Monthly Archives: June 2022

The Dark Side of Those Warm and Fuzzy “Chicken Soup for the Soul” Books

Posted on by

Photo by Nguyen Thu Hoai on Unsplash

Many of our blogs come about as a result of readers who give us “tips” about a fad or personality that warrant more research. This is what happened with the popular books, Chicken Soup for the Soul. Thanks to that reader’s tip, we unearthed a goldmine of vital information about these “warm and fuzzy” books that we all need to know about!

Read the rest…

Great confidence

Posted on by

June 29th
At a difficult time in the Church’s history, Pope Pius IX, wishing to place her under the powerful patronage of the holy patriarch Joseph, declared him “Patron of the Catholic Church.”(42) For Pius IX this was no idle gesture, since by virtue of the sublime dignity which God has granted to his most faithful servant Joseph, “the Church, after the Blessed Virgin, his spouse, has always held him in great honor and showered him with praise, having recourse to him amid tribulations.”(43)
What are the reasons for such great confidence? Leo XIII explained it in this way: “The reasons why St. Joseph must be considered the special patron of the Church, and the Church in turn draws exceeding hope from his care and patronage, chiefly arise from his having been the husband of Mary and the presumed father of Jesus…, Joseph was in his day the lawful and natural guardian, head and defender of the Holy Family…. It is thus fitting and most worthy of Joseph’s dignity that, in the same way that he once kept unceasing holy watch over the family of Nazareth, so now does he protect and defend with his heavenly patronage the Church of Christ.”(44)
“This patronage [of St. Joseph]  must be invoked as ever necessary for the Church, not only as a defense against all dangers, but also, and indeed primarily, as an impetus for her renewed commitment to evangelization in the world and to re-evangelization in those lands and nations where-as I wrote in the Apostolic Exhortation Christideles Laici – “religion and the Christian life were formerly flourishing and…are now put to a hard test.”(45)
In order to bring the first proclamation of Christ, or to bring it anew wherever it has been neglected or forgotten, the Church has need of special “power from on high” (cf. Lk 24:49; Acts 1:8): a gift of the Spirit of the Lord, a gift which is not unrelated to the intercession and example of his saints.”

Expressions of trust

Posted on by

June 28th
“Joseph found happiness not in mere self-sacrifice but in self-gift. In him, we never see frustration but only trust. His patient silence was the prelude to concrete expressions of trust. Our world today needs fathers. It has no use for tyrants who would domineer others as a means of compensating for their own needs. It rejects those who confuse authority with authoritarianism, service with servility, discussion with oppression, charity with a welfare mentality, power with destruction.
Every true vocation is born of the gift of oneself, which is the fruit of mature sacrifice. The priesthood and consecrated life likewise require this kind of maturity. Whatever our vocation, whether to marriage, celibacy or virginity, our gift of self will not come to fulfillment if it stops at sacrifice; were that the case, instead of becoming a sign of the beauty and joy of love, the gift of self would risk being an expression of unhappiness, sadness and frustration.”

The plan of salvation

Posted on by

June 26th
“The greatness of Saint Joseph is that he was the spouse of Mary and the father of Jesus. In this way, he placed himself, in the words of Saint John Chrysostom, “at the service of the entire plan of salvation.”

Handfasting: Marriage Pagan Style

Posted on by

                                                                                                        Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

MJB writes: “Some Wiccan friends of mine were recently married in a ritual called handfasting. What exactly is this and is it Christian?”

Read the rest…