Saturday, August 30, 2014

“…Everything around you is passing and everything is falling apart…”

Medjugorje Headlines

Everything around you is passing and everything is falling apart…”

Our Lady of Medjugorje September 2, 2011

 

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  August 29, 2014 A.D.
September 2, 2011
Everything around you is passing and everything is falling apart…”


Tonight Our Lady appeared to Ivan during his prayer group meeting on top of Apparition Mountain. Pilgrims started to arrive near the statue around 6:00 p.m. and a continuous stream of pilgrims ascended the mountain right up to the time of the apparition. It was a beautiful night with the sky full of stars. Rosaries were continuously prayed until the singing began at around 8:30 p.m. Ivan then announced that we would be praying the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary in preparation for Our Lady’s apparition. Our Lady appeared to Ivan around 10:00 p.m. and the apparition lasted over 8 minutes. The following is Ivan’s description of the apparition:
 
Briefly I would like to describe to you what is the most important from tonight’s meeting with Our Lady. Also tonight Our Lady came to us happy and joyful. At the beginning, as always, She greeted all of us with Her Motherly greeting, ‘Praised be Jesus my dear children.’ After that She continued, with Her arms extended, to pray over all of us for a while. She especially prayed over all of you here who are sick. Then for a long time Our Lady prayed for peace, for peace in the world. Then Our Lady blessed all of us with Her Motherly blessing, and She also blessed everything you brought to be blessed. I also recommended all of you, all of your needs, your intentions, and your families, and especially all of you, the sick present here. After that Our Lady continued to pray for a while over all of you and then left in that prayer, in an illuminated Sign of the Cross, with a greeting, ‘Go in peace my dear children.’ I would especially like to emphasize that also at tonight’s meeting Our Lady, for a long time, especially prayed for peace. Thank you.”


Pictures from the August 29, 2014 Apparition in Medjugorje

Ivan's apparition August 29, 2014
A pilgrim knelt before the large wooden crucifix on top of Apparition Mountain hours before Our Lady’s apparition tonight, August 29, 2014. Tonight, Our Lady again asked for prayers for peace, for peace in the world. This has been Her request throughout the summer and watching the daily deterioration of peace around the world, we understand from Our Lady’s words that peace is greatly threatened in this time. In the early years of the apparitions in Medjugorje, there were many physical miracles and supernatural phenomenon that took place. These events confirmed to those who experienced them that Our Lady was truly appearing in Medjugorje. It was not uncommon for the villagers to see Our Lady on top of Cross Mountain below the Cross, Her veil blowing in the wind. The visionaries were pressed by many to ask Our Lady if it was truly Her that they saw. She responded:

December 31, 1981

Ivan asks Our Lady if it is really She appearing at the foot of the cross.

"Yes, it is true. Almost every day I am at the foot of the cross. My Son carried the cross. He has suffered on the cross, and by it, He saved the world. Every day I pray to my Son to forgive the sins of the world."

Tonight, in response to Our Lady’s request, we should place ourselves before a cross or crucifix and plead with Jesus to forgive the world its sins. It is only through the forgiveness of our sins that we can achieve peace. This is what the world has forgotten, and because there is no true recognition and repentance of sin, there is no peace.
 
Medjugorje August 29, 2014
A beautiful late summer sky spread across Medjugorje this evening, August 29, and led pilgrims who were waiting for Our Lady’s apparition to spend their time in contemplation of God’s creation. Our Lady said:
March 25, 1990
God wants to save you and sends you messages through men, nature, and so many things which can only help you to understand that you must change the direction of your life…”

A Friend of Medjugorje speaks often of the need to recognize our own sinfulness and to regularly repent of our sins through Confession. He says:
 
Not acknowledging sin and denying sin leads us in the wrong direction. Living the Commandments is not simply stating, “I keep them.” Living the Commandments is recognizing that often we don’t keep them, that we have broken them in our lives, and that we acknowledge that we have sinned against them. That is the road to waking up, which will lead to God rescuing our nation from its present course of suicide. The recognition of what sin is and being sensitive enough to repent and confess our weaknesses will lead us towards the right direction. That is what it means to keep the Commandments. Wisdom can then be obtained of how to gain authority over wickedness.”

From the writing “Troubles Befall You? How to Correct Them” by A Friend of Medjugorje

Why is it that Christians always seem to be on the losing side of every conflict in today’s culture? We do not have the power of God with us because we do not stand before Him with pure, humble and repentive hearts. We must change the direction of our lives and follow the wisdom of Our Lady who said. “You will not have happiness on this earth, neither will you come to Heaven if you are not with pure and humble hearts, and do not fulfill the law of God…” February 2, 1990

Sunset at Ivan's apparition August 29, 2014

The beauty of the sunset over Medjugorje tonight helps to open the heart to prayer. The youngest Medjugorje visionary, Jakov Colo, explained how Our Lady taught them how to do this, in beautiful simplicity:
 
“My true life began when I was ten years old, at that precise moment, when I truly experienced Jesus and the Gospa, when I felt them in my heart. The Gospa invited us to pray. She said: “Dear children, pray with your hearts, feel the joy, the peace and the peace that prayer brings. May prayer become your joy, because you cannot pray if you think that you must pray.” The heart needs to feel the need to pray, then prayer will become joy.”

“When the Gospa told us this, I asked myself as a child how it was possible to pray with the heart, how this should happen. I realized that prayer with the heart was a gift from God, a gift that God wishes to give everybody. I said to God and to the Gospa: “Dear God, dear Gospa, from now on I wish to pray with my heart, I wish to feel prayer in my heart, I wish to feel the joy of prayer, I wish to feel peace in prayer.” Then I began to pray and, slowly, I felt the joy of prayer. I searched for a place where I could pray and I didn’t find it difficult to pray anymore. We all need to ask the Gospa to help us pray with our hearts so that we may feel the beauty of prayer.”
From A Conversation with the Visionaries by Kresimir Sego
 


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Friday, August 29, 2014

Mary TV Daily Reflection 8/29/2014



A double rainbow over St. James
 (c) Mary TV 2014   
    

J.M.J
August 29, 2014
The Passion of St. John the Baptist

Dear Family of Mary!

"Dear children! Pray for my intentions, because Satan wants to destroy my plan which I have here and to steal your peace. Therefore, little children, pray, pray, pray that God can act through each of you. May your hearts be open to God's will. I love you and bless you with my motherly blessing. Thank you for having responded to my call." (August 25, 2014)

This message is a serious one. It comes at a moment when the world is tense. Fear and anxiety are washing over us. But we have been given all we need to defend ourselves from these weapons of the devil. We have been given prayer, the sacraments, Holy Mass, the Bible, forgiveness and God's peace. Our Lady's school is a defense against all of the enemy's strategies.

Jelena Vasilj once received instruction from Our Lady about how to maintain peace. There is no date on these words, but they were in the 80's when she received locutions:

To Jelena:
"Christians make a mistake in considering the future because they think of wars and of evil. For a Christian, there is only one attitude toward the future. It is hope of salvation."
"Your responsibility is to accept Divine peace, to live, and to spread it not through words, but through your life."
"The only attitude of the Christian toward the future is hope of salvation. Those who think only of wars, evils, punishment, do not do well."
"If you think of evil, punishment, wars, you are on the road to meeting them. Your responsibility is to accept Divine peace, live it and spread it"

I am especially helped by this one sentence: "The only attitude of the Christian toward the future is hope of salvation." These words of Our Lady should immediately refocus us on what our true future is... Heaven and life eternal with God. We must look up. We must look far ahead and see the place prepared for us by Jesus. That is our future. That is our joy. To live with Jesus forever in heaven is what should be in our viewfinder.

With that attitude we can face each day with strength and perseverance.

Let us pray for a renewed heavenly perspective, a way of seeing things that keeps our final destination in view at all times. We are destined for salvation! What blessed children we are.

In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2014








"Medjugorje is the spiritual center of the world."
Saint John Paul II
Be connected!
www.marytv.tv
 

Thursday, August 28, 2014

Detroit ISNA Conference – Stealth Jihad for The Subjugation of America

Detroit ISNA Conference – Stealth Jihad for The Subjugation of America
ISNA (Islamic Society of North America) will be holding its annual convention in Detroit this weekend beginning Friday, August 29 and ending September 1.  ISNA was designated by federal prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation case, the largest terrorism financing trial in American history.   A 1991 Muslim Brotherhood memorandum introduced in that trial identified ISNA as one of its front organizations. The memorandum further stated the Brotherhood’s “work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within … so that it is eliminated and Allah’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”
Detroit ISNA Conference – Stealth Jihad for The Subjugation of America
Astonishingly, despite ISNA’s terrorist ties, former President Jimmy Carter will be the convention’s keynote speaker.  Carter, also, recently called for the legitimization of Hamas, which is listed by the US government as a terrorist organization.   In addition to Carter, several other prominent non-Muslim political leaders will be speaking at the convention.
Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, about an hour’s drive from Detroit, commented, “The participation of these political leaders is giving the ISNA convention the cover of respectability and as a result is enabling ISNA and other the other Muslim extremists at the convention to achieve their goal of a “Grand Jihad” to subjugate America.”
An integral aspect of ISNA’s plan for the subjugation of America is to portray itself as a peaceful, mainstream charitable institution.  It is part of the Muslim Brotherhood’s strategy of “civilization jihad.”  While most Americans are focused on violent jihad, civilization jihad is even more dangerous
Logo Muslim Brotherhood
Logo Muslim Brotherhood (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
 to American security.  According to Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy, it is “a form of political and psychological warfare that includes multi-layered cultural subversion, the co-opting of senior leaders, influence operations, propaganda and other means of insinuating Shariah gradually into Western societies.”
Erick Stakelbeck, a terrorism expert and author of the book “The Brotherhood: America’s Next Great Enemy,” compared the Muslim Brotherhood’s strategy to that of “termites.”  “The Muslim Brotherhood in America and really around the world are like termites. They burrow into a host society. They eat away at it until the day comes where they are ready to make their move.”
Siraj Wahhaj, one of the scheduled speakers at the conference, was the first Muslim cleric to deliver opening prayers to Congress.  In his prayer he recited from the Koran and asked God to guide America’s leaders “and grant them righteousness and wisdom.”  A year later, he told a Muslim audience in New Jersey that, “If only Muslims were more clever politically, they could take over the United States and replace its constitutional government with a caliphate.” He was later named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
In one of his sermons, Wahhaj said: “In time, this so-called democracy will crumble, and there will be nothing, and the only thing that will remain will be Islam.”
Abdurahman Alamoudi conducted the Muslim Brotherhood’s most successful infiltration of our political and defense establishments.  He advised Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush.  He penetrated and compromised our military and both the Democrat and Republican national organizations.   He established the Muslim Chaplain Program for the Defense Department.  He was the certifying authority for Muslim chaplains serving with the U.S.military.  He appeared with President Bush at a press conference days after the 9/11 attacks.  In 2005, the U.S. Treasury Department publicly admitted that Alamoudi was the top Al-Qaeda fundraiser in the United States.  Alamoudi is currently serving a 23-year prison sentence for his terrorist related activities.
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi of the Muslim Brotherhood, told a youth conference in Toledo, Ohio in 1998, “We will conquer Europe, we will conquer America.”
Thomas More Law Center
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Mary TV Daily Reflection 8/28/2014 - Be Open to God's Will



 (c) Mary TV 2014   
    

J.M.J
August 28, 2014
St. Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church

Dear Family of Mary!

"Dear children! Pray for my intentions, because Satan wants to destroy my plan which I have here and to steal your peace. Therefore, little children, pray, pray, pray that God can act through each of you. May your hearts be open to God's will. I love you and bless you with my motherly blessing. Thank you for having responded to my call." (August 25, 2014)

Our Lady gave a prayer to Jelena Vasilj in 1985 that contains a plea to be able to overcome evil in our lives and do the good. It seems like this prayer might be helpful for us as we try to respond to this message. Satan is a thief and will stop at nothing to take our peace and our faith away. He wants to kill our souls. So we must learn how to fight him at every level. As we fight, we will become strong. Our faith will grow. Jesus is with us to give us the victory.

The wording of the prayer is a bit difficult, but I think you will understand it well. We want to pray, pray, pray that God can act through us. We want to be open to God's will.

Petition to God
  (Given by Our Lady to Jelena Vasilj, 6/22/1985)

Recite 3 Glory Be's

Oh God, our heart is in deep obscurity,
in spite of our union to Your Heart.
Our heart is struggling between You and satan;
do not permit it to be in this manner!

Every time that the heart is divided
between good and evil,
let it be enlightened by Your light
and let it be unified.
Never permit,
for there to be able to exist in us two loves,
that there can never co-exist in us two faiths,
and that there can never co-exist in us;
lying and sincerity,
love and hatred,
honesty and dishonesty,
humility and pride.
Help us on the contrary,
so that our hearts may be elevated toward You
just like that of a child.
May our heart be ravished with peace
and continue to always have the nostalgia of it.

May Your Holy will and Your love
find a permanent place in us, that at least
sometimes we would really wish to be Your
children and when, Oh Lord,
we will desire to be Your children,
remember our past desires
and help us to receive You again.

We open our hearts to you
so that Your holy love will remain in us.
We open our souls to you,
so that they may be touched by Your holy mercy
which will help us to see clearly all our sins,
and will make us realize,
that which makes us impure is sin.

God, we want to be Your children,
humble and devout,
to the point of becoming your cherished and
sincere children,
such as only the Father
would be able to desire that we be.
Help us, Jesus our brother,
to obtain the goodness of the Father in our regard,
and to be good to Him.
Help us Jesus,
to understand well what God gives us,
although sometimes we fail to perform a good act,
as though it were for us an evil.

In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2014








"Medjugorje is the spiritual center of the world."
Saint John Paul II
Be connected!
www.marytv.tv

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Over 70,000 People Say Stop the Satanic 'Black Mass' in Oklahoma

Contact: John Ritchie, TFP Student Action, 717-225-7147 ext 229

OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla., Aug. 27, 2014 /Christian Newswire/ -- Offending Christians nationwide, the Oklahoma City Civic Center is hosting a public "Black Mass" on September 21.

Opposition is mounting from coast to coast. More than 70,000 online petitions have been collected urging the Civic Center to cancel the sacrilegious and obscene ""Black Mass" which attacks God and desecrates the true Catholic Mass.

Readers are invited to sign the petition here:
www.tfpstudentaction.org/stop-black-mass-oklahoma-city.html

"If the event involved stomping on the Koran, I bet the Civic Center would be calling for tolerance," said TFP Student Action Director, John Ritchie. "But since the Black Mass calls for stomping on the Holy Eucharist, the Civic Center claims the event is 'educational' and deserves a public platform, which happens to be funded with Christian tax-dollars. Shame on the Civic Center. They're misusing the 1st Amendment as a billy club to beat God-loving Americans over the head. It needs to stop."

Last week, Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City filed a lawsuit demanding that satanist Adam Daniels return the Consecrated Host he illicitly obtained for the "Black Mass" to its rightful owner, the Catholic Church. The lawsuit was successful and the Host was returned to Archbishop Coakley.

"That was a victory," Ritchie said. "But we must not rest until the whole sacrilege is canceled. Civil leaders in Oklahoma should be encouraged to do the right thing, serve the common good, and cancel the 'Black Mass' altogether."

Students at Harvard University, Yale, Brown, Cornell, Columbia, Stanford, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and many other institutions of higher learning joined the petition sponsored by the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) against the "Black Mass" in Oklahoma.

"The public outcry is only growing," Ritchie continued. "The petition will probably hit 100,000 in a few weeks."

"Thousands of college students are really upset about this type of in-your-face satanism. They want America to remain one nation under God. And they want the 'Black Mass' to be canceled right away."

Access the TFP petition to stop the "Black Mass" here:
www.tfpstudentaction.org/stop-black-mass-oklahoma-city.html

Mary TV Daily Reflection 8/27/2014



Our Lady's plan in Medjugorje is real!
 (c) Mary TV 2014   
    

J.M.J
August 27, 2014
St. Monica

Dear Family of Mary!

"Dear children! Pray for my intentions, because Satan wants to destroy my plan which I have here and to steal your peace. Therefore, little children, pray, pray, pray that God can act through each of you. May your hearts be open to God's will. I love you and bless you with my motherly blessing. Thank you for having responded to my call." (August 25, 2014)

Our Lady came to Medjugorje in 1981 with a plan from God. She came to the six visionaries to initiate that plan through them, through their personal response to her call and through the messages she would give to all of us through them. She has never really spelled out the plan to us. I like to think she keeps her cards close! She has told us lots of ways in which we can be part of her plan. Her main messages map out our way to join in the plan. And we certainly can see some of the evidence of this plan, in the conversions and healings, the joy and the peace, the hope and the love for God that has developed in her children over the years. But we are still awaiting the revelation of the full plan.

I decided to look back at Our Lady's messages and gather a few of them that mention Our Lady's plan. There are a lot of them. I find it helpful to just read them, and let her words over the years give me a perspective on what she is doing. I think you will find that there are at least three main points that she brings up about this plan. 1. She has a plan for Medjugorje that has been given to her by God and it has something to do with peace and salvation. 2. Satan hates this plan and is doing everything he can to destroy it. 3. Our part in the plan depends on our prayer and our commitment to do whatever God tells each of us to do in our own lives, and that we withstand the enemy's temptations.

Take a look at a few messages and see what you think:

July 12, 1984 "Dear children! These days satan wants to frustrate my plans. Pray that his plan not be realized. I will pray my Son Jesus to give you the grace to experience the victory of Jesus in the temptations of satan. Thank you for having responded to my call."

August 11, 1984 (Saturday) "Dear children! Pray, because satan wishes to complicate my plans still further. Pray with the heart and surrender yourselves to Jesus in prayer."

December 27, 1984 "Dear children! This Christmas satan wanted in a special way to spoil God's plans. You, dear children, have discerned satan even on Christmas day itself. But God is winning in all your hearts. So let your hearts keep on being happy. Thank you for having responded to my call."

January 14, 1985 (Monday) "My dear children! Satan is so strong and with all his might wants to disturb my plans which I have begun with you. You pray, just pray and don't stop for a minute! I will pray to my Son for the realization of all the plans I have begun. Be patient and constant in your prayers. And don't let satan discourage you. He is working hard in the world. Be on your guard!" (Message conveyed by Vicka from Our Lady.)

February 7, 1985 "Dear children! These days satan is manifesting himself in a special way in this parish. Pray, dear children, that God's plan is brought into effect and that every work of satan ends up for the glory of God. I have stayed with you this long so I might help you along in your trials. Thank you for having responded to my call."

September 5, 1985 "Dear children! Today I thank you for all the prayers. Keep on praying all the more so that satan will be far away from this place. Dear children, satan's plan has failed. Pray for fulfillment of what God plans in this parish. I especially thank the young people for the sacrifices they have offered up. Thank you for having responded to my call."

September 26, 1985 "Dear children! I thank you for all the prayers. Thank you for all the sacrifices. I wish to tell you, dear children, to renew the messages which I am giving you. Especially live the fast, because by fasting you will achieve and cause me the joy of the whole plan, which God is planning here in Medjugorje, being fulfilled. Thank you for having responded to my call."

January 25, 1987 The first apparition of the 25th of the month, given to Marija, for the parish: "Today I want to appeal to all of you to start living a new life from this day on. Dear children, I wish that you would understand that God has chosen each one of you to have a part in the great plan for the salvation of mankind. You cannot fully understand how great your role is in God's design. For that reason, pray, dear children, so that through prayer, you may be able to know your role in God's plan. I am with you, so that you may be able to realize it fully."

August 25, 1991 "Dear Children! Today also I invite you to prayer, now as never before when my plan has begun to be realized. Satan is strong and wants to sweep away my plans of peace and joy and make you think that my Son is not strong in His decisions. Therefore, I call all of you, dear children, to pray and fast still more firmly. I invite you to self-renunciation for nine days so that, with your help, everything that I desire to realize through the secrets I began in Fatima, may be fulfilled. I call you, dear children, to now grasp the importance of my coming and the seriousness of the situation. I want to save all souls and present them to God. Therefore, let us pray that everything I have begun be fully realized. Thank you for having responded to my call."

May 25, 1993 "Dear children! Today I invite you to open yourselves to God by means of prayer so the Holy Spirit may begin to work miracles in you and through you. I am with you and I intercede before God for each one of you because, dear children, each one of you is important in my plan of salvation. I invite you to be carriers of good and peace. God can give you peace only if you convert and pray. Therefore, my dear little children, pray, pray, pray and do that which the Holy Spirit inspires you. Thank you for having responded to my call."

June 25, 2004 "Dear children! Also today, joy is in my heart. I desire to thank you for making my plan realizable. Each of you is important, therefore, little children, pray and rejoice with me for every heart that has converted and become an instrument of peace in the world. Prayer groups are powerful, and through them I can see, little children, that the Holy Spirit is at work in the world. Thank you for having responded to my call."

June 25, 2007 "Dear children! Also today, with great joy in my heart, I call you to conversion. Little children, do not forget that you are all important in this great plan, which God leads through Medjugorje. God desires to convert the entire world and to call it to salvation and to the way towards Himself, who is the beginning and the end of every being. In a special way, little children, from the depth of my heart, I call you all to open yourselves to this great grace that God gives you through my presence here. I desire to thank each of you for the sacrifices and prayers. I am with you and I bless you all. Thank you for having responded to my call."

October 25, 2008 "Dear children! In a special way I call you all to pray for my intentions so that, through your prayers, you may stop satan's plan over this world, which is further from God every day, and which puts itself in the place of God and is destroying everything that is beautiful and good in the souls of each of you. Therefore, little children, arm yourselves with prayer and fasting so that you may be conscious of how much God loves you and may carry out God's will. Thank you for having responded to my call."

August 25, 2011 "Dear children! Today I call you to pray and fast for my intentions, because satan wants to destroy my plan. Here I began with this parish and invited the entire world. Many have responded, but there is an enormous number of those who do not want to hear or accept my call. Therefore, you who have said 'yes', be strong and resolute. Thank you for having responded to my call."

Sorry for this long reflection, but I feel that our response to Our Lady's call in this day, now, is vital. The better we understand her presence and plan in Medjugorje, the better we will be able to help her. Let's do what she tells us to do. We won't regret it!

In Jesus, Mary and Joseph!
Cathy Nolan
©Mary TV 2014
 

Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Mark Mallett Update

Mark

Getting Back on Track

 
WARM greetings to my family of readers! Just an update on things here…
As you know, my laptop was fried by lightning a couple weeks ago, and as a result, I have been unable to do some writing while on the go. The end result is that I’ve been falling behind. But at last with a new computer in hand, I will resume the Now Word this coming week, continuing at this point with a weekly summary of the Mass readings.
PUBLISHED IN: | ON AUGUST 24TH, 2014 | 

“...satan wants to destroy my plan which I have here...”

Medjugorje Witness

If You Were to Decide Again...

August 26, 2014 A.D.

 
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August 26, 2014 A.D.

Yesterday Our Lady gave the 25th message for the world through Marija. In the message Our Lady said:

...satan wants to destroy my plan which I have here...”

Medjugorje visionary Marija
Medjugorje visionary Marija, through whom Our Lady gives the 25th message for the world. Marija often visits the founder of Caritas and his family at the Community of Caritas in Alabama, where Our Lady has delivered part of the Medjugorje plan. Caritas is one of many plans that Our Lady said She has in the world.
Here, in Medjugorje Our Lady came with a great plan, a plan to save the world - a plan which includes many plans throughout the world. It can be easy after 33 years of apparitions to grow lazy, complacent, or to simply lose interest. Medjugorje visionary Marija tells us, after all the suffering she has endured, all the prayers, if she had to decide again:
 
“Perhaps to begin our meeting, it would be best for us to pray because I think that if Our Lady was not here, we would also not be here. So simply I feel that our life here in Medjugorje, through Medjugorje, those who come to Medjugorje, cannot be without repeating a thousand times a day the Hail Mary. So we will also begin invoking Our Lady, inviting Her to come here among us that She may also hear our prayers, our cries to Her, our difficulties and our joys due to which we have come here and that we will pray that truly She may be the one who from the beginning has said to us, “I am with you. I love you. If you knew how much I love you, you would cry with joy.” We will call Her among us, that She who for 33 years has been living with us and I can say today as an adult as I am no longer a child, if I were to be honest. “Marija, let’s go back, in some marvelous way, if you were to decide again, what would you do? Most certainly my life was not easy, not before the apparitions, but especially after the apparitions, when many people expected of us who knows what, for us to work miracles that we were not capable of doing. If you were to say to me, “Marija, let’s go back and decide again,” I would say again, with Our Lady and Her messages, with Her school and with Her inspirations, even today I would decide yes. So my answer today will also be yes to Our Lady through this witness. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy SpiritHail MaryWithout Mary, there is not Jesus either, so we also greet Him in the Most Holy TrinityGlory Be to the Father…”
-Medjugorje visionary Marija


For your spiritual nourishment, we encourage you to download free and read, "Have You Become Complacent or Fallen Asleep?" by a Friend of Medjugorje, available by clicking to visit here...
 

How Christians Can Rebuild Our Culture

August 26, 2014  

(Php 2:14-15) And do ye all things without murmurings and hesitations: That you may be blameless and sincere children of God, without reproof, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation: among whom you shine as lights in the world.

POPE FRANCIS: Every baptized person is called to offer to Jesus his or her own faith, poor but sincere, so that He can continue to build His Church today, in every part of the world.


DR. KENT BRANTLY: "I prayed that God would help me to be faithful even in my illness, and I prayed that in my life or in my death, He would be glorified."

EXCERPT ARCHBISHOP CHAPUT: Law and Morality in Public Discourse: How Christians Can Rebuild Our Culture

One of the ways we might begin to live more fruitfully in a world that seems so deeply conflicted is to create parishes, seminaries, clubs, colleges, and families that are real schools of sanctification. These would be vital in building up society, changing the culture, and trying to build a renewed sense of Christian community.


But, as Benedict XVI said in one of his many talks, the original St. Benedict and his monks never sought to build a civilization or preserve a culture. Rather, he said,
Their motivation was much more basic. Their goal was: quaerere Deum [to seek God]. Amid the confusion of the times, in which nothing seemed permanent, they wanted to do the essential—to make an effort to find what was perennially valid and lasting, life itself. They were searching for God. They wanted to go from the inessential to the essential, to the only truly important and reliable thing there is. . . . What gave Europe’s culture its foundation—the search for God and the readiness to listen to him—remains today the basis of any genuine culture.”

It’s in seeking Jesus Christ with all our hearts that culture is built and society is renewed. It’s in prayer, the sacraments, changing diapers, balancing budgets, preaching homilies, loving a spouse, forgiving and seeking forgiveness—all in the spirit of charity—that, brick by brick, we bring about the kingdom of God.

As Pope Benedict pointed out in Jesus of Nazareth, “The kingdom of God comes by way of a listening heart.” That’s the most important thing we can pray for, a heart open to the word of God. When our hearts listen and we hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, then God can begin to conform us to his likeness and will.
Português: Cerimônia de canonização do frade b...
Papa Bento XVI no Campo de Marte em São Paulo, Brasil. (fragment) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Mass too has unique importance in our personal renewal and in the renewal of our culture. Father Richard John Neuhaus once wrote that the Eucharist is not only the “source and summit” of the Church’s life: “It is [also] a supremely political action in which the heavenly polis is made present in time. The eucharistic meal here and now anticipates, makes present, the New Jerusalem’s eternal Feast of the Lamb.”

The Mass feeds us with the body and blood of Jesus Christ. But it also reminds us that we’re on pilgrimage to the heavenly city. We live in the earthly city with its earthly ends. But we’re ultimately fulfilled only by our final end: communion with God when we see him in the glory of eternal life. Because we seek Jesus, we will never be fully at home in a world that rejected and killed him. The Letter to the Hebrews reminds us that “here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come” (Heb 13:14).

And yet, we can use the goods and the peace of the City of Man to help us pursue the goods and the peace of the City of God, as Augustine teaches. Jesus has called us by name. He empowers us by his Spirit. Now he invites us to work with him for the redemption of that same world.



EXCERPT HOMILY FR. JOSEPH ESPER: A young woman named Jill had been dating her boyfriend Tom for several months, and they had become very close; in fact, the two of them were seriously discussing marriage, and even considered themselves engaged to be engaged. There was one hitch, however: Jill hadn’t yet met Tom’s parents. They’d been putting this off, for Tom had warned Jill that his mom and dad tended to be set in their ways, judgmental, and suspicious of new people. Finally this meeting couldn’t be postponed any longer, so Tom arranged for his girlfriend to come over to his parents’ home for dinner and meet the family. When Tom arrived at her apartment to pick her up, Jill noticed her black shoes looked a bit dingy, and because it was so important that she make a good impression, she grabbed a paper towel and quickly wiped them off—not realizing it was the same paper towel she had used earlier that day at breakfast to blot or dry off her bacon. When she and Tom arrived at his parents’ home, they were greeted by Tom’s mom and dad and their spoiled, cranky poodle, named Cleo. After sniffing the bacon grease on Jill’s shoes, the dog happily followed her around all evening. As the young people were about to leave a few hours later, Tom’s mother said to Jill—with her husband silently nodding his agreement— “Dear, Cleo really likes you, and she is an excellent judge of character, so we would be delighted to welcome you into our family” (May, The Story File, p. 2). Sometimes we human beings can make important decisions regarding other people on very flimsy or mistaken reasons; if these lead us to like or accept someone we might otherwise reject, that’s good—but if our quirks and prejudices cause us to reject someone God has sent to us, that’s very bad. Rather than relying on our own hit-or-miss feelings and intuitions, Jesus calls us to a higher standard: namely, to look upon everyone as a potential child of God, and thus a person of importance.

St. Therese of Lisieux once wrote, “There’ll be a lot of surprises at the Last Judgment when we shall be able to see what really happened inside people’s souls. . . .” It’s entirely possible that some people we admire or look up to are actually hypocrites and terrible sinners in God’s eyes, while others we take for granted or even look upon with disdain have a deep but hidden spirituality that’s very pleasing to the Lord. St. Francis de Sales once noted that because God’s grace is great enough to transform the life of even a hardened sinner in a single instant, our judgments about another person’s apparent lack of holiness—even if accurate—can quickly become outdated; moreover, as Mother Teresa once noted, “If you judge people, you have no time to love them.” That’s what the Lord expects of us—that we love everyone we encounter: young and old, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, Americans and foreigners, attractive and unattractive, friendly and rude, likeable and obnoxious, churchgoers and non-churchgoers, and those who are like us and those who are quite different from us. In practical terms, loving them means three things in particular. First of all, we must show respect to everyone, treating others as we wish to be treated, helping them when needed, and disagreeing with them or correcting them—when necessary—in a gentle and caring way. We’re not expected to like everyone we meet, but we are expected to place Christian charity ahead of our personal feelings. Secondly, we must forgive others who offend us, even if they mock our moral and religious values, even if they don’t seem to want or deserve our forgiveness, and even if we’ll never see them or even think about them again. If they truly need to be punished for their sins, God will take care of that; besides, we’ll only receive mercy ourselves in the same degree we’re willing to share it. Thirdly, we have to pray for others, especially those we dislike or consider suspicious or find annoying. Criticizing them, judging them, or gossipping about them won’t help them change or improve as persons, but our prayers might— and it’s certain that this type of humble and loving prayer will help us grow in grace.

Jesus tells us today that we’re not supposed to have an “us versus them” mentality, for through His gift of redemption, everyone is given the chance to be part of God’s family. If we go along with the mistaken ways of this world, we’ll be passing judgments on everyone—and more often than not, our judgments will turn out to be wrong, foolish, and perhaps even harmful. Our Lord calls us to rise above this shortsighted approach and instead base all our decisions in the light of His Gospel. If we do this, then—as He did for the Canaanite woman—He will joyfully praise our faith and lovingly give us His blessing.

The Desert Fathers: sayings of the Early Christian Monks: Discretion

50. He also said, 'He who knows himself is a man.'


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