FATIMA
ANNIVERSARY
Acts, Chapter 13, verse 26
My brothers, children of the family of
Abraham, and those others among you who are GOD-FEARING, to us this word of salvation has been sent.
Is there no end to the Hubris of man, who has no fear of God, making himself the purveyors of good and evil?
In the United States and France, during the Age of enlightenment two forms of government were established; one was God fearing and the other made reason, science and the Egoism of Man into modernist gods.
America’s
revolution although immersed in the ideology of the age of enlightenment
retained its fear of God which was indeed been our salvation. Whereas France
lost its fear of God and as a result found no salvation in man; thus, began the
reign of terror and Napoleonic wars. God is no tyrant; his church although
flawed is his Kingdom on earth there is no other way to salvation.
A number of novel ideas about religion developed
with the Enlightenment, including Deism and talk of atheism. Deism, according
to Thomas Paine, is the simple belief in God the Creator, with no reference to
the Bible or any other miraculous source. Instead, the Deist relies solely on personal
reason to guide his creed,
which was eminently agreeable to many thinkers of the time. Atheism was much
discussed, but there were few proponents. Wilson and Reill note that, "In
fact, very few enlightened intellectuals, even when they were vocal critics of
Christianity, were true atheists. Rather, they were critics of orthodox belief,
wedded rather to skepticism, deism, vitalism, or perhaps pantheism." Some
followed Pierre Bayle and argued that atheists could indeed be moral men. Many
others like Voltaire held that without belief in a God who punishes evil, the
moral order of society was undermined. That is, since atheists gave themselves
to no Supreme Authority and no law, and had no fear of eternal consequences,
they were far more likely to disrupt society. Bayle (1647–1706) observed that
in his day, "prudent persons will always maintain an appearance of
[religion].". He believed that even atheists could hold concepts of honor
and go beyond their own self-interest to create and interact in society. Locke
said that if there were no God and no divine law, the result would be moral
anarchy: every individual "could have no law but his own will, no end but
himself. He would be a god to himself, and the satisfaction of his own will the
sole measure and end of all his actions".[1]
All Saints’ Day
was originally on May 13 in Rome, but the feast day was transferred to November
1, right at the time of harvest to provide food for the pilgrims traveling to
Rome.
May 13 is the anniversary
of the apparition of Our Lady to three shepherd children in the small village
of Fatima in Portugal in 1917. She appeared six times to Lucia, 9, and
her cousins Francisco, 8, and his sister Jacinta, 6, between May 13, 1917, and
October 13, 1917. The story of Fatima begins in 1916, when, against the
backdrop of the First World War which had introduced Europe to the most
horrific and powerful forms of warfare yet seen, and a year before the
Communist revolution would plunge Russia and later Eastern Europe into six
decades of oppression under militant atheistic governments, a resplendent
figure appeared to the three children who were in the field tending the family
sheep.
“I am the Angel of Peace,”
said the figure, who appeared to them two more times that year exhorting them
to accept the sufferings that the Lord allowed them to undergo as an act of
reparation for the sins which offend Him, and to pray constantly for the conversion
of sinners.
Then, on the 13th day of
the month of Our Lady, May 1917, an apparition of ‘a woman all in white, more
brilliant than the sun’ presented itself to the three children saying “Please
don’t be afraid of me, I’m not going to harm you.” Lucia asked her where she
came from and she responded, “I come from Heaven.” The woman wore a
white mantle edged with gold and held a rosary in her hand. The woman asked
them to pray and devote themselves to the Holy Trinity and to “say the Rosary
every day, to bring peace to the world and an end to the war.”
She also revealed that the
children would suffer, especially from the unbelief of their friends and
families, and that the two younger children, Francisco and Jacinta would be
taken to Heaven very soon, but Lucia would live longer in order to spread her
message and devotion to the Immaculate Heart.
In the last apparition the
woman revealed her name in response to Lucia’s question: “I am the Lady of the
Rosary.” That same day, 70,000 people had turned out to witness the apparition,
following a promise by the woman that she would show the people that the
apparitions were true. They saw the sun make three circles and move around the
sky in an incredible zigzag movement in a manner which left no doubt in their
minds about the veracity of the apparitions. By 1930 the Bishop had
approved of the apparitions and they have been approved by the Church as
authentic. The messages Our Lady imparted during the apparitions to the
children concerned the violent trials that would afflict the world by means of
war, starvation, and the persecution of the Church and the Holy Father in the
twentieth century if the world did not make reparation for sins. She exhorted
the Church to pray and offer sacrifices to God in order that peace may come
upon the world, and that the trials may be averted.
Our Lady of Fatima
revealed three prophetic “secrets,” the first two of which were revealed
earlier and refer to the vision of hell and the souls languishing there, the
request for an ardent devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the prediction
of the Second World War, and finally the prediction of the immense damage that
Russia would do to humanity by abandoning the Christian faith and embracing
Communist totalitarianism.
The third “secret” was not
revealed until the year 2000 and referred to the persecutions that humanity
would undergo in the last century: “The good will be martyred; the Holy Father
will have much to suffer; various nations will be annihilated'”. The
suffering of the popes of the 20th century has been interpreted to include the
assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II in 1981, which took place on May 13,
the 64th anniversary of the apparitions. The Holy Father attributed his escape
from certain death to the intervention of Our Lady: “... it was a mother's hand
that guided the bullet's path and in his throes the Pope halted at the
threshold of death.” What is the central meaning of the message of Fatima?
Nothing different from
what the Church has always taught: it is, as Cardinal Ratzinger, the former
Pope Benedict the XVI, has put it, “the exhortation to prayer as the path of
“salvation for souls” and, likewise, the summons to penance and conversion.”
Perhaps the most well-known utterance of the apparition of Our Lady at Fatima
was her confident declaration that “My Immaculate Heart will triumph”.
Cardinal Ratzinger has interpreted this utterance as follows: “The Heart open
to God, purified by contemplation of God, is stronger than guns and weapons of
every kind. The fiat of Mary, the word of her heart, has changed the history of
the world, because it brought the Savior into the world—because, thanks to her
Yes, God could become man in our world and remains so for all time. The Evil
One has power in this world, as we see and experience continually; he has power
because our freedom continually lets itself be led away from God. But since God
himself took a human heart and has thus steered human freedom towards what is
good, the freedom to choose evil no longer has the last word. From that time
forth, the word that prevails is this: “In the world you will have tribulation,
but take heart; I have overcome the world” (Jn 16:33). The message of Fatima
invites us to trust in this promise.
Fitness Friday
· Try the St.
Joseph Universal Man Plan
Catechism
of the Catholic Church
PART ONE: THE PROFESSION OF FAITH
SECTION TWO I. THE CREEDS
CHAPTER TWO-I BELIEVE IN JESUS
CHRIST, THE ONLY SON OF GOD
Article
4 "JESUS CHRIST SUFFERED UNDER PONTIUS PILATE, WAS CRUCIFIED, DIED AND WAS
BURIED"
Paragraph 2.
JESUS DIED CRUCIFIED
I.
THE TRIAL OF JESUS
Divisions
among the Jewish authorities concerning Jesus
595 Among
the religious authorities of Jerusalem, not only were the Pharisee Nicodemus
and the prominent Joseph of Arimathea both secret disciples of Jesus, but there
was also long-standing dissension about him, so much so that St. John says of
these authorities on the very eve of Christ's Passion, "many. . believed
in him", though very imperfectly. This is not surprising, if one
recalls that on the day after Pentecost "a great many of the priests were
obedient to the faith" and "some believers. . . belonged to the party
of the Pharisees", to the point that St. James could tell St. Paul,
"How many thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed;
and they are all zealous for the Law."
596 The
religious authorities in Jerusalem were not unanimous about what stance to take
towards Jesus. The Pharisees threatened to excommunicate his followers. To
those who feared that "everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will
come and destroy both our holy place and our nation", the high priest
Caiaphas replied by prophesying: "It is expedient for you that one man
should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish." The
Sanhedrin, having declared Jesus deserving of death as a blasphemer but having
lost the right to put anyone to death, hands him over to the Romans, accusing
him of political revolt, a charge that puts him in the same category as
Barabbas who had been accused of sedition. The chief priests also
threatened Pilate politically so that he would condemn Jesus to death.
Jews
are not collectively responsible for Jesus' death
597 The
historical complexity of Jesus' trial is apparent in the Gospel accounts. the
personal sin of the participants (Judas, the Sanhedrin, Pilate) is known to God
alone. Hence, we cannot lay responsibility for the trial on the Jews in
Jerusalem as a whole, despite the outcry of a manipulated crowd and the global
reproaches contained in the apostles' calls to conversion after Pentecost. Jesus
himself, in forgiving them on the cross, and Peter in following suit, both
accept "the ignorance" of the Jews of Jerusalem and even of their
leaders. Still less can we extend responsibility to other Jews of
different times and places, based merely on the crowd's cry: "His blood be
on us and on our children!", a formula for ratifying a judicial sentence. As
the Church declared at the Second Vatican Council: . . .
Neither
all Jews indiscriminately at that time, nor Jews today, can be charged with the
crimes committed during his Passion. . . the Jews should not be spoken of as
rejected or accursed as if this followed from holy Scripture.
All
sinners were the authors of Christ's Passion
598 In her
Magisterial teaching of the faith and in the witness of her saints, the Church
has never forgotten that "sinners were the authors and the ministers of
all the sufferings that the divine Redeemer endured." Taking into
account the fact that our sins affect Christ himself, The Church does not
hesitate to impute to Christians the gravest responsibility for the torments
inflicted upon Jesus, a responsibility with which they have all too often
burdened the Jews alone:
We
must regard as guilty all those who continue to relapse into their sins. Since
our sins made the Lord Christ suffer the torment of the cross, those who plunge
themselves into disorders and crimes crucify the Son of God anew in their
hearts (for he is in them) and hold him up to contempt. and it can be seen that
our crime in this case is greater in us than in the Jews. As for them,
according to the witness of the Apostle, "None of the rulers of this age
understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of
glory." We, however, profess to know him. and when we deny him by our
deeds, we in some way seem to lay violent hands on him.
Nor did demons
crucify him; it is you who have crucified him and crucify him still, when you
delight in your vices and sins.
II.
CHRIST'S REDEMPTIVE DEATH IN GOD'S PLAN OF SALVATION
"Jesus
handed over according to the definite plan of God"
599 Jesus'
violent death was not the result of chance in an unfortunate coincidence of
circumstances, but is part of the mystery of God's plan, as St. Peter explains
to the Jews of Jerusalem in his first sermon on Pentecost: "This Jesus
(was) delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of
God." This Biblical language does not mean that those who handed him
over were merely passive players in a scenario written in advance by God.
600 To
God, all moments of time are present in their immediacy. When therefore he
establishes his eternal plan of "predestination", he includes in it
each person's free response to his grace: "In this city, in fact, both
Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, gathered
together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, to do whatever
your hand and your plan had predestined to take place." For the sake
of accomplishing his plan of salvation, God permitted the acts that flowed from
their blindness.
"He
died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures"
601 The
Scriptures had foretold this divine plan of salvation through the putting to
death of "the righteous one, my Servant" as a mystery of universal
redemption, that is, as the ransom that would free men from the slavery of sin. Citing
a confession of faith that he himself had "received", St. Paul
professes that "Christ died for our sins in accordance with the
scriptures." In particular Jesus' redemptive death fulfils Isaiah's
prophecy of the suffering Servant. Indeed, Jesus himself explained the
meaning of his life and death in the light of God's suffering Servant. After
his Resurrection he gave this interpretation of the Scriptures to the disciples
at Emmaus, and then to the apostles.
"For
our sake God made him to be sin"
602 Consequently,
St. Peter can formulate the apostolic faith in the divine plan of salvation in
this way: "You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your
fathers... with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without
blemish or spot. He was destined before the foundation of the world but was
made manifest at the end of the times for your sake." Man's sins,
following on original sin, are punishable by death. By sending his own Son
in the form of a slave, in the form of a fallen humanity, on account of sin,
God "made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become
the righteousness of God."
603 Jesus
did not experience reprobation as if he himself had sinned. But in the
redeeming love that always united him to the Father, he assumed us in the state
of our waywardness of sin, to the point that he could say in our name from the
cross:
"My
God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Having thus established him
in solidarity with us sinners, God "did not spare his own Son but gave him
up for us all", so that we might be "reconciled to God by the death
of his Son".
God
takes the initiative of universal redeeming love
604 By
giving up his own Son for our sins, God manifests that his plan for us is one
of benevolent love, prior to any merit on our part: "In this is love, not
that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for
our sins." God "shows his love for us in that while we were yet
sinners Christ died for us."
605 At
the end of the parable of the lost sheep Jesus recalled that God's love
excludes no one: "So it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven
that one of these little ones should perish." He affirms that he came
"to give his life as a ransom for many"; this last term is not restrictive
but contrasts the whole of humanity with the unique person of the redeemer who
hands himself over to save us. The Church, following the apostles, teaches
that Christ died for all men without exception: "There is not, never has
been, and never will be a single human being for whom Christ did not
suffer."
III. CHRIST OFFERED HIMSELF TO HIS FATHER FOR OUR SINS
Christ's
whole life is an offering to the Father
606 The
Son of God, who came down "from heaven, not to do (his) own will, but the
will of him who sent (him)", said on coming into the world, "Lo,
I have come to do your will, O God." "and by that will we have been
sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." From
the first moment of his Incarnation the Son embraces the Father's plan of
divine salvation in his redemptive mission: "My food is to do the will of
him who sent me, and to accomplish his work." The sacrifice of Jesus
"for the sins of the whole world" expresses his loving communion
with the Father. "The Father loves me, because I lay down my life",
said the Lord, "(for) I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the
world may know that I love the Father."
607 The
desire to embrace his Father's plan of redeeming love inspired Jesus' whole
life, for his redemptive passion was the very reason for his Incarnation.
and so he asked, "and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'?
No, for this purpose I have come to this hour." and again,
"Shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?" From
the cross, just before "It is finished", he said, "I
thirst."
"The
Lamb who takes away the sin of the world"
608 After
agreeing to baptize him along with the sinners, John the Baptist looked at
Jesus and pointed him out as the "Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of
the world". By doing so, he reveals that Jesus is at the same time
the suffering Servant who silently allows himself to be led to the slaughter
and who bears the sin of the multitudes, and also the Paschal Lamb, the symbol
of Israel's redemption at the first Passover. Christ's whole life
expresses his mission: "to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for
many."
Jesus
freely embraced the Father's redeeming love
609 By
embracing in his human heart the Father's love for men, Jesus "loved them
to the end", for "greater love has no man than this, that a man lay
down his life for his friends." In suffering and death his humanity
became the free and perfect instrument of his divine love which desires the
salvation of men. Indeed, out of love for his Father and for men, whom the
Father wants to save, Jesus freely accepted his Passion and death: "No one
takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord." Hence
the sovereign freedom of God's Son as he went out to his death.
At
the Last Supper Jesus anticipated the free offering of his life
610 Jesus
gave the supreme expression of his free offering of himself at the meal shared
with the twelve Apostles "on the night he was betrayed". On the
eve of his Passion, while still free, Jesus transformed this Last Supper with
the apostles into the memorial of his voluntary offering to the Father for the
salvation of men: "This is my body which is given for you."
"This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the
forgiveness of sins."
611 The
Eucharist that Christ institutes at that moment will be the memorial of his
sacrifice. Jesus includes the apostles in his own offering and bids them
perpetuate it. By doing so, the Lord institutes his apostles as priests of
the New Covenant: "For their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also
may be sanctified in truth."
The
agony at Gethsemani
612 The
cup of the New Covenant, which Jesus anticipated when he offered himself at the
Last Supper, is afterwards accepted by him from his Father's hands in his agony
in the garden at Gethsemani, making himself "obedient unto
death". Jesus prays: "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass
from me. . ." Thus he expresses the horror that death represented for
his human nature. Like ours, his human nature is destined for eternal life; but
unlike ours, it is perfectly exempt from sin, the cause of death. Above
all, his human nature has been assumed by the divine person of the "Author
of life", the "Living One". By accepting in his human will
that the Father's will be done, he accepts his death as redemptive, for
"he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree."
Christ's
death is the unique and definitive sacrifice
613 Christ's
death is both the Paschal sacrifice that accomplishes the definitive redemption
of men, through "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the
world", and the sacrifice of the New Covenant, which restores man to
communion with God by reconciling him to God through the "blood of the
covenant, which was poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins".
614 This
sacrifice of Christ is unique; it completes and surpasses all other sacrifices. First,
it is a gift from God the Father himself, for the Father handed his Son over to
sinners in order to reconcile us with himself. At the same time it is the
offering of the Son of God made man, who in freedom and love offered his life
to his Father through the Holy Spirit in reparation for our disobedience.
Jesus
substitutes his obedience for our disobedience
615 "For
as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man's obedience
many will be made righteous." By his obedience unto death, Jesus
accomplished the substitution of the suffering Servant, who "makes himself
an offering for sin", when "he bore the sin of many", and who
"shall make many to be accounted righteous", for "he shall bear
their iniquities". Jesus atoned for our faults and made satisfaction
for our sins to the Father.
Jesus
consummates his sacrifice on the cross
616 It is
love "to the end" that confers on Christ's sacrifice its value
as redemption and reparation, as atonement and satisfaction. He knew and loved
us all when he offered his life. Now "the love of Christ controls us,
because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore, all have
died." No man, not even the holiest, was ever able to take on himself
the sins of all men and offer himself as a sacrifice for all. the existence in
Christ of the divine person of the Son, who at once surpasses and embraces all
human persons, and constitutes himself as the Head of all mankind, makes
possible his redemptive sacrifice for all.
617 The
Council of Trent emphasizes the unique character of Christ's sacrifice as
"the source of eternal salvation" and teaches that "his
most holy Passion on the wood of the cross merited justification for us." and
the Church venerates his cross as she sings: "Hail, O Cross, our only
hope."
Our
participation in Christ's sacrifice
618 The
cross is the unique sacrifice of Christ, the "one mediator between God and
men". But because in his incarnate divine person he has in some way
united himself to every man, "the possibility of being made partners, in a
way known to God, in the paschal mystery" is offered to all men. He
calls his disciples to "take up [their] cross and follow (him)", for
"Christ also suffered for (us), leaving (us) an example so that (we)
should follow in his steps." In fact, Jesus desires to associate with
his redeeming sacrifice those who were to be its first beneficiaries. This
is achieved supremely in the case of his mother, who was associated more
intimately than any other person in the mystery of his redemptive suffering. Apart
from the cross there is no other ladder by which we may get to heaven.
IN
BRIEF
619 "Christ
died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures" (I Cor 15:3).
620 Our
salvation flows from God's initiative of love for us, because "he loved us
and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins" (I Jn 4:10). "God
was in Christ reconciling the world to himself" (2 Cor 5:19).
621 Jesus
freely offered himself for our salvation. Beforehand, during the Last Supper,
he both symbolized this offering and made it really present: "This is my
body which is given for you" (Lk 22:19).
622 The
redemption won by Christ consists in this, that he came "to give his life
as a ransom for many" (Mt 20:28), that is, he "loved [his own] to the
end" (Jn 13:1), so that they might be "ransomed from the futile ways
inherited from [their] fathers" (I Pt 1:18).
623 By
his loving obedience to the Father, "unto death, even death on a
cross" (Phil 2:8), Jesus fulfils the atoning mission (cf Is 53:10) of the
suffering Servant, who will "make many righteous; and he shall bear their
iniquities" (Is 53:11; cf. Rom 5:19).
Daily
Devotions
·
Unite in the work of the Porters of St. Joseph by joining them
in fasting: Victims
of clergy sexual abuse
·
Litany of the Most Precious
Blood of Jesus
·
Manhood of
the Master-week 12 day 6
·
Offering to
the sacred heart of Jesus
· Make reparations to the Holy Face
· Total
Consecration to Mary Day 16
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