Feasts of St Augustine & St Monica

Today we celebrated with dear friends, the feast of St Augustine..no, the double feast of St Augustine and his mother, St Monica.

The highlight of the meal was this cake which focuses upon the famous words of St Ambrose the bishop who said to the distraught St Monica, "A son of so many tears cannot be lost."

The cakes represent the prayerful tears of St Monica, the St Augustine biscuit/cookie on top tells us that he was raised to a bishop and raised to a saint through those prayers and tears.

I have to say it was a YUMMIEST catechetical lesson ever!

Pop on over to Catholic Cuisine to see how I made it and then you may like to read my posting on St Monica, St Augustine and spiritual motherhood over at Spiritual Motherhood for Priests.

Happy Feast Day!

Happy Feast Day for The Cure of Ars

Head over to Catholic Cuisine, to see my explanation for this very symbolic meal in The Cure's honour.

Then pop on over to Spiritual Motherhood for Priests to read my posting about the indulgences connected with today's feast in the Year of the Priest and read a wonderful story of his life! {It makes a great read aloud for the children, I read it to my 6 year old and above group.}

'Pray For Priests' daily reminder for children

I had wanted to do something special on our family altar for the children in the Year of the Priest. A daily visual reminder that we must pray for them. The way I've designed it IS unusual but there is quite a deep meaning to it, one that the children should grasp and understand.

Here is what I bought to build this:

- MDF board {I used a laundry basket to trace a half sun onto it. I made the sun rays from this board as well}

- piece of timber for the base {I just searched around for an old piece as was going to be covered}

- I bought an assortment of colours/patterns of scrapbooking paper {all bought half price on special}

- suitable glue

- MDF Alphabet cutouts

- Rub-On Alaphabet Transfers

- little stick-on ladybirds and bees {could be any symbol of nature and life}

- screws {to screw the sun MDF board to the back of the base timber}

I have always been taken by and pondered upon this incredible quote by Padre Pio:

"It would be easier for the earth to exist without the sun than without the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass."

I wanted this quote to be the 'theme' of presenting the words, "PRAY FOR PRIESTS" to my children. The Base upon which the words sat, represented the fertile earth that is warmed by the sun. I had scrapbooking paper that made a lovely representation of that.

I then had the words themselves covered in a paper that contained, flowers, plants and birds..God's nature and creation that thrive upon the fertile earth and are warmed daily by the sun. To give an extra 3 dimensional feel to it, I added the cute little ladybirds and bees! {I read somewhere recently that bees are diminishing in numbers on this earth due to chemicals and polution in nature and in turn plants and pollination is affected.}

We too, are part of this element of creation, we live off the fertile earth, we need the sun to live...in the spiritual realm the priests feed us and sustain us with the sacraments of the Church, with the Body and Blood of Christ.

" Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. " John Chapt 6

Then behind the words we see the sun, that supports the fertile earth and the creation that lives upon it. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is where we reecive the Son of God Himself, His Body, Blood, Son and Divinity. The lovely quote of Padre Pio's is written across the Sun and ties the visual presentation together.

Here it is on our family altar, each day the children are reminded that Priests give us the one thing that Padre Pio says we cannot live without, something that is even more essential than the sun! Children can comprehend that - the sun is essential to our existance. So it is a powerful quote that allows us to know that we CANNOT live without the Body and Blood of Christ, they were Christ's own words in scripture.

Priests are "Alter Christi" in Christ they give us His Body and Blood, how can we ever fully show our gratitude?

We can pray for them daily, for starters.

A Beautiful Precious Blood Prayer for Priests

This is one of the most beautiful Precious Blood Prayers I know and it is for priests and vocations, pop over to Spirtual Motherhood for Priests to cut and paste and recite as often as you can for the Year of the Priest!

Spiritual Motherhood for Priests Blog just started

In this Jubilee Year of the Priest, motivated by the Congregation of Clergy's inspirational booklet, Adoration, Reparation and Spiritual Motherhood for Priests (ARSMP) Zeliemum (Chemai) and I have been stirred to take spiritual action to support the sanctification of our priests, to pray for priests and vocations in the Church and vocations from our own families and to strengthen the battle against the priesthood in this sacrilegious era. In order to further promote this devotion we have endeavoured to start a blog dedicated to Spiritual Motherhood for Priests.

We are hoping to connect with likeminded women, whether married, single or consecrated who, after reading Adoration, Reparation, Spiritual Motherhood for Priests will join us in putting together our merits at the disposition of Our Lord, collectively in prayer, adoration, thanksgiving, praise, petition and reparation. Our beloved Pope Benedict XVI says “the urgent call of the Lord stresses that prayer for vocations should be continuous and trusting, as to be raised to God incessantly and from every corner of the earth”.

The blessed 'fruit' of the prayers of the Mothers of Lu.

Through this devotion we may do great things as the woman from the Northern Italian village of Lu (pg 18 ARSMP) did from their humble and persevering prayers. These women offered one visits a month to the Blessed Sacrament, they united a prayer intention for vocations at Mass on the first Sunday of the month and the simple prayer mentioned at the bottom of this letter. Through these ordinary actions and offerings their prayers raised up 323 priests and religious for the Church, including one Blessed of the Church and an Archbishop.

We hope to unite together with other women throughout the world in committing together as many of the following spiritual actions:

* To pray for priests through Eucharistic Adoration, at least once a month.

* Through offering Mass and Holy Communion for priests on the 1st Thursday of the month to obtain the plenary indulgence for the Jubilee Year.

* If attending Mass on the first Thursday is not possible, to offer the prayer to Sacred Heart of Jesus for priests written by St Therese of Lisieux. (This can be found over at Spiritual Motherhood for Priests).

* Offering Mass and Holy Communion on the first Sunday of the month for vocations, particularly in our own families & offer the prayer of the Mothers of Lu.
* To recite as often as possible throughout the day, the prayer of Sister Consolata, victim for priests, "Jesus, Mary, I love you save souls!" remembering particularly the souls of priests.

The booklet Adoration, Reparation and Spiritual Motherhood for Priests

We will be sharing the stories from this booklet and many more stories within the Church to encourage each other in this prayerful activity and we would love women to share any faith filled stories of Spiritual Motherhood for Priests that they might come across, any discoveries on the Saints that lived Spiritual Motherhood, any pertinent prayers, any practical action on Spiritual Motherhood from their parish, or articles of interest. We can post up your stories onto the blog with personal acknowledgment or not.

If you are able to commit to the minimum of one hour in Eucharistic Adoration monthly to pray for priests and vocations, please email us (over at the blog) and we will add your chosen name or blog name to the sidebar list in an effort to sustain each other in this pledge. We can also email ladies a prayer sheet, that they can cut up into prayer cards to put in their prayer books etc.

The little villiage of Lu, in Northern Italy.

Our hope is to develop a virtual village of Lu through the new technology of the internet and to advance the awareness of Spiritual Motherhood for Priest in order to increase this devotion that we were blessed to become aware of from the Congregation for the Clergy. You may want to earkmark this site for future reading on Spiritual Motherhood and novenas, thoroughout the year to come.

God Bless and we look forward to praying with you.

The simple prayer of the Mothers of Lu.

"O God, grant that one of my children may become a priest or religious!
I myself want to live as a good Christian
and want to guide my children always to do what is right,
so that I may receive the grace, O God, to be allowed to give you a holy priest or religious! Amen."

Stained glass window at St Stephen's of St John Vianney, patron of parish priests

Please join with us in a novena to St John Vianney for priests, starting today 27th of July and finishing on the 4th of August, The Cure's feastday, this year marks the 150th anniversary of his death and is an especially indulgenced day which we will talk about very soon. The novena prayer for each day is over at Spiritual Motherhood for Priests in this posting.