06 Wednesday Feb 2019
Posted in Catholic Family Handbook - Fr. Lovasik, Finances, Marriage
by Father Lovasik, Catholic Family Handbook
Be temperate toward material things
Ill-regulated love of material things can be the cause of much trouble, unhappiness, and downright misery in the home. Your attitude toward money can be a source of great friction if it is not well ordered.
Two extremes are to be avoided: miserliness and prodigality. Continue reading
23 Wednesday Jan 2019
Painting by Al Buell 1910-1996
by Father Lovasik, Catholic Family Handbook
Ask God to help you be patient
Even people who constantly strive to please God have a goodly share of hard things to bear. This is the reason patience is so necessary for happiness in marriage.
Be constantly prepared to bear disagreeable things.
When there is an abundance of the good things, there is danger of becoming too occupied with passing and material considerations.Be grateful to God for them.
When disagreeable things, reverses, sorrows, and disappointments come your way, put your confidence in God, who will strengthen you.
Ask for patience. In the mercy of God, reverses are sometimes sent to awaken your wayward conscience or to test your love of God. When God so tests you, you must never be wanting in love and confidence and patience.
Be honest and sincere
You owe your spouse truth and sincerity. Our Lord is the greatest example of these virtues. He wished everyone well and was never anything but kindness itself in word and deed. He never made use of men for selfish ends, but spoke and acted openly, sincerely, and uprightly.
Honesty and sincerity bring about confidence and a spirit of loyalty. Few things contribute more to the success of a marriage.. Such confidence bolsters a husband’s flagging courage and inspires him with the will to win and to measure up to the high opinion that his wife and children have of him and his abilities.
The enemies of honesty and sincerity are nagging, miserliness, jealousy, and in-law trouble.
Avoid nagging
Nagging is not always the fault of women, yet it seems that they often fall victims to this disagreeable habit that spoils family happiness. Do not be a nagging wife.
Do not try to remake your husband. Prize your own individuality and be willing to put up with his.
Do not expect your husband to render daily reports on where he was, why, when, and with whom. Be an eager listener, but a reluctant inquisitor.
You must assure yourself of your husband’s unwavering devotion. The result of your placing implicit confidence and trust in him will not incline him to take advantage of your refusal to snoop or pry, or to step out of line.
He will be won by decency, gratitude, loyalty, and trust, but never with fear.
A sincere and trusting wife will have a great influence in shaping her husband’s life. Stand by your husband and share with head and heart his successes and failures.
Give him due encouragement, but have the courage to drive home a sometimes unpleasant truth.
Never be afraid of responsibility, but be prepared to embark on a new course of life with your husband, should the need arise.
You will bring to your husband the love and inspiration he needs in the many problems of life, and that love and inspiration will weave threads of gold in his life’s pattern.
Wealth, fame, and power are no satisfactory substitutes for the hard-earned joys of the married life, for not one of them can satisfy the hunger of the heart for love.
When your husband knows he is married to his most trusted confidant, your influence soars. -Matthew L. Jacobson https://amzn.to/2MtbcTT (afflink)
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Finer Femininity is a small publication compiled to inspire Catholic women in their vocations. It consists of uplifting articles from authors with traditional values, with many of them from priests, written over 50 years ago. These anecdotes are timeless but, with the fast-paced “progress “of today’s world, the pearls within the articles are rarely meditated upon. This little magazine offers Catholic womankind support and inspiration as they travel that oftentimes lonely trail….the narrow road to heaven. The thoughts within the pages will enlighten us to regard the frequently monotonous path of our “daily duties” as the beautiful road to sanctity. Feminine souls need this kind of information to continue to “fight the good fight” in a world that has opposing values and seldom offers any kind of support to these courageous women. Inside the pages you will find inspiration for your roles as single women, as wives and as mothers. In between the thought-provoking articles, the pages are sprinkled with pictures, quotes and maybe even a recipe or two.
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14 Wednesday Nov 2018
Posted in Catholic Family Handbook - Fr. Lovasik, Marriage
Be ready to compromise and to forgive
There will be many disagreements in your married life. Marriage has many difficulties and trials that are inevitable when two human beings live together in a life-long union of the greatest intimacy, with all the changes in mood and temperament that the varying conditions of life occasion.
Self-sacrifice is one of the standards of measurement for true love. Self-sacrifice is opposed to selfishness. Selfishness means wanting your own way always. It makes you a dictator.
Self-sacrifice must take the form of compromise. This compromise does not surrender in matters of moral or spiritual principle, but does surrender in disputes over the use of money, leisure time, or material things.
If you always insist on having your way, on doing what you want, on buying what you want, on going where you choose, without considering the desires of your partner, there is selfishness in place of love. Such selfishness is the basis of all impatience, and anger is the fruit of impatience.
A happy marriage depends so much on cooperation, self-sacrifice, sacrifice, and understanding that whatever is gained by insisting on rights will be lost in peace and good will.
So never talk about what you have a right to do against the wishes of your partner. It is difficult, if not impossible, to bring peace into a home where either the husband or the wife is stubbornly insisting on some right against the judgment or wishes of the partner.
You cannot force a person to be a good companion. That must come from the person’s own desire and from his freedom from external tasks and worries. Rather than just laying down the law, you would do far better to show an interest in each other’s work and to make some effort, even with all your own responsibilities, to help each other with it.
The partnership of marriage requires give and take. There are still husbands who feel that only men are entitled to freedom of movement and outside-the-house contacts and associations.
Either they are very jealous men, who unreasonably fear that they might lose their wives’ affection if they permit them to mingle with people outside the home, or they are simply the dictator type, who feel that women should be subject to men and to their duties as wives and mothers, and that they should ask for nothing in the way of relaxation and recreation.
This is not normal, but it is something wives should accept patiently. They can use any reasonable means to correct the condition. Anger, resentment, and bitterness will not accomplish anything; rather they will serve only to harden some husbands in their unjust attitude.
If your husband has a kind of tyrannical temperament – if he thinks he knows it all as far as you are concerned – you will not change his opinion of his superior wisdom merely by butting your head against his will.
You must have a full measure of respect for the judgment and wishes of your spouse. Use spiritual motives to accept with peace the tyranny you cannot avoid without war.
If your husband insists on making all the decisions, no matter how intimately you may be involved, then only by the grace of God, combined with a constant effort to cultivate patience, prudence, and tact will you be able to solve your problem.
Furthermore, you accepted him “for better or for worse,” and when “the worse” comes out in him, remember your promise at God’s altar. Be thankful that you have a good Catholic husband, if that be the case, who does not, with all his faults, make it difficult for you to live up to your Faith and to save your soul.
Be forgiving
Self-sacrifice must take the form of forgiveness. Forgiveness means the sacrifice of anger, bitterness, resentment, and revenge against your partner. There is no marriage in which forgiveness is not sometimes required, because there are no perfect human beings on earth.
It is inevitable when you live with another person day after day that at times your feelings will be hurt, and you will think that your rights are abused. So do not be too sensitive, and do not feel sorry for yourself.
A nagging wife never wholeheartedly forgives, because she never lets her husband forget his faults and defects of character. A husband who bears grudges against his wife and enters into moody silences for long periods of time is too selfish to forgive from his heart.
The causes for disagreements are usually very trivial. If you have misunderstandings, do everything possible to straighten out these domestic problems as soon as possible, and try to keep harmony.
Balance your accounts every day: if you quarrel in the morning, try to be at peace by nightfall. If you have failed, admit the mistake, and your spouse should forgive and forget.
You need a technique for handling the differences that so often lead to explosions of temper in marriage. Try to discuss your differences with calmness and understanding and settle them through reason tempered with good will and love. Without these elements, no disagreement can be solved.
With the help of God and your good will, love, and understanding, a solution can be found for every difficulty.
Accept each other’s faults
The state of being in love is not a sufficient guide to the new life of marriage, as a pagan, secular world would have us believe. The implications of the vows of Matrimony become clear only gradually.
When you were married, each of you had to choose first the interests of the other. This choice could not be accomplished in a matter of days. When you began to live as one, you discovered in yourselves faults of temper and character of which previously you may not have been aware. Even to this day you will find these faults your stumbling blocks.
Your chance of happiness depends on your sincere determination and your capacity for self-sacrifice to get them out of your way. Learn to accept each other’s faults with patient love. Do not brood over them. If you do, you will pile one thing upon another and make mountains out of molehills.
Forgiveness is especially a necessary part of your relationship. If you see a fault in your spouse that you consider serious, and which makes you unhappy, be patient and bring it up to your partner in a kind, prudent way.
Be ready to accept correction for your own faults and failings. If you have complaints about your spouse, begin the process of correction by examining and correcting yourself. A case cannot be settled on the basis of one spouse’s complaints alone. The principal fault may be found on one side only, but you should not take it for granted without self-examination and humble self-improvement.
You must dare to put aside your petty personal pattern, your peeves and fears, and in humble trust and prayer beg the help of God, offered to you in the sacrament of Matrimony.
Make unpleasant experiences fewer. There will be numerous occasions when even loving personalities verge on hatred. There will be spells of boredom and dreariness that even real love does not dispel. There will be days and nights of weariness, discouragement, unhappiness, and almost despair.
Remember that you have enough help to assure you of improvement. Both of you are working for the ideal marriage, and both of you are eager to find ways of making your life happier.
If only you cooperate, God will give you innumerable graces -those particularly conferred by the sacrament of Matrimony – actual grace and sanctifying grace. This means a real lift to progress at the very moment you need it most.
Punctuality exacts self-discipline and detachment; it often asks us to interrupt some interesting, pleasant work in order to give ourselves to another kind, perhaps less attractive or less important.
However, it would be a great mistake to esteem our duties and to dedicate ourselves to them according to the attraction we have for them or according to their more or less apparent importance.
All is important and beautiful when it is the expression of the will of God, and the soul who wishes to live in this hole he will every minute of the day, will never omit the slightest act prescribed by its rule of life. -Divine Intimacy
Review: The volumes are so thick and worth the price! Both the black and white volume with its intricate pencil illustrations, and the volume with its bright wall-to-wall colors, have equal appeal each in their own way. It is a sturdy paperback, and will last in a house full of kids. Shipped quickly.
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18 Tuesday Sep 2018
From The Catholic Family Handbook, Fr. Lovasik
Put your family ahead of your activities outside your home
Marriage demands companionship. The wish to be with the one loved is a sign of true love. To be satisfied being with each other only when this can hardly be avoided leads to taking love for granted.
So many people crowd their lives with too much activity and squeeze out of their schedule some of the things they would like to do or ought to do. They are doing many things that are good, but they are neglecting other things that are better and more important.
Perhaps this is because they lose sight of the primacy of the obligations arising from their family and home.
Your first duty is to your home and family. You have solemnly sworn an obligation to work for their happiness and salvation.
To be successful, families must be happy; and to be happy, the members must anticipate and fulfill the reasonable needs and desires of one another.
Trust in God
You are assured of God’s help. The Church teaches that through the sacrament of Matrimony, you and your spouse are assured of God’s constant help. Therefore, you must firmly trust in God.
In the next life, you may expect still greater blessings if on earth you have tried to build your home on the model of the Holy Family of Nazareth. God is never outdone in generosity.
If you serve Him as well as you can, you can be certain that He will bless you abundantly. If, on the other hand, you deliberately break His laws, you can be sure of depriving yourself and your family of His blessing.
The primary requisite for family happiness is union with God, who is the source of all happiness in this world and in the next. No one has such powerful means and more frequent opportunities of being united with God than a conscientious Catholic.
Keep in touch with God through the frequent reception of the sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist and by much prayer. Work hard for your family and their happiness as if everything thing depended upon you. Pray to God and trust Him even more, because everything really depends upon Him.
Our Lord said, “Abide in me, and I in you…. Apart from me you can do nothing.””
Be patient
Patience is a powerful help in married life. It controls and restrains strains angry feelings and outbursts of anger. It is a mature virtue that shows superiority of intellect, practical wisdom in daily life, strength of will, and a good, humble, and benevolent heart.
The more spiritual progress you make, the more patient and gentle you will become. Patience procures for you love and influence. It attracts people to you and is of the utmost importance in the family, since you spend so much of your lives together.
Impatience, on the other hand, drives people away. It does no good and much harm, especially in the case of parents who are engaged in the rearing of children.
Impatience is certainly not the spirit of Jesus. In order to be patient, you must be prayerful and prepared for the inevitable unpleasantness in this life.
Although you will never be able to arrange matters so that there will be nothing to provoke you to impatience, you can live by the principle that there is no reason in the world for getting impatient.
Avoid being unjustly angry
Anger, which overrides the requirement of justice and charity, is a destroyer of family peace and happiness. There is such a thing as just anger, and even Christ became angry when He saw something wrong that deeply offended Him.
But anger is wrong when it is out of proportion to whatever occasioned it, when it becomes senseless fury, or when it accomplishes more harm than good.
In the family, you must practice forbearance, clemency, and patience, lest your children suffer from anger that runs wild. Anger is a homewrecker of deadly efficiency. It causes family members to lose respect for each other, and where respect is missing, love can hardly survive.
If you indulge in anger frequently, conditions get worse instead of better, because you are constantly seeking new, sharper ways of hurting others.
Anger leads to deep dislike and brooding hatred. This is the worst possible atmosphere in which to raise children. Giving in to anger was condemned by Christ. Outbursts of temper are contrary to the whole idea of charity that He preached.
There are occasions, however, when reasonable anger may be a forceful means of correction or the lesser of two evils. Scripture says, “Be angry, but sin not.”
You may be justly angry when your spouse suggests something sinful. In that case, you are directing your anger to the correction or prevention of sin, and your anger may be justified if it is held in reasonable bounds.
A short flurry of anger may at times be the lesser of two evils – for instance, if you are temperamentally inclined to hold a deep grudge for a long time unless you bring the matter into the open at the start and so end it.
A secretly nursed grudge may also be the cause of anger. A grudge is a permanent refusal to forgive a real or imaginary injury. As long as you hold a grudge, you are inviting anger, and you are in some degree responsible for anger in others.
This anger can be detected in your tone of voice, in the silence of your mood, and in the very atmosphere of your home. If you want to prevent explosions of anger in your home, do not permit grudges to last more than a day.
Correction of temper is mostly a matter of self-control. Hide your feelings of displeasure. Be silent when you feel like saying harsh words.
Cultivate a spirit of forgiveness and humility. You will seldom rejoice over your explosions of anger. But you will be glad that you did not say the things you wanted to say when you were angry.
“Holiness means happiness. Holy people are happy people at peace with God, with others, and with themselves.
There is only one requirement. You must do God’s will. This embraces various obligations and gives you corresponding rights and privileges.
This is the lesson of the Holy Family. The will of God must count for everything in our daily lives. Prosaic deeds done for God can lead to spectacular holiness.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph were human, intensely human in the best sense of the word. They show us how our lives, too, should be human–truly warm and Godlike.” -Fr. Lovasik
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18 Wednesday Apr 2018
It IS interesting, isn’t it, how, in the last decades, women are made to feel as if they are being “losers”, “nobodys” if they are dedicated to the home. They are not using their talents if they aren’t out working in the world.
Truly, I find that illogical. How many talents does it make to run a pleasant home, raise good children, have a healthy relationship with someone you rub shoulders with night and day? That, in itself, is a full-time job…not to mention if some are homeschooling, seeking out healthy alternatives, helping with their parish life, etc., etc.
No, it takes a brave, committed, responsible, hard-working adult to do what it takes to raise a Godly family in today’s society.
And for those women who have to work on top of all that, what a load, indeed! My own mother had to work for a period in our lives and it was very difficult!
Father Lovasik, in this excerpt, talks about happiness in marriage, and how it must be earned…
by Father Lovasik, The Catholic Family Handbook
Happiness in marriage must be earned. It is something you must work out for yourself, chiefly by forgetting yourself and serving others.
Marriage involves the art of human relations, the psychology of children, the economics of running a home, the maintenance of health, but, above all, the development of the moral and spiritual life of the family.
All this demands a wide range of talents and skill. No marriage is a success unless less you make it so, and that takes persistent effort and, still more, a constant and humble reliance on God.
The supreme object of your effort and striving is the family. You worked and saved in order that you might be married and have a home of your own. Once married, you worked and saved that you might successfully bring up a family.
Your purpose in Matrimony should be to bring God’s children into the world and rear them properly, to be one in body and spirit, and to make a happy home. You are to help one another and your children in every possible way, especially to get to Heaven, which is the final and eternal destiny for us all.
You and your spouse must be willing to work at marriage as the greatest job of your lives and not desert when problems arise. When you married, each of you took on a responsibility for some part of the work that goes into the making of a home.
Both assume the responsibility of encouraging and helping the other, insofar as is possible, in the specific tasks designed for each.
The training of children is the mutual responsibility of both husband and wife. Thus, marriage is very much a fifty-fifty proposition. Only when you are willing to bear your share of the burdens of married life can you hope to have real love and peace.
Marriage is normally a source of equilibrium for you, because cause it brings you legitimate and healthy pleasures. But equilibrium always consists of an effort to impose the guidance of reason upon all your activities.
Welcome without narrow-mindedness and weakness the joy marriage offers; use your reason in meeting the difficulties that marriage inevitably entails.
If your temperament is inherently unstable, if your life is weighed down with unfavorable conditions, you can recover the health of your emotional and spiritual life only if you seek above all what is right according to the sane reason that God has given you, providing, of course, that you make yourself do it.
Only this effort can bring you the joy that is worthy of you.
At any rate, she has by nature the power, the art, and the disposition to please, to soothe, to charm, and to captivate. It is a wonderful power; and we see daily women exerting it in a wonderful way. Why will not women who are truly good, or who sincerely strive to be so, not make it the chief study of their lives to find out and acquire the sovereign art of making their influence as healthful, as cheering, as blissful as the sunlight and the warmth are to their homes? – Rev Bernard O’Reilly, True Womanhood, 1894 http://amzn.to/2mPm81e (afflink)
07 Friday Jul 2017
From The Catholic Family Handbook, Fr. Lawrence Lovasik
A good Catholic home is the one supreme need of the hour. And a good Catholic family life alone makes up a good Catholic home.
A good Catholic home is the source and maintainer of the Catholic way of life. We have many institutions that we call schools, but the real schools where the real lessons of life are learned are our homes.
We hear a great deal about higher education, but the highest that can be had is found in the lofty lessons sons of self-control, self-sacrifice, sublime faith, and splendid trust, which home life has such a marvelous power to teach.
There is no training to be had in school or college or anywhere in the world that can take the place of the discipline of the home.
Even a public school from which every religious influence is banned cannot destroy the Catholic faith of children who come from wholesome Catholic homes.
It is difficult for a child to be better than his home environment or for a nation to be superior to the level of its home life.
In fulfilling its double generation and formation of home becomes a little world in itself, self-sufficient even in its youngest years.
It is vital that you, as a mother or father, make of your home a training ground in character-building for your children, who will inherit the world’s problems.
Home is a place in which the young grow in harmony with all that is good and noble, where hardship, happiness, and work are shared.
Home should not be just a place. Rather, it must be the place. All else should be “outside.”
Home should be the center of activities and interests. It was built for births, courtship, marriage, and death. It is maintained so that children might grow, trained by precept and example – so that they will develop spiritually, mentally, and emotionally, just as they do physically.
Strong home ties have a tendency to weaken in children during high school. Then children work outside the home; they establish friendships independent of the family; they date; and they enjoy recreation away from the family.
These are the years when family spirit is firmly cemented or broken, and the outcome depends, to a large extent, on youthful training.
The more that parents and older brothers and sisters can do to focus all attention within the family, the better it is for the children.
To accomplish the high purpose set for its nature, and regulated by Divine Providence, the family must normally act as a unit. It is recognized as a unit by the Church, which cherishes and protects it as the basic unit of all society.
The family should wield its influence and give a good example as a unit, particularly within its parish. This will be possible only if all the members have practiced the humbler virtues within the sanctuary of the home.
As a Catholic parent, you must consecrate every intelligent effort to the task of developing the love of family as early as possible.
Family consciousness, leading to intelligent love of family, is to be instilled from earliest childhood.
There is need for a reasonable family pride. Home, marriage, love, and children are still the great heart-words of humanity and must continue to be so if civilization is not to sink.
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Don’t forget to dress for your role as Domestic Queen! You can still look feminine as you go about your business. – Fascinating Womanhood http://amzn.to/2orXm6w (afflink)
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This is a wonderful little prayer book that I have used all through my married life. The prayers are beautiful and the promises wonderful!
The following are a couple of examples of special prayers I have used a lot:
Mary, Virgin Mother of God, conceived without sin, we choose you today as the Queen and Mother of our home.
We ask you, through the Precious Blood of Jesus and your Immaculate Conception, to preserve us from sickness, fire and water, lightning and storms, from war and theft, from loss of faith and sudden death.
Bless and protect, O holy Virgin, all who live here and preserve us from every other temporal and spiritual misfortune. Amen
( Inexpressible graces have been received through the use of this prayer, which in one cry of confidence, links together those three most dear and holy names: – Jesus, Mary, Joseph.)
Remember, Heart of my Jesus, Immaculate Heart of Mary, and you, oh glorious St. Joseph, that no one has ever had recourse to Your protection, or implored your assistance without obtaining relief. Animated with the like confidence, I come laden with the weight of my sins, to prostrate myself before You. Oh Merciful Heart of Jesus, Immaculate Heart of Mary, and you, oh glorious St. Joseph, reject not my petitions, but graciously here and grant them. Amen
-Prayer for Choosing a State in Life
-Act of Consecration to the Precious Blood and the Blessed Virgin for Children
-Memorare to St. Joseph (and many other beautiful prayers to that Glorious Saint)
-A Prayer in time of Affliction, Wars, Pestilence, etc.
…….Beautiful Prayers to many Saints
….and many, many more. It is a small prayer book with around 150 pages. You will find it a superb companion to your prayer life. You can locate the prayer book here.
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02 Sunday Jul 2017
Posted in Catholic Family Handbook - Fr. Lovasik, Family Life, Virtues
The Catholic Family Handbook, Fr. Lovasik
Model your Home Life on the Holy House of Nazareth
The Holy Family lived in a plain cottage among other working people, in a village perched on a hillside. Although they did not enjoy modern conveniences, the three persons who lived there made it the happiest home that ever was.
You cannot imagine any of them at any time thinking first of himself. This is the kind of home a husband likes to return to and to remain in.
Mary saw to it that such was their home. She took it as her career to be a successful homemaker and mother. And there was never a voice raised in that home.
You cannot not imagine Joseph shouting at his spouse and Mary screaming back at him, or the child Jesus answering impudently. You cannot imagine any of the three sulking or being moody and uncooperative.
In establishing your home, adopt the characteristics of the holy house of Nazareth.
In proportion as you do so, you will have fashioned for yourselves a replica of the happiest home that ever was on earth. The thought of the Holy Family suggests the love of simplicity.
Domestic and marital happiness are closely bound up with the simple but good things of your state of life.
Seek your happiness within the range of your income and your social, domestic, and family circles, and you will spare yourself many heartaches.
Husband, be fair to your wife and family in trying to provide the necessities and ordinary comforts of life.
Wife, strive to live within the income that is provided.
Be loyal to each other in periods of trial, and confidently seek the blessing of God at Mass, Holy Communion, and prayer.
Pray often to the Holy Family to sanctify your family by their example and intercession, so that you may reach the ultimate goal of your marriage: the eternal possession of God.
In all your family needs and problems, confide in the intercession and help of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.
They will protect, guard, and keep you in holy fear, in peace, and in the harmony of Christian charity.
By conforming yourselves to the divine model of this Holy Family, you will attain eternal happiness.
Above all, through their prayers, you and your children will be enabled to honor God by a virtuous life so as to be worthy of a heavenly reward.
Every other consideration should yield to the thought of aiding each other to attain that goal.
Only when religion permeates your daily life does your marriage fulfill its purpose. You and your children will find real happiness in direct proportion to your efforts to make God the very center of your married life.
In this, the Holy Family should be your inspiration. As a truly Catholic parent, try to copy the example of the Holy Family and to see in a hidden life of prayer, work, and daily fidelity to the commonplace, the surest steppingstone to sainthood.
As a family, try to lead a hidden life with Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Through holy Mass, offer yourselves through Mary’s hands as a sacrifice with Jesus; at Holy Communion, you will be changed into Jesus by divine grace so that you may live His life; by your visits to the tabernacle, you will enjoy His friendship ship in the midst of the many problems of life.
If you have faith, you will discover His presence and see His veiled glory.
If you love Him in the Holy Eucharist to the extent of making the Eucharist the center of your life, He will pour out His grace into your hearts and breathe the peace of God into your souls and make your burdens light.
If you speak to Him, your God, with reverent familiarity, He will enlighten you about His Providence in your regard and strengthen you to bear the crosses He sends you.
Devotion to the Holy Eucharist is the surest and easiest way of making your family resemble the Holy Family of Nazareth.
Joseph, the honest workman, is still the guardian of families. Mary, the Mother of God, is the blessed mother of every Catholic home. Jesus, subject to the model of every child.
Through their intercession, may you and your family find your joy in God in this life, and may you be reunited to enjoy Him for all eternity in a family! Follow St. Paul’s counsel
In his letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul gives us some general principles to follow in order to make family life truly Christian.
To the entire family, he says, “Always and for everything [give] thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father. Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.”‘
To wives he says, “Wives, be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife as Christ is the head of the Church, His Body, and is Himself its Savior. As the Church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.”‘
To husbands he says, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her…. Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.”‘
To children he says, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. `Honor thy father and thy mother’ (this is the first commandment with a promise), `that it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth.’”
To fathers, he says, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”‘
This is the perfect solution to a major family problem. Let the wife be subject to her husband as if he were Christ. Let the husband love his wife as Christ loves the Church.
If such a relationship existed between husband and wife, they would be in harmony as the Church and Christ perfect love and peace. Finally, let children obey and respect their parents. If they do, God will bless them and grant peace to that family.
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A Poem from Catholic Mother Goose:
Ladybug, Ladybug, fly away home
Why do you always go out and roam?
Your duties await you, your dishes are dirty;
Ladybug, Ladybug, it’s almost ten thirty!
Ladybug, Ladybug, now in your dwelling;
Your house is all tidy and not so repelling.
Your bread in the oven smells homey and sweet;
We’ll come and we’ll visit and enjoy this nice treat!
Ladybug, Ladybug, your lesson learned well;
Attend to your home and happy you’ll dwell.
You pray and you clean, you sing and you spin;
Your friends will all come, you’ll invite them on in!
SAMMY AND THE MEDAL
Sammy wandered outside on a lovely fall day. He was looking at the pretty butterfly that was landing on his mother’s summer flowers when his eye caught something shiny on the ground. He picked it up and saw that it was his sister Polly’s shiny, new Miraculous M edal she had received for her birthday. Sammy looked around to see if anyone was watching and began to slip it into his pocket.
He then heard his mother’s voice, “Sammy! what have you got and why do you look so guilty?”
Sammy sheepishly looked at his mom and opened his hand. Inside his palm lay the shiny new medal that he was about to take.
Sammy’s mom reminded him that it was not his to have and that to take anything that did not belong to him was a sin. It was stealing.
Sammy was glad that his mom had stopped him before he put the medal in his pocket. He wanted to be a good boy and please Jesus, just sometimes it was hard.
He said he was sorry, hugged his mom and skipped off with a light heart to give the medal to his sister.
Let’s chat about this: What did Sammy see on the ground? Whose was it? What was Sammy tempted to do? Who stopped him? Was Sammy glad that his mom stopped him? Why was he glad?
Prayer: Dear Jesus, please help me always to be a good little child of God. When I am tempted to do wrong, please give me strength to say no. I love You, Jesus, and I know You love me too and will always help me if I ask. Dear Guardian Angel, protect me.
Sammy was taking the medal,
But he would have felt real bad.
Instead he chose to love Jesus;
He did what was right and was glad!
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A coloring page for your children for the Month of the Precious Blood….
31 Monday Oct 2016
Posted in Catholic Family Handbook - Fr. Lovasik, Family Life, Virtues
The Catholic Family Handbook, Fr. Lovasik
Model your Home Life on the Holy House of Nazareth
The Holy Family lived in a plain cottage among other working people, in a village perched on a hillside. Although they did not enjoy modern conveniences, the three persons who lived there made it the happiest home that ever was.
You cannot imagine any of them at any time thinking first of himself. This is the kind of home a husband likes to return to and to remain in.
Mary saw to it that such was their home. She took it as her career to be a successful homemaker and mother. And there was never a voice raised in that home.
You cannot not imagine Joseph shouting at his spouse and Mary screaming back at him, or the child Jesus answering impudently. You cannot imagine any of the three sulking or being moody and uncooperative.
In establishing your home, adopt the characteristics of the holy house of Nazareth.
In proportion as you do so, you will have fashioned for yourselves a replica of the happiest home that ever was on earth. The thought of the Holy Family suggests the love of simplicity.
Domestic and marital happiness are closely bound up with the simple but good things of your state of life.
Seek your happiness within the range of your income and your social, domestic, and family circles, and you will spare yourself many heartaches.
Husband, be fair to your wife and family in trying to provide the necessities and ordinary comforts of life.
Wife, strive to live within the income that is provided.
Be loyal to each other in periods of trial, and confidently seek the blessing of God at Mass, Holy Communion, and prayer.
Pray often to the Holy Family to sanctify your family by their example and intercession, so that you may reach the ultimate goal of your marriage: the eternal possession of God.
In all your family needs and problems, confide in the intercession and help of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.
They will protect, guard, and keep you in holy fear, in peace, and in the harmony of Christian charity.
By conforming yourselves to the divine model of this Holy Family, you will attain eternal happiness.
Above all, through their prayers, you and your children will be enabled to honor God by a virtuous life so as to be worthy of a heavenly reward.
Every other consideration should yield to the thought of aiding each other to attain that goal.
Only when religion permeates your daily life does your marriage fulfill its purpose. You and your children will find real happiness in direct proportion to your efforts to make God the very center of your married life.
In this, the Holy Family should be your inspiration. As a truly Catholic parent, try to copy the example of the Holy Family and to see in a hidden life of prayer, work, and daily fidelity to the commonplace, the surest steppingstone to sainthood.
As a family, try to lead a hidden life with Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Through holy Mass, offer yourselves through Mary’s hands as a sacrifice with Jesus; at Holy Communion, you will be changed into Jesus by divine grace so that you may live His life; by your visits to the tabernacle, you will enjoy His friendship ship in the midst of the many problems of life.
If you have faith, you will discover His presence and see His veiled glory.
If you love Him in the Holy Eucharist to the extent of making the Eucharist the center of your life, He will pour out His grace into your hearts and breathe the peace of God into your souls and make your burdens light.
If you speak to Him, your God, with reverent familiarity, He will enlighten you about His Providence in your regard and strengthen you to bear the crosses He sends you.
Devotion to the Holy Eucharist is the surest and easiest way of making your family resemble the Holy Family of Nazareth.
Joseph, the honest workman, is still the guardian of families. Mary, the Mother of God, is the blessed mother of every Catholic home. Jesus, subject to the model of every child.
Through their intercession, may you and your family find your joy in God in this life, and may you be reunited to enjoy Him for all eternity in a family! Follow St. Paul’s counsel
In his letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul gives us some general principles to follow in order to make family life truly Christian.
To the entire family, he says, “Always and for everything [give] thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father. Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.”‘
To wives he says, “Wives, be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife as Christ is the head of the Church, His Body, and is Himself its Savior. As the Church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.”‘
To husbands he says, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her…. Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.”‘
To children he says, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. `Honor thy father and thy mother’ (this is the first commandment with a promise), `that it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth.’”
To fathers, he says, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”‘
This is the perfect solution to a major family problem. Let the wife be subject to her husband as if he were Christ. Let the husband love his wife as Christ loves the Church.
If such a relationship existed between husband and wife, they would be in harmony as the Church and Christ perfect love and peace. Finally, let children obey and respect their parents. If they do, God will bless them and grant peace to that family.
*******************************************************************
A Poem from Catholic Mother Goose:
Ladybug, Ladybug, fly away home
Why do you always go out and roam?
Your duties await you, your dishes are dirty;
Ladybug, Ladybug, it’s almost ten thirty!
Ladybug, Ladybug, now in your dwelling;
Your house is all tidy and not so repelling.
Your bread in the oven smells homey and sweet;
We’ll come and we’ll visit and enjoy this nice treat!
Ladybug, Ladybug, your lesson learned well;
Attend to your home and happy you’ll dwell.
You pray and you clean, you sing and you spin;
Your friends will all come, you’ll invite them on in!
