Treasures of Grace

Disciples of Divine Mercy Prayerline

2009-10-19T20:59:00.004-04:00

The Disciples of Divine Mercy will take your prayer request at 716-662-6025 and will pray for your request on a daily basis. It will then be placed under a relic of St. Faustina.

You may also leave requests on www.TreasuresofGraceLLC.Com

2009-10-05T09:19:00.001-04:00

Happy Feast Day St. Maria Faustina!

Please intercede before the Merciful Jesus for all our intentions!

God's Mercy in Reconciliation

2009-07-14T08:18:00.003-04:00

A Wonderful Story of God's Mercy!

This is a beautiful story of how God in His mercy, loves us so much! He will continue to call us to seek Him in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

by Deacon Greg Kandra as printed in the Jesuit magazine - America

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

I spoke the words clearly, firmly, just as I had been taught by Sister St. Margaret. This wasn’t my first confession, but it was close to it. And on this particular Saturday afternoon, my mother had decided to take me to confession for reasons I can’t remember; but since I was a 7-year-old with a cranky temper and a disobedient streak, I’m sure they were valid.

Now here I was alone in the dark, whispering my sins. I was kneeling on a piece of cracked vinyl padding, speaking into a frayed scrap of velvet cloth that covered a metal grate. Behind that cloth sat a stranger, a priest with his ear bent and his shadowy head nodding. I smelled mothballs and after-shave and something like cigarettes. Or was it incense?

I told him my sins, and he gave me my penance. And in just a few moments, it was over. I prayed the act of contrition—“O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee...”—then crossed myself, pulled aside the heavy curtain and went to the altar rail, knelt and prayed.

I had done it. The secrets in my heart had been shared with another and God, in his mercy, had forgiven me. I was a new man! (O.K., a new 7-year-old.)

The slate was clean.

I could begin again.After finishing the prayers I had been given, I returned to my mother’s pew and we went out into the parking lot. As she started the station wagon and backed out of her space, she had a word of advice. “Gregory,” she said, “you’ve got to learn to keep your voice down. I could hear you all over the church.”

My ears turned crimson. And early on, before I had barely gotten my feet wet in the sacrament of confession, I wanted to shake them dry and have nothing to do with it again. Ever.

My early experience with confession may be one reason why for many years I avoided it, as a man with a cavity avoids the dentist. I was afraid it would hurt. Even when “confession” underwent a make-over and became “reconciliation,” and the small dark boxes were replaced with wide-open rooms, I was reluctant. I would go once or twice a year—a perfunctory, had-to-do-it practice. My heart wasn’t in it. My head, certainly, was elsewhere.

In the interim, when I did go, there may have been flashes of forgiveness, moments of grace. If so, they were accidental. I didn’t do much to help matters. Neither, for that matter, did some priests.

I remember once, in college, going to confession to talk over a family problem. It was a Saturday afternoon, just before the 5 p.m. Mass. The priest, fully vested for Mass, was standing outside the confessional, hands clasped behind his back. He looked like a barber waiting for his next customer. People were arriving for Mass, taking their pews. Nobody else was there for confession, so I approached the priest.“You open for business?” I asked. He said sure, and ushered me into the confessional—actually more like a small office, complete with a desk and two chairs. I sat down, took a deep breath and told him my troubles and why I felt I needed forgiveness. He nodded sympathetically and said he thought he might be able to help. Then he opened a desk drawer and pulled out a pamphlet, offered it to me, and smiled. It was a brochure about communication.

I wasn’t sure what to say, but thanked him. He patted my shoulder and said he would pray for me. With that, he stood up to point me back into the church. He had to begin Mass. I didn’t pray the act of contrition. I don’t think he gave me absolution. He told me to have a nice day.

I didn’t. Somehow, I left the confessional feeling worse than when I went in.

I remained skeptical of the sacrament for years after that. I drifted away from regular Mass attendance, and went for years without darkening the door of a reconciliation room or slipping behind the velvet curtain of a confessional. What was the point? In my mind, I was right with God: He knew where I was coming from (and, no doubt, where I was going) and I apologized to him, privately, when it seemed like the right thing to do. End of discussion.

But no.

Returning HomeYears later, the twisting road of my life led me back to the church and the sacraments, and it plunged me more deeply into my faith than I had ever imagined possible.

There were many reasons for my return: the deaths of my parents, the prayers of my wife and a growing sense that there had to be more to life than just getting up and going to work and planning where to go out for dinner or when to take the next cruise. I became a daily communicant. I served in my parish as an usher and, later, as an extraordinary minister of Communion.

And as part of my journey, when the time became right and my heart became ready, I found myself on yet another Saturday in yet another church, preparing to catalogue my sins yet again.

I was going to give confession another chance.

I had wandered into the basement chapel of St. Francis of Assisi in Manhattan, a place whose lifeblood is the endless stream of commuters from Penn Station and the Long Island Railroad, who find their way there for confession at all hours of the day. There is always a line. As I soon discovered, it is easy to understand why.

After entering the small confessional/reconciliation room and closing the door, I found myself seated opposite a kindly old friar wearing the familiar brown robe and, oddly enough, sneakers. I cleared my throat and began: “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been (quick tally in my mind) 10 years since my last confession.”

He broke into a small smile. “Welcome back,” he said. “It’s good to see you again.”

He had never seen me before in my life. But I knew what he meant.And with that, I began my confession. I spoke. He listened. He nodded. He had heard it all before, umpteen times, from the quivering lips of countless sinners like me. When it was over he gave me a mild penance and some gentle advice: “Just live the Gospel,” he said softly. “Just live the Gospel.”

He sighed and smiled. “There you are. Good as new. God bless you.”

It was the first time in a long time that those words stuck. And when I left that little room I felt, in fact, “good as new.” So I went back a few weeks later, and a few weeks after that—again and again and again. It became a habit. Uplifted and Given Grace I can’t quite explain it.

Why does this sacrament exert such force?

Some of it, I’m sure, is that it just feels good to let the weight of all our wrongs roll off our shoulders. It is comforting to be told that we are going to be okay and that what was wrong can be set right.

Everybody needs a second chance. Or a third.

Of course, it isn’t easy. It requires reflection, observation, scrutiny. For a few moments we are asked to be moral anthropologists. We seek out our sins. We capture them, name them, tag them and put them under glass to study, like wildly exotic fauna. What on earth is that?

The Chinese have a saying: “The beginning of wisdom is to call something by its correct name.” Perhaps that is part of it, too: we name what we are—proud, greedy, lustful, petty, selfish, untruthful—and become aware.

With penance and practice, we strive to be better. Wisdom begins.Or so we hope. And so we pray:

“I firmly resolve with the help of thy grace to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life, Amen.”

Those final words of the Act of Contrition put it so succinctly and clearly.

The purpose of the sacrament, really, is to amend life. To improve on what is there.

And with that improvement, I think, comes this beautiful promise at the heart of our faith: the promise that we will rise. We can be uplifted.

Resurrection is available. All of us can roll aside the stone of our personal tomb and stagger, blinking, into the sun. As more than a few preachers have proclaimed: the paschal mystery didn’t end on Good Friday but on Easter Sunday.

So it can be with each of us, too.T he profound act of being reconciled with God enables us to live Easter every time we emerge from that confessional.

We breathe again. We see light again. We hope again. We are given grace.

At bottom, what begins with seven short words—“Bless me, father, for I have sinned”—ends in transformation. It may last only an hour or a day.

But the fact that it happens at all is miraculous. And that gives me reason enough to keep going back.

Greg Kandra was ordained a deacon for the Diocese of Brooklyn, N.Y. A writer and producer for “The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric,” he also writes and edits his own blog at deacbench.blogspot.com.

The Year of the Priests

2009-06-22T08:34:00.002-04:00

A Time to Thank Our Priests
From the editors of the National Catholic Register

As the Year of the Priest begins, we lay editors of the Register want to take a moment to thank priests.

We want to thank not only the priests who have been our friends, but also those we barely knew, who did more for us than our friends ever could.

We want to thank not only the priests who inspire us with their words, but also those who moved us more deeply with the daily work of their priesthood than they ever could with words.We want to thank not only those men who gave up their retirement, and their well-deserved rest, to enter the priesthood as late vocations, but also — especially — those who as young men saw their whole life ahead of them and handed all of it to Christ.

We want to reassure them that the attacks on the priesthood will not prevail, because Christ doesn’t take their kind of generosity lightly.

We know that there have been terrible, scandalous priests. This has been true from the beginning — from the original Twelve Apostles through the early Christian heresies, from the scandals before the Reformation to the scandals of the 20th century.But we also know that the priesthood is under attack.

Priests know it, too.

Whenever someone looks at them suspiciously, whenever a mother hurries her children away from them, whenever they read an antagonistic article about how the life of a priest makes them prone to become monsters, they know it.

Their noble, loving sacrifice is so often made to look ugly and twisted — the opposite of what it is. The whole group is too often defined by the exceptions in a way few of us ever have to deal with.But the priesthood will survive, and grow stronger. In fact, it is already growing stronger. There are more new priests than we have seen in a long time, and the new generation of priests is more committed to the Church’s mission than any in memory.

We want to tell the faithful priests who unjustly suffer from these attacks that we’re on their side and, more importantly, remind them what Christ said: Rejoice and be glad on this day, for your name is great in heaven.

Thank you, priests, for sacrificing the fulfillment of “making it in the world” in order to give us a chance to make it in the next world. You don’t take on jobs — they are appointed to you. You put your own will at the disposal of the Church, for us.

We are grateful.

Thank you for bringing our children into the Church, and sustaining their souls with the sacraments. And thank you for welcoming them into the Church informally, as well. We see them look at you like celebrities, and we’re glad the first “celebrity” they got to meet was a man of God. Thank you for patiently listening to them, for taking such joy in teasing them, and for showing them the true face of Christ: the gentle one who said “Let the children come to me.”

Thank you, priests, for presiding at our marriages, even while you yourselves live such that you can be ready to serve your people at a moment’s notice. Sometimes married people sigh and think envious thoughts about living alone. But in the end, it’s hard for us to imagine how you do it. Thank you for risking loneliness to serve us and our families.

Thank you, priests, for putting yourself in the unenviable position of dealing with us at our worst moments — when we’re anxious, upset, depressed, even a little out of our minds, focused on our own problems to the exclusion of all else.

When we see the care you have to take in listening to the problems of so many kinds of people, we can’t imagine how you do it. How do you listen to angry people, whining people, weeping people, nervous people, suspicious people and clueless people? How do you listen to us?

Thank you, priests, for sitting in empty confessionals on Saturday afternoons. You wait there, not even knowing if we’ll come, like the Prodigal Son’s father on the road. Thank you for all the times we hear “I absolve you from your sins” and feel a great burden lifted from our hearts. This gift of God’s forgiveness brings the greatest joy back into our lives. We can give you nothing in return that even comes close to that.

And thank you, priests, most of all, for bringing Christ himself into our lives. Where would we be without your astonishing ability to make the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ present on our altars and in our tabernacles?

You are there for us every Sunday, every morning, giving us this infinite gift. Thank you.

In the end, that’s what is so great about you: not you, in yourself, but who you bring us — Christ.People call from the hospital and say, “I need a priest.” They point to the confessional and ask, “Is there a priest in there?” They approach in the airport and ask, “Are you a Catholic priest?”When people need a priest, any priest will do.

Because a priest is nothing but a representative of Christ. Christ is the main actor in the consecration at Mass. It is Christ who forgives sins. It is in Christ that we are baptized.

“The story of my priestly vocation?” wrote Pope John Paul II. “It is known above all to God. At its deepest level, every vocation to the priesthood is a great mystery; it is a gift which infinitely transcends the individual. Every priest experiences this clearly throughout the course of his life.
Faced with the greatness of the gift, we sense our own inadequacy.”

Your inadequacy is your secret weapon.

You aren’t acting on your own behalf or through your own powers. You are acting for Christ. And that’s why, despite all the attacks, the priesthood will prevail. We depend too much on you to ever let you go.

Thank you, Father, for being Christ for us.

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Why did Jesus rise with Wounds?

2009-04-18T20:01:00.004-04:00

The Sunday Homily
by Fr. James Farfaglia

Did you ever stop to think why Jesus rose from the dead with wounds?

Jesus rose from the dead with a glorified body. The barriers of time and space no longer apply to him. The Lord appears and disappears with shocking suddenness. He continually demonstrates his physical reality.

The Apostles and the disciples see him, hear him, and eat with him. Thomas is told to touch his wounds. The stone rolled away from the entrance, and the carefully folded burial cloths direct our gaze to the physical.

He has truly risen.

The disbelief and uncertainty evidenced by those who saw him testify to an apparent strangeness in the appearance of the newly risen Christ. Slowly they came to recognize him, but they still struggled with doubt.

We are accustomed to an annual celebration of Easter. However, for the first disciples of Jesus, resurrection was totally new. Let us remember, that the son of the widow of Nain, Jairus' daughter, and Lazarus were all brought back to life by Jesus, but not one of them continued their lives with a glorified body.

Although the risen Jesus is the same Jesus that died on Calvary, his physical reality is now different than before. The body of the risen Lord is indeed his physical body, but he now moves about with a glorified body.

Each of us will have a glorified body also at the resurrection of the dead if we persevere and are faithful.

Over and over again the gospels stress that something extraordinary has occurred. The Lord is tangible, but he has been transformed. His life is different from what it once was. His glorified body transcends the limitations of time and space. For this reason he can pass through the closed door of the Upper Room, and appear and disappear as he desires.

At times his disciples cannot recognize him precisely because their physical reality moves within time and space, and the Lord's physical reality is no longer subject to time and space, although he exists within time and space.The empty tomb and the neatly folded burial cloths point to us that Jesus is physically alive. His crucified body has been transformed.

What lesson is he teaching us by keeping his wounds intact?

We can answer this question by turning to our own wounds.

What are our wounds?

First, we all experience the large wound caused by original sin. Although we are baptized and original sin has been cleansed from our soul, our human nature has been wounded. Our sinful condition manifests itself in different ways and we struggle with those manifestations of fallen human nature.

And then there are the other wounds, the wounds that are smaller. We have wounds that are caused by sickness and the wounds that are caused by problems, adversities, challenges and the disappointments of life.

All of us are wounded.

Even Jesus is wounded. By retaining the wounds of his passion, the glorified Jesus is showing us that we can find hope and strength by taking our wounds and uniting them to his wounds.

The eleven apostles of today's gospel passage were discouraged and filled with fear. They had lost all hope. They did not understand that Jesus had to first die on the cross in order to rise on Easter Sunday. They did not understand that the risen Jesus would bear his five wounds as an eternal reminder that when our wounds are united to his wounds we will find true peace.

"Peace be with you".

These are the first words of the risen Jesus. He dispels the darkness of discouragement, despair and fear by showing the eleven his glorified and wounded body.

Thomas places his finger in the wounds of Jesus and he believes. "Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe". (John 20: 27)

Many call Thomas the doubting Thomas. All of the Apostles doubted. All of the Apostles ran away and abandoned Jesus. In reality, he is not the doubting Thomas, but the courageous Thomas. He is the only apostle who knows where to find Jesus. By touching the wounds of Jesus, he begins to understand that the risen Jesus is not a ghost, but that he is truly real. By encountering Jesus in his woundedness, he is able to encounter the authentic Jesus, the real Jesus, the whole Jesus.

Because he is able to encounter the Jesus that shed his blood on the cross, he falls to the ground and pronounces a profound act of faith: "My Lord and my God".

Thomas is able to encounter Jesus in all of his humanity and all of his divinity. He comes to grasp the reality that the risen Jesus is the same Jesus that died on Calvary.

But, where is the risen and wounded Jesus? Where can we encounter him? As Jesus hung on the cross, all of his blood flowed from his wounds. The eternal reminder of his wounds reminds us that we are to experience him in the Eucharist and in the Sacrament of Confession.

By coming to Jesus every day at Mass, for visits and adoration; by encountering the God of mercy through the awesome gift of the sacrament of forgiveness, we can dispel the despair, the discouragement and the fear that may fill our lives.

It is in the Eucharist that we encounter peace because we truly encounter the Lord. We need to bring our wounds to the risen and wounded Jesus every day in the Eucharist. It is there, at the tabernacle, that his wounds will heal us.

On this feast of Divine Mercy, let us remember the words that John Paul II wrote in his second encyclical letter: “Believing in the crucified Son means ‘seeing the Father,’ means believing that love is present in the world and that this love is more powerful than any kind of evil in which individuals, humanity, or the world are involved.

Believing in this love means believing in mercy.

For mercy is an indispensable dimension of love; it is as it were love's second name and, at the same time, the specific manner in which love is revealed and effected vis-a-vis the reality of the evil that is in the world, affecting and besieging man, insinuating itself even into his heart and capable of causing him to perish in Gehenna” (Dives in Misericordia).

Written by Father James Farfaglia

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Living Our Lives for Others

2009-03-29T08:27:00.005-04:00

Living Our Lives for Others
The Sunday Homily by Father James Farfaglia

A long time ago, there was a man who played piano in a bar. He was a good piano player. People came from all over just to hear him play. But one night, a patron told him he didn't want to hear him just play anymore. He wanted him to sing a song. The popular piano player said, "I don't sing."

But the customer was persistent. He told the bartender, "I'm tired of listening to the piano. I want that guy to sing!"

The bartender shouted across the room, "Hey buddy! If you want to get paid, sing a song. The patrons are asking you to sing!"

So he did. He sang a song.

A piano player who had never sung in public did so for the very first time. And nobody had ever heard the song Mona, Mona Lisa sung the way it was sung that night. The piano player was Nat King Cole.[i]

"Amen, amen I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life" (John 12: 24-25)

The happiest and most remarkable people that I have known throughout my life are those who are totally selfless. Great things: ideas, beliefs, cultures have lived because men and women have decided to die for causes greater then themselves.

The countless martyrs of the Catholic Church give witness to the multitude of selfless people, young and old, who have given themselves to the cause of Christ and his Church. Where would the Church be today without the blood of the martyrs? Martyrs are selfless people who believe in a cause greater than themselves.

However, there lies a deeper reality in these heroes of the Church. They are able to believe in something bigger than themselves precisely because they have first died to themselves. They have died to their comfort, to their laziness and to their personal ambitions.

Only the selfless, only those who have truly died to themselves, become useful instruments of God.

When a person is truly empty of self, God can take full possession of that person and do marvelous and powerful things. Only the authentic disciple of Jesus who has truly died to self can truly possess the fullness of divine grace. The more we die to self, the more Jesus can take over.

"Amen, amen I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life".

To die to self is not an easy endeavor.

Death is always painful. Sometimes we will want to hold on to an idea, a place, a particular sin, or a bad relationship. Inherent in all transformation, change, conversion, is destruction. The grain of wheat must fall to the ground and die.

As a priest, I have seen many people make radical changes in their lives. In order to bring about the desired change, something had to end. Some young people have had to terminate a relationship in order to live a life of chastity. Others have taken all of their CD's and thrown them in the garbage in order to stay away from satanic rock music. Once I told a penitent who had a terrible problem with pornography that as a penance he must go home and throw into the garbage all of his magazines. Would it have been as helpful just to say, "For your penance recite three Hail Mary's?"

To bring about new life, the grain of wheat has to fall to the ground and die.

When disciples of Jesus Christ truly die to self, they become the most happy, most hard working, most dynamic and most productive people of any enterprise. They are the moms and dads rearing happy families, the priests nurturing spiritually alive parishes, and the religious and lay leaders engaging in fruitful apostolates.

Just imagine what this world would have lost had there not been men and women determined to die to self and forget their personal safety, security and ambition. Where would we be without the great doctors, nurses, policemen, firefighters, school teachers, wise political leaders, and the heroic men and women of the military?

This Sunday’s liturgy reminds me about a story that took place many years ago regarding a woman, who was carrying her baby on her back as both were trapped by a prairie fire.

As the mother looked around, she realized there was no way to escape the fire. Quickly and without thinking about her own safety, she took the baby off her back and began digging a hole in the earth with her bare hands. She then placed her child into it and covered the child with her body. Later the woman was found dead, but the child was saved. [ii]

The world owes everything to such great people who spend themselves daily for God and for others.

If we were to take things easy and do nothing in life, we might exist longer, but we would never know how to live. A famous Christian evangelist once said, "It is better to burn out than to rust out".

Moreover, it is true that those people who give themselves to God and to others unconditionally remain young and vibrant. They go on through life filled with enthusiasm because they are in love with life. They are imbued with a cause that is greater than themselves.I am amazed at times when I see people who look much older, but in fact are much younger than I am. They seem to live purposeless lives, to vegetate, to do nothing with the talents that God has given to them. I cannot live my life in such a way. I prefer to drag my tired body through life and be of service to God and to others, rather than live an aimless and dreary existence.

"Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life".

I am reminded of a story about an elderly carpenter who was ready to retire. He told his boss of his plans to leave the house building business and live a more leisurely life with his wife enjoying his extended family. He would miss the paycheck, but he needed to retire. They could survive.

The contractor was sorry to see his good worker go and asked if he could build just one more house as a personal favor. The carpenter said yes, but in time it was easy to see that his heart was not in his work. He resorted to shoddy workmanship and used inferior materials. It was an unfortunate way to end his career.

When the carpenter finished his work and the builder came to inspect the house, the contractor handed the front-door key to the carpenter. "This is your house," he said, "my gift to you."What a shock! What a shame! If he had only known he was building his own house, he would have done it all so differently. Now he had to live in the home he had built so poorly.[iii]

Always strive to be more and do more. With service comes greatness.

If you are married, set your children on this path. If you are a priest or a religious, save more souls. Never think of yourself. "I" and "me" must always be replaced with "we" and "us". This is what makes us truly happy: to die to self unconditionally so that Jesus may live in us.

The grain of wheat must fall to the ground and die.

How can this essential dimension of Christianity either begin or continue to flourish in your life?

The answer is this: to center your life on the Eucharist.

Bread comes from the crushed wheat that is ground to become flour. Wine comes from the grapes that are crushed together and the seeds are removed.

The bread and the wine that becomes Jesus for us have gone through death and destruction. But, it is through death and destruction that we have the presence of eternal life in the tabernacle of every Catholic Church throughout the world.

"Amen, amen I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life"

Written by Fr. James (thank you Father!)
Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Cleaning Out the Temple

2009-03-14T08:08:00.009-04:00

Cleaning Out the Temple

The Sunday Homily by Father James Farfaglia

“Since the Passover of the Jews was near, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. He found in the temple area those who sold oxen, sheep, and doves, as well as the money changers seated there. He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, ‘Take these out of here, and stop making my Father’s house a marketplace’” (John 2: 13-16).

The sacrament of baptism has made us temples of the Holy Spirit. Baptism washes away original sin, but we are left with the effects of original sin. Our intellect is darkened and our will is weakened. St. Paul famously describes the inner struggle in chapter 7 of his letter to the Romans. He describes this struggle in dramatic terms. He states that he cannot understand his own behavior, and that he finds himself doing the very things that he hates (see Romans 7:14:25).

Due to the effects of original sin and our own personal sins that are committed after baptism, our temples are filled with many things that are not of God. Lent provides us an excellent opportunity to take up a whip and chase out of our souls anything and everything that does not belong there.

The practice of mortification is the way to rid our souls of sins and attachments that keep God from fully possessing our lives.

St.Paul’s letters are so practical. Regarding mortification he tells us, again from Romans: “So then there is no necessity for us to obey our unspiritual selves or to live unspiritual lives. If you do live in that way, you are doomed to die; but if by the Spirit you put an end to the misdeeds of the body you will live” (Romans 8: 12-13).

In his letter to the Colossians the theme is repeated with these words: “That is why you must kill everything in you that belongs only to earthly life: fornication, impurity, guilty passion, evil desires and especially greed, which is the same thing as worshipping a false god…” (Colossians 3: 5).

Finally, in his letter to the Galatians he writes emphatically: “You cannot belong to Christ Jesus unless you crucify all self-indulgent passions and desires” (Galatians 5:24).

The practice of continual mortification is an essential part of our walk with the Lord.

Without the use of daily mortification, we will not be able to resist the onslaught of our sinful human nature, the temptations caused by Satan, and the allurements of the world. Not only are we to fight against sin, be it mortal sin or venial sin, but we must also get to the root of our sins and remove the inordinate affections that cause us to sin in a certain way. However, to avoid sin is not enough.

We must grow in holiness.

The practice of mortification must be daily and life long. The battle never ends until we are dead. The practice of mortification demands a conscious and willful renewal every day of our lives. The struggle may be more or less intense during the different stages of our life journey. Although we may have to deal with different issues, the struggle will always be present.

If we want to save our souls, an intense, dramatic struggle is necessary. We need to take up the whip and continually force out of our temple anything that keeps us from getting to heaven. Let us consider briefly some of our most common struggles and the mortification that needs to take place in order that Jesus may take full possession of our temple.

Pride is at the top of the list of the seven deadly sins. Pride is an ugly sin and it must be dealt with seriously and energetically. This sin will be uprooted by replacing it with the virtue of humility. Repeated concrete acts of humility will continue to hammer away at this sin. The Litany of Humility provides an excellent program for anyone who struggles with this vice (see http://www.rc.net/wcc/humility.htm).

Greed is another sin that causes many problems. Two weeks ago I addressed this issue in the Sunday homily. Excellent acts of mortification include establishing a budget, practice the Biblical teaching of tithing, eliminate your debt, limit the use of credit cards, live within your means, and be content with what you already have.

Gluttony is a very addictive sin. If we can control our eating habits and our spending habits, we will then have a greater ability to live the virtue of chastity. Gluttony needs to be mortified by a strict spirit of self-control. It is said that Blessed Pope John XXIII struggled with this sin. He had a life long battle with his weight. One day he was seen crying as he was eating a huge bowl of ice-cream. Acts of mortification include not snacking between meals, eating smaller portions, eating healthy foods, saving deserts for Sundays and special feast days, and exercising moderation in the use of alcoholic beverages.

Laziness is also a very controlling sin. The lazy person is not so much concerned about the bad that he does, but the good that is left undone. The lazy person has to form and strengthen the will. Getting up on time in the morning, making your bed, cleaning your room, doing your duty with perfection, using your time well, regular physical exercise, and personal discipline are very important acts of mortification that will successfully uproot the sin of laziness and replace it with the virtue of diligence.

Lust is another big struggle, if not the biggest for most people. Of all of the sins that have been mentioned thus far, this one is the most addictive. Lust must be dealt with severely. This is something that we cannot fool around with. The best weapon against lust is to run away from the occasions of sin. When we accept our weakness, we will not put ourselves into dangerous situations. If the cable is a problem, then get rid of it. There are a number of pornography free Internet servers that can be used. Living a moral life, modesty in dress, control of our eyes, avoiding sensual movies and television programs and staying away from dangerous friends are some of the things that we can do to replace lust with the virtue of chastity.

Finally, anger is another sin that most people struggle with. Anger must be replaced with the virtue of charity. Never deal with situations such as disciplining children when you are angry. Exercise mortification by walking away from a difficult situation and deal with it latter when you are serene. Walking around the neighborhood for a few minutes can be very beneficial when you are ready to explode. Physical exercise is also a good remedy for anger. After work, it is a good habit to work out at the local gym or go for a run. You can blow off a lot of steam and stress, and then enter your house calm and refreshed.

Of course, all of these acts of mortification that I have mentioned presupposes a mature spiritual life. Self-knowledge, a serious battle plan, and the regular use of the sacrament of confession are also indispensable tools for spiritual growth and development.

Remember, the goal of our spiritual life is to become a new person in Christ. It is not enough just to be a “good person” or to be “nice”.

We are called to be saints.

The continual struggle with ourselves can be exhausting at times. We can even become discouraged when we struggle over long periods of time with the same sin.

Discouragement must be met with Christian hope. There maybe something that we will struggle with for the rest of our lives. We may chase the thing out of our temple, but it keeps on trying to get back in. It may continually pound on the door, look for an open window, or even a crack in the foundation. If a dominant fault does not go away, it must be surrounded with heroic virtue.

St. Paul was given an answer that he was not looking for when he complained to the Lord about his “thorn in the flesh”. “My grace is enough for you: my power is at is best in weakness” (II Corinthians 12: 9).

Let us then take up a whip and chase out of our soul whatever maybe an obstacle to our relationship with Jesus Christ.

Mortification is an act of the will. Mortification cannot be based on wishful thinking. We have to really die to ourselves in order for Jesus to live in our temple.

Dying to sin, attachments, addictions, obsessions, and selfish tendencies will be a painful and even dramatic experience. But, too many people today are looking for an easy Christianity.

We need to look upon the crucifix and understand once again that the only Jesus that there is, is the Crucified Jesus. “Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified…” (1 Corinthians 1: 22).

Written by Fr. James (Thank you Father!)

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Wash Yourselves Clean!

2009-03-07T09:14:00.005-05:00

Wash yourselves clean!

Put away your misdeeds from before my eyes;
cease doing evil; learn to do good.

Make justice your aim; redress the wronged,
hear the orphan's plea, defend the widow.

Come now, let us set things right,
says the Lord:

Though your sins be like scarlet,
they may become white as snow;
Though they be crimson red,
they may become white as wool. Isaiah 1:16-18

Thank you Jesus for forgiving us our sins in the Sacrament of Reconciliation...

Posted by Kathy ~TOG

The Power of the Cross

2009-03-06T12:58:00.002-05:00

The Transforming Power of the Cross
The Sunday Homily Written by Father James Farfaglia

"A man and a woman had a little daughter that they adored. Audrey was their only child. They lived their whole lives for their little child. When she became chronically ill and her illness resisted the efforts of the best doctors, the parents became totally discouraged and inconsolable."

"Soon Audrey did not survive the illness and the parents were completely distressed. They became bitter recluses, shutting themselves off from their family and friends."

"But, one night the woman had a dream. She dreamt that she was in heaven. During her dream, she saw a long procession of little children processing like little angels before the throne of God. Every child was dressed in a dazzling white robe and they each held a lit candle. However, when the woman saw her Audrey, she noticed that her candle was not lit. The mother ran up to Audrey, embraced her in her arms, caressed her tenderly, and then asked her how it was that her candle was the only one that was not lit. Audrey said, “Mother, they often relight it, but your tears always put it out”. Just at that moment the woman woke from her dream."

"The lesson was clear, and its effects were immediate."

"She immediately told the dream to her husband. They decided to embrace their loss with Christian hope, and that they would no longer extinguish Audrey’s little candle with their useless tears."

"This Sunday's liturgy provides motivation and inspiration for us to continue our Lenten program. It is not easy to die to self."

"However, the gospel account of the transfiguration of Jesus tells us that our cross will always lead to the transformation of our lives. "

"There are three transfigurations or transformations that take place in our journey towards eternity.

The first change begins at Baptism. The immersion into the baptismal waters symbolizes death and rebirth. The sacrament of Baptism washes away original sin and we are re-created. We are transformed into new creatures. The old self dies, and the new person in Christ Jesus is born.Our new life, which begins at Baptism, is carried out through our daily living of the Gospel. This of course, demands a continual dying to self. Through self-denial, the image of Christ is made visible in our lives. The more we die to self, the more sanctifying grace can transform our lives. "He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it". (Matthew 10: 39)
The second transformation takes place by our victory over the trials and tribulations of life. Every challenge, every difficulty, every moment of suffering, is an opportunity to grow. Transformation only takes place through suffering.A young friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer when he was nineteen years old. He died two years latter. Nevertheless, his acceptance of this challenge and the manner in which he embraced his daily suffering not only transformed his life, but it transformed the lives of those who were closest to him.One day after he returned from a long week of treatments at the hospital, his dad suggested that before returning home, they stop by their parish and pray the Stations of the Cross together. The father told his son that contemplating how much Jesus had suffered for them would be important, particularly in their present trial. Both father and son had understood the transforming power of the Cross of Jesus.The third transformation takes place at death. The suffering that the final moment brings upon us makes way for an amazing transformation. Eternal life in heaven, perhaps after a period of further transformation in purgatory, is granted to those who have been found worthy.
The last transformation or transfiguration is completed at the Second Coming when our body is reunited with our soul. What awaits us is beyond anything that we can imagine. "Sacred Scripture calls this mysterious renewal, which will transform humanity and the world, 'new heavens and a new earth'. It will be the definitive realization of God's plan to bring under a single head all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth. The visible universe, then, is itself destined to be transformed, so that the world itself, restored to its original state, facing no further obstacles, should be at the service of the just, sharing their glorification in the risen Jesus Christ". (Catechism of the Catholic Church # 1043, 1047)"

"When we consider the eschatological teachings of the Catholic Church, we can understand why the Easter liturgy cries out "O felix culpa". "O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer" (Exsúlet – The Easter Proclamation from the Easter Vigil Liturgy) The transfiguration of the Lord reminds us of the outcome of the cross."

"Suffering brings about transformation when we carry the cross like true disciples of Jesus.Each of us has a cross to carry."

"We must all identify our crosses and carry them with patience, joy and love. Why complain about something which is our means to gain eternal life?"

"As Thomas a' Kempis reminds us, "The cross, therefore, is always ready; it awaits you everywhere. No matter where you may go, you cannot escape it, for wherever you go you take yourself with you and shall always find yourself. Turn where you will --above, below, without, or within -- you will find a cross in everything, and everywhere you must have patience if you would have peace within and merit an eternal crown. If you carry the cross willingly, it will carry and lead you to the desired goal where indeed there shall be no more suffering, but here there shall be. If you carry it unwillingly, you create a burden for yourself and increase the load, though still you have to bear it. If you cast away one cross, you will find another and perhaps a heavier one" (The Imitation of Christ, Book II, chapter 12)."

“And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves; and he was transfigured before them, and his garments became glistening, intensely white, as no fuller on earth could bleach them” (Mark 9: 2-3).

"The transfiguration of Jesus on Mount Tabor tells us that the glory of the resurrection will only take place through the sufferings of Good Friday."

"The transfiguration of Jesus teaches us that the experience of the cross is necessary in order for Easter to take place."

"However, too many of our contemporaries are like those who stood at the foot of the Cross and cried out to Jesus that he should come down from the Cross. Many would like to have a Christianity without self-denial, discipline, and renunciation. However, Christianity without the Cross is not Christianity at all."

"What is your cross?"

"Maybe you have many crosses to carry. How do you carry your cross? Do you complain? Are you discouraged? Do you run away from the cross?"

"There is only one way to carry your cross. Carry your cross with generosity. Carry your cross with patience, love, and joy. See in your cross your sanctification, your eternal salvation."

"Understand that with your cross, united to the cross of Jesus, you have a continual opportunity to save souls and make reparation for so many sins."

Written by Fr. James Farfaglia

Posted by Kathy ~TOG (Thank you Fr. James!)

Destroying Sin

2009-03-04T07:28:00.004-05:00

Destroying Sin
(Taken from Divine Intimacy by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.)

"Jesus, our Head, invites us, His members, to unite with Him in His work of destroying sin: to destroy it in ourselves down to the very roots, that is, in our evil inclinations, and to destroy it likewise in His other members by allowing Him to work in us."

"This is the law of solidarity, for the misfortune of one is the misfortune of the others; each sin is a burden on the whole world and disturbs the equilibrium of God's plan."

"Therefore, every Christian, and more especially, every soul consecrated to God, must throw himself ardently into the battle against sin and fight it with the proper weapons: penance, expiatory prayer, and most of all...love."

"When the love of charity is perfect, it destroys sin more efficaciously than the fire of purgatory."

"In this we see why the saints were able to convert so many souls. God used the fire of their charity to do away with sin in sinners."

Divine Intimacy pg. 295

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Man Does Not Live By Bread Alone

2009-02-28T08:08:00.003-05:00

The Sunday Homily

By Father James Farfaglia

Satan’s greatest triumph is that he has caused many people to no longer believe that he really exists. Jesus tells us who he is when he said: "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Luke 10: 18).

My dear friends, Satan is real and his actions in the world are very real. The Second Vatican Council made this point very clear when it said, “The whole of man’s history has been the story of our combat with the powers of evil, stretching, so our Lord tells us, from the very dawn of history until the last day. Finding himself in the midst of the battlefield man has to struggle to do what is right, and it is at great cost to himself, and aided by God’s grace, that he succeeds in achieving his own inner integrity” (Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes, 37.2).

As the holy season of Lent begins, this Sunday’s liturgy reminds us that we are engaged in a daily and dramatic battle between Christ and Satan, between good and evil. What is at stake in this battle is our eternal salvation. Satan will do all that he can do separate us from Christ. Jesus described him as the father of lies. “He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8: 14).

Today’s gospel relates that in the desert, Satan tempted Jesus three times. Satan launched three attacks against our Lord. Now that we are beginning our Lenten practices, we might consider taking a closer look at the nature of the first temptation.

What human failing does it address?

And the tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread’. But he answered, ‘It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God (Matthew 4: 3-4).

We all know that one of the toughest problems that we must face as a nation is materialism. It is difficult to live as true disciples of Jesus in a materialistic society. Every day we are bombarded with materialism. Our market driven society urges us to possess more and more things. Given this all- pervasive temptation we must always remember that “man does not live on bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God”. Let’s take a practical look at how we can fight against the temptation of materialism.

How can we use the things of this world correctly and keep our focus on the things of eternity?

The first practical step is to live within our means. Most people probably receive three or four invitations a week to sign up for another credit card. This is the trap. Advertisements from credit card companies give us the impression that we can spend without any financial consequences at all. We need to discipline ourselves by living debt free. Excessive use of credit cards only foments greed and irresponsibility. One credit card for emergencies or a frequent flyer miles program is enough.

The second practical step we must take to avoid materialism is to understand that work is only a means to provide what is necessary for our families and ourselves. Many feel that their work is the most important aspect of their lives. When people put too much emphasis on their career, family life suffers and marriages flounder.

In conversations with my friends from Spain or Mexico, inevitably we wind up discussing the differences between our respective countries and cultures. My friends have often told me that the difference between their countries and ours is that in their countries they work in order to live while here we live only to work. Simple words, but they express a lot of truth.

The third practical step we must take is to work at being content with what we have. Is new furniture really necessary? Is it necessary to move into a nicer neighborhood? Is it necessary to build a new house? Is it really necessary to re-decorate, re-do the kitchen once more, or install new carpeting or tile? When does it stop? Why do we hunger for novelty? Why do we rationalize that we are improving the quality of family life? Why are we spending all that money when we already have nice homes with everything that is necessary for a comfortable life? Spending money, particularly spending money painlessly, using the magic of plastic, the credit or debit card can easily become an addictive behavior. Buying, spending, possessing all provide that rush of adrenaline, the feeling of power. We need to be very cautious about all of this. Satan will do everything that he can do to confuse and distract us.

Materialism pulls us away from God and the spiritual care of our souls.

The constant temptation to buy and possess more and more things pulls us away from the essential things of life. If we were to care for our souls the way we care for our material things, many of us would soon be saints.

“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God”.

Written by Fr. James Farfaglia

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG

Getting Ready for Lent

2009-02-21T07:39:00.003-05:00

The Sunday Homily
By Fr. James Farfaglia

Getting Ready for Lent

Every car or truck carries in the glove compartment a maintenance schedule. Having your oil changed, your tires rotated and balanced, and the rest of the engine checked keeps your vehicle in excellent shape.

This Wednesday, we begin one of the most practical times of the Catholic liturgical year.

Lent provides us an opportunity to open our personal maintenance schedule and take a close look at ourselves as we journey towards eternal life.

The spiritual life is not an easy endeavor because of our wounded human nature. True, Baptism washes away original sin, but we do not have complete control over ourselves. St. Paul brilliantly describes this continual battle. He portrays this conflict as an inward struggle (Romans 7: 14-25), a treasure in a vessel of clay (2 Corinthians 4: 7-18), and a thorn in the flesh (2 Corinthians 12: 7-10). Because of original sin, an inner force will always move us in the wrong direction.

Continual effort is necessary to control the inner movement of our ego, and allow the presence of grace to take control of our thoughts, desires and actions.

The battle of the spiritual life is like walking in a river against the current. If we do not continue to walk or grab on to a rock, the current will carry us in the opposite direction. Lent provides us with an excellent opportunity to strengthen ourselves so that we can keep walking against the current.

A successful Lent requires us to develop a serious plan of action. Our program should consist of both the general practices that the Catholic Church requires of everyone, and our own particular Lenten program.As a general practice for all Catholics, the Church requires that we fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
We are also asked to abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday and all Fridays of Lent.

Aside from what the Church law of fast and abstinence requires of us, we should come up with a personal program for spiritual growth. This is our personal maintenance program. I have always recommended that we come up with something negative and something positive.

By something negative, I mean that each person should commit themselves to giving up something or a number of things. This sacrifice should be serious and demanding. The self-control that we exercise in giving up a legitimate pleasure strengthens our will and curbs the inclinations of our passions.

By something positive, I mean that each one should also do some kind of act that we would not normally do on a regular basis. Attending daily Mass, visiting the sick, volunteering time at the parish or praying a Sunday evening Rosary with the entire family are positive acts of virtue that have helped many people progress in their relationship with God.

Lenten practices of penance have great benefits for our spiritual lives.

A serious Lent will be like a spring cleaning which will purify the clutter that has accumulated in our souls. A serious commitment to penance will also help us to conquer addictions, obsessions and compulsive behavior. A serious Lent will purify our soul and allow us to experience a deeper interior freedom.

As we approach the beginning of another Lent, we should carefully examine our lives. Usually we focus on carefully examining our sins, but do we ever consider the sins of omission?

Do we honestly consider what we are not doing?

One way to break the cycle of apathy is to bring into your Lent an apostolic dimension.

This can be done by making two firm commitments:

pray the Rosary at your local abortion clinic and
target one person that does not have a church home.

Invite that person to your parish. Moreover, it would be very powerful if we would offer up our fast, abstinence, Lenten sacrifices and our weekly Stations of the Cross to the Lord as of way of ending abortion and bringing souls back to the Church.

Do not wait until Ash Wednesday to come up with your Lenten program. Decide today what you are going to do. Parents should sit down with their children and make sure that they too have come up with a serious plan of action. Have a family meeting tonight and decide together to make this Lent the best Lent ever. Meet as a family every Sunday during Lent and review your program. Be accountable to each other.

If you make this a great Lent you will notice the difference on Easter Sunday.

Written by Fr. James Farfaglia

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG (Thank you Fr. James!)

Prayer of St. Catherine of Siena

2009-02-20T16:04:00.005-05:00

"O omnipotent Father, God of truth, God of love, permit me to enter into the cell of self-knowledge. I admit that of myself I am nothing, but that all being and goodness in me comes solely from You. Show me my faults, that I may detest my malice, and thus I shall flee from self-love and find myself clothed again in the nuptial robe of divine charity, which I must have in order to be admitted to the nuptials of life eternal."
St Catherine of Siena

Jesus Can Heal Us

2009-02-19T09:03:00.015-05:00

The Sunday Homily
By Father James Farfaglia

Sunday, February 8th

Jesus Can Heal Us

"As I pointed out last week, Satan has deceived the world to believe that he does not exist, that there is no sin and that there is no hell. Nevertheless, Jesus tells us something to the contrary.Once again, let us remember these words from our Lord: “I watched Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Luke 10: 18). He was a murderer from the start; he was never grounded in the truth; there is no truth in him at all: when he lies he is drawing on his own store, because he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8: 44)."

"This Sunday’s Gospel passage is another example where Jesus not only confronts Satan, but he is victorious over him. “When it was evening, after sunset, they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons. The whole town was gathered at the door. He cured many who were sick with various diseases, and he drove out many demons, not permitting them to speak because they knew him.”

"Our personal struggle with Satan and with evil is very real indeed. As we considered last week, Saint Paul tells us in his letter to the Ephesians how we are to fight this battle.“Put God’s armor on so as to be able to resist the devil’s tactics. For it is not against human enemies that we have to struggle, but against the Sovereignties and the Powers who originate the darkness of this world, the spiritual army of evil in the heavens. That is why you must rely on God’s armor, or you will not be able to put up any resistance when the worst happens, or have enough resources to hold your ground” (Ephesians 6: 1-13).

"And what is God’s armor for you?"

"Remember what I told you last week. We have to get out of our spiritual nursery school. We have to develop a very serious spiritual life and make frequent use of the Sacrament of Confession. We have to avoid moral relativism when it comes to the formation of our conscience and we have to remove from our soul any manifestation of sloth and spiritual tepidity."

"Only by putting on God’s armor will we be able to persevere in this time of trial, tribulation and uncertainty."

"Aside from the real spiritual warfare that we experience with Satan, he can also make havoc on our weaknesses and wounds that we colloquially call our own personal demons.Last Sunday’s homily generated a lot of interest in the theme of personal healing.Again, let us be aware of the damage that dysfunctional families make on the individual is astounding. Modern psychology recognizes that traumatic events that are too agonizing to deal with can be buried in our unconscious as a way of coping with the pain that the event or events may cause us. It is true that these buried emotions will affect our behavior unless we deal with them properly. Bitterness, anger, resentment and discouragement can be healed."

"Jesus will heal us if we turn to him."

"If we want to experience peace and happiness in our lives we need to turn to the Lord. However, too many times we escape from the pain caused by our personal demons, wounds, weaknesses and addictions by turning to sexual sin, drugs, excessive alcohol and over eating. Sometimes we seek escapes in excessive work, sports, entertainment and even shopping."

"Jesus will bring about profound healing in our lives if we were to do three things every day:"

1) spend 20 – 30 minutes each day in silent contemplative prayer;
2) go to Mass every day; and
3) pray the Rosary every day.

"These three moments of peaceful prayer will allow the Holy Spirit to enter into the deep recesses of our soul and heal us with his loving presence.It is true that God can heal people through extraordinary means such as laying on of hands. But, I am very suspect about charismatic healing services. Emotionalism makes me nervous. It is better that we get back to the traditional means of healing that I have already mentioned. I do not doubt that God can act outside of these traditional means, but these traditional means are valid and should not be neglected." “Praise the Lord, who heals the brokenhearted” (Psalm147).

"Accompanied by a deep spiritual life where we experience God on an intimate level, spiritual guidance by a qualified spiritual director is an important tool in our journey towards inner healing. Sometimes it may be useful for spiritual direction to be accompanied by therapy from a qualified psychologist who can complement the work of the spiritual director for an adequate period of time. However, as someone pointed out to me last week, it is true that when someone seeks the help of a psychologist, one has to make sure that the psychologist is well trained and competent. A bad psychologist can do a lot of damage. So can a bad spiritual director."

"Openness is essential."

"It is important that we do not live in denial or find relief by complaining to our friends about our personal problems. We need to deal with our personal demons that cause us suffering and pain."

“When it was evening, after sunset, they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons. The whole town was gathered at the door. He cured many who were sick with various diseases, and he drove out many demons, not permitting them to speak because they knew him.”

Father James

Posted by Kathy ~ TOG (Thank you Fr. James!)

Seeking God

2009-02-18T08:09:00.006-05:00

Seeking God in Prayer
(Taken from Divine Intimacy)

"Every rule of religious life, even of a simple secular institute, prescribes certain hours for prayer, during which every occupation must be firmly laid aside, and one must retire into solitude in order to renew one's spirit by means of a more direct and more intense contact with God."

"Without these prayerful intervals, it is a real illusion to pretend to live a spiritual life - not only a serious one, but even the most elementary one. Every activity, no matter how important or urgent it is, must therefore be suspended at the prescribed time, so that all the strength of the soul may be concentrated in the supreme activity of prayer."

"These hours are sacred."

"A soul consecrated to God cannot, of its own initiative, subtract even a small part of this time under pain of seeing its spiritual life weaken. The time of prayer is the time to apply Jesus' great commandment: "Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God" (ibd. 6, 33), this kingdom that we now know is within us."

"In order to find it, we must have these moments of retirement, solitude, total avoidance of creatures, of business and occupations."

"During these blessed minutes we can and should effectively "go forth" from all things and "withdraw ourselves" from all creatures to seek God hidden within us." Divine Intimacy pg. 35, chpt 12:1 by Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.

Remember Them in Prayer

2009-02-17T08:56:00.009-05:00

Please continue to pray for the families of the loved ones who perished in the crash of Flight 3407.

May Jesus embrace them in His Merciful arms and bring them peace.

We Must Pass Through Calvary

2009-02-14T09:19:00.004-05:00

Prayer request from Buffalo, NY

Please pray for all of us here in Buffalo, N.Y...the site of the fiery plane crash of Flight 3407.

So many are suffering the loss of a loved one; so many are questioning why God would allow this to happen to good people.

We do not know God's will. And many times, His will is not our will. Often, it is hard to comprehend the suffering that we experience in our lives.

But God asks us to TRUST in Him!

Trust is often not a feeling...but an attitude. An attitude of faith. An attitude of accepting all, good and bad, that is bestowed upon us, our families and our friends. If we develop an attitude of complete trust, we can then respond..."Lord, Thy will be done".

Right now, all of us in this beautiful city of Buffalo, are going to embrace each other and pray that God strengthen us. We pray for peace to surround our lives as we pick up the broken pieces and move on.

Please pray for us as well.

So many are searching for answers to difficult questions only God can answer.

Pray that everyone turn to God for mercy and love. God is the One True Healer. He can and will make us new again.

He will grace us with the infinite treasures of mercy contained in His Divine Heart.

If we had to rely upon our own abilities, we would have every reason to give in to despair. But, we have hope because our God is all powerful and loving! It is His love and mercy that will bring us through this great tragedy. Jesus promises, "Heaven and earth shall pass, but My words shall not pass."

Grace will triumph in the end, but first, we must pass through Calvary.

Peace in Christ,
Kathy

Jesus Words to St. Faustina

2009-01-27T15:28:00.003-05:00

Jesus speaking to St. Faustina:

"My Secretary, write that I am more generous toward sinners than toward the just. It was for their sake that I came down from Heaven; it was for their sake that My Blood was spilled. Let them not fear to approach Me; they are most in need of My mercy." Diary 1275

Jesus wants us to promote His infinite mercy. Please help Him by telling everyone you know about His Divine Mercy!

An Angel Appears at Saintly Woman's Funeral

2009-01-11T20:00:00.005-05:00

The Angel of Mercy

My friend Mary was truly a saintly woman. She belonged to a group of lay apostles who pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy at the bedside of the sick and dying. After battling breast cancer for several years, Jesus took Mary home to her reward.

It was something that happened at her funeral, that has truly left me with a lasting impression of God's mercy.

After the funeral luncheon, several of us had noticed that the three o'clock hour was approaching. We decided to go to a quiet place outdoors and pray a Chaplet of Divine Mercy for Mary's soul.

As we seated ourselves at a nearby table, we could not help but notice soft music coming from the outdoor sound system. Knowing this would not interfere with our prayers, we decided to begin the Chaplet. At almost an instant...as we began the prayer of the Chaplet...the music suddenly stopped.

The most beautiful, angelic, heavenly voice became audible to all of us who were praying!

It seemed this was the voice of an angel...who was singing praises to God with the most awe-inspiring voice we had ever heard!

Could this have been our dear friend Mary...trying to instill upon our hearts the power of this prayer?

A gentle breeze began to swirl all around us. This beautiful voice and the soft gentle breeze stayed with us during the entire prayer of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. We all sensed Mary's presence and wondered if God allowed her to pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy with us one last time...so that we may always remember to continue on in her legacy.

With the final words of the Chaplet...the angelic voice, and the delicate flowing breeze came to a complete halt. We all remained in our chairs. It seemed to us that for this one short moment...time stood still.

Some of us were crying; all of us were transformed.

This experience left us with a tremendous feeling of peace and love. We became more aware of the Supreme Authority of the mercy of God.

O Jesus, how great is Your love...how great is Your Mercy!

May God's mercy remain close to our hearts, our homes and our family.

Jesus, I Trust in You!
Kathy

Many Blessings in 2009

2009-01-01T08:32:00.002-05:00

May you have a Blessed New Year!

"Mary gave birth to her first-born Son and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger.” (Lk 2:7)

Peace and Love in Christ Jesus,

Kathy

Prayer for Peace

2008-12-11T14:53:00.003-05:00

Almighty and Eternal Father, God of wisdom and mercy, Whose power exceeds all force of arms and Whose protection is the strong defense of all who trust in You, enlighten and direct, we beseech You, those who bear the heavy responsibility of government throughout the world in these days of stress and trial.

Grant them the strength to stand firm for what is right and the skill to dispel the fears that foment discord; inspire them to be mindful of the horrors of war for victor and vanquished alike, to see conciliation in truth and patience, to see in every man a brother, that the people of all nations may, in our day, enjoy the blessings of a just and lasting peace.

Conscious of our own unworthiness, we implore Your mercy on a sinful world in the Name of Thy Divine Son, the Prince of Peace, and through the intercession of His Blessed Mother and all the saints.

Queen of All Saints, pray for us.
Queen of the Holy Rosary, pray for us.
Queen of Peace, pray for us.

Amen.

St. Faustina's School of Trust

2008-11-13T19:36:00.011-05:00

Trust and Hope

St. Faustina, in the midst of her fears and difficulties, found great consolation in her prayers to Jesus. The grace stemming from her prayer life was hope.

In every difficult situation St. Faustina turned to Jesus, Who in return gave her the strength to overcome her fears.

"When I am with You, Jesus, I fear nothing, for nothing can do me harm. O my Jesus, I fear nothing, neither hardships or sufferings." (Diary of St. Faustina 306, 517)

Jesus taught St. Faustina to never rely on her own skills or talents, nor to rely on other people, but to rely on God alone.

Sister Faustina prayed for God's good grace and never doubted that she would receive it.

"I do not doubt even for a moment that I will obtain the help of Your grace... Jesus, my only hope is in You." (Diary of St. Faustina)

In these very difficult times, may we pray for complete trust in Jesus, Who in return, will bring us hope in God's good grace.

St. Faustina...pray for us!

Jesus, I Trust in You,

Spreading God's Mercy

2008-10-31T09:48:00.009-04:00

Tenth Anniversary of My Mother's Death

As I reflect on the 10th anniversary of my mother's passing, I thank God that He used her beautiful death to "open my eyes" to see God's mercy. In ten years, we have been able to reach so many people who needed the knowledge of God's love for them.

What a great gift this was for my entire family! To be witnesses to the greatness of God and His love for all His children.

This woman, even though she was small in stature, represented great strength throughout her entire lifetime.

She is sadly missed but her memory lives in all who where fortunate to know and love her.

As our Divine Mercy prayer group continues to take this prayer (The Chaplet of Divine Mercy) to the bedside of the sick and dying, we ask for your support through prayer. It is only by means of your prayers and God's good grace that we are able to continue this ministry.

Pray for those who will die today, especially those who have no one to pray for them, that God will be their merciful Saviour.

May God, Who is rich in mercy, continue to inspire all His children to be great apostles of Divine Mercy!

Jesus, I Trust in You!

"At the beginning of my religious life, suffering and adversities frightened and disheartened me. So I prayed continuously, asking Jesus to strengthen me and to grant me the power of His Holy Spirit that I might carry out His holy will in all things, because from the beginning I have been aware of my weakness. I know very well what I am of myself, because for this purpose Jesus has opened the eyes of my soul." ~ Diary of St. Faustina Kowalska

God bless you always,

We Can All Become Saints!

2008-10-21T09:18:00.004-04:00

What is a saint? (Words of Pope Benedict XVI)

The saint is the person who is so fascinated by the beauty of God and by his perfect truth as to be progressively transformed by it.

Because of this beauty and truth, he is ready to renounce everything, even himself.

Love of God is enough for him, experienced in humble and disinterested service to one's neighbor, especially towards those who cannot give back in return.

Like the disciples of Emmaus, whose hearts were kindled by the words of the Risen One and enlightened by his living presence recognized in the breaking of the bread, who hurriedly returned to Jerusalem and became messengers of Christ's Resurrection, we too must take up the path again, enlivened by the fervent desire to witness to the mystery of this love that gives hope to the world.

Benedictus
Pope Benedict XVI

Prayer to Our Lady of Mercy

2008-10-10T07:27:00.009-04:00

Prayer to Mary, Patroness of Our Land

Most Holy Trinity: Our Father in Heaven, who chose Mary as the fairest of your daughters; Holy Spirit, who chose Mary as Your spouse; God the Son, who chose Mary as Your Mother; in union with Mary, we adore Your majesty and acknowledge Your supreme, eternal dominion and authority.

Most Holy Trinity, we put the United States of America into the hands of Mary Immaculate in order that she may present the country to You.

Through her we wish to thank You for the great resources of this land and for the freedom which has been its heritage.

Through the intercession of Mary, have mercy on the Catholic Church in America.

Grant us peace.

Have mercy on our President and all the officers of our government. Grant us a fruitful economy born of justice and charity. Have mercy on capital, and industry and labor.

Protect the family life of the nation. Guard the innocence of our children. Grant the precious gift of many religious vocations.

Through the intercession of our Mother, have mercy on the sick, the poor, the tempted, sinners... on all who are in need.

Mary, Immaculate Virgin, Our Mother, Patroness of our land, we praise you and honor you and give ourselves to you.

Protect us from every harm.

Pray for us, that acting always according to your will and the Will of Your Divine Son, we may live and die pleasing to God.

Imprimatur: Patrick A. O'BoyleArchbishop of WashingtonMay 8, 1959

A Visit By Her Guardian Angel

2008-09-30T10:49:00.012-04:00

An Excerpt Taken from Open My Eyes...

"As we all know, our Guardian Angels are powerful friends given to us by God to accompany us on our earthly journey. In the book of Exodus our Lord told Moses that He would send an angel to guard him.

In the Acts of the Apostles, St. Peter is freed from prison through the help of an angel.

God blessed my mother with an extraordinary gift, a vision of her own Guardian Angel.

One evening, a slight wind in her bedroom woke her from a sound sleep. She saw an angel who spoke not a word, only gazed so lovingly at my mother. This presence of an angel brought tremendous peace and tranquility to a suffering soul. Little did we know that through this angelic visit, God blessed my mother with courage and strength to withstand the stormy days that lay ahead."

Peace ~ Harmony ~ Calmness ~ Serenity ~ Tranquility

Angels bring this and so much more!

They are a gift from God.

Turn to them whenever you feel despair. They will bring you great peace.

God be with you,

(Kathleen M. Wabick is author of the book titled Open My Eyes...a story about her mother's amazing visions of Heaven at the time of her death. It may be purchased by visiting the website http://www.treasuresofgracellc.com/)

The Love of the Cross

2008-09-15T09:18:00.004-04:00

A Reflection from Pope Benedict XVI:

The most basic Christian gesture in prayer is and always will be the sign of the cross. It is a way of confessing Christ crucified with one's very body.

To seal oneself with the sign of the cross is a visible and public Yes to him who suffered for us; to him who in the body has made God's love visible, even to the utmost; to the God who reigns not by destruction but by the humility of suffering and love, which is stronger than all the power of the world and wiser than all the calculating intelligence of men.

The sign of the cross is a confession of faith:

I believe in him who suffered for me and rose again; in him who has transformed the sign of shame into a sign of hope and of the love of God that is present with us. The confession of faith is a confession of hope: I believe in him who in his weakness is the Almighty; in him who can and will save me even in apparent absence and impotence.

By signing ourselves with the cross, we place ourselves under the protection of the cross, hold it in front of us like a shield that will guard us in all the distress of daily life and give us the courage to go on.

We accept it as a signpost that we follow. The cross shows us the road of life - the imitation of Christ.

Whenever we make the sign of the cross, we accept our Baptism anew; Christ from the cross draws us, so to speak, to himself. We make the sign of the cross on ourselves and thus enter the power of the blessing of Jesus Christ. We make the sign over people to whom we wish a blessing.

Through the cross, we can become sources of blessing for one another.

Benedictus
Pope Benedict XVI

To Be Loved and to Love

2008-09-09T08:26:00.007-04:00

A Reflection on Love From Pope Benedict XVI:

God brings Abraham out from among his family and sets him on certain path. When it comes down to it, everyone has to undergo his own exodus. He not only has to leave the place that nurtured him and become independent, but has to come out of his own reserved self.

He must leave himself behind, transcend his own limits; only then will he reach the Promised Land, so to speak - the sphere of freedom, in which he plays his part in creation.

We have come to recognize this fundamental law of transcendence as being the essence of...love.

And of course the act of one who loves me is an act of this type. He has to bring me out of the comfortable inclination to stay within myself. Isolation is contrary to man's inmost inclination. If isolation means not being loved, being abandoned, being alone on one's own, this situation is indeed the fear underlying all our fears.

Thus we can see again that man is constructed from within, in the image of God, to be loved and to love.

At this point I believe we have to refer to man's being in the image of God. God is love.

The essence of love portrays its own nature in the Trinity. Man is in God's image, and thereby he is a being whose innermost dynamic is likewise directed toward the receiving and the giving of love.

Benedictus
Pope Benedict XVI

Who is God asking me to show love to today?

Peace,

Trust Him

2008-08-28T20:49:00.006-04:00

A Lesson on Trust

After my mother died, I found this prayer amongst her belongings and many times it brought me great comfort.

I wanted to share this prayer with you.

When trials come your way and the sea gets a little stormy, read this prayer and then place all your trust in God, the One Who knows all things.

God sends trials to those He loves.

He never tests us beyond our strength.

Theses trials purify our souls in order that our love for God and our neighbor may grow in strength. Here is the prayer. May it bring you comfort in times of trials.

Trust Him

Trust Him when dark doubts assail thee,

Trust Him when thy strength is small,

Trust Him when to simply trust Him

Seems the hardest thing of all.

Trust Him, He is ever faithful;

Trust Him, for His will is best;

Trust Him, for the Heart of Jesus

Is the only place of rest.

Trust Him, then, through doubts and sunshine,

All thy cares upon Him cast.

Till the storm of life is over

And the trusting days are past.

God bless you,

Be Merciful

2008-08-18T08:53:00.007-04:00

"Be merciful, as your Father is also merciful."
Lk. 6,36

Jesus reveals this mystery of God's love for us in order that He may teach us to be merciful to others.

The more we contemplate God's mercy, the more we will be able to imitate it.

If we should feel annoyed with someone, we ought to attempt to dive into the inexhaustible mercy of God. This will help extinguish all resentment in ourselves.

Could we try to show others only a small image of God's mercy in our actions?

The world would certainly be a better place.

God has such a desire to shower His mercy upon all souls. And yet, we in return are so quick to act the opposite towards our neighbor.

"O Lord, You so easily pardon us of all our sins. May we also easily forgive those who trespass against us."

One act of mercy performed everyday makes God smile!

Have a very blessed week,

Jesus Visits Our Soul

2008-08-10T10:50:00.009-04:00

Do you know how to recognize the moments in which Jesus visits your soul?

How do I know when our Lord visits my soul?

I am still trying to improve ways to recognize Jesus dwelling in my heart.

It may be through a word that I read or heard.

Sometimes when I am a reading Sacred Scripture or other spiritual books, I stumble across a word or phrase that touches my heart. And I know this is not by chance; I know this is Jesus.

It may be through an interior inspiration.

Once in a while, I will feel inspired to say or do something. After taking it to prayer, I wait to feel the peace of Christ. If the inspiration is still there, I know it is from God.

A new light which makes me see my faults.

God may reveal one or more of my faults in order that I may improve on removing them (or at least try to) from my life. He may make me totally aware of my sinfulness and through His grace, help me to be a better person.

Jesus can and will visit our soul if we are open to letting Him in. When He visits our soul, it is a grace. Time spent with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is a wonderful way to allow Jesus to enter your heart.

"My love, reign in the most secret recesses of my heart, there where my most secret thoughts are conceived, where You alone have free access, in this deepest sanctuary where human thought cannot penetrate. May You alone dwell there, and may everything I do exteriorly takes its origin in You. I ardently desire, and I am striving with all the strength of my soul, to make You, Lord, feel at home in this sanctuary." ~ St. Faustina ~ Diary 1721

Jesus, may You always feel at home when You visit my soul!

Could This Have Been An Angel?

2008-07-25T08:35:00.035-04:00

My Angel of Mercy
(This story happened in September of 2007. I wanted to bring it back for the anniversary of Father Baker's death this July 29th.)

I had the opportunity to experience God's good grace.

As my day unfolded, I knew I wanted to stop and pray at the crypt of Father Nelson Baker, a saintly priest who founded Our Lady of Victory Homes of Charity. He also built the Basilica of Our Lady of Victory which was consecrated in 1926. Father Baker died on July 29, 1936. His cause is up for sainthood and he is confirmed with the title of Servant of God.

As I walked into to the Basilica, I noticed several people praying at different areas of the church. I slowly and reverently approached Father Baker's crypt, which was located in the grotto within the Basilica.

I knelt down to pray. I closed my eyes and began to ask God for a healing of my grandson Jude. Suddenly, a calmness and stillness came over me. I truly felt God's presence.

With a slight awareness I could feel someone nearby. I began to hear soft taps on the kneeler next to me and sensed this person needed my help.

So I opened my eyes and slowly glanced over my shoulder.

A man, seated in a wheelchair, was trying to read the intercessory prayer that was printed and taped to the top of the kneeler. As he strained his eyes, I noticed his wheelchair kept him from getting a clear view of the prayer.

I asked him, "Would you like a copy of that prayer? It's on a prayer card and I can get one for you?" He shook his head in approval.

I quickly got off my knees, picked up a prayer card off the table to the left of me and gave it to him. He looked straight into my eyes and said, "Please, place this prayer card on Father Baker's tomb."

I followed his orders.

As he closed his eyes in prayer for a moment, I too bowed my head and offered my prayers for his private intentions. Then he opened his eyes and nodded to me; he was giving me consent to lift the card and hand it over to him. I willingly reached for the card and delivered it into the hands of this pious man.

I then proceeded to tell him I was here praying for my grandson who was very ill.

He said to me, "What is his name?"

"Baby Jude", I replied. "Can you please pray for him?"

With a wink of an eye and a smile on his face he responded, "I will pray for him."

"What is your name so I can also pray for you?", I requested.

"My name is John", he acknowledged.

I prayed for John that day and asked God to grant him the desires of his heart. My act of mercy may have been to lend a helping hand to John, but John may not have realized what an act of mercy he presented back to me. His willingness to pray for Baby Jude, amongst his own trials and tribulations, made a lasting impression on me. I will never forget the smile on his face and the twinkle in his eye.

Could this have been an angel sent from God?

I saw something very special in the eyes of this humble man. Reverent, believing, angelic, pure in heart are all words that I could use to describe him.

This man came to the Basilica to possibly pray for a healing for himself or maybe a loved one, but in return he also prayed for the intentions of someone whose heart was searching for a healing. He said a prayer for a complete stranger.

As I walked away from the crypt I turned to look back at him. His head was bowed in prayer and I knew he was asking God to heal Baby Jude.

Was God sending me an angel not only to intercede for me, but to teach me something?

When nighttime fast approached, I placed my head upon my pillow and reflected on what happened to me that day at the Basilica. I thought about how wonderful it is that we can offer intercessory prayers of healing for each other. Even total strangers can pray for each other if we can only reach out and manifest God's mercy.

What lesson did God want me to learn from this?

Could this man have been an angel sent from God to teach me to pray as I ought?

Was God trying to show me His Mercy? Was He teaching me how to be merciful?

I like to think He was.

As Jesus told St. Faustina, "I unite Myself with you, take away your misery and give you My mercy. I perform works of mercy in every soul." (723)

May our God of mercy be with you today and always,

(Kathleen M. Wabick is author of a book titled Open My Eyes ~ you may purchase this book at http://www.treasuresofgracellc.com )

Our Lady of the Angels

2008-07-23T14:11:00.007-04:00

Our Lady of the Angels

The ancient church of the Portiuncula in Assisi, Italy is dedicated to Mary under the title of Our Lady of the Angels of which Feast Day we celebrate on August 2nd.

From the Franciscan Book of Prayer:

(The following is an excerpt from the Major Life of St. Francis by St. Bonaventure.)

" The Portiuncula was an old church dedicated to the Virgin Mother of God which was abandoned . Francis had great devotion to the Queen of the world and when he saw that the church was deserted, he began to live there constantly in order to repair it. He heard that the Angels often visited it, so that it was called Saint Mary of the Angels, and he decided to stay there permanently out of reverence for the angels and love for the Mother of Christ.

He loved this spot more than any other in the world. It was here he began his religious life in a very small way; it is here he came to a happy end. When he was dying, he commended this spot above all others to the friars, because it was most dear to the Blessed Virgin.

This was the place where Saint Francis founded his Order by divine inspiration and it was divine providence which led him to repair three churches before he founded the Order and began to preach the Gospel.

This meant that he progressed from material things to more spiritual achievements, from lesser to greater, in due order, and it gave a prophetic indication of what he would accomplish later.

As he was living there by the church of Our Lady, Francis prayed to her who had conceived the Word, full of grace and truth, begging her insistently and with tears to become his advocate. Then he was granted the true spirit of the Gospel by the intercession of the Mother of mercy and he brought it to fruition.

He embraced the Mother of Our Lord Jesus with indescribable love because, as he said, it was she who made the Lord of majesty our brother, and through her we found mercy. After Christ, he put all his trust in her and took her as his patroness for himself and his friars."

Prayer to Our Lady of the Angels:

You are fair, O Mary,
And the stain of original sin is not in you.You are the glory of Jerusalem;
You are the joy of Israel;
You are the honor of our people;
You are the advocate of sinners, O Mary Our Lady of the Angels,Virgin most prudent,Mother Most loving,
Pray for us,Intercede for us with Jesus Christ our Lord.(mention your request)

AMEN.

Prayer for Faith, Grace and the Intercession of Our Lady of the Angels:

Heavenly Father, you filled the heart of St. Francis with a special love for the Mother of Your Son, Jesus,and for the Portiuncula.

In this hallowed place you nourished his spiritual life and inspired him to found the Franciscan Order.

Through the intercession of Our Lady of the Angels may we be steadfast in our faith and remain true to You.

Grant us the faith and grace always to do Your will. Grant this through Your Son, Jesus Christ.

AMEN

Through the Mercy of God, may we all be embraced by Our Lady and the Blessed Angels!

A Prayer for the Sick and Dying

2008-07-14T19:44:00.026-04:00

The Chaplet of Divine Mercy

What a truly powerful prayer!

When I prayed the Chaplet of Divine Mercy for my mother, never did I realize the graces she would soon receive.

Never did I realize the graces I would receive!

How blessed we are to have an awesome God Who loves us unconditionally.

His mercy is unfathomable!

Pray for those who may die today, especially those who have no one to pray for them; that God will show them His mercy and His peace.

Jesus, I Trust in You!

Now is the Time for God's Mercy

2008-06-26T08:57:00.036-04:00

God's Mercy and The Chaplet

God wants to see fruits in our lives. He wants us to make it known to all those we love that His mercy is endless!

At the time of my mother's death, I was not totally aware of the mercy of God and the Chaplet of Divine Mercy.

A friend introduced the chaplet to me and I prayed it at my dying mother's bedside. She opened her eyes and shared with us her amazing visions of Heaven.

My mother's death opened my eyes to the reality that Our Heavenly Father is waiting for us.

Heaven is real and God wants all of us to live with Him for all eternity!

But God needs our help.

We can be great apostles of His mercy by:

A) Performing acts of mercy everyday through deeds of kindness to others
B) Spreading the Mercy of God to our family and friends through word
C) Praying for God's Mercy for ourselves and the whole world

By doing this, God can and will work miracles!

Now is the time.

God needs us to help Him embrace our world with His mercy.

May we all delight ourselves in the healing rays of God's mercy!

God's blessings,

At Time of Death, God's Mercy is Greater!

2008-06-02T17:47:00.018-04:00

The Gift of God's Mercy

A friend of mine's husband passed away very suddenly a few days ago and she said to me...

"Kathy, I am worried. I don't know where his soul is? Is he in Purgatory? Is he suffering terribly?"

My answer to her was this, "God's mercy is greater!"

We do not know for sure, where our loved one's soul is upon their death, but we should be rest assured of one thing...God's mercy is unfathomable!

God's mercy is beyond our comprehension!

If we completely trust in God's love for us, then when we die His mercy will be endless!

God knows all things. He see's all of our prayers for all of time!

Pray for those who have gone before you.

Pray for your parents.

Pray for your spouses or children.

Pray for your friends or relatives who may have gone before you.

When you are united to them again, they will thank you!

Ask God to have mercy on their souls.

God wants all of us with Him in Heaven.

Pray a Chaplet of Divine Mercy for those souls who may die suddenly today...that God may be their Merciful Savior.

Then trust in His mercy, for it is great!

God bless you always,

A Reflection on My Mother's Death

2008-05-07T16:32:00.018-04:00

"I am not afraid to die..."

The greatest gifts my mother gave to me were her visions of Heaven at the time of her death as well as her deep faith in God. Through all her trials and tribulations, this omnipotent and merciful God was her strength.

As Mother's Day quickly approaches, I cannot help but remember some of her last words to me before she died.

"Kathy, remember I told you I was afraid to die?", she said.

"Yes Mom, I do.", was my reply.

"Well, I'm not afraid to die!", she expressed after revealing her visions of Heaven.

I was so happy for my mother... her greatest fear was no longer a reality!

Through His mercy, God had granted my mother the grace of a peaceful death.

My prayer is that God in His mercy will bring a peaceful death to all of those you love.

If you seek His will and ask for this amazing grace, God will shower His Divine Mercy upon you.

You need only ask... and you will receive.

God bless you always,

God and His Mercy!

2008-04-09T22:02:00.007-04:00

Mercy is a Grace...

God, in His unfathomable mercy, has allowed us to be witnesses to His mercy.

My mother, at the time of her death, was able to verbally tell us of her visions of Heaven. It was an amazing story that had to be told.

This great gift from God is now spread to all areas of the world. Whoever is willing to be open to hear of God's goodness, will experience His mercy.

May you be enriched with God's love and may you be blessed with many treasures of His grace!

God be with you,

A Mother's Gift

2008-03-26T22:01:00.005-04:00

A Mother's Gift to Her Children

"My mother was a witness to the realism of Heaven. It is a beautiful place prepared for us by our merciful God who loves us unconditionally. Moreover, it is a place that, at the time of our death, we will hopefully yearn for; a place where we will again greet loved ones who have gone before us and a place we will call our eternal home with God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit."

"We will not be afraid, for Jesus promises that we will never be alone on this journey home. My mother was living proof of this. He remained with her, as well as everyone else who was in her room the night she died."

"Heaven is real, and God wants all of us with Him in eternity. However scarlet our sins may be, He stands before us with open arms, waiting to grant us forgiveness. May we all delight ourselves in the healing rays of Gods omnipotent mercy!" (Taken from Open My Eyes)

My mother left us a beautiful gift...the realization of Heaven through her visions, thanks be to God's mercy!

March 30th is Divine Mercy Sunday. Please take advantage of all the graces God is willing to give you. The graces come through receiving the Eucharist worthily on this day, meaning, you need to be in a state of grace (no mortal or venial sin on your soul).

Jesus loves you so much. May His rays of mercy shower many graces upon you!

Jesus, I Trust in You!

Kathy

Answering God's Call

2008-02-01T11:01:00.000-05:00

What are you calling me to do Lord?

In St. Faustina's diary she refers to a group of people living outside the convent and monasteries who will pray and perform at least one act of mercy each day.

"Anyone in the world may belong to this group," St. Faustina said, "without any obligation of taking vows," they "will have a share in all the merits and privileges of the whole congregation." (Diary 1157)

If you implore God's mercy every day, perform acts of mercy and pray for the whole world, then you are an apostle of God's mercy. Being an apostle of Divine Mercy means giving witness in our lives as to how we trust in God and show mercy towards our neighbors.

The world is in desperate need of your prayers for peace and healing through the mercy of God.

May you continue to answer God's call to spread His Divine Mercy!

God be with you,

I Remember

2007-10-31T14:09:00.000-04:00

"Open my eyes, O merciful God, and let me see with the eyes of Jesus. In my most difficult moments, let me think only of the love and peace of heaven...I pray for all the souls of my family members who have gone before me. May the warmth of God's love shine forever on their face." (Open My Eyes)

My sister and I share a common bond...we both have babies interceding for us in heaven. This is a passage from the book Open My Eyes, describing my mother's vision of the babies God took home to heaven so many years ago.

A few weeks after her admittance into the nursing facility, my mother told my sister and me that she could see our heavenly babies. She recognized that they were in the room with us.

"Jessica is here," she said.

"And Kathy, your two baby boys are here also. I can see them. They remain at your shoulders, following you everywhere around the room. Climb into my bed and get close to me so I can touch them because they will not leave you."

Honoring her wishes, we climbed into her bed. My sister and I managed to get as close to my mother as we possibly could. Unable to hold back the tears, we wept as my mother spoke about the babies God took home to heaven so many years ago...

Mom...may the warmth of God's love shine forever on your face.

Here I Am Lord

2007-10-23T09:18:00.000-04:00

"Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will."

Today I open my heart to seek God's will, and yet a slight fear is taking hold of me.

I know God will take the fear away and all will be fine; He has done this for me so many times before.

Although the fear remains... I think fear of this kind is good.

It helps me practice humility. It is also a slight reminder that I can do nothing without God.

So pray for me as I present a seminar this evening about living the Divine Mercy as a way of life. So many people hunger for God's mercy; so many people are unaware of His willingness to grant us His mercy.

May God direct me as I open the door and seek His will. Also, please check out my Prayer's of Trust blog. I have placed some prayer requests there. Thank you!

Peace,

Blog: Prayer's of Trust

2007-10-15T10:13:00.000-04:00

In response to so many prayer requests on my Treasures of Grace website, I have decided to create a new blog focusing on praying with trust.

On this blog titled Prayer's of Trust, I also will be taking prayer requests that are placed under a relic of St. Faustina.

I will be sharing passages of St. Faustina's diary that deal with praying with trust.

My hope is to get more people praying for each other.

Let us have the attitude of a child who simply trusts in a loving God who is all merciful.

Jesus, I Trust in You!

Peace,

So Beautiful

2007-10-12T08:59:00.000-04:00

From the Diary of St. Faustina:

"From early morning, I felt the nearness of the Blessed Mother. During Holy Mass, I saw Her, so lovely and so beautiful that I have no words to express even a small part of this beauty." (805)

Today, I feel the need to reflect on our Blessed Mother. I could not help but ponder how my own mother, as she so patiently waited to return home to Jesus, saw Mary in all her beauty.

She said to us, "Our Lady is here!"

When asked to describe Mary my mother responded, "She is just so beautiful...so beautiful!"

There were no words to describer her. Mary, in all her beauty is indescribable. She is beyond words.

As my mother suffered from her physical afflictions, I always saw her clinging to her rosary.

By meditating on the Life, Death and Resurrection of Jesus through the "praying of the beads", my mother received many graces from a merciful God.

May we always pray for those in hospitals, nursing homes or even in their own homes, who may be clinging to a rosary seeking God's mercy.

Thank you Blessed Mother, for bringing us closer to your Son through the power of the rosary!

Peace,

Many Thanks

2007-10-09T17:20:00.000-04:00

"I thank my God for you every time I think of you..." Phil 1:3

Many thanks to my new "blogging friend" Esther, for designing my signature tag. I love it!

Kevin...thank you for all of your help. You are truly amazing!

The One Who Treated Him With Mercy

2007-10-08T09:45:00.000-04:00

Today's Gospel Reading:

Luke 10:25-37

"Which one of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers' victim?"

He answered, "The one who treated him with mercy."

Jesus said to him. "Go and do likewise."

A wonderful way to express love for one's neighbor is to perform "works of mercy". There are fourteen works of mercy; seven spiritual and seven corporal.

Spiritual Works of Mercy:

Convert the sinner
Instruct the uninformed
Counsel the doubtful
Comfort the sorrowful
Be patient with those in error
Forgive offenses
Pray for the living and the dead

Corporal Works of Mercy:

Feed the hungry
Give drink to the thirsty
Clothe the naked
Shelter the homeless
Visit the sick
Comfort the imprisoned
Bury the dead

When we love God, we will love our neighbor. And if we love our neighbor, we will show them mercy.

"Lord, help me to love You more so that I might do positive things and bear more fruit by showing mercy to those who are in need."

Peace,

Kathy

God's Blessings

2007-10-06T21:15:00.001-04:00

To realize how much God loves us,
observe a sleeping child...

And you will see God's mercy.

His mercy is beyond all comprehension;
His mercy is endless.

For when God created man and woman,
He created us out of love and mercy.

I thank God for His many blessings.

Peace,
Kathy

Feast Day of Saint Faustina Kowalska

2007-10-05T10:39:00.000-04:00

Today, October 5th, is the Feast Day of St. Faustina. As I reflect on this beautiful saint, I smile and remember my visit to her church, St. Casmir's in Swinice Warckie, Poland. This was the place where St. Faustina was baptized, made her first Confession, first Communion and obtained her initial calling to the consecrated life.

As I prayed in this holy church, I envisioned a humble, holy child of God, Helena Kowalska, who longed for the religious life.

I could not help but wonder if, as a small child, she knew deep down in her soul one day she would do great things for God.

St. Faustina had a special devotion to Jesus truly present in the Blessed Sacrament. Today at Mass, I offered my Communion for those who are in need of God's mercy.

I asked this humble saint who sees the face of God, to intercede for all those who may not be trusting in God's mercy. In the midst of a great storm it is sometimes hard to say,"Jesus, I trust in You!"

But IF we do, no matter how turbulent the waters might be, God will bless us with His amazing grace.

So today I reflect on her death and the day St. Faustina Kowalska was called home to Jesus.

Here is a photo of the room where she passed away at the convent of the Sister's of Our Lady of Mercy in Krakow, Poland.

May St. Faustina continue to pray for all those who seek her intercession and may God bless us with His unfathomable Divine Mercy!

Peace,

Kathy

The Sight of the Angels

2007-09-18T09:06:00.000-04:00

"In the sight of the angels I will sing your praises, Lord." (Ps. 138)

I want to reflect on a few stories about angels in order to prepare for the feast of the Holy Angels on September 29th. It is through these powerful angels that God grants us His mercy. Out of love, God's angels deliver messages and carry out His commands.

Taken from an excerpt of Open My Eyes, it states: "I began to contemplate this sense of peace that came over my mother through the grace of an angel. Peace...harmony, calmness, serenity, tranquility and contentment; her angel brought all this and more to someone who desperately needed to feel God's presence and His love. My mother soon experienced great tribulations. Her guardian angel came to deliver many treasures of grace from a merciful God."

My mother was graced by God to see her Guardian Angel. Not many of us see our angels, but we do know they are always present.

Several months ago my daughter ran a marathon in California. I was not able to accompany her on this journey, but I knew during her run I wanted to pray before Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament.

As she began this long and grueling task, I entered the Adoration Chapel to pray. A strong "sense of urgency" came over me and a need to offer intense prayer for my daughter.

Suddenly, I thought of the angels!

In the presence of the Lord I asked Him to round up as many angels as He possibly could and send them to my daughter's side. I asked her own Guardian Angel to protect her and keep her safe from all harm. Totally unknown to me, at this exact same time she was seeking treatment for dehydration. She probably would be unable to complete the run.

Not to worry...the angels came to her rescue!

After only a short period of rest and hydration, my daughter re-entered and finished the race!

God uses His celestial angels in amazing ways. It might be through a feeling or a sense of urgency; whatever means God may use, His angels will deliver a message of mercy.

May we constantly be under the attentive care of the angels as they help us on our spiritual journey.

And may we offer prayers of thanksgiving to God for their heavenly assistance!

Peace,

Kathy

Going Fishing

2007-09-14T08:24:00.000-04:00

Today, I am going fishing.

I will cast my nets in hopes of catching not the gentle inhabitants of the sea, but someone who is in desperate need of God's mercy.

I had the opportunity to receive God's mercy from the hands of those who truly know and love Him. My grandson Jude was admitted into the hospital with Cystic Fibrosis on July 26th. He remains there today, trying to build enough strength to come home to the embracing arms of his family.

His mother and father keep constant vigils at his side, always making him aware that he is not traveling alone on this path God is taking him.

It may be stormy; it may be turbulent. But he is not alone. His parents are with him all the way.

And so is God.

Many of our friends and family have shown us their love by helping out with meals and babysitting Jude's big sister Joscelyn. It is through these acts of mercy that God gives us strength to endure each and every day. It is through these acts of love that I feel God's presence.

So today I want to give back in some way. How can I show compassion and kindness to someone in need? Who is it Lord, that I may help today? Please show me how to spread Your mercy, however vast or minute the act may be.

Yes, today before the sun goes down I will have hauled in my nets in the hopes of catching only one small fish...someone in need of God's love.

Think of one act of mercy you can perform today, however big or small it may be. It will make God smile!

Peace,
Kathy

God's Mercy Revealed

2007-09-13T20:27:00.000-04:00

God's mercy is truly amazing!

My mother died in October of 1998 and through her extraordinary death, God graced us with a wonderful gift of His mercy. God presented my mother with beautiful visions of Heaven.

In my book titled Open My Eyes, I reveal all of these heavenly visions. My prayer is that this story will bring hope to those who may be in need of God's infinite mercy.

You may purchase this book by visiting the Treasures of Grace LLC.com website.

The desire to write about the many aspects of God's mercy has remained close to my heart.

And so I designed this blog.

May God continue to use me to help spread His Divine Mercy!

Peace,
Kathy