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Handing on the Faith
It’s hard to imagine that anyone who ever raised children found it an entirely easy job. Challenging, exciting, often rewarding – yes. But easy? You’ve got to be kidding.
That is certainly the case when it comes to religion. Yet as Christian Smith and Amy Adamczyk report in their important new book Handing Down the Faith , “Above and beyond any other effect on children’s religion is the influence of their parents.”
C.S. Lewis’ struggle to believe has something for everyone
The man remembered when illness and death first cast a shadow in his life. It was a toothache, of all things, and he was calling for his mother. He became distressed when she didn’t come.
“That was because she was ill, too; and what was odd was that there were several doctors in her room, and voices and comings and goings all over the house and doors shutting and opening,” wrote the great Christian author C.S. Lewis years later. “And then my father, in tears, came into my room and began to try to convey to my terrified mind things it had never conceived before. It was in fact cancer and followed the usual course.”
Read more C.S. Lewis’ struggle to believe has something for everyone
Sacred Heart Priests – Help, hope, and the Gospel for Madagascar’s poorest
The La Salette Missionaries welcomed these Sacred Heart
Missionaries in 1929 to MadagascarThe Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (also known as Dehonian missionaries) represents an important point of reference for the local population, which is very poor. Today, some of the first foreign missionaries have died, others have returned to their country or left as missionaries in other countries, but the Malagasy Dehonians are growing. Currently, between priests and laity, our community has more than 70 missionaries.
Everyone takes care of offering them hospitality, medical assistance, education, but above all help and hope. This is what Father Yvon Mathieu, Regional Superior of the Dehonians in Madagascar, told Agenzia Fides, speaking of the missionary commitment in the African country and the challenges that the religious face on a daily basis:
“For us it is important to be close to the people. In our community, we strive to carry out a work of evangelization and human promotion, trying to educate young people to work together, to help each other, stimulating them to reflect and seek their own autonomy.”
Severe lack of water and food in Madagascar
Madagascar has been experiencing a devastating food crisis for years and is facing the worst drought in the last 40 years, intensified by sandstorms and invasions of locusts. Father Yvon reports:
Read more Sacred Heart Priests – Help, hope, and the Gospel for Madagascar’s poorest
Getting back to ‘letting it be’ – a new documentary
When I wrote about the 50th anniversary of the Beatles’ Abbey Road album and how it was able to dominate the charts a half-century after it was recorded, I thought I was done with the Beatles. With the Peter Jackson epic re-imagining of the “Let It Be” documentary, I discovered I was wrong. Leave it to “Lord of the Rings” maven Jackson to turn a 90-minute film released in 1970 into eight hours of 2021 content.
I must confess I binged my way through the entire documentary on the Disney streaming service and found that you could have trimmed a couple of hours off this behemoth and still captured the essence of what Jackson was conveying.
Like the Beatles themselves in this period of their careers, the film meanders and does not have a lot of focus, as hard as Paul McCartney tries to instill some. Normally, I wouldn’t watch a bunch of musicians fiddling around on their instruments, getting into petty squabbles, and doing a lot of just sitting around, but somehow when the Beatles do it, it’s compelling. What Jackson’s long form did that the original theatrical “Let It Be” film could not was give context to all those squabbles and sitting around.
The original Beatles do not disappoint
Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and John Lennon in Peter Jackson's
"The Beatles: Get Back." (IMDB)All of the pre-release marketing hype about how Peter Jackson was going to show a happier group of band mates and not the sour and testy group we saw in the “Let It Be” film turned out not to be hype. From all these hours of film it was clear that they still had the ability to have fun together.
It was also clear they were coming apart at the seams. The life of living in a bubble was taking its toll, which did make for interesting viewing even if I felt like a voyeur at times.
It was painful to watch as each member takes a turn of silent reflection on that very real possibility — in between the squabbling and general nonsense of course.
Read more Getting back to ‘letting it be’ – a new documentary
How are apparitions seen as a page of the gospel?
Editor: This is the ninth in this series of articles based on the eight Dossiers (from February 1978 to November 1981) totaling 718 pages in this study. In 1982, Fr. Eugene Barrette, M.S., the prime mover in this historic study, was elected the thirteenth La Salette Superior General (1982-1988). Other articles on Religious Life are available in our La Salette Online Library.
What are a few basic ideas about apparitions?
Our Weeping Mother speaks with the two children on the Holy Mountain“Since our roots as La Salette Missionaries are so intimately tied to an apparition, it would be worthwhile to offer a few reflections on apparitions in general. Much of the following has been taken from:
• an unpublished study was done by Fr. Charles Novel, M.S. (1912-1980, France);
• Visions, Revelations and the Church by Fr. Laurent Volken, M.S. (1914-2002, Switzerland);
• and Visions and Prophecies by Fr. Karl Rahner, S.J. (1904-1984), a basic book on the subject.
Public and Private Revelation:
“We are a people who have placed our faith in a living God — a God of history who has manifested and continues to manifest himself either directly or through intermediaries. These divine manifestations fall into two categories: public revelation and private revelations.
“Vatican II reminds us that the Church has recognized that this divine public revelation ended with the death of the last Apostle: ‘no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of Our Lord, Jesus Christ’ (Dei Verbum, #4). All of public revelation is contained in the inspired writings that have been canonized as such by the Church and all people are called to give their assent to these truths.
What is the relationship between prayer and ministry or work?
Editor: In Fr. Barrette’s extensive work on the La Salette Rule in the 1980s, he summarized the fascinating and ever-changing relationship in Catholic spirituality between our prayer and our ministry (or work). Enjoy his insightful summary.
The conflict and tension involved here between prayer and ministry have been put in very sharp relief over the past few decades. From one extreme we have swung to the other extreme and in the last decade have arrived at a more balanced position.
Read more What is the relationship between prayer and ministry or work?
Times Square billboard promotes 'Bible in a Year' podcast
A billboard will go up in New York's Times Square during Christmas and New Year's to promote and celebrate the evermore popular podcast "The Bible in a Year," but more is in store for the program that topped the charts shortly after its debut in January.
The creators of the daily podcast that leads listeners through the Bible's narrative have announced several new initiatives designed to highlight the show's success and attract even more listeners.
• An all-new Spanish-language version of the podcast – La Biblia en un año – with original commentary and a new, native-Spanish speaking host, will be launched Jan. 1.
• "The Bible in a Year Retreat" virtual event for listeners will take place Feb 18-20. It will have a limited capacity for participants but is "designed to help Catholics cultivate a lifelong relationship with the word of God – one that extends far beyond the podcast."
A Times Square billboard will promote "The Bible in a Year"
podcast from Dec. 19, 2021, until Jan. 9, 2022;
photo: CNS photo/courtesy AscensionThe planned billboard will be unveiled Dec. 19 in Times Square and will stay up through Jan. 9. "Through distraction and distress, our culture has lost a hopeful, historical biblical worldview – but by the grace of God this podcast has helped thousands rediscover it," said Father Mike Schmitz, a priest of the Diocese of Duluth, Minnesota, and popular Catholic speaker and author, who hosts the podcast.
The podcast is already going strong...
According to Ascension, a multimedia Catholic publisher and the podcast's producer, "The Bible in a Year" to date has hit 142 million downloads and 3.3 billion minutes of listening worldwide. It gets 464,000 daily downloads, of which 90% are U.S.-based listeners. "That U.S. audience of 418,000 would fill the largest football stadium in the country, that of the University of Michigan, four times over," according to a news release.
Read more Times Square billboard promotes 'Bible in a Year' podcast
St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, Patron of Immigrants
St. Frances Xavier Cabrini was born Maria Francesca Cabrini on July 15, 1850, in Lombardy, Italy. She was the youngest of 13 children, born two months premature, and was a frail child with delicate health. Only three of her siblings grew to adulthood, and they were orphaned by the time Maria was 18.
A very simple life
As a child, Maria’s father told her stories of the missions, inspiring her to want to work as a missionary herself. After she finished her education, Maria helped teach catechism to young children. She applied to the Daughters of the Sacred Heart for admission, but they turned her down because of her ill health. She was asked to teach at the House of Providence orphanage in Italy, where she spent six years. She drew other young women to help her, and they lived in the lifestyle of religious sisters.
Pope sets date for canonization of Blessed de Foucauld and others
Blessed Charles de Foucauld and six other candidates for sainthood finally will be canonized May 15, 2022, the Vatican announced Nov. 9, 2021.
The final stage in the sainthood process – a gathering of cardinals in Rome to affirm that church law had been followed in preparing for the candidates' declaration of sainthood and a formal request "in the name of Holy Mother Church" that Pope Francis set a date for the canonizations -- took place in early May. But no date for the ceremony was set because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
The previous time Pope Francis celebrated a public Mass for the canonization of saints was Oct. 13, 2019, when he canonized St. John Henry Newman and four others. However, in April, he used what the Vatican calls the "equipollent" or equivalent canonization to declare the sainthood of Blessed Margaret of Città di Castello, an Italian Dominican laywoman. He used the same formula in July 2019 to recognize St. Bartolomeu Fernandes dos Mártires, a 16th-century Portuguese Dominican and Archbishop.
Along with Blessed de Foucauld, the spring ceremony will see the canonization of the Indian martyr, Devasahayam Pillai, and the five founders of religious orders.
Read more Pope sets date for canonization of Blessed de Foucauld and others
Christianity's inseparable pair – Martyrdom and the Mass
The company of the first believers devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles and the communion, the breaking of the bread, and the prayers (Acts 2:42).
Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, the central panel of the Ghent Altarpiece by Jan van Eyck, 1432. The Mass is what the early Christians did. St. Paul’s letters are notable for their concerns about table fellowship. Later books of the Bible, Hebrews and Revelation, also take up priestly and liturgical matters. The Mass was defining for the first Christians.
But there was another distinguishing Christian act in the ancient Church: martyrdom.
Martyrdom occupied the attention of the early Christians because it was always a real possibility. Shortly after the Catholic faith arrived in Rome, the emperor, Nero, discovered that Christians could provide an almost unlimited supply of victims for his circus spectacles. The emperors needed to keep the people amused, and one way to do so was by giving them spectacularly violent entertainments in the circus.
Read more Christianity's inseparable pair – Martyrdom and the Mass