Tag: Venerable Fulton Sheen

by-grace-of-god:

“The Rosary is psychologically one of the greatest prayers, because it draws all our scattered human energies, mind, lips, and fingertips, into a single, unifying purpose.  To those who find prayer difficult, the rhythmic movement of the fingers induces spiritual thoughts.  To those who are used to mental prayer, the spiritual gains a new dimension when it spills over into the body and comes out on the tips of the fingers.

Ours is not an age in which the heavenly therapy of prayer-by-beads is generally used. One of the reasons why people today are so frequently worried and fearful is that they keep their minds too busy and their fingers too idle, or else tap a jerking syncopations to the noises of a nervous world. The Rosary, by contrast, gathers together our dispersed forces and fixes our minds on holy, simple thoughts, while the fingers, too are drawn into the magnetic field of worship. Because it focuses the whole man towards a single, uplifting purpose, the Rosary can be the greatest of all therapies for troubled modern men. A faint suspicion of this fact has begun to penetrate into some hospitals. Nervous and combat-fatigued patients are taught to knit or weave, to relax their nervous tension. The disadvantage of this treatment is that it is only partial; the patient’s mind is not involved. But in the Rosary, all faculties, mind, will, imagination, memory, desires, hopes and muscles, are directed to the Divine.”

– Archbishop Fulton Sheen, The Fifteen Mysteries

curlyfountain:

by-grace-of-god:

“The reason why we are not better than we are is that we do not will to better: the sinner and the saint are set apart by a series of tiny decisions within our hearts.” – Ven. Fulton J. Sheen, Way to Happiness

Ven. Fulton J. Sheen, pray for us!

by-grace-of-god:

“Sanctity is not giving up the world. It is a continuation of that
sublime transaction of the Incarnation in which Christ said to man:

“You give Me your humanity, I will give you My Divinity.

You give Me your time, I will give you My Eternity.

You give Me your bonds, I will give you My freedom.

You give Me your death, I will give you My life.

You give Me your nothingness, I will give you My all.”

And
the consoling thought throughout this whole transforming process is
that it does not require much time to make us saints: it requires only
much love.
And now, in exchange for telling you how saints are made, kindly give me your prayers, that I may practice what I preach.”

– Fulton Sheen, The World’s Greatest Need

catholicconnect:

Pope Paul VI predicted grave consequences that would arise from the widespread and unrestrained use of contraception. He warned, “Upright men can even better convince themselves of the solid grounds on which the teaching of the Church in this field is based if they care to reflect upon the consequences of methods of artificially limiting the increase of children. Let them consider, first of all, how wide and easy a road would thus be opened up towards conjugal infidelity and the general lowering of morality. Not much experience is needed in order to know human weakness, and to understand that men—especially the young, who are so vulnerable on this point—have need of encouragement to be faithful to the moral law, so that they must not be offered some easy means of eluding its observance. It is also to be feared that the man, growing used to the employment of anti-conceptive practices, may finally lose respect for the woman and, no longer caring for her physical and psychological equilibrium, may come to the point of considering her as a mere instrument of selfish enjoyment, and no longer as his respected and beloved companion” (HV 17).

No one can doubt the fulfillment of these prophetic words. They have all been more than fulfilled in this country as a result of the widespread availability of contraceptives, the “free love” movement that started in the 1960s, and the loose sexual morality that it spawned and that continues to pervade Western culture.

Indeed, recent studies reveal a far greater divorce rate in marriages in which contraception is regularly practiced than in those marriages where it is not. Experience, natural law, Scripture, Tradition, and the magisterium, all testify to the moral evil of contraception.
.
The Church has always maintained the historic Christian teaching that deliberate acts of contraception are always gravely sinful, which means that it is mortally sinful if done with full knowledge and deliberate consent (CCC 1857). This teaching cannot be changed and has been taught by the Church infallibly.
#CatholicConnect #BirthControl #Catholic #Chastity #SelfControl #Sex #Love #Divorce #Marriage #Pray #Faith #NFP

Archbishop Sheen’s Warning of a Crisis in Christendom

by-grace-of-god:

“First of all, we are at the end of Christendom,” Bishop Fulton Sheen solemnly said during a television show in 1974. “Now not Christianity, not the Church. Remember what I am saying.”

Then he defined what he meant. “Christendom is economic, political, social life as inspired by Christian principles. That is ending — we’ve seen it die. Look at the symptoms: the breakup of the family, divorce, abortion, immorality, general dishonesty.”

That was 1974. Today we know it’s even worse with the definition of marriage and gender drawn into the picture. And the crisis within the Church.

He reminded that of 22 civilizations that have decayed since the beginning of the world, 19 rotted and perished from within.

[…]

“it is a picture of the Church in the midst of increasing opposition from the world. And, therefore, live your lives in the full consciousness of this hour of testing, and rally close to the heart of Christ.” Be the “minority.”

He really had ears perked up with his next revelation and recommendation.

“And if there is anything that has to be restored in our day, I would say it would be violence. Violence! The kingdom of heaven is won by violence. And only the violent shall conquer it.”

…Sheen explained, “Our Blessed Lord said I have come to bring the sword. Not peace! We are always talking about peace, peace, peace! Yes, because that war (World War II, Korean War, etc.) happened — but we aren’t making war in ourselves — and there’s not going to be any peace in the world until we make war. Our Lord said, I came not to bring peace, but the sword! He never used the word ‘peace’ until after Easter.”

“The Lord brought a sword. It’s not the sword that’s thrust outward against the enemy. It’s a sword that’s thrust against ourselves, cutting out the seven pallbearers of the soul: pride and covetousness and lust and anger, envy, gluttony and sloth. And we’ve given up the sword — someone else has taken it up, and we have to restore it! Then we’ll get peace! And peace is never corporate — it’s never social — until it’s first individual.

Social peace, world peace, is the extension of individual peace in our hearts. When we are right with God, then we will be right with our fellow man. When are not right with God, then we will be wrong with everyone else.”

He told everyone to take seriously spending an hour before the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament every day “not only for our own souls, but for the world, and to strengthen our minority.” It’s “violence” to ourselves, easily enough understood.

Archbishop Sheen emphasized, “The Lord is keeping reserves. He is training us. We’ll make the entry. We’ll prepare for a new Church. And he is with us — we just simply can’t add rules — only we’ve already won as a matter of fact, only the news has not yet leaked out — and so it’s violence that has to be restored.”

Read in full.

Archbishop Sheen’s Warning of a Crisis in Christendom

byjoveimbeinghumble:

“God creates a woman for man, to be his helpmate. “It is not well that man should be without companionship; I will give him a mate of his own kind.” (Genesis 2:18, 19) The Divine creation of the two sexes is here suggested as essential from the point of view of fellowship. A helpmate does not mean servile inferiority, but rather that through differences, like a bow and violin, they would complement each other. Sex is not only the Divinely-willed manner in which mankind will increase and multiply; it is also to be the basis of mutual helpfulness. Not to every husband and wife is given the privilege of having a Pentecost of the flesh through the birth of a new physical body, but to every one is given the companionship which God wills should be his lot on earth.”

— Venerable Fulton Sheen, Three To Get Married (1951)