Friday, July 24, 2015

An important Message!

John 6, 1-6; Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time. July 26th, 2015

Dear Friends,

Again, sadly, we have had another deadly shooting at a movie theater, just three years from the deadly shooting that took place in Aurora Colorado. Shortly after that shooting, three years ago, I shared with you a very important message from Fr. Mitch Pacwa, a Jesuit priest who is a regular on E.W.T.N. I reread his important message from three years ago and know that it is even more true today. Please read it carefully and prayerfully. Included are the additional comments I made three years ago as well. God bless you and may God bless America by bringing us to our knees in repentance and conversion. Our Lady of the Americas pray for us...St. Joseph protect our families. Amen.

Father Lange

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This past week I heard a very powerful message from a holy priest who was speaking about the horrible massacre which took place at the movie theater in Aurora Colorado; this priest’s name by the way is Father Mitch Pacwa. I know that many of you know Him. I want to share this message with you today.
We are very shocked and concerned about this terrible tragedy and our hearts continue to go out to the families of the victims; and we continue to pray for those who were killed and injured. We also pray for all of the law enforcement and EMS personal who had to be greatly affected by such unspeakable horror.

I am sure we are going to hear plenty of people tell us what we need to do to prevent such a tragedy from occurring in the future. But I think, as did this good and holy priest that I listen too, that we have to keep something very important in mind as we struggle to come to grasp with such evil and seek a remedy for our society. I think we have to keep something very important in mind that has to do with the nature of our great country. And now, Fr. Pacwa:

"When the Constitution of these Unites States was written, the founding Fathers said they wanted to restrict the size and power of the federal Government. Remember when they came to America, they had just escaped from an oppressive government and did not want to form a new oppressive Government. So they focused on restricting the federal government and limiting its power and its reach.

But when you read some of the document of these first founders, especially Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams and others, they emphasized that with such a government structure, that placed so much on individual responsibility, you depend on having a moral people, that the people themselves have to have firm moral characters. In other words, they knew that their vision would only work with a nation of Godly people. And so these same founders emphasized that this character is going to have to be fashioned by faith in the true God and His Ten Commandments and Teaching, that it has to be fashioned by their Religion. This is exactly why the founding Fathers knew the importance and necessity of religious freedom and so emphasized it in our founding documents. Without religious freedom the America experience dies from immorality.

When you look at all of history we discover, shockingly, that the last century has witnessed some of the most horrible mass murders ever seen. In fact, before 1890 we would be hard pressed to find such atrocities as we just witnessed in Colorado. Even though these unspeakable crimes begin around 1890, we see them begin in earnest in the early part of the century; but where you really see them increase is from 1965 forward. From 1965 on we can count about 60 or so serial killers and mass murders; who interestingly, use for the most part small caliber weapons in perpetrating their killing. Colorado was rare in its use of a large caliber weapon.

What’s interesting, and I think this points to the real problem at hand, it is interesting that about this time (1965 and on) we can see the beginning of a strong diabolical movement to get God and the truths of the Christian religion out of the public sphere, out of the public discussion, attempting to keep God away from this aspect of public life. We also see at this same time many corresponding societal revolutions shaking the foundation of our Judeo-Christian culture--the sexual revolution and the drug revolution.

And so in most of these mass murders, not in all but by far in most, the constant underlying theme has included something twisted on the sexual side and, drug use. And most especially, you see a hatred for God and the sacred things of God, including and especially His true Church on earth, the Holy Roman Catholic Church. It is as if, when God is kicked out of society a vacuum results which becomes filled in by pure evil.

And so, all of us as faithful Catholic Christians, as faithful Americans have to raise up, doing more of what we can to in righteousness to confront the people and organizations in our country that are trying to remove God from the public discourse. It is time for us to ever more start standing up to the forces of the media, some in the judicial system, and in organizations such ACLU, who are doing everything they can to squash religious freedom in order to keep God out and to keep Christians, especially Catholic Christians, out of public life and so silence the moral voice of the Catholic Church which is the audible voice of Jesus Christ Himself, the True and Living God incarnate.

And all Americans, beginning with us Catholic Christians have to, with God’s grace, repent more deeply in order to get back to ever more fully living a deeper moral life that is rooted in what God has taught us, rooted in the truth that comes from God and is proclaimed infallible by His Catholic Church and her teachings, all her teachings including those which are deemed unrealistic in today’s more modern age. To live this moral life is to live our life fully because we are living in Christ, through Christ—living life with Christ.

We, as a Country and as a people of God, have to get back to a morality that is base on what God has told us is the difference between right and wrong even when it is not politically or socially acceptable or even tolerated, even when it is politically incorrect. And even we are mocked and called names or accused of being judgmental, we have to stand up for what is right and stand against what is wrong. We as Catholic Americans are called by Jesus Himself to, in love for our all of our brethren, speak up and teach the truth about what is right and what is wrong, to teach the full unadulterated Gospel; and to do so, most especially, by how we live our lives. WE have to proclaim with our voices but most especially by our actions that right is right if no one is doing it and wrong is wrong even if every one is doing it.

And in confronting our current culture of death, we have to especially proclaim the Gospel of LIFE!!! Because what is universal in every single case of mass murder, serial murder and massacre is that none of the perpetrators have any sense of the dignity of other people; they have no concern for them being real persons. They treat their victims merely as objects; they have no concern whatever for human life; they are a product of our society that is doing the same with it’s culture of death, a society which discards the unborn as if they were non-person, kills the sick and elderly under the premise of so-called “mercy,” and rejects the sanctity of life by experimenting on it without any regard for Lord and Giver of Life; they are a product of a society which seeks to redefine that which God has defined to bring forth new human life into the world and nurture it, namely, marriage between one man and one women, the family itself.

And so we, you and I, all of us have a grace responsibility to teach that it is God who gives us our dignity as people. We have to proclaim without fear, that is God the Creator who give us our dignity as human persons as our own declaration of Independence makes clear; and that our inalienable rights come directly from the Creator, to each individual, no exceptions, from the moment of conception to natural death.

With all due respect, I know our president will talk about our inalienable rights but notice he refuses to talk about them as coming directly from the Creator; he refuses to acknowledge this truth, this reality; he always skips the part about the Creator when he quotes or mentions this part of the Declaration of Independence. But you can’t skip this truth; it is the Creator Who is the source of these rights, not the government, not any government and not any man or group of men.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have to be the ones to remind everyone, including our elected officials, that God is the source of human dignity and rights, and that each human person must be seen as an individual endowed with these rights from God. And in light of this perennial truth, as the declaration also says, everyone of us will be answerable to God Himself for what we do or what we fail to do. By the way that’s also in the Declaration. A lot of people don’t pay attention to that part; but in the last paragraph it is there, that everyone is responsible before God for protecting the dignity and rights of the human person, especially the right to life and religious freedom. We have to remind people of this, we have to call people to that accountability to God, not to an accountability to the government, not to a priest, but to God our Lord the Almighty Creator and sustainer of heaven and earth.

One last point, this holy and wise priest made. In watching the news over the last few days what was impressive was the number of heroes…the number of people who gave their lives to protect others, men literally laid themselves on top of their girlfriends in order to be human body shields taking the bullets, giving their lives so they could live. These people are heroes, they are heroes because they did see the dignity of life, did see the dignity of the human person, so much so that they gave their life to protect this dignity which comes from the Creator, who is the Lord of Life. That’s why we celebrate them as heroes, for no greater love is there than this than that a man would lay down His life for his friend.

There were other heroes as well, those who praying for those who were injured, those who although injured themself still tried to come to the aid of others who were injured, those who even though bleeding themselves prayed for others; and all those other heroes who put them self in harms way, in grave and mortal danger in order to come to the aid of others…God has send us and our county a powerful message by the selfless actions of these heroes and we celebrate them."


Father Pacwa ending his powerful message by saying that in light of all this incredible heroism of so many to protect life, because of its dignity and worth which comes from the Creator, we should pray that we all can be heroes, like these heroes, in our society and call people to respect the God given dignity every human person, born or unborn, innocent or guilty, male or female, black or white, conscious or unconscious, rich or poor. And if it be God’s will to have the courage to sacrifice all we have and all, even our lives in order to save life, especially eternal life, the eternal life of souls.

It’s up to us, you and me, to do whatever we can with the help of God’s grace in order to convert our current culture of death into a culture of LIFE. We are all so weak and fearful; but let us not fear, our strength is in the LORD! He loves us so much. Let us fall on our knees in faith and love before out God Truly Present in the Holy Eucharist and cry out, “Jesus I trust in Thee! Jesus I trust in Thee! Jesus I trust in Thee! Have mercy on us and on our whole world, have mercy on our beloved country, the United States of America, convert her for in God, in You, we TRUST! O my Jesus forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, lead all souls to heaven, especially those who are in most need of Thy Mercy. Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, patroness of our Country pray for us, obtain the grace we need to faithful even to the foot of the cross. Amen.

Saturday, July 11, 2015

In our day, the Blessed Mother is trying to gather up her faithful remnant to be used to bring others to Christ her Son and so give hope to a sick and dying world.

Mark 6;7-13. 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time. July 13th, 2015

In last week’s Gospel from St. Mark, we heard how Jesus encountered his mistrusting townsfolk in his hometown of Nazareth. They thought they knew Jesus well because they had lived with him for thirty years, but they didn’t really know him at all. They heard of the miracles Jesus performed in other places, but in their midst, Jesus could work no miracles because of their lack of faith.

And so, after giving us an example of unbelief in last weeks Gospel, immediately in today’s Gospel, St. Mark gives us an example of faith, the faith of the apostles. Remember St. Mark writes his Gospel in order to strengthen our faith. And so, in today’s Gospel, Jesus sees the faith of his apostles strengthening, and so sends them out in order that He can, through them, catch souls.

These first disciples were not unlike us. When they first met Jesus, the disciples where slow to understand, they usually just didn’t get it. They were weak and poor, but they had a quality deeper than their human frailty- they had hearts that were open to the working of God’s divine grace. This grace would produce in them a living faith, one that would slowly grow and deepen. Their trust in Jesus would become stronger and they eventually would fall on their knees in adoration before Jesus, as their true Lord and the true and living God, offering their lives totally to Him and witnessing to the true faith with their very lives.

In today’s gospel, Jesus sends these very weak souls out to preach his message of repentance and to heal the sick, which primarily means to heal and save souls from sin and its deadly effect—eternal death and separation from God and one another. Think about it, such unqualified men going out for such important work as the salvation of souls. (If it had been up to us, we would not have chosen such men as the apostles for such important work). And yet, not only does Jesus send this sorry bunch out to bring others to the true faith, He tells them to take hardly anything with them.

They are to take only a walking stick and sandals, but no food, no sack, no money, no change of clothes. Jesus here is trying to teach them an important lesson in the life of faith. The apostles would have to cut their dependence and trust in themselves and begin to rely on their faith and trust in Jesus alone. And so, Jesus sends them out without any extra provisions all in order that the apostles could learn to trust that God, in His divine providence, would provide for everything needed to support their life and their mission.

Just as He taught his first disciples, Jesus is also trying to teach us today as well. And so, we need to ask God to grant us the grace to imitate the faith and the trust of these disciples. We must live our faith by asking God to help us to trust Him more to provide what we are lacking, materially speaking and spiritually speaking; in other words, to trust in His divine Providence. This trust in God’s Divine Providence and care over us is first of all an interior attitude of faith.

In light of faith, the question for each of us today is, “Do we really believe Jesus is God and as God has the power not only to save us but also to do great things through us, to continue His work to heal and to save souls. Do we believe that this God is available to us by being truly present for us in His Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Hoy Eucharist physically present as the very source of our Faith, Hope and Love. And because of this faith in His Eucharistic Presence, do we truly Hope in God by entrusting everything, everything to Him. Faith in Holy Eucharist as the True and Living God, leads us to hope in God.

Hope as a theological virtue really means to have trust, or to have confidence in God. So do we hope in God to take care of us, even if everything we have, everything we depend upon on this earth was taken away from us? Do we have the hope we need so that even though the walls may fall around us and everything we have be taken from us, we will not despair, because we have a strong faith that our Heavenly Father loves us and will never, ever, abandon us? And do we have the hope and trust to completely offer ourselves, and everything we have and posses to Jesus with total love and total abandonment. Jesus I trust in You, help my lack of trust. Please help me to trust in you more!

In our day, the darkness and loss of hope in our world is not coming primarily from terrorism. It is coming from an illusionary ideal of self-dependency and the idea that we can build an earthly utopia and so save ourselves apart from God and His grace and help which come to us through His Catholic Church and her Incredible Sacraments. These Sacraments of the Church are the source of all grace and mercy for the world; especially the Blessed of all Sacraments, the Holy Eucharist, because is the source of all graces and mercy and the others Sacraments flow from it because the Holy Eucharist is
Jesus and His pierced heart the source of all mercy and grace for the world).

In the last 100 years or so, the Blessed Mother as been appearing all over the world telling us, her children, that we must turn back to God and His Holy Church and realize we are absolutely dependent on Him. She is reminding us that we are too much like little children who think they don’t need their parents help. She is warning us that we must turn back to God and trust Him for all we need. She is telling us that if we continue to trust in all of our possessions and our self-dependency, God will take these away from us, just like a good Father. And He will do this in order to teach us the truth…that we can’t take care of ourselves, that we absolutely need God and His Church for peace on this earth and in the life to come, for peace in our hearts. In our day, the Blessed Mother is trying to gather up her faithful remnant to be used to bring others to Christ her Son and so give hope to a sick and dying world.

And so through His Mother, Jesus wants to send us out into the world just has He did with His first disciples, order to take what we receive through our faith, adoration, trust and love of the Holy Eucharist, namely grace and mercy and to share it with the world. But first, we have to be willing to leave everything behind, that is our dependency on ourselves and the things of this world. We need to have a holy detachment from things, using them only as a means to become more attached to Jesus- as did the apostles; we need to use the things of this world, primarily to help us carry out our mission to lead others to Christ so they may be saved.

At this Holy Mass which makes present Jesus our hope in the Holy Eucharist and His once and for all Sacrifice on Calvary, let us ask the Holy Spirit, through the intercession of the Blessed Mother, for a holy detachment from things and a holy attachment to the Creator of things, God our heavenly Father. Let us ask her to help us place our total trust in His divine providence alone beginning at this Holy Mass, by offering ourselves, our whole heart, our whole being all that we have and are to the Father, through the Son in the Unity of the Holy Spirit. Let us make our offering to Jesus through Mary in union with St. Joseph. Totus Tuus! Amen.

Sunday, July 5, 2015

I am not preaching at any parish this weekend. I have decided to reprint a homily from 2012 that I think is most appropriate for our current situation. Happy and blessed Fourth of July weekend. Let us pray for our beloved country.

Last week in my homily I spoke about our great commission that we Christians have been given by Jesus; we are called to speak the truth to all men and to do so with great love, better yet, with great Charity. We are to speak the truth in Charity.

Again, this is what is at stake with regards to our current struggle with religious freedom. It is so much more that freedom to worship. Again, the enemies of the truth will give us that, at least for the time being. It is even more than the freedom to not to betray our principles and our conscience, which are part of our human dignity. Religious freedom is freedom to engage society; the freedom to proclaim to all of the members of society out of love for them, the truth that sets men free, gives them true happiness and saves them; it freedom to call all men to repent of their sins and to accept the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ who is God become man to save us through the forgiveness of sins, sins which are acts against the truth.

It is the freedom to speak out against all evil, yes, against the evil of homosexual acts, which are life-less acts; but also against the evils of artificial contraception which too are life-less, anti-family, and so oppress and degrade women and endangers their health and well-being; it is the freedom to defend life, to defend the life of the human person in all of its stages; to speak out in defense of the sacred dignity of every single human person born or unborn, rich or poor, sick or healthy, black or white, conscious or unconscious; to defend all human persons, especially those who cannot defend them selves.

Yes, we must speak the truth in Charity out of love for God who is the source of all truth, and then out of love for our brother and sister and concern for their eternal salvation. We want to bring them the truth so that they might be free, that is free to live life to the fullness by being free to choose all that which is True and Good, and ultimately free to choose He Who is Truth and Goodness Itself God. This is why Jesus came to earth, to reveal the truth about God and Man; and then to free man from the greatest slavery, the slavery of sin, in order that men could accept this truth with their intellect and live it with their lives and so become one with God through Jesus who is the Truth.

But if we are to speak the truth in Charity we must also live Charity in the truth. We can’t live charitable lives, lies of love without the truth, that is without Jesus who is the truth and without the truth that He came to bring to us from His Father in Heaven so that ultimately through living the truth we might become one with God.

This was the title and theme of the most recent Encyclical of our Holy Father, Pope Benedict entitled Caritas et Veritate…Charity in Truth. In the Encyclical He said our works of Charity must be done in the truth or they are not charity at all. Without the truth they can actually become unjust works which degrade man and lead to a loss of the freedom and liberty of man. They become acts which are done not for the common good, not for the good of all the members of the society, especially not for woman and the unborn.

Let me use an example. Let’s take for instance governments that send aid to third world countries but only on condition that these third world countries accept our own population control mandates. In other words they must force their people, all in the name of development, to limit their births and mandate laws that allow artificial birth control and even abortion before they receive that which their people are in great need of. Once the governments of these countries acquiesce to these unjust conditions, then and only then, will material aid be given. In fact, many times before any material aid arrives, first arrives the birth control and aborti-facient drugs first. This aid is not charity for it is not given with the truth, not given in the truth; it is unjust and does not promote the common good of the society.

Ultimately, charity done without the truth is not charity at all because the truth is really a Divine Person, Jesus Christ. Charity is really doing good works through Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ through Jesus Christ. Charity is doing good works for love of God and for the love of our brethren with the Love of God alive in our hearts, minds and souls. Any so-called works of charity that are done without the truth, are ultimately works done without God who is the source of all Charity. God is in fact, Charity Itself, for God is love, Deus Caritas est--God is Charity…! Interestingly the title of another of Pope Benedict’s encyclicals.

All of this brings up why we are against Obama care, and why all Christians and men of good will should oppose Obama Care…it is charity without the truth and so it is not Charity at all. Even though it is presented as a law for the common good, it actually goes against common good because it endangers our religious freedom and our freedom of conscience.

The truth is, is that this goes against the very dignity of the human person; it strips the person of the right to practice the truth, to proclaim the truth out side of the walls of the Church building. And even more, and most of all we oppose Obama Care because it is anti-life…and as such is anti-God who is the Creator and Lord of Human life.

Let us get it straight; we are not against the right to affordable health care for every human person. Our bishops promoted that ideal long before this current administration. In fact it was our religious orders that were the first to provide affordable health care and in fact many times free health care to the first citizens of this great country. The Church has been the savior to the sick and ill, not some politician.

These hospitals were founded for the love of Christ and to bring the healing and love of Christ to the sick and suffering, both physically and spiritually. In other words, Catholic Hospitals were founded in charity. Even to this day, many times when a patient has the inability to pay, the secular hospitals will send them to Catholic hospitals for care.

We know that our current health care system needs to be reformed. But we are against Obama Care because it is health care without the truth. And it is so, not only because denies Catholics and all men of good will religious freedom and freedom of conscience by mandating us to go against the truth of God; not only because, thanks to the supreme court ruling is now a tax on the public practice of religious by its imposition of a penalty for following the truth of our faith; but we are also against it because it is an Abortion expanding health care reform law and the most abortion expanding law since the Roe vs. Wade decision which legalize abortion in all nine months of pregnancy. It is charity without the truth, which means it is not charity at all.

And so, it will never work because it is an unjust law. It does not protect our liberties and it does not protect the most defenseless and most poor of all, the unborn…it is unjust because it is anti-woman; it oppresses women; it is a weapon in the true war against women in its attack against motherhood, treating women’s gift of fertility and bearing new children of God as if these things were diseases …it is a war against woman because it attacks and will kill in ever increasing numbers especially unborn women…and so it is anti-family; and all this funded by yours and mine tax dollars and insurance premiums; and our cooperation in this evil will be mandated, that is forced upon us Catholic Christians and upon all men and women of good will. In good conscience we must disobey this unjust law for as St. Augustine taught, “An unjust law is no law at all and must be opposed.”

St. John Paul II once directly addressed America saying, “(America) The ultimate test of your greatness is the way you treat every human being, but especially the weakest and most defenseless ones. The best traditions of your land presume respect for those who cannot defend themselves. If you want equal justice for all, and true freedom and lasting peace, then, America, defend life.” John Paul II

Obama care is not charity because it is unjust; and it is unjust because, it ignores the truth that comes from God about the dignity of every single human person; and so it does not protect life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness…In fact, interestingly, immediately after the Supreme Court’s ruling, one of the first groups to come out in support of its decision was Planned Parenthood, the most anti-life organization in the world…They understand clearly that Obama care is not going to make abortion more accessible, nor will it make abortion causing pills more accessible and life preventing contraception more accessible, but it will force you and I to pay for these moral evils out our tax dollars and with our insurance premiums. And if we refuse to deny our consciences and not go along with this evil then we will be punished and force to submit by an even greater so-called tax. And after that, who knows what the punishment will be.

Even more than a health care overhaul, our dear country is in great need of a spiritual health care overhaul. It’s leaders, Catholic, Christian or otherwise are in need of spiritual and moral conversion; its Catholics, Christians or otherwise, including all of us, are in need of great spiritual and moral conversion and the healing of our sins. So, Let us not pray for the suffering to be taken away but that we may accept the Holy Will of God. Let us not pray to escape the cross but to be able to embrace the cross. Let us pray not to escape persecution but that we may be used as faithful instruments of God’s divine design, even if that means that we may be Martyrs (white or red) for Christ and for His Holy Catholic Church and for the salvation of souls and salvation of our Great Country.

“Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless, and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us, and increase Your mercy in us, that inn difficult moments, w might not despair, no become despondent, but with great confidence, submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy Itself. Our Lady of Divine Mercy, Mother of the Americas, Pray for us. Amen.”