Blogposts

The Great Feasts of September

09-16-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

There are so many great feast days in September.  There is the birthday of Our Lady on September 8 one of only three birthdays celebrated by the Church: Our Lord’s, Our Lady’s and St. John the Baptist.  The birthday according to the Faith is the re-birth of baptism and hence the importance of the name-day of the person and entering eternal life. There is the feast of the great doctor and father of the Church St. John Chrysostom on September 13.

Then there’s the great feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on September 14 one of the oldest feasts in the Church.  A great book about the discovery of the Holy Cross of Christ is the story of St. Helena the mother of Constantine the Great.  British author Evelyn Waugh has written a short resume of St. Helena’s life. 

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From Canterbury to Rome: Why the Queen’s Former Chaplain Became Catholic

09-15-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

The former chaplain to Queen Elizabeth has decided to return to the Faith of his ancestors of England before Henry VIII. Click here to find out why.

Save the Dates: October 25, 26, 27

08-27-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

40 Hours Devotion: Beginning at the 12:15pm Sunday Mass and closing Tuesday at 7:00pm Mass.

Eucharistic Adoration on Sunday and Monday until 10:00pm and on Tuesday until 7:00pm.

Processions with the Eucharist after the 12:15Mass and after the Mass on Tuesday evening.

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Why Do We Need Commandments?

08-26-2020From the desk of Fr. VillaSt. Thomas Aquinas

We are placed between the things of this world, and spiritual goods from which eternal happiness consists: so that the more we cleave to the one, the more we withdraw from the other, and vice versa.

Wherefore whoever cleaves wholly to the things of this world, so as to make them his reason for living, and to look upon them as the reason and rule of all he does, falls away altogether from spiritual goods. Hence this disorder is removed by the commandments.

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Saints of August

08-19-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

The greatest of the saints is the Blessed Virgin.  The original feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is celebrated on August 22 and is kept in the traditional liturgy.  In the ordinary form of the Mass clergy can offer a votive Mass to the Immaculate Heart of Mary since the month of August is dedicated to her Immaculate Heart. 

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St. Jean Eudes, the devotion the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the Rosary

08-17-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

August 19 is the feast of St. John Eudes the great apostle of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. 

Since August is dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, click here to read an article about St. Jean Eudes, this devotion, and the Rosary.

A Latin hymn on the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary has the following:

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From the Cardinal-Archbishop of New York

07-27-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

Dear Family of the Archdiocese of New York,

The Covid-19 pandemic, which has caused disruption across many aspects of our daily lives, is having an especially profound impact on young people, including those in our Catholic schools, whose education is being altered or interrupted.

The pandemic and resulting economic impact have dramatically reduced the number of parents who can afford to make tuition payments for the upcoming school year. Two weeks ago, I shared the sad news that 20 of our schools, already facing soaring deficits, would not be able to re-open this Fall due to steep declines in enrollment. Without assistance to our parents and children from the Federal government, many more of our Catholic schools may have to close permanently. These closures will harm thousands of students from our archdiocese, and across the nation.

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Love of Neighbor: The Communion of the Saints, The Souls in Purgatory

07-23-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

One of the works of mercy is to pray for the living and the dead. The living get the lion’s share of our attention when we think of love of neighbor. However, love of neighbor also includes prayer and Masses for the dead. Prayer for the dead should be daily. They are dead to this world but we trust alive for God in eternity. We cannot assume anyone is in heaven except canonized saints and innocent baptized children. Even if the person we are praying for is in heaven the love being bestowed is not wasted because the Lord uses the love for some other member of the family which is the Church.

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Some of the Glorious Catholic Feasts of July

07-21-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

July 16: Our Lady of Mt. Carmel and the Scapular: In 1251, the most extraordinary event in English history

The Mother of God and her Divine Son appear to Saint Simon Stock in Cambridge -- 769 years ago today, in 1251: has there been any other moment in English history whose consequences have aided so many souls throughout the world achieve and keep holiness, reaching final perseverance? Men and women, made of flesh, need material reminders of the presence of God in their lives -- and what could be more profitable than the blessed physical sign that Our Lady's Mantle covers us at all times, that Her Divine Son keeps watch over us day and night?

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From the Cardinal-Archbishop of New York

07-15-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

Dear Family of the Archdiocese of New York,

May I intrude on what I hope is a relaxing summer with a not-so-pleasant subject?

Last week, the Associated Press published a scurrilous article, heavy on innuendo, about Catholic dioceses, parishes, schools, charitable organizations, and other institutions that rightly received assistance from the federal government to pay their employees during the Covid-19 crisis. Many news outlets picked up the story, which implied that there was something amiss in Catholic institutions receiving paycheck protection money. Many of you have called or emailed me, wanting to know if the story was true. My answer, quite simply, is absolutely not! It was misleading at best, outright false at worst. Here’s why.

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July 6 was the feast day of the child-saint and virgin-martyr St. Maria Goretti

07-09-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

On Fr Z’s blog there was the following reminder about this saint.

Maria Goretti was murdered in the course of an attempted rape, which she resisted to the point of being mortally wounded. The Church teaches that those who die bearing witness to Christ, to the Faith, or to some virtue or quality inseparable from the Faith, in that moment manifest the virtues in a heroic way and are, therefore, able to be proposed even for elevation to our altars. Something about St. Maria Goretti captured the imagination of the Catholic faithful in the early 20th c., as did, for example, St. Therese de Lisieux. Their lives show us that we can, in fact, try – with the help of grace – to be clean in a world that is fallen and fallen far. It is not hard to understand why even some Catholics react with strong negativity about Maria Goretti. They’ve gone the way of the world. Also, my contact with exorcists informs me that St. Maria Goretti is a mighty intercessor and a serious terror of demons, surely after the heart St. Joseph… known for his purity. Joseph most chaste… Guardian of virgins… Solace of the wretched… Patron of the dying… THE Terror of demons.

Offering the Precious Blood of our Lord Jesus

07-06-2020From the desk of Fr. Villa

July is dedicated to the Precious Blood of our Lord. It is a wonderful practice of offering the Precious Blood:

One of the best means of participating in the graces and blessings of the Precious Blood is to offer It to the Eternal Father. “An offering,” says Father Faber, is “more than a prayer.” In prayer, we are the recipients, but when we make an offering, God vouchsafes to accept something from us. St. Mary Magdalen de Pazzi, when in ecstasy, once exclaimed: “Every time a creature offers up the Blood by which he was redeemed, he offers a gift of infinite worth, which can be equaled by no other.” God revealed the practice of making this offering to this Saintly Carmelite nun when He complained to her that so little effort is made in this world to disarm His Divine justice against sinners. Acting upon this admonition, she daily offered the Precious Blood fifty times for the living and the dead. She did this with so much fervor that God showed her on different occasions the numerous souls who had thereby been converted or delivered from Purgatory.

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