PathToHoliness

It’s almost time for deer hunting season. I’ll be hunting on a new lease property this year. The Crystal Pig Hunt Club members have been on location several times already getting things prepared. I’ve been deer hunting for more than 21 years now and have unbelievable memories that come more from the time spent with family and friends than the deer we’ve killed!

One recent trip to the new property was pretty much a wash out due to heavy rain. Here are three of my hunt buddies, nephews Luke, Joe and Eli. I’m the little guy in the back in the middle.

I can’t tell you how blessed I am to have the opportunity to hunt with these boys. They have grown into great young men over the years. Joe, the youngest in the middle will be hunting with us for the first time. He is majorly excited.

Thank you Lord for this.

Welcome to the new iBreviary website. My favorite app now has a very robust set of website features that includes being able to put it on your website.

iBreviary for your website:

Do you want to put IBreviary on your website or blog? Do you want to give your visitors the chance to pray on your site? iBreviary can be inserted through a simple window (installation of additional software is not required) within your website.

In this way you offer your visitors the opportunity to pray online and spread the beauty of Catholic Prayer through your website / blog.
You can also use your site for your daily prayer online http://www.wildstarplatinums.com.

The Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral is where Pope Francis served before becoming our new pope. Cindy and I got to visit and attend Mass during a business trip last week for a conference that was held nearby.

We learned that the patroness of Argentina is Our Lady of Luján and found a small statute that we brought back. The Cathedral also houses the remains of General José de San Martín, a famous revolutionary leader.

I am constantly amazed at the opportunities we’ve had to attend Mass all over the world. This is definitely a highlight because of the connection to Pope Francis.

Our journey is toward Heaven in this year of faith. But there are often obstacles. Sin.

Lord let me see myself as I really am.

This is a tough one for a lot of people I have talked with about personal decisions and their impact on other people. I have friends who can’t understand how what they decide to do or think has an impact on other people. Even people on the other side of the world from them. It’s easy to understand that if you steal from someone or damage their property that you’ve had an impact. Or that if you feed a hungry person some food you’ve had an impact. But what about the choices you make when you look at what we’ll just call inappropriate images on the internet? You might wonder how that can hurt someone. But have you thought about the exploitation of the person you might be looking at? If you didn’t look then perhaps there wouldn’t be that exploitation. And let’s face it, the pornography industry exploits people in terrible ways.

So I take from this meditation point from my retreat that I need to keep my thoughts pure as well as make sure I am not actually doing something sinful that others can see.

Hello Path To Holiness fans. Do you listen to satellite radio? I’m taking a poll and interested in your response if you have a couple seconds. I know EWTN is on ch. 130 on Sirius XM. I also have a Pandora account and have stations like Gregorian Chant set up there. Let me know if listen to satellite.

Last Sunday I was returning home from Missouri where I went for business related reasons. After living in Missouri for about 21 years it was interesting to get back to that familiar territory. The photo is St. Francis Borgia in Washington, MO. I have mtgs. near there for two days before heading to Columbia, Jefferson City and Camdenton.

It has been over a year since moving back to my home state of Florida. I like Missouri but love Florida more. Great to be in the sunshine state although it’s not shining right now.

Here’s a back yard meditation garden at Roseaire Retreat. At least that’s what I’m calling it. There are some benches in front of it.

I’m going to try to write a series of posts from notes I took while on retreat last weekend. I’m also tweeting them.

So, to get started, the first note I wrote is, “Ask Jesus what you can do to love and serve him more. Where are you going?” This was something we were asked to do and meditate on at the start of the retreat. The answer to the question would help us form a good resolution to take away with us. So, each time I visited the Blessed Sacrament during the next couple days I asked Jesus what He wanted me to do and how could I love Him more. This doesn’t mean I expected to hear a voice give me clear direction but by the end of the retreat I made a resolution to re-dedicate myself to my daily spiritual practices and follow my plan of life. And to do so without complaining and worrying. Writing this post is an example of how I’m trying to follow up on my resolution. Here’s to hoping I will continue.

I have written before about having a plan of life and I will write some more about it soon. I’m taking a few moments to get a new update here on Path to Holiness while I’m on my annual retreat. This is part of my plan of life.

I’m attending a retreat at Roseaire Retreat which is managed by the Tekesta Study Center in Miami. This annual retreat is needed to charge the spiritual batteries so I can go forward toward the goal of Heaven. We live in a world with a lot of challenges to achieving that goal but it is possible with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ!

I’ll be sharing notes from this retreat as I have time to in coming weeks. Now I need to get back to some serious meditation and examination of my conscience.

One of our Godson’s, Luke Zimmerman, received the sacrament of Confirmation last week. He is the son of my brother who lives in Georgia. We got to go spend a few days there after making it up in time for the Mass. Bishop Zarama of the Atlanta Archdiocese was there and gave the Confirmation class a great homily. Here’s a quote that Chelsea wrote down.

The most important decision you make in life is to be yourself. That is, be the person God made you to be. –Bishop Zarama to my cousin’s Confirmation class

Happy Easter to everyone. It’s a great day to celebrate Christ’s resurrection.

This year the Men’s NCAA Basketball tournament is happening at the same time. Hopefully my Gators will win but even if they don’t it’s still a lot of fun to support them.

It’s also fun to support the Catholic Gators Alumni Association. Our mission is:

To become partners with the Catholic Student Center in forming Catholic leaders who live their faith fully and invite others into a closer relationship with Christ.

The Association is affiliated with St. Augustine church in Gainesville, FL, part of the Diocese of St. Augustine. I found this video on the parish website showing the Bishop Felipe J. Estévez making his first visit to the church. We’re hoping to be there ourselves this year to root on our Gators.

Congratulations to our daughter, Chelsea, for becoming the Editor-in-Chief of Catholic Lane.

Here’s an excerpt from her blog.

As you may recall, I have been as associate editor at Catholic Lane for the past year and a half or so, managing the Life Issues and Bioethics section. Sadly, my former editor-in-chief — and CL founding editor — Mary Kochan has been forced to step down due to increased disability in her hands and she graciously asked me to take her place. It seemed like an opportunity that I would be a fool to pass up. I pray that I am up to this challenge.

Viva il Papa! Habemus Papam. And his name is Pope Francis and he’s the 266th Pope.

He was Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio from Argentina. So he’s got a lot of firsts. He’s the first Pope born outside of Europe and first Pope born in the Americas. He’s also the first Pope Francis. How about that?

I can’t tell you how happy a day this is. My Confirmation saint is Saint Francis of Assisi!

Let’s look at some ways to follow legitimate news about the selection of our new Pope. I say legitimate because there is so much speculation and supposed news reporting that just shows a world out of touch with faith and especially the Catholic faith. I’m sure the Cardinals really appreciate media stars telling them what they need to consider when making this very important decision, not! We’re seeing it all from advice on how we should have a Pope who is a better business man to a Pope who needs to be more liberal. No where do you see these news stories talk about the need to pray for our Cardinals, that God does watch over His Church, that we need not be afraid and that we need to let our faith guide us during this time.

Okay, so how do we follow what is happening in Rome? How about starting with the Vatican News? They are about as close to the action as you can get. And they will have special coverage of the conclave.

Here’s a Vatican Radio report on what will happen this coming Tuesday: Vatican Radio Report

Then there’s the Pope App. Get it for your iOS or Android device. How’s this for transparency?

An app focused on the figure of the Pope. It will allow you to follow his events live and to set up alerts notifying you when papal events begin.

Additionally, the app will let you see key areas of the Vatican through webcams distributed throughout St. Peter’s Square that are always broadcasting images.

You can also follow Vatican News on Twitter @NewsVa_En, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr.

And there is a Vatican Radio app for your iOS or Android devices.

And of course there’s always L’OSSERVATORE ROMANO and EWTN.

There are so many ways to get better information than you’ll find in the media of today. Now you know what I’ll be following.

I never had an opportunity to meet or see Pope Benedict XVI but I have a memento to remind me of him.

A priest that said Mass at an Indy Car race I attended had just returned from Rome and had a number of rosaries with him that were blessed by Pope Benedict. He gave them to those of us who wanted one and this is it.

I prayed my rosary with it this morning!

If you’d like to offer some prayers for our outgoing Pope here are some petitions from a document titled, “LITURGICAL NOTES AND RESOURCE MATERIALS FOR USE UPON THE RESIGNATION OF THE POPE” (pdf) available from the Secretariat of Divine Worship of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

• That Pope Benedict XVI may be given the strength needed to complete faithfully and fully his remaining ministry as our Pope, we pray to the Lord.
• That Pope Benedict XVI, who has served the Church faithfully as Supreme Pontiff, may find peace and consolation as he turns to a life of prayer for the Church, we pray to the Lord.
• That the tireless efforts of Pope Benedict XVI in fostering the unity and communion of the Church may bear fruit in our hearts and among all Christians, we pray to the Lord.
• For Pope Benedict XVI, who preached that God is love and that we are saved in hope, that he may strengthened in hope and know God’s love for him now and for all eternity, we pray to the Lord.

Planning a scheduled retreat right now and looking at various options this year. For years I have attended a Wespine Study Center retreat which is currently being held at the Sojourn Center in Missouri. However, this year since I have re-located to north Pensacola, FL there are two closer Opus Dei centers offering men’s retreats.

One is Roseaire Retreat in Delray Beach, FL and the other is Featherock Conference Center in Schulenburg, TX. They are about equal distance driving for me and both look like they have scheduled retreats that are open dates on my calendar. I’m sure that I can find other retreats to go on but none offer the same type of spiritual opportunities I find on an Opus Dei led retreat. At least that I have looked at. I’m sure there are very good retreats available but I want to stay with the formative structure of Opus Dei as a cooperator in the work.

If you have not attended a retreat or perhaps have not thought about going on one this year then perhaps now is a good time to do a little research and see what would work into your schedule.