Twin Cities Catholic Cursillo
One of the talks on our weekend is about habitual grace. In Mark 6:30-34 Jesus said, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” Jesus had planned a time of rest for himself and for the disciples from the pressures of their apostolate. But He had to change his plans because so many people came, eager to hear Him speak. Not only was He not annoyed with them; He feels compassion. They were like a sheep without a shepherd.
This statement by Jesus shows us the intensity of Jesus’ public ministry. In fact, it was so intense that Mark even comments that the disciples did not even have time to eat. But the apostles were eager to share with Jesus their excitement and passion for all that they had experienced in Jesus’ name: the forgiveness of sins, the healing of the sick, the feeding of the hungry, the sharing of the “good news” of the kingdom with others; all elements that prefigure our call to ministry.
Through baptism we have been called to continue the task of preaching and proclaiming the “good news.” True proclamation of God’s word is not simply paying lip service. Far more important than what we say is who we are. What do I believe? Like the apostles, many more people will be touched by our faith than will be touched by the faith.
It is not enough to speak about God. People are hungry to find God in their everyday lives. And the only way we reveal God in our everyday lives is to allow others to see us and to hear us as we really are. We are to reach out to those who need our weakness as well as our strength: our faith as well as our doubt; our passion as well as our compassion.
We can come to better appreciate the good news if we let our beliefs speak a little more clearly in our day-to-day activities. Teaching is often the best way of learning. There are millions of people starving for spiritual nourishment that only the gospel can provide. Untold numbers are hungry for a word of inspiration that God loves them passionately, that their sins are forgiven, that faith works miracles and the “yoke” of Jesus is easy to bear. Why would we ever be hesitant in sharing this message with our children, with family members, with people at work and even with strangers who need help? We are commanded to, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel.”
But Jesus tells his followers that they need to take care of themselves as well, both physically and mentally. Jesus makes his disciples rest to show that people cannot work or preach without breaks. Jesus gave us an example of the kind of attitude a Christian should have in order to find a balance in our lives and that is, “habitual intimacy with God.” That is a habit of addressing God in the midst of our busy lives in our everyday activities: our work, studies, play, personal relationships, apostolate and our prayers.
We need to go off by ourselves to rest, to pray and to just “be” with God. Perhaps we need to spread a blanket under a tree, look through the branches into the sky and get a sense of the peace and beauty of God’s creation. And as we look at the clouds and we gaze at the endless blue sky, we get in touch with our true feelings and the world around us. Nature is like a mother holding us in her arms. That is when we become aware of being a part of it all. That is where we find God. It is a time of prayer and a time of silence. It is a communion with the mystery of the universe – “of touching the holy!”
Fr. Al Backmann
Have you heard about the Virginia politician who wanted references to God injected into the Declaration of Independence? Or about the activist from Massachusetts who urged making the Fourth of July a quasi-religious holiday? These proposals were made over 239 years ago. If made today they would probably be swiftly denounced by the Anti-Defamation League, American Civil Liberties Union, the “politically correct” and a slew of editorial pages.
The politician who wanted to stick God into the Declaration of Independence was its author, Thomas Jefferson. Indeed, the document adopted unanimously by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, refers to God not once, but four times. It was Jefferson’s great colleague and rival, John Adams of Massachusetts, who thought the fourth of July, should be an occasion of joy and worship. “It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty,” he wrote to his wife Abigail from Philadelphia.
In linking religion to American liberty, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were not bowing to the politi- cal correctness of their time. They were articulating a core principle of American nationhood: Religious faith and the civic virtues it gives rise to, are indispensable to a democratic republic consisting of rights such as freedom of speech or the right to own property.
Religion can survive in the absence of freedom, but freedom without religion is dangerous and unstable. “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity,” George Washington reminded the country in his Farewell Address, “religion and morality are indispensable supports.”
Liberty with faith, a secular state nourished by a religious society, was the formula the founders devised. They sought to combine the Enlightenment’s emphasis on reason, learning and pluralism with the Judeo-Christian ethic of responsibility, justice and morality. What resulted was a nation that is, on the whole, more diverse, more free, more tolerant, more prosperous and more religious than any before or since.
It would have astonished Jefferson, Adams, and their colleagues to witness the hostility to religion that pervades modern liberalism and the domains where it holds sway. On Independence Day, we should remind ourselves of another truth the men and women of 1776 held to be self-evident. American liberty and democracy do more than tolerate religion. They depend on it!
Last month we celebrated Mother’s Day and recognized the great love and affection that we have for our mothers and all that they do for us. This month we celebrate Father’s Day. During this month I would like to congratulate all of the loving fathers, living and dead, for their dedication and their self-giving love to their families.
Several years ago there was a bumper sticker, “Any man can be a father – it takes a special man to be a daddy!” A rather long bumper sticker, but I think it makes a point. We use the word “Father” easily, but it is important to understand that the Aramaic word (ABBA) is a word of great intimacy, probably best translated as “Daddy.”
Perhaps the most touching story I know about what it is to be a “Daddy” is the one about a little boy of five who was left alone with his father to get him ready for bed. After some hassling the dad finally got the little boy into his pajamas and tried to get him into bed. “But Daddy,” the little boy said, “I have to say my prayers first.”
He knelt down beside his bed, joined his little hands, raised his little eyes to heaven and prayed, “Dear God,” make me a great big, good man, just like my daddy. Amen.” He jumped up and into bed and in five minutes he was sound asleep. Then his father knelt by his son’s bedside and prayed, “Dear God, make me a great big, good man, just like my little boy thinks I am.”
Men, have you ever had a time when someone thought you to be greater than you really are? I think at some time in each of our lives we have experienced it. And we think that we are not worthy of the praise of admiration given to us. Perhaps we are not, but we have to try to live up to the responsibilities of fatherhood. Sometimes it means sacrifice. Sometimes it means humility. But always it means showing our children how to live and how to love, selflessly, growing in virtue and spirituality. Let’s let our children see that great big, good man like they think we are.
We ask God’s blessing on all fathers; to strengthen them, reward them, and help them to be good fathers, not only on Father’s Day, but always. Happy Father’s Day! May God bless you on this day and every day of your lives.
The celebration of Mother’s Day has a long and interesting history. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica it originated with the custom of mother worship among the ancient Greeks. Throughout Asia Minor the Ides of March was designated as a day of honor to Rhea, “the mother of the gods.” With the coming of Christianity the honor gradually shifted to “Mother Church” and the day of celebration became the mid Sunday of Lent.
In the United States the history of this day is more clearly defined. It apparently started in 1872, when Julia Ward Howe sug- gested that June 2nd be designated Mother’s Day and be dedicated to the cause of peace. For several years she personally led such a cele- bration in the city of Boston. In 1904, a convention of the Fraternal Order of Eagles, meeting in Kansas City, Missouri, launched a cam- paign for a national Mothers’ Day. Three years later, Anna Jarvis of Philadelphia took up the cause, suggesting that the day should be the second Sunday of May. Her efforts succeeded in 1914, when both houses of Congress passed resolutions recommending that Mother’s Day be proclaimed a national observance. The following year Presi- dent Woodrow Wilson made that proclamation. Thus, for the past ninety-seven years, in our nation, the second Sunday of May has been Mother’s Day.
The question might be raised why should we set aside a special day to honor mothers? The answer is simple; because moth- ers are special people! “Mother” is probably the most sentimental word in our language, defining one of the most necessary and beauti- ful of all relationships. A little child first gets to know his/her mother as the person who meets their needs. If hungry, our mother feeds us. If hurt, our mother is the one who consoles us. If frightened, our mother is the one who holds us close and makes us feel secure. If we do something wrong, our mother is usually the one who corrects us and also forgives us. Abraham Lincoln has been quoted as saying, “All that I am or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.” How could we not be sentimental about someone who is so much a part of our lives?
One of the greatest influences that a mother can have on her children is to show them how to live and how to love. Her example of caring about others and how to love others and how to accept love, will have a lasting impression on her children. That is what “real love” is all about. Real love is a choice that we make – it is a commitment that we keep. It is a heroic love manifested every day in motherhood.
Our mother is that unique human being, selected by God, through which we received the gift of life. She is the one to whom we bonded in the very first minutes of our life. She is the one whose love for us began even before we were born – a love that she carried for us months before we were ever able to return any love to her. We were fed by our mothers before we could live by ourselves. That is our true bond with our mother. That is our gratitude that we express on this special day, a gratitude for the gift of life.
During the month of May we ask Mary, our mother, in this her special month, to bless our mother and all mothers, living and dead, to strengthen them, reward them and help them to be good mothers always. Thank you mothers for the gift of life.
Happy Mother’s Day! Fr. Al Backmann
Easter stands at the heart of our faith. It is at Easter that we hear the happy ending to the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus. It is the good news that Jesus has overcome death and sin, and that Jesus lives! Without the resurrection all of our beliefs would be in vain. The cross would make no sense without the resurrection.
Christ’s emergence from the tomb has importance to us for three major reasons.
First, it is God’s endorsement of everything Jesus claimed and taught. His life ends in victory, not defeat. He was not destroyed by cynics, or political manipulation, or military power. In Jesus’ resurrection, God has the final word.
Second, this event is the cause of our salvation. Paul tells us that if Christ did not rise, then we are still deep in sin. But Jesus did rise. Jesus did conquer death. Jesus did conquer sin. It is the risen Christ that gives us the Holy Spirit, our sanctifier. The “firstborn of the dead” gives assurance to all of us that we are called to a similar destiny.
Third, it is the risen Christ that represents the starting point of Christian faith. It is the prism through which everything in His earthly ministry is now viewed. The Risen Christ is read into the events that preceded his death. Jesus of Nazareth, the Jewish rabbi instructing his disciples, is truly God’s Son and our Lord. Easter stands at the heart of our faith.
Easter is the day of all days to begin to experience the Resurrection power of God, as it wells up from the deepest center of our beings – to “feel and experience healing,” right at those points where we need it the most.
He lives! By his blood, poured out in loving sacrifice on the cross, Jesus has conquered sin and death. He lives, and we, who have been washed clean, and are made free by his blood – we also live.
In the gospel of John, he tells us that, “When Mary of Magdala came to the tomb, she saw that the stone had been moved.” And, running to Simon Peter and the other disciples she said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we don’t know where they have put him.” But we know. We know that the Spirit of the Risen Christ is deep within each one of us. Yes, Jesus lives. He lives in us, and that is the Good News of Easter.
One of my favorite gospel readings is the Transfiguration of Jesus. Jesus, along with three of his disciples, had gone up
the mountain top where they could be alone to think and talk and pray. Apparently, the climb was exhausting because the disciples soon fell fast asleep. In the meantime Jesus was transfigured. “His face changed in appearance and his clothes became dazzlingly white.” Then we are told that the disciples awakened from their sleep and saw Jesus in all of his glory.
What a redeeming thing it would be if that same kind of experience could be ours. Of course, we would not see him with a radiant face and dazzling garments, but that would not matter. His real glory is in the life that he lived and the truth that he taught. He understood things about people that modern psychology has only in recent years begun to figure out. Consider his perception of the destructive effects of hate on the human soul. Some have thought of him as a starry-eyed dreamer because he taught his disciples to hate no one; to love everyone, even their enemies.
If you think that idea is an empty dream, take a closer look at the lives of people today. Find someone who is consumed by hatred and see the results. It may be bad for the person who is hated, but it is infinitely worse for the one who does the hating. Hatred is to the soul what cancer is to the body. Untreated and unchecked it utterly consumes and destroys. Just look at the recent events in the world and in our own country.
Jesus saw and understood that fact centuries ago. So he said to his followers, “Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you.” His profound insight into human nature is not a dream. It is a solid fact that we can never fully appreciate until we look at it with our eyes wide open. We must learn to live together peacefully.
It would be difficult to describe the present dilemma of the human race in more accurate terms than that. We have inherited this earth as a bequest from God. It is like a large house with many rooms. There was a day when a few of us could live in one room and a few in another and maybe not bother each other very much. At least, the major parts of the house were separate. Those in the east wing did not know or care about what was going on in the west wing. But those days are long since gone. Now every part of the house is interconnected. The things that happen in one room affect the people in all the other rooms. Now, we must learn to live together in this house that God has given us.
If we are going to live together in this house, all of us are going to have to be changed a little, and some of us are going to have to be changed a lot. Most of the problems of our world, if we trace them back far enough, are found to be rooted in the “cussedness” of human nature. Thus, the redemption of the world must begin with the redemption of individual lives. When we face this fact, then the world’s great need comes home to our own doorstep. Redemption must begin right there, in the transformation of our individual lives; in the renewing of our minds; in the restoring of our relationships. We must be transfigured into Christ.
In the days before the Second Vatican Council, if my memory serves me right, Catholics took the season of Lent quite seriously. It was a season focused on self-discipline, expressed especially in the rigorous 40-day fast and abstinence period for adults, and for children, in giving up candy or some other desirable object. The season was also marked by devotions at church, especially the Stations of the Cross.
After the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI changed the rules on fast and abstinence calling on all Catholics still to do penance throughout the season of Lent, as well as on every Friday of the year, but to choose penances that were appropriate to their individual lives and circumstances.
Unfortunately, many Catholics still saw their religion as a matter of obedience to laws, so they only heard that the law set them free from fasting. Combined with the increasingly overscheduled lives we lead, this has resulted in many Catholics going through Lent with minimal involvement in this season of repentance and renewal. For many, it is just like the rest of the year with different songs at Mass perhaps, but not much else noticeably different. So, what should we do?
What is the Church’s official position concerning penance and abstinence from meat during Lent? In 1966, Pope Paul VI reorganized the Church’s practice of public penance in his “Apostolic Constitution on Penance.” Not long after that, the U. S. Bishops applied the canonical requirements to the practice of public penance in our country. To sum up those requirements, Catholics between the ages of 18 and 59 are obliged to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. In addition, all Catholics 14 years of age and older must abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and all the Fridays of Lent.
Fasting, as explained by the U. S. Bishops, means partaking of only one full meal. Some food (not equaling another full meal) is permitted at breakfast and around midday or in the evening, depending on when a person chooses to eat the main or full meal. Abstinence forbids the use of meat, but not of eggs, milk products or condiments made of animal fat.
In his “Apostolic Constitution on Penance,” Pope Paul VI did more than simply reorganize Church law concerning fast and abstinence. He reminded us of the divine law that each of us, in our own way, do penance. We must all turn from sin and make reparation to God for our sins. We must forgive and show love for one another just as we ask for God’s love and forgiveness.
We are also reminded by our bishops that during Lent we not only fast as penance but also that we pray, do almsgiving and works of charity. Wouldn’t it be nice if we attended Mass daily or several times a week, making the way of the cross, help out at a soup kitchen, visit the sick and shut-ins and other personal acts of charity during Lent? All of these can be even more meaningful and demanding than simply abstaining from meat on Friday. Just a thought.
The grace in offering masses may not always be seen or felt. Nevertheless, it is a gift from God of sanctifying (habitual) grace. The two Palanca masses are offered beginning at 9:30am on Friday and Saturday of the Cursillo weekend. Do we think it is coincidental that on Friday’s schedule, the first Rollo, Ideals, begins at 9:30am and on Saturday at 9:30am the Sacraments talk begins.
It would be great to see full houses for each of these masses. If you have not had time to write and do Palanca, offering your time and the graces of these masses for the intentions of the candidates serves as a powerful witness to the grace of God.
Below are two reflections about this:
Any Catholic may offer up the Mass in which he or she participates for any good intention. Certainly, graces will accrue in accordance with the intensity of that person's participation and sincerity.
In the case of the deceased in purgatory any benefit is received passively, since the soul is no longer capable of performing new meritorious acts. While such a soul is already saved, it cannot increase in sanctity but only purify those imperfections which impede its definitive entrance into glory.
A living person, however, is still capable of growing in sanctifying grace. And so a Mass offered for a person already in God's grace has the effect of offering a gift of increased grace which the person may willingly receive in order to become more Christ like. Father Edward McNamara, professor of liturgy at the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University.
Given this understanding, we can add some specifics. When a priest offers Holy Mass, he has three intentions: First, to offer the Mass reverently and validly in accord with the norms of the Church. Second, to offer the Mass in union with the whole Church and for the good of the whole Church. Third, to offer the Mass for a particular intention, such as the repose of the soul of someone who has died. Therefore, the effects of the Mass bring certain benefits or fruits. The general fruits of the Mass are the effects upon the whole Church — to the living faithful as well as the poor souls in purgatory. For this reason, in the Canon of the Mass (the Eucharistic Prayer), a special mention is made for both the living and the dead.
The special ministerial fruits of the Mass are applied to the particular intention of the Mass, i.e. "for whom the Mass is offered." The special personal fruits of the Mass benefit the celebrating priest who acts in the person of Christ in offering the Mass and to the people who are in attendance and participate in the offering of the Mass.
These fruits are both extensively and intensively finite, since each of us is finite. Therefore, the more a Mass is offered, the more benefit is conferred. For example, all things being equal, 10 Masses offered for the repose of a soul confer 10 times the benefit of one Mass.
Saunders, Rev. William. "Mass Intentions." Arlington Catholic Herald.
This article is reprinted with permission from Arlington Catholic Herald.
Dn. Tim Helmeke
Welcome 4th Day!
