Beannacht: A Blessing for the New Year by John O'Donohue

LITURGY FOR World Day of Peace and Mary Queen of Peace at Mary Mother of Jesus Catholic Community with Presiders Katy Zatsick ARCWP and Elena Garcia ARCWP, Linda Lee Miska, New Year's

World Day of Peace and Mary Queen of Peace

Mary Mother of Jesus Catholic Community Celebrates Liturgy for World Day of Peace

December 31, 2016

Presiders Katy Zatsick and Elena Garcia ARCWP

Music Ministers:  Linda Lee Miska,

Welcome! Gathering Song: Come Mother Eagle (song sheet)

Opening Prayer. Presiders God of love, You became human in Jesus and showed us how to live life fully. May we, like Mary, rejoice as we give birth to God within us in everything we say and do as we act for Peace and Justice.   All:  Amen.

Opening prayer All: O Giver of Hope, you delight us through Mary and Joseph with the birth of Christ in whom we find strength, wisdom and grace. Renew our vision of justice and peace during this season that we may reach out to the needs of others in our families, our neighborhoods, and places of work. In confidence we pray that we may always find hope in your birth especially in our new year. Amen.
Liturgy of the Word First Reading: Numbers 6:22-27 Response: Psalm 72 # 785 All: Justice will flower in their days and profound peace, till the moon is no more

First Reading: Janet

Responsorial Psalm: Russ

Second Reading: Katy

Second Reading: Pope Francis

“Involvement in politics is an obligation for a Christian. We Christians cannot “play the role of Pilate,” washing our hands of it—we cannot. We must be involved in politics because politics is one of the highest forms of charity, for it seeks the common good. And Christian laypeople must work in in politics. You will say to me, “But it isn’t easy” Nor is it easy to become a priest. Nothing is easy in life. It is not easy; politics has become too dirty, but I ask myself: why has it become dirty? Why aren’t Christians involved in politics with an evangelical spirit? I leave you with a question. It is easy to say, “It is so-and so’s fault.” But me, what do I do? It is a duty! Working for the common good is a Christian’s duty! And often the way to work for that is politics. There are other ways: being a teacher, for example; teaching is another route. However, political life for the common good is one of the ways.”

The inspired word of Pope Francis All: Thanks be to God.

(Politics: A Christian Duty: Dialogue with Students of Jesuit School of Italy and Albania, Paul VI audience Hall, June 7, 2013 from Pope Francis Speaks to our Hearts, Words of Challenge and Hope, 2013)

Acclamation (Sing): Alleluia!

Gospel: Luke 2:16-21 Response. All: Glory and praise to you our Brother Jesus the Christ! 






 Homily: Katy Zatsick

Dialogue Homily

1. How have I experienced Mary’s intersession in my life? What is my relationship to Mary?
2. Pope Francis teaches we must work for the Common Good. What can I do? What can MMOJ as a community do to work for peace and justice?
3. As we close 2016, how will I thank God for being present in my life this past year?

Profession of Faith. All: We believe in God who is creator of all. We believe in Jesus our Brother the Christ, who is our love, our hope, and our light. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the breath of Wisdom Sophia, who energizes and guides us to build caring communities and to challenge injustices to bring peace to our communities and the world.  We believe in the communion of saints our heavenly friends especially Mary mother of Jesus, who support us on life’s journey.  We believe in the partnership and equality of women and men in our church and world.  We believe that all are One in the community of creation. We believe that God calls us to live fully, love tenderly, and serve the work of our Common Good generously.  Amen.

Community Petitions. Presider: Prince of Peace, you forbade Peter to use the sword; enable us to resolve conflicts between persons and nations through dialogue rather than violence, we pray. Response: Jesus, Mary and Joseph hear us.

Presider: God, our Mother, you share with us the strength and beauty of giving birth: may we draw upon your strength in times of birthing new energy, insight, and integrity lino our country’s institutional structures we pray. R: Jesus, Mary and Joseph hear us.

Presider: Christ, proclaimer of peace, enable us to speak honestly and truthfully for the sake of peace and justice in our country and world, we pray: R: Jesus, Mary and Joseph hear us.

Presider: Christ, sign of peace, be with us in our efforts to be women and men with peaceful hearts and may the prayers of contemplative people bring peace to those in need of healing and reconciliation, we pray; R: Jesus, Mary and Joseph hear us.

Presider: May the sick and suffering receive the healing love of God, we pray. (please name out loud or in the silence) R: Jesus, Mary and Joseph hear us. (Other Intentions)

Offertory Song: Taize Ubi Caritas (see sheet) during collection Presider: Blessed are you, God of all life, through your goodness we have this bread and our own lives to offer. This bread is our Mary Mother of Jesus community seeking to work for the Common Good and that your justice will prevail for all life and our planet. Through this sacred meal may we become your new creation. All:  Blessed be God forever.

Presider: Blessed are you, God of all life, through your goodness we have this wine and our own lives to offer. This wine is our Mary Mother of Jesus community working for the Common Good that your peace will prevail throughout the earth and all peoples. Through this sacred meal may we become your new creation. All:  Blessed be God forever.

Presider: God is with you. All: And also with you. Presider: Lift up your hearts.  All:  We lift them up to God.  Presider:  Let us give thanks to our God. All: Amen Eucharistic Prayer. Men: Mothering God, you brought forth all creation from your life-giving womb. O Love of the ages, we praise you and leap for joy in your presence.

Women: Holy One of ancient Israel, you revealed yourself in Mary’s womb, in a shining star, in humble shepherds, in a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes. You embrace us with infinite love in every situation and relationship. You dwell in the depths of our hearts.

Men: As God’s beloved, we celebrate our own sacred presence on the table and around the table in joyful song.

All We are holy…you are holy…I am holy…we are holy(Karen Drucker)

Women, God, of all people. we glorify you for the dawning of the sacred promise of God’s Anointed, fulfilled in Jesus the Prince of Peace.

Men : We celebrate the birth of Jesus, our newborn Emmanuel, who came to share your extravagant kindness. During this holy season we share the bread of hope and lift the cup of life.

All (with hand extended to invoke the Spirit): Indwelling Spirit deepen your Presence within us and in these gifts of bread and wine, that they may become the Body of Christ. Presider: As Jesus gave birth to the new covenant, he took bread, gave thanks, broke the bread, and shared it with all those present and with us today saying: All: Take this all of you and eat it. This is my body.

Presider: Then Jesus took a cup of wine, blessed you, Loving God, shared the cup with all those present saying: All: Take this all of you and drink from the covenant, poured out for you and for everyone. Do this in memory of me.

Presider:  Let us proclaim the infinite love of our Prince of Peace: All: Christ, by your life, death and rising, you have blessed us with abundance and Peace that will never end.

Second Invocation of the Spirit: All (with hand on next person’s shoulder): God of all people, you call us “beloved.” Give us courage to accept your faith in us and to live your compassion in the world. You infuse us with Sophia, Holy Wisdom, to serve you in the last and the least.

Women: As we wait with joyful hearts for the fulfillment of your loving presence in our lives, we remember the saints who have gone before us:. (name mentors they want to remember, living and dead.)

Men: God of Inclusiveness. may we work for justice and equality for all God’s people and for the healing of our earth.

All: Through Christ, with Christ, in Christ, all praise and glory are yours, Holy God, through the power of the Spirit.  Amen.

All: Our Father and Mother…. Sign of Peace.  Presider:   Let us join hands and hearts and pray for God’s peace for all our world in 2017 as we sing #535 All: “Peace is flowing…, Love is flowing…Joy is flowing…Alleluia…

Litany for the breaking of bread.  

All::   Loving God, you call us to speak truth to power. We will do so. Loving God, you call us to live the Gospel of peace and justice.  We will do so. Loving God, you call us to be your presence in the world. We will do so. Amen

Presider: This is the banquet table of our brother Jesus,. All are invited to the feast.  All: May we be who we are, the Body and Blood of Christ for peace and justice in our world.

Presider:  Let us share the Body of Christ with the Body of Christ!   All: Amen

During Communion: piano music by Linda

After Communion sing “Mary” on song sheet Prayer after Communion.

Presider:  Mary Queen of Peace and Jesus Prince of Peace,  thank you for opening our hearts to your Spirit of love flowing as we begin our new year 2017.   May Jesus’ humanity help us to embrace our humanness and grow in love each day. All: Amen.

Thanksgiving/Introductions/ Announcements

Final Blessing.(please extend hand in blessing)

All: May our Brother Jesus and his mother Mary bless you and keep you! May Our God’s face shine upon you, and be gracious to you! May Our God look kindly upon you and give you and your family peace in the coming year of 2017! Amen.

Presiders: Let us be the Peace of Jesus in our world today with Mary as our loving Mother. Let us go in the peace of Jesus our Cosmic Christ to work for and to serve the Common Good. All:   Thanks be to God.

Recessional: When the Saints Going Marching In

Adapted from a Liturgy by Bridget Mary Meehan,

www.arcwp.org

"You Raise Me Up" with Andre Rieu, "I Am Yours, My God" by Bridget Mary Meehan ARCWP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJqiV55JnX0

"I Am Yours, My God"
by Bridget Mary Meehan ARCWP

O Love that flows within me always,
I am your special creation, new each day
in the refreshing springs of your love:
You speak to my womanspirit each day
love words that whole my soul and heal my heart.
"I love you."
"You are mine."
"You are my delight."
"I am loving through you."
Living Waters, I praise you for the fountain of your love welling up within me, lifting me higher...
I am yours my God forever and ever.
(from Praying with a Passionate Heart, p. 59.)

"Follow Your Heart's Desire"/ John 14:12/ NEW YEAR'S EVE

https://youtu.be/1wgy5rkfVBs

"THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER IS , ANYONE WHO HAS FAITH IN ME, WILL DO THE WORKS I DO AND GREATER WORKS BESIDES. ((THE INCLUSIVE  BIBLE)

André Rieu – Ode to Joy, Video

All men shall be brothers, all women shall be sisters

Musician and Conductor André Rieu performing “Ode to Joy” by Beethoven live in Maastricht with His Johann Strauss Orchestra. The orchestra is outstanding and the singers are amazing. If you enjoyed this wonderful music video then be sure to watch André Rieu performing Amazing Grace Live in the Amsterdam Arena with His Johann Strauss Orchestra and a contingent of bagpipes.

la-igualdad-de-apoyar-a-las-mujeres-en-la-iglesia-catolica-romana-con-su-donacion-a-la-asociacion-de-mujeres-sacerdotes-catolicos-rom

https://evangelizadorasdelosapostoles.wordpress.com/2016/12/29/la-igualdad-de-apoyar-a-las-mujeres-en-la-iglesia-catolica-romana-con-su-donacion-a-la-asociacion-de-mujeres-sacerdotes-catolicos-rom

Nurturing Communities of Peace: a prayer and a song

Prayers for a Thousand Years by Elizabeth Roberts and Elias Amidon

https://youtu.be/sUJdGNAfsBE

Support Women's Equality in the Roman Catholic Church by Donating to the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests

                                                                                                           

December 2016

We want to keep you informed about ARCWP. Soon you will be receiving our new quarterly newsletter, LEADING. We cannot continue to flourish without your prayers, interest and support.

Since 2010, we have grown significantly in number from an initial group of 6 priests to 58 priests, 7 deacons, 5 candidates and several applicants in 2016. Our members work throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and South America. We are a branch of the international women priest movement. Our preparation program is life-long and integrates the mystical, prophetic and inclusive sacramental celebrations with contemporary theology.

ARCWP is a prophetic movement dedicated to gender equality, acceptance of all God’s children, and a return to the true meaning of the gospel.  Embracing simplicity, kindness, and love of each other is evident through the willingness to aid those who require assistance.  Our desire is to carry this message to everyone by working in hospices, universities, and servicing small faith communities. We serve the homeless, the sick and dying, the addicted, the abused, the neglected and the marginalized…the ones no one else wants to notice. We vigorously advocate for social justice.

And we need your help. If possible, please make a donation to our cause. Our Association must educate our candidates in contemporary theology, grow our movement through outreach and media, and defray the cost of ordinations. Any support, no matter the amount, is graciously accepted and makes you a part of our movement for justice and equality in our Church.

Your donation can be sent via credit card on our website (www.arcwp.org) where you can scroll down to the “donate” tab or mailed to: ARCWP, PO Box 2685, Orland Park, IL 60462.

With gratitude and daily prayer,

The Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests

Rev. Terese Kasper, Treasurer 

Links: Pope Francis and Peace, Christmas, Paul VI's Statement on World Day of Peace

1. Pope Francis and Peace http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/12/26/pope-francis-and-the-style-of-politics-for-peace/

   Father John Dear http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/22/the-churchs-turn-toward-nonviolence/

    Pope Francis Christmas http://www.news-herald.com/general-news/20161226/pope-wishes-christmas-peace-to-those-scarred-by-war

    Paul VI’s statement on World day for peace  http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/messages/peace/documents/hf_p-vi_mes_19671208_i-world-day-for-peace.html

New biography tells Maura’s story A RADICAL FAITH: THE ASSASSINATION OF SISTER MAURA By Eileen Markey Published by Nation Books,

https://www.ncronline.org/books/2016/12/new-biography-tells-maura-s-story

Sister Mura Clark

"The churchwomen of El Salvador: The December 1980 news footage of their four limp bodies being dragged up by ropes from a shallow grave was an affront to anyone who watched. For Catholics raised on “The Bells of Saint Mary’s” and “The Trouble with Angels,” it was a tragically different view of religious women. For Americans, it was the end of an age of naive security expressed in the words, “Well, they don’t kill gringos.”

Three of the churchwomen, Maryknoll Sr. Ita Ford, Ursuline Sr, Dorothy Kazel and lay missionary Jean Donovan, have already found their biographers. Oddly, until now, Maryknoll Sr. Maura Clarke, the oldest and the most seasoned missionary in the group, has never been the subject of her own biography. Eileen Markey’s A Radical Faith: The Assassination of Sister Maura fills that void admirably.

Markey’s work is the fruit of extensive research -- conversations with Clarke’s family and friends, use of the Maryknoll Sisters’ archives, and examinations of the still heavily redacted documents from the U.S. State Department. She tells much more than the story of an American missionary caught up in the violence of Central America. A Radical Faith is very much the “story of a soul” -- the human and spiritual journey of an American woman religious from her Irish-American childhood in Queens, N.Y., to a life of missionary accompaniment with the people of Nicaragua and El Salvador.

In many ways, Clarke’s childhood was the typical mixture of piety and patriotism of 1930s American Catholicism. Her parochial school had the motto Pro Deo et Patria over the door. Hearing the stories of the involvement of her father’s family in the Irish Republican struggle gave her an innate sympathy for popular fights against oppression. Her mother’s hospitality to friend and stranger taught her generosity.

In 1950, for reasons that were unclear even to herself, she joined the Maryknoll Sisters to prepare for a life of foreign missionary service. She adapted to the quasi-monastic formation and imbibed the idea that Maryknoll was part of America’s battle against godless communism. Longing for foreign service, she chaffed at her first placement in the Bronx but was delighted to be assigned in 1959 to a Maryknoll mission in the remote town of Siuna on Nicaragua’s Atlantic coast. When the mission was founded in 1944, the sisters dined with Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza García. Their superior assured him, “We won’t be any trouble.”

Though Clarke is associated with El Salvador, the majority of her missionary life (1959-80) would be spent, except for furlough times in the U.S., in Nicaragua. There, she left the traditional ministry of teaching to move to Managua for a ministry of accompanying people and the formation of basic Christian communities. A particular strength of Markey’s book is that it includes the names and experiences of the women and men of these communities. The book is as much their story as Clarke’s -- as she would have wanted. It was also there that she experienced the Second Vatican Council quantum shift in religious life.

On one occasion, she confronted a member of the National Guard who had arrested a young man protesting the lack of potable water. When the soldier found out she was a nun, he said, “Oh, Sister. Go back to your convent.”

Clarke responded, thrusting her finger at the dusty street, “This is my convent!”

Clarke arrived in El Salvador in August 1980, part of the discernment of the Maryknoll Sisters in Central America to strengthen their presence in the war-torn country, reeling from the assassination, just five months earlier, of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Clarke joined the other missionaries in Chalatenango, in the northwest, aiding refugees of the civil war and helping in any way she could.

In November, she had the chance to return to her beloved Nicaragua for a meeting with other Maryknollers of Central America. At the meeting, they prayed with the biblical image of the Good Shepherd who never abandons the flock, even in the face of death. On the road, returning home from the airport after the meeting, Clarke and her three companions were ambushed and murdered by Salvadoran security forces.

Markey’s portrait is skillful and nuanced. Clarke was not shy about engaging her family and friends in her missionary vocation. They were not always thrilled when she showed up at a relative’s door to cook a meal for a Central American immigrant and filled the house with smells not customary in an Irish-American kitchen in Queens. We see Clarke’s struggles to maintain relationships across continents, to balance her concern for her aging parents with her commitment to mission, and her dealing with the experience of falling in love with a priest with whom she worked. Her most persistent struggle, brought frequently to prayer, was her sense of personal inadequacy and hunger for approval.

In December 2015, I had the privilege of joining the pilgrimage to El Salvador, sponsored by the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, for the 35th anniversary of the murder of the churchwomen. Also in the group were Markey; her husband, Jarrett Murphy; and their two boys, Hugh and Owen.

We arrived one night by bus at San Antonio Los Ranchos, one of the communities where Clarke had worked. The people gave us candles, and we joined the procession through the dark paths to the village square. It was festooned, end to end, with banners of the four churchwomen. The parish church that was a bombed-out shell when Clarke was there had been rebuilt, and its bell rang out through the night air.

The people chanted the four names over and over -- Ita, Dorothy, Jean, Maura -- with the refrain ¡Presente! And they were present, even though only the oldest villagers were alive when they worked there. That is the fruit of Clarke’s “radical faith” that Markey writes about: an invincible faith in the God of justice in the face of violence and oppression.

[Terrence Moran is the director of the Office of Justice, Peace and Ecological Integrity of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth at Convent Station, N.J.]

This story appeared in the Dec 30, 2016-Jan 12, 2017 print issue under the headline: New biography tells Maura’s story .

Leonardo Boff: “Francis is One of Us” Interview with Liberation Theologian Leonardo Boff by German Newspaper/ Interesting!

 Maike Hickson December 26, 2016 

On 25 December 2016 the Brazilian Leonardo Boff, one of the most prominent theorists and operatives of Latin American Liberation Theology, gave a candidly revealing and manifoldly informative interview to the German regional newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. Due to his confident, if not presumptuous, openness, the 78-year-old Boff (b. 14 December 1938) speaks about several matters of moment which we otherwise would not so easily hear about.

For example, he reveals the following:

• How and why Pope Francis did not meet Boff in Rome, as planned, on the day before the second Synod on the Family in 2015 – because the pope was angry at the Thirteen Cardinals’ Letter and was trying to quiet the situation (and himself?) ahead of the Synod;
• How Cardinal Walter Kasper recently told Boff that Pope Francis has some “big surprises” planned;
• How Pope Francis intends to allow the Catholic Church in Brazil to permit married priests, as his friend Cardinal Claudio Hummes has been requesting now for some time;
• How Pope Francis had requested from Boff material for the writing of his own encyclical Laudato Si and how the pope thanked him afterwards;
• How Boff considers Pope Francis to be “one of us,” meaning one of the supportive sympathizers with liberation theology.

In the following, therefore, I shall translate parts of this important interview. The words of Leonardo Boff will speak for themselves. Important to note in this context, however, is that Boff himself was publicly criticized and silenced in 1985 by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) – for his unorthodox writings that boldly go quite far against Church doctrine. Thus, in 1992, he both formally left the Franciscan Order to which he had belonged and he also then publicly left the Catholic priesthood.

Q: Liberation Theology of Latin America – one of whose most prominent representatives you certainly are – has now received new honors [and encouraging support] from and through Pope Francis. [Is there now to be] A rehabilitation also for you personally, after your years-long struggles with Pope John Paul II himself and with his highest defender of Doctrine, Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI?

Francis is one of us. He has turned Liberation Theology into a common property of the Church. And he has widened it. Whoever speaks today of the poor, also has to speak of the earth, because it, too, is now being plundered and abused. “To hear the cry of the poor,” that means to hear the cry of the animals, the forests, of the whole tortured creation. The whole earth cries. Also, says the pope – and he thus quotes one of the titles of one of my books – we have to hear simultaneously the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth. And, for sure, both need to be liberated. I myself have dealt in the recent past with this widening of the Liberation Theology. And that [this environmental dimension] is also the fundamentally new aspect in Laudato Si.

Q: ….which is now in the “ecological encyclical” of the pope promulgated in the year 2015. How much Leonardo Boff is in Jorge Mario Bergoglio?

The encyclical belongs to the pope. But he has consulted with many experts.

Q: Has he read your books?

More than that. He asked me for material for the sake of Laudato Si. I have given him my counsel and sent to him some of what I have written. Which he has also used. Some people told me they were thinking while reading: “Wait, that is Boff!” By the way, Pope Francis directly told me: “Boff, don’t send the papers directly to me.”

Q: Why not?

He said: “Otherwise, the Sottosegretari (the employees of the Vatican administration, editors [of the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger]) will intercept them and I will not receive them. Rather, send the things right to the Argentine Ambassador [at the Holy See] with whom I have a good connection, then they will safely land into my hands.” For that, one needs to know that the current Ambassador at the Holy See is an old friend of the pope from his time in Buenos Aires. They have often drunk together mate [a special drink from Argentina, a sort of tea]. Then, one day before the publication of the encyclical, the pope had someone call me in order to thank me for my help.

Q: A personal meeting with the pope is still outstanding?

He [Pope Francis] has sought a reconciliation with the most important representatives of the Liberation Theology: with Gustavo Gutierrez, Jon Sobrino, and likewise with me. I have said to him with respect to Pope Benedict – respectively Joseph Ratzinger – “But that other is still alive, after all!” He did not accept this. “No,” he said, “Il Papa sono io” – “The pope, that is me!” We were welcomed to come. That is where you see his courage and his decisiveness.

Q: Why then has your visit not yet worked out?

I had received an invitation and I even had already landed in Rome. But just that day, immediately before the beginning of the [second] Synod on the Family in 2015, 13 cardinals – among them the German Cardinal Gerhard Müller – rehearsed a rebellion against the pope with a letter addressed to him which then, o surprise!, was published in a newspaper. The pope was angry and he told me: “Boff, I have no time. I have to establish calm before the synod begins. We will see each other another time.”

Q: But also with the hoped-for calm, that did not really work out, either, did it?

The pope feels the sharpness of the headwind from his own ranks, especially coming from the U.S. This Cardinal Burke, Leo Burke, who now – together with your retired Cardinal Meisner from Cologne – has already written another letter [to the pope]; he is is the Donald Trump of the Catholic Church (laughs). But, unlike Trump, Burke has now been neutralized within the Curia. Thanks be to God. These people really believe that it is up to them to correct the pope. As if they are above the pope. Something like this is unusual [sic!], if not unprecedented in the history of the Church. One may criticize the pope, one may have discussions with him. That is what I have often done. But, that cardinals publicly accuse the pope of the spreading of theological mistakes or even heresies, that is – I think – too much. That is an affront with which a pope cannot put up. The pope cannot be judged, that is the teaching of the Church.

Q: With all your enthusiasm for the pope – what is it with these Church reforms which so many Catholics have expected from Francis; but where, in fact, not so much has yet happened?

You know, as far as I understand, the center of his interest is not any more the Church – and certainly not the internal operation of the Church – but, rather, the survival of humanity, the future of the earth. […] I believe that there is a hierarchy of problems for him. When the earth perishes, all the other problems have also been taken care of. But, with regard to the questions within and about the Church: wait and see! Only recently, Cardinal Walter Kasper, a close confidant of the pope, told me that soon there will be some great surprises.

Q: What do you expect?

Who knows? Perhaps a diaconate for women, after all. Or the possibility that married priests may be again engaged in pastoral care. That is an explicit request from the Brazilian bishops to the pope, especially from his friend, the retired Brazilian Curial Cardinal Claudio Hummes. I have heard that the pope wants to meet this request – for now and for a certain experimental period in Brazil. This country with its 140 million Catholics should at least have 100,000 priests. But, there are only 18,000. Institutionally, this is a catastrophe. No wonder that the faithful now go in droves to the Evangelicals and the Pentecostals, who fill this personal vacuum. If now all these thousands of already married priests might again exercise their office, this would be a first step toward an improvement of the situation – and, at the same time, it would be an impulse [and a sign] that the Catholic Church now loosens the fetters of obligatory celibacy. [my emphasis]

Q: If the pope were to make a decision in this sense and direction – would you yourself, as a former Franciscan priest, also again undertake priestly duties?

I personally do not need such a decision. It would not change anything for myself because I still do what I have always done: I baptize, I give Christian burials, and if I happen to come into a parish without a priest, then I also celebrate Mass together with the people.

Q: Is it very “German” to ask whether you are permitted to do that?

Up to now, no bishop whom I know has ever either criticized it or forbidden it. The bishops, on the contrary, are happy and tell me: “the people have a right [sic] to the Eucharist. Just keep doing it!” My theological teacher, Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns – who just died a few days ago – was, for example, of a very great openness. He went so far that, when he saw married priests sitting in the pew during Mass, he had them come to the altar and he then concelebrated the Eucharist with them. He did it often and said: “You are, after all, still priests – and you will remain so!”

http://www.onepeterfive.com/liberation-theologian-boff-francis-is-one-of-us/

"The Divinity Became Human" by Olga Lucia Alvarez Benjumea ARCWP

https://evangelizadorasdelosapostoles.wordpress.com/2016/12/27/la-divinidad-hecha-humana-olga-lucia-alvarez-benjuma-arcwp/

... Yes, that's Christmas!

But ... if someone makes a mistake, he hears: "to err is human." Then God is a mistake? To be human is to be something bad?

…Just a moment. Not so fast, because you're going to crash. In some homilies, some years ago ... we listened to something about it ... And, if it was about women, we were the worst. Still today. That concept has not changed.

We are not going to throw more ground on what they said or stopped saying because they are women.

Here it is, the beginning of everything. Genesis 1:27. Remember us ?:

" And God created man in his image, in the image of God he created him; Male and female created them. "

Let us not lose sight of this text. Let us keep it in the depths of our heart.

Now, let us return to today's theme: Divinity made human. In other words: "The Word, Logo, it became flesh" John 1:14. This is what we are celebrating these days of Advent and Christmas!

We can not stay in the only noise of gunpowder, lights, carols, balloons, novena, gifts, travel. While it is the time to reunite the family, as far as possible, the dimension of this celebration goes much further ... It is the lesson that the Divinity came to teach us and that we appropriate it. It is the rethinking, of the importance of having been created in the image and likeness of God. The birth of Jesus, is the embrace of solidarity and rescue of the Divinity towards the human being! It is to make us worth your Divine dimension in Humanity.

If we had been made to believe garbage and misery, as human beings and more to women. Divinity becomes human, and as Father-Mother it rescues us and divinizes us!

You hear run, runes ...! "Care Olga, with what you're saying ..."

Sisters and brothers, we can no longer deny our Divinity! The birth of Jesus is proof, that we are daughters and sons of God, daughters and daughters of the same Father-Mother! We are family of gods, royal blood, blue blood. We are the best family!

When Jesus discovered in himself his kinship with the Godhead, he said: "We are gods" (Psalm 82: 6, John 10:34). That's why they condemned him, declared him blasphemous! And murdered him as if he had been a delinquent! They crucified Him!

From fear, they never let us know and make known our Father-Mother, our Divinity, that is why they want us to appear as daughters and children of "father-unknown."

For fear of losing hierarchical power, that is why our fear is transferred with the pretense of dominating, crushing and hoarding, so that we do not claim what corresponds to us as an inheritance of the Divinity!

That is why they blind us, so that we are unable to recognize the features of the image and likeness of God, in the other ... So there is panic that we get to talk to Him and always make us believe, like It happens in reality: there is no line, network congested, off-hook, disconnected, "suspended", disabled, busy, no answer, "sent to voice mail", you have not paid the services ... is that here, is not, is There ... they confuse us, they give us false leads ...

Let us learn to listen to the Voice of the Divine Essence within us. It costs us, it's true. Because we are not accustomed to listen to his voice, to be listening to rules, third-party concepts, norms and dogmas, that disconnect us from the Divine relationship.

You and I, little by little, as we discover the image of God in us and in others, we will be able to realize Peace, in the home, in the neighborhood, in the School, at work, in The city, in the Church, in the country and in the whole world! We will respect each other. We will share. We will realize our "Peace Accords", starting with ourselves. No more misunderstandings, There will be no subjective interpretations, No more suspicions, doubts and prejudices. There will be no envy or competition. There will be no immigrants, no displaced persons, no threats, no kidnapping, no murder. There will be no judgments or condemnations. There will always be open dialogue ... without scorn or marginalization.

The Divinity / God has loved us in such a way, that He has descended on us, leaving the comfort of His Heaven, to become human, to embarrass ourselves, to take us and to cleanse us from our ignorance and misery, raising us in His Dignity, to equal us He / She, living inserts and inserts in his full and happy life, from now and forever (John 3:16).

Divinity is born among us, Emanuel is with us. We welcome you, let us rescue him / her.

HAPPY EASTER!!!  

I INVITE YOU TO CONTINUE TO BE COMPLETED, PARTICIPATING IN THE STRATEGIC PLAN OF THE DIVINITY, ANNOUNCING THE GOOD NEWS.