Real Catholic Blog

It’s been an eventful year and we feel blessed to have taken part in it with you. Thank you for joining with us as we’ve explored various aspects of the Faith and the culture. We very much look forward to 2011 and a more active, more involved, much improved RealCatholicBlog.com. We hope you join us. 

This year has been an important one for the Church. For example, Pope Benedict XVI was extraordinarily active over the last 12 months (Kevin Clarke/Zenit.org/Catholic.net): Five foreign trips, including a ground breaking one to England to beatify Cardinal Newman (Fr. Richard J. Shiefen/CatholicInsight.com), the Year of the Priest and the canonization of several saints (NewsAhead.com) were only a few of the visible accomplishments. He continues to right the direction of the Church, speak out against evil, and rejuvenate the flock. 

Year-ends allow us to reflect and ponder, and look forward with renewed vigor. It’s good for all of us to take some time off and recharge and renew. Whether you are one to make resolutions or not, it is important to refocus and approach our lives with a new vigor. That includes our spiritual lives, which requires consistent introspection.

From Brother John, myself and the team at RealCatholicBlog and RealCatholic.com, our online Catholic book an merchandise store, have a blessed, safe, healthy, prosperous and joyful New Year. Until we return shortly after the New Year, we leave you with this commentary on the meaning of the Christmas season and how to act upon it: The Word made flesh, Emmanuel, God Among Us. It is important that not only do we renew ourselves through Mass and the sacraments this New Year, but to bring others with us. We are called to God’s Grace but also, as Jesus tells us, to be a reflection of Him and win souls to him for their salvation.

Please view this video from Michael Voris of RealCatholicTV.com (no connection), who is at his most eloquent:

Cooperate with His Grace To be restored to the heights of Heavenly Communion with our infant savior  . . . is the quintessential gift. …

Merry Christmas from myself, Brother John and the team at RealCatholicBlog.com and RealCatholic.com, our online Catholic book and merchandise store. We offer our prayers for a joyous, blessed and merry Christmas season and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year. We look forward 2011 for continued renewal and a further growth in the Faith as individuals and for the Church Universal, and for a rebirth of a culture of life throughout society. We ask for your prayers in these causes.

Why do we look forward to Christmas? Why should we? Please watch this short video from Pope Benedict XVI’s last general audience before Christmas.

Pope Benedict: The coming of Jesus is intended to “teach us to see and love events, the world and everything around us, with the same eyes of God. … The Word became a baby to help us understand how God acts, so we can let ourselves be ever more transformed by His goodness and His infinite mercy. …”

I recently came across this article by David Olson of the Riverside (Calif.) Press-Enterprise (click here to read or hear audio report). It mirrors a trend I’ve seen over the last three-four years. Here’s how it starts:

David Calvillo used to think praying the rosary was for “old ladies and funerals.”

Then he went to a Catholic men’s retreat in 2008, where for the first time he felt the rosary’s spiritual power as he prayed it with 79 other men.

Calvillo, 49, is now on a crusade to convince Catholics that “real men pray the rosary,” the name he gave a nonprofit he founded last year.

The rosary, a cycle of prayers said while worshippers finger a string of beads, is not gender-specific. Yet many men say they have always associated the rosary with women, especially older females.

There’s no way to know whether the number of men praying the rosary is increasing, but nearly 9,000 people have indicated they like “Real Men Pray the Rosary” on the group’s Facebook page. (Note: The article was published in June. Its Facebook “likes” now number more than 15,000. “Real Men Pray the Rosary” also has a Web site and blog.)

The increase in men praying the Rosary is great news, although it is odd that men should ever think the Rosary is a woman’s prayer. In school, it was taught as an important aspect of Catholic prayer life and priests and religious never, in my experience, emphasize it to girls over boys, women over men.

There are several ways in which praying the Rosary is encouraged: At an adoration hour, with your family, and after daily Mass to name a few. If your parish does not have an active group praying the Rosary and promulgating it, perhaps that is a project to take on in consultation with your pastor.

Unlike other prayers, the Rosary, with its devotion to different mysteries of the Gospel, has a certain draw and power. As the article states, the prayers are the same, but they can take on a different meaning each day as you meditate on the meaning of each mystery. It’s one reason the Rosary has a special place in the hearts of many — and many more, particularly men, are discovering that now.

Groups such as Real Men Pray The Rosary are sprouting up to encourage men to pray the Rosary.

Does 2010 have you down? Concerned over the decline in societal mores and government aiding and abetting that shove over the cliff? Our friends at CatholicVote.org produced a video giving us real reason for hope. It is a product of thousands of responses to its request for suggestions on what happened this year to give reason for hope in the future. It is, as usual with CatholicVote.org, an inspiring piece. We hope you enjoy it and provide us your feedback. Do you agree with the 10 reasons? What gives you hope for 2011 and beyond?

The Top 10 reasons for hope are . . . and none of them have to do with social justice.

As we go deeper into Advent, we are called to open our hearts and welcome Jesus, our Saviour, into our lives more fully. It also is an invitation to know Him better. So, how well do we know Jesus? How well do we know the Father and the Holy Spirit? Do we know — or accept — that Jesus, the Father and the Holy Spirit are one divine being? Michael Vorris from RealCatholicTV explains.

We cannot know everything about Him, but we can some things, even many things, about Him.

During this Holy season, when we make ourselves open to accepting our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, by celebrating the birth of his earthly life, it is more appropriate and important than ever to pray for the healthy birth of all children. That means an end to abortion. Thus, Father Frank Pavone, of Priests for Life, has written a beautiful Advent Prayer for Life. We hope you pray it often during Advent and even throughout the year.

If you want to help distribute this prayer to a wider audience, please share this link to your e-mail lists and on your social media sites. You also can order the prayer cards for bulletin insertion or of ways of distribution by clicking here. 

God of Life,

We rejoice in the promise of your coming.

You have sent your Son, born in Bethlehem.

He is the Prince of Peace, and

The one in whose name all oppression shall cease.

May we welcome his coming each day

And prepare for his coming at the end of time.

May we build a culture that welcomes him

By welcoming every child, born and unborn.

We pray through the same Christ our Lord. Amen.