Three Nuns Praying For The White Sox Team

Three nuns from Chicago are praying for the White Sox to win the World Series. CBS Chicago reported on the 21st:

It’s not what you would expect to find in a convent, but then again, who can resist a World Series that hasn’t come to town in 46 years?

Everyone wants a ticket to the World Series, and Sister Rita Marie with the Sisters of St. Casimir is actually going to Game 1 tomorrow.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be there tomorrow night!” she said.

It’s all thanks to a benefactor from Philadelphia where the good sister was born.

“I'm not from Chicago, but I've been a Sox fan for 50 years,” she said.

It's not the first time the sisters are going to a White Sox game, but they say it's a miracle that they actually got tickets for the World Series. The next miracle, they say, will happen at the end of October and true White Sox fans know exactly what they're talking about.

Read more...

So far, the White Sox are ahead of the Astros 2-0. That's not good for Astros fans. But, things could change when the games are played in Houston. We'll see.


UPDATE 26/10/2005
The Astros has a nun praying for them. The Associated Press reports:

HOUSTON - Sister Damian Kuhn can be found in Section 116, row 35, seat 31 when the Houston Astros play in Minute Maid Park.

"I'm sitting in what I call my Seventh Heaven," she said Tuesday. "It could not be any better."

A little divine intervention sought by one of their most devout fans certainly couldn't hurt the team, who were in an 0-2 deficit going into Tuesday night's World Series game against Chicago.

"A lot of people are praying on both sides," noted Sister Damian, an 85-year-old Catholic nun who lives across the street from the ball park and faithfully attends Astros games. Her religious order, the Sisters of the Incarnate Word and Blessed Sacrament, has operated a school at the site since 1873. Three-hundred girls now attend high school there. "I'm just thanking God I'm part of this."

Sister Damian, as she is known, is a celebrity of sorts at both the school and the ball park, where Astros owner Drayton McLane for several years now has provided her a pair of tickets.

Read more...

Three nuns [White Sox fans] to one nun [Astros fan]. I think the Astros need more prayers as they lost their third game last night. It doesn't look good for the Astros.


UPDATE 10/27/2005
As I predicted, when you have three nuns praying for your team to win, then it'll most likely win. The White Sox won The World Series for the first time in 88 years. Congratulations to the White Sox fans.
 

The Gift of Insults

Here's a good story before the weekend:

A great Samurai warrior, now old, had decided to teach Zen Buddhism to young people. Despite his age, the legend was that he could defeat any adversary.

One afternoon, a young warrior - known for his complete lack of scruples - arrived there. He was famous for using techniques of provocation: he waited until his adversary made the first move and then swiftly counterattacked,

skillfully taking advantage of any slightest mistake his adversary made. He had never lost a fight.

Hearing of the Samurai's reputation, he had come to defeat him, to increase his fame. All the students were against the idea, but the old master accepted the challenge.

All gathered on the town square, and the young man started insulting the old master. He threw a few rocks in his direction, spat in his face, shouted every insult under the sun - he even insulted his ancestors. For hours, he did everything to provoke him, but the old man remained impassive. At the end of the afternoon, by now feeling exhausted and humiliated, the impetuous warrior left.

Disappointed by the fact that the master had received so many insults and provocations, the students asked:

"How could you bear such indignity? Why didn't you use your sword, even knowing you might lose the fight, instead of displaying your cowardice in front of us all?"

"If someone comes to you with a gift, and you do not accept it, to whom does the gift belong?" asked the Samurai.

"To the one who tried to deliver it," replied one of his disciples.

"The same goes for envy, anger and insults," said the master. "When they are not accepted, they continue to belong to the one who brought them."

Doesn't this story remind you of Jesus' teaching?
 

Nuns Adapt To New Living Conditions

When a major hurricane hits an area, life is never the same again. This story is an example:

The 19th-century French convent in the toughest part of New Orleans has always been as sturdy and secure as a fortress...

A National Guard unit took over the convent in the days after Hurricane Katrina, when the nuns had fled and the soldiers needed a place to stay. It was the second time the convent had been occupied by soldiers; the first was during the Civil War.

"We never thought in our wildest dreams we'd ever live in a convent," said Maj. Russell Heaton of Walla Walla, Wash., who heads the unit of 150 Washington state National Guard soldiers based at Holy Angels. "But it's not bad. Our ethics, our structures are fairly similar."
...
The sisters are educated: doctors, nurses and teachers, some of whom work at a Ninth Ward hospital and others who care for AIDS patients and do social work throughout the city.

The holy sisters and the Washington soldiers are growing on each other.

The soldiers have talked about getting T-shirts made, picturing the sisters in traditional habits - they wear civilian clothes nowadays - bearing Army accoutrements, under the slogan "nuns with guns."

"We're a nonviolent order," Kinberger tells them, in a warm Southern drawl. "Maybe we could get something a little more in line with our mission."

Read more...

Nuns and soldiers are two groups that can definitely get along together as long as the soldiers follow orders from the nuns then their commanders.
 

Mother Teresa's Business Card

I came across Mother Teresa's business card while reading "Reaching Out In Love."It's a valuable business card to share with everyone who reads this blog:

The fruit of SILENCE is Prayer.
The fruit of PRAYER is Faith.
The fruit of FAITH is Love.
The fruit of LOVE is Service.
The fruit of SERVICE is Peace.

-- Mother Teresa

No phone number or address were listed. I'm not surprised.

---

Reaching Out In Love
Stories Told By Mother Teresa

 

Explaining Catholicism To Children

This weekend, the Pope met with an estimated 150,000 children, who attended his first youth rally at St. Peter's Square. The Guardian reports:

During a question-and-answer session with a half-dozen children, one boy told the pope that he had been told that Christ was really present in the Eucharist, or Communion.

"But how? I don't see him," the boy said. Benedict chuckled.

"We don't see him, but there are so many things that we don't see that exist and they are essential," Benedict said. "For example, we don't see our reason, but we still have reason. We don't see our intelligence, but we have it... We don't see the electric current, but we still see it works: We see how this microphone works, the lights.

"We don't see the risen Lord with our eyes, but we know that where Jesus is, men change, become better, become a bit more able to have peace and reconciliation."

Read more...

It's always amazing how children can ask the smartest questions. And, adults have to have an answer that would make sense to them.
 

An Attack On Catholics In Indonesia

This was reported in AsiaNews:

Jakarta (AsiaNews) – A group composed of Islamic extremists attacked Catholics praying the rosary on 11 October and threatened to burn down the house they were gathered in. The assailants, who claimed to be part of the Islamic Defender Front (Front Pembela Islam, FPI), invaded the house of one of the Catholic community belonging to the parish of Christ Salvator in western Jakarta.

The men forced the marian prayer to stop immediately, threatening to burn the place down. They forced all those present including the Ketua Lingkungan (informal parish leader - ed. note) to sign a declaration that they will not hold any more rosary gatherings in houses in the area.

Read more...

You never appreciate your freedom of religion until you read stories like the above.

I've been to Jakarta's Airport on my way to Singapore in 1999. The presence of armed military/men/cops or whoever they were surpised me at the time. A very different atmosphere compared to the one at Singapore International Airport.
 

Priests And Priestly Bonus

The following story may be weird. But, it's kind of cute:

Priests, it turns out, are prone to bad habits, like everyone else. Some smoke; others eat too much.

So as old priests die off faster than new ones replace them, and health care costs climb, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York is taking steps to conserve its precious and not-quite-renewable resource: it is offering bonuses of $500 to priests who quit smoking or lose weight.

Such incentive programs are common in the corporate world, but New York's is a Catholic first, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops....

...

Five, so far, out of about 500 priests notified, Sister Walsh said. And the money will not be easy to claim. To get a weight-loss bonus, a priest must trim 10 points from his body-mass index in a year. For a 5-foot-10-inch, 240-pound man, that would mean losing 70 pounds. Smokers must quit for a year.

Read more...

I don't see many priests signing up for this plan to get the bonus. But, it's a nice try.
 

It's About Time For a Joke

Three guys are sitting in the stands at a ballgame, and there are these three nuns sitting in front of them. The guys are getting a little hooted up, so they decide to start messing with the nuns.

The first guy says, "You know, I think I'm going to move to Montana. I know there's only about a hundred nuns there."

The second guy says, "Yeah, I can go to Utah. There are probably only 75 nuns there."

The third guy says, "I think I might go to Wyoming. I know there's only about 10 or 15 nuns there."

Finally, one of the nuns turns around and says to the three guys, "You know, you can go to Hades. I know there's no nuns there."

Lesson learned: Don't mess with nuns because they will mess with you.
 

A Message From Mother Mary

When I visited my family in Michigan two years ago, I noticed many Iraqi homes displayed a statue of Mother Mary in their front or back yards.

A few days ago, I read the following piece of news on Chaldean.org:

Chaldeans in Michigan flock by the thousands to the Pattah home on Fox Hill Drive in Sterling Heights where supposedly a miracle has taken place. The Pattah family has been inundated by pilgrims from all over the world to witness the mysterious occurrence.

After having visions of the Virgin Mary Ghassan had grown increasingly ill. Amira, Ghassan’s mother says that once her son’s condition worsened the statue of Jesus Christ's mother, which sat on the front lawn and was once looking straight ahead, bowed her head and shed tears in sorrow. When Ghassan died in the hospital a number of witnesses claim to have seen the photo of the Virgin Mary weeping. The family and other eye witness also attest to seeing a photograph of Mary blinking and producing a tear and seeing the image of the Virgin Mary appear in a photograph of the deceased Ghassan Pattah. a tear in photographs of her, the family said.

Ghassan Pattah, 39 passed away from what doctors are calling heart failure. Many, including Ghassan’s family are calling it odd since he was in good health, neither a drinker nor smoker, and was initially diagnosed with only a fever. While with the fever Ghassan tells his mother that the Virgin Mary has visited him and to his brother he confides that he will die soon, the family said. “This is a message that we have to change our ways,” said Sal Pattah, Ghassan’s brother.

Read more...

Chaldeans are very attached to Mother Mary. During the Iran-Iraq war, there were similar stories told in Iraq. But, this is the first time I've seen pictures like above.

Whether true or fiction, I hope she brings hope to the hearts of Iraqis. We really need hope during these dark times.
 

St. Anthony Cathedral In Beaumont

Today, I attended the Sunday Mass at my church, St. Anne Catholic Church in Beaumont. Thank God it survived the hurricane.

St. Anthony Cathedral wasn't as lucky. The Beaumont Enterprise reports:


Mark M. Hancock / © The Beaumont Enterprise

Damage from Hurricane Rita is visible at St. Anthony Cathedral in Beaumont on Monday, September 26. Hurricane Rita tore through the area on Saturday, September 24, 2005.

Hurricane Rita's winds blew off the covering atop the St. Anthony Cathedral dome in downtown Beaumont and rain poured into the sanctuary below.

Plastic sheeting and fans were set up inside as cleaning crews worked to dry out earlier this week. The dome had been covered last weekend.

Rita's winds and rain didn't spare historical structures when the Category 3 hurricane battered Southeast Texas and Southwest Louisiana on Sept. 24.

Crews from the Texas Historical Commission came to the area last week to start documenting the damage to historical spots in Rita's path, Debbi Head, Texas Historical Commission spokeswoman, said by phone.

"Our main intent is to ensure that during the cleaning that historically significant structures aren't further damaged or razed," Head said.

Read more...

During the first mass I attended at the Cathedral, I couldn't stop myself from looking around and absorbing the artwork. It's really gorgeous.


Mark M. Hancock / © The Beaumont Enterprise

Monsignor Richard DeStafano prays over a monstrance blessed by Pope John Paul II during mass at St. Anthony Cathedral in Beaumont on Tuesday, August 23, 2005. The monstrance is on display at the cathedral for 24 hours. It holds the blessed sacrament for communion.

 

An Assault On a Catholic Church

Pebblepie forwarded this story to me:

What would seem to be among the safest places in America came under attack Sunday morning at Annunciation of the Lord Catholic Church on Spring Avenue Southwest.

After communion at the 11 a.m. Mass, a man and woman came forward, screaming.

Then, to the shock and horror of the Rev. Joe Culotta and his congregation, the man turned over the cherished century-old marble altar. It tumbled down the steps and smashed onto the floor, ripping up carpet in front of the first-row pews.

Men from the congregation subdued five people and held them for Decatur police. Detective Todd Walker said no one was injured.

Read more...

The Decatur Daily News has more on this story:

In an interview Monday from the visitation room at the Morgan County Jail, Adam Joseph Turgeon, 27, admitted his act of knocking over a marble altar Sunday, shortly after communion at Annunciation of the Lord, was poor judgment.

Decatur police charged Turgeon, his common-law wife Lisa Marie Wagner, 26, and their roommates Val Eugene Loughman, 20, and Loughman's wife Emily Beth Loughman, 21, with felony criminal mischief, following the outburst at the 11 a.m. Mass.

"I woke up Sunday, went, pulled in and there it was," Turgeon said of why the group chose Annunciation of the Lord. "I had a vision. Lisa and me were tearing a church apart. That's not what I did. I just tore up a table that people saw as an idol, kneeling before it and bowing before an idol."

The group went inside, listened to prayers and watched parishioners take communion before the outburst, Turgeon said.

Read more...

What kind of God would want someone to destroy a church, any church? God is a loving God and will never ask anybody to do something like this. This is an act of man and not God.
 

We're Alive

Sorry for not updating this blog. We survived Hurricane Rita. What an experience!!

Our internet connection is not reliable yet. So, I'm on and off the net. Here's something as a comeback post:

BEAUMONT - The Texas Baptist Men have Bibles. They have chainsaws, too.

A three-man team from the Collin County Chainsaw Ministries of the Texas Baptist Men cleared three pine trees Saturday from a home on Briarcliff Drive, just off Delaware Street.

They didn't come to profit. No exchange of money was involved. They simply came to help Southeast Texas recover from Hurricane Rita. They came to assist, just like they did with a soup line in the post-World War II era when the Texas Baptist Men's aid started.

"It's a ministry for people in need," Robert Clements said. "It's international. Beaumont happens to be the place that needs it."

Read more...

We're so thankful for all the people who are helping us to rebuild our lives.