Faithful gather inside the Shrine Church of St. Charbel at the St. Maron Monastery in Annaya, Lebanon. (photo: Sarah Hunter)
As noted on Tuesday, the fortunes of the Maronites are often tied to those of Lebanon; to separate either of these symbiotic entities would do neither of them justice. But equally inaccurate is the suggestion that to be Maronite is to be Lebanese, or vice versa.
Catholics worldwide honor Blessed Virgin Mary on August 15, marking the Solemnity of the Assumption, which is one of the principal feasts of Blessed Mother Mary, Mother of the Church.
This feast commemorates the departure of Our Blessed Lady from Her earthly life and the assumption of her body and soul into Heaven by God. It is a day that marks the sublime nature of Our Mother being the Mother of the Saviour of the entire world, Lord Jesus Christ.
During his Wednesday General Audience, August 12, His Holiness Pope Francis looked ahead to the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary and asked the Blessed Virgin Mary to intercede so that humanity might overcome the novel coronavirus, as the Church prepares to celebrate the feast of her Assumption, August 15.
On Tuesday, August 4, 2020 at 6:09pm Lebanon turned over a new leaf in its modern history. It is a new leaf stained with blood, as well as smeared with despair, with the loss of beloved ones, and with hopelessness for a bright future.
This massive explosion of tons of ammonium nitrate left the people aghast and unable for some time to comprehend the damage inflicted on their capital or rather on their future, as the Lebanese people have all the time sought to emit to the world sublime values of brotherhood and cultured nobility.
The Holy Bible states that the disciples came to Jesus and asked Him, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?" He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."
Press reports indicate that His Holiness Pope Francis addressed a message to Archbishop of Managua, Cardinal Leopoldo Brenes, on August 3, in a gesture of closeness over a petrol bomb attack at the Managua Cathedral on Friday, July 31, in which a molotov cocktail was thrown inside the cathedral which burned, among other things, a 400-year-old crucifix.
In his message Pope Francis expressed sorrow at the attacks saying, “Dear Brother, I accompany you in sorrow for this act of vandalism and I am close to you and your people. I am praying for all of you.”
Pope Francis has urged young people gathered in Medjugorje to imitate the Virgin Mary by abandoning themselves to God.
He issued the appeal in a message to an annual youth meeting in Medjugorje, read out Aug. 1 by Archbishop Luigi Pezzuto, Apostolic Nuncio in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“The great example of the Church that is young in the heart, ready to follow Christ with new freshness and fidelity, always remains the Virgin Mary,” the pope said in the message, sent in Croatian and released by the Holy See press office Aug. 2.
St. Paul asks questions that never lose their relevance: “Brothers and sisters: What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?” (Romans 8:35). Maybe today we might ask: Will viruses, unemployment, political and social division, or anxiety? The answer for the follower of Christ remains: “No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us” (Romans 8:37). Yet do we believe this?
I wish, dearly wish, that as the letter to the Romans says, nothing could separate us from the love of Christ. It is difficult, if I am honest, to express what I mean by my own love for Christ, but how I experience his love is something else, elusive, there, but intangible.
Catholic education and human civilization are two faces of the same coin. Over the past centuries the Catholic universities and schools, run by Catholic clergymen and women religious, have produced to the world renowned scientists and educated people who contributed greatly to scientific research and politics, thus serving the advancement of societies in various fields.
