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Thursday, May 31, 2012

Outrage

The house bill to ban gender selection abortions was not passed today as it needed a two-thirds majority to pass, and the vote was 246-168. 

Jake Tapper reported that while initially Jay Carney, the Press Secretary didn't know the President's position, he got back to him later to let him know
Obama opposes the bill.

I've been overdosing on learning about how to advocate for the unborn including attending Sidewalk Counseling training this past Saturday.  


What put me over the edge was watching the first of the two sting videos that clearly showed that gender selective abortion, if determined from ultrasound, would need to occur in the 2nd Trimester when the painful D&E procedure is commonly used.  On top of that, I received a pack of DVDs from a pro-life activist during my last trip to the PP in Aurora.  I was watching the sorrowful testimonies of women on-and-off during the past two days.  


I found out via the Crescat and ABC News that there are many countries that do have laws banning sex-selection abortions including Canada, the U.K., France, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, India, Vietnam.  Even China has "officially" outlawed it.

But not the U.S.A.  I can't even spell out our full name for shame . . . well I could, but I'm trying to make a point!  Here we have a President (yes, not proud of him or his accomplishments at all), and 168 representatives in the U.S. House of Representatives that stood up to be counted and voted in favor of protecting the legality of a mother's choosing to have the child within her killed if she would prefer one of the other gender.

I've prayed regularly that through the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Sacred Heart of Jesus there would be a changing of hearts and minds in this country, similar to what occurred with slavery, as to the evil of killing the pre-born child in the womb.  Do you pray for this intention regularly too?

Maybe, and please join me in this hope and prayer, this will be the galvanization needed to make the choice not capitalism vs. socialism or conservatism vs. liberalism but truly moral vs. immoral.  Let's be a society that defends the innocent against extreme acts of violence.

My hope is that somehow this again strengthens all of us whether single, married, religious, priests, bishops, Pope to speak out against this evil.

The devil is going to have to employ all the stops to ensure the moral confusion and brain fog necessary for the U.S. electorate to keep B.H.O. in the oval office.

What evil?  It is clear if you listen to this testimony.  It won't haunt you like watching one of the youtube videos showing "real-time ultrasounds" of the "silent scream" when a baby is being killed in the womb or the bloody pictures that some say are necessary to show so that the horrific truth is known.  When you combine it with the non-chalance and commitment by PP to perform an abortion at a woman's request for any reason without any judgment of her reasons, how do you end up with any conclusion other than evil?  I guess you can call it reproductive health or privacy rights or something that sounds positive, you know spin it to appeal to our American value of freedom, but it remains evil.

The O'Reilly Factor featured this in the Talking Points Memo and in a segment last night.  He didn't seem as prepared as he should have been to discuss it . . . not as bad as Obama's "Polish Deathcamps".  Today there have been lots of commercials and it is going to be his main topic of coverage tonight.  Here are the two "sting" videos in full.  The transcript on the right is really helpful.


If you can stand anymore, here is another video I watched last week that again, opens your eyes to the horrors, and how it is the money and not the care of women and helping them to plan their families that is behind the fierce tactics of Planned Parenthood and other Abortion Providers.

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Better Than the Hunger Games . . .

Content wise and price wise, you can't beat On Acquisition of the Holy Spirit.  It was only $.99 on Kindle.  I read Hunger Games in one night.  I read the next two books in an additional 3 days.  I was fairly convinced of my extreme lacking in the virtue of temperance by the end of this popular trilogy.  But I proved it when my daughter and I viewed it twice in a single visit to the theater.
  
I convinced myself if I could read those three books in such a short period of time I should be able to read a holy book in short period of time too.  With Pentecost being this week, I chose this book.  I was not disappointed.  Hunger Games itself and the series had some great lines but none better than any of the quotes I've included below.  I enjoyed the story of Katniss and Peeta, but I was blessed to learn more about the magnificence and reality of the Holy Spirit.

St. Seraphim of Sarov sought the Holy Spirit as a hermit for several decades.  He was beaten by robbers and his injuries left him bent over in need of a staff to walk.  He was sought after and received thousands of pilgrims who recognized his holiness.  Similar to St. Padre Pio he could read souls, and gave consolation and guidance to all who visitied him.

In 1831, a pious Orthodox Christian named Nicholas Motovilov met with St. Seraphim and transcribed the conversation.  Here are some of the quotes that I highlighted in my Kindle version.  I refer to Nicholas as "Pilgrim" below.

Come Holy Spirit and let us learn how to receive you and dwell with you in the Kingdom of God inside our own souls!

. . . (T)he true aim of our Christian life consists of the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God.

. . . (W)e are influenced by three wills:  the first is God's all-perfect and all-saving will; the second is our own human will which, if not destructive, neither is it saving; and the third will is the devil's will - wholly destructive.


But if we are not in the Spirit, we must discover why not and what reason our Lord God the Holy Spirit has willed to abandon us. . . . We must attack the enemies that drive us away from Him until even their dust is no more.


 . . . (W)e do not seek the grace of God and in the pride of our minds, do not allow it to dwell in our souls.  That is why we are without true enlightenment from the Lord, which He sends into the hearts of men who hunger and thirst wholeheartedly for God's righteousness or holiness.


Pentecost

Then on the day of Pentecost He solemnly sent down to them in a tempestuous wind the Holy Spirit in the form of tongues of fire which alighted on each of them and entered within them and filled them with the fiery strength of divine grace which breathes as with dew and acts with gladness in souls who partake of its power and operations (Acts 2).  And this same fire-infusing grace of the Holy Spirit which is given to us all, the faithful in Christ, in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, is sealed by the Sacrament of Chrismation on the chief parts of the body as appointed by the Holy Church, the eternal keeper of this grace.

Advice

. . . (H)asten to offer true repentance for all . . . sins and . . . practice the virtues which are opposite to the sins committed.  Then through the virtues practiced for Christ's sake, (you) will acquire the Holy Spirit Who acts within us and establishes in us the Kingdom of God.

The fact that I am a Monk and you are a layman is utterly beside the point.  What God requires is true faith in Himself and His Only-begotten Son.  In return for that the grace of the Holy Spirit is granted abundantly from on high.  The Lord seeks a heart filled to overflowing with love for God and our neighbor; this is the throne on which He loves to sit and on which He appears in the fullness of His heavenly glory.  "Son give Me thy heart," He says, "and the rest I Myself will add to thee (Prov. 23:26; Matt. 6:33)," for in the human heart the Kingdom of God can be contained.


(B)y consoling one another with mutual love, we may lighten the sorrowful and narrow way of our journey to the heavenly country (Gal 6:2). . . . The Lord God has led us out to work and has given us the gifts of His grace in order that, by reaping the ears of the salvation of our fellow-men and bringing as many as possible into the Kingdom of God, we may bring him some thirtyfold, some sixtyfold, and some a hundredfold.


(Jn. 14:12,16; 16:24) Thus, my son, whatever you ask of the Lord God you will receive, if only it is for the glory of God or for the good of your neighbor, because what we do for the good of our neighbor He refers to His own glory (Matt. 25:40).


Mary!

The Ever-Virgin Mary Mother of God, who crushes the head of the serpent in herself and in all the human race, a constant mediatress with her Son and our God, and an invincible and persistent intercessor even for the most desperate sinners.  That is why the Mother of God is called the "Plague of Demons," for it is not possible for a devil to destroy a man so long as man himself has recourse to the help of the Mother of God.

Grace is Light

The Spirit of God reminds us of the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and always acts triumphantly with Him, gladdening our hearts and guiding our steps into the way of peace, while the false, diabolical spirit reasons in the opposite way to Christ and its actions in us are rebellious, stubborn, and full of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life.

How Can I know that I am in the grace of the Holy Spirit?

"All things are simple to those who find knowledge." (Prov. 8:9)  The trouble is that we do not seek this divine knowledge which does not puff up, for it is not of this world.  This knowledge . . . is full of love of God and for our neighbor builds up every man for his salvation. . . . (T)he holy Apostles were consciously aware of the presence in themselves of the Spirit of God.  "It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us (Acts 15:28)."

Holy Spirit Reveals Himself

Thank the Lord God for His unutterable mercy to us!  You saw that I did not even cross myself; and only in my heart I prayed mentally to the Lord God and said within myself:  "Lord, grant him to see clearly with his bodily eyes that descent of Thy Spirit which Thou grantest to Thy servants when Thou are pleased to appear in the light of Thy magnificient glory."  . . . . This grace of God, like a loving mother, has been pleased to comfort your contrite heart at the intercession of the Mother of God herself.
  • Pilgrim:  I feel such calmness and peace in my soul that no words can express it. . . .
    St. Seraphim:  And to those people whom the world hates but who are chosen by the Lord, the Lord gives that peace which you now feel within you, the peace which . . . passes all understanding (Philippians. 4:7).
  • Pilgrim:  (I feel) an extraordinary sweetness.
    St. Seraphim:  . . . (T)his sweetness is flooding our hearts and coursing through our veins with unutterable delight.  From this sweetness our hearts melt as it were, and both of us are filled with such happiness as tongue cannot tell.
  • Pilgrim:  (I feel) an extraordinary joy in all my heart.
    St. Seraphim:  When the Spirit of God comes down to man and overshadows him with the fullness of His inspiration, then the human soul overflows with unspeakable joy, for the Spirit of God fills with joy whatever He touches. . . . The Lord speaks in his Gospel . . . . "In the world you will be sorrowful; but when I see you again, your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you (Jn. 16:21-22)."  Yet however comforting may be this joy which you now feel in your heart, it is nothing in comparison with that of which the Lord Himself (said through St. Paul) . . . "Joy eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man what God has prepared for them that love Him (1 Cor. 2:9)."  Yet see with what joy the Lord consoles you even in this life!
  • Pilgrim:  (I feel) an extraordinary warmth.St. Seraphim:  There is more than an inch of snow on us, and the snowflakes are still falling.  What warmth can there be?   This warmth is not in the air but in us.  It is that very warmth about which the Holy Spirit in the words of prayer makes us cry to the Lord:  "Warm me with the warmth of the Holy Spirit!"  And so it must be in actual fact, for the grace of God must dwell within us, in our heart, because the Lord said:  "The Kingdom of God is within you (Lk. 17:21)."  By the Kingdom of God the Lord meant the grace of the Holy Spirit.
  • Pilgrim:  There is nothing on earth like this fragrance.St. Seraphim:  The sweet earthly fragrance cannot be compared with the fragrance which we now feel, for we are enveloped in the fragrance of the Holy Spirit of God.  
The Kingdom of God . . .
is now within us, and the grace of the Holy Spirit shines upon us and warms us from without as well.  It fills the surrounding air with many fragrant odors, sweetens our senses with heavenly delight and floods our hearts with inutterable joy.  "The Kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit (Rom. 14:17)."  . . . . Of this state the Lord said:  "There are some of those standing here who shall not taste of death till they see the Kingdom of God come in power (Mk. 9:1)."

I have now told you and given you a practical demonstration of all that the Lord and the Mother of God have been pleased to tell you and show you through me, poor Seraphim.  Now go in peace.  The Lord and the Mother of God be with you always, now and ever, and to the ages of ages.  Amen.  Now go in peace.


Pilgrim:  And during the whole of this time, from the moment when Father Seraphim's face became radiant, this illumination continued; and all that he told me from the beginning of the narrative till now, he said while remaining in one and the same position.  The ineffable glow of the light which emanated from him I myself saw with my own eyes.


May the Holy Spirit renew us from within by his Presence and Sanctifying Grace!  Amen.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Mom Forcing Daughter to Have Abortion?


This past Saturday morning, we watched a mother, a woman about my age, go out to the Planned Parenthood escort, so that her daughter would not be distracted by the people across from the parking lot, while she walked into the center.  The people who consisted of counselors from the Waterleaf crisis pregnancy center, our high school girls standing there holding signs like "Stop Abortion Now" and "Planned Parenthood Lies" and "Planned Parenthood Kills Babies".

So the escort, in a florescent vest, like you would see on a construction worker, walked over a little closer to where the mother parked.  The girl then walked behind them by a few yards as they made their way into the center.  I didn't see her face, but I know she must have been young, because she was wearing a pink hoodie and pink sweat pants.  I think that color pink goes into hiding when a girl becomes a woman, until she is preparing for a baby girl.

The question in my mind was, "Does that girl have a choice?"

I wondered if her Mom and the Planned Parenthood telemarketing team and on-site counselors explain the choices.  A choice of giving life to a baby, and perhaps giving the child up for adoption to a couple that will love and care generously for the child, or putting the baby to death, and dealing with the grief of that decision for many years into the future, until the Lord would forgive and heal her.  Or what I hope I would do if one of my daughters gets pregnant before marriage . . . offer to adopt and raise the baby as my own, or as her own, but in my home with as much secrecy and privacy as my daughter needs.

How strong would any of us have been if our mother, who loved and cared for us were telling us things like, "This is the best way.  You should have a child when you are older, when you are married, when you can afford to give that child a good life.  It won't take long, and no one needs to know."

We know Planned Parenthood says things like, "It is an emotional decision, but know that 1 in 3 women has had an abortion."  I got this from a youtube Planned Parenthood video on surgical abortion.

Where do they get that statistic?  Do they take the total number of aborted babies, and do we even have accurate data on that, and then divide it by the population of women in the world?  Do we have that...even if we calculate it just for the U.S.A., do we know how many aborted children there are to divide it?  I just don't think that number is accurate, considering that there is actually a market for aborted baby parts (Korean "vitality pills", some food manufacturers testing, stem cell research).

Maybe if they included women that used birth control that acts as an abortificient as the third method of preventing a pregnancy by weakening the endometrium so a fertilized egg cannot implant, or those that have used IUDs that do the same thing.  Somehow I have hard time believing that 1 in 3 women in the U.S. have had a surgical abortion.  Maybe 1 in 10 have an abortion . . . which is still high, or maybe 1 in 20 have multiple abortions?

One of the adults that came last month came again this month.  She is the one that had an abortion as a young woman, and had spoken in the chapel to the High School kids.  She brought her grandchild, a 6 year old, 1st grader with her.  One of the people we met was an organizer for "I Regret My Abortion".  At her request, she gave a button to this Grandma.  I was curious how the woman would handle it when her granddaughter saw the button.  I didn't have to wonder for long.

"Grandma, why are you wearing that button?"
"Well, when I was a young woman, 48 years ago, I was pregnant and I went into a place like this.  There wasn't anyone outside telling me that what was inside me was a baby.  I had an abortion."

The little girl didn't say, "Oh, Grandma!  How could you?" or anything similar. She didn't seem shocked at all.  Instead she ran right back beside the other girls and picked up her Stop Sign again.  She made the connection that it might have helped her grandma not to have the abortion if she would have seen someone letting her know it was a baby inside her, and that there were people who could help her.

It was an amazing thing to see.  I walked this little girl over to the Dominick's so we could both use the bathroom.  I have a son the same age, and I think I know when they are happy or sad or in between.  She was fine.  She didn't seem sad or upset about the news from her Grandma.

I told the Grandma afterward, how brave I thought she was.  That I thought it was easier to tell strangers, high school kids she didn't know, than to tell her own Grand-daughter.  She said she had never talked about it publicly before talking in the high school chapel the previous month.

It turns out both the little girl and the Grandma have had quite a bit of suffering in their lives.  The Grandma grew up in two different Catholic orphanages in the northern suburbs of Chicago with her 4 siblings.  At one point her birth mother had planned their murder by drowning in her car trunk.  The mother had a fifth child that was temporarily in the orphanage with them, but was taken to live with the mother after she married the father of the child.  The now Grandma explained that was hard for her and the others that remained orphans, to know that they were not to have a home, motherly love, and good food to eat that their youngest brother would have.

The little girl was taken away from her birth mother.  In a few months she will be officially adopted by the Grandma and Grandpa.  I didn't pry to find out the history, but for some reason DCFS has already granted the child a college scholarship.  I think I will pray the "Healing Your Family Tree" prayer for them.

I am sadder now writing this than I was sitting in the car hearing her story.  Part of it is that I just read this testimony from another woman that had two abortions.  She is a famous, and gifted blogger who is faithful Catholic and also very funny.  This post isn't funny.  It is courageous, and it is sad.  I cannot recommend it highly enough.  Please do whatever you are inspired to do.  You can sense the pain she has endured because of those two abortions.  Even though God will bring good from her witness, don't you just want to spread this story to others both to save the lives of the children, and also so they don't have the same grief to endure?

There is so much suffering, and sadness in this fallen world.  Still we have the gift of faith, and the confidence that we are loved.  We have the Gifts of the Holy Spirit that we can witness to God's steadfast love and kindness.  We can make a difference whether we are the repentent and forgiven sinner, or the innocent little kid, that has been both a victim and now the recipient of love from one that knows what it is like when your Mom doesn't act like a Mom should act.

Life is really intense and beautiful when you get the opportunity to interact with others grasped by Christ, and acting to support his causes.  One of the arguments someone used with me as to why abortion on demand isn't terrible is that it isn't a great loss to be denied a life where the mom doesn't want you or love you.

I think this little girl and her Grandma are evidence against that.  I want to say it is a lack of faith in the love of God to think that God isn't there in the midst of the little girl in the orphanage who does know the love of her siblings, and the nuns caring for and teaching her, and the experience of accepting Jesus as her Savior as an adult, and coming to know the faithful love of a husband.  Some would say that it would have been better if she would have been aborted than to have been born to a woman that would plot drowning her and her siblings in the trunk of her car.  But, she would say no.  She would testify that God has always cared for her and always shown her love and is strengthening her voice now to help persuade others not to commit the sin of abortion.

The little girl now has a Grandma and a Grandpa, gets to go to a great school, has great friends and birthday parties.  It is better that she lived.  God has acted to show her His great love through her Grandma and Grandpa, her teachers and friends.

Lord God, please bless all the women I wrote about in this post from the youngest little girl, to the high schoolers that came out to witness to your love and truth, to the adults praying and witnessing, some from experience.  Please bless and heal them.  Please change the hearts and minds of all that work to provide abortion services on demand.  Please convict them of the deliberate killing of innocents and give them the grace of repentance and conversion to turn to you and then in reparation to work to end this practice in our country and around the world.

Mary, our Mother, and the mother of these unborn and defenseless little ones, please pray with us that God's grace would change the hearts and minds in this country and around the world to stop this slaughter, and end the suffering of the women that are told it is OK, and then find out afterward, it isn't OK.  The pain tells them it is not OK.

If you are a girl that happened to find this post and you are pregnant, please know there are crisis pregnancy centers that can help you.  All you need is an internet connection and a phone for a start.  Here is a site that has links to local help lines and crisis pregnancy centers:  http://www.lifecall.org/  May God comfort, bless and strengthen you.  He loves you and your unborn child more than you can fathom!

I did a quick search and here are some actual words from girls forced to have abortions by their mothers: http://www.religioustolerance.org/abo_ess1.htm
http://generationsforlife.org/2006/0809/choice-whose-choice/
http://www.experienceproject.com/stories/Had-An-Abortion/1516282

Quote from the last one, "The biggest mistake in my life wasn't getting pregnant. The biggest mistake in my life was ending my pregnancy."

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Your Hands

Wanted to give a quick update that while my mom's mood has not been balanced (she has bipolar disorder) she does sound better each time I talk to her.  There is less grossness anyway.  She is going to the new psychiatrist and complying with prescribed medicines.  My father sounds less strung out everytime I talk with him.  There was a cost to him getting the leverage to get her to take her medicine but it is small relative to the damage from her last acute mania episodes.

Your prayers, and the prayers of others, as well as the cooperative efforts of my sister, my Dad, my brother, my Dad's priest, a few of their friends, my Dad's lawyer have been successful.  As I wrote in my first post on this situation, we have all been in God's Hands all along, as always.  It was good we finally got Dad's cooperation to intervene this time.

Last acute mania episode had the following financial damage (the physical and emotional damage can't be measured as easily):  
  • approximately $474,000 net loss (sometimes my Dad says "1/2 million", sometimes $650,000) due to unscrupulous people praying on my mother's mental illness . . . only found out recently this could have been criminally prosecuted
    • $34,000 truck purchase by HVAC worker that agreed to go into business with my mom---after she paid for his truck with her credit card she didn't hear from him again
    • $300,000 across 3 different investment frauds
    • $40,000 for bonding newly made "friends" out of jail
    • $100,000 for townhome purchased to provide housing for "friends" from AA meetings
  • bankruptcy
  • second mortgage that took many more years of work past when my Dad should have been retired for age and chronic pain from job injuries to pay off.
This acute Mania episode should be less than $20,000:
  • $7000 in legal fees (lawyer, court filings)
  • $5000 in medicine
  • $2000 in travel
  • $? hospital bill after insurance
Much better . . . while the prayers my family has offered over the years haven't always been answered the way we would have liked when we prayed them, there is no question that God hears us, and as I always ask Mary on the 4th Sorrowful Mystery, that she is interceding for us as my parents carry the cross of my mother's mental illness.  I have tremendous confidence in her motherly care and prayers.

Thank you for your prayers.  Thought you might enjoy this beautiful song by JJ Heller.  My other favorites from her are "What Love Really Means" and "My Savior's Love Endures" which is the Magnificat and the Glory Be set to music.

The amazing lyrics are contained in the video and also pasted below, in case you tire that many of the images are repeated many times over the course of the song, especially during the chorus.


Your Hands by JJ Heller
I have unanswered prayers
I have trouble I wish wasn't there
And I have asked a thousand ways
That you would take my pain away
You would take my pain away

I am trying to understand
How to walk this weary land
Make straight the paths that crooked lie
Oh Lord, before these feet of mine
Oh Lord, before these feet of mine

When my world is shaking, heaven stands
When my heart is breaking
I never leave your hands

When you walked upon the earth
You healed the broken, lost and hurt
I know you hate to see me cry
One day you will set all things right
Yeah, one day you will set all things right

When my world is shaking, heaven stands
When my heart is breaking
I never leave your hands

Your hands that shaped the world
Are holding me
They hold me still
Your hands that shaped the world
Are holding me
They hold me still

When my world is shaking, heaven stands
When my heart is breaking
I never leave you
When my world is shaking, heaven stands
When my heart is breaking
I never leave
I never leave your hands

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Healing Your Family Tree

My Pastor emailed this prayer to me a few months back, when my husband and I were in a multi-day argument.  Are you familiar with this prayer?

It is recommended to pray this prayer everyday.  It is also recommended that the best time to pray it is immediately after Holy Communion, "when you and Jesus Christ are one; when you are like the Blessed Virgin Mary - a living tabernacle of The Savior.  That is when you are holiest, and when your prayers are most efficacious.  A few minutes of heartfelt prayer after receiving Jesus in the Eucharist while in the state of grace are worth many hours of prayer later on." (Source:  http://www.catholicbible101.com/healingyourfamilytree.htm)


PRAYER FOR HEALING THE FAMILY TREE
REV. JOHN H. HAMPSCH, C.M.F.
Heavenly Father, I come before you as your child, in great need of your help; I have physical health needs, emotional needs, spiritual needs, and interpersonal needs.  Many of my problems have been caused by my own failures, neglect and sinfulness, for which I humbly beg your forgiveness, Lord.  But I also ask you to forgive the sins of my ancestors whose failures have left their effects on me in the form of unwanted tendencies, behavior patterns and defects in body, mind and spirit.  Heal me, Lord, of all these disorders.

With your help I sincerely forgive everyone, especially living or dead members of my family tree, who have directly offended me or my loved ones in any way, or those whose sins have resulted in our present sufferings and disorders.  In the name of your divine Son, Jesus, and in the power of his Holy Spirit, I ask you, Father, to deliver me and my entire family tree from the influence of the evil one.  Free all living and dead members of my family tree, including those in adoptive relationships, and those in extended family relationships, from every contaminating form of bondage.  By your loving concern for us, heavenly Father, and by the shed blood of your precious Son, Jesus, I beg you to extend your blessing to me and to all my living and deceased relatives.  Heal every negative effect transmitted through all past generations, and prevent such negative effects in future generations of my family tree.

I symbolically place the cross of Jesus over the head of each person in my family tree, and between each generation; I ask you to let the cleansing blood of Jesus purify the bloodlines in my family lineage.  Set your protective angels to encamp around us, and permit Archangel Raphael, the patron of healing, to administer your divine healing power to all of us, even in areas of genetic disability.  Give special power to our family members' guardian angels to heal, protect, guide and encourage each of us in all our needs.  Let your healing power be released at this very moment, and let it continue as long as your sovereignty permits.

In our family tree, Lord, replace all bondage with a holy bonding in family love.  And let there be an ever-deeper bonding with you, Lord, by the Holy Spirit, to your Son, Jesus.  Let the family of the Holy Trinity pervade our family with its tender, warm, loving presence, so that our family may recognize and manifest that love in all our relationships.  All of our unknown needs we include with this petition that we pray in Jesus' precious Name.  Amen.

St. Joseph, Patron of family life, pray for us.  Our Lady Queen of Peace, pray for us.
+ + + + 
If you have questions about this prayer please see "Response to Objections about the Healing of the Family Tree".  You'll need to scroll down after you hit the hyperlink.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

To Be Born

On Saturday, April 21, I rode with a group of high school teens to the field outside the Planned Parenthood in Aurora, IL.  The school's bus was filled so I rode a few extra kids in my van.  Riding in my passenger seat was a woman that recently talked at the high school chapel because she lives with the memory of having an abortion as a young woman.

I told her that I've become more sensitive to the language I use when I talk about abortion.  I asked her if it makes her sad when people say abortion is murder, that I try to say ending the life of the unborn or something but not "murder".

She said, "It is murder."

At the center, the high school organizer asked that just 5 of the girls at a time stand across from the center.  This was the second biggest turnout for the monthly trip that we've had.  He advised me and the other adult not to yell anything, but instead to stand behind the girls.  He asked the girls to love the women walking in there, and to say things that they thought would touch their hearts.

The girls in sequence yelled:
(together) "Your baby is going to be beautiful!"
(girl 1) "Your baby could have your eyes . . . "
(girl 2) ". . . your laugh"
(girl 3) " . . . your walk."

They would also yell that there were counselors here from a free crisis pregnancy center a couple blocks away that could help them, and that they were not here to judge them, but to love them and help them.

One of our girls asked the woman with me if there is anything that they could say that might have kept her from going through with the abortion.  They didn't ask her directly.  I coached some of these girls in basketball so they asked her through me.

She told me, and I relayed, "'Your baby is going to be beautiful' is perfectly innocent and would have impacted her when she was walking in for her abortion appointment."

Both she and I remained silent and prayed as we were directed.  I was praying the rosary on my rosary ring.

There was one couple that came out, hand-in-hand, smiling, and walked right in front of us by about 15 yards, continuing onto their car in an adjacent parking lot, where they hugged.  We, neither the girls, the counselors, the other woman or I, nor the Knights of Columbus or even the guy from Operation Rescue yelled or said anything to the couple.  What they decided is their business, after all.

One of the Knights did peak through the trees to see them hugging at their car.  One of the wives of the Knights said, "She didn't do it. She was walking too well to have had an abortion."

One of the lies of those supporting Planned Parenthood and slamming people like Santorum (i.e. Ashley Judd) is that there are angry people outside of the centers.  No one out there was angry, or judging the women walking into the center.

There was one woman who rode by in a car and asked the high school girls if they were from Aurora.  Immediately when one of the girls said no, she yelled, "Then go home!"  I yelled after her, "Thanks for stopping by.  Good-bye."

I told the girls, "You don't have to give an answer to someone when they ride by.  She like some adults think they have the right to yell and tell people your age what to do.  They don't."

The girls and I are resident of this state and this country and are children of God owing him our allegiance, and not obedience to a stranger yelling at them rudely from a slowly moving vehicle.

The reason we are out there is in hope that by seeing these girls, about the same age as the girls going in for the abortion, they will think, and we pray, reconsider.  That is it.  We are trying to prevent the extreme violent act of the killing of the unborn child, even though it is legal, and we don't live in the immediate township of the facility.

It is confusing to some of the girls that the pregnant woman is sometimes accompanied by mother, or father, or both.  It doesn't fit with their understanding of the scriptures they have been taught to memorize from preschool:

"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right."  Ephesians 6:1

We really are not sitting in judgement of the woman.  We are angry that this is legal.  We are angry that a young woman is often pressured into this, and sees it as the chance for a fresh start, rather than the tragedy, and emotional wound that it will be for her that can only be healed by the Divine Mercy of her Savior.


In the car when I was talking to the other adult woman, I said the reason I don't say "murder" is because I think the emotional pain must be touched off again when the woman sees a baby, or child.  She said it was painful until she was saved and Jesus healed her.

The life of the unborn child, and the pain that the woman (mother), and man (father), and grandparents feel after the abortion is exactly why the high school kids and the adults, the majority of whom are Catholic, go out there to be the visible, physical reminder of the God who saves!

In case you need some encouragement to pray the rosary, fast, and offer sacrifices for the intention of changing the hearts and minds of pregnant women, and the electorate in this country you can watch this.

It is one of those pieces of visual art that is both very sad and hopeful at the same time.  I am still trying to resolve my own crying while watching this.  I'll use the tissues right after I hit the Publish button.


It is under 10,000 views at this point.

***Spoiler Alert***

While I would love if all pregnant women considering Abortion would be touched by the grace to have a dream like this before their appointments that end the life of the unborn baby within them, I would hope that at minimum you and I would do whatever the Holy Spirit prompts us to do from praying the rosary to offering a fast, to actually showing up in person at an Abortion Clinic or a Freedom of Religion event. Oh and voting, yes voting.

If there was confusion in anyone's mind in 2008 that Barak Obama is activist for NARAL and Planned Parenthood that confusion should be gone.  His administration has acted to provide public funding for chemical and surgical abortion and to enlarge the number of facilities providing this to the public.  I do not understand how someone could justify voting for him on moral grounds.  I just don't!