Suffering With Joy

Sunday Snippets – A Catholic Carnival

January 9, 2010

Hello, Sunday Snippets readers!  Welcome to this carnival hosted by RAnn at This That and the Other Thing where Catholic bloggers share their posts for the week. Join us at RAnn’s and link over there to your favorite posts of the week or read and leave comments.

This week I finished an autobiography by Susan Boyle and reviewed it at Susan Boyle – Her Inspiring Story.

Pillar hermits have always fascinated me so on his feast day I wrote a bit about St. Simeon Stylites – A Hermit on a Pillar.

Epiphany – Celebration of Three Manifestations of Christ’s Divinity covers one of my favorite feasts of the year and why I love it.

Please pray for my sister who is out of work and needs a job.

Want to subscribe to posts by email? Visit the third box in the sidebar.

V.  Praised be Jesus Christ!

R.  Now and forever.  Amen.

(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)

Tags: liturgy, Saints

St. Simeon Stylites – A Hermit on a Pillar

January 5, 2010

St. Simeon Stylites icon, 1465 A.D., Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

For about 600 years in the early Church, God called certain followers of Christ to be hermits in the north African and Middle East deserts.  St. Simeon Stylites was one of them.  Stylos means pillar in Greek, and stylites is a person supported or standing on a pillar.  Hence his name, Simeon Sytlites.

Today we can hardly imagine what it would be like to fast from food and water in the desert for the forty days of Lent, but St. Simeon did that and more.  The average person would be dead in a week or so.  Most of us can’t imagine being hermits at all, although God is still calling people to this vocation and you can find them in many dioceses in the United States and other countries. The 1983 Code of Canon Law in the Catholic Church provides vows and rules for the eremitic life.

St. Simeon Stylites received extraordinary graces to live the way he did because only God can keep somebody alive under the blazing desert sun, in sweeping dust storms, through cold nights and rain, fasting and praying always.

He was born in northern Syria in 388 where he tended sheep.  Before St. Simeon was sixteen, he joined a monastery but horrified his fellow monks with his extreme asceticism. He quit the monastery and went to live in the wilderness where eventually he took up life at the top of a pillar adoring and praising God day and night.

Column Remains of St Simeon The Stylite topped with boulder, Syria, Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

As happened with many of the desert hermits, people flocked from miles around to ask for guidance to live in a holy way. St. Simeon prayed, preached to the crowds that came, wrote letters we still have today, and advised his disciples from the top of his pillar which was always exposed to the weather.

Although his manner of living seems extreme, God is teaching us a lesson: no matter how unusual a person’s calling is, we cannot judge God’s work in their heart. We should never interfere with someone’s vocation or criticize his path, especially when the person is under spiritual direction.  God has a special job for each of us individually, a job He prepares us for often over many years without us realizing it. We can imitate St. Simeon Stylites by seeking God alone in all that we do.

If you’ve ever felt that you were banging your head against the wall with regard to your spiritual life, it means you are trying to do it all yourself rather than letting God lead you as St. Simeon let God lead him. Stop.  Climb the spiritual pillar in front of you and get away from the incessant demands pressuring you.  Be silent and contemplate the Lord.  He is with you and will never leave you.

Want to subscribe to posts by email? Visit the third box in the sidebar.

V.  Praised be Jesus Christ!

R.  Now and forever.  Amen.

(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)

Tags: Catholic Church, sacrifice, Saints

St. Andrew, the Relationship Broker

November 30, 2010

Last week I wrote a little about St. Clement of Rome and my various patrons.  Today the Church celebrates the feast of St. Andrew, the Apostle, who is also special to me because my brother closest in age to me is named after him. (Happy feastday, brother!)

I call St. Andrew the “Relationship Broker” because he is the one who brought Peter, his brother, to Jesus.  He also brought the little boy with the loaves and fishes to Jesus when the crowd needed to be fed.

In neither case did St. Andrew get a commission for his “brokering”.  He thought only of the needs of others and did all that he could out of the generosity of his heart to bring the right people together for the benefit of all. Of course Jesus was the key to these relationships.

By the time he started preaching the Gospel in Greece and other places, nobody could keep him quiet.  Even when he was crucified upside down he preached until his last breath.

Because many churches and especially the Orthodox celebrate the feast of St. Andrew with great solemnity, every year the Pope sends a delegation to mark this day with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew 1^st at the headquarters of the Orthodox Church in Fanar, Istanbul.  Vatican Radio reports:

In a message sent to Patriarch Bartholomew, the Pope says “in a world characterized by increasing interdependence and solidarity, we are called to proclaim the truth of the Gospel with renewed conviction, and to present the risen Lord as the response to the most profound spiritual questions and aspirations of men and women today.”

In order to do this, the Pope adds, “we must continue along the path towards full communion, showing that we have already united our strengths for a shared witness of the Gospel. For this reason I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Your Holiness and to the Ecumenical Patriarchate for the generous hospitality you offered to delegates of the European Episcopal Conferences who – on the island of Rhodes in October – met with representatives of the Orthodox Churches of Europe for the Catholic-Orthodox Forum on the theme: ‘Relations between Church and State: theological and historical perspectives’”. Pope Benedict concludes his message by assuring the patriarch of “the interest with which he follows “your wise efforts for the good of Orthodoxy and for the promotion of Christian values in many international contexts”.

Bishop Brian Farrell, a member of the delegation sent to Turkey this year said:

“Andrew is the ‘first called’ of the disciples, it was he who then called Peter…Andrew, the brother of Peter, is as forceful symbol of the kind of embrace we would like to see between East and West.”

As an indefatigable evangelist, St. Andrew shows us that all we have to do is bring people to Jesus. We find those who are sad and searching and tell them there is hope – real hope – not in earthly pursuits but in the Son of God.  We find people with special gifts needed in the world today and point them to Him.  Jesus then does the rest.

Fair questions to ask myself are: Am I as generous sharing Jesus with others as St. Andrew was?  Am I willing to bring the good news of Christ to others even to my last breath like St. Andrew?

St. Andrew is the patron saint of sore throats , Russia, Greece, and Scotland.

V.  Praised be Jesus Christ!

R.  Now and forever.  Amen.

(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)

Tags: Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI, Saints

St. Clement of Rome

November 23, 2010

Today is the feast of St. Clement of Rome, the third pope after St. Peter, consecrated bishop by the Apostle himself.  He is considered the first of the Fathers of the Church and Patristic writer.

St. Clement’s name has been enshrined in the Canon of the Mass since the early Church.  He died a martyr in the ferocious persecution of Domitian.

We know this early pope for a couple of epistles he wrote to the Corinthians concerning the need for charity, the evils of schism and ill treatment of priests.  The fact that he wrote his letters as a successor of the seat of Peter indicates that the role of Pope was well-established from the beginning of the Church.

It wasn’t until 1997 that I realized St. Clement is a special patron of mine because today is my birthday.  I became involved in the movement for restoration of the sacred liturgy that year, and who better than a former pope to look after me in this work? I have often felt he was with me and thank God that I was born on this day.

Co-incidentally my name patron, St. Barbara, whose feast is December 4th, is known for her devotion to the Holy Eucharist, a central part of the Church’s liturgy, and I was baptized on December 8th, the feast of Mary’s Immaculate Conception.  How could anybody be so lucky?  Now it remains to live up to the example of these three holy people in all that I do, to fulfill the blessings God has given me, to do the job He has asked.

God bless my readers and please pray for me.

11/24/10 – Addition to this post:

Who is your birthday patron?  Your name patron?  The saint of the day you were baptized?  What have they to do with your life?

V.  Praised be Jesus Christ!

R.  Now and forever.  Amen.

(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)

Tags: Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI, Saints

Blessed John Henry Newman – I Have My Mission

October 13, 2010

Pope Benedict XVI’s recent trip held an event long desired and enthusiastically anticipated by Catholics, especially those of English speaking countries.  The beatification of Blessed John Henry Newman, one of the leaders of the Oxford Movement in the 19th century was a cause of great celebration.

Newman, a convert from the Anglican Church, was one of the greatest thinkers and shepherds of the Catholic Church in his time.  His wisdom has been a buffer to modernism and his holiness a salve to the troubled heart. For those of us in the Traditional Mass movement, Newman has been a shining star – a saint who always spoke the truth in charity.

What he wrote about his purpose in life expresses perfectly what my blog and the rest of my life is all about.  May you find inspiration in it, too.

Newman’s Purpose is the Christian Purpose

I have a place in God’s counsels, in God’s world, which no one else has;
whether I be rich or poor, despised or esteemed by man, God knows me and calls me by my name.

God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission–I never may know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next.

Somehow I am necessary for His purposes,
as necessary in my place as an Archangel in his
–if, indeed, I fail, He can raise another, as He could make the stones children of Abraham.

Yet I have a part in this great work;
I am a link in a chain, a bond of connexion between persons.
He has not created me for naught.
I shall do good, I shall do His work;
I shall be an angel of peace,
a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it,
if I do but keep His commandments and serve Him in my calling.

Therefore I will trust Him.

Whatever, wherever I am, I can never be thrown away.
If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him;
in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him;
if I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.
My sickness, or perplexity, or sorrow may be necessary causes of some great end,
which is quite beyond us.

He does nothing in vain; He may prolong my life, He may shorten it;
He knows what He is about.
He may take away my friends,
He may throw me among strangers,
He may make me feel desolate,
make my spirits sink, hide the future from me
–still He knows what He is about.

Blessed John Henry Newman

V.  Praised be Jesus Christ!

R.  Now and forever.  Amen.

(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)

Tags: Blessed John Henry Newman, Saints, trust in God

Sunday Snippets – A Catholic Carnival

June 20, 2010

Sunday Snippets – a Catholic Carnival is hosted by RAnn over at This That and The Other Thing.  It’s a great way to meet other Catholic bloggers and get acquainted with their writing.  You are welcome to join in even if you don’t have a blog yourself. I have made some wonderful friends by participating in this meme nearly every weekend.

This week I was very busy developing a study guide for my friend Lynn’s book, Amazing Grays – Amazing Grace. There were many chapters and it took a lot of mental energy to plow through the job so she will have it ready for a homeschooling conference in Austin, Texas next weekend.  Thus, I didn’t get many posts written.

You may like to read about a great Doctor of the Church, St. Ephrem, who is called “Harp of the Holy Ghost”. His feast was this week.  I also included a YouTube performance of one of his Nativity poems set to music for the Syrian Orthodox liturgy by composer John Tavener.  St. Ephrem’s hymns and writings are also used in the Maronite rite of the Catholic Church.

In the post Praying the Psalms – Psalm 23 I wrote some truths that came to me while meditating on this famous psalm.

God bless you and have a beautiful, fruitful week.

Tags: Saints