Ad te beate Ioseph

As we close this month in honor of St. Joseph, let us approach him for assistance as we enter Holy Week.  Even though he did not have to witness the events of Holy Week, neither did we. Therefore, it is appropriate to ask for his help so that we might have the proper view of these tragic and glorious events. Let us walk with Joseph following in the footsteps of Jesus.

Also, it would make sense that a part of the strength that Christ had during His sufferings (even if it was only a small part) was from the witness and teachings of his foster-father. Joseph taught Jesus how to patiently endure in silence the sufferings and pangs of this world. It is fitting then to go to Joseph in the midst of our trials and to learn from him how to suffer.

TO thee, O blessed Joseph, do we come in our tribulation, and having implored the help of thy most holy Spouse, we confidently invoke thy patronage also. Through that charity which bound thee to the immaculate Virgin Mother of God and through the paternal love with which thou embraced the Child Jesus, we humbly beg thee to graciously regard the inheritance which Jesus Christ has purchased by his Blood, and with thy power and strength to aid us in our necessities.

O most watchful Guardian of the Holy Family, defend the chosen children of Jesus Christ; O most loving father, ward off from us every contagion of error and corrupting influence; O our most mighty protector, be propitious to us and from heaven assist us in our struggle with the power of darkness; and, as once thou rescued the Child Jesus from deadly peril, so now protect God's Holy Church from the snares of the enemy and from all adversity; shield, too, each one of us by thy constant protection, so that, supported by thy example and thy aid, we may be able to live piously, to die holy, and to obtain eternal happiness in heaven. Amen. (Pope Leo XIII)

March-Month of Saint Joseph

The feast day of Saint Joseph falls on March 19th and so this month has always been venerated as a month dedicated to St. Joseph, patron of the Universal Church. This month, I hope to provide various reflections on St. Joseph and how he can be both a teacher for us in the interior life and guide us in our work.

Saint Josemaria Escriva on Saint Joseph:

There are many good reasons to honour Saint Joseph, and to learn from his life. He was a man of strong faith. He earned a living for his family ‑‑ Jesus and Mary ‑‑ with his own hard work. He guarded the purity of the Blessed Virgin, who was his Spouse. And he respected ‑ he loved! ‑ God's freedom, when God made his choice: not only his choice of Our Lady the Virgin as his Mother, but also his choice of Saint Joseph as the Husband of Holy Mary. (The Forge, 552)

Saint Joseph, our Father and Lord: most chaste, most pure. You were found worthy to carry the Child Jesus in your arms, to wash him, to hug him. Teach us to get to know God, and to be pure, worthy of being other Christs. And help us to do and to teach, as Christ did. Help us to open up the divine paths of the earth, which are both hidden and bright; and help us to show them to mankind, telling our fellow men that their lives on earth can have an extraordinary and constant supernatural effectiveness. (The Forge, 553)

Love Saint Joseph a lot. Love him with all your soul, because he, together with Jesus, is the person who has most loved our Blessed Lady and been closest to God. He is the person who has most loved God, after our Mother. He deserves your affection, and it will do you good to get to know him, because he is the Master of the interior life, and has great power before the Lord and before the Mother of God. (The Forge, 554)

Meditation for the Second Sunday of Lent

Meditation on the Transfiguration

(Gospel for Second Sunday of Lent)

Troparion

You were Transfigured on the Mount,
O Christ God,

Revealing Your glory to Your disciples as far as they could bear it.

Let Your everlasting Light shine upon us sinners!

Through the prayers of the Theotokos,
O Giver of Light, glory to You!

Kontakion

On the Mountain You were
Transfigured, O Christ God,

And Your disciples beheld Your glory as far as they could see it;

So that when they would behold You crucified,

They would understand that Your
 suffering was voluntary,

And would proclaim to the world,

That You are truly the Radiance of the Father!

Troparion

Come, you faithful, let us welcome the Transfiguration of Christ,

And let us joyfully cry as we celebrate the prefeast:

"The day of holy gladness has come;

The Lord has ascended Mount Tabor

To radiate the beauty of His divinity."

-Taken from the Byzantine Liturgy for the Feast of the Transfiguration

Reflections on Ash Wednesday

First, here is an excerpt on what the Pope had to say about Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday is a day of fasting and penance on which we begin a new journey towards the Easter of Resurrection, the journey of Lent. I would like to reflect on the liturgical sign of the ashes, a material sign, a natural element that, in the Liturgy, becomes a sacred symbol, so important on this day that marks the start of our Lenten journey. In ancient times, in the Jewish culture, it was common to sprinkle one’s head with ashes as a sign of penance, and to dress in sack-cloth and rags. For us Christians, there is this one moment which has important symbolic and spiritual relevance.
Ashes are the material sign that brings the cosmos into the Liturgy. The most important signs are those of the Sacraments: water, oil, bread and wine, which become true sacramental elements through which we communicate the Grace of Christ who comes among us. The ashes are not a sacramental sign, but they are linked with prayer and the sanctification of the Christian people. Before the ashes are placed on our heads, they are blessed according to two possible formulae: in the first they are called “austere symbols”, in the second, we invoke a blessing directly upon them, referring to the text in the Book of Genesis which can also accompany the imposition of the ashes: “Remember that you are dust and unto dust you shall return”. Read More...

Here is an excerpt of an additional reflection via the New Liturgical Movement by Dom Prosper Gueranger:

This was the motive the Church had in enriching her liturgy with the solemn rite, at which we are to assist this morning. When, upwards a thousand years ago, she decreed the anticipation of the lenten fast by the last four days of Quinquagesima week, she instituted this impressive ceremony of signing the forehead of her children with ashes, while saying to them those awful words, wherewith God sentenced us to death: 'Remember, O man, that thou art dust, and into dust thou shalt return!' But the making use of ashes as a symbol of humiliation and penance, is of a much earlier date than the institution to which we allude. We find frequent mention of it in the Old Testament. Job, though a Gentile, sprinkled his flesh with ashes, that, thus humbled, he might propitiate the divine mercy and this was two thousand years before the coming of our Savior. The royal prophet tells us of himself, that he mingled ashes with his bread, because of the divine anger and indignation. Many such examples are to be met with in the sacred Scriptures; but so obvious is the analogy between the sinner who thus signifies his grief, and the object whereby he signifies it, that we read such instances without surprise. When fallen man would humble himself before the divine justice, which has sentenced his body to return to dust, how could he more aptly express his contrite acceptance of the sentence, than by sprinkling himself, or his food, with ashes, which is the dust of wood consumed by fire? This earnest acknowledgment of his being himself but dust and ashes, is an act of humility, and humility ever gives him confidence in that God, who resists the proud and pardons the humble.

Fast and Pray

An excerpt from a reflection on Ash Wednesday by Fr. Steven Markantonis from the Theology of the Body Institute

"When asked why his disciples do not fast, the Lord Jesus responds, "Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them and then they will fast." (Mt 9:15) The days will come, and are now finally here! Lent begins. Throughout the liturgical year we are afforded the benefit of experiencing the entire life of Christ our Bridegroom. Our Lenten journey is thus a sacramental entrance into the mystery of the Lord's suffering and death. We must enter into the sorrow, bitterness, pain and loss of the Lord's death; for there can be no Easter Sunday without Good Friday. As we journey into this reality, we too suffer as our beloved, our divine spouse, our everything and all, is being taken away from us. We find ourselves again abandoned and afraid.

 [...]

The fast is our preparation for the feast. It is an interior preparation, a circumcision of the heart, through which we take up our cross and walk daily with our Beloved. He endured what he did to heal us of our sins. No doubt then, when we fast we share his cross so as to be purified and healed of any lesser loves that get in the way of our one true Love. We literally become emptied so as to be filled with the new wine of divine grace. The Bridegroom is being taken away, but he will return. Then, we will share in the victory feast, the nuptial feast, when our Beloved has conquered all threats and divisions, and brought us to the newness of life!"