Mary and The End Times - Fatima

The year was 1917 and the Blessed mother appeared to three simple shepherd children six times.  The children were Jacinta who was 7 at the time, Francisco age 9, and Lucia age 10.  What our Lady was that they were to warn the world about upcoming tribulations.  They were told that the first world war would end but if we did not change our ways another more terrible war would come. 

The apparitions began not with Mary but with an angel who identified himself as both the Angel of Peace and the Angel of Portugal.  The angel told the children that they mus pray and pray a great deal, "The Hearts of Jesus and Mary have designs of mercy for you.. Offer unceasingly to the Most High prayers and sacrifices."  In the autumn the angel brought them a chalice and bid them to, "Take and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful man. Make reparation for their crimes and console your God." 

The following spring, May 13, 1917, "a lady clothed in white, brighter than the sun, radiating a light more clear and intense than a crystal cup fill with sparkling water, lit by burning sunlight appeared to them.  Lucia asked what the lady wanted of them and was told that the lady came from heaven and told them to come to this spot on the 13th of each month at the same hour and later she would tell the children who she was and what she wanted. 

On June 13th the Lady told them to pray the rosary every day and once again she told them that she would tell them later what she wanted. 

On July 13th Lucia asked what she wanted the lady told her come on the 13th of next month and the pray the rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary to obtain peace.  Lucia again asked her who she was and if she could perform a miracle so that all present would believe. She asked the to cure some sick people and Mary replied some would be cured and others would not, all must say the rosary to obtain such graces.  She told them to sacrifice themselves for sinners and to say many times this prayer when making a sacrifice, "O Jesus it is for your love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary."  Then the first secret of Fatima was revealed to the children.  She opened her hands and rays of light appeared and revealed a scene of poor souls in hell. She then revealed the second secret of Fatima and said to the children that they had seen the horrors of hell and to save poor sinners from going there Jesus wants to establish devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. To do this she asked for the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart and to request a communion of reparation of the First Saturdays.   If we do this then Russia would be converted, if we didn't do this then there would be a terrible war, persecution of the Church and Russia would spread her errors throughout the world. The Third Secret was now revealed - more about that later. 

On August 13th the children were in custody and subjected to lengthy interrogations but in spite of this and in spite of being offered a large sum of money held their ground.  On August 19th the children saw Mary again. She told them to continue to pray the Rosary and that that in October there would would be a miracle so that all would believe. 

On September 13th Mary appeared again and told them pray the Rosary in order to obtain the end of the war. 

On October 13, 1917 the sixth and final apparition happened. A crowd estimated at 70,000 found their way to the Cova because of reports that a great miracle would occur.  Rising into the air Mary opened her hands towards the sun. Then to the left of the sun the children saw St. Joseph from the chest up holding the Child Jesus.  They saw Our Lady dressed in blue and white, the colors of Our Lady of the Rosary and Lucia alone saw Our Lord dressed in red as the Divine Redeemer,  

The crowd saw none of this. But, when all of this began it was raining in the cova, Lucile told everyone to close their umbrellas which everyone immediately did.  The rain stopped and all the people were dry as was the formerly muddy ground!  The people looked up into the sky where they could see the sun and they were able to stare at it without hurting their vision.  The sun appeared to spin and dance in the sky and then it appeared to zig zag downward causing many to scream in terror and called out for mercy. 

The "Third Secret of Fatima" was written down by Sister Lucia and eventually made it way to the Vatican.  It was in an envelope that said it should not be opened until 1960.  Since 1960 each pope has had a chance to read the Third Secret and decide if it should be made public. None of the popes had it published.  

Today the Third Secret of Fatima can be read in its entirety (in Portuguese in Sister Lucia's hand if you want to) or in an English version.  The third secret is not much of a secret at all as it turns out.  It is written in an apocalyptic style and is a call for penance.  

Much has been made of this Third Secret of Fatima and why it was held secret until 1960.  It turns out the year 1960 was chosen not by Mary but by Lucia because she thought no one before that date would understand the message.   The third secret features a story of a bishop dressed in white (The Pope) walking through a war torn landscape littered with corpses.  The Pope is praying for the souls of the dead he encounters as he makes his towards a large wooden cross atop a hill.  In a hail of bullets he is mowed down. Is this a vision of things to come or is it a vision of something that has already occurred with the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul the Second or perhaps it encapsules the horrors of the twentieth century?  Lucia herself said she was given the secret but not the interpretation of it.  She said the interpretation was to be made by the Church.  

The Church itself says that the events shown in the Third Secret of Fatima belong to the past.  There is no revelation about the end of the world here.  

In spite of this, the Fatima message remains as important today as it was back in 1917.  We are called by our Blessed Mother to pray, pray, and pray some more.  We are called to make sacrifices and to do penance for our sins.  This message is as fresh today as it will be tomorrow.  The Fatima message is not just for those who came before us but rather is for us today as well. 

When we look at the events that are occurring in our world today we can see that the heart of man (generic - meaning men and women) has not changed so much since that rainy day in 1917.  In fact our hearts may have grown more tepid or in some cases even cold.  The commandments of God are watered down and since Roe v Wade we have gradually declined to where we are today.  Evil is slowly taking over the world and it is only through prayer that we Catholics will be able to slow and God help us, reverse the tide.

Our next destination will be a small town called Garabandal.

Mary and The The Last Days

Of all creation, Mary, the Mother of Jesus is second only to her Son in importance to mankind. She was chosen by the Father to be the physical earthly mother of Jesus. As such she was preserved from the moment of her conception from the stain of original sin. She still had free will and could choose to serve God or not, it was her choice.  Of course she did say yes to the angel Gabriel and her fiat, her "yes" started the final act in the redemption of mankind promised in the garden of Eden.  When the time came she delivered into this world Jesus who would go to the cross and save us from our sins. When her earthly life was finished she died as all of us will and displaying His great love for His mother Jesus caused her to be assumed body and soul into heaven.  

I do not think that anyone would disagree with me when I say that Jesus perfectly kept the ten commandments.  If He did not then He would have committed sin and we know that is not possible.  Since Jesus kept the commandments perfectly, that would mean he kept the fourth commandment perfectly and he honored his father and mother. So, we can see Mary is a very important person indeed. She is very close to her Son. Jesus even began his ministry early at the wedding feast at Cana when he changed water into the finest wine. 

It is important for us to realize the importance the Mother of God plays in the history of salvation.  To this very day some people believe she is interceding for the race of man and delivering urgent messages warning us of the coming of the end times or at the least a great chastisement because of the way we have strayed from the will of God. 

Mary, it is said, has appeared at various places in various times and has brought both requests for prayer and fasting and warnings of punishments that are to come upon the race of man. The Church classifies these appearances as private revelations and we are free to believe in them or not.  

Let's take a look at some of the apparitions and see what they were all about. 

 The first apparition is that which is called Our Lady of

Guadalupe.  This took place in Mexico in the year 1531 right after the city of Mexico had been pacified and the Catholic faith was starting to take hold.  A new bishop had just been appointed and had just taken up residence there.  Juan Diego, a typical peasant, was on his way to Mexico to attend Mass when he heard some beautiful singing. He topped the hill and was stopped by a beautiful woman whose garments shined like the sun. She identified herself as "the ever virgin Holy Mary, Mother of the True God"  She told him that he was to go to the bishop and tell him that he is to build a church in her honor on this spot.  Juan Diego went of and with some difficulty he was admitted to see the bishop. The Bishop was named Father Juan de Zumarraga, a Franciscan, listened to the peasant courteously and he told Juan basically. "I'll think about it." 

Juan left and was broken hearted because it appeared to him that he was not believed by the prelate. Mary appeared to him and Juan related with happened and told Mary that she had entrusted her mission to a nothing of a man.  Mary told him that she had many servants and he was one of them and she chose him for this mission. She sent him back telling him you come in my name and he should start the erection of the temple that I am asking for.  She said "Tell him that I, in person, the ever virgin Holy Mary, Mother of God, has sent you." 

So off he went and once again with much difficulty he was able to see the bishop. The bishop sent him away stating that he had to bring him a sign from heaven that what he said was true.  Juan immediately left. This time servants of the bishop followed him to see where he went and who he spoke to. When Juan reached the crest of the hill on which Our Lady appeared to him he vanished from their sight and they could not find him. They decided that if this churlish peasant ever darkened the door of the bishop again that they would punish him severely.  Juan told the Virgin what had happened and she told him to return the next day and that she would give him a sign of the bishop.  Juan returned home and found that his uncle was ill and near death. The next morning Juan set out to fetch a priest to hear his uncle's confession but the Virgin once again appeared to him. He told her of his uncle's sickness and she said not to worry, that his uncle was cured. He then sent him to the top of a hill where, once he arrived, he could not believe his eyes. Here it was in the chill of December and all around him were beautiful roses, they do not bloom in December.  They Virgin told him to gather them and she put them into his robe and told him that this is the sign the bishop needed to see and to show them to noone before the bishop saw them. 

Juan went off to the bishops house again.  True to their word the servants of the bishop gave Juan a hard time and refused to tell the bishop that he was there to see him.  But soon he was admitted to the presence of the bishop and he told him that the sign that the bishop wanted was in his robe.  The bishop opened the robe and the beautiful roses spilled on to the floor and inside the robe was a picture of the Blessed Virgin.  The bishop now believed and needless to say the church was built.  Juan Diego himself has been canonized as a saint.  

Okay. some peasant finds some flowers and paint a picture in his robe, big deal, cute, but not miraculous. It's not that simple, we cannot just throw away the possibility of the miraculous.  Let's talk about the robe, or as it properly called a "Tilma."  The tilma was a typical garment used by the natives in the 15th and 16th centuries. It is made of two pieces of coarse cloth fibers and is approximately 70 inches by 41 inches.  The normal life of this typical garment is approximately thirty years.  This tilma has been with us for almost 500 hundred years and in the early years it was handled by literally thousands of people, hung without any protection from insects, uv light and contamination of tens of thousands of candles that have been near it over the years and it has suffered no degeneration. 

In 1879 Dr. Jose Ignacio Bartolache had two copies of the image made by local artists placed them in identical conditions as the original and the copies disintegrated in twenty years. Further, human artists tried to embellish  the original by adding a crown around Mary's head and adding gold to the sun burst. All of these things faded away but the original remained perfectly preserved. 

Modern investigations have been made as well.  In 1936 a Noble Prize winner in chemistry examined the fabric and he was unable to tell how the pigments were made as they were from no known source, neith natural, animal, mineral, or vegetable. 

NASA has ascertained that the image floats above the surface of the tilma a distance of 1/100th of an inch without touching it! The Kodak Corporation in Mexico examined the image and says it bears more resemblance to a color photograph than a painting.

Microscopic examination of the eyes of the image reveal a most remarkable thing.  In the pupil of each eye can be seen miniscule image of a bearded man, Juan Diego!  Also, if a bright light is shined into the pupil, it reacts and the retina contracts and when the light stimulation is removed the retina returns to a dilated state, just as what happens to a living eye.  

Finally, one other miraculous occurrence bears mentioning.  On November 14, 1921 a bomb consisting of 29 sticks of dynamite was left near the tilma and the subsequent explosion broke the marble communion rail and windows up to 150 meters from the explosion but the tilma, housed in an ordinary frame covered with standard window glass was not damaged at all. A heavy brass crucifix near by was almost bent in half. 

So, given the facts above, I think we can say that the tilma is a very special piece of cloth that was left as an ongoing reminder of the love of the Blessed Virgin Mary for her children.  But what can we learn about the end times from this miraculous event that happened so very long ago.  About the end times, probably not a whole lot. But I believe that this visit of Mary to her Mexican people shows that she is a caring mother who will do what she needs to help her children.  And I think it also proves that Mary does appear on earth and that she uses the powerless of the world to get her message across.   We move next to a place called Fatima. 

(Thanks to Infallible Catholic which provided the facts quoted above. Please visit the blog by clicking on the link below. ) 

Infallible Catholic (Click Here) 

The Truth about the Crusades

The followers of ISIS constantly bring up the crusades in their propaganda.  They call the alliance fighting them crusaders and the word itself is a loaded word which for the ignorant (such as those marching under the flag of ISIS) brings to mind evil hordes of Christian knights attacking and killing the peaceful Muslim people.  It brings to mind men filled with greed and taking the spoils of war from these same peaceful Muslims as they tried to mind their own business and make a living selling things to nomad traders.  Well, nothing could be farther from the truth. 

Beginning in the year 632 AD the following countries were all Christian lands; Egypt, France, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica but in less than one-hundred years they would become under Muslim rule. The Christian communities in Arabia were destroyed when Jews and Christians were expelled from the peninsula. Between 850 and 950 Benedictine monks were driven out of their monasteries, the Papal States were overrun and plundered by Muslim pirates that set up their bases on the coast of Italy and France. But what about the Crusades?  All we have heard about so far is Muslim conquests.  We will get there in a minute, but let's talk about the conditions that surviving Christians had to endure under the rule of the followers of Islam. By the eleventh century AD conditions for Christians living in lands controlled by Muslims were harsh. They had to pay a special fax and were considered a second class known as the dhimmi. Churches were destroyed and harsh conditions were imposed.  In 1067 a peaceful group of seven thousand German pilgrims lost two thirds of their members to assaults from the Muslims. 

The call for the first Crusade went out in 1095 AD. It was called to address the tyranny and the spoiling of places such as the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, the site of the crucifixion where Christian pilgrims were massacred.  Before the capture of Jerusalem, Muslim fighters taunted the crusaders by profaning religious objects and taunting them. The commanders of the crusaders lost control of their men and the melee that followed was brutal and bloody and while it happened it should be remembered that the Crusaders were deeply religious men and the blasphemous things done to the cross would strike deeply at what they were there fighting for.  They were there not only to retake the holy land but they were there fighting for Cross and all that the Cross meant to them. 

So, the Crusades were not a war of aggression. The war of aggression had been started 450 years BEFORE the first crusade was called for by the Muslim armies of conquest.  History clearly shows that the Christians had no hair trigger, did not rattle swords but waited four and a half centuries before attempting to right the wrongs of Islamic conquest. Once again the Muslim jihadists are on the move like a plague of locusts laying waste to all that they can get their hands on.  Their cruel and bloodthirsty ways are not unlike their forefathers in the early centuries. I am afraid that I have come to the belief that Islam caters panders to the evil impulses of the creature we call man. I am not saying that it is completely evil and depraved, only that it can be turned that way by the "correct" reading of their holy book which contains such charming instructions as to cut the head off of the infidels wherever you find them. Or to beat your wife if she disobeys you.  All very practical and made so you can live peacefully with other people. 

The scary part of Islam is that it is a religion without any leader. There is no one in charge to say this interpretation is correct and this interpretation is wrong.  So for my neighbor down the street, Islam is a religion of peace because he does not take the verses that preach violence to heart.  On the other hand the follower across the street, he believes in the sword and is biding his time waiting for his opportunity to strike. Until then, he smiles, nods, pays his taxes, votes and worships at the local mosque where he hangs with other radicals who also are biding their time. To be quite frank about it, I am afraid of most Muslims because you just do not know. 

Let is be said and let my voice be heard.  I am an American. I believe in the American way of life and part of that way of life is the freedom of religion for ALL of us.  It was not so long ago that Catholics were looked down upon as second class citizens and unworthy to be called Americans just because of their religion. Today there is still great amounts of anti-Catholic rhetoric out there and still much prejudice against us. Some say it is the last acceptable form of prejudice in America.  So, I know my Father in heaven loves all of His children, including the misguided followers of the prophet and I want them to be free in this great country of ours. 

So when you read Islamic propaganda that uses the word Crusade  or Crusader in ways that make it seem evil. remember, that the Crusades were just wars undertaken to return peace to the Holy Land, to protect Christians and other that lived there from Muslim injustice.  

Many thanks to Scott Eric Alt whose article formed the basis for the facts quoted here. 

ISIS Cannot Win

ISIS is losing ground and the so called caliphate is but a shadow of its former self. The vicious snake has begun to consume itself as we hear of executions of their own fighters, men who have had enough of the killing of innocent women and children and have tried to desert these butchers.. Now their rabid leader calls for lone wolf attacks against "the infidels." everywhere.   It turns out that the infidels include everyone who are not a part of ISIS including other Muslims especially the Sunni branch of Islam.  So in one of the latest attacks two fevered followers took five hostages and after shouting obscenities around the altar in the Catholic Church killed the eighty-five year old priest who was saying Mass.

The murder of the priest in a house of worship should come as no surprise. ISIS and it followers have no desire to co-exist with any other religion including Sunni members of Islam. To them all are infidels deserving of death. The fact is that there has been a wholesale slaughter of Christians in the lands that have been infested by ISIS. Thousands upon thousands of Christians, Catholics and Protestants alike have been put to death because they would not submit to the pagan religion espoused by ISIS.  Why our esteemed president, Barack Hussein Obama, seems afraid to call this wholesale murder of whole blocks of people for their religious beliefs what it is, genocide, is beyond me.  Who is he afraid of alienating? ISIS? ISIS would like nothing more than to have the president in their clutches. Is he afraid of alienating ordinary Muslims? Your ordinary Muslim hates what ISIS has done to their religion and wants nothing more than to live in peace.  How do we know this?  Because it was done for hundreds of years in places where Christians and Muslims lived together in peace. Declaring the murder of the innocent a genocide is not declaring war on Islam at all, it is declaring war on those who pervert Islam. 

There will be more bloodshed and there is no safe place. The lunatics that ISIS attracts live among us. They may be of foreign descent but they may have been born in America and will use the freedoms we have against us. But the title of this post is, "ISIS Cannot Win." and so far what I have written makes it sound as if they are.

ISIS cannot win because they do not bear any allegiance to God at all. They cannot win because they have turned their hearts away from the way of peace and hardened them into hearts of stone. The martyrs they are making are showing other Christians what it may take to prove themselves to Christ.  The Christian martyrs know that Jesus is the Son of God and rules at the right hand of the Father.  They surrender their very being to Jesus rather than to deny Him.  When a group of Christians were going to be executed by ISIS there was one Arab man who was not a believer among them. He watched as the Christians prayed and said the name of Jesus over and over again. His captors told the Arab man that if he converted to Islam right there and then he would be spared.  He looked at the condemned Christian men praying and told the devil's apostles that "Their God is My God."  He went to his death and  I am sure directly to heaven as he was a martyr for the faith because he professed his belief in Jesus at the cost of his very life. 

ISIS cannot hope to win because we know that Jesus Christ has already won the victory and that at the name of Jesus, every knee must bend and every tongue proclaim to the Glory of God the Father, that Jesus Christ is Lord.   

Lord Teach Us To Pray

Why do we fold our hands when we pray? 

There are a lot of theories out there and many of them make sense but the one I like is the one that explains that if you were an enemy  soldier captured by a Roman soldier you could avoid immediate death by folding your hands which indicated you have surrendered and were ready to be shackled and taken into captivity. This symbol of surrender is a proper one for us to adopt when we pray. 

THERE IS POWER IN PRAYER ! 

What a great power we have within us. Each of us can make the creator of the universe stop whatever he is doing and actually listen to us. Can you imagine that? The God that built the galaxies, who set the planets in their places, who keeps all things in existence is there ready to listen to you or I.  The power of God is so very great that when you are lifting yourself up in prayer to Him you have His whole attention! He cares about the most minute things in your life and He wants you to share them with Him.  It is true that he already knows all of your problems,sins, virtues and needs before you can mention them but He wants you to freely demonstrate your trust in Him by telling them in your own way and in your own words. 

Trust In God 

Our prayers show God that we trust Him and that we recognize Him as our true and most loving Father. Our prayers make us realize that we cannot do it alone, that we need help and that help is only one breath away. Sometimes our needs are so great that we cannot put them into words. In those times of great stress, God's spirit will pray of us in words and ways we do not understand. 

Prayer As An Obligation

Prayer is an obligation too. God can and will exist quite nicely even if we do not pray. When we pray we acknowledge our dependence. Prayer helps us to conform to the will go God and helps us find what His will is.  

There are many methods of prayer out there some of which are quite complex and take years to master. But simple prayer is nothing more than speaking to the Lord as to a friend. The strange thing about it is the more that we pray the more we recognize the beauty and wonderful nature of God. 

Pray With Confidence

We should pray with confidence and with trust and with persistence. God answers all prayers, and I mean all prayers.  There are only three answers God gives to prayer. The first is the one we long to hear, "Yes." There is nothing better than you and God agreeing fully about something. Yes is more beautiful than any other word you can hear when you pray. The second answer is "No."  We really dislike when the answer to our prayer is "No."  When the answer is no, we have to accept it as if it were a yes. This is because that yes and no are the same answer, the answer that expresses inexhaustible love for us. 

Like a good Father,He will give us everything that we need, but not necessarily everything that we want. Yes and no are easy to deal with compared to the third possible answer to prayer and that answer is "Wait." Why should we wait? We know what we need, we know what is good, why does He make us wait? We have to remember that this earth is not our home.  Our home is in heaven with God and He will give us everything that we need to make it to heaven. Sometimes that means we have to wait for a time. 

Praying in or out of the foxhole 

It is sad that more people do not realize that within them they have this great power, a direct line to God. Some people resort to prayer when all other possibilities under their control have been used and they are in a foxhole with enemy shells whizzing overhead. It is okay to pray then of course, but personally I when the enemy seemingly is winning I would rather have a personal ongoing relationship with God, not because he is more or less likely to answer my prayer, but rather my spirit would be calmer knowing by experience that he will answer and his answer will come in the nick of time. 

The late Mother Angelica said this about prayer and I have always remembered it: 

"WHEN WE PRAY TO GOD OUR PRAYER NO MATTER WHAT THE WORDS ARE ASKING GOD IF HE LOVES US AND HIS ANSWER NO MATTER WHAT THE ANSWER IS, YES, NO, OR WAIT, IS THAT YES INDEED HE LOVES US." 

Attitude Is Important

The Sodom Chamber of Commerce Welcomes You!
What happens in Sodom stays in Sodom. 

Today in this world we have created for ourselves, a world where little by little God is being edged out and being replaced with what seems good, or feels good, or doesn't offend, we Christians have a grave duty.  It is a duty to our to our God, to our Church and to our fellow human creatures.  Our duty is to be the pain in the ass for the world. (I cam't believe he said that!) It is the easiest thing in the world to be politically correct, just sitting back and letting what happens around us happen. We need not participate. No we just need to stand by and watch it happen. This will promote peace and harmony among all of the people and isn't that what we are after?  Peace is a good thing after all isn't it? Well, there is peace and there is peace. In 1938 Neville Chamberlain stumbled off of his airplane clutching a piece of paper in hand and proclaimed that he had brought back "peace in our time." We all know what happened. On September 1, 1939 NAZI Germany started World War II which caused millions of deaths world wide. 

The men and women living in ancient Sodom kept things politically correct, they were at peace with one another and we know what happened to them. I am afraid that peace is something that is going to be hard to achieve in our world. We Christians have the duty to point the way, to be a lighthouse that points out the rocky outcrops that litter the pathways of life. This duty is not going to make us popular with the people around us that have chosen to turn their back on the law of God and to follow their own law. It is very important that in being a PIA we do so keeping in mind that those we are trying to help are beloved by God our Father just as we are. The most rabid homosexual activist, the Muslim who bathes in the blood of the innocent, the abortion doctor who has filled his wallet with money by creating baby cadavers, all of these are loved by God who is just one step away from them with His arms outstretched waiting for them to return to Him. 

In a soul where God is absent, ego grows to imperfectly fill His place. A soul without God can never be satisfied because no matter what he/she obtains in gratification of their wants still leaves them wanting more.  They are in a most pitiful shape because they cannot see the trouble that they are in. When we point out an issue where Christians and they are on opposite sides their ego shuts off their ability to see and they that cannot see, will not see. 

Okay, lets get to the bottom line. We must love our brothers and sisters back to life. Do you remember Chinese handcuffs? You put your fingers in them and if you pull hard, they hold more tightly to your fingers and you cannot get out of them. Release the pressure and your fingers slip right out. While we have to confront people about behavior that is sinful we must do it in a loving and respectful way. We must always remember that we are the planters and God Himself is the harvester. If we sit back and say nothing then we are guilty as if we committed the sin ourselves.  If we attack frontally and insult our brothers and sisters, we can only expect them to hold on to their beliefs even more strongly. We must love them back to health. Our good example and gentle prodding will do more good than anything else. 

God bless all of you. Please leave a comment, even if it is only to say you think I am nuts! Michael 

Early In The Morning

I was up very early this morning. It is a gloomy looking start to the day and it is refreshingly cool as I sit by the window with my computer thinking about what I want to say this weekend.  To be honest, I feel a little bit down today.  I look back at my life and I see nothing noteworthy that I have accomplished. It seems everything I have tried has come to naught.  I look at the lives of others and with suppressed envy I wonder why the key to success does not fit the lock I have been given. This is a very rare thing for me to be feeling this way. I am normally a guy who sees the glass as being half full, not half empty.  

There have been a few changes in my life recently, nothing too bad but changes none the less.  The most important of these changes is that my Type 2 Diabetes has become harder and harder to control with just oral medications and TLC care, so my doctor has put me on Lantus, a long acting synthetic insulin. Some of my friends have offered their sympathy and while I am grateful that they think that this is something to mourn about, it really is just another medication and I have adapted to it.  In my life too there have been things I have had to adjust to. I know it was bound to happen sooner or later and I think deep inside of me, in the part of my brain where "self failures" are stored I still consider this to be a failure.  this has been added to the list my brain has compiled when it wants to make me feel sorry for myself.  

My brother and sisters for reasons known only to them have in effect abandoned me and since the death of my father eight years ago I have truly been an orphan, declared persona non gratis by those that should be closest to me. I mourn about this regularly and pray to God often and ask Him why he has permitted this. 

Now, why am I sharing all of this personal stuff with you?  It is because our Gospel today is the story of Mary and Martha. You know, Mary is running around serving the guests while Martha is sitting at the feet of Jesus listening to him speak.  Our deacon pointed out that what Mary is giving us is a poor me type of a story. She is saying "Oh poor me, look at how hard I have it, why me?" 

I truly believe that God has a plan for us and it is our job to cooperate as best as we can with that plan.  People come and go in your life and it is a fact that the ones that you love most are the ones that can hurt you the most.  As for me, I bear no ill will towards my estranged family.  I have granted them what their heart seems to yearn for, my absence in their lives. I leave it up to God to someday to tell me why this has happened.  This of course has caused my spirit to suffer, to feel lonely and abandoned but I offer my anguish and sadness that the situation causes me up to the Lord and ask Him, as Paul did in our second reading today, to add it to the all sufficient suffering he experienced on the cross for us. 

There is a purpose for everything under God's universe.  My puny mind and my sin weakened soul cannot hope to know what specific part those things that appear as evil in my life will have in bringing the ultimate plan of God into fruition, but I just have to remember that it will.  For the disappointments in life, for those things that have caused me pain and suffering I accept them and thank God for them because I know that He will ultimately place all things under his feet.