Universal Living Rosary Association of Saint Philomena (ULRA)

Dear beloved Associates and Benefactors,

It gives me great joy to salute you and thank you mightily for your loving concern for our country and the Church in Ukraine. The revolution on our soil has been a miracle in the making. Souls estranged from God are flocking to the churches to attend to their Confession in order to regain strength to make their peace with God. The war has been a reminder to them that our life here upon earth is passing and the solemn and most important work at hand is to prepare for our journey Home to the Father.

The Eucharistic Heart of Christ which we possess in the Most Blessed Sacrament is the pledge of our future glory. This Heart has a human nature and can therefore feel for us in a human manner; but It is hypostatically united with the divine Nature, and is at the same time the Heart of a Divine Person. Behold the fountain of blessings, always accessible, always gushing, from whence we can ever draw, but which we can never drain. If we have offended God, here we will find mercy and forgiveness, and regain our peace. If we are languishing from weakness, here our strength will be restored. If we need counsel, courage or assistance, here we will obtain it in abundance. Whatever is conducive to our real happiness, we will secure at any time, in any place, in health and in sickness, in life and in death.

Heart of Jesus! Heart of my God! True and Everlasting Heaven,
Repose of all the Elect, may I always dwell in Thee!

Behold the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, filled with love for us! Look at the magnitude of It’s kindness, gentle and meek towards all! Look at It’s piety! Look at It’s poverty! See It’s purity and obedience! See It’s prudence, fortitude, zeal, generosity, perseverance and holiness! His Heart is the most safe Way to follow, for by following It, we cannot error; It is the shortest, most easy and pleasant Way, because It is the Way of Love. In the Heart of Christ, we will find all things. Take care then to repose on the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus and He will take us up with Him to the everlasting abode of our Heavenly Home.

During this month of July, we are remembering all of your departed loved ones at the Holy Altar in the 31 days of special Masses arranged for this intention. By praying for one another, we change every prayer into excellent alms for the salvation of suffering souls and those estranged from God. Those most in need of our alms are sinners. United our prayers have double and triple value for souls.

I impart to all of you, my priestly blessing:

+ In the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.

Fr. IVAN KOLODIY
Byzantine Rite, Greek-Catholic Church, UKRAINE

Dear Apostle of the Immaculate Heart of Mary,

Thank you for your generous support of our missionary efforts throughout the whole world. We are keeping you and your family most especially in our prayers. We beg God to bless and protect you from every evil and all harm.

In a world in which materialism has come strangely to dominate the lives of millions, the dignity and apostolate of the Christian Mother is tragically obscured. Domestic society is being attacked by political systems which, with false arrogance, claim authority over all social relations and by ‘WOULD-BE’ educators who seek to destroy the natural and divine rights and functions of the family. The Good Shepherd elevated marriage to its pristine purity and sanctified it with sacramental graces. The apostolate of the Christian Mother has grave responsibilities, with holy reaches and sublime dignity. Reverence for the dignity of motherhood is the foundation upon which nations rest. The unfathomed mystery of life has been placed in woman’s hands. Man is influenced by truth, but woman is guided by her heart. At the core of a woman’s soul is motherhood. It is her greatest happiness and, for this new life, she is ready to make stupendous sacrifices. Gentle compassion is the duty of woman whose hand causes the works of charity and mercy to grow immeasurably. Florence Nightingale was the guardian angel of the sick. Ven. Pauline Jaricot was the heroine of social service. Woman is the only one who gathers and holds together life’s broken pieces. The more mankind withdraws from God, the more difficult it becomes to comprehend and justly evaluate the proper worth of woman.

The ideal must be upheld that the married woman’s first priority is her family. To them, she must give her love wholly and entirely. Whatever she accomplishes outside the home, can never counterbalance the loss sustained in the home by her absence. Modern woman has taken up every field of man’s endeavor but, in the meantime, she has forgotten how to be a wife and mother. A mother’s quiet labor in the home radiates out upon the entire Nation. Without her, there can be no family and no home. Without her, goodness, love and mercy vanish. Marriage IS the greatest adventure any young couple can undertake. They conquer life by the power of love, and in the fire of love fuse two hearts into one: seeking each to sanctify the other, they walk together on the road to Heaven. Death alone can break their sacred bond.

I remain, one with you in the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

PATTI MELVIN, Director ULRA

Let us pray for one another.

FR. MATEO ON THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS (continued)

TRUE LOVE IS GIVING ONESELF

We are coming towards the close of this meditation and I hope that it has acted as a beautiful sun to enlighten and warm your hearts. It is necessary in this place to dwell on a point of doctrine found in every page of the Gospel and the Epistles of St. Paul. It is what St. Paul calls the “science of the charity of Christ,” the charity that “presseth us.” (2 Cor. 5:1 4)

It is too bad that there are so many who hesitate to speak on this subject simply because they are afraid of love. In excusing themselves, they openly try to keep us from the danger of what they call fantastic and poetic “sentimentality,” “affectedness”, and “fancies,” as though the first Commandment: Thou shalt love, were an error of heaven and the spirit and fiery style of St. Paul weakness or dreaming! Love is decidedly not mere sentiment nor poetry! Love is the giving of oneself!

The sublime donation of self to God and the good of souls always has been and will ever continue to be the basis and essential element of all Christian virtue. Divine love is the great secret — the only secret of all heroism. “Love is the fulfilling of the Law.” (Rom 13:10). To love is to possess God in the depth of our souls. But God is love! Thus, whoever loves truly is either a saint now or well on the road to sainthood.

It is easy to pride oneself on being a thinker or intellectual, for this costs nothing in the way of moral consequences. Such pretense is often nothing but self-inflation, happily painless. But to love has always been exceedingly arduous! In fact, to give oneself, to surrender oneself in imitation of Jesus Christ, so far from being a sentimental love, is an interior martyrdom. True love is always a noble tyrant.

Yet, “love is the first and the greatest commandment.” Since it is so easy to believe and to be called a thinker and intellectual, believers and thinkers abound. But cowardice keeps many of them from giving themselves, from loving with their whole heart, and the result is that there are few saints. Ask the martyr of the lepers, the celebrated Father Damien, whether love is a sentimentalism, a weakness … or rather a sweet and terrible tyrant!

The Holy Sacrifice is above all the Mystery of Faith and Love. We find its supernatural explanation in these words, as solemn as they are divine and strong: “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” (Jn. 3:16) These are the words of the Holy Spirit. Further comment is useless.

Yes, the Love of God the Father, and of God the Son, Incarnate and Victim through love, gives us the key of this ineffable Mystery! Just as the beatific vision resolves itself in an endless ecstasy of love, so here below the Mystery of the Holy Sacrifice is revealed in the light which pours forth from the flame of a burning love.

ALMS DELIVER FROM SIN:

What is almsgiving but an act of trust! We have God’s promise that all is to come back to us in abundance. Instead of lending our money to a banker or a broker, we lend a little to Our Lord Who is in sore need of it for His poor. This small act of trust and mercy console Him ineffably. We cannot call it giving, when we are to receive all back with interest.

Oh, how I have wronged the holy and patient Souls in Purgatory by forgetting and neglecting them in their distress! I could have so easily given them unspeakable relief. I have wronged many others by making salvation more difficult for them: by bad example, by bad advice and by hindering good.

What reparation shall I make? Many there are who leave this great debt to accumulate, and all through life it weighs them down and acts as a barrier between their souls and God. Zacchaeus teaches us to give half of our goods to the poor. Abundant almsgiving will not only wipe out the debt left by past sins, but give us the grace to resist future temptation and sin. Alms have, then, against sin the same power as water against fire. One or two small alms that cost us little, may not suffice, just as one or two small pails of water may not extinguish a raging fire; but if we pour enough water, at last it prevails over the fire.

Our condemnation will be pronounced for our neglect of works of mercy. “I was hungry and you gave Me not to eat.” (St. Matt. 25) The terrible doom which came upon Judas was due to the lack of mercy he showed. Our Blessed Lord called His disciples round Him to notice the alms of the poor woman, which gave great consolation to His Heart. We also need to do works of mercy which cost us a great deal.

Alms given out of our abundance are good, but they are only Copper Alms. Alms given out of money that is not over-abundant or quite superfluous, but still sufficient and even more than sufficient for our maintenance, are Silver Alms. The alms given in the presence of our own want are Golden Alms.

Too often, the rich are unwilling to give of their abundance. The more self-sacrifice our alms represent, the more precious they are in God’s sight. Hence, those who have no silver or gold, but give their toil in the schoolroom or by the sick-bed, and those who give out of tears and fastings for sinners, may be giving alms more precious than gold or silver.

Alms deliver us from all sins and from death, as they will not suffer the soul to go into darkness. Alms shall be a great confidence before the Most High, to all them that give. (Tobias 4:11-12) It is impossible for one who does his works of mercy well to be lost. If a man dies in sin, he will be lost. But, if he has been rightly merciful, he will not die in sin. He will have the grace given to him during life to live innocently or, if he has sinned, to break the chains of sin, to make a good confession and to reform his life.

If we are merciful during life, God pledges that He will help us in the evil day and on our bed of sorrow. If during life we have formed the habit of almsgiving, that is, of loving our neighbor and helping him in his wants, we shall go on to our last illness loving and giving alms. Christian parents by prayers and alms avert calamity for their offspring. Fathers, who like Tobias, give alms abundantly, win graces for their children.

“Come ye blessed of My Father, for I was hungry and you gave Me to eat … Depart from Me, yet cursed, for I was thirsty, and you gave Me not to drink.” (St. Matt. 25)

No sick persons, no starving poor, none of the Holy Souls in Purgatory, are in such need of alms as those who are in sin. We must arouse ourselves to say for poor sinners Our Savior’s dying prayer: Father forgive them! By praying for others, we change every prayer into excellent alms; or rather, we add a tremendous almsgiving to prayer. We double and triple the value of our prayers and win far more grace for others than when we pray for ourselves. Christ died for all and desires that all be saved. Unless we desire our neighbor’s salvation, our desire for our own cannot be genuine. God is OUR Father. If I do not wish blessings to His other children, He will not be disposed to be generous to me. Let us remember Our Lord’s contentment because of our acts of hospitality to a stranger show proof of our reverential gratitude to Him. What delight will burst upon our souls if Our Savior at Judgment is able to say to us the words He so longs to say: “Come ye blessed! For as long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me.”

O Lord, help my unbelief, that I may realize this wonderful Truth!

Some will grumble and resist when asked to give, or exhort the petitioner not to come again after the gift has been given. Some will give more promptly when asked, with outward civility, though inwardly they give with reluctance. Others give with better charity when asked and give willingly.

Charity and kindness are still more perfect when we do not wait to be asked, but look for opportunities of giving. Better still, like the disciples, some will not take a refusal, They lovingly and with charitable tact, constrain those in need to accept help and make them feel they are doing a charity to the giver by receiving their gifts. They give, at times, while concealing who it is who was the benefactor, so that no return or thanks need be given.

(Extract from The Watches of the Sacred Passion
by Fr. P. Gallwey, S.J., 1930)

Mother of God, pray for us sinners that we may draw from the Heart of thy Son, some share of His Charity. Let man go forth to do his work till evening comes. For the night cometh when no man can work. We must work until God calls. Let us strive to save our souls, by helping save others!!!

Attached are the photos of our chapel, when it was being built after Super Typhoon Yolanda. We are grateful to you and to the ULRA for the financial help for the rebuilding of the Sacred Heart and Immaculate Heart Chapel here in Bantayan Island, Cebu. We are happy to let you know that our chapel now has a roof and the monthly Mass in our chapel has resumed.

With the financial assistance from the Living Rosary, we were able to pay all our debts for the construction materials and we were also able to have a Mass celebrated in our chapel on May 31, and on June 26 and 27, 2014 (the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus).

Almost all who attend the Mass in our Chapel are members of the Living Rosary and some of them are promoters. On my next email, I will send you more photos of our activities.

May Jesus, Mary and St. Joseph bless and protect you, always! Love and prayers,

< Teresita – PHILIPPINES >

Share Your Gift of Faith

For centuries, our cherished Catholic faith has been passed from person to person, parent to child, etc. Each of us carries in our heart a special memory of how God first graced us with the knowledge of the faith and how Our Blessed Mother, Saint Philomena, Venerable Pauline Jaricot and other saints changed our lives and brought us closer to Christ.

In our work in the Universal Living Rosary Association, we see first hand how millions of souls are currently living without that knowledge of God and are living outside of His grace. We have been given a beautiful opportunity to carry out Christ’s work and pass on our faith and blessings to others who would otherwise never be introduced to Our Lord, the Savior of all mankind. Just as we pray for the souls in Purgatory who have no one to pray for them, we should also make it a part of our life’s mission to pass on our faith to as many souls as possible who have no one else to pass it on to them, who don’t know Our Lord and His promise of salvation.

This is the box we send out to the foreign Missions $77.95. It contains Rosaries, Scapulars, Miraculous Medals, Cord & Oil, Newsletters, Calendars, Catechism books, 2 TAN books, large color prints, lists and encouragement for our Promoters.

Please Click here to Share Your Gift of Faith