Posted on November 1, 2020 View all news
Just a reminder to make sure that you vote this coming Tuesday, if you have not already. Just a reminder on what Pope Pius XII taught us on the importance of our civic duty. Pius XII said: ” In the present circumstances, it is a strict obligation for all those who have the right to vote, men and women, to take part in the elections. Whoever abstains from doing so, in particular by indolence or weakness, commits a sin grave in itself, a mortal fault. Each one must follow the dictate of his own conscience. However, it is obvious that the voice of conscience imposes on every Catholic to give his vote to the candidates who offer truly sufficient guarantees for the protection of the rights of God and of souls, for the true good of individuals, families and of society, according to the love of God and Catholic moral teaching.”
I am confident that in our teaching and preaching we have sought to inform your conscience with the principles that the Church has left us to guide us. Please vote accordingly, and remember that all campaign races matter, all issues count. Never just throw your vote away by not being informed!
Today we celebrate the Feast of All Saints. This is a reminder to each of us that we are all called to holiness. Many have gone before us, known and unknown, who sought to faithfully fulfill the will of God. May we do so as well, being happy to do so quietly, unless the Lord calls us to practice our holiness in a way that causes us to do great things for the Lord before the world like many of our own beloved saints. Please find this reflection on holiness by St. Francis de Sales this week. Have a blessed week ahead!
“I say that devotion must be practiced in different ways by the nobleman and by the working man, by the servant and by the prince, by the widow, by the unmarried girl and by the married woman. But even this distinction is not sufficient; for the practice of devotion must be adapted to the strength, to the occupation and to the duties of each one in particular…
Tell me, please, my Philothea, whether it is proper for a bishop to want to lead a solitary life like a Carthusian; or for married people to be no more concerned than a Capuchin about increasing their income; or for a working man to spend his whole day in church like a religious; or on the other hand for a religious to be constantly exposed like a bishop to all the events and circumstances that bear on the needs of our neighbor.
Is not this sort of devotion ridiculous, unorganized and intolerable? Yet this absurd error occurs very frequently, but in no way does true devotion, my Philothea, destroy anything at all. On the contrary, it perfects and fulfills all things. In fact if it ever works against, or is inimical to, anyone’s legitimate station and calling, then it is very definitely false devotion…
It is therefore an error and even a heresy to wish to exclude the exercise of devotion from military divisions, from the artisans’ shops, from the courts of princes, from family households.
I acknowledge, my dear Philothea, that the type of devotion which is purely contemplative, monastic and religious can certainly not be exercised in these sorts of stations and occupations, but besides this threefold type of devotion, there are many others fit for perfecting those who live in a secular state.
Therefore, in whatever situations we happen to be, we can and we must aspire to the life of perfection.” – St. Francis de Sales