Pentecost Novena - 1

    Now is the time to pray to Pentecost Novena. What is a novena? Why should we pray it?

Here's an explanation from The Church's Most Powerful Novenas by Michael Dubruiel

A novena is a challenging form of prayer. Whereas the recitation of the prayer or a set of prayers may be easy, doing it for nine consecutive days is not. Our lives are crowded and it is often easy to let the prayer pass. I like to think of the practice of praying a novena as setting the ground-work for a life of prayer. Consider the possible benefits of praying a novena besides the actual requests that one mentions in them. 

1. Praying a novena can help you develop the habit of praying daily. Our lives are filled with ritual from the time we get up in the morning: the route we take to work and home again, how we spend our evenings, and the usual time we go to bed. Day in and out the pat-tern is repeated. Is prayer a part of that daily rou-tine? Praying a novena for nine consecutive days can set a pattern of prayer in our lives that can create a daily habit of prayer. 

Feast of the Ascension

     

The first reading at Mass, from the Acts of the Apostles: 

In the first book, Theophilus,
I dealt with all that Jesus did and taught
until the day he was taken up,
after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit
to the apostles whom he had chosen.
He presented himself alive to them
by many proofs after he had suffered,
appearing to them during forty days
and speaking about the kingdom of God.
While meeting with the them,
he enjoined them not to depart from Jerusalem,
but to wait for “the promise of the Father
about which you have heard me speak;
for John baptized with water,
but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

When they had gathered together they asked him,
“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”
He answered them, “It is not for you to know the times or seasons
that the Father has established by his own authority.
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you,
and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem,
throughout Judea and Samaria,
and to the ends of the earth.”
When he had said this, as they were looking on,
he was lifted up, and a cloud took him from their sight.
While they were looking intently at the sky as he was going,
suddenly two men dressed in white garments stood beside them.
They said, “Men of Galilee,
why are you standing there looking at the sky?
This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven
will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven.”

Books by Michael Dubruiel

Free Catholic Book

   

From How to Get the Most Out of the Eucharist by Michael Dubruiel - free today

About Michael Dubruiel

Chapter 1 - Serve, Part 1

“You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.”

M ATTHEW 4:10

In my home parish, St. John the Baptist in Fort Wayne, Indiana, the words Parate Viam Domini are inscribed over the front doors. The two years of Latin that I had in college and my knowledge of Scripture are enough for me to figure out that the message greeting me each Sunday are the words of St. John the Baptist in the desert, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” It is an excellent message to set the tone for the mystery that is about to be celebrated.

PREPARATION

I remember how differently I approached the Mass when as a young man I began to serve at the Eucharist as an altar boy. Before I could serve for the first time, I had to attend training sessions so that I knew what gestures and movements I was to make, and had to study the Latin responses so that I could answer the prayers of the priest at the appropriate time.Sometimes school was sacrificed so that I could serve a funeral mass,or a Saturday afternoon so that the priest could be attended to as he witnessed the marriage vows of a couple celebrating the Sacrament of Matrimony.

The thought and preparation that went into serving at the Eucharist required a sacrifice on my part but kept me focused on why I was there. Adults who serve as lectors, ushers, extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist,and choir members often mention feeling similar sentiments when they first take on these acts of service. Yet with time we are all apt to find ourselves going through the motions without much preparation and indeed without much thought about the fact that we are serving God in our respective roles at the Eucharist, and this inattentiveness is to our detriment. Making preparations is the work of a servant, and in the celebration of the Eucharist it is the work of every disciple of Christ.

Free Catholic Book

  

From How to Get the Most Out of the Eucharist by Michael Dubruiel - free today

       

    

Jesus told a parable about what happens when a storm comes that lashes out against our very lives (see Matthew 7:24–27). He said that the wise person builds his house (his life) on solid ground,on rock (the image that he used to speak about his church and Peter). The foolish person builds on sand and is destroyed by the storms of life.

The work of building the foundation on which our lives depend takes place every time we participate in the Eucharist. While I was putting the finishing touches on this book I traveled to Florida, right after Hurricane Frances had made a direct hit near Stuart, Florida. I had been scheduled to give a talk in nearby Palm Beach Gardens two days after the storm had hit.The talk was canceled because the church, St. Patrick’s, was without power, but I had the opportunity to meet with the pastor of the parish, Father Brian Flanagan, and some of the parish staff. In the midst of much devastation what remains vivid in my mind is how peaceful everyone there was. I know Father Brian to be a man whose deep faith is rooted in the Eucharist, and what I experienced in those days immediately following Hurricane Frances was a literal exposition of Jesus’s parable — the storm had come,but because the lives of the people I met were built on solid rock, they were not destroyed.

Isn’t this what we all want, a joy that the world cannot take away, no matter what might happen? Our Lord offers it to us at every Eucharist. It is my hope that this small book will help you to better experience this joy, and to discover the richness the Lord’s Eucharistic presence can add to your life.

About Michael Dubruiel

Free Catholic Book

       

From How to Get the Most Out of the Eucharist by Michael Dubruiel - free today

I was giving a talk at a Catholic parish in rural Ohio a few years ago about the topic of this book.When I had concluded my presentation someone asked,“Why do people care so little about their faith today?”

I told them of a man, a non-Catholic, I had known who cared little about his faith but attended Mass every week with his Catholic wife because he wanted to make her happy. He did this for years, to the point that several priests tried to convince him that he should convert to the Catholic faith since he had been attending the Eucharist for so many years. He refused.

Then he was diagnosed with bone cancer. His condition deteriorated rapidly. In a few months he went from being robust and strong to bedridden and totally dependent upon others.He called for a priest, who heard his first confession and then offered the Eucharist at his bedside, where he received his First Holy Communion. In the last months of his life, his Catholic faith was all that mattered to him.

This led a woman in the group to recall an incident when a tornado had wiped out her family’s farm and the family had sat huddled together in the storm cellar, praying the Rosary. At that moment their faith had mattered more than anything else in the world to them.

Someone else mentioned that in the weeks following the 9/11 terrorist attacks on this country he had noticed more people in the Church and more fervency in the way people seemed to pray.

Our faith is a matter of life and death and our faith is totally centered on Jesus Christ.The Scriptures reveal that Jesus did not leave us as orphans but founded a Church. He made the very human apostle Peter the first leader of this Church. He left a memorial of his saving death in the Eucharist and commanded his disciples to perform it.

Getting the most out of the Eucharist is an urgent task, then, because our very life depends upon Christ, and Jesus comes to us in the celebration of his passion, death, and resurrection at every Eucharist. Jesus said that he is the vine and that we are the branches. In the Eucharist we receive the very life that connects us to Christ the Vine.

About Michael Dubruiel

Michael Dubruiel's Pocket Guide to the Mass

    

The Gospel readings at Mass during this time are focusing on the Eucharist via John, chapter 6.  Why not follow the Church's lead and learn more about the Mass during this time?

From Michael Dubruiel, in 2007:

I have written a lot about the Mass--without ever really intending to do so. First, I wrote about the Mass in The How-To Book of the Mass: Everything You Need to Know but No One Ever Taught You--this book has done so well that I was asked to write a follow-up to it. That book How To Get The Most Out Of The Eucharist, probably should have been titled "How to Offer Your Sacrifice at Every Mass." Then this year, A Pocket Guide to the Mass, which is part of the "A Pocket Guide" series. Each book is different and offers a slightly different way to open oneself up to the riches that are being bestowed upon us by fulfilling the Lord's command to "Do this." Thanks to everyone who has read any of the three and offered very positive reviews of them.

Michael Dubruiel: The Pocket Guide to the Mass

    Michael Dubruiel's Pocket Guide to the Mass - a sample page. 

Walks you through the Mass, explaining the biblical basis of prayers, the meaning behind gestures, and a brief overview of the spirituality that brings Catholics together for Eucharist each week.

Published in 2007, still in print. 

An excellent resource for your parish for the Eucharistic Revival year. 

More books by Michael Dubruiel