Last week I shared some of my Protestant Christian upbringing, and my desire to share with you more of the spiritual riches of the Catholic Christian Faith. We begin with prayer.       As a child I was taught to pray by saying grace at meals, memorizing the Lord’s Prayer (the “Our Father”), by how we prayed at church, by reading prayers, and just speaking my own words to God. I don’t remember any teaching in either my Christian home or at Christian colleges, on how to pray, kinds of prayer, stages of prayer, or growth in prayer.       That’s sad. Because from the Jewish tradition before us, and after 2000 years of Christian experience, Christianity has a vast knowledge and experience of prayer.       St. Teresa of Jesus (AD 1515-1582), of Avila, Spain, is a Doctor of the Church and outstanding teacher of prayer. She describes prayer as “nothing less than an intimate sharing between friends.”  ...

      I, Dibby, would like to further introduce the Christian community of California City with more of the riches and depths of the Catholic Faith. But I know well the blocks in some quarters to hearing something that is from the Catholic Christian Faith.       So I think it’s time for a bit of my own personal testimony. We all like stories, and testimonies of what the Lord has done in our lives, right? So here goes.       I grew up in a Christian home, parents and grandparents Presbyterian and Evangelical ministers, missionaries and teachers in England, Scotland, Australia, New Zealand, Colombia, and the USA. My BA degree in Religious Studies came from a good Evangelical school (Westmont College, Santa Barbara), with course work at two other Presbyterian schools. I especially took classes on “Reformation” Theology, so knew where the “errors” of Roman Catholicism lay. My English minister father had always been quite c...

        Last week we looked at the life of St. Matthias from the Bible, tradition, and Church history. St. Matthias replaced Judas Iscariot as the 12th Apostle after Jesus had ascended into Heaven and before the outpouring of the Holy Spirit (see Acts 1:12-26). In addition to what we know of his life and ministry, St. Matthias left some writings.       We know of a “Gospel of Matthias,” but it either hasn’t survived, or has not yet been identified. The book is mentioned by Origen, St. Eusebius, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, and St. Bede. It also appears in two list of books from the 6th and 7th Centuries. It may be apocryphal, written by another using Matthias’ name; but we don’t know.       Then there is a book called, “Traditions of Matthias.” Although the full text has been lost to history, St. Clement of Alexandria (AD 150-211/216), writing circa AD 210, gives us three quotes from what probably was origin...

        In the Bible, Acts 1:12-26, relates how St. Peter, based upon prophetic words in the Psalms, led the 11 Apostles to replace the 12th Apostle with St. Matthias (after Judas Iscariot’s defection). This occurred after Jesus’ Ascension into Heaven and before Pentecost.       St. Matthias is not mentioned anywhere else in the Bible. So does history or tradition tell us anything about who he was?       Yes. First, his name in Hebrew purportedly means the “Gift of Yahweh,” or (per St. Arator, died about 550) the “small one of Yahweh.” “Small” was understood to reflect his humility.       The tradition from the Eastern Church tells us St. Matthias was born in Bethlehem, of the tribe of Judah. Apparently as a youth or young man, he studied the Law under St. Simeon, the one who received the Christ child when He came into the Temple as an infant (Luke 2:25-35). As Scripture implies Simeon w...

      Someone posted a question on social media last week: Is there any proof that Jesus actually rose from the dead?       Sometimes you just want to chuckle at people’s ignorance. Oh, the amount of proof is astonishing! How many people saw Him! How many testified that it was Jesus indeed! People even came back from the dead to give testimony to Jesus!       Jesus Christ, as resurrected, appeared to Mary Magdalene (Mt. 28:9-10, Jn. 20:11-17 – an “idle tale” Peter says, Lk. 24:11) and to the other women.       To Simon Peter (who must have swallowed his words; Lk. 24:34; I Cor. 15:5).       To the 11 Apostles (Lk 24:36-49; Jn. 20:19-23, 26-29; I Cor. 15:5), when Jesus ate some fish and had them touch Him to prove He was real flesh and not a ghost, even rebuking them for their unbelief and hardness of heart (Mk. 16:14).       To two disciples on the ...

When the Church uses the term, the “Paschal mystery,” she is referring to the mystery of Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. The word “paschal” comes from the Greek pascha , meaning Passover, so it is the “Passover mystery.” The Jewish Passover meal had its own rules and regulations. Today the meal is called the Passover Seder , from the Hebrew word for “order.” That order revolved around four cups of wine, all of which must be drunk. Jesus, however, did not do this that Thursday night at the Lord’s Supper , His final Passover on earth. The details are described in the book, Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist , by Brant Pitre, Ph.D., Chapter 6 titled “The Fourth Cup and the Death of Jesus.”   Below is a quick summary. From the descriptions in the New Testament of how Jesus celebrated that last Passover meal, which we now know of as the Last Supper, three of the four cups can be identified. But what Jesus does differently is that he does not drink the fourth cup....

At Our Lady of Lourdes, we continue our Lenten Parish Retreat. This fourth week of Lent our theme is “The Bread of the Face of God,” a theme from the Book of Exodus.       After the Exodus, when the children of Israel were in the wilderness of Sinai, God instructed Moses to set up a sanctuary (the Tabernacle) that He might dwell in the midst of the people ( Ex. 25:8 ), according to a vision Moses was given of the heavenly sanctuary ( Ex. 25,9, 40 ; Heb. 8:4 ). One of the three sacred objects to be placed in the inner Holy Place was a golden table of bread ( Ex.25:23-30 ), patterned after the heavenly reality Moses was given to see. The description is sometimes translated “showbread” or “Bread of the Presence.” However, Hebrew word panim literally means “face,” or, “Bread of the Face [of God].”       The table would not only hold the bread, but also hold bowls for the pouring of libations of wine, as well as plates of incense as the bread and ...

We continue our Lenten Parish Retreat, and this third week of Lent our theme is “Raining Down Bread from Heaven.” It comes from Exodus 16:4 where the Lord says to Moses, “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you.” The “manna” given in the wilderness is the precursor, the type, of the Bread of Life that Christ gives us, the Eucharist.       The setting in Exodus is that the 12 tribes of Jacob/Israel had now come forth from Egypt. The Passover deliverance had spared their first-born sons from death when the destroying angel “passed over” their homes upon seeing the blood of the slain lamb on the wood of their doorposts. ( Exodus 12 & 13 .)       Then, in Exodus, the people were next miraculously delivered through the waters of the Red Sea ( Exodus 14 & 15 ), a “type” or precursor of Christian Baptism. But now the people had fallen into complaining. They were hungry. They even blamed Moses for bringing them out of Egypt! In respons...

We are now in the second week of Lent. The Gospel for Sunday, Week 2 of Lent, is the Transfiguration of Christ, as recorded by St. Mark in his Gospel ( 9:2-10 ).       The First Reading at Mass is from Genesis 22 , the story of the sacrifice of Isaac. Although Isaac was not killed after all (God’s mercy), a sacrifice consists in the offering and not in the slaughter, so the sacrifice of love was indeed made.       From the earliest days of Christianity, the Church Fathers saw this sacrifice of Isaac as a type, an image, a foreshadowing of the Passion and death of Christ on the Cross. St. John Chrysostom (AD 344/354-407) wrote, “All these things were types of the Cross. That is why Christ said: Abraham rejoiced that he might see My day; he saw it, and was glad. How did he see it, considering that he [Abraham] was born so many years before? In type and in shadow.... The reality had to be depicted beforehand in type.”   ...

We are now in the first week of Lent. Not only for Christians who follow the Liturgical Year, but the six weeks before Easter is a wonderful time for all of us to take time to reflect on our lives. It’s good to reflect. Are we growing in love (charity) of God and others? After all, love of God and others is part of the natural law binding on all people; our conscience tells us this. And if we claim to be Christian, are we following the teachings of Christ? Acting the same way He did? Abiding in Him? (Not just talking about it?) One way to reflect on our lives is to consider these two lists:       Capital Sins: – Opposing Virtues:       Pride – Humility       Envy – Mercy       Anger – Meekness       Greed – Generosity       Lust – Chastity       Gluttony – Temperance       Sloth – Dil...

February 14th, is Ash Wednesday, a day of fasting, and the beginning of Lent. Lent is a six-week period of conversion and penance to prepare ourselves by prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, for the great celebration of Easter Sunday and the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ on March 31st this year. Today’s Ash Wednesday Masses with Distribution of Ashes is at 9:00 AM and 5:30 PM at Our Lady of Lourdes in Calif. City, and at 6:30 PM at St. Joseph’s in Boron. Starting on Thursday, February 15th, we are beginning a six-week Lenten Parish Retreat with particular focus on the Holy Eucharist, under the theme of “Given for You.” Every Thursday evening, after the 5:30 PM Mass, Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, with Confessions and Benediction, will be held in the OLL church. Fridays are days of abstinence, and at 5:30 PM Stations of the Cross in English are held at OLL and at SJM in Boron. Stations in Spanish at OLL are at 7:00 PM. On Tuesdays during Lent, after the 5:30 PM Mass, a ...

 This is the fifth in our serious on St. Antony the Great (AD 251-356) of Egypt. Last week we saw that he was physically beaten so badly by the demons that people thought he was dead. But he awoke, and upon returning to the tomb that was his cell at the time, he shouted out to the devil: "Here am I, Antony; I flee not from your stripes, for even if you inflict more, nothing shall separate me from the love of Christ!" (Romans 8:35.) Antony's biographer, St. Athanasius (writing about AD 360), records a conversation [make believe? later told to him by Antony?] of the devil with his demons: "'You see,' said [the devil], 'that neither by the spirit of lust nor by blows did we stay the man, but that he braves us, let us attack him in another fashion.' But changes of form for evil are easy for the devil," wrote Athanasius, "so in the night they made such a din that the whole of that place seemed to be shaken by an earthquake, and the demons as if b...

This is the fourth in our serious on St. Antony the Great (AD 251-356) of Egypt, leaning heavily on the biography written about AD 360 by St. Athanasius. Last week we saw Antony’s beginning to train himself in self-discipline, asceticism. This period of his life lasted 15 years, roughly from age 20 to 35, about AD 271-285. The devil made haste to try to extinguish Antony’s resoluteness. St. Athanasius writes of this time: “First of all, [the devil] tried to lead [Antony] away from the discipline, whispering to him the remembrance of his wealth, care for his sister, claims of kindred, love of money, love of glory, the various pleasures of the table and the other relaxations of life, and at last the difficulty of virtue and the labor of it. [The devil] suggested also the infirmity of the body and the length of the time.” (Has anyone who sought to be a serious Christian not heard such temptations also?) “In a word [the devil] raised in [Antony’s] mind a great dust of debate, wishing...