Rosary Workshop - Reflections with Fr Joe
 REFLECTIONS
WITH FATHER JOE
 Father Joe is our Spiritual Advisor.  He has offered a few refections below for our meditation, and reflection.  We hope he will send us more so we may continue to grow in Christ as a community. His first reflection is in response to the school shooting and other signs of evil in our world today.
 
PRAYER AGAINST EVIL
ASHES, LENT, PURGATORY
 
We are in the midst of spiritual warfare, some is subtle and some is very obvious - we are called to prayer, especially the rosary as we are the militant in the body of Christ.
 

~ PRAYER AGAINST EVIL ~

  
AUGUST QUEEN OF HEAVEN!

Sovereign Queen of the Angels!
You who from the beginning hast received from
God the power and mission to crush the head of Satan,
we humbly beseech you to send thy holy legions that under
thy command and by thy power,
they may pursue the evil spirits, encounter them on every side,
resist their bold attacks and drive them far away
from us into the abyss of darkness.
Our Lady of Light, we praise you!
Amen.

Peace
Father Joe

~ ASHES, LENT, PURGATORY ~

I had just placed ashes on his head. I was looking at him - with his
dirty forehead lying there on the white sheets of the hospital bed - when he said, 'Father can I ask you a question?' 'Yes', I replied, realizing full well there was an ashen cross on this sinners forehead too. Then he asked:

'Why do I need Lent?'

I thought for a moment and answered:
Lent confronts the horror of my sin before the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, who knew no sin (See 2 Cor. 5:21). Without coming to grips with my sin, I can't see how much I need God's love. I need to see his love for me in the cross of Christ and the glory of Easter.

Sins really does matter. We deceive ourselves into thinking, 'we are not really that bad compared to everyone else - God is not really concerned about my little sins.' We have an eternal soul and Lent is a mini purgatory. In purgatory the soul stands before God Almighty, helpless, stripped, naked just like the Lord has always seen us. We can't dress up our sin to hide it from God.
We stand like our Lord Jesus stripped of His garments before He was nailed to the cross.

Every pain in purgatory points to His cross and our failure to see our need of accepting Christ's pardon of our sins. Purgatory will not let us go until we discover how Jesus wants us to love Him.
Our sins nailed Christ to the cross and His love for our souls held Him there. THE WAY OF THE PILGRIM, a work by an unknown Christian, has this prayer:

"Lord, make me worthy to love you as I have loved sin in the past."

And then the pains of purgatory will be the joyous peace of Easter.
Peace

Father Joe