It's Game Time. Are You Ready to Help Fight the Good Fight?

It's Game Time. Are You Ready to Help Fight the Good Fight?

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The Conservative Democrat with Liberal Leanings to the Republican Party

The Conservative Democrat with Liberal Leanings to the Republican Party

Please Read Todd Lemieux's latest post. Absolutely perfect summary of what we are called to as Catholics/Christians. It is one of the greatest tensions of our lives to remain faithful to God and vote in a way according to that rather than the other way around.

God is Love: The Conservative Democrat with Liberal Leanings to the Republican Party

Living Life-Giving Lives

I came that they might have life and have it more abundantly. John 10:10

In the sum total of your life there will be a simple formula by which you are remembered. It will not be the amount of fun things you did, it will not be the death-defying stunts you did, it will not be the amount of money you made, it will not be the amount of accolades you received, it will not be the nice cars you drove, it will not be the number of touchdowns you scored, it will not be how good looking you were, it will be none of those things. In the sum total of your life, the math will only be this; did your life give life to others? Or to put it another way, "was your life creative?".

We are by our very nature creative. At the center of our human nature God made us male and female and gave us the parts necessary to in fact create life. He also gave us talents and abilities which are of their own miraculous. The simple tasks that you and I do each day may not seem extraordinary or even creative but have you ever had a moment when you were doing an every day thing like turning on a light where you stopped and thought of how incredible it is that Thomas Edison came up with the light bulb. Have you ever had an incredible meal and wondered how the chef or cook came up with such an incredible recipe? How is it that some people just know what will taste good? We are indeed creative at our core.

This is why I say that in the sum total of your life and mine there is a simple formula - did you give life? Unfortunately, for many of us we tend to take more than we give. I talk to people all the time who seem to just live life as if it were one big bank account meant to be spent until the last cent is gone. I actually met a man in an airport smoking section once who was enjoying a very nice and expensive cigar. As we were talking the man and he told me how he had made a lot of money in life and now that he was retired he was going to spend every last cent before he dies. He said "I hope that I overdraft on my last day." I laughed - because in my mind he must be joking - and he said, "I'm not kidding. I don't want my kids to get any of it, it is all mine. I made this money and it is mine to spend."

Are you living your life as if you are trying to overdraft your account?

There are lots of people who live this way and sadly many of them look to be living the good life. Many people applaud this kind of living even faithful believers in Christ. Still you may be wondering why it is so important that your life be "life-giving".Perhaps this short story can help:

There are two bodies of water in Jerusalem. One is flourishing and full of life. There are people congregating on its beaches regularly and wild-life everywhere. There are birds of all kinds, the waters are teaming with fish, the trees and wildflowers grow abundantly, and the water is beautiful and clear. The other is quite desolate. You would never choose to swim in this water. Its banks are bare and wildlife is hard to find. People do not congregate here and most people wouldn't eat fish caught in its waters. Both bodies of water are fed by the same river - the Jordan - so why is it that one is so full of life and the other not. Because the first, the Sea of Galilee pours out a drop of water for each one it takes in. It gives away all that it has and as such it is full of life. The other, holds the water in and never lets it out of its banks, it is called the Dead. - Matthew Kelly from Rhythm of Life

If you are living a life that is not creative or life-giving you will become stagnant just like the dead sea. On the contrary the more you seek to be "life-giving" or creative with everything you do, you will find abundance in your life. I will share more on this topic in the next day, but for now consider these questions:

1. What am I doing in my life that is life-giving or creative?
2. Am I seeking to give life to others through my relationships and encounters?

Feel free to share your thoughts on this topic in the comments section. It will help me in my next couple of articles.

In Christ,
Chris Faddis

CBS Movie about Catholic Social Worker in WWII

Beautifully this movie will air on Divine Mercy Sunday! Tomorrow April 19th at 9pm ET. Rumor has it that Irena kept a Divine Mercy prayer card with her when she was imprisoned and kept that card her entire life.

I hope and pray she is considered for Sainthood.







Story Courtesy of Catholic News Agency:

New York City, N.Y., Apr 18, 2009 / 12:58 pm (CNA).- On Sunday evening CBS will broadcast a movie about the heroic efforts and “courageous heart” of Irena Sendler, a Polish Catholic social worker who created and led an underground group that rescued Jewish children from Nazi persecution. Sendler created and led a conspiracy of women who moved in and out of Warsaw’s Jewish Ghetto disguised as nurses. While saying that they were simply to prevent and contain the spread of Typhus and Spotted Fever, Sendler and her companions helped the children of consenting Jewish parents escape imminent deportation to death camps, CBS' website says.

The children were sometimes sedated and hidden inside boxes, suitcases and coffins to escape the ghetto. They were given new identities and placed with Polish families and in convents.

Sendler kept a hidden record of the children’s birth names and locations in hopes that they could be reunited with their families. About 2,500 children were smuggled to safety, with none being discovered by the Nazis.

After the Nazis discovered her operation in 1943, Sendler was arrested and tortured by the Gestapo, who broke her feet. On the day of her execution, she was rescued by the underground network “Zegota,” with which she had worked to save Jewish children.

She kept a Divine Mercy holy card from her prison cell until 1979, when she gave the card to Pope John Paul II as a gift.

CBS will broadcast “The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler,” a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie, on Sunday, April 19 at 9 p.m. Eastern Time. It will star Anna Paquin as Irena while her mother will be played by Academy Award winner Marcia Gay Harden.

Nathaniel Parker will play the role of Dr. Majkowski, the head of Warsaw’s Department of Health who helped Sendler’s operation. Goran Visnjic will play Stefan, a Jewish university friend of Sendler with whom she fell in love when she began her underground operation.

The movie is based on Sendler’s authorized biography, Anna Mieszkowska’s 2005 book “Mother of the Children of the Holocaust: The Irena Sendler Story.”

Sendler was granted the title “Righteous among the Nations” by the organization Yad Vashem of Jerusalem in 1965 and was nominated several times for the Nobel Peace Prize. She died on May 12, 2008 at the age of 98.

More Videos on Irena:

A clip from the Movie


On Glenn Beck

Oh How We Need His Mercy

Tomorrow is Divine Mercy Sunday. The day that we as Catholics celebrate the outpouring of God's mercy that he promised to St. Faustina. Christ gave Faustina the prayers of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy and said we ought to recite it as often as we can, especially in times of great need or trial.

I will write more about this great prayer later but let me just say here that this prayer has saved my life and my family in so many ways. It is only be Christ's mercy and by calling on that mercy through this prayer that I have gotten through so many situations in my life.

We need God's Mercy for so many reasons and only you know why you need His Mercy today. I encourage and even beg of you to pray this prayer today, for yourself and for your family and all those that you love. Beg God for mercy daily.

Below is a recording of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy from www.catholictv.com. It is a great way to pray the chaplet especially if you have never prayed it or get distracted easily like I do.

You can also go to this site to learn more about the Chaplet and to get instructions on how to pray it. (Note: in your own prayer of this Chaplet you do not have to sing it like in the video.)

In Christ's Mercy,
Chris Faddis

Rule for Married Couples

John Paul II’s ‘Rule’ for married couples discovered, published by newspaper
From Catholic News Agency

Exerpt
“The Rule is aimed at married couples in their entirety and not to spouses as individuals. It is important, indeed, that it is adopted and put in practice by the couple, not solely the husbands or wives without the commitment of their spouses.”

READ THE FULL STORY HERE

Handing Over the Spirit - TRUST

In prayer today I was trying to focus on the prayer and not what I was praying for. I was praying a Chaplet and kept losing my focus to worrying about what it was I was offering up. As I sat there losing my place for the fifth time I finally stopped and ask God why I can't focus.

I just want to trust God with everything; I want to hand it over and trust that he will take care of it all. But instead I'm sitting there thinking of solutions, figuring it out in my head while I recite the prayers. Why?

In truth I think it is because where the rubber meets the road when it comes to trusting God is in actually handing over our troubles one by one and actually letting go. This is what God desires of us in prayer. To hand it all over to him and let it be His concern. "Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?" Matt 6:27

I began to think about Christ on the Cross in that moment of handing over His spirit and breathing his last. He had to actually hand over his spirit; he had to lay it down. He had to trust that His Father would not fail Him.

I think about that in relation to my own struggles. I must hand each one over to God and die to it. Christ breathed his last and so too must I breathe my last breathe of concern and worry. I must give it over to Him and die to the worry - If I hand over my worry, my anxiety about one thing or another - I must like Christ say "into your hands Lord I commend my spirit." Not so I can pick it back up later. Often I think we pray, and then we go to work trying to solve this or that. Or we pray and let it go only to wake up in panic the next day continuing to worry. Rather, what we ought to do is breathe our last concern over that matter, hand it over to the Father through Christ's Divine Mercy and allow Him to do the rest. In a sense we are waiting for a "resurrection" of that concern/worry/situation.

This is a difficult task and one that must happen over and over again, as new situations rise in our lives and we hand them over one by one dying to our worry a little more each day. Each time we do this His infinite Grace and Mercy fill that place in our hearts and goes to work in our lives.

Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, truly present in the Holy Eucharist, I place all my trust in you.


I offer this simple prayer to help you in handing it over to Christ.

A Prayer of Trust
Father, into your hands I commend my spirit; my human weakness, my frailty, my anxiety and fear. Into your hands Lord I commend __________________ (list a concern or burden). I die to this worry in full trust and confidence that your mercy and grace are sufficient for me and that just as your Son rose from the grave you will resurrect this situation in my life.

Another prayer from the Divine Mercy Novena:

Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion —
inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in
difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great
confidence submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy itself.

If you haven't prayed the Divine Mercy Chaplet I encourage you to pray it regularly to help you in this dying to your worries and concerns. You can find it here.