Be remembered by what you love not by what you hate.

Consider This

Learning Christ

Teach me, my Lord, to be sweet and gentle in all the events of life - in disappointments, in the thoughtlessness of others, in the insincerity of those I trusted, in the unfaithfulness of those on whom I relied.

Let me put myself aside, to think of the happiness of others, to hide my little pains and heartaches, so that I may be the only one to suffer from them.

Teach me to profit by the suffering that comes across my path.

Let me so use it that it may mellow me, not harden nor embitter me, that it may make me patient, not irritable that it may make me broad in my forgiveness, not narrow, haughty and overbearing.

May no one be less good for having come within my influence. No one less pure, less true, less kind, less noble for having been a fellow-traveler in our journey to Eternal Life.

As I go my rounds from one distraction to another, please let me whisper from time to time a word of love to Thee. May my life be lived in the supernatural, full of power for good and strong for the purpose of sanctity.

may the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier, touch all of us!!

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1. Sunday Readings: Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time 2006
   
2. Today: Relevant Articles For Catholics
   
3. Cath Humor
   
4. Our Engine: SiteBuild It

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Sunday Readings

June 25, 2006
Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time 2006

First Reading: Jb 38:1, 8-11

The Lord addressed Job out of the storm and said:
Who shut within doors the sea,
when it burst forth from the womb;
when I made the clouds its garment
and thick darkness its swaddling bands?

When I set limits for it
and fastened the bar of its door,
and said: Thus far shall you come but no farther,
and here shall your proud waves be stilled!

Responsorial Psalm: Ps 107:23-24, 25-26, 28-29, 30-31

R. (1b) Give thanks to the Lord, his love is everlasting.
or
R. Alleluia.
They who sailed the sea in ships,
trading on the deep waters,
These saw the works of the LORD
and his wonders in the abyss.

R. Give thanks to the Lord, his love is everlasting.
or
R. Alleluia.
His command raised up a storm wind
which tossed its waves on high.
They mounted up to heaven; they sank to the depths;
their hearts melted away in their plight.

R. Give thanks to the Lord, his love is everlasting.
or
R. Alleluia.
They cried to the LORD in their distress;
from their straits he rescued them,
He hushed the storm to a gentle breeze,
and the billows of the sea were stilled.

R. Give thanks to the Lord, his love is everlasting.
or
R. Alleluia.
They rejoiced that they were calmed,
and he brought them to their desired haven.
Let them give thanks to the LORD for his kindness
and his wondrous deeds to the children of men.

R. Give thanks to the Lord, his love is everlasting.
or
R. Alleluia.

Second Reading: 2 Cor 5:14-17

Brothers and sisters:
The love of Christ impels us,
once we have come to the conviction that one died for all;
therefore, all have died.
He indeed died for all,
so that those who live might no longer live for themselves
but for him who for their sake died and was raised.

Consequently, from now on we regard no one according to the flesh;
even if we once knew Christ according to the flesh,
yet now we know him so no longer.
So whoever is in Christ is a new creation:
the old things have passed away;
behold, new things have come.

Gospel: Mk 4:35-41

On that day, as evening drew on,
Jesus said to his disciples:
"Let us cross to the other side."

Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was.
And other boats were with him.
A violent squall came up
and waves were breaking over the boat,
so that it was already filling up.
Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion.

They woke him and said to him,
"Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?"
He woke up,
rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Quiet! Be still!"
The wind ceased and there was great calm.
Then he asked them, "Why are you terrified?
Do you not yet have faith?"

They were filled with great awe and said to one another,
"Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?"

Today

Defend Family, Counter Secularism, Pope Asks Baltic Bishops

Speaking to bishops from Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia on June 23, the Holy Father said that the Church must counteract the growing influence of secularism in those countries. He told the bishops, who were concluding their ad limina visit to Rome, that the faith is the proper antidote to "the tyranny of instability and confusion" caused by a loss or moral orientation in society.

The pastoral work of the Church, the Pope continued, should provide support for the many families troubled by "the the fragility of conjugal ties, by the scourge of abortion and the demographic crisis, by the scant care with which they transmit authentic values to children, by job insecurity, by social mobility weakening ties between the generations and by a growing sense of disorientation among young people."

To organize that effort, he said, the bishops should take great care to provide proper formation for new priests, and devote extra efforts to instruction of young Catholics. The influence of secularism is particularly dangerous in the Baltic countries, where "the wounds that Communism inflicted on your people are not yet completely healed," the Pope observed. He urged Church leaders to help their people understand that Christ's message "does not hinder man's freedom and true social progress; on the contrary, it helps human beings to full self-realization and renovates society through the sweet and demanding law of love."

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References On Catholic Apologetics

I really encourage you to read at least the following:

• ¹What Catholics Really Believe-Setting the Record Straight: 52 Answers to Common Misconceptions About the Catholic Faith, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 1992, by Karl Keating, director Catholic Answers, a lay-run apologetics and evangelization organization, and editor of the magazine, This Rock. He is also the author of the best-seller, Catholicism and Fundamentalism.

• ²Nuts & Bolts: A Practical Guide for Explaining and Defending the Catholic Faith, Basilica Press, San Diego, 1999, by Tim Staples, a former Assemblies of God youth pastor who converted to the Catholic Church.

• ³Catholic Source Book, Harcourt Religion Publishers, 2000, by Rev. Peter Klein. Rev Peter Klein is a priest of the Diocese of Winona in Minnesota.

• ⁴Our Sunday Visitor's Catholic Encyclopedia, Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Division, Huntington, Indiana, 1998, by Rev. Peter M.J. Stravinskas, editor. Rev. Peter M.J. Stravinskas is the author of eleven books and more than 500 articles. He is the founding editor of Catholic Answer and the administrator of St. John the Baptist Church of Bayonne, New Jersey. He likewise serves as adjunct professor of education at Seton Hall University in South Orange, New Jersey.

For more great information about our faith, please read Our Sunday Visitor's Catholic Encyclopedia. This is an excellent addition to a Catholic family library. I refer to this book everytime I come across a questionable term. It is also a very good source of a summary of Catholic Doctines, without the deep and brooding terminologies.

Groaners

"Oh, good heavens! Have we come to this?" said the woman. "Well, give me 50 Protestant and 50 Catholic ones."

*******************

Little Johnny was spending the weekend with his grandmother after a particularly trying week in kindergarten. His grand-mother decided to take him to the park on Saturday morning. It had been snowing all night and everything was beautiful.

His grandmother remarked..."doesn't it look like an artist painted this scenery? Did you know God painted this just for you?"

Johnny said, "Yes, God did it and he did it left handed."

This confused his grandmother a bit, and she asked him "What makes you say God did this with his left hand?"

"Well," said Johnny, "we learned at Sunday School last week that Jesus sits on God's right hand!"

*******************

A little girl was sitting on her grandfather's lap as he read her a bedtime story. From time to time, she would take her eyes off the book and reach up to touch his wrinkled cheek. She was alternately stroking her own cheek, then his again. Finally she spoke up, "Grandpa, did God make you?"

"Yes, sweetheart," he answered, "God made me a long time ago."

"Oh," she paused, "Grandpa, did God make me too?"

"Yes, indeed, honey," he said, "God made you just a little while ago."

Feeling their respective faces again, she observed, "God's getting better at it, isn't he?"

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