Brown Pelican Society of Louisiana

Psalms Chapter 127: 3-5

Children too are a gift from the LORD, the fruit of the womb, a reward.  Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children born in one’s youth.  Blessed are they whose quivers are full. They will never be shamed contending with foes at the gate.

…Strange how thirty years ago the big panic was overpopulation and now the big panic is underpopulation . . .One thing which might turn it around is for people to start regarding children as an asset again . . . having more kids might just be your chance for survival….

Posted by Fr Longenecker, July 24, 2010

The American Academy of Fertility Care Professionals had their annual conference here in Greenville this week and I was asked to be keynote speaker and deliver another presentation on the Demographic Winter. I hesitated because all of this is not really my area of expertise, but my arm was twisted and the first address was on Christ and Culture and the relationship between Church and State. Today’s was on the coming Demographic Winter.

John Allen’s book The Future Church has an excellent chapter on the projected drop in human population for the rest of this century. Strange how thirty years ago the big panic was overpopulation and now the big panic is underpopulation. Some might think that underpopulation is okay and even necessary to conserve the worlds’ resources etc. Not really. Underpopulation brings economic recession because a growing population means a growing economy. Along with a declining birth rate goes an increasing number of elderly. By 2040 the developed countries won’t have enough young people working to support their elderly. Long term health care costs for the elderly will skyrocket. Immigration provides part of the solution, but the birth rates in Mexico and Latin America are dropping too.

Inevitably there will be a whole range of societal shifts that need to take place. Forget about the concept of ‘retirement’–especially retirement at 65. We won’t be able to support such a thing. It will be more like retirement at 75 if you’re lucky. Get ready for euthanasia. They will argue that we simply can’t support so many elderly people who are contributing nothing and who’s quality of life is negligible. Here comes Nurse Ratched to put you to sleep. Get ready for the closure of schools and colleges and the opening of rest homes. There’s a good business opportunity. Buy up little colleges and turn them into retirement communities. There won’t be the market for colleges then.

What might turn it around? In some countries it can’t be turned around. The replacement birth rate for the population has already been too low for too long, and it cannot now recover. One thing which might turn it around is for people to start regarding children as an asset again. See, at when a society is agrarian a child is an asset. Many hours of labor are required to feed everyone so every child helps keep the farm going. When people move to the city and work in factories and offices a child become an expensive liability, not an asset.

However, if elderly health care is unavailable, pension funds dry up, social security goes bust, the Medicare pot is empty and insurers refuse to pay for long term elderly health care, having more kids might just be your chance for survival.

Think about it. Who is going to get the sleepy pills first? It will be the old people with no family, no one to visit, no one to object, who’s money has run out. That’s assuming that there are care facilities that have room for the old codger in the first place. Who’s going to pay and look after all these folks who have no one?

On the other hand, if you’ve got lots of kids invest in a different kind of insurance plan: send one off to college to specialize in geriatric medicine, another to be a geriatric nurse just in case. Once kids start being seen as retirement insurance people might start breeding again. It’s terrible to recommend such a course simply out of self interest, but hey, if Nurse Ratched is coming for you with the sleepy pills, wouldn’t you rather have your kids in charge?

http://gkupsidedown.blogspot.com/2010/07/nurse-ratched.html

By  Michael Ramirez

The Heritage Foundation, Morning Bell, 7/29/2010

It is established practice in Washington that if you have to release bad news, it is best to do it on a Friday … the later in the day the better. So not only did the White House schedule the publication of the “Mid-Session Budget Review” for last Friday, but they then released it three hours late to ensure that as few reporters as possible were left in the nation’s capital to cover it.

But Heritage’s dedicated budget team patiently waited the Obama administration out, and their analysis shows that this year’s mid-session review is nothing short of a complete admission of failure of the White House’s economic policies.

When President Obama sold his $862 billion economic stimulus to the American people, he promised that, if enacted, it would prevent unemployment from ever rising above 8%. With unemployment currently at 9.5%, the American people are now well aware that the President’s stimulus has been a complete failure. But Friday’s report was the first time this Administration was forced to admit just how long Americans will have to suffer for their failed economic policies. According to Friday’s report, the Obama administration now projects that unemployment will average 9% throughout all of next year and 8.1% throughout 2012.

And if that news wasn’t bad enough, the report pegs this year’s budget deficit at $1.471 trillion, or 10% of the entire U.S. economy. In nominal dollars, it’s the largest deficit in American history; and as a percentage of the economy, it’s the largest deficit since World War II. To pay for that $1.471 trillion hole, our government will borrow 41 cents of every dollar it spends. And the Obama Administration concedes that these large deficits are here to stay. It projects another $1.42 trillion deficit in 2011, which is $150 billion worse than previously predicted. Looking ahead, the President’s budget includes deficits that never fall below $698 billion and leaves our children with $18.5 trillion in debt by 2020. And all this assumes the economy will grow 4% from 2012-2014. The only times the economy performed that well in the past thirty years was from 1997-2000 and from 1983-1985.

These future deficits are driven almost exclusively by rising spending.

As Heritage Foundation analyst Brian Riedl noted earlier this year: “Before the recession, federal spending totaled $24,000 per U.S. household. President Obama would hike it to $36,000 per household by 2020 — an inflation-adjusted $12,000-per-household expansion of government.” There is a way out of this deficit nightmare: stop spending. If the federal government managed to return to the per-household spending level of the Reagan administration, the budget would be balanced by 2012 without any tax hikes. Too ambitious? Just returning to the per-household spending levels that existed before the current recession would balance the budget by 2019.

But that is not the route this President wants to take. President Obama wants to close the gap between what our government spends and what it takes in by raising taxes by $3 trillion. His Treasury secretary was on television yesterday claiming this massive tax tsunami would have no effect on economic growth. After last Friday’s Mid-Session Budget Review exposed the failure of this Administration’s economic stimulus claims, does anybody believe anything this Administration says anymore?

http://paracom.paramountcommunication.com/hostedemail/email.htm?h=f3c765000ce3a2bb5075efc1d7568ad5&CID=6648249963&ch=48E5D7089B85DF5010EF1D2847AB037D

Can anyone tell me why suddenly race is the hot topic of national discourse? We’ve all been snookered by the NAACP

Star Parker, Townhall, July 26, 2010

Can anyone tell me why suddenly race is the hot topic of national discourse?

According to Gallup polling of last week, the issues most on the minds of Americans are the economy and jobs followed by dissatisfaction with all aspects of government.

I didn’t notice racism on the list anywhere.

The NAACP says it was “snookered” by Fox News on the Shirley Sherrod story.

I say we’ve all been snookered by the NAACP.

The NAACP has shown that those who have written this organization off as irrelevant are wrong. It demonstrated this past week that if it so chooses it can dominate the national discussion with its racial agenda, regardless of what the real pressing issues of national concern may be.

The accusation about Tea Party racism is ridiculous. But even if you don’t think it’s ridiculous, is this the discussion we need to be having when national unemployment hovers at ten percent, and when black unemployment is closer to 15%, double that of whites?

Now, of course, we should be talking about racism if this is what is driving black unemployment. But is it?

I don’t think so. Nor do most blacks.

In January of this year, well into our recession, and well into the emergence of the Tea Party movement, the Pew Research Center surveyed black attitudes. Continue reading →

“There is no limit to what you can accomplish if you don’t care who gets the credit.”

Ronald Reagan, self-consciously playing off Truman, put a conspicuous plaque on his desk which said: “There is no limit to what you can accomplish if you don’t care who gets the credit.”

Support is mounting for a University of Illinois professor who was fired for telling students in his Catholicism class that he agrees with the Catholic Church’s teaching against homosexuality.

A student at the university accused Professor Ken Howell of engaging in “hate speech” when he stated in a class review session that he agreed with the Catholic teaching that homosexuality is immoral. (See earlier article)

Students and faculty have rallied behind the professor, and at last count, nearly 6,000 people have joined the “Save Dr. Ken” Facebook group. Members are planning a prayer vigil on the university’s quad, and students are also organizing a mass boycott of all university religion courses unless Howell is reinstated by the fall.

“It’s highly unusual in an academic freedom case to have so many students engaged in the struggle,” notes David French, legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF).

“Students often don’t pay attention to academic freedom issues unless it affects them personally,” he adds. “But in this case, I think it’s a testament to the quality of teaching that Dr. Howell has given over the years at the university. There are a lot of students who hold him in high esteem.”

The ADF attorney reports that the school has made a “promising step” in suspending the decision to fire Dr. Howell, but they have not “gone all the way” and given him clearance to teach again in the fall. So the legal alliance has contacted the University of Illinois, demanding the professor be reinstated.

“We said [that] it’s good that there has been a suspension of the decision to fire him, but it’s meaningless unless he is teaching. An adjunct professor without a class to teach is not really an adjunct professor,” French explains.

He hopes the school “will do the right thing without having to go to court.”

http://www.onenewsnow.com/Education/Default.aspx?id=1098952

7/26/2010, Asia News (www.asianews.it/)

In Sundays’ Angelus prayer, from his vacation, Benedict XVI talked about the Pater Noster, the Our Father, noting that those who pray are never alone. He also talked about Saint James, hoping that in November he might visit the shrine dedicated to him in Spain. He also had some thoughts about the Duisburg tragedy. The Pope is currently writing the third part of his opus on Jesus, which focuses on the ‘Gospels of Childhood’.

As he takes some time off, Benedict XVI is still working on the third volume of his Book on Jesus.

CASTEL GANDOLFO (AsiaNews) – In reciting the Angelus Sunday from Castel Gandolfo, Pope Benedict XVI focused on the “heroism” of Saint James, hopeful that he might travel to Santiago de Compostela this November, and on Jesus’ entreaty to pray, which “does not mean asking God to satisfy one’s desires, but rather calls upon us to keep our friendship with Him keenly alive. The Holy Father also had some thoughts about the “tragedy of Duisburg”.

Inspired by Sunday’s Gospel and speaking before a crowd of 3,000 people that had gathered in the inner courtyard of the Apostolic Palace of Castel Gandolfo, the Pope spoke about the Pater Noster, which Jesus taught. “Before us,” he said, “are the first words of the Holy Scripture we learn in childhood. They remain graved in our memory, shape our life and accompany us until our last breath. They show that ‘we are not yet fully God’s children, but ought to become and be so always through our ever deep communion with Jesus. As children we follow Christ’.” This last sentence comes from the book the Pope wrote on Jesus of Nazareth.

As he takes some time off, Benedict XVI is still working on his book on Jesus. As Fr Federico Lombardi, director of the Press Office of the Holy See, said, “In the past few days, the Pope has started working on the third volume of his great opus on Jesus. After handing in a few months ago the second tome, dedicated to the Passion and  Resurrection and currently undergoing translation in various languages for publication next spring, Benedict XVI has started on the third and final volume, dedicated to the ‘Gospels of childhood’.”

Again today, the Pope stressed, “Every time we recite Our Father, our voice becomes entwined with that of the Church, because those who pray are never alone. By themselves, believers must seek and shall find in the truth and richness of the Christian prayer, taught by the Church, their own life, their own way of praying . . . . They will allow themselves to be led . . . by the Holy Spirit, which guides them, through Christ, to the Father.”

Lastly, Benedict XVI said, “Today is the Feast Day of the Apostle James, called the Greater, who left his father and his job as a fisher to follow Jesus, and for Him, gave his life, first among the Apostles. With all my heart,” he added, “I dedicate a special thought to the pilgrims who have travelled in great numbers to Santiago de Compostela.”

As he greeted Spanish pilgrims, the Pope also spoke about the Spanish shrine, expressing his hope that he can travel to the city this November. Similarly, in greeting French pilgrims, he urged them “imitate the heroism of Saint James” who “carried the Gospel until the end of the world as it was known in his times.”

http://www.catholiconline.com/international/international_story.php?id=37525

EXCERPT:   …This is precisely the prophetic warning reiterated by the Holy Father to us… us, to whom much has been given.

The threat of judgment also concerns us, the Church in Europe, Europe and the West in general… the Lord is also crying out to our ears the words that in the Book of Revelation he addresses to the Church of Ephesus: “If you do not repent I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place.” Light can also be taken away from us and we do well to let this warning ring out with its full seriousness in our hearts, while crying to the Lord: “Help us to repent! Give all of us the grace of true renewal! Do not allow your light in our midst to blow out! Strengthen our faith, our hope and our love, so that we can bear good fruit!” —POPE BENEDICT XVI, Opening Homily, Synod of Bishops, October 2nd, 2005, Rome.

If my people, upon whom my name has been pronounced, humble themselves and pray, and seek my presence and turn from their evil ways, I will hear them from heaven and pardon their sins and revive their land. (2 Chronicles 7:14)

SOURCE:  Mark Mallett
http://www.markmallett.com/blog/?p=710

2 Chronicles 7:14 - If my people, upon whom my name has been pronounced, humble themselves and pray, and seek my presence and turn from their evil ways, I will hear them from heaven and pardon their sins and revive their land.

Looking for Orthodox Catholic Prayer Books? Here is one source of many that are available . . . .

http://www.catholiccompany.com/prayer-books-c124/?aid=117&gclid=CMG5g9yQiaMCFdVb2godeUMXew

This is not an advertisement for The Catholic Company only a resource for those seeking a deeper prayer life, but aren’t sure where to begin.  The prayer books above are a good place to start.

… It is not just kids that are taken up with the wiles of the dark world either: many moms of teens are swooning for them too…..

By Fr. Thomas Euteneuer, Catholic Exchange, July 26, 2010

With the issuing of the third movie in the Twilight series I have to speak out about our culture’s twisted fascination with vampires. I don’t hesitate to tell people that I am totally disgusted with the new fad sweeping over our youth culture these days. It is not just kids that are taken up with the wiles of the dark world either: many moms of teens are swooning for them too. I think that these seductive creatures are simply the spawn of the Harry Potter culture that has for over a decade now been indoctrinating kids to think that the occult world is normal and that all this evil messaging is harmless when dressed up as entertainment. That’s vampire logic – and just what the devil wants us to think.

Picture of Dracula – Bela Lugosi

Gone are the days of Bella Lugosi’s Dracula (1931) where good was good and evil was evil. A crucifix would drive Dracula away and then he had to go into his infernal coffin when the first streaks of dawn appeared. He was in every way presented as a creature of evil, dark of heart and dread to encounter. He drank human blood too, a feature that was supposed to strike terror in every person who valued his life’s essence. The image of a blood-sucking creature who lives in slime and darkness and will pounce on you to drain out your very essence should terrorize every decent person. This is because vampires used to be images of demons. That’s what demons are all about: the vanquishing of all human decency and life. They represent the spiritual vortexes of the demon world that drag down to the depths of hell all who fall prey to their wiles.

But, my, how vampires have come up in the world these days.

Nowadays vampires are divided into good and bad – no longer intrinsically evil. The good ones rescue vulnerable women instead of biting them and, allegedly, drink only animal blood (well, we haven’t seen the last Twilight movie yet…). And crucifixes? Don’t think you’ll see any of those driving away bad guys in these movies. The heroes are the “good” vampires, not the Church or religious faith in Christ.

These super-star vampires also walk around in sunlight and, as a matter of fact, their skin just happens to glisten like diamonds when exposed to direct sunlight. Isn’t that wonderful? The glam vamps are gentlemen, chaste and well-intentioned, yet they are always hovering around the edge of “falling” and in seductive situations which cause young people to think that they are capable, like their hero vampire, Edward Cullen, of going just so far and pulling back, out of self-control. That’s teaching them to play with fire, not a real chastity message for kids.

The worst part of this fascination with vampires from a faith point of view, however, is its blasphemy of the Eucharist. “Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you have no life in you,” said our Blessed Lord in Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel. He is the One who offers His flesh and blood for the life of the world. The vampires eat (bite) the flesh and drink the blood of victims rather than give their own to redeem others. Their bites corrupt and transform their victims into vampires like themselves. They have no life in them. They are the “living dead” by their own estimate.

How sad that this generation has been so taken in by those who represent the very antithesis of the core reality of our Faith — the Eucharist. Vampire logic is anti-Eucharistic logic, and it’s very dangerous for our kids. In their obsessive fascination with such darkness, kids (and adults) turn their backs on the One who actually died for them.

To those who say, “Oh, Father, it’s only harmless entertainment,” I say simply: You’ve been warned.

---

Fr. Tom Euteneuer is president of Human Life International.

http://catholicexchange.com/2010/07/26/132602/

Speaking to the left-wing Netroots conference in Las Vegas, the Senate Majority Leader concedes that he knows he gets on their nerves once in a while.

A group of Benedictine nuns who live in complete seclusion in the South of France have signed a major record deal with Decca.

WATCH: http://www.breitbart.tv/nuns-sign-major-record-contract/

SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP NOW UNANIMOUSLY OPPOSES PRO-ABORTION KAGAN
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – Sen. Lamar Alexander, the Tennessee Republican who is the chairman of the Senate GOP conference, announced his opposition today to the nomination of pro-abortion Solicitor general Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court. His announcement makes it so every top Republican lawmaker now opposes Kagan.

OBAMA RATIONING CZAR DONALD BERWICK HAS LIFETIME HEALTH CARE, GOP RESPONDS
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – Earlier this month, President Barack Obama used a recess appointment to make rationing advocate Donald Berwick the director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Now, new information shows the rationing czar has lifetime health care insurance from an institute paying him millions of dollars.

HOUSE MEMBERS SLAM OBAMA ADMIN’S PROMISE TO NOT FUND ABORTION IN HEALTH CARE
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – A group of 21 hardcore pro-abortion members of the House sent a letter to Obama administration officials today complaining about its promise not to fund abortions in the new high risk health insurance programs created under the national health care plan President Barack Obama signed.

RIGHT TO LIFE TO SENATE: DEFEAT DISCLOSE ACT, PLACES LIMITS ON PRO-LIFE GROUPS
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – The National Right to Life Committee is again asking members of the Senate to defeat the DISCLOSE Act, the campaign finance reform bill. The pro-life organization says the bill places such onerous limits on pro-life groups that they would have problems getting their message out.

KENYA RESIDENTS WILL SUPPORT NEW PRO-ABORTION CONSTITUTION, POLLING RESULTS SHOW
Nairobi, Kenya (LifeNews.com) – Two new polls released today reveal Kenya residents plan to support the proposed constitution on an August 4 vote. The constitution has become an international debate as the Obama administration has come under heavy criticism for spending as much as $23 million to support it.

DON’T TRUST OBAMA ADMINISTRATION TO KEEP ABORTION FUNDING OUT OF HEALTH CARE
by Richard M. Doerflinger
The high-risk pool program is just one funding stream left open to abortion by PPACA. For now it seems pro-life forces have won the first round, through careful research and a prompt public response. But PPACA needs a legislative fix to close such loopholes once and for all. Whether these or other billions of dollars in taxpayers’ funds are used to help kill unborn children is not a matter we should leave to shifting politics or to chance.

As Jivin J indicated in his post today, FactCheck.org yesterday agreed with the National Right to Life Committee that PA’s federally funded high risk insurance pool would have covered all abortions except “those ‘sought solely because of the sex of the unborn child’” had not NRLC sounded the alarm.

NRLC and other pro-life groups maintain this loophole is one of many yet to be discovered in the new 2k page healthcare law, despite Obama and pro-life Democrats’ assurances that the combination of the Nelson Amendment and Obama’s executive order ban federally funded abortions from Obamacare unless for rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother.

On July 17 Charles Krauthammer, a pro-abort I might add, said on Fox the PA controversy was evidence “Stupak was taken. He couldn’t stand the heat on this….”

But on July 18 Democrats for Life of America issued a fundraising appeal, making harsh accusations against NRLC in the process. Click to enlarge…

Continue reading “National Right to Life vs. Democrats for Life”

http://www.jillstanek.com/national-right-to-life-vs-demo.html

Digest, Patriot Post, July 23, 2010

The Foundation

“Excessive taxation … will carry reason and reflection to every man’s door, and particularly in the hour of election.”

–Thomas Jefferson

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

Government & Politics

Yeah, About Those Tax Rates…

Memo to Democrats: Higher taxes isn’t the answer

Barack Obama signed into law the sweeping financial-sector overhaul Wednesday, opening the way for government tentacles to gain an even firmer grip on the economy. Of course, Obama couched the bill with a promise: “The American people will never again be asked to foot the bill for Wall Street’s mistakes. There will be no more taxpayer-funded bailouts. Period.”

As Democrats feverishly expand the power of government, another issue looms — the expiration of the Bush tax cuts at midnight on Dec. 31. What a New Year’s celebration that will be. If Congress doesn’t act, Americans will be saddled with one of the largest tax increases in history.

Don’t be fooled by demo-goguery, either. The tax hikes will hit every income level.

• The top bracket would rise from 35 percent to 39.6 percent; the 33 bracket will rise to 35; 28 will rise to 31; 25 will rise to 28; and the lowest bracket, 10 percent, will rise to 15 percent — a 50 percent hike.
  

• Capital gains taxes will rise from 15 percent to 20 percent, and the tax on dividends will skyrocket to 39.6 percent, which is a far cry from the current 15 percent rate.

• The marriage penalty will return, and the child tax credit will be cut in half from $1,000 to $500.

That said, it seems likely that Democrats will act to stop this huge tax increase — at least for those in the lower brackets, and even if it’s only temporary (after all, it’s “their” money to give or not, right?). A few Democrats have even partially broken with their party’s traditional class warfare platform to argue that tax increases shouldn’t hit top-bracket earners either. The highest bracket includes small business owners, and increasing their taxes during a recession isn’t exactly a way to encourage them to hire new workers — or to just stay in business.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who found paying his own taxes somewhat inconvenient, doesn’t buy this economic argument. While there is “still some uncertainty about how strong the recovery is going to be,” he said, that doesn’t mean small business owners and individuals in the top bracket should keep their money. “Business always wants their taxes lower and always wants to live with less regulation,” he snorted. Yes, and job-killing Democrats always seems to want the opposite.

So, he concluded, “We believe it is appropriate to let those tax cuts that go to the most fortunate expire.” Got that? All you hard-working taxpayers who dare to earn more than $250,000 a year are just “fortunate,” and it’s time you paid your “fair share.”

The Obama agenda includes increasing spending to such stratospheric levels that deficits must be solved with higher taxes. Of course, with elections looming, Democrats have suddenly found religion on deficits, which means arguing over how much extending the tax cuts will “cost.” According to Politico, “Extending all the tax cuts would add $3 trillion to the deficit over the next decade, while extending only the middle-class cuts would cost $1.4 trillion.” Um, whose money is it?

Indeed, deficits are now such a public relations nightmare that Democrats didn’t even bother enacting a budget this year — they’ll just let that $3.6 trillion blow in the wind and hope you don’t notice the $1.5 trillion deficit. On the other side of the aisle, Republicans actually have a plan. Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), an orthopedic surgeon who heads the conservative Republican Study Committee, has offered a budget that reduces federal borrowing from Obama’s new baseline by $6.4 trillion over 10 years. Not only that, but it makes the Bush tax cuts permanent for everyone and further lowers taxes by $1.7 trillion.

Price also proposes a spending “reset” to 2008 levels. “We think it’s essential to show the American people we can cut spending enough to balance the budget even with the big hole Barack Obama has put us in,” Price said. However, he admitted, “Even some Republicans will flinch from the spending cuts required to get to a balanced budget.” Those Republicans should grow a backbone.

http://patriotpost.us/edition/2010/07/23/digest/

By Burt Prelutsky, Patriot Post, July 24, 2010

Apparently, one of Obama’s orders to NASA was to reach out to Muslim nations, celebrating them for their contributions to science, math and engineering. So, in short order, we’ve gone from reaching for the moon to reaching for Tehran.

I say if we’re going that far back in history, we should also take a moment to thank whomever was responsible for coming up with shoes, because in living memory, the only contribution to science made by the Muslim world was turning human beings into delivery systems for bombs………

• Read More

“It becomes all therefore who are friends of a Government based on free principles to reflect, that by denying the possibility of a system partly federal and partly consolidated, and who would convert ours into one either wholly federal or wholly consolidated, in neither of which forms have individual rights, public order, and external safety, been all duly maintained, they aim a deadly blow at the last hope of true liberty on the face of the Earth.”

—James Madison, Notes on Nullification

Castel Gandolfo, Italy (CNA/EWTN News).- The “Our Father” helps us to confront the difficulties in our lives, said the Holy Father on Sunday. In reciting the prayer, we never find ourselves alone as our voices are “intertwined with that of the Church.”

This Sunday’s Angelus took place amidst the festive atmosphere of Castel Gandolfo’s “Sagra delle pesche,” an annual festival celebrating the local peach production. For the occasion, the Holy Father was presented with a basket of local white peaches which were blessed at a nearby parish, shortly before the Angelus.

During his catechesis, the Pope reflected on Sunday’s Gospel from Luke in which Jesus is asked by the disciples to teach them how to pray. To this, Benedict XVI said, “Jesus does not make objections, He does not speak of strange or esoteric formulas, but with great simplicity He says: ‘When you are praying, say, “Father…,’ and he taught the Our Father, taking it from his own prayer, with which he addressed God, his Father.”

We learn these words from St. Matthew’s Gospel from the time we are young, he pointed out. “They imprint themselves in our memory, mold our lives, they accompany us up to our last breath. They reveal that we are not already completely children of God, but we must become them and be them … through our ever deeper communion with Jesus.

“Being children becomes the equivalent of following Christ,” he said, quoting a passage from the first “Jesus of Nazareth” book.

The Our Father prayer “takes and also expresses” our human and spiritual needs, he explained, alluding to the phrase “Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins.”

The Pontiff noted that this “is not an ‘asking’ to satisfy one’s own wishes, as much rather as gaining from it friendship with God, who – as the Gospel says – “will give the Holy Spirit to those that ask it of him.

People throughout history have become “friends of God” through prayer, he added, saying that among them was St. Teresa of Avila. And it was she, he pointed out, “who invited her sisters to ‘beseech God to deliver us from these perils forever and to keep us from all evil! And although our desire for this may not be perfect, let us strive to make the petition. What does it cost us to ask it, since we ask it of One Who is so powerful?’

“Whenever we recite the Our Father, our voice is intertwined with that of the Church, so that he who prays is never alone.“

Concluding the thought with a quotation from a 1989 document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on Christian meditation, Pope Benedict said, “From the rich variety of Christian prayer as proposed by the Church, each member of the faithful should seek and find his own way, his own form of prayer…. therefore, let himself be led … by the Holy Spirit, who guides him, through Christ, to the Father.”

He ended his catechesis in prayer for the pilgrims to Santiago de Compostela, the location of the tomb of St. James, whose feast is celebrated on Sunday. He also asked that the Virgin Mary “help us to rediscover the beauty and the depth of Christian prayer.”

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/through-the-our-father-we-are-never-alone-teaches-pope-benedict/

July 26, 2010
Memorial of Saint Joachim and Saint Anne, parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Father Ernest Daly, LC

Matthew 13:31-35

Jesus proposed another parable to the crowds. “The Kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a person took and sowed in a field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it is the largest of plants. It becomes a large bush, and the birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches.” He spoke to them another parable. “The Kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed with three measures of wheat flour until the whole batch was leavened.” All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables. He spoke to them only in parables, to fulfill what had been said through the prophet: I will open my mouth in parables, I will announce what has lain hidden from the foundation of the world.

Introductory Prayer: Lord, I come into your presence seeking to know you better. I believe that you take the lead in seeking me. You want me to find you. I trust that in your mercy you will bring me to intimacy with you. I open my heart today to receive your friendship.

Petition: Lord, teach me to long for your Kingdom and your holiness.

1. Silently Becoming Strong The Kingdom of Christ is not a very visible and flashy organization in the world. It is above all a spiritual force. It works quietly yet powerfully in the hearts of those who receive it. By living faith, hope and charity, Christians discover that the generous response to the voice of Christ in their consciences builds a life that has strength and substance. Living the Christian faith makes a person strong in the midst of difficulties and even able to sustain others in their life’s journey. Am I allowing the Kingdom to grow in my heart in such a way that I can quietly sustain others by my values and my charity?

2. Hidden Expansion As we allow Christ to reign in our hearts more each day, we find that his influence affects not only our internal attitudes but also the people around us. This world becomes more of a caring, compassionate place. Truth is sown. People are reminded of God’s presence and love. This world becomes more a place where others can find God. It is a quiet transformation of the world, but relentless, like the rising of the dough through the action of yeast. Am I constant in allowing the values of the Kingdom to transform the way I deal with others? Do I have confidence in the transforming power of the Gospel?

3. Revealing Hidden Secrets By speaking in in parables Christ helps us understand that God’s kingdom is real and accessible. God has a plan to reign in our hearts, and the fulfillment of this plan is within our reach through his grace. The secret to fruitfulness in our lives lies in our openness and cooperation with God’s grace. It is within our grasp if we would exercise our faith. Christ has come to open our horizons to God’s grace. Are we showing our thankfulness by doing his will?

Conversation with Christ: Lord, I believe in your kingdom. I know that it continues to grow by the power of your grace. Help me to work with confidence today, knowing that by sowing with faith, hope and love, I am allowing you to do great things in the world around me.

Resolution: Today I will speak of God’s goodness explicitly with someone whom I meet.

http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=363&ca=975&te=735&id=20302

CATHOLIC NEWS AGENCY, JULY 26, 2010

All our information concerning the names and lives of Sts. Joachim and Anne, the parents of the Virgin Mary, is derived from apocryphal literature, the Gospel of the Nativity of Mary, the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew and the Protoevangelium of James.

The Protoevangelium gives the following account: In Nazareth there lived a rich and pious couple, Joachim and Hannah. They were childless. When on a feast day Joachim presented himself to offer sacrifice in the temple, he was repulsed by a certain Ruben, under the pretext that men without offspring were unworthy to be admitted. Whereupon Joachim, bowed down with grief, did not return home, but went into the mountains to make his plaint to God in solitude. Also Hannah, having learned the reason of the prolonged absence of her husband, cried to the Lord to take away from her the curse of sterility, promising to dedicate her child to the service of God. Their prayers were heard; an angel came to Hannah and said: “Hannah, the Lord has looked upon thy tears; thou shalt conceive and give birth and the fruit of thy womb shall be blessed by all the world”. The angel made the same promise to Joachim, who returned to his wife. Hannah gave birth to a daughter whom she called Miriam (Mary). Since this story is apparently a reproduction of the biblical account of the conception of Samuel, whose mother was also called Hannah, even the name of the mother of Mary seems to be doubtful.

The renowned Father John of Eck of Ingolstadt, in a sermon on St. Anne (published at Paris in 1579), pretends to know even the names of the parents St. Anne. He calls them Stollanus and Emerentia. He says that St. Anne was born after Stollanus and Emerentia had been childless for twenty years; that St. Joachim died soon after the presentation of Mary in the temple; that St. Anne then married Cleophas, by whom she became the mother of Mary Cleophae (the wife of Alphaeus and mother of the Apostles James the Lesser, Simon and Judas, and of Joseph the Just); after the death of Cleophas she is said to have married Salomas, to whom she bore Maria Salomae (the wife of Zebedaeus and mother of the Apostles John and James the Greater). The same spurious legend is found in the writings of Gerson (Opp. III, 59) and of many others. There arose in the sixteenth century an animated controversy over the marriages of St. Anne, in which Baronius and Bellarmine defended her monogamy. The Greek Menaea (25 July) call the parents of St. Anne Mathan and Maria, and relate that Salome and Elizabeth, the mother of St. John the Baptist, were daughters of two sisters of St. Anne. According to Ephiphanius it was maintained even in the fourth century by some enthusiasts that St. Anne conceived without the action of man. This error was revived in the West in the fifteenth century. (Anna concepit per osculum Joachimi.) In 1677 the Holy See condemned the error of Imperiali who taught that St. Anne in the conception and birth of Mary remained virgin (Benedict XIV, De Festis, II, 9). In the Orient the cult of St. Anne can be traced to the fourth century. Justinian I (d. 565) had a church dedicated to her. The canon of the Greek Office of St. Anne was composed by St. Theophanes (d. 817), but older parts of the Office are ascribed to Anatolius of Byzantium (d. 458). Her feast is celebrated in the East on the 25th day of July, which may be the day of the dedication of her first church at Constantinople or the anniversary of the arrival of her supposed relics in Constantinople (710). It is found in the oldest liturgical document of the Greek Church, the Calendar of Constantinople (first half of the eighth century). The Greeks keep a collective feast of St. Joachim and St. Anne on the 9th of September. In the Latin Church St. Anne was not venerated, except, perhaps, in the south of France, before the thirteenth century. Her picture, painted in the eighth century, which was found lately in the church of Santa Maria Antiqua in Rome, owes its origin to Byzantine influence. Her feast, under the influence of the “Golden Legend”, is first found (26 July) in the thirteenth century, e.g. at Douai (in 1291), where a foot of St. Anne was venerated (feast of translation, 16 September). It was introduced in England by Urban VI, 21 November, 1378, from which time it spread all over the Western Church. It was extended to the universal Latin Church in 1584.

The supposed relics of St. Anne were brought from the Holy Land to Constantinople in 710 and were still kept there in the church of St. Sophia in 1333. The tradition of the church of Apt in southern France pretends that the body of St. Anne was brought to Apt by St. Lazarus, the friend of Christ, was hidden by St. Auspicius (d. 398), and found again during the reign of Charlemagne (feast, Monday after the octave of Easter); these relics were brought to a magnificent chapel in 1664 (feast, 4 May). The head of St. Anne was kept at Mainz up to 1510, when it was stolen and brought to Düren in Rheinland. St. Anne is the patroness of Brittany. Her miraculous picture is venerated at Notre Dame d’Auray, Diocese of Vannes. Also in Canada, where she is the principal patron of the province of Quebec, the shrine of St. Anne de Beaupré is well known. St. Anne is patroness of women in labour; she is represented holding the Blessed Virgin Mary in her lap, who again carries on her arm the child Jesus. She is also patroness of miners, Christ being compared to gold, Mary to silver.

St. Joachim
Joachim (whose name means Yahweh prepares), was the father of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Continue reading →