Saints, Feast, Family
- Traditions passed down with Cooking, Crafting, & Caring -
Tom Cruise, born
on July 3, 1962, is a world-famous actor known for his roles in action-packed
movies. He started acting in the 1980s and quickly became a popular star.
Cruise is famous for doing his stunts
in movies. He has been a part of many big hits, inspiring fans worldwide. His
life story is a journey from a small-town boy to a global icon.
Tom
Cruise’s rise to fame began with the movie “Risky Business”
in 1983. This role made him a star overnight.
He then
starred in “Top
Gun” in 1986, a film that became a cultural phenomenon. His
portrayal of a fighter pilot won hearts globally. These early successes set the
stage for a remarkable career.
In the
1990s, Cruise took on diverse roles. He starred in the “Mission: Impossible”
series, which became a huge success. His role as Ethan Hunt showcased his
talent for action and suspense. Cruise did many of his stunts, earning him
respect for his dedication.
Feast of Saint Thomas, Apostle
FIRST WEDNESDAY
Deuteronomy, Chapter
17, Verse 18-20
18When he is sitting upon his royal throne, he shall write a copy of this law upon a scroll from the one that is in the custody of the Levitical priests. 19It shall remain with him and he shall read it as long as he lives, so that he may learn to FEAR the LORD, his God, and to observe carefully all the words of this law and these statutes, 20so that he does not exalt himself over his kindred or turn aside from this commandment to the right or to the left, and so that he and his descendants may reign long in Israel.
God commanded that the King should
read the scrolls of the law and follow them. The scrolls were the bible of the
time. If we wish to have fear, that is wonder and awe at God we need to read
the bible every day. Perhaps today would be a good day to shut off the TV and
read a chapter a day for every day of your life or read the daily readings for
the Mass. Perhaps doing this along with a family dinner where you pray together
over the meal and then read the bible together would help strengthen families. (A good
resource to peruse to strengthen the family is: http://www.catholicfamilyfaith.org/)
The Judgment of the Nations[1] (Matthew 25:31-46)
31“When the Son of Man
comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious
throne,32 and all the nations will
be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a
shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.33 He will place the sheep on his
right and the goats on his left.34 Then the king will say to
those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you
gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me,36 naked and you clothed me, ill
and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’37 Then the righteous will answer him and say,
‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?38 When did we see you a
stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit
you?’40 And the king will say to
them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers
of mine, you did for me.’41 Then he will say to
those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire
prepared for the devil and his angels.42 For
I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,43 a stranger and you gave me no
welcome, naked and you gave me no clothing, ill and in prison, and you did not
care for me.’44 Then they will answer
and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or
ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?’45 He will answer them, ‘Amen, I
say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for
me.’46 And these will go off to eternal punishment, but the
righteous to eternal life.”
Feast
of St Thomas[2]
St Thomas Facts
·
An
early church text claims that Thomas was the only witness to the Assumption of
Mary into heaven. As her body entered heaven, she dropped her girdle.
Medieval art often depicts Thomas catching the girdle.
·
Thomas
didn't believe the apostles when they saw Jesus the first time after the
resurrection. He saw Jesus himself during his second appearance and
touched the wounds on his hands and side (John 20:24-29).
·
Church
tradition says that Thomas traveled to eastern lands, including Persia, to
evangelize to the people there about Jesus. He is thought to have settled
in India.
· The feast day is held July 3, but sermons the following Sunday may also mention St. Thomas and faith. Originally the feast day for St. Thomas was on Dec. 21, the shortest day of the year. All sorts of traditions surrounded the day, including serving meat pies and charitable giving.
St Thomas Top Events
and Things to Do
·
Read
writings by St. Thomas. Several early church documents bearing Thomas'
name are popular, including the Gospel of Thomas, which is a collection of
Jesus' sayings. Other texts include the Acts of Thomas and the Infancy
Gospel of Thomas. None of these texts were included in the Bible.
·
Thousands
of Indians claim to be descendants of the Christians that Thomas helped to
convert. Join them on a pilgrimage in Paylador to the traditional spot of
Thomas' tomb, Our Lady of Lourdes Cathedral of the Syro-Malabar Archdiocese of
Trichur (Kerala, India).
·
If
you are a single
woman, try an ancient custom performed on the Feast of St. Thomas to get an
idea who you will marry. Unmarried Austrian women would climb into bed
over a stool, throw their shoes with toes pointing downward toward the bedroom
door, and then sleep with their head at the foot of the bed. Women who
performed this ritual were thought to dream about their future husbands.
·
Say
a blessing prayer for your property on the feast of St. Thomas. An
ancient custom was for farmers and their sons or hands to drive off evil
spirits in preparation for Christmas. They were sprinkling holy water
across the land, while other family members stayed inside and prayed the
rosary.
First Wednesday[3]
Our Heavenly Father desires all three hearts of Jesus, Mary and Joseph to be honored. And so along with devotion to Jesus on First Fridays, and to Mary on First Saturdays, Our Father longs for us to add devotion to St. Joseph on each First Wednesday of the month.
"The Sacred Hearts of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph have been chosen by the Most Holy Trinity to bring peace to the world." It is at God's request that "special love and honor be given to them" to help us "imitate" their love and their lives, as well as "offer reparation" for the sins committed against them and their love.
The St. Joseph First Wednesday devotion is:
1. Pray the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary - remembering St. Joseph's love, his life, his role and his sufferings
2. Receive Holy Communion - in union with the love St. Joseph had for Jesus the first time and each time he held him - his son, his God and Savior - in his arms.
In the approved
apparitions of Our Lady of America, St. Joseph revealed:
·
"I
am the protector of the Church and the home, as I was the protector of Christ
and his mother while I lived upon earth. Jesus and Mary desire that my pure
heart, so long hidden and unknown, be now honored in a special way.
·
Let my
children honor my most pure heart in a special manner on the First Wednesday of
the month by reciting the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary in memory of my life
with Jesus and Mary and the love I bore them, the sorrow I suffered with them.
·
Let them
receive Holy Communion in union with the love with which I received the Savior
for the first time and each time I held Him in my arms.
·
Those
who honor me in this way will be consoled by my presence at their death, and I
myself will conduct them safely into the presence of Jesus and Mary."
Every Wednesday is
Dedicated to St. Joseph
The Italian culture has
always had a close association with St. Joseph perhaps you could make
Wednesdays centered around Jesus’s Papa. Plan an Italian dinner of pizza or
spaghetti after attending Mass as most parishes have a Wednesday evening Mass.
You could even do carry out to help restaurants. If you are adventurous, you
could do the Universal Man Plan: St. Joseph style. Make the evening a family
night perhaps it could be a game night. Whatever you do make the day special.
·
Devotion to the 7 Joys and Sorrows of St.
Joseph
·
Do the St.
Joseph Universal Man Plan.
·
Total Consecration
to St. Joseph Day 2
Catechism
of the Catholic Church
PART ONE: THE PROFESSION OF FAITH
SECTION ONE-"I BELIEVE" -
"WE BELIEVE"
CHAPTER THREE-MAN'S RESPONSE TO GOD
Article 1 I BELIEVE
III. The Characteristics of Faith
Faith is a grace
153 When St. Peter confessed
that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, Jesus declared to him that
this revelation did not come "from flesh and blood", but from
"my Father who is in heaven". Faith is a gift of God, a
supernatural virtue infused by him. "Before this faith can be exercised,
man must have the grace of God to move and assist him; he must have the
interior helps of the Holy Spirit, who moves the heart and converts it to God,
who opens the eyes of the mind and 'makes it easy for all to accept and believe
the truth.'"
Faith is a human act
154 Believing is possible only
by grace and the interior helps of the Holy Spirit. But it is no less true that
believing is an authentically human act. Trusting in God and cleaving to the
truths he has revealed is contrary neither to human freedom nor to human
reason. Even in human relations it is not contrary to our dignity to believe
what other persons tell us about themselves and their intentions, or to trust
their promises (for example, when a man and a woman marry) to share a communion
of life with one another. If this is so, still less is it contrary to our
dignity to "yield by faith the full submission of... intellect and will to
God who reveals", and to share in an interior communion with him.
155 In faith, the human
intellect and will co-operate with divine grace: "Believing is an act of
the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by God
through grace."
Faith and understanding
156 What moves us to believe is
not the fact that revealed truths appear as true and intelligible in the light
of our natural reason: we believe "because of the authority of God himself
who reveals them, who can neither deceive nor be deceived". So
"that the submission of our faith might nevertheless be in accordance with
reason, God willed that external proofs of his Revelation should be joined to
the internal helps of the Holy Spirit." Thus the miracles of Christ
and the saints, prophecies, the Church's growth and holiness, and her
fruitfulness and stability "are the most certain signs of divine
Revelation, adapted to the intelligence of all"; they are "motives of
credibility" (motiva credibilitatis), which show that the assent of faith
is "by no means a blind impulse of the mind".
157 Faith is certain. It is
more certain than all human knowledge because it is founded on the very word of
God who cannot lie. To be sure, revealed truths can seem obscure to human
reason and experience, but "the certainty that the divine light gives is
greater than that which the light of natural reason gives." "Ten
thousand difficulties do not make one doubt."
158 "Faith seeks
understanding": it is intrinsic to faith that a believer desires to
know better the One in whom he has put his faith, and to understand better what
He has revealed; a more penetrating knowledge will in turn call forth a greater
faith, increasingly set afire by love. the grace of faith opens "the eyes
of your hearts" to a lively understanding of the contents of
Revelation: that is, of the totality of God's plan and the mysteries of faith,
of their connection with each other and with Christ, the centre of the revealed
mystery. "The same Holy Spirit constantly perfects faith by his gifts, so
that Revelation may be more and more profoundly understood." In the
words of St. Augustine, "I believe, in order to understand; and I
understand, the better to believe."
159 Faith and science:
"Though faith is above reason, there can never be any real discrepancy
between faith and reason. Since the same God who reveals mysteries and infuses
faith has bestowed the light of reason on the human mind, God cannot deny himself,
nor can truth ever contradict truth." "Consequently, methodical
research in all branches of knowledge, provided it is carried out in a truly
scientific manner and does not override moral laws, can never conflict with the
faith, because the things of the world and the things of faith derive from the
same God. the humble and persevering investigator of the secrets of nature is
being led, as it were, by the hand of God in spite of himself, for it is God,
the conserver of all things, who made them what they are."
The freedom of faith
160 To be human, "man's
response to God by faith must be free, and... therefore nobody is to be forced
to embrace the faith against his will. the act of faith is of its very nature a
free act." "God calls men to serve him in spirit and in truth.
Consequently they are bound to him in conscience, but not coerced. . . This
fact received its fullest manifestation in Christ Jesus." Indeed,
Christ invited people to faith and conversion, but never coerced them.
"For he bore witness to the truth but refused to use force to impose it on
those who spoke against it. His kingdom... grows by the love with which Christ,
lifted up on the cross, draws men to himself."
The necessity of faith
161 Believing in Jesus Christ
and in the One who sent him for our salvation is necessary for obtaining that
salvation. "Since "without faith it is impossible to please
(God) " and to attain to the fellowship of his sons, therefore without
faith no one has ever attained justification, nor will anyone obtain eternal
life 'But he who endures to the end.'"]
Perseverance in faith
162 Faith is an entirely free
gift that God makes to man. We can lose this priceless gift, as St. Paul
indicated to St. Timothy: "Wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good
conscience. By rejecting conscience, certain persons have made shipwreck of
their faith." To live, grow and persevere in the faith until the end
we must nourish it with the word of God; we must beg the Lord to increase our
faith; it must be "working through charity," abounding in hope,
and rooted in the faith of the Church.
Faith - the beginning of
eternal life
163 Faith makes us taste in
advance the light of the beatific vision, the goal of our journey here below.
Then we shall see God "face to face", "as he is". So
faith is already the beginning of eternal life:
When we contemplate the blessings of faith even now, as if gazing at a
reflection in a mirror, it is as if we already possessed the wonderful things
which our faith assures us we shall one day enjoy.
164 Now, however, "we walk
by faith, not by sight"; we perceive God as "in a mirror,
dimly" and only "in part". Even though enlightened by him
in whom it believes, faith is often lived in darkness and can be put to the
test. the world we live in often seems very far from the one promised us by
faith. Our experiences of evil and suffering, injustice and death, seem to
contradict the Good News; they can shake our faith and become a temptation
against it.
165 It is then we must turn to
the witnesses of faith: to Abraham, who "in hope... believed against
hope"; to the Virgin Mary, who, in "her pilgrimage of
faith", walked into the "night of faith" in sharing the
darkness of her son's suffering and death; and to so many others:
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let
us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run
with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer
and perfecter of our faith."
Daily Devotions
·
Unite in the work of the Porters of St. Joseph by joining them
in fasting: The
Pope
·
Litany of the Most Precious
Blood of Jesus
·
Offering to
the sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
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