May 3, 2013 / Maria News

Jesus is the Inspiration for Our Marian Devotion

By Deacon Antonio Sandoval

There is no doubt that Jesus has a profound devotion to his Mother, Mary.  Being True Man he had need of her for his physical and spiritual development, just as any human child has a need for his or her mother.  Mothers, on the other hand, are instinctively predisposed to love and nurture their children.  This is indeed a motive for children to have devotion for their mothers.  So it was with Jesus, a truly human child, who in Mary had a perfect mother.

However, Jesus, also being True God, had another motive for his devotion to Mary.  As True God, he is the author of the Commandments written in every human heart, including the fourth commandment, “Honor your father and mother”.  As True God Jesus could not contradict himself in thought, word, or deed.  Rather, he would obey this commandment with Divine perfection.  For any mother this indeed would be the greatest expression of devotion.

Jesus also taught that honoring your father and mother is proper and necessary.  In Matthew 15: 3 – 6 we read that Jesus said to the scribes and Pharisees, “And why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?  For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’, and ‘Whoever curses father and mother shall die’, But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Any support that you might have had from me is dedicated to God”, need not honor his father.  You have nullified the word of God for the sake of your tradition”.

It appears that Jesus is saying that honoring father and mother has a higher priority than dedicating all our time, talent, and treasure to what we deem to be the service of God.

Now the Blessed Virgin Mary is really our spiritual mother, not only because Jesus gave her to us at the foot of the Cross to be our mother, but also because in Baptism we are conformed to Jesus.  We become the adopted sons and daughters of God and of Mary.  We become the brothers and sisters of Jesus.  As such, we owe Mary the same devotion that Jesus has for her.  Jesus is the ideal of how we are to be in relation to the Blessed Virgin Mary, His mother and our mother.

Jesus taught us both with his words and his example.  We note that of his 33 years on earth as the Incarnate Word, he spent 30 years with his mother and only three years in his public ministry (Luke 3: 23).  One might have thought that if Jesus had begun his public ministry earlier in his life, he would have accomplished more.  Apparently Jesus thought that he would teach us something more valuable by being devoted to his mother for 30 years, than by having an extended public ministry.

Our goal in True Devotion to Mary is to love Jesus as Mary loves him and to love Mary as Jesus loves her.  The love of Jesus for Mary is the “gold standard” by which we measure our own devotion to Mary.

Jesus said [to us], “I give you a new commandment:  Love one another.  As I have loved you, so you also should love one another” (John 13: 34).  It is certain that He also wants us to love Mary as he loves her.

Therefore, Jesus, who is the Alpha and the Omega, (Revelation 22: 13), of our spiritual life, and the Way, the Truth, and the Life, (John 14: 6) of our faith journey, has clearly demonstrated by words and example the reverent devotion that we must have towards His most worthy mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Read More: http://marianews.com/wordpress/category/deacon-antonio/

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December 5, 2012 / MariaNews.com 

Advent Homily: St. Bernard on the Three Comings of the Lord

By Catholic Online

WASHINGTON (Catholic Online) – We present a beautiful portion of a homily preached by St. Bernard of Clairvaux during Advent for reflection during the first week of Advent:

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We know that the coming of the Lord is threefold: the third coming is between the other two and it is not visible in the way they are. At his first coming the Lord was seen on earth and lived among men, who saw him and hated him.

At his last coming All flesh shall see the salvation of our God, and They shall look on him whom they have pierced. In the middle, the hidden coming, only the chosen see him, and they see him within themselves; and so their souls are saved. The first coming was in flesh and weakness, the middle coming is in spirit and power, and the final coming will be in glory and majesty.

This middle coming is like a road that leads from the first coming to the last. At the first, Christ was our redemption; at the last, he will become manifest as our life; but in this middle way he is our rest and our consolation.

If you think that I am inventing what I am saying about the middle coming, listen to the Lord himself: If anyone loves me, he will keep my words, and the Father will love him, and we shall come to him. Elsewhere I have read: Whoever fears the Lord does good things. – but I think that what was said about whoever loves him was more important: that whoever loves him will keep his words.

Where are these words to be kept? In the heart certainly, as the Prophet says I have hidden your sayings in my heart so that I do not sin against you. Keep the word of God in that way: Blessed are those who keep it.

Let it penetrate deep into the core of your soul and then flow out again in your feelings and the way you behave; because if you feed your soul well it will grow and rejoice. Do not forget to eat your bread, or your heart will dry up. Remember, and your soul will grow fat and sleek.

If you keep God’s word like this, there is no doubt that it will keep you, for the Son will come to you with the Father: the great Prophet will come, who will renew Jerusalem, and he is the one who makes all things new. For this is what this coming will do: just as we have been shaped in the earthly image, so will we be shaped in the heavenly image.

Just as the old Adam was poured into the whole man and took possession of him, so in turn will our whole humanity be taken over by Christ, who created all things, has redeemed all things, and will glorify all things.

November 3, 2012 / MariaNews.com 

Feast of St Francis Xavier Calls for New Evangelization Missionaries For the West

By Catholic Online

CHESAPEAKE, Va. (Catholic Online) – On December 3 the Western Church remembers the great disciple of Jesus Christ and follower of St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis Xavier. His missionary voyages to Japan and to India continue to bear extraordinary fruit centuries later as we witness the courageous witness of the Christians of our day in both lands.

St. Francis Xavier arrived in the Land of the Rising Sun, Japan, in 1549. Sixty years after he began his missionary work, the Shogun began their violent persecution against the Christians. The evil inflicted in that persecution did not stop those who had heard the Gospel from the mouth of this Saint. In fact, as has been the case throughout the ages, their blood became the “seed of the Church” in Japan and beyond. Nothing – and no-one-  can stop the advance of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the spread of His Kingdom.

On his Feast, I present this excerpt from one of St. Francis Xavier’s Letters to Ignatius Loyola. The missionary spirit which it reveals is also alive in the Church in this hour. It is alive in the New Ecclesial movements. It is live in the religious communities which are springing up as new shoots in the One Vine and the renewed ones which are rediscovering their charism. It is alive on the authentically Catholic Colleges and Universities which are forming the new saints, missionaries and martyrs for the Third Millennium. Some of them are new, others are being renewed.

Is it alive in you and me? Do we view our vocation, no matter what our state in life, as missionary? All of us can – and should - burn with the same missionary fire which animated this great saint. It is the fire of the Holy Spirit. We should cry out those words of the great Apostle Paul “Woe unto me if I dod not preach the Gospel.” (1 Cor. 9:16)

It is the Gospel of Jesus Christ – preached and lived in its fullness – which is the liberating message the whole world longs to hear. In Jesus Christ we can all be made new! The West staggers under the lies and deception of an advancing new paganism which offers only the old slavery of sin and despair which has accompanied every culture of death and use from the time the old foe lied to our first parents. It is the Church of jesus Christ which offers Life and Freedom!

What the West needs – more than anything else – right now - is conversion. The real kind - the kind which comes through encountering the Savior as He lives His Risen Life in the Heart of His Church for the sake of the world which He still loves. Those of us who have the privilege of being Catholic Christians have the highest of obligations. “To those to whom much is given, much more will be required!” (Luke 12:48)

Our mission field is our own back yard. The West is pre-Christian – not Post-Christian! Rather than waste any more time bemoaning this fact, rather than join the naysayers, it is time to enter into the new missionary age which stretches out before us. All we need is the intimate personal communion with the Risen Lord Jesus which so obviously motivated St. Francis Xavier and the evangelical courage which is its fruit. It is time to get to work.

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Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel

We have visited the villages of the new converts who accepted the Christian religion a few years ago. No Portuguese live here the country is so utterly barren and poor. The native Christians have no priests. They know only that they are Christians. There is nobody to say Mass for them; nobody to teach them the Creed, the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the Commandments of God’s Law.

I have not stopped since the day I arrived. I conscientiously made the rounds of the villages. I bathed in the sacred waters all the children who had not yet been baptized. This means that I have purified a very large number of children so young that, as the saying goes, they could not tell their right hand from their left. The older children would not let me say my Office or eat or sleep until I taught them one prayer or another. Then I began to understand: “The kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

I could not refuse so devout a request without failing in devotion myself. I taught them, first the confession of faith in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, then the Apostles’ Creed, the Our Father and Hail Mary. I noticed among them persons of great intelligence. If only someone could educate them in the Christian way of life, I have no doubt that they would make excellent Christians.

Many, many people hereabouts are not becoming Christians for one reason only: there is nobody to make them Christians. Again and again I have thought of going round the universities of Europe, especially Paris, and everywhere crying out like a madman, riveting the attention of those with more learning than charity: “What a tragedy: how many souls are being shut out of heaven and falling into hell, thanks to you!”

I wish they would work as hard at this as they do at their books, and so settle their account with God for their learning and the talents entrusted to them.

This thought would certainly stir most of them to meditate on spiritual realities, to listen actively to what God is saying to them. They would forget their own desires, their human affairs, and give themselves over entirely to God’s will and his choice. They would cry out with all their heart: Lord, I am here! What do you want me to do? Send me anywhere you like – even to India.

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July 16, 2012 / MariaNews.com 

The Second Nativity

By Deacon Antonio Sandoval

I call Pentecost the “second Nativity” because on this day the Mystical Body of Christ, of which Jesus is the head, was finally born.  This is why Pentecost is also called the birthday of the Church.  The first Nativity was announced by the Angel Gabriel who told Mary that she would be the mother of Jesus. Mary couldn’t understand how this would happen because she had no relationship with a man.  But the Angel said, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God” (Luke 1:35).  It took nine months from the coming of the Holy Spirit to Mary at the Annunciation until the birth of Jesus, because the Eternal Word chose to vest himself in flesh by the natural way of human generation in order to be truly God and truly man.

The second Nativity was announced by Jesus himself when he said to Peter, “And so I say to you, you are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 13:18).  This second Nativity was also to be the work of the Holy Spirit whom Jesus promised.  “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth…” (John 14: 16-17a)  It took a matter of days from the announcement of Jesus of the coming of the Spirit to the Apostles and the second Nativity.  When the Spirit came on the day of Pentecost, the members of the Mystical Body of Christ were instantly born of Mary, who was present with the disciples, because this birth was not by the natural way of human generation, that is, not of the flesh, but purely of the Spirit.

The identity of Jesus was revealed to Mary by the angel.  He was the Son of the Most High God (Luke 1:35).  He was the long-awaited Messiah, born of Mary, whose mission was the redemption of God’s people.  Jesus was the one who was to bring good news to the poor and the liberation of those oppressed by sin.  The identity of the Mystical Body was revealed by Jesus who identified himself as the “vine” and the members of his Mystical Body were to be his “branches”. The mission of the Mystical Body was clearly stated when Jesus appeared to his apostles after his Resurrection on a mountain in Galilee and said, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always until the end of time” (Matthew 28:16-20). By the power of the Holy Spirit we were to be his witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

We, the Christians of today, are still the branches that originally sprouted from the “Vine”. The mission that the “Vine” originally gave to the branches has not changed and still resonates throughout the earth, and neither has the admonition that if we do not bear fruit we might be cut off from the “Vine”.  Our day is far spent.  Let us ask the vine grower, that is, the Eternal Father, for a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon us, so that we may produce fruit in abundance for the sanctification of all the present people of the earth, as well as those who will populate our planet in the future.

The following is a quote from Father Farfaglia’s article, The Happy Priest:  Be Not Afraid!  We are All Called to Be a Witness, “Never be afraid to be a witness of the Gospel.  You will change the world around you and the reward is eternal life in Heaven”.   Read the full article by Father Faraglia here: http://www.catholic.org/hf/faith/story.php?id=46950

Read more by Deacon Antonio here

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Antonio is a retired deacon in the Archdiocese of Denver. Last September his wife, Maud, was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a form of cancer. They were told that she didn’t have long to live. Since she is 83 years old, they decided to refuse the chemotherapy and radiation treatments. Last October they were sent to Hospice. They have now been there for 8 months. Antonio’s wife is not experiencing the symptoms of multiple myeloma other than the fact that she cannot move and has to stay in bed all the time. She is also in the last stages of Alzheimer’s disease. You prayers will be appreciated. Antonio spends the entire day with his wife.

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May 26, 2012 / MariaNews.com 

Pentecost and The Gift of The Spirit: Be Transformed, Recreated, and Elevated Into Eternal Life

“[God] gave himself to us through his Spirit. By the participation of the Spirit, we become communicants in the divine nature. . . . For this reason, those in whom the Spirit dwells are divinized” (St. Athanasius) Although it is true that the Holy Spirit can make his presence known through external signs and special gifts for the sake of unbelievers (1 Corinthians 12: 4-11), our personal Pentecost begins with the Sacrament of Baptism and is made deeper through the Sacrament of Confirmation.