Who are your Holy Traveling Companions?

On this All Saints’ Day (officially the Solemnity of All Saints) we might consider an excerpt that Pope Benedict XVI presented in a general audience 2010:

“There are very dear people in the life of each one of us to whom we feel particularly close, some of whom are already in God's embrace while others still share with us the journey through life: they are our parents, relatives and teachers; they are the people to whom we have done good or from whom we have received good; they are people on whom we know we can count. Yet it is important also to have "travelling companions" on the journey of our Christian life. I am thinking of a Spiritual Director, a Confessor, of people with whom it is possible to share one's own faith experience, but I am also thinking of the Virgin Mary and the Saints. Everyone must have some Saint with whom he or she is on familiar terms, to feel close to with prayer and intercession but also to emulate. I would therefore like to ask you to become better acquainted with the Saints, starting with those you are called after, by reading their life and their writings. You may rest assured that they will become good guides in order to love the Lord even more and will contribute effective help for your human and Christian development...” (http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2010/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20100825_en.html#)

Fr. Robert Barron’s sermon for this Holy Day of Obligation addresses, in part, “the panoply of saints, both those who are similar to us and those who bring out the parts of us that are 'in shadow.' He speaks of how making those complementary saints our friends can help sanctify this shadow side." Listen to the sermon here. 

(Fr. Barron is the author of Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith (2011) and the outstanding video series (2012).) 

Is Venerable Matt Talbot one of your traveling companions?

 

.

Everyone is called to holiness

From that day in 1884 when he first took the “pledge” not to drink, Matt Talbot strove to imitate Christ for the remaining forty-one years of his life. (JB)

The Pope’s 3 Simple Rules for Holiness: Mass and the Eucharist, prayer, and the Ten Commandments are key, as well as the example of the saints.
by CINDY WOODEN (CNS) 04/13/2011

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Everyone is called to holiness, which is simply striving to imitate Christ, particularly in loving God and loving others, Pope Benedict XVI said.

Ending a long series of general audience talks about saints and doctors of the Church, the Pope spoke about the meaning of holiness and how it is achieved.

Addressing an estimated 12,000 people in St. Peter’s Square April 13, Pope Benedict said there are three simple rules for living a holy life:

“Never let a Sunday go by without an encounter with the risen Christ in the Eucharist; this is not an added burden, it is light for the entire week.”

“Never begin or end a day without at least a brief contact with God” in prayer.

“And along the pathway of our lives, follow the road signs that God has given us in the Ten Commandments, read in the light of Christ; they are nothing other than explanations of what is love in specific situations.”

The Pope said he knows most people, aware of their limits and weaknesses, think it wouldn’t be possible to be a saint.

The doubts, he said, are one of the reasons the Church proposes “a host of saints — those who fully lived charity and knew how to love and follow Christ in their daily lives” — be remembered on specific days throughout the year. The saints come from every period of the Church’s history, every part of the world, every age group and every lifestyle, he said.

“I must say that, personally, for my faith, many saints — not all of them — are true stars in the firmament of history,” the Pope said. “But I also want to say that, for me, it is not just the great saints, who I know well, who show me the path to follow, but the simple saints — the good people who I have known in my life and who will never be canonized.”

The unnamed saints “are people who are, so to say, ‘normal,’ without visible heroism, but in their goodness each day, I see the truth of the faith, this goodness that has matured in the faith of the Church. For me, their goodness is the surest form of apologetics for the Church and a sign of where truth lies,” the Pope said.

“It is in the communion of the saints — canonized and not canonized — that the Church lives,” Pope Benedict said.

“We enjoy their presence, their company, and we should cultivate the firm hope of imitating their journey and of joining them one day in the same blessed life, eternal life,” he said.

Pope Benedict said the Holy Spirit wants to transform each and every Christian into “tiles in the great mosaic of holiness that God is creating in history.”

He said, “How great and beautiful and also simple is the Christian vocation seen in this light. All of us are called to holiness.”


Source: http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/the-popes-3-simple-rules-for-holiness/

Pope calls recovering addicts "ambassadors of hope"

By Cindy Wooden (Catholic News Service)

Published Jul 18, 2008

SYDNEY, Australia (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI told a group of young Australians recovering from drug and alcohol abuse that he considers them "ambassadors of hope."

Those who have struggled to overcome addiction and get their lives back on a positive track are the best ones to help others who are lost and suffering, the pope said July 18.

While thousands of young Catholics from around the world were celebrating World Youth Day in Sydney, Pope Benedict stopped to visit a rehabilitation community and support program run by the Sydney Archdiocese's social service agency.

A young man and a young woman publicly shared their stories with the pope, struggling with emotion to speak of their difficult pasts and their joy in finding the program that helps disadvantaged youths, including the homeless and refugees as well as those trying to overcome substance abuse.

The program is called Alive and the pope said the participants, like the people following Moses, had been given the stark choice of choosing life or death.
"They had to turn away from other gods and worship the true God," the pope said.

The false gods competing for people's allegiance today, he said, are associated with the worship of material things, possessive and manipulative forms of love and power.

Material possessions, true love and leadership are all positive, the pope told the young people. But greed, the thought that happiness lies in having things, sexual activity without commitments and controlling others are indications that someone has been following a false god.

"The cult of material possessions, the cult of possessive love and the cult of power often lead people to attempt to 'play God,' to try to seize total control with no regard for the wisdom of the commandments that God has made known to us," the pope said. "This is the path that leads toward death."

But, Pope Benedict said, worshipping the true God, recognizing him as the source of goodness, entrusting oneself to him, opening oneself to his healing power and obeying his commandments are the choices that lead to life.

The pope told the young people, "the choice to abuse drugs or alcohol, to engage in criminal activity or self-harm, may have seemed at the time to offer a way out of a difficult or confusing situation.

"You now know that, instead of bringing life, it brings death," he said.

"I wish to acknowledge your courage in choosing to turn back onto the path of life," Pope Benedict told the young people.

The people Jesus loved most, he said, were those who knew they had messed up and needed his help and his healing.

"Jesus welcomes you with open arms. He offers you unconditional love -- and it is in loving friendship with him that the fullness of life is to be found," the pope said.

Pope Benedict told the young people that human beings were designed by God to love, not with "fleeting, shallow relationships," but loving God and sacrificing to serve others.

"In the power of the Holy Spirit, choose life and choose love, and bear witness before the world to the joy that it brings," he said.

Source: http://www.catholicexplorer.com/explore4325/nationworld/at-rehab-center-pope-calls-recovering-addicts-amba.shtml

Whether using solely Matt Talbot's way to sobriety or combining it with the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, this resource center also celebrates the example of recovering addicts as "ambassadors of hope."

For those who have an interest in Matt Talbot but are not addicted to a substance, the public is always invited to an "open speaker's meeting" of Alcoholics Anonymous or other twelve-step groups to learn first hand from recovering addicts.