To follow is a brief examination of conscience which covers the Ten Commandments.An Examination of Conscience Prayer Before Confession O Lord, grant me light to see myself as Thou dost see me and the grace to be truly and efficaciously contrite for my sins. O Mary, help me to make a good confession.Preliminary Besides telling the nature of our sins, we must also recollect, as far as possible, the number of times we have committed them, telling also (and only) those circumstances which at times may either make a venial sin mortal or a mortal sin notably worse.

1. Have I ever failed to confess a serious sin or disguised it?
2. Have I been guilty of irreverence for this sacrament by failing to examine my conscience carefully?
3. Have I failed to perform the penance given me by the confessor or disobeyed any of his directions?
4. Have I neglected the Easter duty of receiving Holy Communion or failed to confess my sins within a year?
5. Have I any HABITS of serious sin to confess first (impurity, drunkenness, etc.)?

First Commandment

1. Am I ignorant of my catechism (Act of Contrition, Apostle’s Creed, Ten Commandments, Seven Sacraments, the Our Father)?
2. Have I willfully doubted or denied any of the teachings of the Church (heresy)?
3. Have I taken active part in any non-Catholic worship?
4. Am I a member of any anti-Catholic or any secret society?
5. Have I knowingly read any anti-Catholic literature?
6. Have I practiced any superstitions (horoscopes, fortune tellers, etc.)?

Second Commandment

1. Have I used God’s name in vain by way of profanity?
2. Have I murmured or complained against God (blasphemy)?
3. Have I maligned priests or others consecrated to God?
4. Have I sworn by God’s name (oath) either falsely or rashly?
5. Have I broken any private vow?

Third Commandment

1. Have I missed Mass on Sundays or holydays through my own fault?
2. Have I been late for Mass through my own negligence?
3. Have I been inattentive at Mass or otherwise failed in reverence for the Most Blessed Sacrament?
4. Have I done unnecessary servile work (physical labor) or shopping on Sunday?

Fourth Commandment

1. Have I been disrespectful to my parents or neglected them?
2. Have I failed in obedience or reverence to others in authority?
3. Have I mistreated my wife or children?
4. Have I been disobedient or disrespectful to my husband?
5. Regarding my children:
   • Have I neglected their material needs?
   • Have I failed to care for their early Baptism or their proper religious instruction?
   • Have I allowed them to neglect their religious duties?
   • Have I otherwise failed to discipline them?
   • Have I given bad them example?
   • Have I interfered with their freedom to marry or follow a religious vocation?

Fifth & Eighth Commandments

1. Have I quarreled with any one?
2. Have I cursed anyone or otherwise wished evil on him?
3. Have I taken pleasure in anyone’s misfortune?
4. Is there anyone to whom I refuse to speak or be reconciled?
5. Have I lied about anyone (calumny)?
6. Have I rash judged anyone of a serious sin?
7. Have I engaged in gossip (detraction) or spread scandal?
8. Have I lent an ear to scandal about my neighbor?
9. Have I been jealous or envious of anyone?

Sixth & Ninth

1. Have I denied my spouse his or her marriage rights?
2. Have I practiced birth control?
3. Have I abused my marriage rights in any other way?
4. Have I committed adultery or fornication?
5. Have I touched or embraced another impurely?
6. Have I sinned with others of the same sex?
7. Have I committed masturbation or otherwise sinned impurely with myself?
8. Have I harbored lustful desires for anyone?
9. Have I indulged in other impure thoughts?
10. Have I failed to dress modestly?
11. Have I done anything to provoke or occasion impure thoughts in others?
12. Have I read indecent literature or looked at indecent pictures?
13. Have I watched suggestive films or programs?
14. Have I permitted my children or others under my charge to do these things?
15. Have I used indecent language or told indecent stories?
16. Have I willingly listened to such stories?
17. Have I boasted of my sins?
18. Have I sinned against chastity in any other way?

Seventh & Tenth Commandments

1. Have I stolen anything?
2. Have I damaged anyone’s property through my own fault?
3. Have I cheated or defrauded other?
4. Have I refused or neglected to pay any debts?
5. Have I neglected my duties or been slothful in my work?
6. Have I refused or neglected to help anyone in urgent necessity?
7. Have I failed to make restitution?

OTHER SINS

1. Have I knowingly caused others to sin?
2. Have I cooperated in the sins of others?
3. Have I sinned by gluttony?
4. Have I become intoxicated?
5. Have I used narcotics?
6. Have I been motivated by avarice?
7. Have I indulged in boasting or vainglory?
8. Have I received Holy Communion or another sacrament in the state of mortal sin?
9. Is there any other sin I need to confess?

Prayer for a Good Confession O my God, by my grievous sins I have re-crucified Thy divine Son to myself and have deserved Thy everlasting wrath in the fires of hell. Even more, I have been most ungrateful by my sins to Thee, my Heavenly Father, Who have created me out of nothing, redeemed me by Thy Son, and sanctified me in the sacraments by Thy Holy Spirit. But Thou hast spared me to make this confession. Receive me back as Thy prodigal son and grant me to confess myself well, that I may begin anew to love Thee with my whole heart and soul, henceforth keeping Thy Commandments and suffering patiently whatever temporal punishment for my sins may remain. I hope by Thy goodness and power to obtain everlasting life in paradise. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.

Why I am Catholic
Category: Religion and Philosophy

I found this at a great Catholic web site and wanted to share it! 

I AM A CATHOLIC …

St. Josemaria Escriva de BalaguerFeastday: January 9

June 26, 1975 Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer was born in Barbastro, Spain, on January 9, 1902, the second of six children of Jose and Dolores Escriva. Growing up in a devout family and attending Catholic schools, he learned the basic truths of the faith and practices such as frequent confession and communion, the rosary, and almsgiving. The death of three younger sisters, and his father’s bankruptcy after business reverses, taught him the meaning of suffering and brought maturity to his outgoing and cheerful temperament. In 1915, the family moved to Logrono, where his father had found new employment.

Beginning in 1918, Josemaria sensed that God was asking something of him, although he didn’t know exactly what it was. He decided to become a priest, in order to be available for whatever God wanted of him. He began studying for the priesthood, first in Logrono and later in Saragossa. At his father’s suggestion and with the permission of his superiors at the seminary he also began to study civil law. He was ordained a priest and began his pastoral ministry in 1925.

In 1927, Fr. Josemaria moved to Madrid to study for a graduate degree in law. He was accompanied by his mother, sister, and brother, as his father had died in 1924 and he was now head of the family. They were not well-off, and he had to tutor law students to support them. At the same time he carried out a demanding pastoral work, especially among the poor and sick in Madrid, and with young children. He also undertook an apostolate with manual workers, professional people and university students who, by coming into contact with the poor and sick to whom Fr. Josemaria was ministering, learned the practical meaning of charity and their Christian responsibility to help out in the betterment of society.

On October 2, 1928, while making a retreat in Madrid, God showed him his specific mission: he was to found Opus Dei, an institution within the Catholic Church dedicated to helping people in all walks of life to follow Christ, to seek holiness in their daily life and grow in love for God and their fellow men and women. From that moment on, he dedicated all his strength to fulfilling this mission, certain that God had raised up Opus Dei to serve the Church. In 1930, responding to a new illumination from God, he started Opus Dei’s apostolic work with women, making clear that they had the same responsibility as men to serve society and the Church.

The first edition of The Way, his most widely read work, was published in 1934 under the title Spiritual Considerations. Expanded and revised, it has gone through many editions since then; more than four million copies in many different languages are now in print. His other spiritual writings include Holy Rosary; The Way of the Cross; two collections of homilies, Christ Is Passing By and Friends of God; and Furrow and The Forge, which like The Way are made up of short points for prayer and reflection.

The development of Opus Dei began among the young people with whom Fr. Josemaria had already been in contact before 1928. Its growth, however, was seriously impeded by the religious persecution inflicted on the Catholic Church during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). The founder himself suffered severe hardships under this persecution but, unlike many other priests, he came out of the war alive. After the war, he traveled throughout the country giving retreats to hundreds of priests at the request of their bishops. Meanwhile Opus Dei spread from Madrid to several other Spanish cities, and as soon as World War II ended in 1945, began starting in other countries. This growth was not without pain; though the Work always had the approval of the local bishops, its then-unfamiliar message of sanctity in the world met with some misunderstandings and suspicions-which the founder bore with great patience and charity.

While celebrating Mass in 1943, Fr. Josemaria received a new foundational grace to establish the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross, which made it possible for some of Opus Dei’s lay faithful to be ordained as priests. The full incorporation of both lay faithful and priests in Opus Dei, which makes a seamless cooperation in the apostolic work possible, is an essential feature of the foundational charism of Opus Dei, affirmed by the Church in granting Opus Dei the canonical status of a personal Prelature. In addition, the Priestly Society conducts activities, in full harmony with the bishops of the local churches, for the spiritual development of diocesan priests and seminarians. Diocesan priests can also be part of the Priestly Society, while at the same time remaining clergy of their own dioceses.

Aware that God meant Opus Dei to be part of the mission of the universal Church, the founder moved to Rome in 1946 so as to be close to the Holy See. By 1950 the Work had received pontifical approvals affirming its main foundational features-spreading the message of holiness in daily life; service to the Pope, the universal church, and the particular churches; secularity and naturalness; fostering personal freedom and responsibility, and a pluralism consistent with Catholic moral, political, and social teachings.

Beginning in 1948, full membership in Opus Dei was open to married people. In 1950 the Holy See approved the idea of accepting non-Catholics and even non-Christians as cooperators-persons who assist Opus Dei in its projects and programs without being members. The next decade saw the launching of a wide range of undertakings: professional schools, agricultural training centers, universities, primary and secondary schools, hospitals and clinics, and other initiatives, open to people of all races, religions, and social backgrounds but of manifestly Christian inspiration.

During Vatican Council II (1962-1965), Monsignor Escriva worked closely with many of the council fathers, discussing key Council themes such as the universal call to holiness and the importance of laypersons in the mission of the Church. Deeply grateful for the Council’s teachings, he did everything possible to implement them in the formative activities offered by Opus Dei throughout the world.

Between 1970 and 1975 the founder undertook catechetical trips throughout Europe and Latin America, speaking with many people, at times in large gatherings, about love of God, the sacraments, Christian dedication, and the need to sanctify work and family life. By the time of the founder’s death, Opus Dei had spread to thirty nations on six continents. It now (2002) has more than 84,000 members in sixty countries.

Monsignor Escriva’s death in Rome came suddenly on June 26, 1975, when he was 73. Large numbers of bishops and ordinary faithful petitioned the Vatican to begin the process for his beatification and canonization. On May 17, 1992, Pope John Paul II declared him Blessed before a huge crowd in St. Peter’s Square. He is to be canonized-formally declared a saint-on October 6, 2002.

Benedict Groeschel: You and I were talking and you told me an anecdote about when they took the crucifixes down from the classroom walls at Boston College. I think this anecdote is a little bit long, but I think our audience would be very interested to hear it.

Peter Kreeft: Well, I was teaching comparative religions, and during the long break, there was a Jewish student and a Muslim student in the front row. The Jewish student noticed a faint cross painted on the wall behind me, so he asked me, “Is that supposed to be a cross?”

I started to explain that that’s where the crucifix used to be, and another student, a Catholic, said “Oh, we took the crucifixes down last year.”

“Why did you do take them down?”

“Oh, well, we didn’t want to offend people.”

“When did you take them down?”

“Well, let’s see. 1979.”

“Aha,” said the Jewish student. “It was the Bundy money.”

No one understood that, so he explained that President Carter’s secretary of state, McGeorge Bundy, had brokered a deal by which federal money could go to private schools if and only if those schools were not sectarian, divisive, discriminatory… something like that. And - by coincidence - all 21 Jesuit colleges took down their crucifixes from their classrooms in the year following that decision. So when he explained that to the students, the students were rather scandalized, and one said, “Oh, no, we wouldn’t do that for money.”

And he said, “Of course you wouldn’t, but I hope you got more than thirty pieces of silver this time.” Rather wicked… some of them were so biblically illiterate that he had to explain to them that Judas Iscariot was the first Catholic bishop to accept a government grant.

But then the student said, “No, we did that to be ecumenical.”

And then the Muslim chimed in.

“What is ecumenical?”

So the student said, “Oh, ecumenical means we think we’re all equal, and we didn’t want to discriminate against others, and offend outsiders.”

And the Muslim said, “You mean people like me, and my friend the Jew?”

“Well, yes.”

“Well, I am highly insulted.”

“Why?”

“Well, you’re treating me like a bigot.”

“No, we hate bigotry.”

“Let me explain. Suppose you came to my country. You enrolled in a Muslim university. Now we don’t have pictures or images; we think that’s idolatry, but when you are in a Muslim university, you know you are in a Muslim university. Who would object to a Muslim symbol in a Muslim university, except a bigot? Now you expect me to be offended by a Catholic symbol - the crucifix - in a Catholic university, so you are treating me like a bigot.”

Everyone was thinking.

He didn’t stop. He said to the students, “How many of you believe that Jesus is the Son of God?”

And most of them raised their hand.

He said, “Well, we Muslims don’t believe that; the Koran says that’s blasphemy, that’s ridiculous, but we have a great devotion to Jesus. We hardly ever mention his name without saying, ‘Blessed be he’ or ‘Blessed be his name’ and we think he’s one of the greatest men who ever lived, and he is a great prophet, and we love him and his mother Mary. And if we had pictures of him, we would never take them down, not for any money in the world. In fact,” he said, and he was now waxing eloquent, “what if some soldiers came into our classroom and said, ‘We demand that you take down this offensive picture of the prophet Jesus’? Every good Muslim would go in front of that picture and say, ‘You will take down this picture of our beloved prophet Jesus over our dead bodies. We would be glad to be martyrs for him.’ So I think we are better Christians than you are.”

You could hear a pin drop.

Comparing Christianity & Islam

“Islamic growth rates in Africa and even America are phenomenal.  Islam has the world’s lowest rate of being converted and one of the world’s highest rates of converting.  What accounts for this success? What makes Islam such an attractive creed?”  Alarmed Catholic, Peter Kreeft, bemoans the success of Islam then outlines the main theological and practical differences, as well as the important common elements, between Christianity and the other great world religions. 

Two unsettling facts dominate the relations between Christianity and Islam:

1. Dialogue is almost nonexistent. Islam resists ecumenical dialogue more than any other religion. To “proselytize” in any way in a Moslem country is to go to prison.

2. Islam once nearly conquered the world, in the early Middle Ages when its empire stretched from Spain to Indonesia, and it looks as if it could do so again. Islamic growth rates in Africa and even America are phenomenal.

In other words, Islam has the world’s lowest rate of being converted and one of the world’s highest rates of converting.

What accounts for this success? What makes Islam such an attractive creed?

In a word: simplicity. Islam reflects the stark simplicity of the Arabian desert where it was born. A Moslem knows exactly where he stands. To a world more and more confused, Islam comes with a sword that cuts through the Gordian Knot of modern malaise in a single stroke.

That stroke, the striking simplicity of Islam’s creed, is summed up in the palindrome (i.e., it reads the same backward as forward) which shatters the silence daily from every mosque and minaret: la illaha illa Allah! “There is no God but Allah!”

Allah, of course, is the same God Jews and Christians worship. Islam is not only a Western, monotheistic religion rather than an Oriental, pantheistic religion, but explicitly bases itself on the historical revelation of the God of the Jews, tracing itself to Ishmael, Isaac’s brother, to whom God also promised special blessings according to Genesis. Isaac and Ishmael, Jews and Moslems, have been engaged in sibling rivalry ever since.

The older name that “infidels” gave this religion, “Mohammedanism,” is inaccurate, for neither Mohammed nor any of his followers ever claimed Mohammed was anything more than a human prophet. “There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is His prophet,” is the complete Moslem creed.

The code is almost as simple as the creed. The “Five Pillars of Islam” define the duties of every Moslem. They include a pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime, if possible, to commemorate Islam’s beginning in 622 A.D. with the “Hegira;” Mohammed’s flight from Mecca; fasting; almsgiving; ritual prayer five times a day; and professing the creed, “There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is His prophet.”

In one sense Islam is a simplification of Christianity as Buddhism is a simplification of Hinduism. But in another sense Islam adds to Christianity, for where Jews have only our “Old Testament” Scriptures and Christians add the New Testament, Moslems also add the Koran. They accept the claims of the Jewish prophets to be sent by God. They believe Jesus deepened this revelation and that Mohammed completed it. Mohammed is “the seal of the prophets.” He tells you how to live Jesus’ ethic (Jesus is seen only as a man, an ethical teacher).

Actually, Islam neither merely simplifies Christianity nor merely adds to it, but reinterprets it—somewhat as Christianity does to Judaism. As the Christian interpretation of the Old Testament is not the same as the Jewish one, the Moslem interpretation of the New Testament is not the same as the Christian one; the Koran authoritatively interprets the New Testament as the New interprets the Old.

The Koran itself is the only miracle Mohammed claimed—though perhaps equally miraculous is the fact that Mohammed’s wife became his first convert. An illiterate peasant, Mohammed received the Koran by word-for-word dictation from Allah, according to the faith of Islam. When Moslems read the Koran, they become ecstatic with admiration. They say no outsider can appreciate it, nor can it be adequately translated out of Arabic. In this sense, Islam is a bit esoteric, though it is a religion of public revelation in a book.

Islam believes in a single, all-just, all-merciful, all-powerful God who created the world and man, insists on obedience to His will, and promises salvation and immortality to believers and obeyers. In all these ways Islam is like Judaism and Christianity (Western) rather than like Hinduism and Buddhism.

(Eastern). Allah is not a Force but a Person; not merely Being or even merely Consciousness but moral Will. From the Will of Allah comes both the existence of the world by creation and the rule over it, over nature and history by Providence and over human free choice by moral law.

The three crucial Christian doctrines Islam denies are the Trinity, the Incarnation and the Resurrection. Like Judaism, Islam denies Christ’s claim to divinity. Allah is one; so how could He be three? Jesus is human; so how could He be divine? “It is unfitting for Allah to have a son,” wrote Mohammed, apparently interpreting sonship biologically.

The Koran believes in Christ’s virgin birth, but not His resurrection; in His prophetic function (teaching) but not His priestly function (salvation) or His kingly function (ruling); in His moral authority but not His supernatural authority. To Moslems, as with Jews, Christ is the stumbling block. The theology of God the Father and the ethics of human living are essentially the same for Jews, Christians and Moslems. What then is missing? Aren’t these the two essentials?

No. What’s missing is the link between the two, the “missing link,” Christ the Mediator between God and man. Mohammed and the Koran are essentially another Moses (lawgiver) and another law. What’s missing is grace, salvation, redemption. What’s missing is precisely the essential thing.

There are two kinds of Moslems today, just as there were in the Middle Ages: modernists and orthodox, liberals and fundamentalist, Mutazilites (rationalists) and Mutikalimoun. In the 13th century, Thomas Aquinas confronted “Latin Averroism,” the European copy of the Moslem philosopher Averroes’ way of reconciling the Koran with the philosophy of Aristotle by reducing much of the Koran to myth and exalting Aristotle to the authority of Pure Reason. He taught that a literal interpretation of the Koran (which the vast majority of Moslems hold) is proper for the masses, who cannot rise to the level of philosophical abstraction, but for those who can, Aristotle’s arguments must prevail over belief in divine providence, creation of the world and individual immortality (all of which Aristotle denied). But Islam, by and large, has resisted this “demythologizing” rationalism far more completely than Judaism and Christianity have in our day.

We have not yet mentioned the most important thing about Islam: What is it to be a Moslem? How do Moslems exist religiously? Here too, as in Moslem theology and ethics, there is a striking simplicity, summarized in the very title of the religion. “Islam” means both “peace” (etymologically connected with the Hebrew shalom) and “submission,” or “surrender”; it is the peace that comes from submission to Allah’s will. Moslems would applaud T.S. Eliot’s choice of Dante’s line: “In His will, our peace” as “the profoundest line in all of human literature.”

The famous Moslem “fatalism” (“it is the will of Allah”), like the Calvinistic doctrine of Predestination, makes them work harder, not less hard. Moslems, like Christians, believe in man’s free will as well as God’s sovereignty. Theirs is not the modern fatalism from below, a scientific determinism, but from above. It is energizing and liberating, not squashing. Islam, like Judaism and Christianity, has produced a rich crop of saints and mystics, especially in the Sufi tradition, which is similar in many ways to the Jewish Hasidic tradition.

Can Moslems be saved? They reject Christ as Savior; yet they seek and love God “Islam” means essentially the “fundamental option” of a whole-hearted “yes” to God. Most Moslems, like most Jews, see Christ only through broken lenses. If God-seeking and God-loving Jews, both before and after Christ’s Incarnation, can find God, then surely God-seeking Moslems can too, according to Christ’s own promise that “all who seek, find”—whether in this life or the next.

Yet Christ also insists that “no one can come to the Father but by me.” Whatever truth Mohammed taught Moslems about God is really present in Christ the Logos, the full revelation of God. If Moslems are saved, they are saved by Christ.

Christians should hope and pray that their separated Islamic brothers and sisters be reunited with our common Father by finding Christ the Way. We cannot stop “proselytizing,” for proselytizing means leading our brothers Home.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Kreeft, Peter. “Comparing Christianity & Islam.” National Catholic Register. (May, 1987).

THE AUTHOR
Peter Kreeft has written extensively (over 25 books) in the areas of Christian apologetics. He teaches at Boston College in Boston Massachusetts. Peter Kreeft is on the Advisory Board of the Catholic Educator’s Resource Center.

DISCERNMENT

“The word of the LORD came to me thus: Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I dedicated you, a prophet to the nations I appointed you.” (Jeremiah 1:4-5)

From the moment you were conceived God has had a plan for you and your life, and He has a desire to share His life with you. He has been forming you throughout your life to fulfill this plan that is specific for you.  God wants you alive now, in our time, with your family, living among His people today – and He has given you this life for a purpose.

This can be a reassuring thought when we consider that our lives are not merely random, but purposeful.  And, more important to calm your fears, His plan for your life is what is already the greatest joy of your heart.  So there is nothing to fear in discovering God’s plan for you.

Discernment is a special form of prayer which ultimately helps people figure out where they fit into the Lord’s plan, or as we often say, where they are “called”.  It is a process that requires prayer, meditation, reflection, honesty, and direction.  Through the sacraments of Eucharist and Penance as well as private prayer, Christ draws us more deeply into His life and reveals His will.  Here is where one learns to listen for the voice of the Lord. 

Anyone who wants to walk closely with the Lord, regardless of the vocation of life to which he is called, should take time to discern where the will of God is directing his life, for it is only in the fulfillment of His will that we find our peace.  It is essential to remember that the primary focus of discernment is not to determine what I want to do with my life, but rather to determine what God wills for my life.

1. Faith is the ability to not panic.

2. If you worry, you didn’t pray. If you pray, don’t worry.

3. As a child of God, prayer is kind of like calling home every day.

4. Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape.

5. When we get tangled up in our problems, be still. God wants us to be
still so He can untangle the knot.

6. Do the math. Count your blessings.

7. God wants spiritual fruit, not religious nuts.

8. Dear God: I have a problem. It’s me.

9. Silence is often misinterpreted, but never misquoted.

10. Laugh every day, it’s like inner jogging.

11. The most important things in your home are the people.

12. Growing old is inevitable, growing up is optional.

13. There is no key to happiness. The door is always open.

14. A grudge is a heavy thing to carry.

15. He who dies with the most toys is still dead.

16. We do not remember days, but moments. Life moves too fast, so enjoy
your precious moments.

17. Nothing is real to you until you experience it, otherwise it’s just
hearsay.

18. It’s all right to sit on your pity pot every now and again. Just be
sure to flush when you are done.

19. Surviving and living your life successfully requires courage. The
goals and dreams you’re seeking require courage and risk-taking. Learn
from the turtle — it only makes progress when it sticks out its neck.

20. Be more concerned with your character than your reputation. Your
character is what you really are while your reputation is merely what
others think you are.

– Author Unknown

Bishop Fulton J. Sheen  

Muslimism is the only great post-Christian religion of the world. Because it had its origin in the 7th century under Mohammed, it was possible to unite within it some elements of Christianity and of Judaism, along with particular customs of Arabia . Muslimism takes the doctrine of the unity of God, his majesty and his creative power, and uses it, in part, as a basis for the repudiation of Christ, the Son of God. Misunderstanding the notion of the Trinity, Mohammed made Christ a prophet announcing himself (Mohammed) just as to Christians, Isaiah and John the Baptist are prophets announcing Christ.

The Christian European West barely escaped destruction at the hands of the Muslims. At one point they were stopped near Tours and at another point, later on in time, outside the gates of Vienna . The Church throughout northern Africa was practically destroyed by Muslim power, and at the present hour, the Muslims are beginning to rise again.

 If Muslimism is a heresy, as Hilaire Belloc believes it to be, it is the only heresy that has never declined. Others have had a moment of vigor, then gone into doctrinal decay at the death of the leader, and finally evaporated in a vague social movement. Muslimism, on the contrary, has only had its first phase. There was never a time in which it declined, either in numbers, or in the devotion of its followers. The missionary effort of the Church toward this group has been, at least on the surface, a failure. For the Muslims are so far almost unconvertible. The reason is that for a follower of Mohammed to become a Christian is much like a Christian becoming a Jew. The Muslims believe that they have the final and definitive revelation of God to the world and that Christ was only a prophet announcing Mohammed, the last of God’s real prophets.   

At the present time, the hatred of the Muslim countries against the West is becoming a hatred against Christianity itself. Although the statesmen have not yet taken it into account, there is still grave danger that the temporal power of Islam may return, and with it, the menace that it may shake off a West which has ceased to be Christian, and affirm itself as a great anti-Christian world power. Muslim writers say, “When the locust swarms darken countries, they bear on their wings these Arabic words: We are God’s host, each of us has ninety-nine eggs, and if we had a hundred, we should lay waste the world, with all that is in it.”

The problem is, how shall we prevent the hatching of the hundredth egg? It is our firm belief that the fears some entertain concerning the Muslims are not to realized, but that Muslimism, instead, will eventually be converted to Christianity–and in a way that even some of our missionaries never suspect. It is our belief that this will happen not through the direct teachings of Christianity, but through a summoning of the Muslims to a veneration of the Mother of God. This is the line of argument:

MARY
The Qu’ran, which is the Bible for the Muslims, has many passages concerning the Blessed Virgin. First of all, the Qu’ran believes in her Immaculate Conception, and also in her Virgin Birth. The third chapter of the Qu’ran places the history of Mary’s family in a genealogy which goes back through Abraham, Noah, and Adam. When one compares the Qu’ran’s description of the birth of Mary with the apocryphal Gospel of the birth of Mary, one is tempted to believe that Mohammed very much depended upon the latter. Both books describe the old age and the definite sterility of the mother of Mary. When, however, she conceives, the mother of Mary is made to say in the Qu’ran: “O Lord, I vow and I consecrate to you what is already within me. Accept it from me.”

When Mary is born, the mother says: And I consecrate her with all of her posterity under thy protection, O Lord, against Satan!”

The Qu’ran passes over Joseph in the life of Mary, but the Muslim tradition knows his name and has some familiarity with him. In this tradition, Joseph is made to speak to Mary, who is a virgin. As he inquired how she conceived Jesus without a father, Mary answered:

Do you not know that God, when he created the wheat had no need of seed, and that God by his power made the trees grow without the help of rain? All that God had to do was to say, ‘So be it, and it was done.’

The Qu’ran was also verses on the Annunciation, Visitation, and Nativity. Angels are pictured as accompanying the Blessed Mother and saying: “Oh, Mary, God has chosen you and purified you, and elected you above all the women of the earth.” In the nineteenth chapter of the Qu’ran there are 41 verses on Jesus and Mary. There is such a strong defense of the virginity of Mary here that the Qu’ran, in the fourth book, attributed the condemnation of the Jews to their monstrous calumny against the Virgin Mary.

FATIMA
Mary, then, is for the Muslims the true Sayyida, or Lady. The only possible serious rival to her in their creed would be Fatima, the daughter of Mohammed himself. But after the death of Fatima, Mohammed wrote: “Thou shalt be the most blessed of all women in Paradise , after Mary.” In a variation of the text, Fatima is made to say, “I surpass all the women, except Mary.”

This brings us to our second point: namely, why the Blessed Mother, in the 20th century, should have revealed herself in the significant little village of Fatima , so that to all future generations she would be known as “Our Lady of Fatima.” Since nothing ever happens out of Heaven except with a finesse of all details, I believe that the blessed Virgin chose to be known as “Our Lady of Fatima” as a pledge and a sign of hope to the Muslim people, and as an assurance that they, who show her so much respect, will one day accept her divine Son too.

Evidence to support these views is found in the historical fact that the Muslims occupied Portugal for centuries. At the time when they were finally driven out, the last Muslim chief had a beautiful daughter by the name of Fatima . A Catholic boy fell in love with her, and for him she not only stayed behind when the Muslims left, but even embraced the faith. The young husband was so much in love with her that he changed the name of the town where he lived to Fatima . Thus, the very place where our lady appeared in 1917 bears a historical connection to Fatima, the daughter of Mohammed.

The final evidence of the relationship of Fatima to the Muslims is the enthusiastic reception which the Muslims in Africa, India , and elsewhere gave to the pilgrim statue of Our Lady of Fatima. Muslims attended the church services in honor of our Lady, they allowed religious processions and even prayers before their mosques; and in Mozambique, the Muslims who were unconverted, began to be Christian as soon as the statue of Our Lady of Fatima was erected.

MISSIONARIES
Missionaries in the future will, more and more, see that their apostolate among the Muslims will be successful in the measure that they preach Our Lady of Fatima. Mary is the advent of Christ, bringing Christ to the people before Christ himself is born. In an apologetic endeavor, it is always best to start with that which people already accept. Because the Muslims have a devotion to Mary, our missionaries should be satisfied merely to expand and to develop that devotion, with the full realization that Our Blessed Lady will carry the Muslims the rest of the way to her divine Son. She is forever a “traitor,” in the sense that she will not accept any devotion for herself, but will always bring anyone who is devoted to her to her divine Son. As those who lose devotion to her lose belief in the divinity of Christ, so those who intensify devotion to her gradually acquire that belief.

Many of our great missionaries in Africa have already broken down the bitter hatred and prejudices of the Muslims against the Christians through their acts of charity, their schools and hospitals. It now remains to use another approach, namely, that of taking the 41st chapter of the Quran and showing them that it was taken out of the Gospel of Luke, that Mary could not be, even in their own eyes, the most blessed of all the women of Heaven if she had not also borne One who was the Savior of the world. If Judith and Esther of the Old Testament were pre-figures of Mary, then it may very well be that Fatima herself was a post-figure of Mary! The Muslims should be prepared to acknowledge that, if Fatima must give way in honor to the Blessed Mother, it is because she is different from all the other mothers of the world and that without Christ she would be nothing.

 This was written by Bishop Sheen in 1952.

“Catholic Men of Christ”

for more informaton:

http://www.sacramentocursillo.org

 

What Does Catholic Mean? 

I have spent much time recently in diologue with our Protestant brothers & sister on Godtube and have discovered that there are a great deal of misconceptions about the Catholic Church.  One of the questions I get is, ” if you are Christian, why do you call yourself Catholic?”  I usualy explain that the word means “universal”.  Today I ran across an article by Steve Ray that explains the roots of Catholic very well and wanted to share it with my Protestant and Catholic brothers & sisters. 

  I hope this helps!

SG