Our Lady of Guadalupe

My son, will you pray for me?

No one prays for me because I died in great peace, with a reputation for holiness, and my dear sisters certainly believe me to be in Paradise, and do not pray for me. I am on the verge of Paradise, languishing of love; close to my Divine Spouse; this love is the engine of my joy and the cause of the pain that tortures me. The pain is our joy in Purgatory, it is the torment of love, of love sickness. You start to know Purgatory, but never completely experience its joys and its sorrows. Tell your brothers that their great joys on earth are nothing but wind and smoke, next to the sublime joys of Purgatory. The greatest happiness for a soul is in Heaven. It is the eternal bliss! But immediately afterwards, there is no greater joy than to savor the joys of Purgatory. And learn this: the closer we get to Heaven, the further our sorrows diminish, that our focus upon them disappear. This disease of love of God is known by us here on the verge of Paradise. Yes, speak of the punishments in Purgatory, but also speak of the joy unspeakable of one day obtaining heaven!

My son, will you pray for me?

please remember especially Madre Maria de San Jose Corral...

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Saint Michael Archangel and the War in Heaven

Many Christians are unaware of the meaning and significance that Saint Michael’s name bears.

Throughout the entire history of the Church, Saint Michael has been viewed as a protector and guardian.

Our current prayer to Saint Michael, penned by Pope Leo XIII, states specifically:

“Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.”

But what about his name itself?

The name “Michael” is a question, and it bears a great deal of significance for us, and is perhaps

most understood in our current age of debauchery and death.

“Michael” means, “Who is like God?”

It may seem rather odd that Saint Michael’s name would be a question, but the meaning of this question will become evident after a few brief readings from the Scriptures.

Saint John, in the Book of Revelation, describes the rebellion in Heaven:

“Then war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels battled against the dragon. The dragon and its angels fought back, but they did not prevail and there was no longer any place for them in heaven.

The huge dragon, the ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, who deceived the whole world, was thrown down to earth, and its angels were

thrown down with it.” (Revelation 12:7-9)

As we know from Tradition, and also from Saint John, it was Michael the Archangel who cast Satan out of Heaven. But what was the nature of the

Rebellion itself?

The prophet Isaiah says:

Lucifer said in his own heart:

"I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High .”

(Isaiah 14:14) The choice of words “like the most High” are very interesting, especially considering

who it was that cast Lucifer out of Heaven. If Lucifer said:

“I will be like the most High,” then Michael’s name is a question directly aimed at

Lucifer’s declaration.

In effect, he is asking Lucifer, “Who is like God?”

But this isn’t a question without an answer.

In the book of Genesis, Holy Moses explains,

“Then God said: Let us make man to our image and likeness.”

So, when Michael announced his own name by asking the question, “Who is like God?” he is pointing to man, because man was made in the image and likeness of God.

The fact that we are made in the image of God is clear.

Our Blessed Lord is the Word through whom all of creation came into existence.

When Adam was created, in the image of God, he was made in the physical reflection of God. But what about the "likeness?”

The image refers to visual similarity, but likeness has more to do with the nature of the thing.

There is only one way by which man is like God, and that is our participation in

creation.

The one power man possesses which NO angelic being possesses is the ability to participate in creation.

In other words, people can make more people, but angels cannot make more angels.

This places an interesting perspective on the rebellion in Heaven.

Lucifer’s desire to be “like the most High” is a sign of his rejection of God’s plan for Creation.

And since man is created in the image and likeness of God, it stands to reason that the strongest attacks of the devil would be focused on the one thing that man can do, which the devil cannot.

In short, the devil wishes to destroy us through our likeness of God. Today, and more specifically throughout the 20th century, we have seen a steady and unwavering

assault on man’s participation in creation. The first wave of attacks came in the form of the birth control movement of the early 1900’s. Through this movement, the devil deceived men by convincing them to rebel against God’s gift of the power of co-creating more people. This rebellion was a direct assault on the power God gave to man by creating us in His likeness.

The second wave came through the rise of no-fault divorce. It was through a series of legislative decrees in early 1918, under the revolutionary government of Russia, that no-fault divorce was introduced to the world. Lenin’s revolutionary government in Russia produced the Russian Family Code of 1918.

The code introduced “mutual consent of both spouses as well as the wish of one of them” as grounds for divorce.

It is no coincidence that Our Lady of Fatima warned that “Russia will spread her errors throughout the world” just a few months before no-fault divorce was legislated into existence by the Russians.

Through birth control and no-fault divorce, the devil attacked both the structure and the power of man’s participation in creation.

Then came war and abortion. There is not a single year since World War I where there has not been a state of war or rebellion around the globe.

And with the introduction of abortion, the devil has launched a third assault on the likeness of God by attacking the very fruits born out of this likeness.

But what we face today is the very crown of the devil’s assault on the likeness of God.

The Book of Genesis says, “male and female He created them.”

Through this complimentary likeness, the human race is able to participate in the creation of new people. But through the deception of the devil, man’s concept of the masculine and the feminine has become twisted.

The very concept of a homosexual “person” is an assault on the likeness of God.

While all of mankind was cursed with concupiscence, struggling against the temptations of the flesh, in truth, there is no such thing as a “gay man” or “lesbian woman,” because the dignity provided to ALL human beings includes the image and likeness of God.

But homosexual acts (by which self-proclaimed gay men and lesbian women identify themselves) are a full and complete rejection of man’s likeness to God. In its very essence, the idea of homosexuality is the complete rebellion of man’s own nature because in rejecting man’s likeness to God it attempts to remold man into the likeness of the devil; barren, twisted, and seeking to be something other than what he was created to be.

Now, society and the courts are fighting to entrench sodomy under the guise of a sacrament.

This satanic revolt will be the devil’s most ferocious assault against humanity, but as Satan was cast out of Heaven by Saint Michael.

The prophet Daniel tells us that Saint Michael holds a particular significance in our time today.

“But at that time shall Michael rise up, the great prince, who standeth for the children of thy people: and a time shall come such as never was from the time that nations began even until that time. And at that time shall thy people be saved every one that shall be found written in the book.” (Daniel 12:1)

There can be no doubt to the satanic nature of so called same-sex ‘marriage,” but just as St. Michael cast the dragon out of Heaven, we join Pope Leo XIII in his prayer:

“Do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, cast into Hell, Satan, and all the evil spirits who prowl throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls.”

The Precious Blood of Jesus

July is the Month of the Precious Blood of Jesus. The following is a meditation on the shedding of His Precious Blood from Fr. Johann Evalgelist Zollner:

1. The first shedding of blood was his circumcision

Jesus shed His blood the first time when He was circumcised. According, to the law of Moses, every Israelite male child was to be circumcised eight days after his birth. This circumcision was a sign of the covenant which God had made with the children of Israel. The circumcised belonged only to the people of Israel, and partook of the graces which God bestowed on this people; they were also obliged to observe the law of Moses. Out of obedience to the laws Jesus permitted himself to be presented in the temple, to be circumcised, but thereby he had a far higher purpose; he wished to indicate the mystery that he would redeem us by the shedding of His precious blood. When our Saviour was born in Bethlehem, the holy angels announced Him as our Redeemer, without intimating, however, in what manner He was to redeem the world. Eight days later Jesus himself revealed this mystery of blood by His circumcision. As a rosy morn announces an evening rain, so this rosy morn of circumcision means nothing else than that in the evening of His life His blood was to flow, like rain, from all the veins of His sacred body.

This first shedding of the precious blood is an exhortation to us to serve Jesus from our earliest childhood. When He shed His blood as a mere infant, is it not becoming that we should devote to His service the years of our childhood? But, alas! how many of us have urgent reasons to exclaim with David: "The sins of my youth and my ignorance do not remember."--Ps. 24: 7. Think of the years of your childhood; did you not pass them in levity? Did not some of you suffer shipwreck of your innocence and commit grievous sins in those years. Call to mind the years of your youth. Did you not commit sins then, which perhaps on your death-bed will lie on your conscience as a heavy load? Let us then repent of the many sins of our childhood and youth and let us at least henceforth lead a penitent life. You, Christian parents, possess a special means of atoning for the sins of your youth by educating your children in the fear and love of God.

2. The shedding of blood in the garden of Olives:

The Evangelist says: "And being in an agony, He prayed the longer and His sweat became as drops of blood trickling down upon the ground."--Luke, 22: 43. 44. The love of Jesus was so great that He would not wait for the scourges, thorns and nails, but, as the myrrh sends forth its precious oil through the foliage before its bark is cut, so His infinite love and His desire to redeem us urged Him to shed for us His innocent blood in the garden of Olives as a sacrifice of propitiation. This shedding of blood in the garden of Olives was the most painful of all His sufferings; for it was not caused by external, bodily wounds, but by internal sufferings, by the agony of His soul. Jesus anticipated in it His entire Passion, which was vividly represented before His eyes. He trembled at the thought of the loss of so many souls for whom he foresaw he would die in vain; who might be saved, but will not. When the death agony is very severe, you notice with heartfelt compassion, large drops of sweat on the brow and face of the dying. But there was never heard of a dying man who sweat drops of blood. Our Saviour alone exhibited this sign of mortal anguish at the moment when He commenced His sacred Passion.

A legend says that on every place where a drop of Jesus's blood trickled down, a flower sprang up. Spiritually explained, this legend is literally true. Meditation on our Saviour's shedding blood in the garden is the fruitful seed of virtue. Can you be so cruel as to offend Jesus again by sins, when you remember his sadness of spirit and his agony caused by your sins, which was so vehement that he sweat blood? Or can you be indifferent to your own salvation and persevere in an impenitent spirit when you reflect that the remembrance of His sacred Passion being fruitless in regard to many sinners because of their obduracy, made the Son of God sweat blood?

3. Jesus is scourged:

Thus St. Matthew says that ''Pilate having scourged Jesus, delivered Him to the Jews to be crucified." The Jews were forbidden by law to inflict more than forty stripes. The Romans had no number of stripes fixed by law. That Jesus was scourged after the manner of the Romans is evident from the fact that it was a Roman judge that passed sentence upon Him, as also from the words of Jesus: "They shall deliver the Son of Man to the Gentiles to be mocked, and to be scourged, and to be crucified."--Matt. 20: 19. This punishment, as inflicted by the Romans, was one of excessive cruelty. Many expired before it was finished. As Pilate by the punishment of scourging intended to move the Jews to compassion, it is to be inferred that it was inflicted on Jesus with the utmost cruelty. The prophets who saw in spirit our scourged Saviour, say of him that "from the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein; wounds and bruises and swelling sores."--Isaiah, 1: 6. They say there was no beauty in Him, nor comeliness; that they thought Him, as it were, a leper, and as one struck by God.--Is. 53: 2-5. Our Saviour was so cruelly scourged that even Pilate, the heartless Gentile, cried out at the pitiable sight: "Behold the man."

St. Bridget, when a child of ten years, saw in a vision our Saviour in the act of being scourged. The good child, moved to compassion, said: "Who has disfigured you thus?" Jesus answered: "Not the Jews only have done it, but all those who despise my love." And who are these? Especially those Christians who do not endeavor to restrain the passions of their flesh. If your conscience reproaches you with having scourged your Redeemer anew by committing such heinous sins, repair the outrage by a virtuous and penitential life. "Let not sin therefore, reign in your mortal body so as to obey the lusts thereof," (Rom. 6: 12); on the contrary, "mortify your members which are upon the earth," (Col. 3: 5); and make no provision for the flesh in its concupiscences.--Rom. 13: 14.

4. Jesus sheds His Blood the fourth time, when he is crowned with thorns:

The Evangelist, St. Matthew, relates this cruel coronation, in the following manner: "Then the soldiers of the governor, taking Jesus into the hall, gathered together unto Him the whole band, and stripping Him, they put a scarlet cloak about Him. And plaiting a crown of thorns, they put it upon His head, and a reed in His right hand. And bowing the knee before Him, they mocked Him saying: Hail, king of the Jews. And spitting upon Him, they took the reed and struck His head."--Matt. 27: 27-30. The adorable head of Jesus had thus its own sufferings. The coronation was as ignominious as it was painful; ignominious, because in order to jeer at His pretensions, they put a crown of thorns upon his head; painful, because of the many wounds the thorns made in His head.

The coronation is to us an earnest exhortation to banish all proud and ambitious thoughts from our minds. Jesus crowned with thorns says to us: "Learn of Me, because I am meek and humble of heart."--Matt. 11: 29. "Far be it from me," said St. Elizabeth of Hungary, "that I, poor creature that I am, should appear with a bright crown upon my head before my God and Saviour, who, being king of heaven and earth, wore a crown of thorns."

5. Jesus sheds His Blood the fifth time, carrying the cross:

We cannot doubt that Jesus shed blood when He carried the cross. When he took the cross upon his shoulders, he was already bruised, and full of wounds, which, being fresh, bled continually; He also fell several times under the heavy weight of the cross, whereby He received new wounds, out of which blood flowed; He was also struck by the soldiers and executioners, and this could not be done without shedding blood.

The precious blood which Jesus shed when carrying the cross, points out to us the way that leads to heaven. It is no other way than that which He trod before us; the way of the cross. Jesus Himself declares: "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me."--Matt. 16: 24. Both the sinner and the just man must tread this bloody way; the sinner, because without mortification he is not able to overcome his passions and do penance; the just man, because without self-denial it is impossible to resist the many temptations with which all are assailed, to make progress in virtue, and to persevere in justice to the end. Let us follow Jesus on the way of the cross, let us suffer with Him, that we may be glorified with Him.--Rom. 8: 7.

6. Jesus shed His Blood the sixth time, when He is crucified:

St. John (19: 18) says: "Bearing His own cross, he went forth to that place which is called Calvary, but in Hebrew, Golgotha, where they crucified Him." Having arrived at the place of execution, the soldiers stripped off His clothes, and crucified Him, by piercing His hands and feet with heavy nails, and fastening them to the wood of the cross. Who is able to describe the torments of our dear Lord, when He was nailed to the cross and hung thereon, supported by His own wounds? How truly can He cry out with the Prophet: "O all ye that pass by the way, attend and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow."-- Lam. 1: 12.

Cast one glance at your crucified Redeemer and take to heart the words of St. Bernard: "I need no other evidence to convince me how grievous an evil sin must be. I know sufficiently from the nature of the medicine; the nature of my wound, and the remedy being so painful, I clearly see how dangerous my disease was. God himself, the holy and innocent God, would suffer in His human nature for the sins that we regard so little; for the guilty pleasures we enjoy so easily, God Himself would die the death, the most ignominious death, of the Cross." O let us make the resolution, never again to offend God by a mortal sin.

7. The seventh and last time Jesus shed His Blood was when His side was opened:

"When the soldiers came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs, but one of the soldiers opened His side with a spear and immediately there came out blood and water."--John, 19: 33, 34. Blood and water came out as an evidence that these were the last drops of the Sacred Blood. Thus it is literally true, that our Redeemer shed the last drop of his blood for us. We are reminded of this infinite charity by the separate consecration of bread and wine in holy Mass, for after the Elevation the Body and the Blood of Christ appear separated, the sacred species being separated on the altar.

By the shedding of the precious blood from the wound of the Sacred Heart our Saviour gave us the last proof of His infinite love. Let us return the love of Jesus by devoting to Him all the affections of our heart. Let us give Him a proof of our love by fulfilling His divine will and fearing nothing so much as to offend Him. "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me."--John, 14: 21.

Thus Jesus shed His precious blood seven times, and the price of these seven sheddings of blood is found in the seven Sacraments, by which we are cleansed from sin and sanctified. These seven sheddings of blood remind us also of the three Theological and the four Cardinal virtues; also of the seven virtues opposed to the seven deadly or capital sins, which are infused into us by baptism; also of the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost, which we receive in confirmation, and finally of the seven days of the week, which we should dedicate to the service of God. The covenant between God and the Israelites was sealed with blood. The new covenant was sealed with the precious blood of Jesus Christ. The covenant between God and men is sealed again as many times as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is offered to God. Assist, whenever you can, at the tremendous Sacrifice of the Mass, and frequently receive holy communion.

My son, will you pray for me?

El Santo Nino de Antocha