Mirror 0917 by Aid to the Church in Need

Aid to the Church in Need

MIRROR GIVE JOY, GIVE HOPE

The Heart of the Fatima Message

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

MIRROR GIVE JOY, GIVE HOPE

CONTENTS PAGE ACN and Fatima................................................................................... J F Declan Quinn.................................... 1 ACN is at the Heart of the Fatima Message ....................... Fr. Martin Barta....................................... 2 Do whatever He tells you............................................................... Card. Mauro Piacenza.......................... 4 The only reason for the Church to Exist................................ Ditto............................................................. 6 Mass Offering for a Suffering People............................................................................................................ 8 What really counts in God’s Eyes.............................................. Card. Mauro Piacenza....................... 10 Defending Life, The Family and Civilisation Itself........... Ditto.......................................................... 11 Like a Rosary in the Hands of the Church ............................................................................................. 12 Christianity is Joy Peace and Love.......................................... Card. Mauro Piacenza....................... 14 Sharing the Joy of the Redemption........................................................................................................... 16 The Church and the Cross............................................................ Card. Mauro Piacenza....................... 18 Let us Pray to Our Lady of Fatima............................................ Ditto.......................................................... 22 Forever Grateful and Loyal........................................................... Lebanon................................................. 24 Come to Jesus......................................................................................................................................................... 26

‘Mary is so full of love, that no one who asks for her help is rejected, no matter how sinful he may be.’ SAINT LOUIS DE MONTFORT

Editor: Jürgen Liminski. Publisher: ACN International, Postfach 1209, 61452 Königstein, Germany. De licentia competentis auctoritatis ecclesiasticae. Printed in Ireland - ISSN 0252-2535. www.acninternational.org

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ACN AND FATIMA A chairde,

peaking about Joy, Pope Benedict XVI affirmed that ‘Joy is at the heart of Christian experience.’ and highlighted that it is ‘the Church’s vocation to bring Joy to the world, a joy that is authentic and enduring’. Speaking the about the times we are in, he then points out that ‘in these difficult times, ...people... need to hear the Christian message… a message of Joy and Hope!’ Fully embracing this theme, Pope Francis exhorts each of us, always and everywhere, to proclaim by our words and our works, ‘the Joy of the Gospel’ and to do so especially in those places, and at those times to all those souls who are in greatest need Joy and Hope in their lives. As it happens, I am writing this short letter from Fatima on the not insignificant date 13th September where Aid to the Church in Need have come to commemorate the centenary of the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin. At Fatima, Our Lady told the little shepherds that ‘if (only) men knew what Eternity is, they would do everything to change their lives’. Here Our Blessed Lady was reminding us, that every one of us have a choice to make:

Do we want to live lives of authentic Joy and invincible Hope, lives which are rooted in the Eternal Truth, the Revealed Truth, the Truth of Faith? or Do we wish to be the victim of intellectual fashion, political whims, ideological manipulation? Fashion of course is ephemeral, it does not last. Faith in the God-Man however is eternal and it is upon the rock of Faith, this deposit of Faith, that we ground our Hope: the invincible Hope which is the well-spring of our authentic Joy. Dear Friends it is truly a great grace and a great Joy to pray for you, your families, (past, present and to come) during these privileged days in Fatima. St. Pope John Paul II reminds us that the call to prayer lies at the very heart of the message of Fatima, a ‘message which is addressed to every human being.’ So let us pray for each other and for all those many many souls the world over who need to discover Joy and Hope in their lives.

Beir Beannacht

J F Declan Quinn Director, Aid to the Church in Need (Ire)

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THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

ACN IS AT THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE Dear Friends,

CN would have been impossible without the apparitions of our Blessed Lady in Fatima. ACN follows the ‘spiritual strategy’ given by the Queen of the Rosary in Fatima to combat the great evil of militant atheism and thus bring peace to the world. ‘If you listen to what I say, there will be peace,’ declared the Holy Virgin in 1917. Her prophetic words – along with the worldwide act of consecration – are still of critical importance 100 years later. Pope Pius XII even described the apparitions in Fatima as ‘the greatest intervention by God in the history of mankind since the death of the Apostles’. Through the shepherd children of Fatima’s visions of Mary, God wanted to save the world

from the catastrophe of the Second World War and from atheistic communism. But the message of Fatima met with lukewarm faith – and we are still suffering from the consequences of our unwillingness to hear it: the persecution of Christians, huge numbers leaving the faith, moral decadence on a scale never seen before and conflicts in every part of the world – with the threat of nuclear war again hanging over us. As Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI said in his homily in Fatima (on May 13th 2010): ‘Anyone who believes that the prophetic mission of Fatima is completed, is mistaken’. Pope Saint John Paul II when he consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary wrote: ‘Today, as never before, mankind stands at a crossroads… We possess instruments of unheard-of power. We can transform this world into a garden, or reduce it to a heap of ashes,’ Our Lady has given us simple, supernatural tools so that we help transform the world into a ‘garden’, tools that even children can use, as the three shepherd children of Fatima showed us. And what are these tools?

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Daily Rosary, Consecration to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, Communion of Reparation on the first Saturday of each month, and the offering of our daily trials – which we embrace for the love of God , for reparation of sins, the conversion of sinners and to console the heart of God. In short, a path of penance and conversion. In this sense ACN is at the heart of the Fatima message. Dear friends, by holding an international pilgrimage to Fatima on our own 70th anniversary we wanted to reinforce the union between our work and the message of Fatima and renew our own consecration to the Mother of God. May the month of October, the month of the Holy Rosary, provide new impetus for us to pray and strive still more faithfully to fulfil Our Lady’s wishes. As Pope Francis assured us in Fatima: ‘Under her mantle we are not lost; from her embrace will come the hope and the peace that we desire…’

With my grateful blessing on you all

Father Martin M. Barta, ACN Ecclesiastical Assistant

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THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

DO WHATEVER HE TELLS YOU1

oday the Blessed Virgin’s words continue to echo and remind us of the certainty of Christian Truth as a constant and reliable point of reference for all of our lives. She who is ‘full of grace’ repeats to us ‘Do whatever He tells you’ and invites us to use our intelligence, informed by our conscience, to discern the signs of the times and do the right things. Again and again she repeats ‘Do whatever He tells you’. Again and again she invites us to acknowledge her Son and to recognise that the fullness of God, the fullness of the Divinity, is alive in the flesh and blood of the God-Man, Jesus of Nazareth. Yes, we know that whoever recognises that Jesus is God made Man, is someone who comes from God and the Holy Spirit lives in him. (cf.1 John 2:22). Conversely whoever

denies or hides the singular mystery of the Incarnation is not of God. The first thing then that the Madonna asks us to do is to accept this precise act of faith from which everything else follows. We thank you, Our Lady of Fatima, for you always remind us of how the core of our faith is the recognition that Jesus of Nazareth is Lord and Christ, the centre of the universe and of history (cf. Acts 4:12). Faced with passing fashions, with all the corruption of the true faith, all the world’s monotonously repetitive attempts to ‘reduce’ the mystery of Christ, we acknowledge that there is no other God but the One and Triune God, and only in Jesus Christ is there salvation. Today, in the current cultural context and occasionally even in the ecclesial context, acknowledging this is truly prophetic. So it is that in repeating ‘do whatever He tells you’, Mary is in fact inviting us to be prophets. Not only is she is inviting us to repeat her words at Cana in an attitude of humble obedience to Divine Revelation, but she is asking us to allow the Holy Spirit to shape our hearts 1 Edited and adapted from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 13 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70 anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need.

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and our minds so that this sanctification may sustain our efforts that our entire existence may become ‘prophetic,’ and just as in Cana, a proclamation of Christ, of His presence, and of the salvation that He brings. Certainly today, in an old and tired Europe, we have to acknowledge that being a true believer and one who accepts Divine Revelation in its entirety is to be counter cultural – and as a result we will be mocked from certain quarters. In which regard, the words of the Sermon on the Mount come to mind ‘Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you [falsely] because of me’ (Mt 5:11). Precisely for this reason it is a prophetic act to proclaim the truth of the Lamb of God, that sacrificed itself to carry the sins of the world without uttering a word.

Such prophetic acts are a gift of the Holy Spirit and require the gift of fortitude. Ultimately, such behaviour is one of the most obvious expressions of the ‘vicarious atonement’ which Fatima reminds us that Christians must learn to undertake in relation to Humanity: the prayer and penance which through charity flows through the veins of the Mystical Body. Thank you, Our Lady of Fatima, you support us as you did your Son as we ascend Calvary, you help us in the difficult challenge of bearing witness, thank you for with us and for us, you continue to ‘crush the snake’s head’ which is always undermining the truth of faith with lies, and the purity of life with temptations and compromises. For two thousand years, through the action of the Church and in particular through the celebration of the Most Holy Eucharist, knowledge of the singularity of Christ has reverberated in the world in which the Church affirms and sees accomplished ‘all that she herself is and all that she herself believes’.2 So it is then that ‘Do whatever He tells you’ anticipates the Last Supper when Jesus commanded the Apostles to ‘Do this in memory of me.’ •

2 Dei Verbum, No. 8.

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THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

THE ONLY REASON FOR THE CHURCH TO EXIST3

earest Brothers and Sisters, let us be vigilant in order that the ‘good wine’ of our faith does not run out and that the ‘good wine’ of our faith is not watered down by excessive worldliness, by its yielding to the seductions of the world and the dictatorship of ‘political correctness’ which is being widely promoted and which relentlessly seeks to underline our sense of the mystical.

celebrations, then the Church would lose her identity and as Pope Francis has warned, it would be reduced to being merely a nongovernmental organisation.

Let us never permit our Eucharistic celebrations to become ‘weddings without the Bridegroom’: that is, nondescript banquets of some commonplace celebration at which Christ the protagonist, the only Bridegroom of the Church, is absent. Dear friends, were this to be so, were the Bridegroom to be absent, the Bride would no longer be a bride. Were Christ not to be central in our Eucharistic

To point to Christ and to invite men to fulfil His Will is precisely the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Indeed, there is no one who believes in Christ and loves Him more than she does, just as there is no one who loves the Blessed Virgin Mary more than her Son Jesus Christ.

Thank you, Our Lady of Fatima, because in this Eucharistic celebration we repeat again: ‘Do whatever He tells you’ and we obey the Lord’s command: ‘Do this in memory of me.’

‘Mary’s mission’ is expressed and is historically realised in this unique and unrepeatable relationship between Mother and Son, it is expressed and fulfilled in doing the Father’s Will, which began with the ‘Here I am’ of the Annunciation and has never ceased. In fact, the Blessed One among women is the Woman of the ‘Here I am,’ the one who pronounces her ‘Here I am’ for eternity, even in the glory of Heaven. In summary, we can almost say that the ‘Here I Am’ belongs to Marian Ontology: The 3 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 13 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70 anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need.

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Blessed Virgin was created to pronounce in love and freedom ‘Here I am.’ For this reason, for her total submission to the Divine Will, the ‘Ever Virgin’ has the authority and the power to say, ‘Do whatever He tells you’. She herself is the full expression of the Divine Will. For this reason, we ourselves are sure that by obeying Mary’s invitation, Christ will also transform the water of our amphorae into excellent wine. So it is that we are confident that offering to the Lord, the ‘amphorae’ of our lives, filled with the water of our freedom, He will refill them with ‘good wine’, with the wine of salvation, the wine of celebration and of joy, with that real sacramental presence that sees in the Eucharist the Lord’s greatest fulfilment. In fact, there is no more complete or significant manifestation of God’s presence on earth than that of the Eucharist. In it, again and again, Christ gives Himself to the world; Christ gives Himself to each one of us. In it, again and again, He becomes the sole support of the life of the Church, the only food of the people walking in the desert, the only reason for which the Church exists and journeys as a pilgrim through time. If in the Eucharist, Christ gives himself, again and again to humanity, then the One who once and for all gave Christ to the world cannot be absent from any Eucharistic celebration. •

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MASS OFFERINGS FOR A SUFFERING PEOPLE ‘Oh, how great is the priest! If he understood himself, he would die... God obeys him. He utters two sentences, and at his word the Lord descends from heaven and encloses Himself in a tiny host.’

difficult in Venezuela today. The country is in chaos. Until now ACN has not been asked for too much help. But now there are food shortages, and medicine is practically unobtainable. Sometimes they don’t even have a chapel to celebrate in.

ean Marie Vianney, the holy Curé of Ars, lived out the priestly mystery to the point of physical exhaustion. He spent countless hours in the confessional, often up to 16 hours a day. Right up to the end he sought to bring heaven and earth together through forgiveness and the Blessed Eucharist. He is the patron saint and pattern of all priests.

Father Milton Correa celebrates Holy Mass in the street, in a small town on Margarita Island, and the faithful kneel reverently in the dust when he elevates the Host. A sharp contrast to the violence in the country. He also thanks you for your Mass stipends, which help him to survive and continue his ministry.

Ramón Moya also wants to offer up his life for others. He has spinal cancer, and following surgery is now undergoing chemotherapy. But he continues to celebrate the Holy Mass. And thanks to your Mass stipends, he is able to pay for his medication. This is exceptionally

Your offerings are a source of hope for the 14 priests in Margarita, once a tourist paradise but now utterly impoverished. You are helping these priests with your stipends and they in turn are using them to help the poorest in their parishes. •

Via crucis in Venezuela: the priest brings heaven and earth together.

Jean Marie Vianney:‘Without the sacrament of Ordination we would not have the Lord.’

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Fatima’s 100th Anniversary and ACN’s 70th ‘There is no more complete or significant manifestation of God’s presence on earth than that of the Eucharist’ CARDINAL MAURO PIACENZA

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

WHAT REALLY COUNTS IN GOD’S EYES4

t Fatima, Our Blessed Lady sought to urge men and women

to pray, to do penance, to convert and to prepare them for the future...

...prophesying and pointing to the struggles and hardships, the crosses and battles that all souls, and with them the Church that lives in souls, are called to endure. As authoritatively taught by an unbroken Magisterium in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Faith tells us that the end of history will occur at a time of suffering for the Church, at a time of kenosis and poverty of faith.5

So it is that at Fatima Our Lady repeats to the Church and to the world ‘Do whatever He tells you,’ so that no one will find themselves afflicted by the misfortune of being unprepared when the Lord returns. And here we should recall that although our lives are full of limitations and sinfulness, what really counts in God’s eyes are our constant exertions to be faithful, our unending efforts to ‘remain in Him’ in order to live and be fruitful.6 It is then that we discover an ocean of Divine Mercy. But we must not forget what Holy Scripture teaches: ‘The start of wisdom is fear of the Lord,’ always noting that the fear of God is one of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit.7 Thank you, Our Lady of Fatima, because, while you were taken up into the glory of Heaven, you did not abandon humanity; rather you continue to sustain and guide us on this pilgrimage which has as its objective the embracing of your Son and our remaining forever under your mantle. Thank you again for repeating ‘do whatever He tells you’ in this gathering of love, which is Fatima. •

4 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 13 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70 anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need 5 cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 677 6 Cf. Jn 15:4-7 7 Cf. Isa 11:2; CCC 1831

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DEFENDING LIFE, THE FAMILY AND CIVILISATION ITSELF8

earest brothers and sisters, let us free ourselves from all ties to sin, so that our lives, as deeply united with Christ, may reflect His presence in the world and that in this way, our kindness as ‘known to all’ may be the guiding principle and the driving force of our apostolate. Also let us as Christ’s Church respond with unity and purpose to the terrible attack on marriage and the family which has been unleashed worldwide as the final assault by the Evil One. As a letter from Sister Lúcia do Santos of Fatima clearly indicates, the Devil’s final attack will be directed towards the family, at that natural institution which was willed by the Creator, who created ‘male and female’ and ordered them to ‘be fertile and multiply’.9 From both a cultural and a juridical perspective this violent attack upon the family has no precedent and in it, the dragon of Revelation (i.e. the devil) is seeking the realisation of anti-creation. The Devil wants to be the anti-Creator by convincing mankind that anti-creation can be more beautiful, more enjoyable, and ultimately better than what God has created. 8 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 13 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need 9 Gen 1:27-28,

WHAT IS ANTI-CREATION? God created man in his image and likeness and placed him in that unmistakable two-as-one relationship between man and woman, which is the essential basis of life. The devil, for his part in his anti-creation, wants to destroy man by drowning him in the culture of death. Not content only with this, Satan wants to destroy the ‘place’ where this life vibrates, is transmitted and is formed: the family. The anti-creation that is taking place in the suppression of life is being echoed in the anticreation that is being realised in the cultural destruction of the family. Here today at Fatima, fulfilling God’s Will, discerning the Signs of the Times, means for us to resist! Resist with the strength of Faith and Charity! We are convinced that nothing is more prophetic, more modern, more countercultural than defending life, family, education, in the knowledge that today these are the real emergencies. Dear friends, the day will come when the world will thank the Church for fearlessly and uncompromisingly defending Life, the Family and Civilisation itself. •

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LIKE A ROSARY IN THE HANDS OF THE CHURCH 70 YEARS OF ACN

his year ACN is celebrating its 70th anniversary. At the promptings of various Popes our founder, Father Werenfried van Straaten expanded our apostolate of prayer and actions for the suffering Church. And over the years these prayers and actions have, so to speak, formed themselves into the beads which make up an enormous Rosary of Love for Christians throughout the world. Today ACN is a pontifical foundation, working in 150 different countries. But its goal is still the same as it has always been – to relieve suffering and lead people to God. To this end, Father Werenfried appealed to you, our benefactors, on innumerable occasions. At the turn of the new millennium he wrote: ‘Werenfried – a warrior for peace. I will readily admit to you that I have not always brought honour on this beautiful name, which I received as a novice, and that I have often failed in my programme of life. But as Pope John Paul II has said, God also gives us ‘the strength to fulfil what he asks of us’. As is clear from the many annual reports we have sent you we have, with God’s help, all of us achieved much together. Yet the heathens still mock us, and Satan is still the prince of this world. Peace is further away than we had hoped, following the collapse of communism.

Saved by the Rosary: Our Lady of Palo, Philippines. She holds the Child Jesus, who reaches down with the Rosary beads, saving a little child from Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda) in 2013.

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This is a reproach, and it concerns you and me. It means that we have not fought enough, not prayed enough, not sacrificed enough. It means that we must commit ourselves still more generously for peace, which is irreconcilable with injustice, oppression and our own sinfulness. It means that we – poor weak sinners that we are, who have so often betrayed our Lord – must step forward once more to do battle in this time. And we must do so as though it were the decisive battle.’ For over half a century Father Werenfried appealed to his benefactors in words like these. Only thanks to their help was he able to build up our charity.

Today, in our 70th year, peace is still far away and the persecution of Christians is fiercer than ever. But our benefactors are spiritual warriors, offering their prayers and sacrifices, participating in God’s plan of salvation, just as we all do when we take the Rosary in our hands. Right from the start Father Werenfried put his trust in the intercession of Our Lady. In Fatima Father Werenfried consecrated our charity to the Mother of God. Let us stand as witnesses to hope with the ‘woman clothed with the sun’ and pray for peace – ‘as though it were the decisive battle’. •

We now have national offices in 23 countries – but it is never enough to meet all the growing needs. We are receiving more and more requests and pleas for help. Often we are able to help, but more often than we like to we have to say no, with a heavy heart, because we have ‘not fought enough, not prayed enough, not sacrificed enough’.

Witness to FAITH in Niger: Mother Marie-Catherine Kingbo, caring for little ones.

Witness to HOPE in the Philippines: Archbishop John Forrosuelo Du of Palo, in front of the Basilica in Fatima.

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Witness to LOVE in Syria: Sister Annie Demerjian.

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

CHRISTIANITY IS JOY, PEACE AND LOVE10

ear friends, the Lord’s proclamation is unequivocal. It explicitly tells us that it is not enough to believe in Him in order to claim to be authentically Christian, but rather that all of us are called upon to see, embrace and enter into a new logic: the logic of the Cross. It is a logic that is based on the freedom of God, who gives His Only Son to humanity in the only way that makes it possible to free us from the grip of the evil one. As Pope Francis so often reminds us, the evil one is no mere allegory of evil but rather a real personal presence who acts in the world, causing grave harm to every individual and to society generally. 11

To a humanity enslaved by sin, crushed by the bite of a Satan thirsting for human blood, God sent His Son, who freely offered Himself in the place of men, who spilt His precious blood in exchange for that of men. In this admirable exchange, in this vicarious replacement, we find the heart of the history of salvation, capable of truly freeing man and definitively destroying the evil one.

10 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 14 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need 11 cf. CCC 395

‘If men knew what Eternity is, they would do everything to change their lives.’ OUR LADY OF FATIMA

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The historical fact of the bloody sacrifice that Christ made of Himself on the altar of the Cross demands our acceptance, not only in the doctrinal and ecclesial domain, but also in the sphere of our own moral and human existence. In the doctrinal and ecclesial domain it is more urgent than ever to keep before our eyes the Mysterium Crucis12 whenever we attempt to understand, present and re-present the essence of our faith. Christianity is Joy, Peace and Love – only because Christ was lifted from the earth, only because the Blood of Eternal Life and the Water of Salvation gushed out from His pierced side.

12 13

There is no Love that does not gush forth from Christ’s pierced side! There is no Joy that does not gush forth from Christ’s pierced side! There is no Peace that is not conquered for man by the Cross of Christ. ‘Christus Pax nostra!’13 proclaims the Apostle, who well understood the centrality of the Cross. •

‘The Mystery of the Cross’ ‘Christ is our Peace’ Eph 2:14

‘The Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life’ cf. Jn 3:14-15

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SHARING THE JOY OF THE REDEMPTION 'The charity of works lends unmistakable efficacy to the charity of words', wrote Pope Saint John Paul II. Both these things, words and works, are the essence of mission. And it is particularly in the area of works that we can help.

ometimes these works consist in enabling the presence of priests. The indigenous peoples of the diocese of Jinotega, in Nicaragua, have been waiting a whole year for a priest to come. But they can only be reached by water. The priests of the diocese would be only too happy to undertake the boat journey, three or four times a year and bring the strength of the sacraments – and especially the Eucharist – to the waiting faithful of the Miskito and Mayangna peoples in their 31 villages. Indeed,

as one of the missionaries, Father Cristobal Gadea observes, ‘Our mission is by no means a one-way street. We can learn a great deal from their deep, natural faith.’ But the old motor on their boat is getting increasingly unreliable, and maintaining it is becoming too expensive. They don’t have the money for a new motor, they barely have enough to afford to hire a boat. Bishop Carlos Enrique Gutierrez told us: ‘We have sold the still usable parts of the old motor. We have two boats without motors, a small one and a large one, to suit the size of the team. Two new motors – a small one and a powerful one are needed as is financial help for fuel and spare parts...’

Nicaragua: The boat is waiting. With medicine and also with the priest.

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Their closeness to the people gave them comfort and showed the truth of their words. But the continuing warfare has forced the people to flee and destroyed the small mission outpost. So the Sisters have followed the refugees to Uganda. Here they have found temporary refuge with their fellow Comboni Sisters – but they are over 100 miles (170 km) from the refugee camps – too far away to be able to continue their work.

'There I am among you': a procession with the Blessed Sacrament.

The bishop has a fervent devotion to the Mother of God. His letters have a printed motto at the foot of each page: ¡Quien Causa tanta alegría! … ¡La Inmaculada Concepción de María! (‘What causes such deep affection – Mary’s Immaculate Conception!’).

A modest house nearby with a water tank, solar panels and a gas cooker would cost more then they can afford. Such a little house would help nurture the refugees’ faith. The Comboni Sisters have asked our help, so that they can be close to the people and – despite the circumstances – share the Joy of the Redemption with them. We have promised them the help they need, so that they can live closer to the refugees and bring the loving charity of God to them. •

We are only too happy to help, so that his priests can more often share the joy of the redemption with the Miskito and Mayangna peoples. Sometimes the work of charity involves going out to the people and living alongside them. In Kajokeji, in South Sudan, three Comboni Sisters have spent several years carrying out missionary work, even in time of war, when it was particularly needed.

South Sudan: Comboni Sisters staying close to the refugees.

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THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

THE CHURCH AND THE CROSS14

Christianity without the Cross, fearful of contemplating the Cross, of preaching it, or which in practice marginalises it, would fall into the absurdity of a Christianity without Christ. And in so doing we would fall into the very dangerous confusion of idealism. The same is true for the Church, which has been called for two thousand years not only to contemplate the Crucified, but also – as we do today – to celebrate Him, to exalt the Holy Cross – obviously not as an instrument of torture or out of an insane devotion to pain, but rather as a historical place for the recapitulation of all things in Christ and as a necessary way to arrive at the victory of the Resurrection and the fullness of love, peace and joy, won for us by Christ and given as a gift to man. Only a Church that is fully aware of the centrality of the mystery of the Cross will have the necessary vitality to recognise all the crucified ones of our own time and, with the help of Grace, to become like Simon of Cyrene for them. The Church is not called to solve all the problems of humanity, it is not called to eliminate the Cross from the lives of men, and still less to erase its memory from human history.

14 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 14 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need.

The Church is the inn where the Good Samaritan accompanies the wounded pilgrim! The Church is like Simon of Cyrene, who helps Christ carry the Cross but does not prevent him from dying crucified! The Church is to be found in the apostle He loved, who at the foot of the Cross contemplates the Master, without understanding everything but continuing to love passionately. The Church is above all represented by the Sorrowful Virgin whom, God willing, we shall celebrate tomorrow and who, full of compassion, takes into her arms the Body of the Crucified One, surrounds Him with her overflowing maternal love, and venerates Him with loving trepidation in expectation of the Resurrection. The Church is fully contained in the passionate devotion of the women, who in the morning hasten to the sepulchre, expecting to find a body and instead becoming proclaimers of the Resurrection. The Church is in the running of Peter and John, a running that never stops and which enables us even today, in contemplating the Crucifixion and the empty Sepulchre, to tell the world that we have seen and have believed: ‘And he saw and believed’ (Jn 20:8).

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For all these reasons, in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass we implore that the Church may always be permeated by the dimension of the Cross of Christ, whose expiatory value shines especially brightly in the messages of Fatima, which see a struggling Church, besieged and seemingly crushed by evil, but all enveloped in the salvific Love of Christ and the beating maternal heart of Mary, who is the perfect Icon of the Church. Let us remember that it is never possible to separate the Church from the Cross, to separate Christ from the Cross, to separate Man from the Cross. The Church will be faithful to God and faithful to men only by proclaiming the historical fact of a salvation that passes through the Cross, learning always and again to express the logic of the Cross in all the fabric of her own being and doing. All the great topics, from family to ecology, from evangelisation to faith, can be seen in no other way than in the logic of the Cross, a logic of offering and sacrifice, of atonement and death, to reach the glory of the Resurrection, the total fulfilment of the Cross. â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Per Crucem ad lucem!â&#x20AC;&#x2122; 11 Hence this centrality of the Cross, and of the Crucified one, also becomes the light and standard whereby we must evaluate, increase, and enliven our life as Christians. We cannot delude ourselves that we can be Christians without contemplating the Crucified One. On the contrary, a Christianity without the Cross would be reduced to a generic GIVE JOY, GIVE HOPE

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

collection of moral rules, devoid of attraction and meaning, and thus uselessly proclaimed and never realised. There is no reason to love all our brothers and sisters, except in the Crucified one! There is no reason to love ourselves, except in the Crucified one! There is no reason to pray for sinners, as Fatima invites us to do, except in the Crucified one! There is no reason to continue to hope, again and always, except that God became Man and died for us, for everyone, with no one excluded! The Cross is thus the foundation and the reason for our own Christian existence. 11

We look upon the Crucifix with the wondering gaze of the Apostle John, knowing that we too are the disciples whom Jesus loved. With tearful eyes, but firm and full of faith, we look towards the Blessed Virgin Mary, in whose grieving and Immaculate Heart we feel gently protected. Every time life crucifies us, every time our brothers crucify us, every time illness, misunderstanding, loneliness, marginalisation, and betrayal crucify us, we are in Mary’s Heart, because that is where the Cross of her Son always finds room, because within her maternal Heart even her Son found the support he needed to climb Calvary. Only in this awareness can there be a new flourishing of humanity and a radical renewal of our way of thinking, and hence of doing. Christian morality can be described, quite simply, as fidelity to the Cross!

‘Through the Cross to the Light’.

Aid to the Church in Need

YEARS OF AID TO THE CHURCH IN NEED

It means living while bearing constantly before our eyes the Crucified Christ, imploring the wisdom always to choose to suffer rather than cause suffering, to die rather than kill, to accept rather than reject, to love, love and love again. Christ’s promise to draw all men to Himself when he is lifted up from the earth is certainly not the vague raving of someone sentenced to death. It is the sure promise of the new logic that the Cross carries within itself. It is the promise of the fascination that the Cross exercises over the hearts and minds of men, over their very existence, because the Cross is the only possible response to the mystery of human suffering.

We all need Someone to die for love of us, Someone who loves us so radically as to be willing to give his life for us. Jesus Christ has done this for you, for me, for each one of us, and it is this Love, this act of total giving which, lifted up from the earth and thus made visible to all men, draws them, draws them to Christ, becoming a tremendous and fascinating mystery. The task of the Church and of each of us, powerfully outlined and sustained here in Fatima, is to show the Crucified One to the world, to continue to raise up the Cross of Christ over the world. The Church, in this Centenary Year of the Apparitions of Fatima, is called to raise up the Cross of Christ, as the only banner in which humanity can find peace, can find salvation. ‘Stat Crux dum volvitur orbis!’ 15 •

In fact, human suffering cannot be eliminated, and any attempt to eliminate it without the Cross would not be Christian, but simply a form of utopian philanthropy that would end up by destroying freedom. Thus the Cross becomes a fascinating mystery, capable of attracting, capable almost of seducing men by virtue of the new logic that it introduces and the life it enables us to experience.

‘The Cross stands firm as the World turns’.

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THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

LET US PRAY TO OUR LADY OF FATIMA16

et us pray to Our Lady of Fatima who, in inviting us to do penance, to pray and to convert, teaches us the logic of the Cross, the logic of the One who offered himself for others.

Let us pray to Her that the simple and wholesome truths of the Catechism, with its taste of home-made bread, may find an echo in our hearts and in our lives; Let us pray that the meaning of the words of the Angel, who appeared in 1916, and the singular words of the Blessed Virgin, and likewise the example of Saints Francisco and Jacinta, and of Lúcia, may find a welcome within us and renew our everyday Christian life.

Into your hands Most Blessed Virgin, living Tabernacle of the Divinity, we entrust the renewed vows of our Baptism, forever renouncing Satan, his vanities and his works, and giving ourselves completely to Jesus Christ, Wisdom Incarnate, ready to carry our cross behind Him every day of our lives. To You, O Blessed Virgin Mary, we abandon and consecrate ourselves: our bodies and our souls, our spiritual and material possessions and even the value of all our good deeds, past, present and future, entrusting to You the total and complete right to dispose of us and all that belongs to us, for the greater glory of God, through time and for all eternity. We look forward to the triumph of your Immaculate Heart. •

16 Adapted and Edited from Cardinal Piacenza’s homily given on Wednesday 14 September 2017 at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima during ACN’s international pilgrimage to mark the centenary of the apparitions at Fatima and to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Aid to the Church in Need.

Aid to the Church in Need

AT LAST WE CAN GO HOME:

THE NINEVEH PROJECT Sister Clara Nas, a Dominican Sister of St. Catherine of Siena , the Prioress of the badly damaged Immaculate Mary Convent in Qaraqosh, a large Christian town in Nineveh, understand the importance of maintaining the Christian presence in Iraq.

By the end of August 2017, almost 1,000 family homes have been restored in the area, an excellent start.

In total, approximately 13,000 homes were damaged or destroyed by Daesh during their 27-month occupation of the Nineveh Plains. Aid to the Church in Need is repairing many of these homes and is helping the Sisters sustain their witness to Hope in the rebuilding of their Qaraqosh convent.

lands will be permanently without a Christian presence.

Sister Clara with inspiring forthrightness tells us, ‘We want to rebuild and return home.’ And in doing so she thanked ACN for all the emergency relief assistance it provided her community and the many thousands of displaced Christians over the past three years. Sister Clara also voiced her deep appreciation for ACN’s leading role in founding and funding of the Nineveh Reconstruction Committee (a.k.a. The Nineveh Project) which aims to return up to 15,000 Christians to Qaraqosh alone.

FIND MORE INFORMATION GO TO

ACNIRELAND.ORG/NINEVEH

WITHOUT THIS HELP

One of the most ancient Christian home-

Christians will not be able to repair their Churches, their houses, their schools, or their hospitals - at present nearly 13,000 families (95,000 people) need to go home.

WITH YOUR HELP With your prayers and your generosity, together we can help rebuild the lives of our fellow Christians - and in so doing we can help rebuild our Church.

‘ACN is determined to help the faithful replant the faith back in the soil toiled by so many generations of Christians’ Cardinal Mauro Piacenza

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

FOREVER GRATEFUL AND LOYAL

t was late summer 1977, and war was raging in Lebanon. Journalists sat in the safety of West Beirut; while bombs fell on the Christians in the East. The western media portrayed the Christians as fascists. They felt abandoned. So Father Werenfried sent someone to survey the situation in the Christian area. He came by sea from Cyprus, since the airport was unsafe, visiting the refugee camps, where no UN representative had set foot, and the overcrowded Maronite monasteries in the mountains. He saw the needs and wrote down what the people needed. He brought them hope. Later his visit was followed by deliveries of medicines, milk powder and blankets. To this day the older Lebanese Christians still speak with gratitude of Father Werenfried’s messenger of hope.

‘During the war and in the decades that followed, you understood our needs and stood by our side’, writes Maronite Archbishop Chucrallah Nabil Hage of Tyre. In his diocese, which extends to the frontier with Israel, the persecution and oppression of the Christians has never really ceased. During the war they were caught between the Israelis and the Hezbollah militias. The churches were their refuge, their help came from the priests. And the same is true today. Many of the refugees from Syria have found temporary refuge and a little bit of security here, either staying with relatives or in accommodation provided by the Church.

In communion with Rome since the beginning: a Maronite priest celebrating Holy Mass.

LEBANON

Aid to the Church in Need

YEARS OF AID TO THE CHURCH IN NEED

‘My 25 priests are wearing themselves out on their behalf’, says Archbishop Chucrallah. ‘I go begging everywhere in order to strengthen and encourage them. So that they can experience the solidarity of other Christians.’ In this same spirit the Archbishop is also asking us for Mass stipends. He has learned from Father Werenfried to place his requests in God’s hands. He writes, ‘If you can help me, then I will be very grateful to you. If you cannot, I will nonetheless never forget what you have already done us. I remain for ever grateful and loyal to ACN and you can be sure that I will continue to pray for you every day. May the Lord bless you and shower you with his abundant graces, his peace and his joy.’ In Saint Matthew’s Gospel we read how Jesus went ‘to the region of Tyre and Sidon’ (15:21) and praised the woman who pleaded with him for her faith. This faith and this Christian presence have survived, to an remarkable degree, despite all the persecution. The Maronites have always been in communion with Rome. We have sent the archbishop and his 25 priests 1,250 Mass stipends. They will remember you all in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. • ‘Lord, have mercy...’: Archbishop Chucrallah Nabil Hage celebrating Mass according to the Maronite rite in the city of Tyre, Lebanon. GIVE JOY, GIVE HOPE

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

COME TO JESUS

hanks to the 1.5 million Mass stipends collected around the world, every minute nearly three Masses are celebrated for the intentions of the benefactors of ACN. Even in Syria, in the suffering city of Homs, they have continued to celebrate Holy Mass daily, often to the sound of falling shells. They keep in mind the words of the holy Curé of Ars, ‘It is not necessary to speak much in order to pray well... We know that Jesus is there… Come to Holy Communion; come to Jesus. Come, to live from Him, so that you may live with Him.’

And Syriac Catholic Archbishop Philippe Barakat of Homs writes with gratitude, ‘How greatly these Mass stipends help us to survive as Christians. Above all now that our already poor diocese has been bled dry. The needs of our

priests and faithful cry out to heaven. We beg you, pray for peace!’ This year we sent 1,020 Mass stipends to Homs, as well as 935 to Multan, in Pakistan, 3,500 to the diocese of Ivano-Frankivsk in Ukraine, and hundreds of thousands to Africa. Recently, a priest in France left all his possessions in his will to provide Mass stipends for other priests around the world. He had understood what Jean Marie Vianney taught: without the sacrament of ordination, without priests, the Church would be no more than a humanitarian charity. It is our priests who transform it into the Body of Christ; hence they are ‘one of the most precious gifts of divine Mercy’. Your Mass stipends are a form of thanksgiving for this great gift. So let us be generous with our Mass offerings! •

In war and in peace: celebrating Holy Mass in Homs.

Aid to the Church in Need

‘Let us stand as witnesses to hope with the woman clothed with the sun, as though it were the decisive battle’ FATHER WERENFRIED VAN STRAATEN

Join us on

# RED WEDNESDAY 22nd of November 2017 Wear Red - Light Red

To promote awareness of and solidarity with persecuted Christians, Archbishop Eamon Martin and ACN Ireland invite you on #RedWednesday to:

REMEMBER the witness and sacrifice of past and present martyrs by praying the Angelus at 12pm and 6pm.

WEAR a red tie or a red scarf as a symbolic reminder of all those Christians who have suffered and died for their Christian faith.

#RedWednesday will see many landmarks illuminated in red worldwide, including Armagh Cathedral and St. Patrick’s Church, Belfast. If you wish to find out more, please contact redwednesday@acnireland.org or go to

acnireland.org/redwednesday

THE HEART OF THE FATIMA MESSAGE

YOUR APPRECIATION... CUBA: YOU ARE SERVING THE KINGDOM OF GOD We could not have developed our pastoral work in Cuba without your help. Our children would have no Child’s Bible, our young people no YOUCAT. Our priests would struggle without your Mass stipends and we could not repair our churches. We know well that your aid includes many a ‘widow’s mite’ – and so it is all the more precious to us. You are helping to spread the Kingdom of God in this world, and God will reward you a hundredfold. May Our Lord bless you and may the Virgin of El Cobre, Our Lady of Charity protect you! + Álvaro Beyra Luarca of Bayamo-Manzanillo UKRAINE: YOU ARE OFTEN THE ONLY HELP FOR OUR PRIESTS

WHAT THE SAINTS SAY...

My warmest congratulations, and my thanks for your continued support for our diocese over the past 25 years. Thanks to

your benefactors we have been able to rebuild churches and other vital facilities. Indeed, your Mass stipends are frequently the only means of survival for our priests, and so in this way you are helping to bring the Kingdom of God to those who seek it. + Maksymilian Leonid Dubrawski of Kamyanets-Podilskyi, SYRIA: YOUR SUPPORT IS INDISPENSABLE Your support for the Christians of Syria has been indispensable since the war began. You have never ceased to come to our aid, supporting pastoral care, education and health care. I still recall with great emotion that wonderful evening in Rome when the Trevi Fountain was illuminated in red, in memory of the blood of the Christian martyrs. + Antoine Audo of Aleppo, Syria

‘The history of mankind, the history of salvation, passes by way of the family. The family is placed at the centre of the great struggle between good and evil, between life and death, between love and all that is opposed to love.’ Pope Saint John Paul II Quote selected by Eddie Cotter, founder

ead heologians ociety www.DeadTheologiansSociety.com Aid to the Church in Need

YEARS OF AID TO THE CHURCH IN NEED

...AND OUR THANKS Dear Friends,

ooking back over the seven decades of our existence, these words of Saint Paul came into my mind: ‘For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord, begging us earnestly for the favour of taking part in the relief of the saints’ (2 Cor 8:3-4).

It was the Christian communities in Macedonia who, despite their ‘extreme poverty’, as Saint Paul puts it, gave with such a ‘wealth of generosity’. I have the same feeling when I look back over your generosity during the last seven decades. For 70 years now ACN has been the work of your selfless charity.

to further it’s work – there will no doubt be more online giving, communication with our benefactors will become more direct and the information more detailed – but the underlying foundation will remain your selfless love and generosity. ‘Love is the root of all good’, wrote the great Church Father St John Chrysostom. For this love I offer you my heartfelt thanks.

Johannes Freiherr Heereman, Executive President of ACN International

Can this continue in the coming decades? It must and, so please God, it will. For the need is growing, the number of requests are increasing. ACN will use new methods

WHERE TO SEND YOUR CONTRIBUTION FOR THE CHURCH IN NEED Please use the Freepost envelope.

IBAN BIC

Aid to the Church in Need,

IE32 BOFI 9005 7890 6993 28 BOFI IE2D

info@acnireland.org

If you give by standing order, or have sent a donation recently, please accept our sincere thanks. This MIRROR is for your interest and information.

www.acnireland.org

Registered Charity Numbers: (RoI) 9492 (NI) XR96620.

151 St. Mobhi Road, Glasnevin, Dublin 9.

(01) 837 7516

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‘ACN is at the heart of the Fatima message.’ ACN Ecclesiastical Assistant

‘What would happen were we to treat the Bible as we treat our mobile phone? Were we to open it several times a day; were we to read God’s messages contained in the Bible... what would happen?’

Angelus message, March 5, 2017.

Aid to the Church in Need

THE MIRROR IS AVAILABLE TO READ AT ACNIRELAND.ORG/MIRROR

17 - 6

Aid to the Church in Need

MIRROR

Putting Love into Practice

Rays of Hope

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