Posts made in March, 2014

Preparing for Lent

Posted by popemichael on Mar 1, 2014 in Pope Michael, Sanctification | 1 comment

Lent

March 5^th sees the beginning of the holy season of Lent. We shouldn’t need to remind anyone of the fast laws of the Catholic Church. (We have reproduced these below.) We cannot consider the mere observance of the fast laws during Lent as sufficient penance. No, Lent is a time for penance and detachment from the world.

We have been reading Summa of the Christian Life, volume 2. We strongly recommend this set of books for spiritual reading. We will be scanning in this whole chapter on Growth in Charity, but would like to quote a few things: “Although there are countless created goods that man may seek inordinately, St. John reduces them to three: wealth, honor, and bodily pleasure.” None of us are seeking the religious life for wealth, for the Church is truly a non-profit organization. We must consider the other two, honor and pleasure.

“By bodily pleasure is understood all those things which the senses of the body may take pleasure. Thus, the eyes naturally delight in the beautiful colors in paintings, tapestries, clothing or the beauties of nature as well as the beauty of the dance or theatrical spectacles, or any kind of visible beauty.” We must mortify our eyes in this age where they are assaulted by many things we should not see. We must be especially on the guard against the immodesty that will soon return with warmer weather. Also we should put away theatrical spectacles, such as the television this Lent.

“Man’s natural curiosity to know and to see all things is satisfied by many books, much visiting and conversation, and other such things.” Our books and conversations should be on holy things. There is much to distract us today and we cannot feed the vice of curiosity, but must feed the virtue of studiousness. Curiosity killed the cat and also kills the soul.

“Under honor are included such things as offices, dignities, titles, privileges, authority, exemptions, and all other things that are related to worldly honor.” Following Jesus Christ and His Church tend to lead us away from all of these things. However, we must be on the guard against seeking any special treatment in the Church. Ours is to do God’s will as expressed by our superiors. We should not seek a promotion, for the Church will promote when the Church believes a person is ready for such a promotion.

Lent is a time of spiritual spring cleaning. It is time to reexamine our conscience and see where we have let things slide over the past year, since last Lent. Let us consider that we are called to be the salt of the earth, to be saints. We are called to give a good example and lead people to the truth more by our actions than by our words. Let us remember that actions speaks louder than words and talk is cheap. We must live the Catholic way of life, not just preach it.

Forward to a Friend

W e have received a recommendation that everyone forward this to a friend. How long does it take to his the forward button? We are asked to forward things all of the time. Usually we ignore the recommendation, because the material is not that interesting. But consider, if we forwarded the truth to our friends. It may get them thinking as well.

If you received this and would like to be added to the email list, email Us at thetruepope@gmail.com.

Documentary

It has been recommended that We add a link to the documentary Pope Michael Film. http://popemichaelfilm.com/ We would like to note that it is not Our documentary. Adam Fairholm and two other students came from Notre Dame to interview Us for a school project in 2007. After he graduated, Adam contacted Us to propose the idea of making a documentary. The documentary was a completely independent project. We had not editorial control over the project.

Contact Pope Michael

We can be contacted in many ways. We gave Our email above. Snail mail is

Office of Pope Michael

829 NE Chester

Topeka KS 66616-1352

We do not give out Our phone number for random publication. If you wish to speak by telephone, We can arrange that. We also have Skype. You should email to set up an appointment, because We do not have Skype active very often. Our Skype name is PopeMichael.

Our original website was the Vatican In Exile. It is still operating, but remains rather static at the moment. http://vaticaninexile.com/

We are posting these spiritual conferences and other things at the Pope Speaks http://pope-speaks.com/

W are slowly working on Our autobiography at Pope Michael. http://www.pope-michael.com/ When We originally sought a website domain name, We did not even consider using pope-michael, because this is not about Us. This is about God’s holy Church. However, later on We ran into a person who is cyber-squatting, that is reserving and running a domain in another person’s name. He did not ever open up a domain under Our name, but he has with other people.

Fast and Abstinence Laws

1. On days of Fast, only one full meal is allowed. Two other meatless meals may be taken according to one’s needs; but together they should not equal another full meal.
2. On days of Partial Abstinence, meat and soup or gravy from meat may be taken once a day at the principal meal, even by those not obliged to fast.
3. On days of complete abstinence, no meat or meat soup or gravy may be taken.
4. Those not obliged to fast may eat meat several times on fast days which are not abstinence days of any kind.

Let us remember that the laws of fasting and abstinence bind under pain of serious sin. Jesus said: “Unless you do penance, you shall all likewise perish.” (Luke 13:3,5) Jesus fasted forty days and forty nights. The saints fasted and so should we.

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