Pope Francis Archives - Amazing Catechists

Outrage and Grief: The Nuncio’s Letter and My Response

“In an extraordinary 11-page written statement…Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, 77, claims that Pope Francis knew about strict canonical sanctions imposed on McCarrick by Pope Benedict XVI but chose to repeal them.” LifeSite News

I have read the Nuncio’s letter with outrage and grief. So much of what I have sensed, in recent years, appears to be true, and we, as members of Christ’s wounded Body, now have the opportunity to address issues of corruption within the Church more openly than ever before. The following is a personal response.

Our beloved Church is infected with a monstrous disease that must be cut out completely, so the Body of Christ can heal. But I am not afraid. I know that we are Davids, and this monster is merely another Goliath trying to appear too large for the small stones of our faith, hope, and love. I believe with all my heart that the giant will be eradicated from the Church, but it will take much time and courage. We must unite with faithful priests, friends, and family–and “be not afraid.”

I am asking Our Lord what I can personally do, and I suspect that fasting and praying are the first steps, followed by repenting of my own sins and doing my best to live in holiness and trust. Beyond that, I am discerning.

I am comforted that Peter walked through the storm-tossed waves as long as his eyes were on Christ (Matt 14:22-23). I pray that the faithful will be able to do the same, resisting the urge to sink into the waves of grief and humiliation by redoubling their efforts to be God’s light on the lampstand, their eyes fixed firmly on Jesus. But even when we do sink into our own human frailty, I pray that we will always reach for the hand of Jesus and let him lift us back into the safety and comfort of his friendship.

In 1969, long before he was Pope Benedict XVI, Father Joseph Ratzinger prophesied that the Church would undergo a dramatic transformation, that it would be attacked and scorned and severely wounded from within, leaving only a small, poor, faithful remnant to carry on the work of Christ’s love in the world. But he also indicated that the faithful remnant would inspire the world to holiness, rescuing souls from the deep loneliness of living without God.

I believe that the corridors of wealth and power within the Church will crumble, yet Our Lord will be faithful to nourish and bless those who persevere with confidence and humility. I also believe that there will be those among the ranks of the corrupt who will experience conversion and redemption, as a result of our offered sufferings, prayers, and acts of trust.

It is vitally important that each of us engage and do what we can to help in this work, but it is even more important that we live each day faithful to our individual vocations: walking in faith each day, loving those God has placed in our lives, and providing a visible sign of hope to others.

It helps me to think of Jesus carrying his cross, the braying mob all around him seeing only his defeat. And yet, Our Lord loved each of them personally and kept rising from the ground, certain of the beauty and power of his sacrifice.

Joining our pain to his cross will magnify our efforts and fill us with the heroic love that is so sorely needed, now. In heaven, we will see the fruits of this struggle and the myriad of ways that God’s glory and power shone through our small efforts.

Love,

Lisa

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The “Truth” About the War on Christmas

By Lisa Mladinich

A dear family member sent me the following video and asked, “What do you think?”

https://mic.com/articles/186563/a-jesuit-priest-reveals-the-big-problem-with-the-so-called-war-on-christmas#.dXpO3ld3t

In the video, posted at a progressive, liberal website called Mic, Rev. Kevin O’Brien, dean of the Jesuit School of Theology at Santa Clara University, expresses the opinion that Jesus would not care if we wished each other a Merry Christmas, at all. He claims that Jesus would prefer we lived out the message of the Gospel.

Interesting topic. Here’s my take:

Father O’Brien conflates our concern for the commercialization of Christmas with what he claims is a generally-accepted rule of thumb: that the greeting, “Merry Christmas,” is considered a litmus test for whether we are authentically Christian. It’s a fallacy, right out of the gate. There are two completely separate issues going on, here.

First, no reasonable person thinks that if we say “Merry Christmas” it proves our Christianity. In recent generations here in the United States, those happy words have been casually and good-naturedly appropriated and used as a seasonal greeting by people across all faith boundaries. This claim that Christians pat themselves on the back for saying it and then sit back, satisfied that they have proved their authenticity, is not credible.

Second, there is something quite concerning about today’s intense cultural pressure to bury the real meaning of this holy season. That’s what this is really all about.

At this point in our history as a nation, corporations now routinely prohibit their sales staffs from saying Merry Christmas to customers. The idea, ostensibly, is to avoid offending people of other faith traditions; yet, the whole reason for the huge upswing in sales for these same companies is this particular Christian tradition, which is sacred to billions of people around the world. The fact that people of other traditions join in the fun is beside the point. If this were a Muslim tradition and wealthy corporate barons tried to erase the real meaning by prohibiting certain words from being said in public, the cries of tyranny would be deafening.

This suppression of two harmless words that have long expressed kind wishes to all–while reaping profits that keep many of these businesses afloat the rest of the year–is “cultural appropriation” at its worst, something progressives claim to despise.

Those who attempt to bully employees out of acknowledging the meaning of the season are not acting in a true spirit of tolerance and acceptance–quite the opposite. They are trying to erase it.

Why? I believe it’s because Christianity has always been a thorn in the side of those in power. Christians historically are willing to suffer rather than succumb to indoctrination, and our society is full of indoctrination on all sorts of issues: social, moral, and political. The school system sees to the indoctrination of the young, joined by the media, higher academia, and other powerful social influencers.

So my response to those who would forbid anyone from saying something as kind and heartfelt as “Merry Christmas” is this: Stop appropriating our traditions, which are sacred, purely for your own profit, and posturing and pretending that to acknowledge what is sacred to Christians is inherently offensive. Even if only a tiny remnant is celebrating Christmas out of love for Jesus, it is still our sacred tradition, a tradition that shines a unifying, healing, and eternal light into the darkness of our fallen world.

Regarding wishing people a Merry Christmas and the possible risk of offending our Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Atheist, or other brothers and sisters, here’s what I do, everywhere I go:

I pay for my items, thank the store employee with a smile, and then ask, “Do you celebrate Christmas?” If they say, “Yes,” I wish them a merry Christmas. If they say (as the girl at the bakery counter said, this morning), “I celebrate Hanukkah,” I say, “Well have a very happy Hanukkah!”

This accomplishes two things (at least): It tells my fellow traveler that I am Christian and take the season seriously, but it also says that I respect the other faith traditions and the sacredness of those celebrations, beliefs, and customs. This moment of human warmth and connection can be that “encounter” that Pope Francis wants for us, in a very small way. Yet, those small encounters can be used by God to sow His holy peace among us, and that is huge.

St. Teresa of Calcutta, devoted to the Little Way of St. Therese of Lisieux, reminded her followers to do “little things with great love.” The little things matter. God can work miracles of grace through every tiny act of love.

Of course our faith is about living the message of the Gospel, not just saying something Christian (as some sort of phony proof of our authenticity). That is just beyond obvious. But the phenomenon of censorship and denial that has been called, in recent years, “the war on Christmas,” is something we should all be concerned about, whatever our beliefs. Nobody’s faith tradition should be stripped of its identity for any reason, least of all politics or profit. So we actually do defend the rights of other faith traditions when we stand up for our own, in a spirit of mutual love and respect.

If Christmas is in your heart, share it kindly.

May God bless you with his holy peace, providing all that you need to fully become the person you are meant to be, whatever your traditions, beliefs, and customs. Amen.

Papal Correction; Necessary or Noise

By Mary Lou Rosien

Freeimages.com/ps

A group of over sixty Catholic priests and lay people has issued a formal correction to Our Pope. I have defended the Church. I have defended the Pope. I’m authentically Catholic and have taught faith for more than 40 years. I have read and for the most part defended Amoris Laetitia. Pope Francis has not changed Church teaching and that is a very important distinction.

Having said all that… AL has caused confusion and in some circles incorrect or improper formation in Catechesis. It is very difficult as a Catechist to teach without clarification in this confusion, and I have witnessed grave errors and an uptick in people making decisions about faith with uninformed or improperly formed consciences. This is a spiritual danger. If “cafeteria Catholics” pick and choose what teachings to follow–then the menu has been expanded.

In a recent blog Fr. Dwight Longnecker came to this analytical conclusion…

“My own take on this, therefore, is that I understand the need for the “encounter with Christ” as opposed to a faith that is merely propositional, but I also believe that without a clear affirmation of the propositions of our faith, the “encounter with Christ” becomes no more than a subjective religious experience.”

Yes, we are missionaries in the culture. Yes, we must meet people where they are, but we do not leave them there! Yes, God’s mercy is greater. Yes, the gates of hell will not prevail (Matt. 16:18), but we are in a spiritually dangerous place, currently.

We need clarity with charity. I don’t think this discussion is noise; I believe it may be necessary, and I pray Pope Francis will approach it as a loving shepherd and will reach out to the faithful who are truly trying to evangelize the world. That may be what he was doing when he addressed members of a Jesuit order in Columbia, as reported in the National Catholic Register Online:

“I like to repeat that to be a good theologian, beyond studying you have to be dedicated, awake and seize hold of reality; and you need to reflect on all of this on your knees.”

He said a pastor has to continually shift between three positions: “in front to mark out the road, in the middle, to know it, and at the back to ensure nobody falls behind and to let the flock seek the road.”

With prayerful concern for both the Holy Father and the good of the Church, it is my hope that these questions and concerns will one day be clarified, for the good of all.

Divine Mercy : Antidote to the Self-Hate of Sin

By Gabe Garnica

As many of us know, this year has been declared a Jubilee Holy Year of Mercy by Pope Francis, which should remind all of us that Divine Mercy is a game plan we should follow every day, and not just near Easter.

Many otherwise devoted Catholics know little about this beautiful devotion.

The message and devotion are based on the writings of Saint Faustina Kowalska, an uneducated Polish nun who, in obedience to her spiritual director, wrote a diary recording the revelations she received about God’s mercy. Its message is both simple and profound, and stands as the perfect antidote to the self-hate that is sin.

The Message

The Divine Mercy Message is simply that God loves all of us more than we hate ourselves. The reason we can make the above statement is that God is all perfect and all love, and His love transcends our weakness and sin.

God created each of us with a sacred purpose, a special and unique mission in this life. It is our job to discern, discover, develop, and implement that purpose and mission in our lives. As Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos once stated, “No one was ever lost because his sin was too great, but because his trust was too small.”

Because God’s love is so great, so is His mercy, and because that mercy is greater than our sins, we should always approach Our Lord with trust. Trusting God will allow us to receive His mercy. Finally, we must return that mercy to others. In fact, this message is as simple as ABC:

A….Ask for His Mercy through constant prayer, repentance, and petitions for that Mercy.

B….Be merciful to others by extending love and forgiveness.

C….Completely trust in Jesus in that the more we trust in Him, the more we will receive.

Sin as Self-Hate

We know that the devil is the embodiment of hate, lies, and disobedience. He threw away all that God gave him out of greed for power and independence. Having rejected God with ingratitude and betrayal, the devil wants nothing more than to entice us to do the same. Nothing enrages him more than the fact that we have each been given the ingredients, and the mission, to become saints in the service of God.

Consequently, the last thing that Satan wants us to remember is that we can achieve great things in the name and service of God. He wants us to find ourselves incapable, hopelessly lacking in the “impossible” task of ever doing any good.

At some level, we know that God’s love and mercy for us is so great that it makes no sense to our simple, human limitation. This love and mercy contradicts satan’s lie that we are worthless and pathetically ill-equipped to make any difference in God’s plan.

Since satan does not want us to be in God’s loving embrace, he will do anything and everything to get us to surrender to the ultimate lie that we are merely God’s misfit toys, not meant or fit to aspire to holiness, much less sanctity.

Since God’s open arms in the face of our defects make no sense to us, sin becomes our unique opportunity and strategy to sabotage ourselves. If God is all love, then it follows that sin becomes the singular and collective expression of self-hate, the self-fulfilling prophecy of a doomed eternity in despair that we deserve as fallen followers of a fallen leader.

Divine Mercy as The Ultimate Antidote to Sin

If the gap between God’s goodness and our defect is so great, so seemingly insurmountable, then the direct, simplistic response to that perceived gap is to surrender, to stop wasting our time trying to be something we can never be.

Why try to be more like Jesus, when we are a lot more like the devil? This is hell’s propaganda for perdition, but we do not have to buy that propaganda.

Therein is the ultimate twist of Divine Mercy. Namely, that we are not called or expected to grasp for a perfection of which we are innately incapable as defective human beings. Such a misguided effort will merely lead to frustration, defeat, desperation, and surrender, not to mention the inherent self-obsession of those wrapped up in their ups and downs.

Rather, Divine Mercy lovingly and patiently asks us to admit our limitations, seek forgiveness and forgive in return, and love God so much that we dare to offer our defective selves in His service despite the fact that our self-appraisal of our own value, worth, qualification, and merit for that service is so apparently pathetic.

At the end of the day, following Christ is not about happily skipping on some cloud without faltering or falling. If we have learned anything from this world, it is that following Our Lord is more about getting up from the falls and stumbles than pretending that we can always avoid them.

Christ never promised us that we would never fall while following Him, but that He would always be there to help us get up again. In fact, did not Christ Himself fall on the way to Calvary? It is curiously ironic, I think, that the word “sin” in Spanish means “without”, for sin is truly choosing to be “without” God.

Let us recall that Peter loved and trusted Jesus despite his betrayal, and that the good thief humbly gained salvation at Calvary as well. Whether we swallow our hollow pride and reach for Christ as Peter did, or follow Judas by wrapping that pride around our necks, is our eternal decision to make.

In this beautiful year of Divine Mercy, let us resolve to love God with enough trust, obedience, and dedication to overcome the self-sabotage of sin.

Miserere Mei Deus: 4 Video Resources for the Year of Mercy

By Karee Santos

Ever since Pope Francis announced that a Jubilee Year of Mercy would begin in December 2015, voices in the Church have been following the Pope’s call to spread the message of mercy to all people. There are excellent video resources available to inspire and educate us, and many of them are free. Here’s a sampling.

1. Ascension Presents An Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy

This series of four short videos (less than ten minutes each) is available here. Each video features a different popular Catholic speaker. My favorite is this one with Fr. Mike Schmitz, explaining what a jubilee year is and why it’s so important.

2. Catholic Conference 4 Moms Faces of Mercy

This online conference features more than 20 prerecorded presentations on the topic of mercy. Each presentation is about 20 minutes long. The conference will begin February 20, but individuals and parishes can register now. This trailer explains more about the conference.

My husband Manuel P. Santos M.D. and I will talk about Mercy in Marriage. Here’s a sneak peek at our presentation, where we talk about grudges.

3. The Wild Goose by Fr. Dave Pivonka

The mercy of God flows through the work of the Holy Spirit, and so we’re fortunate to have a new series of fourteen videos on the Holy Spirit, whom the Celts analogized to a wild goose because of the Spirit’s vast potential to surprise us. The videos last between twenty and thirty minutes and are available online for free. Only seven out of the fourteen have been completed so far. The first video was filmed against the stunning backdrop of Niagara Falls where we can “literally hear the love of God being poured forth into our hearts through the power of the Holy Spirit.”

4. Allegri’s Miserere Mei Deus

Music inspires me more than anything else, so these recommendations would be incomplete without a music video. I leave you with this astonishingly beautiful performance of Gregorio Allegri’s Miserere Mei Deus (transl.: “Have mercy on me, O God”) by King’s College Choir of Cambridge, England. You can hear the angels start to sing shortly after the one and a half minute mark. Enjoy!

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Another #Amazing #Giveaway! Newsletter Subscribers Entered to Win!

By Lisa Mladinich

To celebrate our new, mobile-friendly website, AmazingCatechists.com is having an AMAZING giveaway!!!

If you subscribed to our newsletter longer than a month ago or have never subscribed, we’d like to give you the opportunity to SIGN UP NOW at the sidebar on the home page to be entered to win one of MORE THAN A DOZEN beautiful crucifixes—and to receive our once-weekly posts!

I’ll be raffling off FOURTEEN stunning pieces by the Holy Mass Crucifix Apostolate, which has received the Apostolic Blessings of both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis! Once you have these extraordinarily beautiful crucifixes blessed by a priest, the Papal blessings will be imparted to them to bring the grace of God to those who use them.

The founder of the Holy Mass Crucifix Apostolate, Roger LeBlanc, frequently receives testimonials as to the power of those graces. Some say their loved ones have been brought back to the sacraments after receiving them! (Please consider supporting his holy apostolate with your Christmas shopping dollars.) He offers this collection to us in hopes of drawing many more souls back to the Holy Mass. What incredible generosity. This is the kind of selflessness that contributes powerfully to a culture of love and life.

As a result, we are GIVING AWAY TEN 5″ “First Communion: Holy Mass Standing Crucifixes,” TWO 3″ pendant crucifixes on black cord, and TWO 2″ pendant crucifixes on black cord. These are exquisite, heirloom-quality, enameled pieces that make great gifts for Christmas, First Communion, First Reconciliation, and Confirmation.

TO ENTER, visit the home page, here at AmazingCatechists.com and scroll down the right sidebar to find our easy sign-up form. Fill in your name and email address. It’s that simple!

I’ll be awarding these beautiful gifts by random drawing from our newsletter subscriber list, starting on the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, December 12th.

Our once-weekly newsletter, updating our subscribers on new posts and features at AmazingCatechists.com will begin in just a few days.

Feel free to contact me with any questions, suggestions, or catechetical tips you’d like to share, at the email address below!

And don’t forget to subscribe to our once-weekly newsletter to be entered to win!

Blessings of the Advent Season!

Lisa Mladinich
Founder, AmazingCatechists.com TM
lisa@mladinich.com
Author, “Be an Amazing Catechist: Inspire the Faith of Children” and
“Be an Amazing Catechist: Sacramental Preparation”
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Forming Missionary Disciples

By William O'Leary

In virtue of their baptism, all the members of the People of God have become missionary disciples (cf. Mt 28:19). All the baptized, whatever their position in the Church or their level of instruction in the faith, are agents of evangelization, and it would be insufficient to envisage a plan of evangelization to be carried out by professionals while the rest of the faithful would simply be passive recipients. The new evangelization calls for personal involvement on the part of each of the baptized. Every Christian is challenged, here and now, to be actively engaged in evangelization; indeed, anyone who has truly experienced God’s saving love does not need much time or lengthy training to go out and proclaim that love. Every Christian is a missionary to the extent that he or she has encountered the love of God in Christ Jesus: we no longer say that we are “disciples” and “missionaries”, but rather that we are always “missionary disciples”. – Pope Francis in EG #120

The Church at this very moment is in great need of missionary disciples willing to say yes to not keeping their faith too close to the vest but to share and live the faith with boldness and with the confidence that human happiness is found most fully in modeling Christ and giving our lives away in service and sacrifice.

What does this mean for Catechesis?

1) Christ came to seek and save the lost — we have to go and search for the lost. And as Pope Francis numerous times in his apostolic letter, we must invite “everyone” into the fold. Pope Francis said: “The Church is called to be the house of the Father, with doors always wide open” ( EG #46).

One of the most profound statements in Pope Francis’ Apostolic Letter is paragraph#49:

Let us go forth, then, let us go forth to offer everyone the life of Jesus Christ. Here I repeat for the entire Church what I have often said to the priests and laity of Buenos Aires: I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the centre and which then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life. More than by fear of going astray, my hope is that we will be moved by the fear of remaining shut up within structures which give us a false sense of security, within rules which make us harsh judges, within habits which make us feel safe, while at our door people are starving and Jesus does not tire of saying to us: “Give them something to eat” (Mk 6:37).

We must never tire of welcoming the weak, broken, sinners into the loving arms of the Church which is an icon of Christ Himself.”

2) When we transmit the Faith, the Pope calls for a “missionary style” in Proclaiming/announcing the Gospel Message. It must be with joy, it must be with vigor and it must communicate the crucified and risen Lord (Cf. EG #11). It’s the basic Gospel message which we should never assume that those we teach have embraced. Our style is always missionary in order to announce with joy the Good News of Jesus Christ and it’s always drawing people more fully into the riches of Christ.

3) Inculturate the Gospel. Finding new expressions of announcing the Gospel so that it will be received is vital for the handing on of the Faith in the Third Millennium. Pope Francis said:

69. It is imperative to evangelize cultures in order to inculturate the Gospel. In countries of Catholic tradition, this means encouraging, fostering and reinforcing a richness which already exists. In countries of other religious traditions, or profoundly secularized countries, it will mean sparking new processes for evangelizing culture, even though these will demand long-term planning. We must keep in mind, however, that we are constantly being called to grow. Each culture and social group needs purification and growth. In the case of the popular cultures of Catholic peoples, we can see deficiencies which need to be healed by the Gospel: machismo, alcoholism, domestic violence, low Mass attendance, fatalistic or superstitious notions which lead to sorcery, and the like. Popular piety itself can be the starting point for healing and liberation from these deficiencies.

The three points specify ways we can be missionary disciples today in our world and to our students. May Our Lady be our model and intercede for us to bring forth the Good News of her Son!