Memorial Day

John Henry Newman says

when man fell and lost this holy grace, he had various gifts still adhering to him; he might be, in a certain measure, true, merciful, loving, and just; but these virtues did not unite him to God. What he needed was holiness; and therefore the first act of God's goodness to us in the Gospel is to take us out of our unholy state by means of the sacrament of Baptism, and by the grace then given us to re-open the communications, so long closed, between the soul and heaven.

Conference on the Spiritual Life

Tuesday June 2
7:00 PM
Cafeteria

I invite you because I want to give you some tips, pointers and suggestions that might improve your time of conversation with God.
These are things that cannot be covered adequately in a Sunday homily.
Come and learn how to get more out of your prayer life!
Fr. Weldon

“We are often focused on personalities and frequently we loose track about what is most important. And, frankly the personality we are most focused on is very often ourselves. Acts never really was about Paul. And your life is not about you. It is about what the Lord is doing for you and through you. We often want things to revolve around us, around what we think, and what we want. But, truth be told, you are not that important, neither am I. We must decrease and the Lord must increase (Jn 3:30).”

Anniversary

Fr. Emil Kapaun died on this day in 1951.
I was ordained a priest in 1998.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

"Absolutely every person, no matter how enmeshed in vice, ensnared by the allurements of pleasure, a captive in exile… fixed in mire… distracted by business, afflicted with sorrow… and counted with those who go down into hell—every soul, I say, standing thus under condemnation and without hope, has the power to turn and find it can not only breath the fresh air of the hope of pardon and mercy, but also dare to aspire to the nuptials of the Word”."

Sexuality, by means of which man and woman give themselves to one another through the acts which are proper and exclusive to spouses, is not something simply biological, but concerns the innermost being of the human person as such. It is realized in a truly human way only if it is an integral part of the love by which a man and woman commit themselves totally to one another until death."
Catechism of the Catholic Church (2360-61)

Top 50 Saints' Quotes

The top 50 Saints' quotes, in an arbitrary ranking. There are many others that I didn't put on the list that are great. Feel free to leave them in the comments.

1. "Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ."
-St. Jerome

2. "Since Christ Himself has said, "This is My Body" who shall dare to doubt that It is His Body?"
-St. Cyril of Jerusalem

3. "Teach us to give and not count the cost."
-St. Ignatius de Loyola

4. "Pray as though everything depended on God. Work as though everything depended on you."
-St. Augustine

5. "Don't you long to shout to those youths who are bustling around you: Fools! Leave those worldly things that shackle the heart - and very often degrade it - leave all that and come with us in search of Love!"
-St. Josemaria Escriva

6. "For me prayer is a surge of the heart, it is a simple look towards Heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy."
-St. Therese of Lisieux

7. "To convert somebody go and take them by the hand and guide them."
-St. Thomas Aquinas

8. "On the question of relating to our fellowman – our neighbor’s spiritual need transcends every commandment. Everything else we do is a means to an end. But love is an end already, since God is love."
-St. Teresia Benedicta (Edith Stein)

9. "If you are what you should be, you will set the whole world ablaze!"
-St. Catherine of Sienna

10. "Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy."
-St. Francis

11. "Our hearts were made for You, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in you."
-St. Augustine of Hippo

12. "Charity is certainly greater than any rule. Moreover, all rules must lead to charity."
-St. Vincent de Paul

13. "Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you!"
-St. Augustine

14. "O Master, make me chaste, but not yet!"
-St. Augustine

15. "’Eat my flesh,’ [Jesus] says, ‘and drink my blood.’ The Lord supplies us with these intimate nutrients, he delivers over his flesh and pours out his blood, and nothing is lacking for the growth of his children"
-St. Clement of Alexandria

16. "Priests have received a power which God has given neither to angels nor to archangels. It was said to them: ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose, shall be loosed.’ Temporal rulers have indeed the power of binding; but they can only bind the body. Priests, in contrast, can bind with a bond which pertains to the soul itself and transcends the very heavens. Did [God] not give them all the powers of heaven?...What greater power is there than this? The Father has given all judgment to the Son. And now I see the Son placing all this power in the hands of men. They are raised to this dignity as if they were already gathered up to heaven"
-St. John Chrysostom

17. "The nation doesn’t simply need what we have. It needs what we are."
-St. Teresia Benedicta (Edith Stein)

18. "We are to love God for Himself, because of a twofold reason; nothing is more reasonable, nothing more profitable."
-St. Bernard of Clairvaux

19. "We always find that those who walked closest to Christ were those who had to bear the greatest trials."
-St. Teresa of Avila

20. "Wherever the bishop shall appear, there let the multitude also be; even as, wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church."
-St. Ignatius of Antioch

21. "If this is the way You treat Your friends, no wonder You have so few!"
-St. Teresa of Avila

22. "Give something, however small, to the one in need. For it is not small to one who has nothing. Neither is it small to God, if we have given what we could."
-St. Gregory Nazianzen

23. "Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort me and restore me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ in quiet, Christ in danger, Christ in hearts of all that love me, Christ in mouth of friend and stranger."
-St. Patrick

24. "Christ said, “I am the Truth”; he did not say “I am the custom."
-St. Toribio

25. "All the efforts of the human mind cannot exhaust the essence of a single fly."
-St. Thomas Aquinas

26. "There are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered prayers."
-St. Teresa of Avila

27. "I have no taste for corruptible food nor for the pleasures of this life. I desire the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, who was of the seed of David; and for drink I desire his blood, which is love incorruptible"
-St. Ignatius of Antioch

28. "You cannot be half a saint; you must be a whole saint or no saint at all."
-St. Therese of Lisieux

29. "You must ask God to give you power to fight against the sin of pride which is your greatest enemy – the root of all that is evil, and the failure of all that is good. For God resists the proud."
-St. Vincent de Paul

30. "Let us go forward in peace, our eyes upon heaven, the only one goal of our labors."
-St. Therese of Lisieux

31. "When you approach the tabernacle remember that he has been waiting for you for twenty centuries."
- St. Josemaria Escriva

32. "From silly devotions and sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!"
-St. Teresa of Avila

33. "Love God, serve God; everything is in that."
-St. Clare of Assisi

34. "Pray with great confidence, with confidence based upon the goodness and infinite generosity of God and upon the promises of Jesus Christ. God is a spring of living water which flows unceasingly into the hearts of those who pray."
-St. Louis de Montfort

35. "Apart from the cross, there is no other ladder by which we may get to heaven."
-St. Rose of Lima

36. "The creator of the heavens obeys a carpenter; the God of eternal glory listens to a poor virgin. Has anyone ever witnessed anything comparable to this? Let the philosopher no longer disdain from listening to the common laborer; the wise, to the simple; the educated, to the illiterate; a child of a prince, to a peasant."
-St. Anthony of Padua

37. "Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved."
-St. Robert Bellarmine

38. "Whether, therefore, we receive what we ask for, or do not receive it, let us still continue steadfast in prayer. For to fail in obtaining the desires of our heart, when God so wills it, is not worse than to receive it; for we know not as He does, what is profitable to us."
-St. John Chrysostom

39. "What does the poor man do at the rich man’s door, the sick man in the presence of his physician, the thirsty man at a limpid stream? What they do, I do before the Eucharistic God. I pray. I adore. I love." -St. Francis

40. "Holy Communion is the shortest and safest way to heaven."
-Pope St. Pius X

41. "We will either accuse ourselves or excuse ourselves."
-St. John Vianney

42. "If a man wishes to be sure of the road he treads on, he must close his eyes and walk in the dark."
-St. John of the Cross

43. "He loves, He hopes, He waits. If He came down on our altars on certain days only, some sinner, on being moved to repentance, might have to look for Him, and not finding Him, might have to wait. Our Lord prefers to wait Himself for the sinner for years rather than keep him waiting one instant."
-St. Julian Peter Eymard

44. "Love is the most necessary of all virtues. Love in the person who preaches the word of God is like fire in a musket. If a person were to throw a bullet with his hands, he would hardly make a dent in anything; but if the person takes the same bullet and ignites some gunpowder behind it, it can kill. It is much the same with the word of God. If it is spoken by someone who is filled with the fire of charity- the fire of love of God and neighbor- it will work wonders."
-St. Anthony Mary Claret

45. "Our Lord loves you and loves you tenderly; and if He does not let you feel the sweetness of His love, it is to make you more humble and abject in your own eyes."
-St. Pio of Pietrelcino

46. "You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working, and just so, you learn to love by loving. All those who think to learn in any other way deceive themselves."
-St. Francis de Sales

47. "Pray, Hope, and Don't Worry"
-St. Pio of Pietrelcino

48. "All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle."
-St. Francis

49. "Tribulation is a gift from God - one that he especially gives His special friends."
-St. Thomas More

50. "If I speak to thee in friendship's name, thou think'st I speak too coldly, if I mention love's devoted flame, thou say'st I speak too boldly"
- St. Thomas More

Home again

It is good to be back in Kingman. My brother has the camera and all of our pictures.

In the meantime, go here for an interesting article.

Jerusalem

I am in the holy Land right now!!

May Flowers

St. Thomas More's Utopia

Just don't try to make that heaven on earth because what you'll end up making is hell on earth. This is because the person who wants so much to create the Utopia will impose his Utopia on everyone else. It has to be his beautiful dream and, in the end, you either buy into it and become a loyal devotee or you're out. Thus cults are born and people are destroyed.

Instead live simply. Try to pray more. Don't look for an earthly Messiah. Be suspicious of those wonderful priests and charismatic leaders and perfect parishes. At the same time, don't condemn them when they fail. Don't lapse into cynicism and disappointment. You were never supposed to have a kingdom here anyway. Look to your own sins. Laugh at your pride. Plead that your sins will be overcome. Look to Jesus the author and finisher of the faith. Ask to be conformed more and more to his likeness, then live that love you've been given for others.

Then, maybe just maybe, you'll begin to live a little bit of heaven on earth as you get yourself ready for your second home.

This is why the most authentic religious communities are austere. They don't promise the novice anything but blood, sweat and tears. They don't promise bliss. They don't promise happiness here. They don't promise anything but a cross. But in that cross they do promise a new identification with Christ, and that is something that will last forever. The best of the new ecclesial communities in the Catholic Church are like that. Furthermore, if they are wise, they do well to continually refer their members back to the ultimate community of Christ, which is the church--warts and all.

But that's tough because, the utopias are soooo seductive. We so much want them to be true. We want that perfect parish. We so want that perfect priest. We so long for that community where all live and love in perfect harmony. But remember 'Utopia' means 'Nowhere' and we are not destined for a perfect community here. That's because we're destined for it hereafter.

Have you ever noticed that the gospel never promises any kind of utopia and Jesus never tells his disciples to go out and create a new community that will be a paradise on earth? No. he says his kingdom is not of this world. He founds a church but he does not found a utopian community. He promises a new kind of abundant life, but it comes with a cost, and the cost is a cross.

If you come across any church or religious community or action group or fellowship group or any such which seems too good to be true. Guess what? It's too good to be true. Any group or community or movement in which everyone is overwhelmingly smilingly nice and sincere and warmly welcoming and flattering and smooth is something to beware. They're promising too much and they can't deliver.

What troubles me about new religious communities or a particularly charismatic priest who is setting up a 'movement' (like Marcel Maciel and the Legionnairies) is that they will attract people who want to believe in the dreamy lie rather than the hard reality that the spiritual life really offers.

Utopias are ultimately disappointing. The hopes of the devotees are so high. The reality is so low. They find that the leader had feet of clay. They find that the charismatic priest is a stinker. They find that the other leaders of the group are seriously flawed and the whole thing collapses in a mess of confusion, fear and recrimination. The disappointment is high because the expectations were high.