The Person of Jesus Christ and the Trinity

2. The Person of Jesus Christ and the Trinity

6. k That “Love Thy Neighbour Thing” ….. I meant it. - God

7. Loved the wedding. Invite me to the marriage. - God

8. k I love you …. I love you….. I love you - God

9. k Will the road you are on get to my place? - God

10. k You think it’s hot here? - God

11. k Tell the kids I love them! - God

12. k Have you read my # 1 best seller? (There will be a test) - God

13. k Do you have any idea where you are going? - God

14. k My way is the highway - God

15. k Godspeaks.com

16. 1. Practical 2. The Blessed Virgin Mary and the Saints 3. Prayer

17. The Annunciation by Fra Angelico The Blessed Virgin Mary

18. But when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” (St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians 4:4-5)

19. Luke: 1: 26 -38 The Annunciation 26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favoured one! The Lord is with you.’* 29But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. 30The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. 31And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. 32He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. 33He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ 34Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’* 35The 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 holy; he will be called Son of God. 36And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. 37For nothing will be impossible with God.’ 38Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her.

20. Luke 1:39-56 The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her cousin, Elizabeth. 39 In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, 40 where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leapt in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42 and exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43 And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leapt for joy. 45And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.’ 46 And Mary said,‘My soul magnifies the Lord, 47   and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, 48 for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.   Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me,   and holy is his name. 50 His mercy is for those who fear him   from generation to generation. 51 He has shown strength with his arm;   he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,   and lifted up the lowly; 53 he has filled the hungry with good things,   and sent the rich away empty. 54 He has helped his servant Israel,   in remembrance of his mercy, 55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors,   to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’ 56 And Mary remained with her for about three months and then returned to her home.

21. Wedding at Cana John 2:1-11

22. There was a wedding at Cana in Galilee. The mother of Jesus was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited. When they ran out of wine, since the wine provided for the wedding was all finished, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” Jesus said, “Woman, why turn to me? My hour has not come yet.” His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” There were six stone water jars standing there, meant for the ablutions that are customary among the Jews: each could hold twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water,” and they filled them to the brim.

23. “Draw some out now,” he told them, “and take it to the steward.” They did this; the steward tasted the water, and it had turned into wine. Having no idea where it came from – only the servants who had drawn the water knew – the steward called the bridegroom and said, “People generally serve the best wine first, and keep the cheaper sort till the guests have had plenty to drink; but you have kept the best wine till now.” This was the first of the signs given by Jesus: it was given at Cana in Galilee. He let his glory be seen, and his disciples believed in him.

24. John 19: 25b-27 Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ 27Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.

25. Her Immaculate Conception • The Virgin Birth: “How can this be for I have not know man.” Luke Fulfillment of the prophet Isaiah 7:14 “a virgin shall conceive and bear a son.” -mentioned in the Apostles Creed of the 1st C. • Mother of God: Mary supplied the Son of God, the second person of the Blessed Trintity, become man with his human nature. Jesus is one person, the Son of God with two natures, divine and human. A mother is the mother of a person and therefore she is the Mother of God. • The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin at the moment of her death • Mother of the Church: “John, this is your mother. Woman, this is your son.” • λατρεία: Latria: Worship due to God alone δουλια : Dulia: Veneration/honour given to the saints. ὑπέρδουλια: hyperdulia: hyper veneration/ honour given to the Blessed Virgin Mary

26. The Reasons for “Hyper” Veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary • Model of Obedience to God: Her yes to God’s plan. “Be it done unto me according to Thy word.” • Model of prayer • The most perfect Christian: “Do whatever he tells you.”

27. Saints Catholic online catholic.org Saints Index Saints FAQs Patron Saints Popular Saints Female Saints Black Saints Japanese Saints Irish Saints Martyr Saints Stigmata Doctors of the Church Feast day List Saint of the Day Saints Fun Facts Saint Calendar California Missions & Saints Search Saints

28. http://www.catholic-pages.com/dir/saints.asp What is a Saint?. In official Church procedures there are three steps to sainthood: one becomes Venerable, Blessed and then a Saint. Venerable is the title given to a deceased person recognized as having lived heroic virtues. (A life of prayer, a life of service and moral virtue) To be recognized as a blessed, and therefore beatified, in addition to personal attributes of charity and heroic virtue, one miracle, acquired through the individual's intercession, is required. Canonization requires two. Martyrdom does not usually require a miracle.

29. Blessed Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997) Lived a life of heroic virtue One miracle has already been accepted

30. Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati (1901- 1925) “In this trying time that our country is going through we Catholics and especially we students, have a serious duty to fulfill: our self-formation. [...]We, who by the grace of God are Catholics... must steel ourselves for the battle we shall certainly have to fight to fulfill our program and give our country, in the not too distant future, happier days and a morally healthy society, but to achieve this we need constant prayer to obtain from God that grace without which all our prayers are useless; organization and discipline to be ready for action at the right time; and finally, the sacrifice of our passion and of ourselves, because without that we cannot achieve our aim.” (1922)

31. St. Gianna Beretta Molla (1922 – 1962)

32. Prayer

33. The best way to teach anyone to pray is to model it. • Begin and end each class with a prayer. • If they see it is of value to you, then they will value it. (It is also one of the best techniques to use to bring a class to order that I have ever used.) Remember Pope Paul VI: “Modern man no longer listens to teachers. He only listens to witnesses. And he only listens to teachers when they are witnesses.”

34. WHAT IS PRAYER? “For me, prayer is a surge of the heart;it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy.” St. Thérèse of Lisieux (1875-1899)

35. "Prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God or the requesting of good things from God."[ St. John Damascene (676 AD to 749 AD)

36. What is prayer? Matthew 7:7-12 7 "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Which one of you would hand his son a stone when he asks for a loaf of bread, 10 or a snake when he asks for a fish? 11 If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him. 12 "Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the law and the prophets.

37. Mother Teresa’s Business Card The Fruit of Silence is Prayer The Fruit of Prayer is Faith The Fruit of Faith is Love The Fruit of Love is Service The Fruit of Service is Peace

38. Ritual Sustains Prayer by Father Ron Rolheiser In a homily at a wedding Dietrich Bonhoeffer once gave this advice to a young couple: “Today you ae young and very much in love and you think that your love can sustain your marriage. It can’t. Let your marriage sustain your love.” Love and prayer work the same: The neophyte’s mistake is to think that they can be sustained simply through good feelings and good intention, without the help of ritual-container and a sustaining rhythm. That’s naïve, however sincere. Love and prayer can only be sustained through ritual, routine and rhythm. Why? What eventually makes us stop praying John of the Cross says is simple boredom, tiredness, lack of energy. It’s hard, very hard, existentially impossible, to crank up the energy, day and day out, to pray with real affectivity, real feeling and real heart. We simply cannot sustain that kind of energy and enthusiasm. We’re human beings, limited in our energies. We need something else to help us. What? Ritual- a rhythm, a routine. Monks have secrets worth knowing and anyone who has ever been to a monastery knows that monks (who pray often and a lot) sustain themselves in prayer not through feeling, variety or creativity, but through ritual, rhythm and routine. Monastic prayer is simple, often rote, has a clear durational expectancy and is structured so as to allow each monk the freedom to invest himself or hold back, in terms of energy and heart, depending upon his disposition on a given day. That is wise anthropology.

39. Ritual Sustains Prayer by Father Ron Rolheiser In a homily at a wedding Dietrich Bonhoeffer once gave this advice to a young couple: “Today you are young and very much in love and you think that your love can sustain your marriage. It can’t. Let your marriage sustain your love.” Love and prayer work the same: The neophyte’s mistake is to think that they can be sustained simply through good feelings and good intention, without the help of ritual-container and a sustaining rhythm. That’s naïve, however sincere. Love and prayer can only be sustained through ritual, routine and rhythm. Why? What eventually makes us stop praying John of the Cross says is simple boredom, tiredness, lack of energy. It’s hard, very hard, existentially impossible, to crank up the energy, day in and day out, to pray with real affectivity, real feeling and real heart. We simply cannot sustain that kind of energy and enthusiasm. We’re human beings, limited in our energies. We need something else to help us. What?

40. Prayer is like eating. There needs to be a good rhythm between big banquets (high celebration, lots of time, proper formality) and the everyday family supper (simple, no-frills, short, predictable). A family that ries to eat every meal as if it were a baquet soon finds that most of its members are looking for an excuse to be absent. With good reason. Everyone needs to eat every day, but nobody has energy for a banquet every day. The same holds true for prayer. One wonders whether the huge drop-off of people who used to attend church services daily isn’t connected to this. People attended daily services more when those services were short, routine, predictable and gave them the freedom to be as present or absent (in terms of emotional investment) as their energy and heart allowed on that given day. Today, unfortunately, we are misled by a number of misconceptions about prayer and liturgy. Too commonly, we accept the following set of axioms as wise: creativity and variety are always good. Every prayer-celebration should be one of high energy. Longer is better than shorter. Either you should pray with feeling or you shouldn’t pray at al. ritual is meaningless unless we are emotionally invested in it. Each of these axioms is overly romantic, ill thought out, anthropologically naïve and not helpful in sustaining a life of prayer. Prayer is a relationship, a one-term one, and lives by those rules. Relating to anyone long term has its ups and downs. Nobody can be interesting all the time, sustain high energy all the time or fully invest himself or herself all the time. Rally life doesn’t work that way. Neither does prayer. What sustains a relationship long-term is ritual, routine, a regular rhythm that incarnates the commitment.

41. Ritual- a rhythm, a routine. Monks have secrets worth knowing and anyone who has ever been to a monastery knows that monks (who pray often and a lot) sustain themselves in prayer not through feeling, variety or creativity, but through ritual, rhythm and routine. Monastic prayer is simple, often rote, has a clear durational expectancy and is structured so as to allow each monk the freedom to invest himself or hold back, in terms of energy and heart, depending upon his disposition on a given day. That is wise anthropology. Prayer is like eating. There needs to be a good rhythm between big banquets (high celebration, lots of time, proper formality) and the everyday family supper (simple, no-frills, short, predictable). A family that tries to eat every meal as if it were a banquet soon finds that most of its members are looking for an excuse to be absent. With good reason. Everyone needs to eat every day, but nobody has energy for a banquet every day. The same holds true for prayer. One wonders whether the huge drop-off of people who used to attend church services daily isn’t connected to this.

42. Imagine you have an aged mother in a nursing ghome and you’ve committed yourself to visiting her twice a week. How do you sustain yourself in this. Not by feeling energy or emotion, but by commitment, routine and ritual. You go to visit her at a given time not because you feel like it but because its time. You go to visit her in spite of the fact that you sometimes can’t give her the best of your heart and that often you are tired, distracted restless, over-burdened and are occasionally sneaking a glance at your watch and wondering how soon you can make a graceful exit. • Moreover, your conversation with her will not always be deep or about meaningful things. Occasionally there will be emotional satisfaction and the sense that something important was shared, but many times, perhaps most times, there will only be the sense that it was good that you were there and that nay important life-giving connection has been nurtured and sustained, despite what seemingly occurred at the surface. You’ve been with your mother and that’s more important than whatever feelings or conversation might have taken place. Prayer works the same way. That’s why the saints and great spiritual writers have always said there is only one, non-negotiable rule of prayer: “Show up! Show up regularly!” The ups and downs of our minds and hearts are of secondary importance.

43. People attended daily services more when those services were short, routine, predictable and gave them the freedom to be as present or absent (in terms of emotional investment) as their energy and heart allowed on that given day. Today, unfortunately, we are misled by a number of misconceptions about prayer and liturgy. Too commonly, we accept the following set of axioms as wise: creativity and variety are always good. Every prayer-celebration should be one of high energy. Longer is better than shorter. Either you should pray with feeling or you shouldn’t pray at al. Ritual is meaningless unless we are emotionally invested in it. Each of these axioms is overly romantic, ill thought out, anthropologically naïve and not helpful in sustaining a life of prayer. Prayer is a relationship, a one on one, and lives by those rules. Relating to anyone long term has its ups and downs. Nobody can be interesting all the time, sustain high energy all the time or fully invest himself or herself all the time. Really life doesn’t work that way. Neither does prayer. What sustains a relationship long-term is ritual, routine, a regular rhythm that incarnates the commitment.

44. Imagine you have an aged mother in a nursing home and you’ve committed yourself to visiting her twice a week. How do you sustain yourself in this. Not by feeling energy or emotion, but by commitment, routine and ritual. You go to visit her at a given time not because you feel like it but because its time. You go to visit her in spite of the fact that you sometimes can’t give her the best of your heart and that often you are tired, distracted restless, over-burdened and are occasionally sneaking a glance at your watch and wondering how soon you can make a graceful exit. Moreover, your conversation with her will not always be deep or about meaningful things. Occasionally there will be emotional satisfaction and the sense that something important was shared, but many times, perhaps most times, there will only be the sense that it was good that you were there and that any important life-giving connection has been nurtured and sustained, despite what seemingly occurred at the surface. You’ve been with your mother and that’s more important than whatever feelings or conversation might have taken place. Prayer works the same way. That’s why the saints and great spiritual writers have always said there is only one, non-negotiable rule of prayer: “Show up! Show up regularly!” The ups and downs of our minds and hearts are of secondary importance.

45. The Serenity Prayer God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; Enjoying one moment at a time; Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace. Taking as he did, This sinful world as it is, Not as I would have it. Trusting that he will make all things right If I surrender to his will. That I may be reasonably happy in this life And supremely happy With him forever in the next. Amen.

46. Nicene Creed We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, one in being with the Father. Through him all things were made. For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven, by the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the Virgin Mary, and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered, died, and was buried. On the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the prophets. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world. Amen..