And if you should hear a mocker by chance when you do not wish to hear, sign yourself with the cross of light, and run from that place like an antelope. Where Satan lodges, Christ will certainly not dwell; a spacious dwelling for Satan is the man who mocks his neighbor; a palace of the Enemy is the heart of the mocker. Satan does not desire to add any other evil to it. Mockery is sufficient for him to supply the place of all. - Saint Ephrem of Syria
‘Compassion, my dear Brother, is preferable to cleanliness. Reflect that with a little soap I can easily clean my bed covers, but even with a torrent of tears I would never wash from my soul the stain that my harshness toward the unfortunate would create.’ - Saint Martin of Porres (1579-1639) Feast day November 3
Everything, even sweeping, scraping vegetables, weeding a garden and waiting on the sick could be a prayer, if it were offered to God. - Saint Martin of Porres (1579-1639)
Does Catholicism support socialism?
Answer:
No, the Catholic Church explicitly rejects socialism.
- If Socialism, like all errors, contains some truth (which, moreover, the supreme pontiffs have never denied), it is based nevertheless on a theory of human society peculiar to itself and irreconcilable with true Christianity. Religious socialism, Christian socialism, are contradictory terms; no one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true socialist (Pius XI’s Quadragesimo Anno, 12.
- The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism” (Catechism, 2425).
- Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum explicitly rejects several main tenants of socialism.
Socialism severely curtails rights to private property. The Church, on the other hand, upholds the individual’s right to private property (Catechism, 2401).
Election Prayer - by Servant of God, Father John Anthony Hardon, S.J.:
Lord Jesus Christ, You told us to give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God. Enlighten the minds of our people in America.
May we choose a President of the United States, and other government officials, according to Your Divine Will.
Give our citizens the courage to choose leaders of our nation who respect the sanctity of unborn human life, the sanctity of marriage, the sanctity of marital relations, the sanctity of the family, and the sanctity of the aging.
Grant us the wisdom to give You, what belongs to You, our God. If we do this, as a nation, we are confident You will give us an abundance of Your blessings through our elected leaders. Amen.
All Souls Day - excerpt
November 2 – Commemoration
Liturgical Color: White, Violet or Black
The earthly Church prays for the Church in Purgatory in hope of a reunion in Heaven
Every country has a civic feast day dedicated to soldiers who died for the nation. Every country has a tomb of the unknown soldier where an honor guard stands solemnly erect near an unnamed hero whose grave represents all the unknowns who never walked off the ship to hug their wife, who never met their parents at the airport and drove home. All Souls Day is like such Memorial Days and Tombs of the Unknown. Because of the Church’s ancient pedigree, timeless customs, and unmatched role in shaping cultures, it is more apt to say, though, that civic customs and ceremonies imitate the Church’s practice rather than the opposite.
The Feast of All Souls is the Catholic Memorial Day. Today the Church commemorates the souls of all the baptized who have died and yet who do not yet enjoy life with God in heaven. It is Catholic teaching that souls needing post-death purification can benefit from the prayers, alms, sacrifices, and Mass offerings of souls on earth. The Old Testament recounts the Jewish belief that the deceased benefit from temple sacrifice made on their behalf (2 Maccabees 12:42–46). Continuing this Semitic practice, prayers for the dead were offered by Christians from the very earliest years of the Church. The walls of the Christian catacombs of Rome were crowded with innumerable marble plaques in succinct Latin praying for the dead. There has never been a time when the Church has not commemorated, remembered, and prayed for the dead.
The Feast of All Souls, then, is much more than a spiritual family reunion where we visit the graves of our ancestors and recall with a tear all the good times. All Souls Day longs for a deeper bond, for an ultimate reunion with God at the head of the family in heaven with all His saints and angels. The dark arts of pagandom understand well the role the dead play in the imagination of the living. Vampires, werewolves, ghosts, zombies and witches surface in many cultures on this day. They manifest a frustrated, non-Christian longing for the afterlife. These characters are the living dead who inhabit the middle ground between earthly life and ultimate death. The undead, the forever young, the “after life but before judgment” souls lust after the flesh and blood of the living to preserve their immortality. In this imaginary world, death feeds on the sacrifice of life, especially young and beautiful life, so that dark powers can slake their thirst.
All Holy Souls, our prayers and Mass offerings are directed to you this day, in the hope that what we do on earth may benefit your advancement toward a fully divine life in heaven where you may, in turn, pray that we may one day join you there. - https://mycatholic.life/saints..../saints-of-the-litur
