Word of the Day

I learned a new word...OK, phrase....today.

RADICAL SANATION

May need radical sanation

 From EWTN:
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If a Catholic is married outside the Catholic Church, then the marriage must be convalidated. This is true whether the marriage involved a Catholic and a non-Catholic or two Catholics.
The marriage can be convalidated either through a simple convalidation, which requires a new (although usually simple) ceremony with a new exchange of consent. Or the marriage can be convalidated by a radical sanation. A radical sanation is a decree issued by the diocesan bishop stating that he accepts the original consent of the marriage as valid. A radical sanation is usually sought when one party to the marriage does not want to participate in a new ceremony for some reason (e.g., because of belief in conscience).
In any case, there is no requirement for a non-Catholic to become Catholic just to get married in the Church or have one's marriage convalidated in the Church by either method.
If a person has prior marital bonds, then one needs to resolve those issues (usually by petitioning a diocesan Tribunal for a declaration of nullity of the prior marriages) before a marriage can be convalidated by either method.

Cherubim and Seraphim

I was reading a parody on CatholicVote.org which included this:

We were going over the purgatory numbers for last quarter and all of a sudden the door bursts open and in flies one of the seraphim.  Or maybe cherubim, I don’t know, hard to tell sometimes.

 

Cherubim, Seraphim, Thrones (top to bottom)

From the Catholic Encyclopedia:

Cherubim:

 The word cherub (cherubim is the Hebrew masculine plural) is a word borrowed from the Assyrian kirubu, from karâbu, "to be near", hence it means near ones, familiars, personal servants, bodyguards, courtiers. It was commonly used of those heavenly spirits, who closely surrounded the Majesty of God and paid Him intimate service.





Seraphim:

 The name, a Hebrew masculine plural form, designates a special class of heavenly attendants of Yahweh's court.

 Although described under a human form, with faces, hands, and feet (Isaiah 6:2, 6), they are undoubtedly existing spiritual beings corresponding to their name, and not mere symbolic representations as is often asserted by advanced Protestant scholars. Their number is considerable, as they appear around the heavenly throne in a double choir and the volume of their chorus is such that the sound shakes the foundations of the palace.

Calumny - The Word of the Day!

"We are all sinners; all of us. We all commit sins. But calumny is something else. It is of course a sin, too, but it is something more. Calumny aims to destroy the work of God, and calumny comes from a very evil thing: it is born of hatred. And hate is the work of Satan. Calumny destroys the work of God in people, in their souls. Calumny uses lies to get ahead. And let us be in no doubt, eh?: Where there is calumny, there is Satan himself. "

"We pray to Our Lady to protect us, and in times of spiritual turbulence the safest place is under the mantle of Our Lady. She is the mother who takes care of the Church. And in this time of martyrs, she is the protagonist, the protagonist of protection: She is the Mother. (...) Let us state with faith: Mother, the Church is under your protection: Care for the Church. '"  - Pope Francis 4/15/13

 

 

Calumny (Slander) - by BOTTICELLI, Sandro - from Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence . . . . . (Click painting to enlarge)

 

In this painting there is a representation of King Midas (bad Judge), with ass's ears, listening to the false words of  Ignorance and Suspicion. In front of them, standing, is Malice (hooded man) who holds Calumny by the wrist.    Calumny is dragging the slandered  by the hair while Envy and Deceit ( Fraud) comb her hair with ribbons  and flowers. Behind this group is the hooded figure of Remorse (Penitence), who turns to look at the naked figure of   Truth. Truth, like Innocence, is naked as she has nothing to conceal.

Humeral Veil versus the Vimpa

The Humeral Veil is " is the name given to a cloth of rectangular shape about 8 ft. long and 1 1/2 ft. wide" and is used " by the priest or bishop in processions of the Blessed Sacrament in giving Benediction, in carrying the Host to its repository on Holy Thursday, and bringing it back to the altar on Good Friday, and finally in taking the Viaticum to the sick."

The Vimpa, on the other hand....

Feast of St. Daniel the Stylite, December 11

The things you learn... First of all, I never heard of St. Daniel the Stylite. He was a monk in the 5th century. He was a stylite, which I found out means "a type of Christian ascetic who in the early days of the Byzantine Empire stood on pillars preaching, fasting and praying. They believed that the mortification of their bodies would help ensure the salvation of their souls." then I found out that Daniel climbed up on his pillar and only came down once in 33 years - "to turn Emperor Baliscus away from backing the heresy of Monophysitism." Monophysitista believed that the Incarnate Christ "had only a single "nature" which was either divine or a synthesis of divine and human. Monophysitism is contrasted to dyophysitism (or dia-, dio-, or duophysitism) which maintains that Christ maintained two natures, one divine and one human, after the Incarnation."

Mar Saba

Today is the feast day of St. Sabbas, who founded the monastic settlement of Mar Saba in 483 AD. Mar Saba is in the West Bank, so it wouldn't surprise me if the Muslims eventually trash the joint. I'm glad photos exist. The monastery is actually called a LAVRA, which is a Greek word for a collection of caves or cells for hermits.

Word of the Day, Part II

From William F. Buckley:

"But a failure to attend church on Sunday is, by Catholic standards, contumacious, an ostentatious rejection of a formal obligation."

con·tu·ma·cious

Pronunciation:
\ˌkän-tü-ˈmā-shəs, -tyü-ˈ, -chə-ˈ\

Function:
adjective

: stubbornly disobedient : rebellious

Yikes!

 

It's called pareidolia (from Wikipedia):

"The term pareidolia, referenced in 1994 by Steven Goldstein, describes a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant. Common examples include images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon, and hidden messages on records played in reverse. The word comes from the Greek para- — beside, with or alongside — and eidolon — image (the diminutive of eidos — image, form, shape). Pareidolia is a type of apophenia.