SATURDAY MORNING MASS HOMILY – MONSIGNOR CHILEN

"Jesus, bless my Guardian Angel." The Lord has put angels in charge of you to guard you in all your ways. Be attentive to your angel; do not rebel against your angel. Heed his voice and carry out all He tells you. The Blessed Mother listened to Her angel. St. Joseph did as His angel said. The Apostles were freed from prison by angels. St. Peter was freed by the angel from his chains. The angels offered incense to God singing "Holy, Holy, Holy."

God gives each child an angel to bring the child to the place where God has prepared. Jesus says to become like little children. At the hour of death, only our Guardian Angel will be there to defend us. At our particular judgment, all the fallen angels will rise to accuse us. From conception to death they will go through every second, every minute, every hour, every year of our life. They will say how we deserve hell knowing our weakness that will keep us off guard and show us as fools.

St. Pio shows us how frightful this is. Jesus rose that we have the grace to be saved. At the hour of death, Jesus says that only justice will save. The day of wrath, the day of justice – how terrible to be accountable to justice without mercy. How terrible the hour of judgment for then it will be too late. As for the foolish who knocked at the door, the groom showed no mercy. Can our Guardian Angel help us in this hour of particular judgment? He will make sure that God will know all the good we did, all the willful acts of faith, hope, and charity that we did perform, and all the circumstances that show us in a positive light as we have a positive side. Will there be any evidence to show that we are a child of God?  Now is our only chance. 

Yes, the Poor Souls suffer willingly and lovingly to make up for the temporal punishment that is due. We cannot presume Purgatory is ours.  We cannot presume that ours is Heaven.  The only thing we know is that if we die and are not little children and are separated from God because of mortal sin, we will be in hell for all eternity.

Be attentive to our Guardian Angel says God. Do not rebel against your Guardian Angel. Heed his voice and carry out all that he tells you. We do turn to the Eucharist – to Jesus – here while alive is the merciful Jesus. Here we adore the face of God. Empty our souls to sin and anything that is displeasing to Jesus.  "Jesus, bless my Guardian Angel."

SATURDAY MORNING INSTRUCTION – FATHER SHANNON
     
We honor Our Lady of Fatima and Our Lady of the Rosary.

Father told us a story about a threat given to a number of the people of God that God would flood the earth a second time. They appealed to the prophets for advice. They were told to gather everything and put in a pile and offer as a burnt offering to God. They did not like what this prophet said. They called a second prophet – do works of mercy. Then they called upon a third prophet who was the wisest of all. He told them to learn to live underwater.

We have fallen for this false idea that every religion is the same thing. Only one religion has been revealed time after time by the Lord. Adam and Eve were given revelation. God spoke to Adam. God called a man named Abraham, then Moses on Mt. Sinai giving him the ten commandments. Everything was being aimed at the coming of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, in the flesh, and He would give the fullness of that religion. He is literally the Word made flesh. If Jesus Christ is the Word of God, there is nothing to be spoken of after that. Jesus Christ is the Word. He is the prophet, teacher, the last one that we have to listen to.

Father then spoke of the Battle of Lepanto and Our Lady of Victory. He also spoke on Islam. He said that Islam had been growing for decades. There was a great interest in Islam. People were leaving Christianity for Islam, exchanging the pre dieu for the prayer rug and exchanging the cross of Christ for the crescent moon. Women embrace this religion even though they allow polygamy in this religion. Islam also promoted the slave trade, that slavery is O.K. Even blacks were seeking Islam. No one can make up Christianity. No one would ever make up a religion that their God died. If you make up your own religion, you can make up your own morality.

In Christianity God is holy. Christianity is a religion of relationships and a religion of redemption. Father and Son = Holy Spirit. When we are down, sick, we still have hope being liberated from sin, being healed. Islam is not a religion of relationships. They do not believe that God has a son. We are the creatures of God. God is the Creator. God has a desire to establish a relationship with us. We can call God "Abba" (Father), Daddy. We are prodigal children returning home.

Alla is ultimately outside this world, never among us as Emmanuel. God is closer to us than we realize ourselves. There is no true intimate relationship with God with the Muslims. They think God is so transcendent to them that they will never get to know God. We are made to know God and to enter into a relationship with Him. We believed that God revealed Himself little by little. Islam protects God's majesty, so as a result, they cannot accept His Incarnation – that God can become one of us. They cannot maintain that God can be both "Most High" and that He cannot become little like us; that Jesus died on the Cross. The Koran says that Christ did not die on the Cross.

St. Paul knew the power of the Cross. Faith is a gift, and amazing that God became one of us,  allowed us to beat Him, spit on Him, and nailed Him to a Cross. St. Francis was alive in the time of the Crusades. Tremendous atrocities were committed on both sides. The Crusades were a counter-attack gaining back what was lost. St. Francis did not want to do it with weapons. He was so powerful in his preaching until the Sultan was convinced of what St. Francis said.

The Fathers of Mercy have a former Muslim in their order. Conversion from Islam to Christianity is extremely rare. To become a Catholic to them is going backwards. They think they have an extra message after Christ from Mohammed. Supposedly, Gabriel spoke to Mohammed, and they think the Word of Christ is not the final word. We need to long for their conversion. Muslims love Our Lady and have a great devotion to Her.
   
HEALING SERVICE – FATHER MARK 

Jesus' last miracle was the healing of the blind man in Mark.  This is an image of what He wanted to do in us - to open the eyes of faith in our soul - to heal the blindness of our faith. Sin causes our blindness, keeps us looking down instead of looking up to Heaven.  We have to admit our own blindness, our weakness. We have to confess our sins. Give your weakness to the Lord.  Sometimes we make a false peace with our sins, but we need to take a step back and see what our sins have done to us.

Bartimaeus in the Scriptures keeps calling out to the Lord. Throw off the mantle of what is holding you back from the Lord. What is this thing that keeps us from going to Jesus Christ? We cannot let go of certain vices and habits, demon versus human respect.  (What you think of me is none of my business).

We have to live our relationship with the Lord. "That I may receive my sight." What a model for us that our Lord wants to heal us. The Lord wants to heal us from the sin that is still in our lives.