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  June 2007

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Archbishop Bohan said the vocation to a life of a hermit is something that is not seen very often in modern times. “It has a very important place in the life of the Church. It is a blessing for the diocese to have someone whose life is devoted to praying for our church and the […]

LETTER OF THE HOLY FATHER POPE BENEDICT XVI TO THE BISHOPS, PRIESTS,
CONSECRATED PERSONS
AND LAY FAITHFUL
OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
IN THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

Greeting
1. Dear Brother Bishops, dear priests, consecrated persons and all the faithful of the Catholic Church in China: ‘’We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for […]

The people we honor today had one thing in common: they gave up their lives for Christ. They were martyred because they were followers of the Lord Jesus. By the year 64, Emperor Nero’s human rights violations had reached proportions beyond description. When a fire broke out in Rome on July 16, it was commonly […]

Saint Gerard, most perfect imitator of Jesus Christ our Redeemer, do thou whose greatest glory was to be humble and lowly, obtain that I too, knowing my littleness in God’s sight, may be found worthy to enter the kingdom that is promised to the humble and lowly of heart.
Say nine Hail Mary’s
V. Pray for us, […]

Pontifical Council for Migrants and Travelers
XXII World Congress of the Apostleship of the Sea
Message to the Maritime World: Witnesses of Hope for a Christian Humanism in the Maritime World
Today, June 29, 2007, the feast of the apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, who was the navigator of the Gospel, we the members of the Apostleship […]

Christ has three brides, namely: a universal bride, who is the Church of all the elect, whom He began to wed at the beginning of the world by faith and charity; a particular bride, who is the holy soul, whom He weds daily by converting individuals to Himself by grace; a  singular bride, who is […]

Paul is the great apostle who first persecuted the Christians. Then he was converted. We celebrate Paul’s conversion on January 25. At the time of his conversion, Jesus had said: “I will show him how much he must suffer for me.” St. Paul loved Jesus very much, so much, in fact, that he became a […]

Peter, the first pope, was a fisherman from Galilee. Jesus invited him to follow him, saying: “I will make you a fisher of men.” Peter was a simple, hard-working man. He was generous, honest and very attached to Jesus.
This great apostle’s name was Simon, but Jesus changed it to Peter, which means “rock.” “You are […]

Saint Gerard, model of obedience, who through thy life didst heroically submit the judgement to those who represent Jesus Christ to thee, thus sanctifying thy lowliest actions, obtain for me from God cheerful admission to His Holy will and the virtue of perfect obedience, that I may be made comfortable to Jesus, my Model, who […]

by Donna L. Watkins
How about you? Do you ever feel like you’re hanging off a cliff? Like the old joke where a man falls off and is hanging by a large root with nothing between him and the ground 100 feet below. He is screaming, “Help! Somebody help me!” God says, “I’ll help you! Let […]

Pontifical Household Preacher Comments on Sunday’s Readings
“Let the Dead Bury the Dead”
13th Sunday in Ordinary Time
1 Kings 19:16b,19-21; Galatians 4:31-5:13-18; Luke 9:51-62
Benedict XVI’s book “Jesus of Nazareth” appeared in April. I thought that I would take account of the Pope’s reflections in my commentary on some of the next Sunday Gospels.
First of all, I’d like […]

Prelates Urge End to Minority Discrimination
U.S. bishops are calling for an immediate halt to what they called deliberate violence against Christians and other religious minorities in Iraq.
In a statement released Monday, Bishop Thomas Wenski, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on International Policy, said: “The deadly cycle of violence must stop if peace with justice […]

Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone will travel to the United States to address the annual convention of the Knights of Columbus in Tennessee. During his visit, the cardinal will also receive the Knights’ “Gaudium et Spes” award, which recognizes individuals for their service to the Church and humanity in the spirit of Christ […]

The Year of St. Paul proclaimed by Benedict XVI is a time to grow in faith, hope and love, says the abbot of St. Paul Outside the Walls.
Father Edmund Power talked with ZENIT about the Pauline Year, which the Pope proclaimed today. The year begins in June 2008, symbolically marking the 2,000th anniversary of the […]

Irenaeus was a Greek who was born between the years 120 and 140. He had the great privilege of being taught by St. Polycarp, who had been a disciple of St. John the Apostle. Irenaeus once told a friend: “I listened to St. Polycarp’s instructions very carefully. I wrote down his actions and his words, […]

The Holy Father Benedict XVI has called the Second Special Assembly for Africa of the Synod of Bishops. The event, which is due to be held in the Vatican from October 4 to 25, 2009, has as its theme: “The Church in Africa at the Service of Reconciliation, Justice and Peace. ‘You are the salt […]

(VIS) - Given below is the text of a communique released today by the Holy See Press Office concerning Benedict XVI’s forthcoming “Motu Proprio” on the use of the Missal promulgated by Blessed John XXIII in 1962.
  “Yesterday afternoon in the Vatican, a meeting was held under the presidency of the Cardinal Secretary of State […]

Holy Mary, Mother of God,
preserve in me the heart of a child,
pure and transparent as a spring.
Obtain for me a simple heart
That does not brood over sorrows;
A heart generous in giving itself,
Quick to feel compassion;
A faithful, generous heart
that forgets no favor
and holds no grudge.
Give me a humble, gentle heart
Loving without asking any return;
A great indomitable […]

Benedict XVI named Archbishop John Foley as pro-grand master of the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher of Jerusalem.Archbishop Foley, 71, leaves his position as president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, where he has served for 23 years. He succeeds Cardinal Carlo Furno, 85, who presented his request for retirement for reasons of age.
John […]

Affirms That St. Cyril Is a Model for Today 
Benedict XVI offered the example of one of the first Christian catechists as a role model for the Church of today.
The Pope dedicated his address at today’s general audience in Paul VI Hall to the figure of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, a fourth-century bishop.
“Cyril’s homilies make up […]

Benedict XVI appointed Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli as the new president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. Archbishop Celli, 65, is leaving his current post as the secretary of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See to assume his new position. Archbishop Celli will be taking over the presidency of the communication […]

Offers Responsible Advertising Guidelines
The Catholic Church has been in advertising for 2,000 years, says Archbishop John Foley. It is called evangelization.
Archbishop Foley, president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and a self-proclaimed “chocoholic,” talked with executives of the Nestle Corporation about advertising on June 22 in France.
“The presentation of the good news of Jesus […]

Campaign Looks to Aid Couples
In a campaign to promote matrimony the U.S. bishops are asking couples, “What have you done for your marriage today?”
Today, Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver, the chairman of the U.S. bishops’ committee on Marriage and Family, introduced public service announcements and a Web campaign to highlight the value of marriage and […]

Saint Gerard, spotless lily of purity, by the angelic virtue and thy wonderful innocence of life thou didst receive from the Infant Jesus and His Immaculate Mother, sweet pledges of tenderest love, grant, I beseech thee, that I may ever strive in my life-long fight, and thus win the crown that awaits the brave and […]

FIRST NOVENA PRAYER IN HONOR OF OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL HELP
Behold at thy feet, 0 Mother of Perpetual Help, a wretched sinner who has recourse to thee and confides in thee. 0 Mother of mercy, have pity on me.
I hear thee called by all the refuge and the hope of sinners: be then, my refuge […]

Gaza’s Situation Described as Very Unstable
Caritas Internationalis is emphasizing the need for an open Israeli border to meet the need for humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip.
Caritas resumed medical operations on Saturday in the Gaza Strip, after being suspended for a week because of the fighting between the Hamas and Fatah parties which left Hamas […]

Cyril was born in Alexandria, Egypt, in 370. His uncle, Theophilus, was the patriarch or archbishop. His uncle meant well, but he had a bad temper and could be stubborn at times. He couldn’t have known, as we do, that the famous John Chrysostom would be a saint some day. We celebrate St. John Chrysostom’s […]

“Make her known throughout the world!”
(Pope Pius IX to the Redemptorists)
 
 
O Lord Jesus Christ, who gave us your Mother Mary, whose renowned image we venerate, to be a Mother ever ready to help us; grant we beseech You, that we who constantly implore her motherly aid, may merit to enjoy perpetually the fruits of Your […]

The Holy Father:
 - Appointed Bishop Denis Kiwanuka Lote of Kotido, Uganda, as archbishop of Tororo (area 8,837, population 2,662,000, Catholics 586,000, priests 85, religious 150), Uganda. The archbishop-elect was born in Pallisa, Uganda in 1938, he was ordained a priest in 1965 and consecrated a bishop in 1991. He succeeds Archbishop James Odongo, whose resignation […]

At the end of today’s general audience, celebrated in the Paul VI Hall, the Pope addressed some remarks to participants in an international congress on adult stem cells, being organized by the “La Sapienza” University of Rome.
 The Holy Father noted how the congress “sets itself the aim of developing autologous cell therapy in the treatment […]

(VIS) - The Holy Father dedicated his catechesis during today’s general audience to St. Cyril of Jerusalem (ca. 315-387), whom he described as a bishop of a great “ecclesiastical culture, centered on the study of the Bible.” The general audience, Benedict XVI’s hundredth, began with his greeting pilgrims in St. Peter’s Basilica, then continued in […]

Saint Gerard, bright seraph of love, who despising all earthly love, didst consecrate thy life to the service of God and thy neighbor, promoting God’s glory in thy lowly state, and ever ready to assist the distressed and console the sorrowful, obtain for me, I beseech thee, that loving God the only God and my […]

The pallium, worn by the Pope and archbishops, symbolizes the lost sheep that is found again, carried on the shoulders of the Good Shepherd, and the Lamb crucified for the salvation of humanity. It also symbolizes, in part, the Pope’s concession of authority and communion to heads of major local Churches.
Given below is a list […]

Call for Putting the Person at Center Stage
The human person must be at the center of politics, culture and all aspects of life, says the Vatican secretary of state.
Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said this during the 7th Congress of Gniezno in western Poland, held June 15-17 and dedicated to the theme “Man: The Way for Europe.”
“European […]

Availing of modern medicine to determine the sex of babies and abort females is a crime against humanity, says the president of India’s episcopal conference.
Archbishop Oswald Gracias of Bombay spoke with Aid to the Church in Need about the widespread practice of aborting female babies in India, explaining that in that poverty torn country, parents […]

The Holy See is appealing to the international community to adopt measures that will put an end to the bloodshed caused by cluster bombs.
Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Holy See’s permanent observer to the U.N. offices in Geneva, made that appeal during a June 19 speech at the Convention on Conventional Weapons.
The conference considered ways to […]

To live for God alone is to wake each morning in His presence.
It is to except the beginning of each day as a tremendous gift.
A day when we receive God through the different things that will come our way.
Each communicating something of God in each person and each thing.
It is to breath in the fresh […]

(VIS) - “In Solidarity with the People of the Sea as Witnesses of Hope, through Proclamation of the Word, Liturgy and Diakonia,” is the theme of the 22nd World Congress of the Apostleship of the Sea, which is being held in Gdynia, Poland from June 24 to 29 under the patronage of the Pontifical Council […]

Made public today was a “Motu Proprio,” written in Latin, with which the Holy Father Benedict XVI restores the traditional norm concerning the majority required for the election of the Supreme Pontiff. According to this norm, in order for the election of a new Pope to be considered valid it is always necessary to reach […]

This boy martyr of Spain lived in the days when the Moors ruled part of his homeland. The Moors were fighting the Spanish Christians. Pelagius was only ten when his uncle had to leave him as a hostage with the Moors in the city of Cordova. He would not be allowed to go free until […]

Saint Gerard, most generous saint, who from thy tenderest years didst care so little for the goods of earth, grant that I may place all my confidence in Jesus Christ alone, my true Treasure, who alone can make me happy in time and in eternity.
Say nine Hail Mary’s
V. Pray for us, O Saint Gerard R. […]

By GEORGE F. WILL
Marriage is the foundation of the natural family and sustains family values. That sentence is inflammatory, perhaps even a hate crime.
At least it is in Oakland, Calif. That city’s government says those words italicized here constitute something akin to hate speech, and can be proscribed from the government’s open e-mail system and […]

Addresses Representatives of Higher Education
Benedict XVI says the crisis of modernity arises from an attempt to separate the human person from his “full truth,” which includes his “transcendent vocation.”
The Pope said this Saturday when he received in audience in Paul VI Hall the participants in the European Meeting of University Professors.
Their four-day meeting, which ended […]

Babies Eliminated as New Eugenics Gains Force
By Father John Flynn, L.C.
ROME, JUNE 25, 2007 (Zenit.org).- The desire for perfect babies combined with the possibilities of biotechnology is taking an ever-higher toll. Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), and other forms of screening enable the detection of genetic defects, leading either to embryos being eliminated before implantation when […]

The U.S. House of Representatives declined to preserve the Mexico City policy, a decision that a bishops’ representative called undermining the international consensus on abortion. The vote, held late last week, defeated a proposed amendment to the Foreign Operations Appropriations bill. Without the amendment, the bill rescinds the Mexico City policy, which bans federal funding […]

The Year of St. Paul has ecumenical significance, according to the prior of the Benedictine abbey at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.
The Year of St. Paul will be proclaimed by Benedict XVI on June 28, on the eve of the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, during an ecumenical celebration at the […]

The Pope is expected to publish a letter to Chinese Catholics soon. No date has been set for its publication.
The women religious are praying “so that the Holy Father’s letter is well-received, China opens up to the Gospels and gives unrestricted religious freedom to all believers,” said Cardinal Ivan Dias. A letter signed by Cardinal […]

Benedict XVI appointed Bishop Raffaele Farina as Vatican archivist and librarian, and elevated him to the dignity of archbishop. Archbishop Farina, 73, currently holds the post of prefect of the Vatican Library. He succeeds Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, who was named the president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue.

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(VIS) - Today in the Vatican, Benedict XVI received participants in a meeting of professors and rectors of European universities, who have come together to mark the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome.
  “The theme of your meeting - ‘A New Humanism for Europe. The Role of the Universities’ - invites a disciplined assessment […]

(VIS) - This morning, Benedict XVI visited the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Vatican Secret Archives. From July 14, the Library is due to close its doors to the public for a period of three years in order to enable restoration work to take place in one of the wings of the Renaissance building in […]

William was born in Vercelli, Italy, in 1085. His parents died when he was a baby. Relatives raised him. When William grew up, he became a hermit. He worked a miracle, curing a blind man, and found himself famous. William was too humble to be happy with the people’s admiration. He really wanted to remain […]

Saint Gerard, ever full of faith obtain for me that, believing firmly all that the Church of God proposes to my belief, I may strive to secure through a holy life the joys of eternal happiness.
Say nine Hail Mary’s
V. Pray for us, O Saint Gerard R. That we may be made worthy of the promises […]

“Walk into any church today before Mass and you will notice that the silence that should embrace those who stand in God’s House is gone. Even the Church is no longer a sacred place.” Such was lament of Diocesan Bishop Arthur Joseph Serretelli of Patterson, N.J. on his diocesan website o9n June 23. He denounced […]

(CNA).- The U.S. bishops are currently considering how prominent their voices will be in the 2008 presidential race. Of late, there have been some high profile encounters between bishops and the different presidential candidates. This has not been isolated to the United States either. In Australia, as previously reported by CNA, Cardinal George Pell and […]

Pope Offers Guidelines
By Father John Flynn, L.C.
Confrontations over globalization no longer make headlines, but many concerns remain over the future of the world economy. In past months the question of growing economic inequality has come under increasing attention.
Globalization has delivered many benefits, argued a front-page article published May 24 by the Wall Street Journal. The […]

Asia News reported that Bishop Jia Zhiguo, 73, was returned Friday afternoon to his episcopal residence in the Hebei province in northeast China. He had been arrested June 5. They also reported sources saying that the bishop was kept in isolation in an army barracks near Zanhuang. The bishop has been sequestered a total of nine […]

Aide Comments on Benedict XVI’s Remarks
Benedict XVI has shown his deep concern for Iraqi Christians in his numerous pronouncements on their plight, notes a Vatican spokesman.
In an editorial on the most recent broadcast of the show “Octava Dies,” Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office, commented on recent remarks of the Pope […]

(CNA).- Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of England met yesterday in the Vatican with His Holiness Benedict XVI.  The Prime Minister had been vacationing for the week in Italy, and had also met with his counterpart, Romano Prodi, President of the Italian Council.
According to BBC new service, the two discussed the challenges of globalization, as well […]

The Vicar of Christ greeted thousands gathered in St. Peter’s Square where he addressed them before praying the Angelus. His message to those gathered was to engage in true conversion and an ardent witness of the Lord. On the solemnity of the birth of St. John the Baptist, the Holy Father called on the Church […]

In your kindness, please unite in prayer for the spiritual and physical health of the unborn children of the world. I will be posting the novena daily for to Saint Gerard, patron of the unborn and of expecting mothers. Please recite it for the nine days beginning tomorrow, June 25th and concluding on Tuesday July […]

John’s parents were Zachary and Elizabeth. Elizabeth was a cousin of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Mary went to visit and help when Elizabeth was old and about to become a mother.
St. Elizabeth had her baby. Zachary named him John, as the angel had requested. John had a special calling. He was going to prepare […]

In the Holy See Press Office on the morning of June 19th, the official presentation took place of the document “Guidelines for the Pastoral Care of the Road,” published by the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People. Participating in the press conference were Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino and Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, respectively […]

Peace, Joy, and God’s choicest blessings to Father David Turner, O.S.B. of St. Procopius Abbey, on his 50th Anniversary of Monastic Profession. Thanks be to God, for such a wonderful person. God bless you!

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Blessed Basil Hopko is considered one of the many priests and religious martyred by Communism. He was born in Slovakia to poor parents. His father died when he was a year old and his mother left for the United States when he was four in seach of work.
He remained in Europe and was an excellent […]

The Catholic News Agency reports that the procurator of the Chaldean Patriarchate before the Holy See, Father Philip Najim, warned that the terrorist attacks, kidnappings and forced conversions are making the Church in Iraq disappear, as extremists have turned Christians into “sacrificial lambs.”
“Closed churches, car bombs, forced conversions, kidnappings: in Iraq Christians are dying. The […]

Author Martin Mosebach wins the Georg Buechner Prize, Germany’s most prestigious literary award. Born in 1951, Mosebach has published novels, stories, and collections of poems, written scripts for several films, opera libretti, theatre and radio plays. 
Among his works translated into English is “The Heresy of Formlessness”. This book is a collection of essays on the […]

A lawsuit recently filed by the St. Benedict Center charges Richmond’s planning board with religious discrimination, and says the board deprived the center of its constitutional rights of freedom of religion, speech and assembly. On Friday, the conservative Roman Catholic center filed an appeal in Cheshire County Superior Court of the planning board’s May decision […]

There have been reports that Tony Blair wi