Today Begins the St. Andrew Novena! Ready, Set, Pray....

The best Christmas present you can give anyone is prayer. And what better intention can anyone offer than for the salvation of the souls of their loved ones. That will be our intention for this 25-day novena seeking the intercession of St. Andrew. I love St. Andrew and ask him to do for me what he did for his brother, Peter. Take me to Jesus! 

St. Andrew Christmas Novena

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I Need a Little Christmas!

           

Life is often filled with challenges and sometimes they seem overwhelming. This has been a rough year for many reasons, so the other day, I just started singing a song from Auntie Mame. I definitely "need a little Christmas!" so we set up the tree. Larry dragged up the canvas bag and out came the pre-lit evergreen. We gave up on real trees about ten years ago when we just got too old and tired to deal with getting down on the floor to water it every day and cleaning up all the pine needles. I've never regretted it.

Happy Thanksgiving and May We All Grow in Gratitude to God and Our Neighbors!

There's a bit of a dispute as to where the first Thanksgiving actually took place. The pilgrims and the Plymouth colony always get the credit, but their thanksgiving was held in 1621 in Massachusetts. My own home state hosted an earlier Thanksgiving in 1619 at Berkley Plantation near Williamsburg. The Thanksgiving event was written into the charter. This fact doesn't diminish the importance or fascination with the Thanksgiving in Plymouth, but it illustrates the attitude of gratitude our forefathers had. May we imitate them in that. 

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

In Honor of the Blessed Mother, Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix of All Graces

In honor of the Blessed Mother as the intercessor who always takes our requests straight to the throne of God, I am re-posting Fr. Tom Collins two-part article. Our Lady is a mother and friend who will never fail us.

Fr. Tom Collins shares his view of Mary as Co-Redemptrix - Part A

Continued, Part B

With Thanksgiving tomorrow, it's the perfect day to say thank-you to the Blessed Mother. She was no "ordinary girl" as Pope Francis called her. She was and is the Immaculate Conception. Not one of us "ordinary girls" can claim that distinction.

Where is the New Evangelization Leading Us? To Comfortable, Complacent Christianity?

What is the "New Evangelization?" In light of Pope Francis scolding people for "proselytizing" and synodal clerics bragging about never baptizing an indigenous person, not to mention the messages that all faiths are paths to salvation....what exactly is the "New Evangelization?" Is there such a thing? Do we find it in Abu Dhabi with its monuments to Judaism, Islam, and, by the way, Christianity?

A Bishop For Our Time: Henry Edward Cardinal Manning -- Lecture 3

You can read my posts on the first two lectures by clicking on the links below. Cardinal Manning's lectures are particularly appropriate as we end the liturgical year. I hope you'll read them in toto and not just my excerpts. He was a prophet and much of what he describes is directly applicable to our own time.

I Should Have Posted This on Halloween! Add to the Weird World File

 Really? 

Cremation jewelry?  Christmas tree ornaments? 

Hey! You can hang Nana on your Christmas tree. Or how about wearing Daddy around your neck or in ear rings. 

A locket with hair is one thing, but wearing the ashes of the dead in a pendant? 

We are certainly living in a weird world. 

A Bishop for Our Time: Henry Edward Cardinal Manning -- Lecture 2

To read my post on Lecture 1 go here.  

On to Lecture 2!

In his second lecture on The Present Crisis in the Holy See, Cardinal Manning focuses on the nature of the Antichrist. At the time, some writers claimed that the Antichrist would not be an individual person, but a corporate group or spirit. Refuting that belief, the cardinal looked to the number of Apostles, Fathers of the Church, etc. who disputed that interpretation. He quotes St. Robert Bellarmine saying, “All Catholics hold that Antichrist will be one individual person.”

Interestingly, Manning offers the opinon of many scholars that the Antichrist will come from the Jewish race:

...the Fathers, with unanimous consent, teach as undoubted, that Antichrist will be a Jew.2 Ribera repeats the same opinion, and adds that Aretas, St. Bede, Haymo, St. Anselm, and Rupert affirm that for this reason the tribe of Dan is not numbered among those who are sealed in the Apocalypse.3 Wiegas says the same, quoting other authorities.4 And this will appear probable, if we consider that the Antichrist will come to deceive the Jews, according to the prophecy of our Lord: “I am come in My Father's name, and you receive Me not : another will come in his own name, him you will receive;” which words are interpreted by the Fathers with one consent of the false Messias, who shall pass himself off upon the Jews as the true. And this, again, is the unanimous interpretation of the Fathers, both of the East and of the West, as St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Ephrem Syrus, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Gregory Nyssen, St. John Damascene, and also of St. Irenaeus, St. Cyprian, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, and St. Augustine.https://www.britannica.com/topic/spiritualism-religion

Ten Novels Every American Should Read to Understand the Culture Part 1

We all have our favorite books that we think everyone should read, both novels and non-fiction. I could probably name a hundred that I think need to be on your Don't Miss This! list.  Why? Because they help us understand what's going on in the world and how to respond to it. I'll start with only ten of my favorite books in a two-part post. Every one is worth reading more than once and reflected upon. Each has prophetic elements that strike the tocsin, the warning bell. We would do well to pay attention! 

Ending Roe Did NOT End Abortion on Demand

Instead it resulted in a return to the coathanger era. Abortion drugs are, indeed, the new bloody  coathanger. Abortions using telemed services and abortion-inducing chemicals leave women unsupervised by any medical providers. The mothers kill their babies at home, expel the little one in the toilet, then flush them away to pollute our water systems. 

Are these abortions safe, legal, and rare? Legal, yes, in most places. And even in states where they aren't, little can be done to stop them. Are they rare? No. In 2023, the estimate was that six out of ten abortions (600,000 or more) were by pill.