Descendant of Charles Darwin becomes a Catholic apologist

Laura Keynes - Catholic Herald

The following Excerpt and photo are from CatholicHerald.co.uk

By Ed West

A direct descendant of Charles Darwin has become a Catholic apologist.

Laura Keynes, a great-great-great-granddaughter of the English naturalist, has joined Catholic Voices, the project set up to speak up for the Church in the media.

She writes in this week’s Catholic Herald about how she returned to her childhood Catholic faith after a period of agnosticism.

The daughter of an atheist father and a mother who had converted to Catholicism but later became a Buddhist, she was baptised Catholic. But she says she drifted into agnosticism in her teens and “away from any contact with the Church”.

When she began studying for a doctorate in philosophy at Oxford she started to “reassess those values. Relationships, feminism, moral relativism, the sanctity and dignity of human life”.

The debate sparked by Richard Dawkins’s book The God Delusion inspired her to read more about the subject, and she concluded that “New Atheism seemed to harbour a germ of intolerance and contempt for people that could only undermine secular Humanist claims to liberalism”.

“That I freely chose to be a Catholic after much thought and analysis, and wasn’t brainwashed into it, baffle my friends and family alike,” she writes.

Read More: Catholic Herald

St. Anthony of Padua - Saint of the Day for June 13

Photograph by Loci B. Lenar

Biographical Information from Catholic Online

Saint Anthony was canonized (declared a saint) less than one year after his death.

There is perhaps no more loved and admired saint in the Catholic Church than Saint Anthony of Padua, a Doctor of the Church. Though his work was in Italy, he was born in Portugal. He first joined the Augustinian Order and then left it and joined the Franciscan Order in 1221, when he was 26 years old. The reason he became a Franciscan was because of the death of the five Franciscan protomartyrs -- St. Bernard, St. Peter, St. Otho, St. Accursius, and St. Adjutus -- who shed their blood for the Catholic Faith in the year 1220, in Morocco, in North Africa, and whose headless and mutilated bodies had been brought to St. Anthony’s monastery on their way back for burial. St. Anthony became a Franciscan in the hope of shedding his own blood and becoming a martyr. He lived only ten years after joining the Franciscan Order.

So simple and resounding was his teaching of the Catholic Faith, so that the most unlettered and innocent might understand it, that he was made a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius XII in 1946. Saint Anthony was only 36 years old when he died. He is called the “hammer of the Heretics” His great protection against their lies and deceits in the matter of Christian doctrine was to utter, simply and innocently, the Holy Name of Mary. When St. Anthony of Padua found he was preaching the true Gospel of the Catholic Church to heretics who would not listen to him, he then went out and preached it to the fishes. This was not, as liberals and naturalists are trying to say, for the instruction of the fishes, but rather for the glory of God, the delight of the angels, and the easing of his own heart. St. Anthony wanted to profess the Catholic Faith with his mind and his heart, at every moment.

He is typically depicted with a book and the Infant Child Jesus, to whom He miraculously appeared, and is commonly referred to today as the "finder of lost articles."

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Prayers for St. Anthony's Intercession

Statue of St. Anthony photographed inside the Hall of Candles at the Shrine of Saint Joseph.  The Catholic Shrine is located on Long Hill Road, Stirling, NJ, USA.

Photograph Copyright Loci B. Lenar

PRAY FOR 'PROPHETIC' HEALING

Photograph by Loci B. Lenar

Excerpt from SpiritDaily.com - Spiritual News from Around the World

Too often we react in retrospect. The damage is done. Heart problems. Cancer.

Where is the prophetic healing? We need to anticipate. The Holy Spirit does this for us. He sees and guides. He helps us stay ahead of the game.

What is "prophetic healing"? That's praying to gird ourselves against that which may afflict us in the future (or may be in an incipient stage). It's to strengthen. Each cell can be girded by the Holy Spirit against insult from chemicals, from viruses, from accident. It is to shield.

It's to put the body in harmony with the spirit. It is to envelope.

Read more: Spirit Daily

The Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

Photograph by Loci B. Lenar

The following excerpt is from Catholic Online

The heart is the center of a person, the place from which he/she makes the choices which will affect the world within them and around them. Devotion to the Heart of Jesus reminds us that it is in His Sacred Humanity that we find the pattern for becoming fully human ourselves. In His Incarnation, saving life, death and Resurrection, we receive both the pattern - and the means - to become more like Him.

The Feast of the Sacred Heart reminds us of our mission in a Culture which has forgotten God. Let us spend the month of June in Prayer to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, lifting up our Nation, indeed the whole world, to the One in whom we place all of our trust. He will not disappoint; His Heart still beats with Mercy and Love for the world.

A 3D virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel

News from RomeReports.com

(Click on the link for a 3D Tour of the Sistine Chapel)

It's known as the most famous chapel in the world. Generation after generation, its priceless artwork is admired by art lovers. For centuries its frescoes have witnessed the conclave, when the successor of Peter is elected to lead the Church.

The Sistine Chapel as we now know it, was completed in the 15th century under the orders of Pope Sixtus IV, which now bears his name. Six centuries later, technology allows everyone to virtually see the Chapel and the Vatican Museums.  By logging onto www.vatican.com everything is just a click away.

In the first stage of the visit, our guide explains that the Conclave, where Cardinals elect a new Pope, takes place right before Michelangelo's  Last Judgment frescoes. Through the chimney installed at the Chapel, they communicate with the world. Black smoke means a candidate has not yet been elected and white smoke means there is a new Pope.

The second stop is in front of the Chapel's frescoes. Anywhere they look, visitors are surrounded by biblical episodes. The north wall illustrates different passages in the history of Jesus Christ, including His Baptism, the Sermon on the Mount and the Last Supper. On the opposite side, the south wall features scenes from the life of Moses. To the east, one can view the resurrection of Jesus and the dispute over the body of Moses.

But undoubtedly, the third and final stop in the tour is the most impressive. Michelangelo's masterpiece, the Last Judgment. The biblical scene recounts the end of time, when Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead. All of humanity is depicted in front of the High Altar.

The guide also explains the history of Creation, through nine scenes from the book of Genesis, which are depicted on the Chapel's ceiling. It's the end of a relaxing and detailed 3D virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel.

The website's creators are already working on their next project, which includes a virtual tour of Saint Peter's Basilica.

Author Stephen King’s Pro-God Response to Atheists and Non-Believers

Stephen King - Photo From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The following excerpt is from TheBlaze.com:

By Billy Hallowell

Author Stephen King believes in God — and he also thinks that the universe is built in a such an organized manner that the notion of “intelligent design” is wholly supportable.

 

King, known for penning thrillers and horror books that both entertain and create intrigue in the minds of readers, made these comments during a recent interview with NPR. Considering the writer’s prominence, his views on God and intelligent design are noteworthy.

 

So, what did he say, exactly?

 

During the exchange, King had some interesting words for atheists and those who are unsure about the existence of a higher power. In particular, he charged that these individuals miss all of the signs that overwhelmingly point to structure.

 

“I choose to believe it. … I mean, there’s no downside to that. If you say, ‘Well, OK, I don’t believe in God, there’s no evidence of God,’ then you’re missing the stars in the sky and you’re missing the sunrises and sunsets and you’re missing the fact that bees pollinate all these crops and keep us alive and the way that everything seems to work together,” he said.

 

All of these structures, he noted, suggest that the world was built by a higher power — a figure who organized everything and structured it accordingly.

 

“Everything is sort of built in a way that to me suggests intelligent design,” King added.

 

Read more: Author Stephen King’s Pro-God Response