The Chaplet of Divine Fire

In the wake of Easter this year, and especially Pentecost Sunday, I have been praying for more of the Holy Spirit. One night, I was thinking of the words of St. Ambrose, "Leati bibamus sobriam profusionem Spiritus," which means, "Let us joyfully drink up the sober intoxication of the Spirit," when I began adding prayers to that thought until eventually I had built a whole chaplet around it. I'm calling it the Chaplet of Divine Fire and it goes like this:
  Begin by holding the crucifix and reciting the following paragraph from Pope Paul VI's Credo of the People of God:
     We believe in the Holy Spirit, who is Lord and Giver of life, who is adored and glorified together with the Father and the Son. He spoke to us by the prophets; He was sent by Christ after His resurrection and His ascension to the Father; He illuminates, vivifies, protects and guides the Church; He purifies the Church's members if they do not shun His grace. His action, which penetrates to the inmost of the soul, enables man to respond to the call of Jesus: "Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect."

Then, holding the next bead, begin the Come, Holy Spirit:

     Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful and enkindle in us the Fire of Your Love. Send forth Your Spirit and we shall be created and You shall renew the face of the Earth.
          Amen.

Moving to the three bunched beads, pray the following words from Luke 1 on each bead, asking Mary to assist you. I call this prayer the Ecce, Sum:

     Behold, I am the handservant of the Lord,

     Let it be unto me according to Your Word:

     Holy Spirit, come upon me;

     Power of the Most High, overshadow me.

          Amen. (x3)

Then on the last bead before the Rosary Centerpiece, recite the second half of the Come, Holy Spirit:

     O God, Who by the light of the Holy Spirit did instruct the hearts of His faithful, grant that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever enjoy His consolations through Christ our Lord.

          Amen.

Finish by saying a simple prayer invoking the Holy Spirit's action in your life:

     Come, Holy Spirit, cast Your Fire on the Earth,
     Fill me, also, with Your Fire and make me a Saint.
          Amen.

This concludes the opening portion of the Chaplet.

This next section is much simpler as far as the prayers go, but also far more meditative. Like the Rosary, it includes meditation on a set of mysteries: the Five Mysteries of the Divine Fire (aka the Holy Spirit). First, I'll explain the prayers of each decade and then I'll explain what the Five Mysteries are.

On the Rosary Centerpiece and each respective large bead, say a Hail Mary asking Our Lady to help you ponder each of the Mysteries as she pondered everything in her heart:

     Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.

     Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

     Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.

          Amen.

On each bead of the decades, pray this prayer for the whole Church as you ponder the Mysteries:

     Loving Father, please engulf the entire Body of Your Son
     In the Fire of the Holy Spirit as with a new and greater Pentecost;

     Let us joyfully drink up the sober intoxication of Your Spirit.

          Amen. (x10)

After each decade, pray the following prayer for the World and for yourself:

     Come, Holy Spirit, cast Your Fire upon the Earth,

     Fill me, also with Your Fire, and make me a Saint.

          Amen.

Then, start the next Mystery as above, beginning with the Hail Mary, etc. When you've finished praying all five Mysteries, you close the Chaplet with the following prayer:
     Breathe into me Holy Spirit, that all my thoughts may be holy. Move in me, Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy. Attract my heart, Holy Spirit, that I may love only what is holy. Strengthen me, Holy Spirit, that I may defend all that is holy. Protect me, Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy.

          Amen.

The mysteries are as follows:

     The First Mystery of the Divine Fire: the Holy Spirit in the time of Moses and the Judges.
     The Second Mystery of the Divine Fire: the Holy Spirit in the time of the Prophets.
     The Third Mystery of the Divine Fire: the Holy Spirit in the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
     The Fourth Mystery of the Divine Fire: the Holy Spirit in the life and ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.
     The Fifth Mystery of the Divine Fire: the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church (from Pentecost onward).
Each of these mysteries involves a wealth of activity of the Holy Spirit and tells us a great deal about who He is and what He wants to do in, with, and for His People. I'm sure we could meditate on each one of them for the rest of our lives and never run out of things to learn about the Spirit of God. Let us pray that everything we learn becomes a part of our relationship with the Spirit and a part of who we are as followers of Christ.

It is my prayer that this chaplet will be shared around the internet and prayed by sincere Christians everywhere, especially by my fellow Catholics, until the Fifth Mystery of the Divine Fire becomes the undeniable reality of daily life around the globe: a new, global Pentecost with miracles, healings, signs and wonders that will shake the world to its very core. So, in the words of my favorite Captain of the Starship Enterprise, let's "make it so!"

P.S. In case you'd like to pray the chaplet and would like to have it all typed out so you can just scroll through and pray it without too much extra work on your part, I've given it its own page on my website here.

Beyond a Mere "Code of Honor"

The following is from one of my websites: Soul Trek: TNG. It's my latest meditation on the episodes of Star Trek: the Next Generation. It's a slow-moving project, due to my life as a stay-at-home dad, but I'll keep plugging away for as long as it takes...

     This refers to the TNG episode called "Code of Honor"; see the link for a synopsis.

     

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This episode should cause us to look at the way we view and treat the people around us. Lutan's constant choice to refer to the people around him, especially women, as "things," and the Enterprise's crew as "strange, alien things"－as though simply denying their personhood isn't insulting enough－is a crass way of expressing verbally what many of us do only subtly. As Pope Blessed John Paul the Great so wisely taught us in his Theology of the Body, one of the tendencies that Original Sin has saddled us with is this very same urge to see others not as persons, equally worthy of the respect due every human being, but as mere tools to be used for our own self-gratification, for the advancement of our personal and selfish desires. For Lutan, everyone, even his "first one" Yaree

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na, is simply a tool, a pawn to be used to give him the power and the undefined but all-important (to him, at least) "honor" he craves.
     But where he seems to do this consciously, we tend to do it thoughtlessly. We see the people driving the cars around us, for instance, as obstacles to our desire to arrive swiftly at wherever it is we're going, and so we curse at their perceived stupidity－after all, they can't hear our obscenities, so it isn't hurting anyone, right? We grumble when our loved ones ask us to clean something around the house, or when our children want us to play with them, because they're just getting in the way of our desire to vege out in front of the TV and/or computer after a long day of work.
     These are the little ways that we devalue and disrespect even those closest to us, but our culture teaches us constantly to keep using others in much more damaging ways than this. We are repeatedly taught, in practically every TV show, even at times in Star Trek, that sexual intercourse should be expected and encouraged as quickly as possible after a couple admits mutual attraction to one another. However, biologically and spiritually, this is the worst kind of abuse of another. As my wife, a family physician, likes to point out to her patients, the most common sexually transmitted disease is depression, because intercourse biologically tells our brains to be linked emotionally for the rest of our lives to the person with whom we've just mated, especially the woman's brain. So when the couple that just started going out (or worse, just "hooked up" for a one night stand) parts ways because their relationship had no stronger basis than physical attraction, their bodies don't know how to cope; their hormones tell them they should feel as bad as if their spouse had just died.
     This is just one way in which intercourse outside of marriage hurts us. This is only one of many scientific reasons, reasons which God knew before we ever thought to study them, that God's command that intercourse be reserved for marriage is anything but arbitrary.(1) Like all of God's laws and commandments, this is given so that you "may have life, and have it abundantly" (John 10:10b). He loves each and every one of us because we are unique, unrepeatable persons, created in His image and likeness, no matter what our physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual deficits, no matter our current situation, and even no matter how much we bump heads with one another.
     So let's not be like Lutan, seeing each other as stepping-stones or stumbling-blocks on the way to the precarious glories of being "on top." And let's also not be like the writers of this episode who saw the Ligonians too a mere obstacles to the crew's humanitarian mission of procuring the vaccine, as though it was law (the Prime Directive), not each Ligonian's (even Lutan's) inviolable dignity as a human(oid) person, that stopped the crew from squashing the Ligonians like bugs and stealing the vaccine simply because they could. Instead, let's be like Blessed Teresa of Calcutta (a.k.a. Mother Teresa) and look at each and every person we interact with today and every day as though they are the dearest person to our hearts. Let's drop everything that's important to us and make their needs come first. Let's respect them enough to honor them for who they are, before even considering for a moment how we might use them to make ourselves feel better.

​     Let us pray:

     

     Blessed John Paul the Great, you reminded us of the absolute sanctity of every human person, of each unrepeatable person's inviolable dignity as a child of God. Pray that we would never forget that lesson and never cease to practice self-donative love because of it.
     Blessed Mother Teresa, you taught your sisters to see the face of Our Host Holy Lord, the King of Love-Come-Among-Us, in even the most destitute and seemingly unlovable of persons. Help us, by your prayers, to likewise see His Adorable Face in that of every person we meet today and every day.
     Amen.​

     

This is only a portion of the content available at the Soul Trek: TNG website, so if you enjoyed it, please head on over and check it out!

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For more information on the science and wisdom behind the Catholic Church's teachings on sexual morality, I recommend reading 

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Sex Au Naturel by Patrick Coffin.

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Be A Dragon Slayer!

“Fairy tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” 
― G.K. Chesterton

The dragon of abortion may not be yet defeated, but the largest civil rights rally in the history of the world, this year's March For Life in Washington, D.C., shows that we will not stop fighting until the very last child has been sacrificed to it. One day, this dragon too shall be slain by the same sword wielded by St. George: faith in Christ Jesus.

Dr. Yeost Debunks Obama's Latest Lies

This article is taken from the latest e-mail installment of AUL action briefs. To sign up, go to http://takeaction.aul.org/ I want to share it because it's a good counterpart to my wife's comments following up on the prior VP debate. Please read and learn the truth:

President Obama talks about Abortion in Tuesday’s Presidential Debate

Above: Governor Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama

AULA’s Dr. Charmaine Yoest analyzes
Life in the Crossfire

As an issue, LIFE motivates 1 in 5 voters, and was front and center among the topics covered this week during the Presidential town hall-style debate in New York. Americans United for Life Action President and CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest addressed some of the misinformation raised during the 90-minute event, fact checking the truth about life in this election cycle.

“Obamacare was the largest expansion of abortion since Roe v. Wade, and is fatally intertwined with the abortion industry,” said Dr. Yoest. “In this debate, Americans could see some of the spin used to camouflage this Administration’s radical, pro-abortion agenda.”

Falsehood: President Obama stated, “[T]here are millions of women all across the country who rely on Planned  
Parenthood for…mammograms.”

Fact: President Obama is attempting to resurrect and advance the myth that Planned Parenthood provides mammograms, an argument that was thoroughly discredited after deceitfully proffered by Planned Parenthood’s President Cecile Richards in 2011. Not one of Planned Parenthood’s approximately 800 clinics nationwide provides mammograms; moreover, as the Department of Health and Human Services documented in June 2012, Planned Parenthood is not even authorized to perform mammograms, and — if a clinic did — it would be violating federal law.  Under the federal Mammogram Quality Standards Act, administered by HHS, “[n]o facility may conduct an examination or procedure…involving mammography” without a certification from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. 

Falsehood: President Obama stated that, under Obamacare, “if you like your healthcare plan, you will be able to keep your healthcare plan. Period. No one will take it away, no matter what.” 

Fact: Obamacare eliminates life-affirming choices from the health insurance market. In 2010, President Obama and his allies in Congress passed the most expansive healthcare bill in the history of the U.S. The Obama Administration’s implementation of that “healthcare reform” law now forces many women (and men) to purchase insurance that covers abortions and life-ending drugs and devices regardless of their deeply held — and constitutionally protected — conscientious beliefs. Forcing Americans to pay for an agenda is not choice. Punishing them with onerous fines if they do not submit is not freedom. Dozens of lawsuits have been filed against Obamacare’s anti-life mandates that violate federal law and American's First Amendment Freedom of Conscience. Real healthcare respects life and the foundational American principle of freedom of conscience.

Falsehood: President Obama also stated that  “[h]ow women succeed in the workplace” is contingent upon forcing health insurance coverage of life-ending drugs.

Fact: President Obama’s comments, that women somehow need “contraception” (and need it to be paid for by others) in order to succeed, are not only offensive, but untrue. He is including some life-ending drugs in his definition of contraception. The true empowerment of women is not dependent on the ability to end pregnancy. As Governor Romney noted: “What we can do to help young women and women of all ages is to have a strong economy, so strong that employers that are looking to find good employees…and adapting to a flexible work schedule that gives women opportunities that they would otherwise not be able to afford.” 

Falsehood: The highly profitable abortion industry and its titular leader, Planned Parenthood, require taxpayer support.

Fact: Planned Parenthood receives over $1.3 million each day from the American taxpayer, a grand total of over $487 million a year — and this continues as our country is facing a $16 trillion debt. We know that 7 out of 10 Americans — self-described as “pro-life” and “pro-choice” — do not want their tax dollars being used for abortion. And yet President Obama was willing to shut down the federal government rather than see any cutin federal subsidies to the nation’s largest abortion provider.

Writing in The Corner at National Review, Dr. Yoest observed, “It’s really a shame that in these debates we never get to ask a direct question to the President himself about his record on abortion. The question I’d ask if I could is this: Mr. President, is there not a single limit on abortion that you would support? Not even one?” 

For more analysis on the debates from Dr. Yoest, click here.

Two Open Letters from my wife, Dr. Elisa Kolk, to Vice President Biden

My wife has written two very articulate and vital letters to our current Vice President Joseph Biden because, firstly, his stance on abortion in politics is patently both hypocritical and absurd, and secondly, to put it simply, he lied through his teeth at the VP debate. I would love to say that he misrepresented the truth, but since there wasn't even a thread of reality in that about which he said, "This is a fact. This is a fact." calling it a misrepresentation would be a lie, and I will not lie. In case you don't see the illogic of Biden's ridiculous stance that, as my wife paraphrased it, "I'm personally opposed to abortion, but I won't impose that view on others," see her first letter. In case you don't know the facts about the HHS Mandate and thus didn't realize that Biden was lying through his teeth about it, please read my wife's second letter. If you intend to be an informed voter this November, I sincerely hope you'll read these letters so as to keep from being swayed by falsehood. Only the truth can keep this great nation free.