Dara’s Corner
· Let Freedom Ring Day 38 Freedom from Worldliness
· Let Freedom Ring Day 39 Freedom from Presumption
· Let Freedom Ring Day 40 Freedom from Sloth
AUGUST 14 Wednesday-Vigil of the
Assumption of Mary
ST.
MAXIMILLIAN KOLBE
Judges,
Chapter 14, Verse 11
Out of their FEAR
of him, they brought thirty men to be his companions.
This verse is about Sampson the
strongman of the bible, who struck fear into the hearts of the pagan
Philistines. Nevertheless, how different was Sampson from his pagan neighbors?
Justyn Rees has an interesting, shortened tale of the tragedy of Sampson that
is available online that is a quick thought-provoking read in his book
entitled, “Old Story New”.[1]
Sampson who was born endowed with
great physical strength started out following God but failed to continue
walking in the spirit of He that Is. John Maxwell[2]
points out that like Gideon many men fail toward the end of their life because
they dilute the vision God had given them and have become too comfortable with
their success and lack the self-control to overcome their weaknesses. John’s
advice to leaders is to be self-disciplined using a quote from Plato, “The first and best victory is to conquer
self.” John points out a five-step plan to develop self-discipline in your
life.
1.
Develop and follow your priorities.
Time is a precious commodity, do what’s important first and release yourself
from the rest.
2.
Make a disciplined lifestyle your
goal. Set up systems and routines to
ensure you feed the mind, body, spirit and love of your neighbor daily.
3.
Challenge your excuses.
We all make them; push the envelope.
4.
Remove rewards until you finish the
job. Eat your vegetables first.
5.
Stay focused on results.
Focus on the outcomes and not the difficulties in accomplishing it; envision
the change.
Our model for transformation: Jesus went up to the mountain to pray, and
he spent the night in prayer to God. (Luke 6:12)
Vigil of the Assumption of Our Lady[3]
The Vigil of the Assumption of Our
Lady. Mention is made of this vigil, with fasting, by Pope Nicolas I, who was
the pope in the year 858. It is recorded that on this day angels were heard,
near the city of Soissons, singing this anthem:
“Felix namque es, sacra Virgo
Maria, et omni laude dignissima, quia ex te ortus est Sol justitiae, Christus
Deus noster.”
Vigils were kept on the evening
before each feast day from the earliest days of the Church. On that evening all
of the faithful would gather together to prepare themselves and their
dispositions for the feast they were about to celebrate. This might also
include listening to readings from the Bible, or a sermon on the topic by a
priest. Mass would then be celebrated on the feast day, and the fast would be
broken. It is said that both Saint Augustine and Saint Jerome practiced and
fully supported the idea of the vigil. The Vigil of the Assumption would have
been one of the Church's most important vigils.
St. Maximillian Kolbe[4]
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, Uncle JOE/Fancy Nancy) in every
state of our Union and resolve to do all that you can to end the killing.
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 2-"AND IN JESUS CHRIST, HIS ONLY SON, OUR LORD"
Day 61
I. Jesus
430 Jesus means in Hebrew: "God saves." At the
annunciation, the angel Gabriel gave him the name Jesus as his proper name,
which expresses both his identity and his mission. Since God alone can
forgive sins, it is God who, in Jesus his eternal Son made man, "will save
his people from their sins". in Jesus, God recapitulates all of his
history of salvation on behalf of men.
431 In the history of salvation God was not content to
deliver Israel "out of the house of bondage" by bringing them
out of Egypt. He also saves them from their sin. Because sin is always an
offence against God, only he can forgive it. For this reason Israel,
becoming more and more aware of the universality of sin, will no longer be able
to seek salvation except by invoking the name of the Redeemer God.
432 The name "Jesus" signifies that the very name
of God is present in the person of his Son, made man for the universal and
definitive redemption from sins. It is the divine name that alone brings
salvation, and henceforth all can invoke his name, for Jesus united himself to
all men through his Incarnation, so that "there is no other name
under heaven given among men by which we must be saved."
433 The name of the Savior God was invoked only once in the
year by the high priest in atonement for the sins of Israel, after he had
sprinkled the mercy seat in the Holy of Holies with the sacrificial blood. the
mercy seat was the place of God's presence. When St. Paul speaks of Jesus
whom "God put forward as an expiation by his blood", he means that in
Christ's humanity "God was in Christ reconciling the world to
himself."
434 Jesus' Resurrection glorifies the name of the Savior
God, for from that time on it is the name of Jesus that fully manifests the
supreme power of the "name which is above every name". The evil
spirits fear his name; in his name his disciples perform miracles, for the
Father grants all they ask in this name.
435 The name of Jesus is at the heart of Christian prayer.
All liturgical prayers conclude with the words "through our Lord Jesus
Christ". the Hail Mary reaches its high point in the words "blessed
is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus." the Eastern prayer of the heart, the
Jesus Prayer, says: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a
sinner." Many Christians, such as St. Joan of Arc, have died with the one
word "Jesus" on their lips.
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 8
Daily Devotions
·
Unite in the work of the Porters of St. Joseph by joining them
in fasting: Catholic
Politian’s and Leaders
·
Religion
in the Home for Preschool: August
·
Litany of the Most Precious
Blood of Jesus
·
Offering to
the sacred heart of Jesus
·
Rosary
Introduction to Proverbs
Like the teachings of an ancient Israelite Yoda, The Book of Proverbs is all about wisdom.
The book's editors and compilers took wisdom wherever they could find it: the
oracles of Agur and Lemuel at the end of Proverbs may very well be
non-Israelite in origin, and the "thirty sayings" in the middle part
of Proverbs are related to an Egyptian wisdom collection ("The
Instructions of Amenemopet"). Combine that with proverbs classically
attributed to King Solomon, and you have a delicious Near-Eastern fusion meal,
slathered in wisdom gravy. Proverbs is a little like Confucius's Analects,
which had a profound influence on the ethical, social, and moral teachings of
China. Confucius doesn't spend much time getting deep into metaphysics and
theological disputes—he just wants to know how to live in accordance with
"the Will of Heaven," how to be a good person, while also managing to
live a productive life in the world. Proverbs has the same set of concerns. It
takes the existence of God for granted and has interesting poetic statements to
make about the role of Wisdom in the world. Yet overwhelmingly, the advice it
offers is extremely practical: it's concerned with the details of everyday
life, with work and family. Like the writer Jack Miles observed, Proverbs deals
with the struggles of character formation and prudence—in a way that the Torah
doesn't, exactly. It's really hard to determine when the book was actually
written or compiled because it takes so much material from so many sources from
different time periods. One section claims to have been compiled by officials
in King Hezekiah's court—so if they truly date from his reign, that would put
that section at roughly the 8th century CE… though its sayings could've come
down from earlier centuries. Then the final compilation of the book would've
likely been a few centuries after Hezekiah's reign, give or take a century or
two. As with all things Bible, you never can tell.
Why Should I Care?
If you've ever wondered if it's okay to gorge yourself on honey
until you throw up, Proverbs is the book for you. (Psst—Proverbs says the
answer is: "It is not.") But, um, even if you haven't wondered about
that particular quandary, Proverbs still probably has something to say to you.
It answers the same questions that people ask when they consult self-help books
or when they (used to) write in to "Dear Abby": "How should I
live?" Proverbs is basically an ancient self-help manual—yet it has plenty
of advice that still holds up today. For example: "Soft words calm
another's anger" and again, "Don't eat honey until you puke" (to
paraphrase). To quote the RZA, explaining the name
of The Wu Tang Clan: "'Wu' stands for 'Wisdom of the Universe' […] but
there's a little 'tang' thrown in." That's actually a pretty good
definition of The Book of Proverbs—though, we suppose it's debatable exactly how
much 'tang' it has. (Well, we think it has 'tang'—more than
you would probably expect, anyway. Also, we're painfully aware that quoting the
RZA in this "Why Should I Care?" could make us seem like Jason
Schwartzman in "Yo
Teach!" from Funny People. But we reject that
contention. Vigorously.)
Wise Elders
Proverbs isn't just a collection of crotchety sayings, like
"Be sure to get your daily recommended amount of fiber" (though
there's, admittedly, a small element of that kind of advice). To some degree,
it does represent the advice of senior citizens to young people (there's an
ancient Egyptian story about an elderly man who got revenge on his nephew for
trying to assassinate him by reciting proverbs to the nephew until the nephew
exploded and died—presumably out of boredom). More than that, though, Proverbs
aims to free you, by giving you the tools and craft you need to navigate life
in the world. "Free your mind, the rest will follow"—that's a proverb
(just, er, not one from Proverbs). Despite the stodgy reputation of some
Biblical Wisdom Literature, its goal is to teach people the rules so that they
can eventually thoroughly embody and forget them. Proverbs imagines Wisdom (or
any wise person) as "rejoicing in the habitable part of the earth" or
"playing all over the earth." Although it seems like a lot of advice
and precepts at first, on a deeper level it's about giving people a method of
targeting their energy to work in a way that helps them enjoy life. Like it
says: "Hope deferred makes the heart sick / But a fulfilled desire is a
tree of life." That's some "Wu" for you, but we hope you'll
agree that it's also got quite a bit of "Tang," too.
[1]https://books.google.com/books?id=Ya4KBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA81&lpg=PA81&dq=burn+you+and+your+family+philistines&source=bl&ots=0UWpCsxdDc&sig=AVZOJtLIcSvCrAzCdgZl5lvhjoE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CEoQ6AEwCWoVChMIq5bd_dLkyAIVA9pjCh0MGwvM#v=onepage&q=burn%20you%20and%20your%20family%20philistines&f=false
[2] John Maxwell, The Leadership Bible,
1982.
[4]http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2017-08-14
No comments:
Post a Comment