrifice. The law of the sacrifice
is simple: Those leaders who stop seeking new challenges; stop growing,
inevitably stop leading. John Maxwell states, “When we stop sacrificing, we
stop succeeding.”[1]
If you want to become a great
leader, you must be willing to make sacrifices.
1.
There
is no success without sacrifice. Every person who has achieved any success in
life has made sacrifices to do so.
2.
Leaders
are often asked to give up more than others. Leaders have to give up their
rights. Leaders need to learn how to put others ahead of themselves. It’s not
easy, but you need to give up more than the people you lead.
3.
You
must keep giving up, to stay up. John Maxwell takes the Law of Sacrifice even
further when he states that ‘If leaders have to give up to go up, then they
have to give up even more to stay up’. Today’s success is the greatest thread
to tomorrow’s success. There’s always a cost involved in moving forward. The
day you stop being willing to pay the price is the day when you stop creating
the results you desire.
4.
The
higher the level of leadership, the greater the sacrifice. You’ve probably
noticed that the higher the position, the fewer the number of people able to
step in. It’s not because there’s lack of capable people. It’s simply because
there’s not enough people willing to pay the price. From my childhood I
remember learning about the utopia of communism – they tried to make everybody
equal. Everybody should have the same rights and the same pay. The problem with
this is the law of sacrifice. There will always be some who will be willing to
sacrifice more, while others will not be willing to do anything extra. No
philosophy of equality will ever be able to overcome this mindset. It’s the
inner job. You must decide for yourself how much time, effort or other sacrifice
you’re going to assign to a specific job, project or task. The Law of Sacrifice
states that those who do, will go up. And those who continue doing this, will
stay up.[2]
Apostolic Exhortation[3]
Veneremur
Cernui – Down in Adoration Falling
of The Most Reverend Thomas J. Olmsted, Bishop of
Phoenix,
to Priests, Deacons, Religious and the Lay Faithful of the Diocese of Phoenix
on the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist
My
beloved Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Part II
III. Worthy Reception of Holy
Communion – Conforming our life with Christ
58. John Paul II reminded us of this
perennial teaching of the Church, that “the celebration of the Eucharist,
however, cannot be the starting-point for communion; it presupposes that communion
already exists, a communion that it seeks to consolidate and bring to
perfection” (Ecclesia et Eucharistia, no. 35). To receive all the graces and
benefits from Holy Communion that was mentioned above, the Eucharist requires
that we live and persevere in sanctifying grace and love, remaining within the
Church as one body and one spirit in Christ. Reaffirming the clear teaching of
the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Saint John Paul II stated, “Anyone
conscious of a grave sin must receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation before
coming to communion” (CCC 1385).
59. It is important to underline this intrinsic connection between the Sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist because, as Pope Benedict wrote, we are “surrounded by a culture that tends to eliminate the sense of sin and to promote a superficial approach that overlooks the need to be in a state of grace in order to approach sacramental communion worthily” (Sacramentum Caritatis, 20). A common and mistaken trend of our times is to presume that all have the right to approach and partake of the Body and Blood of the Lord and that limiting such a ‘right’ would go against the practice of Jesus Christ, who welcomed all sinners.
60. However, the teachings of the
Church have always been clear and based on Scripture. Holy Communion is
reserved for those, who with God’s grace make a sincere effort to live this
union with Christ and His Church by adhering to all that the Catholic Church
believes and proclaims to be revealed by God.
To be continued…
First Saturday
Five consecutive Saturdays in reparation to
the Immaculate Heart of Mary
The practice of the First
Saturday devotion was requested by Our Lady of Fatima, who appeared to three shepherd
children in Fatima, Portugal, multiple times starting in 1917. She said to
Lucia, the oldest of the three children: “I
shall come to ask . . . that on the First Saturday of every month, Communions
of reparation be made in atonement for the sins of the world.” Years later she repeated her
request to Sr. Lucia, the only one still living of the three young Fatima
seers, while she was a postulant sister living in a convent in Spain: “Look, my daughter, at my Heart,
surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce me at very moment by
their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console me and say that
I promise to assist at the hour of death, with the graces necessary for
salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months,
shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the rosary, and
keep me company for 15 minutes while meditating on the 15 mysteries of the
rosary, with the intention of making reparation to me.”
Conditions to Fulfill the First
Saturday Devotion
There are five
requirements to obtain this promise from the Immaculate Heart of Mary. On five
consecutive first Saturdays of the month, one should:
1. Have the intention of
consoling the Immaculate Heart in a spirit of reparation.
2. Go to confession
(within eight days before or after the first Saturday).
3. Receive Holy Communion.
4. Say five decades of the
Holy
Rosary.
5. Meditate for 15 minutes
on the mysteries
of the Holy Rosary
with the goal
of keeping Our Lady company (for example, while in church or before an image or
statue of Our Lady).
Read How to Make
Your First Saturday Rosary Meditation According to Sr. Lucia
Why Five Saturdays?
Our Lord appeared to Sr.
Lucia on May 29, 1930 and gave her the reason behind the five Saturdays
devotion. It is because there are five types of offenses and blasphemies
committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary:
1. Blasphemies against the
Immaculate Conception
2. Blasphemies against Our
Lady’s
perpetual virginity
3. Blasphemies
against her divine maternity, in refusing at the same time to recognize her as
the Mother of men
4. Blasphemies of
those who publicly seek to sow in the hearts of children, indifference or scorn
or even hatred of their Immaculate Mother
5. Offenses of those
who outrage Our Lady directly in her holy images
Never think that Jesus is
indifferent to whether or not His mother is honored!
Saint
Boniface[4]
A Benedictine monk was
chosen by divine Providence to become Germany's great apostle and patron. In
724 he turned his attention to the Hessian people. near the village of Geismar
on the Eder, he felled a giant oak that the people honored as the national
sanctuary of the god Thor. Boniface used the wood to build a chapel in honor of
St. Peter. This courageous act assured the eventual triumph of the Gospel in
Germany. Conversions were amazingly numerous. In 732 Boniface devoted his time
and talent to the organization of the Church in Germany. He installed bishops,
set diocesan boundaries, promoted the spiritual life of the clergy and laity,
held national synods (between 742 and 747), and in 744 founded the monastery of
Fulda, which became a center of religious life in central Germany. The final
years of his busy life were spent, as were his earlier ones, in missionary activity.
Word came to him in 754 that a part of Frisia had lapsed from the faith. He
took leave of his priests and, sensing the approach of death, carried along a
shroud. He was 74 years of age when with youthful enthusiasm he began the work
of restoration, a mission he was not to complete. A band of semi-barbarous
pagans overpowered and put him to death when he was about to administer
confirmation to a group of neophytes at Dockum. Patron: Brewers; Tailors; Germany; Prussia.
Things to
Do
·
One tradition about Saint Boniface says that he
used the customs of the locals to help convert them. There was a game in which
they threw sticks called kegels at smaller sticks called heides. Boniface
bought religion to the game, having the heides represent demons, and knocking
them down showing purity of spirit. You might use your ingenuity to imitate
this game for your children and tell them the story of St. Boniface. Sounds like bowling maybe go bowling in
honor of St. Boniface.
·
St. Boniface was the uncle of St.
Walburga.
·
St. Boniface, although an Englishman, planted
the seeds of the Catholic Faith in Germany (at that time "Germany"
included the domains of the Frankish monarchs, present-day Belgium and the
Netherlands), and now Germany calls St. Boniface her patron. Bake some special German cookies or treat
and learn some of the religious customs that come from this country.
Daily Devotions
·
Saturday
Litany of the Hours Invoking the Aid of Mother Mary
·
Offering to the
sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
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