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8 §1. A plenary indulgence is granted to the Christian faithful who: ... 2° in any Friday in the season of Lent piously recite the prayer En ego, o bone et dulcissime Iesu, before an image of the Crucified Jesus Christ after communion; ... (Reference: Enchiridion Indulgentiarum, 4th edition, al. concessiones.) http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/tribunals/apost_penit/documents/rc_trib_appen_doc_20020826_enchiridion-indulgentiarum_lt.html . . . The En ego is quite well known - it is published in Breviaries and Missals, as well as in all missals for the use of the lay faithful, usually in the section dedicated to thanksgiving after Mass: En ego, o bone et dulcissime Iesu, ante...

Ash Wednesday is upon us again! Here are 9 things you need to know and share . . . 1. What is Ash Wednesday? Ash Wednesday is the day that Lent begins (see: 9 things you need to know about Lent). The name comes from the fact that a particular rite is always celebrated on this Wednesday in which the faithful have ashes put on their foreheads. According to the Roman Missal: In the course of today’s Mass, ashes are blessed and distributed. These are made from the olive branches or branches of other trees that were blessed the previous...

February 18, 2015Ash Wednesday    Reading 1 Jl 2:12-18 Even now, says the LORD,return to me with your whole heart,with fasting, and weeping, and mourning;Rend your hearts, not your garments,and return to the LORD, your God.For gracious and merciful is he,slow to anger, rich in kindness,and relenting in punishment.Perhaps he will again relentand leave behind him a blessing,Offerings and libationsfor the LORD, your God. Blow the trumpet in Zion!proclaim a fast,call an assembly;Gather the people,notify the congregation;Assemble the elders,gather the childrenand the infants at the breast;Let the bridegroom quit his roomand the bride her chamber.Between the porch and the...

Morning and Evening Charles H. Spurgeon February 17, 2015 Morning Reading Isaac dwelt by the well Lahai-roi. —Genesis 25:11 Hagar had once found deliverance there and Ishmael had drank from the water so graciously revealed by the God who liveth and seeth the sons of men; but this was a merely casual visit, such as worldlings pay to the Lord in times of need, when it serves their turn. They cry to Him in trouble, but forsake Him in prosperity. Isaac dwelt there, and made the well of the living and all-seeing God his constant source of supply. The usual...

February 17, 2015Tuesday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Gn 6:5-8; 7:1-5, 10 When the LORD saw how great was man’s wickedness on earth,and how no desire that his heart conceivedwas ever anything but evil,he regretted that he had made man on the earth,and his heart was grieved. So the LORD said:“I will wipe out from the earth the men whom I have created,and not only the men,but also the beasts and the creeping things and the birds of the air,for I am sorry that I made them.”But Noah found favor with the LORD. Then...

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.(Romans 10:9-13)Israel, the nation created...

February 16, 2015Monday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Gn 4:1-15, 25 The man had relations with his wife Eve,and she conceived and bore Cain, saying,“I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”Next she bore his brother Abel.Abel became a keeper of flocks, and Cain a tiller of the soil.In the course of time Cain brought an offering to the LORDfrom the fruit of the soil,while Abel, for his part,brought one of the best firstlings of his flock.The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering,but on Cain and his offering...

The Sunday of the Last Judgment is the third Sunday of a three-week period prior to the commencement of Great Lent. During this time, the services of the Church have begun to include hymns from the Triodion, a liturgical book that contains the services from the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee, the tenth before Pascha (Easter), through Great and Holy Saturday. On this day, focus is placed on the future judgment of all persons who will stand before the throne of God when Christ returns in His glory.

February 15, 2015Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Lv 13:1-2, 44-46 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron,“If someone has on his skin a scab or pustule or blotchwhich appears to be the sore of leprosy,he shall be brought to Aaron, the priest,or to one of the priests among his descendants.If the man is leprous and unclean,the priest shall declare him uncleanby reason of the sore on his head. “The one who bears the sore of leprosyshall keep his garments rent and his head bare,and shall muffle his beard;he shall cry out, ‘Unclean, unclean!’As long as the...

For Moses describeth the righteousness which is of the law, That the man which doeth those things shall live by them. But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy...

ONE OF THE PUZZLING QUESTIONS likely to turn up sooner or later to vex the seeking Christian is how he can fulfill the scriptural command to love God with all his heart and his neighbor as himself. The earnest Christian, as he meditates on his sacred obligation to love God and mankind, may experience a sense of frustration gendered by the knowledge that he just cannot seem to work up any emotional thrill over his Lord or his brothers. He wants to, but he cannot. The delightful wells of feeling simply will not flow. Many honest persons have become discouraged...

Be thou exalted, O God, above the heavens; let thy glory be above all the earth.-Psa. 57:5 It is a truism to say that order in nature depends upon right relationships; to achieve harmony each thing must be in its proper position relative to each other thing. In human life it is not otherwise. I have hinted before in these chapters that the cause of all our human miseries is a radical moral dislocation, an upset in our relation to God and to each other. For whatever else the Fall may have been, it was most certainly a sharp change...

February 14, 2015Memorial of Saints Cyril, Monk, and Methodius, Bishop    Reading 1 Gn 3:9-24 The LORD God called to Adam and asked him, “Where are you?”He answered, “I heard you in the garden;but I was afraid, because I was naked,so I hid myself.”Then he asked, “Who told you that you were naked?You have eaten, then,from the tree of which I had forbidden you to eat!”The man replied, “The woman whom you put here with me— she gave me fruit from the tree, and so I ate it.”The LORD God then asked the woman,“Why did you do such a...

Details:  In response to the desecration of ten parishes since October, including five on February 6-7, the bishop of Bellay-Ars has ordered the Blessed Sacrament removed from the tabernacles of all parish churches and chapels.The Blessed Sacrament, Bishop Pascal Roland decreed, must be kept in a more secure location, and tabernacle doors must be kept open to indicate that the Eucharist is not present. The order (via Google Translate):  Blessed Sacrament will be removed [from] tabernacles of all parish churches and chapels and be kept in a secure location.The door of the tabernacle [will] remain conspicuously open.For the purposes of...

The exterior of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona is a bit loopy, but the interior is so awe-inspiring that it could win over future generations to ChristianityI went to Barcelona by chance. My brother’s wife and daughters had been delighted by this elegant city in northern Spain and especially by the basilica of the Holy Family. They convinced my brother that he too needed to see the city and he asked me to join him on a visit. Naturally I knew of the church and of Pope Benedict’s enthusiasm for it. One of the architects of the new Benedict XVI...

Detail from "Carrying of the Cross" [1308-11] by Duccio (WikiArt.org) The phrase “Lenten journey” has become ubiquitous in contemporary Catholicism, but for once, AmChurchSpeak makes an important point: Lent is a journey—a journey to Calvary with the Lord and an opportunity to reflect on how well we’ve each picked up the cross daily (as instructed in Luke 9: 23) and followed him. The day-by-day quality of the 40 Days hit home during the best Lent I ever spent: Lent 2011, when I made the Lenten station church pilgrimage in Rome with the Pontifical North American College. Every morning, I’d be up...

February 13, 2015Friday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Gn 3:1-8 Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animalsthat the LORD God had made.The serpent asked the woman,“Did God really tell you not to eatfrom any of the trees in the garden?”The woman answered the serpent:“We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden;it is only about the fruit of the treein the middle of the garden that God said,‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.’”But the serpent said to the woman:“You certainly will...

February 12, 2015Thursday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Gn 2:18-25 The LORD God said: “It is not good for the man to be alone.I will make a suitable partner for him.”So the LORD God formed out of the groundvarious wild animals and various birds of the air,and he brought them to the man to see what he would call them;whatever the man called each of them would be its name.The man gave names to all the cattle,all the birds of the air, and all the wild animals;but none proved to be the suitable partner...

February 11, 2015Wednesday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Gn 2:4b-9, 15-17 At the time when the LORD God made the earth and the heavens— while as yet there was no field shrub on earthand no grass of the field had sprouted,for the LORD God had sent no rain upon the earthand there was no man to till the soil, but a stream was welling up out of the earthand was watering all the surface of the ground—the LORD God formed man out of the clay of the groundand blew into his nostrils the breath...

Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.(Romans 10:1-4)Again the apostle Paul pours out of a broken heart his deepest desire and prayer, that Israel be saved.He has already assured us in the name of the...