Novena to the Holy Spirit --- Day Two

Day Two: Holy Spirit, Power of the Most High

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE: “The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin's name was Mary. Coming to her, he said, "Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you." But she was greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Behold, you will conceive...and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end." But Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?" The angel said to her…, "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 1:26-35)

INTERCESSORY PRAYERS: Holy Spirit, Power of God Most High, when the appointed time arrived for the coming of the Savior, you descended upon the humble virgin Mary, covering her with your divine presence and she conceived the incarnate Son of God. Descend upon us now and cover us with your presence that we may be born again from above and live forever as graced members of Christ’s Mystical Body. Creator Spirit, Power of God Most High, transform us into the likeness of Christ Jesus our Lord. As you formed the body of Jesus in the womb of the Virgin Mary, so form us now into the Mystical Body of Christ, that we may more fully become the icon and image of Jesus Christ come to full stature.

Come Holy Spirit. Come Spirit of Jesus and anoint us with your power.

Novena to the Holy Spirit --- Day One

Day One: HOLY SPIRIT, ETERNAL LIGHT

THE BOOK OF GENESIS: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, and God’s spirit hovered over the water. God said: “Let there be light”, and there was light. God saw that the light was good..... Evening came and morning followed: the first day.” (Genesis 1:1-5)

INTERCESSORY PRAYERS: Eternal Creator Spirit, you hovered over the formless void at the dawn of creation and commanded: “Let there be light!”. Let your light shine on us now. Anoint our spirits with your holy presence. Help “..us throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12f) that we might always conduct ourselves as children of the light, “...not in orgies and drunkenness, not in promiscuity and licentiousness, and not in rivalry and jealousy,” (Romans 13:13) but in charity and uprightness as befits our calling in Christ. Holy Spirit, Eternal Light, help us put on the armor of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to make no provision for the desires of the flesh (cf. Romans 13:14). Guide our steps always along the paths of righteousness and truth that the Light of Christ in us might shine forth for all to see.

Come, Holy Spirit. Come, Spirit of Jesus. Anoint us with your light.

THE PRIEST MUST GOVERN WITH THE AUTHORITY OF CHRIST

VATICAN CITY, 26 MAY 2010 (VIS) - In today's general audience, celebrated in St. Peter's Square, the Pope focused his remarks on the duty of the priest to "govern and guide - with the authority of Christ, not with his own - that portion of the people which God has entrusted to his care".

In the last of three catechesis on the essential tasks of priestly ministry, the Holy Father asked: "how, within contemporary culture, can we understand this dimension which implicates the concept of authority and has its origin in the Lord's command to feed His sheep?"

"The regimes which spread death and terror last century are a powerful reminder that authority, in all fields, when exercised without reference to the transcendent, when it ignores the supreme authority that is God Himself, inevitably ends up by turning against man. It is important, then, to recognise that human authority is never an end but always and only a means, and that, necessarily and at all times, the end is always the person".

"In order to be pastors after God's heart, we need to be profoundly rooted in a living friendship with Christ (not only of our minds, but also of our freedom and will), clearly aware of the identity we received at priestly ordination, and unconditionally ready to lead our flock where the Lord wills, not in the direction which seems most convenient and easy. This requires, first and foremost, a continuous and progressive willingness to allow Christ Himself to govern the priestly lives of clergy. No-one, in fact, is truly capable of feeding the flock if they do not live in profound and authentic obedience to Christ and the Church; and the docility of the people towards their priests depends on the docility of priests towards Christ".

Referring then to the concept of "hierarchy" in the Church, the Pope noted how a prevalent idea among the public is of "an element of subordination, ... and for many people this contrasts with the flexibility and vitality of pastoral service. ... This is an erroneous interpretation which has its origins in the abuses of history", he explained. "The true meaning is of a sacred origin, it is an authority that comes from another, and subjects the person to the mystery of Christ, making him His servant. Only as His servant can he govern and guide, for Christ and with Christ".

Thus "the Pope, who is a point of reference for the communion of all the pastors of the Church, cannot do as he pleases; quite the contrary, he is the custodian of obedience to Christ and His word".

"Without this clear and explicit supernatural vision, priests' duty to govern cannot be understood. It is however, when supported by true concern for the salvation of each member of the faithful, a particularly important and necessary duty, also in our own time".

"Where", the Pope asked, "can a priest today draw the strength to exercise his ministry in complete faithfulness to Christ and to the Church, with total dedication to his flock? There is", he said, "only one answer: in Christ the Lord".

Benedict XVI told priests: "Do not be afraid to guide to Christ each of the brothers and sisters He has entrusted to you, certain that each word, each action, if they come from obedience to God's will, will bear fruit. Appreciate the advantages and recognise the limits of the culture in which we live, in the firm certainty that announcing the Gospel is the greatest service we can do mankind. In fact, there is no greater good in this earthly life than to lead man to God, to reawaken the faith, to raise mankind from inertia and desperation, and infuse the hope that God is close and guides the history of individuals and of the world. This is the profound and ultimate meaning of the task of government the Lord has entrusted to us".

The Pope concluded by inviting priests to participate in the closing celebrations of the Year for Priests, due to take place in Rome from 9 to 11 June when, he said, "we will meditate on conversion and mission, on the gift of the Holy Spirit and on our relationship with the Blessed Virgin; and we will renew our priestly promises, supported by the entire People of God".

Pubblished by VIS - Holy See Press Office - Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Deacon Bob Kreps on "Embryos and the Moral Law"

Embryos and the Moral Law
Ex 20:1-17 or 20:1-3, 7-8, 12-17
Ps 19:8, 9, 10, 11
1 Cor 1:22-25
Jn 2:13-25

We acknowledge our sinfulness, our guilt is ever before us.

Last Monday, as he promised during his campaign, President Obama lifted the ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, a ban which President Bush had imposed shortly after taking office in 2001. That means that our taxpayer dollars can now be used to fund this research, research that always begins with the destruction of a human embryo. The embryos destroyed are “spare” embryos left over from in vitro fertilization. Not selected for implantation, their parents donate them for scientific research.

Now these embryos are very tiny human beings, in the very earliest state of development – at this stage scientists call them blastocysts, and they are the very next stage of development of the human embryo after the successful fertilization of the egg. Composed of about 100 cells shaped like a hollow ball, they have already differentiated into two types of cells – from one type will come the fetus, from the other the placenta.

The blastocyst must implant itself successfully into the uterine wall of the mother in order to continue development into a fetus. Within its inner mass, the blastocyst contains embryonic stem cells, and the researcher must harvest these cells and culture them to obtain an embryonic stem cell line. Harvesting embryonic stem cells always kills the blastocyst. I was once a blastocyst – all of us were once blastocysts – it’s a stage of life all human beings must go through.

Many people argue that the blastocyst is “only a mass of cells,” not a human being, just as they argue that a child in the womb has no rights until it’s born. But the blastocyst is not just a mass of cells such as you find in a Petri dish. The blastocyst has form, it has structure, and it has purpose, purpose bound up in the combined DNA of its parents, the blueprint for a unique human being. The church teaches that it is fully human, and to kill it violates the law of God – to kill it is murder.

The ostensible purpose of embryonic stem cell research is to find cures for certain terrible diseases and injuries which afflict human beings. Researchers hold out hope of cures for Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, heart disease, diabetes and spinal cord trauma to name those most often touted. Embryonic stem cells are pluripotent – that is, they may have the ability to be engineered into many different kinds of tissue, tissue that can repair trauma or substitute for cells that have been damaged or destroyed by disease. But our moral law, the law of God, holds that despite the noble end of curing disease or injury, to achieve that end by destroying human beings is intrinsically evil. The end never justifies the means. Never!

During WWII, the Nazis conducted terrible experiments on human beings in the death camps of Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and Auschwitz among the most infamous. In one set of these experiments, they wanted to learn how best to protect their airmen shot down over the North Sea from its frigid waters. So they dressed Jewish men in the protective clothing they’d developed, tied them up, and put them in vats of freezing water. Or, alternatively they strapped them naked to litters and put them outside in the freezing snow. Then they watched to see how long it would take them to die. They didn’t always kill them. They also wanted to learn the best ways to warm them up after they’d been in the freezing water or exposed to the frigid air for different lengths of time. So they conducted experiments on warming them back to normal temperatures.

The Allies captured the records of these experiments when they liberated the death camps. Although much of what they did was not only evil but bad science, the results of the Nazi freezing experiments indicated that the best way to warm a person after exposure to freezing temperatures is by rapid active rewarming. Subsequent legitimate researchers proposed to use the Nazi data in their own research, because the Nazis had subjected their victims to extremes that no legitimate researcher on hypothermia would even approach – and they had meticulously recorded the results. The editor of the New England Journal of Medicine roundly rejected one such proposal to analyze and publish the Nazi data to fill a research gap. The wickedness of the Nazi experiments was so great that even though data from them might be beneficial to legitimate research it must be rejected because of its origin.[1]

Embryonic stem cell research is as morally repugnant as the research carried out in the Nazi death camps and its results are just as tainted.

The real tragedy of President Obama’s executive order is that it’s unnecessary. In just the past year scientist have made some incredible advances in stem cell research that do not require the killing of embryos. As Cardinal Francis George wrote to President-elect Obama on January 16th of this year, “recent startling advances in reprogramming adult cells into embryonic-like stem cells – hailed by the journal Science as the scientific breakthrough of the year – are said by many scientists to be making embryonic stem cells irrelevant to medical progress.” [2]

Cardinal George was referring to research where scientists were able to take adult human skin cells and transform them into pluripotent cells, producing what are called induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS – they apparently have all the potential of growing into a variety of tissues that could ultimately lead to the capability to cure diseases with a patient’s own cells. In a second feat of genetic wizardry, researchers forced mature cells to change their form and function, bypassing the use of stem cells altogether. Working with live mice, an American team demonstrated that certain types of pancreatic cells could be forced to transform into beta cells, the cells that manufacture insulin. Since Type I diabetes kills beta cells, this research holds promise for a cure to that disease without killing human embryos.[3]

Much – no most – of the evil in today’s world comes from human beings’ persistent failure to respect and cherish the life and dignity of all human persons, from the moment of their conception until their natural death. Our ancestors in faith, the Jewish people, made a covenant with God at Mt Sinai in which they pledged to follow God’s law as it was given to them through Moses. We heard that law read to us in our first reading today. We call that law the 10 Commandments. There were other law codes in the ancient Middle East, but this code was unique in that God gave it to the Jewish people, so they could be in right relationship with him. This code was not just a code of laws to regulate society; it was meant to govern their relationship with God as well. When they broke God’s laws – and they did so many times throughout their history – they didn’t just break a law. They disrupted their relationship with God. We disrupt our own relationship with God whenever we break his commandments.

Science has done many wonderful things for humanity, the cure of disease being chief among them. But science is bound by the same moral law as is all human activity no matter how noble its purpose. All of us want to find cures for such horrible diseases as Alzheimer’s and diabetes, but this is not the way to do it. Embryonic stem cell research kills human beings at the very beginning of life. No cure is worth that! Providing federal tax dollars – my dollars and your dollars – to support this research is just – flat – wrong!


[1] Cohen, Bruce C. “The Ethics Of Using Medical Data From Nazi Experiments.” Found on the web at http://www.jlaw.com/Articles/NaziMedEx.html found on the web on March 12, 2009.
[2]Statement of Cardinal Justin Rigali on March 9, 2009 found at http://www.usccb.org/comm/archives/2009/09-052.shtml on March 13, 2009.
[3] “Science's Breakthrough of the Year: Reprogramming Cells” Found on the web at http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2008/12/isciencei-names-top-10-scientific-breakthroughs-of-2008.ars on March 13, 2009.

Deacon Bob Kreps on "Embryos and the Moral Law"

VIOLENCE AGAINST CHRISTIANS FLARES IN INDIA

The persecution of Christians in India has resulted in the murders of over 500 Christians in the past two years. Priests have been killed, nuns raped, but where is the world's outrage? Where are the front page press reports? Check out these web sites and ask yourself why you aren't reading about these stories in the St. Pete Times or the Tampa Tribune.

http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=1013

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/19/orissa-violence-india-christianity-hinduism

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Chennai/Priest_attacked_by_mob_in_Orissa_dies_in_city_hospital/articleshow/3653066.cms

http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=478603&sid=NAT

http://ipsbu.wordpress.com/2008/08/27/hindus-continue-to-attack-christians-in-kandhamal-orissa-india/

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYCJPpAsHejW-aS63tclVUUaGSZbPmETGNkEeKieoI5HhrItMVMFk8Rx4HNDVgbGfD_9xADC4j3OwKpYrPxfQUPlj7Zrhi5inTMp4q0Cd8-1orbDqKrL5sxgHHojLjFiz3RkpQ9fZPsJm2/s220/Editing+Meeting.JPG&imgrefurl=http://wisdomquarterly.blogspot.com/2008/10/hindu-mobs-kill-christians-burn.html&h=170&w=220&sz=14&hl=en&start=4&um=1&usg=__XXNysasP1MG7PUafvUceUyO2QXU=&tbnid=JmUSoFokzN6jPM:&tbnh=83&tbnw=107&prev=/images%3Fq%3DHindu%2Bmobs%2Bkill%2Bchristians%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7GWYA%26sa%3DN

PLANNED PARENTHOOD ADMITS INFANTICIDE HAPPENS

See the video here:
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/10/30/planned-parenthood-admits-infanticide-happens/

Read more here:
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/08/11/infanticide-revisited/