Association Of Catholic Bloggers

By  Mark Shea A bishop gives the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick to an autistic child at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington Feb. 11, 2008. CNS photo We Sheas tend toward the hefty end of the spectrum. Some of that is genetics. Some of it is how the family tends to relate to food and (fails) to govern its appetites. Sin has a generational aspect to it. And sin is, among other things, enslaving (as anybody struggling with addiction will tell you). That’s why, after nearly fifty years of grappling with my renegade appetites and watching my weight balloon into dangerous obesity, I finally (after my priest suggested it) asked for the sacrament of Anointing of the Sick a few years ago. The result was uncanny. Quite simply, my appetite for sweets simply died and my appetite for other foods became, for the first time in my life, manageable. It doesn’t mean I didn’t still have a long struggle ahead of me. But suddenly the struggle became

1. Make the sign of the cross 2. Say the Act of Contrition. Ask pardon for your sins and make a firm promise not to commit them again. Oh my God I am heartily sorry for having offended you. I detest all my sins because I dread the loss of Heaven and the pains of Hell. But most of all, because I offended you, oh my God, who are all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of your grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life. Amen 3. Say the first 3 decades of the Rosary. 4. Make the meditation of the day (to be posted each day) 5. Say the last 2 decades of the rosary 6. Finish with the Prayer to Our Lady the Undoer of Knots Meditation for Day 3 Meditating Mother, Queen of heaven, in whose hands the treasures of the King are found, turn your merciful eyes upon me today. I entrust into your holy hands this knot in my life...and allthe rancor and resentment it has caused in me. I ask Your forgiveness, God teh Father, for my sin. Help me now t

I am quite sure you are all well aware by now... SGK has ceased to provide grants to Planned Parenthood. They are quite simply put, under attack! Please, now is the time to show them your support.  We do not want them to go back on their RIGHT Decision. For more on this, please click here . You can simply go to their FB Page and let them know that you Support them 100%; or, if you have the means, Support them Financially. God Bless You in †JMJ†

Everywhere I have gone, all the Blogs that I have the opportunity to visit, the social-networking sites, everywhere...it is quite rampant... We need Jobs! I have come across this Prayer to St. Joseph, whom among other things is the Patron Saint for...you guessed it, Work.  He's not St. Joseph the Worker for Nuthin'! 9 Days.   A Simple Novena.  I Pray you also find your Vocation, not just a Job... God Love You ♥   Powerful Novena to Saint Joseph (Over 1900 years old) O St. Joseph whose protection is so great, so strong,  so prompt before the Throne of God,  I place in you all my interests and desires. O St. Joseph do assist me by your powerful intercession  and obtain for me from your Divine Son all spiritual blessings  through Jesus Christ, Our Lord;  so that having engaged here below your Heavenly power  I may offer my Thanksgiving and Homage to the most Loving of Fathers. O St. Joseph, I never weary contemplating you and Jesus asleep i

Today while praying day 2 of this blessed Novena to Our Lady I am concentrating on the knots of life that involve my relationship's with other family members. Novena to Mary, Undoer of Knots - Day 2 1. Make the sign of the cross 2. Say the Act of Contrition. Ask pardon for your sins and make a firm promise not to commit them again. 3. Say the first 3 decades of the Rosary. 4. Make the meditation of the day (to be posted each day) 5. Say the last 2 decades of the rosary 6. Finish with the Prayer to Our Lady the Undoer of Knots Meditation for Day 2 Mary, Beloved Mother, channel of all grace, I return to You today my heart, recognizing that I am a sinner in need of your help. Many times I lose the graces you grant me because of my sins of egoism, pride, rancor and my lack of generosity and humility. I turn to You today, Mary, Undoer of knots, for You to ask your Son Jesus to grant me a pure, divested, humble and trusting heart. I will live today practicing these virtues and of

This morning is supposed to be Happy Monday, the first pay after Christmas and Holiday Bookings are piling up, modern society how selfish and greedy! We have on the news this morning the terrible crisis looming in care of the elderly and one mans million pound bonus payment for just 1 years work at a bank owned by the Government. Am I the only person wondering if the current push from some people for legalised euthanasia has a lot to do with the increasing numbers of inconveniently healthy and long lived dementia patients? Only recently we've also had spurious scare stories about too many immigrants and big families costing too much. Its not a christian agenda is it? Did Our Lord visit the tax gatherers and say you need to get more money to pay the Roman governors bonus? Did he refuse to heal the mad or elderly because they would be too expensive to look after? How can we reconcile greater needs and lower spending? I don't have any clever answers . This is more than I can

From Eucharistic Prayer number 1: “... when supper was ended, He took this precious chalice in His holy and venerable hands...” I entered the Church post Vatican II during the “Jesus is our friend” era of the 80s. Religion classes in Canadian schools focused on anthropological questions like what footwear was popular in biblical times, and our spiritual life was addressed by memorizing the Lord’s Prayer. The first has been useful when it comes to the annual Passion Play; the latter has stood me in good stead every day since my conversion. As a method of religious formation, however, this curriculum was seriously deficient in encouraging a relationship with God, or fostering a love for the rich beauty of our faith. Unfortunately the parishes I attended after that, though full of wonderful people and shepherded by sincere priests, did not inspire me to delve any further into the depths of Catholicism. The buildings were rather bland, the music often trite, and the homilies made us fe

This perceptive poster on prayer was created by Marcel at Aggie Catholics:

My friend, Stephanie Mann, author of Supremacy and Survival: How Catholics Endured the English Reformation ,  is starting up a New Sunday Series: Our Lady and the English Martyrs" at her blog, Supremacy and Survival. Be sure to a take a look!

Caritas in Veritate: Faithful Helpers of God's Precious Infants at Maid... : My friend Carole Smith who co-ordinates the prayer vigils outside the Marie Stopes abortion provider in Maidstone Kent sent me these phot...

Officiating at a wedding in the Philippines I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to please the Lord; but the married man is anxious about worldly affairs, how to please his wife , and his interests are divided. And the unmarried woman or girl is anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit; but the married woman is anxious about worldly affairs,   how to please her husband . This is a sort of appendix to   Sunday Reflections   for today . The above verses, 1 Corinthians 7: 32-34, are from today's Second Reading. My friends in   Worldwide Marriage Encounter   are probably sick and tired of my emphasising that the basic vocation in marriage is to be a spouse, not a parent. The latter is a consequence of the former. In this brief passage St Paul doesn't mention parenthood at all but the priority of pleasing one's spouse. I truly believe that  a spouse who gives first priority to t

Read this rubbish and make up your own mind.

Moses , Carlo Dolci, painted 1640-45 Readings   (New American Bible: Philippines, USA) Gospel Mark 1:21-28 (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa) Jesus and his followers went as far as Capernaum, and as soon as the sabbath came Jesus went to the synagogue and began to teach. And his teaching made a deep impression on them because, unlike the scribes, he taught them with authority. In their synagogue just then there was a man possessed by an unclean spirit, and it shouted, ‘What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God.’ But Jesus said sharply, ‘Be quiet! Come out of him!’ And the unclean spirit threw the man into convulsions and with a loud cry went out of him. The people were so astonished that they started asking each other what it all meant. ‘Here is a teaching that is new’ they said ‘and with authority behind it: he gives ord

 I came across this on Facebook. We'll have to wait in the Philippines, in Hong Kong and, I think, New Zealand, until next Advent for this.

By Theresa Thomas Hey, mama! Yes, you with the baby in your arms… I see you, out there, sitting at your table, your desk, or your kitchen island, and I notice you are a little discouraged. You switched on the computer a few minutes ago to check your mail and a couple websites, the most exciting contact you’ll have with the outside world today, in between your hourly dates with your almost-potty-trained toddler in the bathroom and picking up Cheerios off the floor of the kitchen for the umpteenth time. You are disheartened, tired. Maybe you passed a mirror earlier today and thought to yourself, Where is that super-trim figure I had in college? Didn’t my step used to have a little more bounce? Why am I doing this? You love your family with ferocity but you are just running out of steam. Your husband is working hard to allow you this privilege of staying home with your children, but sometimes it doesn’t feel like a privilege. You may even feel like it would be easier to get an outside jo

By Matt Archbold What is the dumbest phrase in the English language? In a moment. As I grew up I learned the difference between good and evil, right and wrong. As a young man, the world was very black and white. Young men can think like that. I remember discussing politics and religion with my Father when I was a young firebrand. While my Father and I shared most beliefs, he seemed less willing than I to call all those who held opinions and acted in opposition to the truth names, names like ‘evil.’ I did. My Father didn’t. He would often say cryptic things like “There but for the mercy of God.” “But Dad, the things they do and say are evil. I would never do that.” He would look at me and repeat, “But for the mercy of God.” As I grow older, I realize that what I once mistook for softness was a strength I didn’t understand. Mercy. When I was young, like Hugo’s Javert, I found mercy hard to understand. It makes a lot more sense to me now because I know much better what I am, a

St. Francis de Sales is patron of Catholic writers.  As a blogger, therefore, I happily claim him as a patron of "me." As the Church celebrates his feast on January 24th, I can imagine him sitting in the world of today with a laptop, clicking out the good news that indeed Jesus lives.  Francis wrote voluminously.  Not only is he known for his books, but for his (numerous) letters.  He also composed short pamphlets for wide distribution, to help clarify the faith in a time when confusion abounded.  I like to imagine him patting today's Catholic bloggers on the back, encouraging us to "keep it up" as we distribute our witness to the Truth in THIS age of the Church and in our turbulent world.       St. Francis was a bishop and founder of the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary; he was a busy man in France in the early 1600s. Still, he found time to take up his quill pen and spread the good news of Christ. As we clack away at our keyboard

Mrs Julie Lamb with grandchildren Erin and Patrick O'Brien Yesterday I received an email from a good friend in London, Ontario, Laura O'Brien. Laura asked me to pray for her mother, Mrs Julie Lamb. Julie has lung cancer and has been ' given weeks to a couple months to live'. I've known Laura since 1981 when I was studying in Toronto. She and her husband Danny - Laura had the good sense to marry an Irishman! - were members of a prayer group that used to meet in St Basil's in the heart of  this remarkably cosmopolitan city. (The 1980 census showed that 44 per cent of the population of Metro Toronto had been born outside of Canada). I met Julie for the first time in 2010 during a visit to Canada. She is a delightfully alive person. Laura wrote, ' She is getting great care, and all the family have pulled together to ensure she has all her needs met'.  Please remember Julie and her family in your prayers

It is quite easy to see the Face of God in a Newborn...in a Toddler. It gets much more difficult as we grow... Thus, many find it easy to criticize, berate and many times belittle the work, the journey, the discovery and the challenges of a Tween and especially of a Teen. I am just as guilty as the rest for saying that Teens are God's punishment for having sex! For the record, that still and always WILL make me laugh!  Hate to say it, but I know I was to my Mom and my kids can be for me as well. Thank God for Humour! It helps to make the yoke lighter. But in all seriousness, we many times fail to see God in the works or our Youth. We fail to give them the Credit that they deserve. I have read too many articles that go on and on as to how the Church is losing numbers in droves.  How the Youth are apathetic and that there is little hope for Our Future... Well, they are WRONG!  Dead and Thank-God Wrong! Our Youth are Filled with the Holy Spirit!  Our Youth are set A