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Blessed Feast Day of St. Anthony of Padua, Catholic Pilgrims, or as they say in Portugal, St. Anthony of Lisbon.
In March, when we arrived in Lisbon, Portugal, it was on a Sunday afternoon. After checking into our home, we quickly changed clothes for Mass and headed out to find the church I had researched for evening Mass.
But, Lisbon’s streets twist and turn and my husband’s phone was having a hard time locating where we wanted to go. We couldn’t find the church I had planned on, but stumbled on this church instead.
Stations of the Cross was already going on when we arrived, so we sat in the back and listened. The church was beautiful and dark and I was so thankful we made it to Mass on time. As we sat in the back, I could see the jet lag and hunger setting into my family, but it’s moments like this that make life special. I will never forget the Mass on the day we arrived in Lisbon where my family was listening to the Mass in Portuguese with our tired, hungry bodies. We still showed up for Christ.
Even though we couldn’t understand the language, we knew the parts of the Mass because of the universality of the Church which is such a comfort.
This church is Igreja de Santo António and it rests on the spot where the home that St. Anthony was born in used to be. He was born in 1195. The original church built on this spot was a simple chapel from the 15th century. In the 16th century, the king wanted a grander church and construction started but the 1755 earthquake partly destroyed it. Reconstruction started and this church was finished in 1787. Underneath, it is said that the remnants of St. Anthony’s house are buried.
St. Anthony is a beloved saint in Lisbon and he is the patron saint of the city along with St. Vincent. He was an excellent preacher and was known to have brought lost souls back to the faith or into the faith altogether. He died very young at age 35 in Padua, Italy where he is buried.
If you have a loved one that has left the Catholic Faith, ask St. Anthony to pray for them.
St. Anthony of Padua, pray for us!
Over these many years of being on here writing about God, I’ve had a lot of commenters that have shown up to say things like: “I don’t need church. I feel God out in nature.” “I don’t need to sit in a pew. I can get the same experience praying in my car on the way to work.” “Jesus never said go to church. You don’t need the walls.” Sure, you can “feel” God out in nature and it’s good to pray in your car on the way to work. However, in the Old Testament, God did lay out a very specific way that He wanted to be worshipped. He wanted the Lord’s Day kept holy and the Jews knew that it was a day to go to the Temple or the synagogue. There was a liturgy and principal players. The people were there to offer worship and sacrifices and the Rabbis taught and the priests offered the sacrifices. Now, a lot of people think that Jesus trashed all that and decided that from now on, people can just practice their faith however they desire on their own. But, this is wrong and prideful. Everything in the New Testament elevates what was in the Old. We are still meant to be a community coming together to worship. We are meant to assist at the Mass. We are meant to be there as the priest offers the perpetual sacrifice of the Son to the Father and receive that sacrifice back as the Eucharist—the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Our Lord. You can’t do that on your own on a hiking trail or in a car. Dom Hubert von Zeller once wrote, “But God wants something more out of us than sympathy. And if we attend Mass properly, He gets something more out of us than sympathy. He gets our wills, which mean more to Him than our feelings. He gets our obedience, which means more to Him than the warmth of our devotion.” Give God your will, Catholic Pilgrims. That is the best sacrifice you can offer. Have a blessed Sunday.
Continue ReadingLast week, when I went into Notre Dame de Paris, it was packed. Packed. However, I was pleasantly surprised by all the ways the staff try to keep some semblance of reverence. There's a voice that comes on that says in a pleasant whisper, "Shhhhhhhhh...silence." And then it says it in different languages. The Adoration area is free of people milling around and no photos are allowed. It's just a place for prayer and adoration. And, even though I was moving with this large throng of people, mostly all you could hear was just the rustling of bodies moving. It was surprisingly quiet. It was the same in Sacre-Coeur. Outside, loud, noisy crowd. Inside, the nuns were singing and it was relativity quiet. I posted a video of the nuns singing in the early morning and someone said, "Yeah, beautiful, except for all the a**hole tourists." I get that people come into our sacred places and don't have the level of reverence that we would want. Many have zero clue that Jesus is truly present. Lots of people are there for social media pictures and care little for our Catholic Faith. I've been annoyed by it all at times. So have you. We all have. So, I get that. But, the comment made me cringe. For one, it's wildly uncharitable and if any non-believer saw it, I would hate the impression it leaves. (I did delete it for that fact. Plus, I don't allow foul language on my page.) I had to shake my head at the irony. Here was this lady mad about tourists who are disrespectful and irreverent, yet, she comes on a video showing nuns singing to Our Lord and uses foul language. While I don't like disrespect in our churches, I know that God can work with people. I saw it in Istanbul. My husband's squadron went on a mini-pilgrimage sponsored by the chaplain and one church we went into dropped people to silence--even atheists. The beauty got to them. So, we have to hope and pray that as people--lukewarm, non-believers, etc--walk around these beautiful churches, the beauty will speak to their souls. We have to pray that they might wonder at the person a statue represents. They might wonder about the story being told on the stained-glass windows. And, as we move through these spaces, Catholic Pilgrims, may we show with our actions how one is to behave and show on our faces that our Faith brings us joy. Make them wonder. Have a blessed day.
Continue ReadingLook at the light in this church, Catholic Pilgrims. It's even better in person. To date, there have been three churches that have literally made me gasp out loud when I first saw their beauty. 1. Notre Dame Basilica in Montreal, Canada 2. St. Stephen's Bulgarian Orthodox Church in Istanbul 3. This one. Basilique de Notre Dame de Pontmain in France Several weeks ago, a lady commented on a video I made where it showed a beautiful church in Ireland. "I don't think Jesus had this ornate of a place to worship! This is entirely to fancy." To which I said, "Go read in the Old Testament how God instructed the Israelites to build the tabernacle as they journeyed in the wilderness. And then go read about the Temple." The tabernacle was to be made with acacia wood, which was not expensive. However, it was to be overlaid with gold. Silver was used. Copper was used. Textiles of fine linen were used. Hard to come by dyes. The entire Ark of the Covenant was overlaid with gold. Not to mention two pure-gold statues of Cherubim (gasp! Statues!) were on top. Solomon's Temple was made of massive stones, expensive woods, and gold. There were also two 15-foot carved Cherubim statues inside the Holy of Holies. (Gasp! Statues!) So, what we find are that houses of God were not ramshackle pixie-stick structures crudely put together with mud. God didn't instruct the wandering Hebrew people to build a simple, plain Tabernacle or Ark of the Covenant. God created the world and the natural world is incredible in its beauty. The heavens above our heads are magnificent--all to glorify God and His Majesty. We, as humans, are made in His image and should try to imitate Him in His goodness, and His ability to create beauty. We can't fashion anything out of nothing like He can, but we can take the materials that He as blessed us with and design and build in such a way as to honor Him. Our beautiful Catholic Churches are where we worship our Lord and it is most fitting that they convey through their beauty that the Almighty is present in a very literal sense. Have a blessed day, Catholic Pilgrims.
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