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Jesus Destroyed The Power Of Death

March 27, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Jesus Destroyed The Power Of Death

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Solemnity Of Easter (YR B) Readings: Acts 10:34a, 37-43 Col. 3:1-4 John 20:1-9 Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, alleluia! Every year on Easter Sunday the churches are filled with people. Easter is not only the highest feast day in the Church, it is the celebration of the single greatest event in human history. While our Lord’s rising from the dead is momentous in itself and we can rejoice for His sake, that is only a tiny aspect of what His Resurrection from the dead entails. Obviously, nothing else we celebrate would have any meaning or purpose had He not risen from the dead, so we have to look at what this means and why…Continue Reading

A Leaven In The World… Make Way For Millennials

March 26, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World… Make Way For Millennials

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK A body that doesn’t grow dies. Every successful organization always devotes some time and resources to accessions. Something of its own energy must be reinvested to take care of an organism’s own needs. Training and retention have no purpose without recruiting. The Church is no exception. We see in Europe that the young vanguard is taking the helm of the ship of state, in some cases at an unusually tender age. “Following the 2017 legislative elections, Sebastian Kurz became the youngest head of government in the world, at the age of 31,” according to Wikipedia, referring to the new chancellor of Austria. The trend continues in southern Europe, most recently, in Italy. The youthful Luigi…Continue Reading

The Sacraments Instituted By Christ… The Union Of Love Between Christ And The Soul

March 25, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Sacraments Instituted By Christ… The Union Of Love Between Christ And The Soul

By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM Part 21 Apart from the increase in sanctifying grace we receive in Holy Communion, there is still another grace we receive from our Lord every time we communicate worthily: It is the sacramental grace, that is, a grace specific to the Sacrament of the Eucharist, which perfects and disposes our souls by charity for a greater union with God in Christ. By this grace also we are given a claim to all those generous actual graces which will help to keep us safe in God’s love, and to live our lives in childlike docility to Him. It is never too much to emphasize this incredible reality that after receiving the Blessed Eucharist, Christ in His…Continue Reading

The Celebration Of Christian Funerals

March 24, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Celebration Of Christian Funerals

By DON FIER Over the past several months, we have expounded extensively on the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) with regard to how Christ and His Church provide so magnificently for the spiritual growth and sanctification of the faithful through the sacraments. Moreover, we saw last week that we have also been given a wellspring of additional aids — in the form of sacramentals — to help prepare ourselves for the reception of God’s grace. In some ways, the two resemble one another, but as explained by Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ: “[Sacramentals] differ from the sacraments in not being instrumental causes of grace. Rather, they arouse the faith of believers to better dispose themselves for…Continue Reading

Catholic Replies

March 23, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: Back in January, in response to a question about the Alpha program, we said all we knew was that it was a 10-week course about basic Christian teachings that claims to serve “as a refresher course for practicing Catholics and a point of re-entry for lapsed Catholics.” We said that the value of such courses would depend on the materials used and the knowledge and orthodoxy of the facilitators conducting the sessions. In February, we published the comments of a woman who took part in the Alpha program at her Catholic parish in Michigan and who did not think it was of much help either to practicing or lapsed Catholics. She said that it was basically a Protestant…Continue Reading

The Stations Of The Cross . . . Follow The Final Earthly Journey Of Christ

March 21, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Stations Of The Cross . . . Follow The Final Earthly Journey Of Christ

By FR. EDWARD McNAMARA (Editor’s Note: Following is a question on whether or not stations of the cross are liturgical or not, answered by Legionary of Christ Fr. Edward McNamara, professor of liturgy and dean of theology at the Regina Apostolorum university. (Fr. McNamara writes the “Liturgy Q-and-A” column for ZENIT News Agency, which provided this text in 2016. All rights reserved.) + + + Q. Are the stations of the cross liturgical, and who qualifies as the minister? — B.A., Enugu State, Nigeria. A. The stations of the cross are not liturgical as such but fall under the heading of pious exercises. The Holy See’s 2001 Directory for Popular Piety gives the following definition of these exercises: “7. The…Continue Reading

The Horror Of The Passion

March 20, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Horror Of The Passion

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Palm Sunday (YR B) Readings: Mark 11:1-10 Isaiah 50:4-7 Phil. 2:6-11 Mark 14:1-15:47   As we celebrate Palm Sunday, we begin with a Gospel reading recounting our Lord’s entrance into Jerusalem to the joyful shouts of the people proclaiming Him to be the Son of David, that is, the Messiah. Our Lord had preached and worked many miracles over the course of three Passovers, but the raising of Lazarus from the dead seems to have convinced the people from the area of Bethany that Jesus was, indeed, the Promised One. As our Lord came down the Mount of Olives from Bethany to Jerusalem, the people were singing His praises. The raising of Lazarus also seems to…Continue Reading

A Leaven In The World… “Fear Is Useless”

March 19, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World… “Fear Is Useless”

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK Lent is about death. The Lord’s death, of course: “Unless the grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies it remains just a grain of wheat.” He Himself in His human nature must be the seed of future glory for all of mankind. Fear is mankind’s most instinctive response before the vast and uncharted waters of death. In the journey to Calvary we live a precursor of our own demise. We accompany the Lord in our traditional prayer of the Way of the Cross on the Fridays of Lent and particularly on Good Friday and, doing so, we meditate also upon the penalty of Adam’s sin, which must be visited upon all the children…Continue Reading

The Sacraments Instituted By Christ . . . Can We Receive Communion In An Eastern Orthodox Church?

March 18, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Sacraments Instituted By Christ . . . Can We Receive Communion In An Eastern Orthodox Church?

By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM Part 20 Here we enter a delicate matter, which requires much prudential judgment from the Church. The matter is normally titled Communicatio in sacris, which refers to receiving Holy Communion in separated Eastern Churches. Here the situation is totally different from receiving “communion” in a Protestant church of whatever denomination, because Protestants do not have a real sacramental priesthood, and therefore their ministers do not have the power to consecrate the Eucharist. Conclusion: All they can offer you is a nice piece of bread, purely and simply. But with the Orthodox churches, the matter is altogether different. Since these have the true priesthood and the Blessed Eucharist, a certain sharing in the Sacraments of the…Continue Reading

Sacramentals In The Life Of The Church

March 17, 2018 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Sacramentals In The Life Of The Church

By DON FIER For almost two years we have been examining the Church’s teaching, as articulated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), on the seven sacraments. As has been emphasized repeatedly, it is an infallibly taught dogma of our faith that Christ Himself instituted each of the seven sacraments during His visible stay on Earth. Moreover, it has been demonstrated that each of the sacraments is administered with “perceptible signs (words and actions) accessible to our human nature. By the action of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit, they make present efficaciously the grace that they signify” (CCC, n. 1084). Simply stated, each sacrament is “an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace” (Baltimore Catechism,…Continue Reading