The preparation for consecration booklet is currently available for $5 from Montfort Publishing. I would recommend you first read “True Devotion To The Blessed Virgin Mary.” You can also find these in the iPieta app for iOS or Android smartphones.

I’ve been using this “spiritual journey” for quite a few years and have come to look forward to it. The 33 days of preparation are broken up into series of reflections on your self, Mary and Jesus. We should all be doing daily meditation, especially with a particular examen. However, several weeks of extra contemplation time are really useful in our fast paced world. I also have been able to start out this devotion each year deer hunting. So I’ve been able to do the daily readings, prayers and reflections while sitting in a tree or on the ground in the woods. It just doesn’t get much better than that!

Feel free to email me if you’ve got questions about this devotion.

If you don’t know how to pray then he recommends, “Put yourself in the presence of God, and once you have said, “Lord, I don’t know how to pray!” rest assured that you have begun to do so.” This is advice that I love because it is so simple and easy to understand. But it means taking time for prayer, something that has to be a priority of our day no matter what is going on in our life.

iBreviary is available for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and contains:
- Breviary, Missal and Lectionary complete in 7 languages and continuously updated
(Italian, French, Spanish, Romanian, English and Latin)
- The text of the Breviary and the Missal in the Vetus Ordo Ambrosian Rite and Latin
- All the main prayers of the Christian
- Rituals for the sacraments and celebrations
- The liturgical texts used in the Holy Land
Also iBreviary “Pro Terra Sancta” offers, than the first version of iBreviary:
- The new section, “Rites”, with all the rituals and texts for the various celebrations
Catholic (Adoration of the Eucharist, the Sacraments, Blessings, etc.).
- The brand new “Terra Sancta” the liturgical texts used in the Holy Land
- Keep in touch through the blog and the pages of the Franciscans
Holy Places.
- A rich section dedicated to Saints
- Store a day on any device
- Full management of saved days (selection and cancellation)
- Unlimited storage days (something very much in demand by those who want to download
a bit ‘of days for travel or long period without internet access from your iPhone /
iPad)
- Instantly download the entire week (continuing to quietly
use the application without having to wait for the download).
- Enlarge and diminish the character of the text, with the flick of the fingers
on the screen (Pinch-to-Zoom)
- The ability to adjust the color of the background for a better
reading of texts
- Application Languages: Italian, Inglese, Español, Deutsch, Française, Românã
- Content Languages: Italian, Inglese, Español, Français, Român?, Latinum
- Languages constantly updated content.
- A new graphical interface

We did have a snowy week and were supposed to get more last night and today. We even went to Saturday evening Mass last night thinking we may not have been able to go this morning. However, Msgr. Higley, prayed that the snow would miss us and he was answered. At least we haven’t received what we expected. Just a light dusting so far.

I’ve been meaning to write about the Rosary again for a while now. I wanted to let you know that Chelsea and I make them and if you leave a comment request well send you one. We make a variety of types of rosaries. My favorite are with cord and the beads are knots like the one you’ll see in the photo. We also make them with plastic beads and slender cord too.

The rosary is one of my favorite forms of prayer for a lot of reasons. For one thing, you can say it anywhere, anytime. I have a rosary ring that I wear at all times. I can use it while driving, in a boring meeting, on the plane, etc. But I also have a nice rosary in a small zipper case in my pocket. I also have one of my cord rosaries with me when I travel that I keep by my bed in a hotel room. Whenever I have trouble sleeping for any reason I just pick it up and start saying it. It calms me down and I often wake up with it in my hand in mid decade.

I’ve got quite a few rosaries. Two of my favorites are the one handed to me by Pope John Paul II and one blessed by Pope Benedict XVI. I have a few from relatives and my rosary given to me when I became a Knight of Columbus. They all have special meaning but you can only carry around so many rosaries.

So, here’s a word of encouragement to get a rosary if you don’t have one (or leave me a comment and Ill mail you one) and start saying it. I prefer daily but I recommend at least once a week if you can. You’ll be amazed at the difference it will make in your life.

Today let’s look at iPieta. This is a very comprehensive app with versions for both the iPhone and iPad containing writings on Catholic teaching, Catholic calendar and a long list of prayers. You have to do a little work but you can go to their website and download audio files of many of the prayers, import into your iTunes and then it becomes available in the app so you can play them. They have asimilar but different App in Spanish which is iPieta Español.

CONTENT:

• Bibles: Douay-Rheims, Clementine Vulgate (Catholic and public domain; note that Psalms are numbered slightly differently than some modern Bibles).
• Baltimore Catechisms #1-3; the Cat. of Christian Doctrine, the Roman Catechism, and the Cat. of St. Thomas Aq
• Both the Ordinary (Novus Ordo) and Extraordinary (Tridentine) Calendars with access to the day’s Gospel and Reading(s) from the D-R & Vulgate.
• Numerous devotions including a version of the Little Office of Our Lady, the 33-Day Total Consecration Preparation, Novenas to the Holy Spirit and to the Divine Mercy, St. Alphonsus Stations of the Cross, and the St. Bridget 1-Year and 12-Year Prayers.
• Spiritual writings by St. Louis Marie de Montfort, St. Teresa of Jesus, St. John of the Cross, St. Catherine of Siena, the Summa Theologica by St. Thomas Aquinas, the Imitation of Christ, Intro to Devout LIfe (St. Francis deS) , St. Jean-Marie Vianney, Treatise on Purgatory (St. Catherine of G), Spiritual Exercises (St. Ignatius), Sinners Guide, Haydock Biblical Commentary, Catena Aurea (St Thomas Aq). The Summa (except for the Supplement) is also in Latin.
• Papal Encyclicals
• Ecumenical Council Documents
• Scriptural passages for the Holy Rosary
• Examination of Conscience
• Saint Notes (incomplete / in progress)
• Bookmarks

It is my understanding that during this month of Mary a plenary indulgence can be gained by saying 5 decades of the rosary on the way, 5 decades while at the shrine and 5 decades on the way home. So that’s how we spent part of our day today. I will try to find a source to point you to for this indulgence and add it later.

A magnificent Shrine dedicated to Mary, Mother of the Church features an awe inspiring fourteen foot stainless steel sculpture of Mary, which stands in a natural amphitheatre surrounded by beautiful fountains.

In 2003, the Shrine became a National Shrine, making this the sixteenth Nation Shrine in the United States, and the only recognized National Shrine in Missouri.

Unfortunately there are people who want to use the law to enforce their own views on everyone else. I’m only guessing that the idea for a national day of prayer came out of the fact that prayer has been so suppressed in our society. We’re a country founded on Christian principles and our Constitution was meant to protect people’s right to pray. Instead certain people have interpreted it incorrectly for their own ends which apparently includes removing prayer from society.

I think it is unconscionable to tell kids they can’t pray on a football field before a game for example. And although having a prayer breakfast or service in a state capitol or out nation’s capitol doesn’t excite me I see no reason for there not to be one.

Prayer is vital to a healthy spiritual life regardless what faith you have. Of course there are a few people who claim to be atheist but I agree with a statement I heard Archbishop Fulton Sheen make once that you have to believe in God to deny Him. People who claim they don’t believe in God often have a substitute like the devil or “mankind” and studies find that many of them actually do pray. Interesting. Probably a lot of them just don’t want to have to follow rules and make the claim as a way to justify their selfishness. There is a very small percentage of people who claim atheism anyway. I guess they’re just very vocal though.

We pray for the pope and for his pastoral mission, asking God to protect, strengthen and uplift our beloved Holy Father at this time of considerable challenge.

This is the image and prayer from the prayer card they have created (pdf).

PRAYER FOR POPE BENEDICT XVI

Lord, source of eternal life and truth, give to your shepherd, Benedict, a spirit of courage and right judgment, a spirit of knowledge and love. By governing with fidelity those entrusted to his care, may he, as successor to the Apostle Peter and Vicar of Christ, build your Church into a sacrament of unity, love and peace for all the world. Amen.

Our Father… Hail Mary… Glory Be…