Monday, August 31, 2015

As the West Sleeps, ISIS Spreads Throughout the Middle East



Tribulation Times

September 1, 2015
  

(Luk 6:22-23) Blessed shall you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you and shall reproach you and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. Be glad in that day and rejoice: for behold, your reward is great in heaven, For according to these things did their fathers to the prophets.

POPE FRANCIS:  “Let it also be a stimulus to legislators and government leaders to guarantee religious freedom everywhere, and to the international community to put an end to the violence and oppression.”



ALETEIA: As the West Sleeps, ISIS Spreads Throughout the Middle East




NEWS REPORT: Muslim “Breaking of the Crosses” in Syracuse, NY as Catholic Church converted to mosque

CRISIS MAGAZINE: Faith-Based Negotiations with Faith-Based Fanatics



REVIEW: The ISIS Caliphate and the Churches

CHRISTIAN TODAY: Iraqi archbishop: 'I quarrel with God daily' over Islamic State crisis



An Iraqi archbishop has said his faith has been challenged by the ongoing crisis in the Middle East.

Archbishop Bashar Warda of Irbil, Iraq, has admitted that while he would outwardly encourage the scores of Christians arriving in Irbil, in his heart he wrestles with why God has allowed such terrible things to happen.

"I don't understand what he is doing when I look at what has happened in the region," Archbishop Warda said.

"I quarrel with him every day."

According to the Catholic Herald, he said the arguments take place within his intimate relationship with God and, with the help of grace, his relationship withstands even the unimaginable challenges that he has faced over the past year.

"Before going to sleep, I usually hand all my crises, wishes, thoughts and sadness to him, so I can at least have some rest," Archbishop Warda told The Criterion, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis.

"The next day, I usually wake up with his providence that I would never dream about."

More than 100,000 Christians and other persecuted minorities have sought refuge in Irbil in northern Iraq as they flee ISIS. With the threat of the extremist group now only 25 miles away, however, many Christians who fled to Irbil are moving on to refugee camps in Jordon, Lebanon and Turkey.

RELATED: ISIS has just ripped a community’s heart out- The monastery of Mar Elian, destroyed by ISIS, was a beacon of inter-faith co-operation




MORE: Persecuted Christians Walk 10 Hours in Dark of Night to Escape ISIS, Praise God for Still Being Alive

EXCERPT DEBKA.COMISIS declares war on the US dollar with the “gold dinar”

The Islamic State on Sunday, Aug. 30, launched a new campaign to destabilize the US Dollar with a 54-minute video tape, produced to the professional standards of New York Madison Avenue. for general distribution.

The ISIS tape calls on world markets to stop using the dollar and revert to the financial system of the medieval Muslim caliphates. It offers the following currency substitutes:

1. A dinar coin weighing 4.25 grams of 21-carat gold, worth $139 at current gold prices;
2. A silver “dirham” coin, currently in use in some Muslim countries such as Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, and parts of Libya, where ISIS is snapping up oil fields and installations.
3.  Two copper coins known as “fulus,” which are handy currency for small transactions and daily use.
4.  The jihadis also accept gold trinkets in lieu of coins.

The tape shows details of the coins’ production process at a plant in Mosul, ISIS’s Iraq headquarters. While the Islamists’ plan for war on the dollar may recall a bygone age in history, it is worth noting that just two years ago, Iran was paid for its oil sales to India in gold and gold ornaments, to beat the Western oil embargo.
 
Most financial circles have greeted the ISIS reach for world domination by the gold dinar as a stunt. They maintain that ISIS itself uses American dollars to buy arms on the black market and pay its fighters.

All the same, DEBKAfile’s counterterrorism experts disclose that the jihadis are deadly serious about their plan to wage a war of terror on the Western economy and financial system with four goals in view:

a) ISIS is not a run-of-the-mill terrorist organization, it is a movement seriously determined to forge an Islamic state and world order governed by its fundamentalist values.
b) Their territorial expansion and conquest of land has been accompanied by the pirating of natural resources, in their reach for affluence and control of the world’s economic levers.
ISIS’s consistent drive for terrain rich in oil, uranium, gold, silver and other natural resources, shows up in their grab for dominance in places like Libya, Iraq, Syria and the Sinai Peninsula. In Afghanistan, the Islamists have of late seized and ousted the Taliban from areas rich in precious metals.
c) The Islamic State is gaining a strong hand in the arms and oil black markets in the Middle East, Africa and parts of Europe. It is also gaining leverage for forcing traders to accept payment in gold dinars.
And there is no reason why they should refuse. Some of them already trade in bitcoins, a virtual currency with no national, economic or banking backing.
d)  Like Al Qaeda in its heyday of the 90s, ISIS has many secret sympathizers among the rich and powerful of the Gulf emirates. If a hundred of them could be persuaded that the jihadist cause required them to start trading in gold dinars in their international business transactions, including the halawa (word of mouth system), Islamist gold would soon start infiltrating the world’s financial system.

The first response came Monday, Aug. 31, from the radical Hizb ut-Tahrir of Britain. It advised examining the benefits of returning to the old Gold Standard for resolving the sovereign debt crisis threatening the Eurozone, instead of “printing counterfeit money on keyboards.”

The ISIS video was not released merely as a provocative propaganda thrust against the likes of Wall Street and Western financiers. The jihadis seriously believe that financial terrorism can be a destructive weapon for destabilizing the US-dominated global economy at least as devastating as a raging horde of suicide bombers.
The Desert Fathers: sayings of the Early Christian Monks: Humility

44. 'A brother once came to Sisois on the mountain of Antony, and as they were talking he said to Sisois, 'Have you reached the stature of Antony yet, abba?' He answered, 'If I had a single thought like Antony, I should leap toward heaven like a flame. But I know myself to be someone who can only with an effort keep his thoughts in check.'


Prayer request?  Send an email to: PrayerRequest3@aol.com
This month's archive can be found at: http://www.catholicprophecy.info/news2.html.

Unification of Europe began under the protection of the Mother of God



* August 31 – Orthodox Feast of the Deposition of the Virgin’s belt in Chalkoprateia * Unification of Europe began under the protection of the Mother of God  ----- A Moment with Mary --

Une Minute avec Marie
An initiative of the Mary of Nazareth Association 

August 31 – Orthodox Feast of the Deposition of the Virgin’s belt in Chalkoprateia

Unification of Europe began under the protection of the Mother of God 


Icon depiction the Theotokos giving her cincture to Thomas the Apostle. Below is a styllized representation of Mary's Tomb, with flowers lying on the sarcophagus. (Wikipedia)
The Belt of the Mother of God was transferred to Constantinople during the reign of Justinian (about 530), and deposited in the church of Chalkoprateia, which was located not far from Saint Sophia.

Three centuries later, in the 9th century, Emperor Charlemagne who was anointed in the Basilica of Aachen, which he wanted to dedicate to the Mother of God, received with great devotion the relic of the Holy Belt of the Virgin that the Empress of Constantinople gave him. All his life he wore the image of Mary attached to his neck by a golden chain.

When he grew older, he asked to be buried with a statue of the Virgin on his heart. After his death, the Council of Mainz instituted the feast of the Assumption for the entire Frankish Empire. Charlemagne's empire marked the end of feudalism and the beginning of the unification of Europe that developed with Christianity, under the protection of the Mother of God.

According to the Synaxarion of Constantinople, confirmed by the Imperial Menology







Mandating an Oath of Fidelity for Teachers and Administrators by Fr. Christopher George Phillips






It is the Clearer and Simpler Way …

by Fr. Christopher George Phillips:
Christendom college president Dr. Timothy O’Donnell led the entire faculty in a profession of faith and an oath of fidelity.
There has been much in the news lately about contracts for teachers in Catholic schools, and what can and cannot be in them. It’s disturbing to see situations such as in San Francisco, where there is something approaching outrage because Catholic school teachers are expected to uphold the Catholic faith in their teaching and personal example. Bishops and other leaders of Catholic schools have tried to come up with contracts which attempt to outline what is expected, and what is not to be tolerated. That whole effort seems to me to be causing a mess.
There is, I believe, an clearer and simpler way; namely, an Oath of Fidelity.
At The Atonement Academy our administrators and teachers have contracts, but mainly for the purpose of outlining salary and duties. It’s really more of an “agreement” between the individual and the institution which says “these are the duties and this is what will be paid for fulfilling those duties throughout the year.” These agreements are not the most important document for employment at the school.
The far more important document is the Oath of Fidelity. Each year the administrators and faculty of The Atonement Academy make a public oath of fidelity to the Catholic Church and her teaching. This is done during the Mass, before God and in the presence of the students. We require that our administrators and teachers be practicing Catholics, and the Oath an important way of promising before God to be faithful in living and teaching the Catholic faith.
This is the text we use:
——–
+In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
I promise that I shall always preserve communion with the Catholic Church whether in the words I speak or in the way I act.
With great care and fidelity I shall carry out the responsibilities by which I am bound in relation both to the universal Church and to the particular Church in which I am called to exercise my service according to the requirements of the law. In carrying out my charge, which is committed to me in the name of the Church, I shall preserve the deposit of faith in its entirety, hand it on faithfully and make it shine forth. As a result, whatsoever teachings are contrary I shall shun.
I shall follow and foster the common discipline of the whole Church and shall look after the observance of all ecclesiastical laws, especially those which are contained in the Code of Canon Law.
With Christian obedience I shall associate myself with what is expressed by the holy shepherds as authentic doctors and teachers of the faith or established by them as the Church’s rulers. And I shall faithfully assist diocesan bishops so that apostolic activity, to be exercised by the mandate and in the name of the Church, is carried out in the communion of the same Church.
May God help me in this way, and the Holy Gospels of God which I touch with my hands.
+ + + + +
I’m asked frequently what is the “secret” of the success of our parish school. It’s really quite straightforward. The education we offer is of the highest intellectual calibre, imparted always in the context of the Catholic faith, and strengthened by the daily celebration of Holy Mass with the regular use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
It really isn’t that hard.
 
from Courageous Priest




Sunday, August 30, 2015

Spiritual Gems-What God Wants for Each One of Us Right Now and Forever

What God Wants for Each One of Us Right Now and Forever

"I have told you these things, so that My Joy might be in you, and your joy might be complete."

"The oil of gladness is the Holy Spirit Himself, who was poured out upon Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit is the joy that comes from God."

Pope Benedict XVI (there is a series on the Holy Spirit at www.divineantidote.wordpress.com to learn about the Holy Spirit and to beg for a personal relationship with Him and His Joy. Simply put "Holy Spirit" in the search box).

Pope Benedictus XVI
Pope Benedictus XVI (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A Free Flame of Love book can be ordered in the US at www.flameoflove.us.
 
You can now order our Consecration boo​ks and our Leaders Packages in the US on our website at www.myconsecration.orgYou can order one free copy of our traditional Montfort-style book at https://www.myconsecration.org/personal-request-form/.  You can also order “33 Days to Morning Glory” for a donation plus shipping at https://www.myconsecration.org/33-days-morning-glory-english/.  If you want more information, contact raymooney@myconsecration.org.

Please do forward these Spiritual Gems to your Catholic friends.  You can subscribe to future Gems at www.myconsecration.org/about.

God Bless you and your work,
 
    Tony
     
    Anthony Mullen
    MyConsecration.org
    8 St. Albans Avenue
    Newtown Square, PA 19073
    visit us at: www.myconsecration.org

 

One night in about the year 1113




* August 30 – Santa Maria de Carquere (Portugal) * One night in about the year 1113 ----- A Moment with Mary --

Une Minute avec Marie
An initiative of the Mary of Nazareth Association 

August 30 – Santa Maria de Carquere (Portugal)

One night in about the year 1113


According to tradition, Our Lady of Carquere, on the Douro River in Portugal, is associated with the miraculous healing of Prince Afonso Henriques, who was to become the first King of Portugal.
Gerald of Braga baptises the infant Afonso
(Wikipedia photo)


Prince Afonso Henriques had been born a cripple, paralyzed from the knees down. A knight by the name of Egas de Monis, the child’s governor and companion, was a man of deep faith. He prayed fervently for the prince, seeking the help of the Blessed Virgin that the boy’s legs might be straightened through her intercession. …

One night in about the year 1113, when the prince was four years old, Egas de Monis put him to bed and fell asleep himself. Our Lady appeared and wakened the governor, disclosing her identity: "I am the Virgin Mary." She told him to go to a particular place in the hills above the Douro River that she indicated where she said: "If you dig there you will find a church that was built in my name. Place the child on the altar at night, and he will recover because my Son wants, through that prince, to destroy many enemies of the faith."

This was done and, as promised by the Virgin Mary, the young prince was healed on the altar of the newfound church of Carquere, now famous throughout Portugal. The Church of Our Lady of Carquere, or Santa Maria de Carquere, can still be visited in Spain.

Mary of Nazareth Team
Adapted from: www.roman-catholic-saints.com







     

Saturday, August 29, 2015

Refuge for sinners



* August 29 – End of the public apparitions in Le Laus in 1664, approved in 1665 (Le Laus, France) * Refuge for sinners ----- A Moment with Mary --

Une Minute avec Marie
An initiative of the Mary of Nazareth Association 

August 29 – End of the public apparitions in Le Laus in 1664, approved in 1665 (Le Laus, France)

Photos prises à Notre-Dame du Laus
Our Lady of Laus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Refuge for sinners


In Le Laus (France), the Virgin appeared for many years (1664-1718) to Benedicta Rencurel, a shepherdess. Le Laus has become a center of reconciliation with God:

"So many people have testified that Le Laus is a refuge for sinners, where God inspires us to make good confessions, lifts the shame of those of us who do not dare to admit ours sins, and—with the help of Benedicta’s advice—opens our consciences, gives us the courage to examine our lives and provides good confessors who send us away full of joy!" (Manuscripts of Le Laus, by Pierre Gaillard). 

Mary of Nazareth Team