Our first session today: My Family and My Faith Family
"My mom brings me closer to God. I always wake up to her praying in the morning." -Vivian
"A faith family wants to help you become closer to God." -Kristen
"I started to connect God with joy." - Kristen
"It's important not to loose sight of God when others hurt you." -Kristen
"This is where my faith family came to life - right here, right in this room." -Kristen
"I challenge you to just go to Mass with your friends." -Kristen
"For the first time I realized how much it meant to have someone praying for me." -Kristen
Our second session of the morning: What It Means to Be a Member
"Peter was the first pope, he had to be really committed - full time dedication." -Sarah
"It takes committed and responsibility to be part of the baseball team." - Bruno
"Fishing is hard work. They weren't catching anything. Jesus said, "I'm going to make you fishers of men." -Sarah and Bruno
"An apostle is one who is entrusted with a mission." -Sarah
"Love is the ultimate mission. God died for love." - Sarah
"That's straight up love." - Bruno
Saturday, February 14, 2015
Luke 18 2015: Friday Night Summary
Here are some quotes from our first session: Who am I? Who is God?
"When I'm at Mass every week, I know God's Presence is with me. I didn't always feel this way though." -Melissa
"On my Luke 18 I opened up to my classmates and became friends with people in my class I didn't really talk to." -Jacob
"I turned to prayer because it helped me find comfort in difficult situations." - Jacob
"I knew I was using my God given talents for something greater. I never would have had that if I'd won the election." -Jacob
"I challenge all of you to find God in all things." -Jacob
"When I'm at Mass every week, I know God's Presence is with me. I didn't always feel this way though." -Melissa
"On my Luke 18 I opened up to my classmates and became friends with people in my class I didn't really talk to." -Jacob
"I turned to prayer because it helped me find comfort in difficult situations." - Jacob
"I knew I was using my God given talents for something greater. I never would have had that if I'd won the election." -Jacob
"I challenge all of you to find God in all things." -Jacob
Monday, November 10, 2014
Love Thy Neighbor
"Jesus said to him, 'What is written in the law? How do you read it?' He said in reply, 'You shall love the Lord, you God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.' He replied to him, 'You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.'
But because he wished to justify himself, he said to Jesus, 'And who is my neighbor?' Jesus replied, 'A man fell victim to robbers as he went down from Jerusalem to Jericho. They stripped and beat him and went off leaving him half-dead. A priest happened to be going down that road, but when he saw him, he passed by on the opposite side. Likewise a Levite came to the place, and when he saw him, he passed by on the opposite side. But a Samaritan traveler who came upon him was moved with compassion at the sight. He approached the victim, poured oil and wine over his wounds and bandaged them. Then he lifted him up on his own animal, took him to an inn and cared for him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper with the instruction, 'Take care of him. If you spend more than what I have given you, I shall repay you on my way back.'
Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers' victim?' He answered, 'The one who treated him with mercy.' Jesus said to him, 'Go and do likewise.' " - Luke 10:26 - 37
"Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations..." -Matthew 28:19
These were the scripture passages used last Thursday to discuss our call to live mercy and peace in the midst of conflict. Here are the highlights...
- Samaritans were outcasts in the Palestinian Jewish society. After the Babylonian Captivity ended, not all the Jewish people returned to their homeland. Some (including the Samaritans) remained in Gentile territory, were influenced by the Hellenization of culture, and intermarried with non-Jewish people. By the time of Jesus, many of these Jewish people had moved back to Palestine, but were treated as unclean and less that the Palestinian Jews who had remained faithful to the ritual purity laws.
- By calling this scholar to see the Samaritan as the neighbor in this parable, Jesus is challenging that culture stigma. This is a theme that is prevalent throughout Luke's Gospel. Jesus is constantly approaching the outcast: the poor, the woman, the leper, the unclean. The resounding message is that your neighbor is the person (Gentile or Jew, clean or unclean) in front of you who needs to experience God's mercy and peace through you. The challenge for us, then, is this: who in today's world do we need to work to see as our neighbor?
- There has been so much conflict in St. Louis in recent months. The Archbishop has called us all to pray for peace. Additionally, we can choose, in our daily lives, to live peace with those around us.
- Who are the outcasts in your school? Your church? Your community? How are you called to be "neighbor" to those people?
Remember, our call to live and spread the message of the Gospel is a call to reach out to ALL. What should that look like in your life today?
Monday, November 3, 2014
Understanding Purgatory
Praying for the dead is a big part of the Catholic Tradition. We pray for the souls of our departed loved ones, hoping that they might be welcomed into the Heavenly banquet. So, where are those souls in the space between death and Heaven?
The answer: purgatory.
Purgatory is the state of purification from temporal punishment for souls to be made perfect before entering Heaven. Here are some helpful ways to think of purgatory.
Mark Hart asks us to consider a wrinkled dollar bill. Most people have experienced the frustration of attempting to get a vending machine to accept a dollar bill that is wrinkled. When that wrinkled bill is the only thing standing between you and your Dr. Pepper, you try your best to flatten it out. (I've always found that holding it in two hands and rubbing it along the edge of the machine works well.) The best scenario though is to have a nice crisp dollar bill to give to the machine - no wrinkles works perfectly.
Another approach: Imagine that your soul is a wooden board. Sin is like a nail that is hammered into the wood. It changes the wood. When we receive absolution in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the sin is removed from our life. (Like a nail can be removed from the wooden board.) However, we are sometimes still attached to sin (removing the nail leaves a hole in the wooden board), and we need to be rid of that attachment to enter Heaven.
Last analogy: Let's say that you are feeling bored one night and decide that it would be funny to throw a baseball through your neighbor's window. The next morning, when you see your neighbor upset about it, you realize it wasn't funny at all. You go and explain to your neighbor that it was you and that you are sorry. Your neighbor forgives you, but the situation hasn't completely gone away. The window is still a pile of broken glass.
The answer: purgatory.
Purgatory is the state of purification from temporal punishment for souls to be made perfect before entering Heaven. Here are some helpful ways to think of purgatory.
Mark Hart asks us to consider a wrinkled dollar bill. Most people have experienced the frustration of attempting to get a vending machine to accept a dollar bill that is wrinkled. When that wrinkled bill is the only thing standing between you and your Dr. Pepper, you try your best to flatten it out. (I've always found that holding it in two hands and rubbing it along the edge of the machine works well.) The best scenario though is to have a nice crisp dollar bill to give to the machine - no wrinkles works perfectly.
Purgatory is the phase of purification where all the "wrinkles" are smoothed out of our souls so that we can be accepted into Heaven.
Another approach: Imagine that your soul is a wooden board. Sin is like a nail that is hammered into the wood. It changes the wood. When we receive absolution in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the sin is removed from our life. (Like a nail can be removed from the wooden board.) However, we are sometimes still attached to sin (removing the nail leaves a hole in the wooden board), and we need to be rid of that attachment to enter Heaven.
Purgatory is the phase of purification where the "hole" is filled, making the board perfect again.
Last analogy: Let's say that you are feeling bored one night and decide that it would be funny to throw a baseball through your neighbor's window. The next morning, when you see your neighbor upset about it, you realize it wasn't funny at all. You go and explain to your neighbor that it was you and that you are sorry. Your neighbor forgives you, but the situation hasn't completely gone away. The window is still a pile of broken glass.
Purgatory is the phase of purification that fixes the window, freeing us from all the lasting effects of sin so that we can enter Heaven.
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
The Four Last Things
Last Thursday, we talked a little about speculative Theology and what happens after we die. Enjoy this summary! Hopefully you'll find some new ideas to think about!
Death
When we talk about death from a theological perspective, we are talking about the separation of body and soul. As human people, we are a union of body and soul. The soul is understood as the unifying or organizing principle of the body. It is the source of life in all living things. The human soul is immortal - it survives death. So, what does the Church understand about what happens to our soul after it separates from our body (death)?
Judgment
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (1022) tells us that the individual's soul receives its particular judgment at the moment of death. The soul either enters into the eternal blessedness of Heaven, the purification phase of purgatory (to eventually enter Heaven), or is condemned to the eternal damnation of hell.
- When we share in God's eternal life, we share in the Divine life, but we don't actually become Divine. We don't become a different KIND of thing; we are still humans. So, while our knowledge in Heaven will likely be far more impressive than human knowledge on earth (I mean, for one thing, it's perfect), we cannot know everything. We are finite beings; we cannot possibly have infinite knowledge. It's human knowledge perfected, not total knowledge.
- God is infinite and eternal, and He is love. We share in all of those when we taste the blessedness of Heaven. Because He is infinite, we will never come to the end of exploration of Him. Every "day" will be as new and as incompletely complete as the "previous one." (Remember: time in Heaven is not like time on earth). Because He is eternal, all of time is PRESENT TIME in Heaven. There is nothing to wait for, nothing to lack. (But, remember, He is infinite, so along with not lacking anything, we are also constantly exploring the infinite ... confused yet?)
Hell
In the Gospels, when Jesus refers to "hell" he calls it "Gehenna." Gehenna was a valley outside of Jerusalem that was used for the perpetual burning of trash. That land was chosen because it had been defiled by the human sacrifice of heathen tribes.
Although the Church does not judge a particular soul, declaring a specific person is in hell (because God is the judge, not man, not even "Church"), it does seem that Judas (the apostle who betrayed Jesus) is there. Jesus says of him, it would have been "good for that man if he'd not been born." It sounds like there's no redemption left.
When Jesus was asked if many are saved, He responded with, "Strive to enter in." Peter Kreeft (linked below) says that, "The most important question about hell, as about Heaven, is the practical one: What roads lead there?"
So, all of this leaves us with an important question about our own lives/souls. Blessed Fulton Sheen once said, "For when the curtain goes down on the last day, and we respond to the curtain call of judgment, we will not be asked what part we played, but how well we played the part that was assigned to us."
God, our loving Father, calls us each to Himself. It is a call that costs our human wills something, but it is also a call that draws us to the source of our very existence - to Love itself, the love for which each soul was created.
What path leads to Heaven? Because of God's intelligent plan for human salvation, we don't have to guess. In the Incarnation, God Himself took on human flesh to show us the path. Christ, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, not only opened the gates of Heaven by His death on the cross, but also, by His LIFE and death, taught us about the way to the Father. The way to the Father is through the Son. While on earth, Christ founded the Church and ensured that through the Sacraments offered to man through the Church, our path to Heaven would be known.
Unite yourself to Christ's saving works by uniting yourself to the life of the Church. Go to Mass. Receive the Eucharist worthily. Confess your sins. Dedicate yourself to a life of prayer, and make your days on earth a self-offering of love and life for the Father.
"Strive to enter in."
(View the Peter Kreeft article mentioned and quoted above here.)
Death
Judgment
How does God judge our soul? Well, that's a bit complicated. Here are general rules:
- Heaven: your soul is entirely free of all sin and all attachment to sin
- Purgatory: your soul still bears the weight of venial sins and/or attachment to sins
- Hell: your soul rejects God, is in the state of unrepented mortal sin at death, and/or there is no remorse for sins
Heaven
Again, a lot of what we talk about when it comes to heaven is speculative. Now, some of the speculation is highly intelligent and entirely reasonable. However, when it comes to these kinds of topics it is important to remember the beauty of delighting in the MYSTERY of God and faith. Here are a couple ideas to consider...
- When we share in God's eternal life, we share in the Divine life, but we don't actually become Divine. We don't become a different KIND of thing; we are still humans. So, while our knowledge in Heaven will likely be far more impressive than human knowledge on earth (I mean, for one thing, it's perfect), we cannot know everything. We are finite beings; we cannot possibly have infinite knowledge. It's human knowledge perfected, not total knowledge.
- God is infinite and eternal, and He is love. We share in all of those when we taste the blessedness of Heaven. Because He is infinite, we will never come to the end of exploration of Him. Every "day" will be as new and as incompletely complete as the "previous one." (Remember: time in Heaven is not like time on earth). Because He is eternal, all of time is PRESENT TIME in Heaven. There is nothing to wait for, nothing to lack. (But, remember, He is infinite, so along with not lacking anything, we are also constantly exploring the infinite ... confused yet?)
Hell
Although the Church does not judge a particular soul, declaring a specific person is in hell (because God is the judge, not man, not even "Church"), it does seem that Judas (the apostle who betrayed Jesus) is there. Jesus says of him, it would have been "good for that man if he'd not been born." It sounds like there's no redemption left.
When Jesus was asked if many are saved, He responded with, "Strive to enter in." Peter Kreeft (linked below) says that, "The most important question about hell, as about Heaven, is the practical one: What roads lead there?"
So, all of this leaves us with an important question about our own lives/souls. Blessed Fulton Sheen once said, "For when the curtain goes down on the last day, and we respond to the curtain call of judgment, we will not be asked what part we played, but how well we played the part that was assigned to us."
God, our loving Father, calls us each to Himself. It is a call that costs our human wills something, but it is also a call that draws us to the source of our very existence - to Love itself, the love for which each soul was created.
What path leads to Heaven? Because of God's intelligent plan for human salvation, we don't have to guess. In the Incarnation, God Himself took on human flesh to show us the path. Christ, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, not only opened the gates of Heaven by His death on the cross, but also, by His LIFE and death, taught us about the way to the Father. The way to the Father is through the Son. While on earth, Christ founded the Church and ensured that through the Sacraments offered to man through the Church, our path to Heaven would be known.
Unite yourself to Christ's saving works by uniting yourself to the life of the Church. Go to Mass. Receive the Eucharist worthily. Confess your sins. Dedicate yourself to a life of prayer, and make your days on earth a self-offering of love and life for the Father.
"Strive to enter in."
(View the Peter Kreeft article mentioned and quoted above here.)
Monday, October 6, 2014
Family
Ah, families...
The word "family" can mean a lot of different things. We talk about "faith families," "biological families," and sometimes we call our close friends "family."
People joke (and sometimes tell the truth) about their family being dysfunctional. Family life can be hard. Sometimes our relationship with our parents is a struggle. Sometimes our siblings seem like the most annoying people on the face of the earth.
Some moments are great, too. Sometimes our family is there for us in ways no one else can be.
Right now, there is a Synod on the Family. Pope Francis called for this gathering of cardinals, bishops, and other church leaders to discuss family life. This shows that he understands it to be a topic of great importance.
Here is the prayer Pope Francis gives us...
Pray this for your owndysfunctional family and for the Synod!
(Who doesn't want to be a Weasley?)
People joke (and sometimes tell the truth) about their family being dysfunctional. Family life can be hard. Sometimes our relationship with our parents is a struggle. Sometimes our siblings seem like the most annoying people on the face of the earth.
Some moments are great, too. Sometimes our family is there for us in ways no one else can be.
Right now, there is a Synod on the Family. Pope Francis called for this gathering of cardinals, bishops, and other church leaders to discuss family life. This shows that he understands it to be a topic of great importance.
Here is the prayer Pope Francis gives us...
Jesus, Mary and Joseph,
in you we contemplate
the splendor of true love,
to you we turn with trust.
Holy Family of Nazareth,
grant that our families too
may be places of communion and prayer,
authentic schools of the Gospel
and small domestic Churches.
Holy Family of Nazareth,
may families never again
experience violence, rejection and division:
may all who have been hurt or scandalized
find ready comfort and healing.
Holy Family of Nazareth,
may the Synod of Bishops
make us once more mindful
of the sacredness and inviolability of the family,
and its beauty in God's plan.
Jesus, Mary and Joseph,
graciously hear our prayer.
Amen.
Pray this for your own
Thursday, October 2, 2014
Our Guardian Angels
A heavenly spirit assigned by God to watch over each of us during our lives, this is what the Church teaches us about the Guardian Angels. This doctrine is a part of the Church's tradition.
God has charged His angels with the ministry of watching and safeguarding His creations on earth. To these angels we've given the name Holy Guardian Angels. The role of the guardian angel is both to guide us to good thoughts, works and words, and to preserve us from evil.
As our protectors, and gifts from God, the Guardian Angels deserve not only our respect and love, but also our prayers in times of need. They are watching over us, there to protect us from danger of sin and guide us in what is Good.
"No evil shall befall you, nor shall affliction come near your tent, for to His Angels God has given command about you, that they guard you in all your ways. Upon their hands they will bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone."
It may be a prayer we learned as a child, short, simple, sweet, but it is a prayer I hope you continue to pray daily...or I encourage you to start now.
Angel of God, my Guardian dear, to whom God's Love commits thee here. Ever this day (night) be at my side, to light and guard, to rule and guide. From stain of sin, O keep me free. At death's dread hour my helper be.
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