31 December 2012 A day for stock-taking Today is a good opportunity for begging pardon for our omissions and lack of love that caused them. A good occasion of thanksgiving for all the good things God has given us. The Church reminds us that we are pilgrims and she herself “being present in the world is, nevertheless, herself a pilgrim”. (Second Vatican Council, “Sacrosanctum concilium”, 2) She stands before her God as “a wayfarer among the persecutions of the world and consolations from God.” (Second Vatican Council, “Lumen Gentium”, 8) Our life, too is a path full of tribulations and of God’s consolation. We have a life in time which we are now living, and another life outside time to which we are bound. Our time now is an important part of the inheritance that God has left us. Time separates the present and that moment when we stand before God. The time at our disposal is short but long enough to tell God that we love him and to complete the work he has given us. St Paul warns: “Be careful how you live, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of the time” (Eph 5:15-6), for soon “night comes, when no one can work” (Jn 9:4). Each year that passes is a call to holiness in our daily life; a warning that we are much nearer to the definitive moment of our meeting with God at death. “Let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all ...” (Gal 6:9-10) On examining our conscience we will easily find that during this past year we have at times lacked charity, been too easy-going in our professional work, grown used to a certain spiritual mediocrity, and given little in the way of alms. We have been a prey to selfishness and vanity. We neglected mortification in our meals. We have ignored the grace offered to us by the Holy Spirit. Our character has been intemperate, ill-humored and stubborn. We have allowed distractions in our norms of piety. We have numerous reasons for ending the year asking God’s forgiveness, making many acts of contrition. “Every day we must ask forgiveness for every day we have caused offence.” (St Augustine, “Sermon 256”) Today, we can ask ourselves if God is pleased with our behavior during the past year. Was it a time well spent or of wasted opportunities at work, our apostolate, in family life? How often did we drop the Cross at the first sign of difficulty? Let us resolve to convert our defeats into victories, each time turning to God and starting over again. Finally, let us ask Our Lady for the grace to live during this new year as if it were the last that God will give us. Ref: Cf F Fernandez, “In Conversation with God”, 1:277-82 ‘Holy Mary our hope, seat of wisdom. Pray for us.’ Mary’s Immaculate Heart will triumph A great battle is on today in the Church. On one side Satan with a great number of emissaries, all enemies of the Church; on the other side, Mary of the Immaculate Heart and us, the People of God. The aims of this war: the devil wants the destruction of the Church and of its members; Mary wants a general return to God through the practice of a more Christian life, based on love, and the conversion of Russia. The victory is undoubtedly ours, through the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Are we ready to enlist in the army of Mary and fight unto victory? We are at the point in the history of the Church where Mary is to crush the head of Satan. This will be brought about through the reign of her Immaculate Heart. The devil is trying everything to destroy anything that is good through immorality, destruction of families, pornography, dishonesty, crimes, dissension in parishes and religious communities. He is even instigating false apparitions to draw the people’s attention away from the true apparitions of the Blessed Virgin. We must do our best to counteract the devil’s actions. If we have devotion to our Mother Mary she will bring about the interest of God in the lives of all. The consecration of each one of us to Her and our prayers will give her the power of the Holy Spirit to pierce the darkness that envelops the world and give us a tremendous victory over the devil. Ref: Rev Joseph A Viano, SSP, “Two Months with Mary”, 1984, p26 The Last Day of the Year “Children, it is ‘the final hour’ (1 Jn 2:18).” How topical these words are! How they fit in well with what we are all living today, December 31! The last day of the year ... let us live it so as to participate in the Eucharistic liturgy, the Sacrifice of Christ ... so as to ‘express God in the fullest way that our hearts and our consciences feel; and to make manifest our thanksgiving and request for forgiveness’. “It is truly right and just, and dutiful ... ‘to give thanks’ to You!” To You. Exactly to You, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. To thank You for all the abundance of the mystery of the Birth of God, in whose light the old year is passing and the new one is coming to birth. How eloquent it is, that the day which humanly tells us above all of “passing”, with the precise content of the Church’s liturgy, should also testify to Birth: God’s birth in a human body. And at the same time, of man’s birth from God: “Any who did accept Him he empowered to become children of God.” (Jn 1:12) Together with this thanksgiving, let all the words of penance become the content of our participation in the Holy Mass today, beginning with the initial ‘Confiteor’ through the ‘Kyrie Eleison’ to the ‘Agnus Dei’, “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” Then to our “Lord, I am not worthy ...” Let us put everything which our consciences live into these words, what weighs upon them, what God alone knows how to judge and remit. And let us not avoid standing here before God, with consciousness of guilt, the attitude of the publican in the Gospel. Let us take up such an attitude. It actually corresponds to man’s inner truth. It brings liberation. It, exactly it, links up with hope. Ref: Cf “Prayers and Devotions from Pope John Paul II”, 1984, 43-4 • About a hundred years before the birth of our Saviour, the image of Our Lady of Chartres, which the Druids had consecrated to the Blessed Virgin, who was to be a mother, raised to life the son of Geoffry, king or prince of Monthery, who, having fallen into a well, had been found dead; out of gratitude for this favor, he made several presents to this image, as the history of this miracle attests, which is represented in the stained glass of the great church. — Sebastien Rouillard, Parthen., c. iii. (“Catholic Gems or Treasures of the Church” Historical Calendar; www.bethlehemobserver.com). (See July 13, August 6 and 17, October 17). (www.marylinks.org/Mary-Calendar.htm) • Image of Our Lady of Chartres brings back to life the son of King Geoffry (100 B.C.) (/www/divinewill.org/feastsofourlady.html); (www.iskandar.com/ourlady/ourladyfeasts.html) • Restoration to life of the son of Geoffrey, King of Monthery by Our Lady of Chartres. 100. (www.miraclehunter.com/marian_apparitions/calendar/index.html)[ (maryfest.htm / www.starharbor.com/santiago/m_feasts.html) • Our Lady of the Closing of the Year. (http://mariedenazareth.com)