Call for Unity

In this week of Christian Unity, let us all pray that we will always strive towards the total reunification of all Christians into the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church that Christ founded on the rock of St. Peter.

With that in mind, please check out the website entitled "Called to Communion" and read more about the efforts and the fruit that God has given towards this goal. May we come to fully realize what Christ prayed for in the 17th chapter of John, "that they may all be one..."

The Anima Christi

Apologies for yesterday's post. I was in a rare mood. However, this prayer has recently been introduced in my life and I find great comfort in it. The Anima Christi is still used by many after they receive communion. It is a beautiful prayer that has been around since roughly the 14th century. I am trying to promote it once again into wide use.

In English:

Soul of Christ, sanctify me
Body of Christ, save me
Blood of Christ, inebriate me
Water from Christ's side, wash me
Passion of Christ, strengthen me
O good Jesus, hear me
Within Thy wounds hide me
Suffer me not to be separated from Thee
From the malicious enemy defend me
In the hour of my death call me
And bid me come unto Thee
That I may praise Thee with Thy saints and with Thy angels
Forever and ever.
Amen

In Latin:

Anima Christi, sanctifica me.
Corpus Christi, salva me.
Sanguis Christi, inebria me.
Aqua lateris Christi, lava me.
Passio Christi, conforta me.
O bone Jesu, exaudi me.
Intra tua vulnera absconde me.
Ne permittas me separari a te.
Ab hoste maligno defende me.
In hora mortis meae voca me.
Et iube me venire ad te,
Ut cum Sanctis tuis laudem te.
In saecula saeculorum.
Amen

Whatever Happened to Christian Charity??

Why does it seem that so many people preach on loving your neighbor and sacrificing yourself for others, then turn around and throw it straight out the window? What happened to Christian charity?

Do this person agree with what I believe is true? No. Do I agree with his beliefs completely? No. Can I show him truly what Catholicism teaches? Yes. Will he listen? That depends on him. Respect is key to dialogue. Especially with talk about ecumenism and anything relating to Christian unity and dialogue. When it appears that openness is there, but truly is not, then that is where it starts to decay.

How does this build up and edify Christ's kingdom on earth? It doesn't. So much for John 17! I'm sure that Christ just loves the fact that his body has been torn asunder. That's true unity! No! It's a plurality of individualism that is the cancer of modern Christianity. No wonder the world is the way it is. (Both sides can use help. Don't think I am attacking just one side.)

Only the Truth can set you free. One Truth. One Church. One Body. Open yourself up to God and his Church. He will lead you into all Truth if you let him. If not, good luck in your endeavors.

491 Years Ago...

“I never approved of a schism, nor will I approve of it for all eternity. . . . That the Roman Church is more honored by God than all others is not to be doubted. St. Peter and St. Paul, forty-six Popes, some hundreds of thousands of martyrs, have laid down their lives in its communion, having overcome Hell and the world; so that the eyes of God rest on the Roman church with special favor. Though nowadays everything is in a wretched state, it is no ground for separating from the Church. On the contrary, the worse things are going, the more should we hold close to her, for it is not by separating from the Church that we can make her better. We must not separate from God on account of any work of the devil, nor cease to have fellowship with the children of God who are still abiding in the pale of Rome on account of the multitude of the ungodly. There is no sin, no amount of evil, which should be permitted to dissolve the bond of charity or break the bond of unity of the body. For love can do all things, and nothing is difficult to those who are united.”

Martin Luther to Pope Leo X, January 6, 1519
more than a year after the Ninety-Five Theses
quoted in The Facts about Luther, 356

Time: A Measure of Change

The first decade of the 3rd millenium has passed in the blink of an eye. If it seemed to have gone quickly then you were there. I'm trying to fathom what it feels like to be 2,010 years removed from the time of Christ. Time has passed slowly since that time and a lot of world history has happened since then. Yet, I can't help but realize what a small number of years it has been in the scope of things.

Think about eternity. Don't try too hard, it will hurt your brain. Ten years ago it was 2000. Ten years before that 1990. Ten years before that I wasn't even born yet. But it wasn't that long ago! Christ was little over the mark of 3 decades when he died. How quickly it must have seemed to Him, His mother and now, in retrospect, to us.

Yet in the time that he was here, he accomplished all that he was supposed to and changed history forever. What can we do here and now, in our time, however long it might be, to change the world forever and leave it a better place? Leave it a little closer to what it's supposed to become?