Who Said it?

Can you guess which famous character in history made these statements? Here's a clue - they were all said and recorded by the same person in the sixteenth century, after the Reformation started.

“Christ our Savior was the real and natural fruit of Mary's virginal womb. . . This was without the cooperation of a man, and she remained a virgin after that.”


“The veneration of Mary is inscribed in the very depths of the human heart.” (September 1, 1522)


“One should honor Mary as she herself wished and as she expressed it in the Magnificat. She praised God for his deeds. How then can we praise her? The true honor of Mary is the honor of God, the praise of God's grace . . . Mary is nothing for the sake of herself, but for the sake of Christ . . . Mary does not wish that we come to her, but through her to God.” (1521)


“It is a sweet and pious belief that the infusion of Mary's soul was effected without original sin; so that in the very infusion of her soul she was also purified from original sin and adorned with God's gifts, receiving a pure soul infused by God; thus from the first moment she began to live she was free from all sin.” (1527)


If you were thinking of Martin Luther as the author of these sermons, you are absolutely correct. Most Protestants today do not realize that the founders of the Reformation, (Martin Luther, John Calvin and Zwingli) each affirmed the Catholic doctrines that Mary is the Mother of God and a Perpetual Virgin.


Hear what John Calvin had to say:

"There have been certain folk who have wished to suggest from this passage [Matt 1:25] that the Virgin Mary had other children than the Son of God, and that Joseph had then dwelt with her later; but what folly is this! For the Gospel writer did not wish to record what happened afterwards; he simply wished to make clear Joseph's obedience and to show also that Joseph had been well and truly assured that it was God who had sent His angel to Mary. He had therefore never dwelt with her nor had he shared her company…. And besides this Our Lord Jesus Christ is called the first-born. This is not because there was a second or a third, but because the Gospel writer is paying regard to the precedence. Scripture speaks thus of naming the firstborn whether or not there was any question of the second” (John Calvin, Sermon on Matthew 1:22-25, 1562).


And Ulrich Zwingli:

“I firmly believe that Mary, according to the words of the gospel as a pure Virgin brought forth for us the Son of God and in childbirth and after childbirth forever remained a pure, intact Virgin” (Ulrich Zwingli, Zwingli Opera, Corpus Reformatorum, Volume 1, 424).

Maybe you can use these quotes in your next conversation with a Protestant when you find yourself defending the Marian doctrines of the Catholic Church. If their own founding fathers believed it, why don't they? If Protestants argue that the three founding fathers of the Reformation must have been wrong to believe in these doctrines and that's why it's no longer believed today, then you could argue that maybe, just maybe, they were wrong about everything else.

Fish Friday

Corinthians 1:27 But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway.

Polly Protestant: Hey, Katie, do you want to go out for dinner tonight? I'm feeling like I want a good, juicy steak! I'd love for you to come with me.

Katie Catholic: Um, sure, but can we go somewhere where they serve fish? It's Friday, and I can't eat meat on Fridays.

Polly Protestant: Why is it exactly that Catholics don't eat meat on Friday's anyway? What's up with that?

Katie Catholic: Um, I'm not really sure of the particulars - I just know that abstaining from meat on Friday's is something we are asked by the Church to do. (yes, I know the curernt regulations allow one to substitue a penance or prayer)

Would you be able to answer that question appropriately? From the dawn of Christianity, Friday has been signalized as an abstinence day, in order to do homage to the memory of Christ suffering and dying on that day of the week. The Baltimore Catechism teaches us that all flesh meat, including meat soup and gravies are forbidden on days of abstinence. Flesh meat is the meat of all warm-blooded land animals, including birds and fowls, so unless one is excused or dispensed, they are obliged to observe the abstinence days of the Church.

The Church, in her wisdom, commands Catholics to abstain from meat in order to control the desires of the flesh, to raise our minds more freely to God, and to make satisfaction for sin. We are to deny ourselves, not because meat is evil, but for the glory of God and the good of our souls. It is a good practice to meditate on the Passion of Christ when we are fasting or abstaining, so that we can best induce in ourselves a proper contrition for our sins. The Baltimore Catechism teaches that fast and abstinence are pleasing to God only when we also refrain from sin and engage in good works.


Here is an absolutely fantastic, easy to prepare recipe from Chatelaine Magazine that is now my favourite fish dinner. It is so good that I wonder if it really is penance to eat fish on Fridays. I am making it tonight because we have company over, but usually I try to make a really plain meal on Fridays.

Caramelized Salmon
Preparation time 5 minutes
Refrigeration Time 30 minutes
Cooking time 30 minutes

Makes 2 Servings

Ingredients

• 2 salmon steaks , at least 1 in. (2.5 cm) thick
• 2 tbsp (30 mL) granulated sugar
• 4 tsp (20 mL) maple syrup
• 1-1/2 tsp (7 mL) water
• 1-1/2 tsp (7 mL) vegetable or olive oil
• 1 tbsp (15 mL) fish sauce
• 3/4 tsp (4 mL) hot red-pepper flakes
• 1 garlic clove , minced
• 1-1/2 tsp (7 mL) cracked black pepper
• 1-1/2 tsp (7 mL) fried shallots
• 2 tbsp (30 mL) chopped cilantro
• 1 green onion , thinly sliced

Directions:

1. Pat salmon steaks dry with paper towels. Place fish on a plate or in a dish. Evenly sprinkle with 1½ tsp (7 mL) granulated sugar. Turn fish and sprinkle opposite side with another 1½ tsp (7 mL) sugar. Refrigerate, uncovered, at least 30 min.
2. When ready to cook, stir remaining 1 tbsp (15 mL) sugar with maple syrup and water in a large frying pan (not non-stick) set over medium-high heat. As soon as it starts to bubble, stir in oil, fish sauce, pepper flakes and garlic. Reduce heat to medium. Add sugar-coated salmon. Sprinkle half of cracked black pepper over fish. Turn fish, then sprinkle with remaining black pepper. Reduce heat to low. Simmer, uncovered, turning fish halfway through and stirring sauce often, until caramelized, 25 to 30 min.
3. Remove salmon steaks to warm plates (or to a hotpot dish) and sprinkle with fried shallots, cilantro and green onion. Delicious served with jasmine rice.

Catholic Suffering

Luke 9:23 And he said to all: If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

Have you ever seen a Protestant roll their eyes at the mere mention of offering up one's sufferings for their own sanctification? I have encountered it often; Protestants tend to rationalize that because Jesus died once and for all for our sins, we are covered. After all, they say, how can anything we do possibly atone for our sins? Didn't Jesus take care of that when He died on the Cross? Protestants appear to have an easy passage through life, never having to make any sacrifices to achieve a high degree of sanctification. All that is required of them is love and prayer.

So why is it that Catholics love to suffer? St Alphonsus Liguori explains it well, using the passage from Luke 9:23 quoted above. First, says this great saint and Doctor of the Church, Jesus tells us to come after Him, not to Him. He tells us to walk the road He walked; He goes before us, and we must follow. His path is one of sufferings, and to follow Him on the road to Calvary is to deny ourselves out of love for Him.

St Alphonsus goes on to explain that when Jesus says "Let him take up his cross daily and follow Me," first, He is telling us to "take up" our crosses, that is to willingly bear the sufferings He sends us out of love for Him. When we take up our cross, we are embracing it, and if we bear it patiently, its load will lighten and we will be consoled with the graces that God sends.

Our cross is our daily sufferings, those which He sends, not those that we hope He will send. (O Lord, let me be a martyr for my faith, but let it be a quick and painless death!) Further, He tells us to do this daily, not when we feel like it; we are to accept our crosses willingly as long as He chooses to send them.

St Alphonsus tells us that when God sends us sufferings, it is a sure sign that He wishes to deliver us from eternal chastisement; that God prepares good things for those who suffer on His account. St. Paul says likewise, in this passage from Romans:

Romans 8:18 For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us.

The Feast of the Epiphany

In searching for something about the Feast of the Epiphany to share with you, I had only to look no further than my day planner that I purchased from Tan Publishers a few months ago. Here I share with you the text for today. (And I learned a few things by reading this).

January 6 is the Feast of the Epiphany, in commeneration of the day the Three Wise Men sought Our Lord and brought Him gifts shortly after His birth. In Greek, the word "epiphany"
means appearance or manifestation, and this feast is particulary important for Gentiles, whose forerunners the Three Wise Men are, and who through the Three Wise Men, were called to believe in and worship the True God. Having seen the bright star in the east, a sign of the
Saviour's birth, the three journeyed to Jerusalem, and asked King Herod where the newborn
King was. Herod asked the chief priests and scribes where Christ would be born, who answered that Bethlehem was the place of the Saviour's birth as foretold by the prophet Micheas.

Soon after leaving Jerusalem, the Three Wise Men were again led by the star, which led them to the Holy Family. They prostrated themselves and worshipped the Infant Jesus, presenting Him with gifts of gold that acknowledged Him to be a King; frankincense, which acknowledged
Him to be God; and myrrh, in testimony that Our Lord would die for the redemption of man.

Mary, Mediatrix of all Graces

For many people, Mary as the Mediatrix of all Graces is a huge stumbling block. Some people even mistakingly think that it makes Mary omnipresent, on the same parallel as God. But if you were to read the writings of the saints and learned theologians on this subject, you would come to understand that Mary does indeed dispense graces at the will of God. St Bernard says that all graces pass through the hands of Mary, and that this is the will of God. This does not mean that God cannot dispense graces without Mary; it means that He wills for Mary, who Jesus gave to us as our Mother, to be a channel of grace for our salvation. Jesus wishes to honour his Mother, and God wants to exalt this holy woman whom He chose to dignify as the Mother of His Son, and who, more than all others, loved and honoured Jesus during His life on earth.

What is meant by that? Isn't Jesus the only mediator between man and God? Yes, just as Jesus is the only mediator between man and God, so Mary is the mediator between Jesus and man. Jesus, as mediator of justice, obtained for us all graces and salvation; but we say that Mary is the Mediatrix of Grace, and that she received this honour from Jesus Christ, because she prayers and asks for everything in the name of Jesus, her Son, and whatever graces we receive come through her intercession.

Is this teaching in accordance with the Church? Yes, and it has been believed for centuries by the faithful. The Church, in its public and approved prayers, teaches us to have recourse to Mary, and to invoke her as the refuge of sinners, the help of Christians, our life and our hope, etc. Indeed, Mary has been referred to by the Church as "the happy gate of heaven," and St Bernard explains it like this: "As every mandate of grace that is sent by a king passes through the palace gates, so does every grace that comes from heaven to the world pass through the hands of Mary." St Bonaventure adds that Mary is called the gate of heaven by the Church because no one can enter that blessed kingdom without passing through her."

When Mary conceived Jesus in her immaculate womb, and He issued forth from her womb into the world, all of His divine gifts flowed from Mary at the moment of His birth. God willed for Jesus to be born of Mary, and He chose to reward her cooperation in His divine plan. It is thus that God wills that all graces flow through the hands of Mary.

Why do Catholics do that?

I love it when little opportunities to defend the Catholic faith crop up in everyday situations at work. This usually happens when one of my co-workers discover I am a Catholic. One evening, while driving in the ambulance, the sky was a beautiful red, with the sun disappearing into a haze of amber clouds. I made the comment, "Red sky at night, sailor's delight." My work partner told me that was a comment from the bible. I responded yes, but many people were not aware of that. (see Matthew 16:2-3) He then told me he was a Christian who had grown up reading the bible, and I took the opportunity to let him know I was a Catholic. That piqued his curiosity, and he asked me if it was true that Catholics really do pray to Mary, since the only way to God was through Jesus. (see 1 Timothy 2:5)

What a wonderful opportunity to correct one of the most common misunderstandings that protestant Christians have about the Catholic faith!

I told him that just as Jesus in the mediator between God and man, so is Mary the mediator between man and Jesus. I started by telling him that we pray for Mary's intercession, that she, who is already in heaven, and very close to God, might beseech God to bestow graces and spiritual favours upon us, so that our prayers will have more merit through her asking.

He asked me why we don't just go directly to Jesus. I asked him if he ever gets his church community, family or friends to unite their prayers to his for a special intention. He replied, "Of course! All the time!"

I told him that is exactly what Catholics are doing when we pray for the intercession of the saints. I asked him to imagine the saints in heaven beseeching God for his own special prayer intentions, and how eager God would be to grant those graces, because the elect were uniting their prayers to his.

Jesus gave his mother to us at the foot of the cross, (John 19:26) and she will intercede for us if we only ask. He will most certainly hear the requests of His holy mother, and just as God will deny nothing to Jesus, so Jesus will deny nothing to Mary, because her will is always in perfect conformity to the holy will of God.

We had a great conversation over this topic. Now there is one more Bible Christian who understands why Catholics pray to Mary.

Call no man Father

I work with several born-again Christians, but sadly, no Catholics. Not any who are practicing their faith, anyway. Born-agains are on fire for their faith, but they have so many misconceptions about the Catholic faith. It's like they've been poisoned against it. One fellow I worked with "found out" I was Catholic when my phone rang, and the person calling me asked about the practice of making sacrifices for Lent, and why some Catholics allow themselves, on Sundays of Lent, to have what they gave up. After the phone call, he said to me, "So you're Catholic, then?" (I knew all along he was a non-Catholic Christian by the plain cross on his lapel).

I told him I was a traditional Catholic, and later, during lunch, he pulled out a little King James bible from his jacket pocket, flipped to Matthew 23:9 "And call none your father upon earth; for one is your father, who is in heaven", and asked me what the meaning of that passage was, and why we call our priests Father. I noticed as he flipped through his Bible that he had many passages such as this one highlighted.

The next part of that passage is "Neither be ye called masters; for one is your master, Christ". The meaning, as far as I understand it, is that our Father in heaven is to be regarded higher than any father upon earth, and we are not to follow any master who would lead us away from Christ. But this doesn't mean that we can't respect our parents, spiritual fathers and teachers, because the fourth commandment expressly commands that we should.

There are also many other places in Scripture that support the Catholic use of Father for our priests. Take a look at Acts 7:2 where St. Stephen calls Jewish leaders father: Who said: Ye men, brethren, and fathers, hear. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charan. And again in Acts 21:40 and 22:1, St Paul also refers to Jerusalem Jews as fathers: Men, brethren, and fathers, hear ye the account which I now give unto you.

Abraham is called the father of us all in Romans 4:16-17: Therefore is it of faith, that according to grace the promise might be firm to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17 (As it is written: I have made thee a father of many nations,)

And what about 1 Corinthians 4:14-15 where St Paul calls himself 'father': For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel. Surely this is strong evidence of why we call our priests Father. In the first epistle of St John, I John 2: 13, he says, I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him, who is from the beginning. Finally, and once again, in Philomen 1" 9-10, St Paul gives a perfect example of our tradition of calling priests father, where he says this: I, Paul, an ambassador and now a prisoner also for Christ Jesus -- [10] I appeal to you for my child, Ones'imus, whose father I have become in my imprisonment.

I wish I had all of these references available to me that day when my co-worker was demanding to know how we dare to call our priests by the term father. At least now, I will be better armed if the subject comes up again.