Harry's RCIA Progress

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Pug said:
I’m so sorry. You are a Christian already, and that ought to be carefully recognized. Be sure to receive the sacrament of confession before they confirm you and before you receive Eucharist for the first time. If you have done a mortal sin since you were first baptized, you really must go before receiving the other sacraments.
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I have done mortal sin, and in fact I am quite worried that if I die before easter 2007, I’ll wind up in hell. Unless The Virgin mary can come through with my wearing of the Green Scapular and the Brown Scapular.

(I have not been properly vested in the brown scapular. I have put it on as an act of faith and hope and Love for Mary. That’s about all I can at the moment.)

I need the sacrament of Confession. I doubt if the RCIA class will be any help.

So I am trying to get a monthly dose of spiritual direction at a local retreat center. In addition, I am thinking of a one or two week retreat at a place in Orange County, with daily spiritual Direction, to make that confession a good one. That would be the first week in February.
 
Our 3rd Pre-Cats session was supposed to start at 10:30 AM, but I showed up at the church at 8:45 AM. This was 30 minutes before the start of the next Mass. I used that 30 minutes for my daily rosary (Glorious Mysteries on Sunday, of course), plus some short prayers for the Church Suffering. I use a small booklet put out by Requiem Press titled DAILY PRAYERS FOR THE CHURCH SUFFERING.👍

The mass started, and I stayed right up to the start of the actual Eucherist. I have sometimes stayed through the Eucherist if time allows. Whilst I cannot partake, I can certainly pray up a storm for the Church Suffering. I even have this nifty new rosary. I may tell you about it later, but it would sound as if I was bragging.:clapping:

In this case I left to attend the RCIA classs. I gave a leftover rosary and instructions to one of the catechumans who expressed an interest in the Rosary. We did not have a guided meditation this week.😃

At one point, we were asked what we had done during the week, and I mentioned my prayers for the Church Suffering. One of the teachers thought I was praying for the way the Church has been suffering. You know, sex scandles, the problems of its anti-abortion, anti-artificial birth control, anti-divorce and all that. :rolleyes:

As politely and mildly as I could, I informed her that the phrase “The Church Suffering” refers to the Holy Souls In Purgatory. She seemed a bit puzzled why an catechuman (as she regards me) would be praying the rosary at all, much less for the souls of the dead. I suppose it is a calling, or maybe just a desire to help out, or even just wishful thinking. But somehow, someway, I keep getting this gut feeling that this is the real reason Mother Mary called me to the Church. I could be wrong, of course:(

The rest of the class was for the catechumans, but I remembered my promise to learn patience, tolerance, and especially obediance. So I behaved myself. “Lord, put your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth.”😉 Class was over at 12:30 PM and I went home to my cats. :bowdown:
 
Andruschak said:
Our 3rd Pre-Cats session was supposed to start at 10:30 AM, but I showed up at the church at 8:45 AM. This was 30 minutes before the start of the next Mass. I used that 30 minutes for my daily rosary (Glorious Mysteries on Sunday, of course), plus some short prayers for the Church Suffering. I use a small booklet put out by Requiem Press titled DAILY PRAYERS FOR THE CHURCH SUFFERING.👍

The mass started, and I stayed right up to the start of the actual Eucherist. I have sometimes stayed through the Eucherist if time allows. Whilst I cannot partake, I can certainly pray up a storm for the Church Suffering. I even have this nifty new rosary. I may tell you about it later, but it would sound as if I was bragging.:clapping:

In this case I left to attend the RCIA classs. I gave a leftover rosary and instructions to one of the catechumans who expressed an interest in the Rosary. We did not have a guided meditation this week.😃

At one point, we were asked what we had done during the week, and I mentioned my prayers for the Church Suffering. One of the teachers thought I was praying for the way the Church has been suffering. You know, sex scandles, the problems of its anti-abortion, anti-artificial birth control, anti-divorce and all that. :rolleyes:

As politely and mildly as I could, I informed her that the phrase “The Church Suffering” refers to the Holy Souls In Purgatory. She seemed a bit puzzled why an catechuman (as she regards me) would be praying the rosary at all, much less for the souls of the dead. I suppose it is a calling, or maybe just a desire to help out, or even just wishful thinking. But somehow, someway, I keep getting this gut feeling that this is the real reason Mother Mary called me to the Church. I could be wrong, of course

The rest of the class was for the catechumans, but I remembered my promise to learn patience, tolerance, and especially obediance. So I behaved myself. "Lord, put your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth."Class was over at 12:30 PM and I went home to my cats. :bowdown:
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Always go with your gut feeling! :cool:

Praying for our holy brothers and sisters in purgatory is a wonderful thing to do, and they need our prayers a lot. I can’t remember which apparition it was, it might have been Fatima, but there was one where our Blessed Mother says that the souls in purgatory need our prayers worse than anyone else. So keep it up! 😉

The Rosary is a wonderful devotion. I went through RCIA and came into the Church last year, and I believe the power of the Rosary had a lot to do with my conversion. I started praying the Rosary when I was a Methodist, still unsure about the Catholic faith, and I believe that the grace I received through praying the Rosary is what allowed me to overcome all of my other doubts about the faith and finally make the conversion.

Your testimony is very inspiring. It’s great to see a new Catholic who is so passionate about the faith! 👍

Take care,
Reed
 
I’m very impressed with your faith journey, Harry. I wish all our RCIA candidates and catechumens were as devoted. I always make a point, as I did this morning in RCIA, to lead our cats and cans (sorry) in prayer for the departed - “May the souls of the faithfully departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace”, so the deceased received a quick 40 prayers right then.

Various scriptures indicate that those in purgatory are unable to pray for themselves, so we’re all they’ve got.

Jeff
 
whenever I have a candidate, usually from one of the mainstream Protestant bodies, who is wavering, can’t decide whether to proceed with RCIA, has problems with one or more areas of doctrin (purgatory, Eucharist, confession etc.) I warn them seriously: whatever you else you do, never pick up a rosary and start praying with it. In 22 years of work with RCIA I have seen this time and time again. For whatever reason, we hand them out in class and teach the rosary, they get one as a gift, they join a prayer group, go to a funeral where the rosary is prayerd, whatever, once, they start with it, Mary has them firmly by the hand, all their difficulties resolve themselves, and they are on the fast track to full communion.

RCIA, with the classes, faith-sharing, all the other tiresome things that are so hard to understand is the slow way to make converts, the human way. The Rosary is the NASCAR version, the high road, Mary’s way to conversion and communion. We have had people fence-sitting for years even decades (hah) make their decision literally overnight once they take up the rosary. It is our secret weapon.
 
Every weekday, Monday through Friday, the RCIA class at catechismclass.com requires us to read the three excerpts from the Bible for that day. On Mondays we read what was read in the churches the previous days. All this followed by commentary. At the end of all this, we were told…:rolleyes:

@@@@@

You now know more about this weekend’s Scripture Readings than probably 80% of the active Catholics you know. If Scripture is really your thing and you want to (and have time to) learn more come back here after you’ve finished today’s whole session and do this extra work on your own time.

@@@@@

Since the Sunday Gospel reading concerned what Jesus had to say about divorce, we read the actual portions of the Church Catechism on this subject, followed by more authoratative commentary.

For our closing prayers we were instructed to draw up a throwaway list of the divorced people we knew and pray for them.

Sigh…two of them are my Sister and her Husband.😦
 
puzzleannie said:
RCIA, with the classes, faith-sharing, all the other tiresome things that are so hard to understand is the slow way to make converts, the human way. The Rosary is the NASCAR version, the high road, Mary’s way to conversion and communion. We have had people fence-sitting for years even decades (hah) make their decision literally overnight once they take up the rosary. It is our secret weapon.
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According to the booklet MY TREASURY OF CHAPLETS, Saint Louis De Montfort is alledged to have said “Let me place the Rosary around a sinner’s neck, and he will not escape me”.

So now I do a little ritual whenever I put on the Rosary…I ask Montfort to put his hands over mine, so that he is also placing the Rosary around my neck. I would like to think that he is actually doing it (probably with a gloating grin on his face)
 
Andruschak said:
So I am trying to get a monthly dose of spiritual direction at a local retreat center. In addition, I am thinking of a one or two week retreat at a place in Orange County, with daily spiritual Direction, to make that confession a good one. That would be the first week in February.
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I hope you enjoy the retreat! I try to always ask the Holy Spirit to help with the examination of conscience and the confession. Pray for the grace of having perfect contrition, while you are at it.🙂 That is always a good idea.
 
Andruschak said:
According to the booklet MY TREASURY OF CHAPLETS, Saint Louis De Montfort is alledged to have said “Let me place the Rosary around a sinner’s neck, and he will not escape me”.

So now I do a little ritual whenever I put on the Rosary…I ask Montfort to put his hands over mine, so that he is also placing the Rosary around my neck. I would like to think that he is actually doing it (probably with a gloating grin on his face)
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I love that book! It *is *a little treasure, isn’t it? 🙂

You may enjoy the song “RCIA” by Nick Alexander. Click on RCIA on the left menu 😉 cdbaby.com/cd/nickalexander2
 
Dear Andruschak,

Just an observation but there are an awful lot of Christians out there that seem to live in two worlds. One is taught through their religion by Christ and the other is what they call the “real” world.

I remember a woman whom I worked with - she had been living with a married man for 12 years and when his wife finally gave him a divorce (after their child turned 18), the woman and man were married. Someone at work remarked to her that it was about time the they married and were no longer living in sin. She told me all this as she was upset by such a remark. Then she said to me that her living with this man was okay with God, because in her words “He understood”.

Truly living a Christian life is not easy to say the least. I’ve been there too - so please don’t misunderstand me. So many people are ruled by their passions. I have found that it only with God’s help that anyone can honestly live the life He wants us to live.

It always amazes me when gosple reading Christians refuse to accept what Christ said … His actual words! Memorizing passages and quoting them to others (as so many of our Protestant brothers and sisters do) is simple foolishment if we do not believe and live our lives as He commanded.
 
That’s why we have so many “cafeteria” Catholics, who pick and choose what they like about the faith. Like coming to mass only on Easter and Christmas because of the beautiful decorations and music.

But church is made up of sinners, and that is what we all are. However, we are called to become saints and saints are just sinners who fall down and get up again and try to live as Christ has taught us. And in the process, we should bring as many people with us along the way.

Let’s begin by praying…for ourselves and those who need our prayers most.
 
stbruno said:
That’s why we have so many “cafeteria” Catholics, who pick and choose what they like about the faith. Like coming to mass only on Easter and Christmas because of the beautiful decorations and music.

But church is made up of sinners, and that is what we all are. However, we are called to become saints and saints are just sinners who fall down and get up again and try to live as Christ has taught us. And in the process, we should bring as many people with us along the way.

Let’s begin by praying through the intercession of the Holy Spirit, the Blessed Mother and our prayer partners in heaven, the communion of saints…for ourselves and those who need our prayers most.
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Well, I can’t ever imagine being divorced. My wife has been so easy to love and such a good wife, for all of our happy 33 years of marriage, that I could never imagine us ever leaving each other.

So, I don’t know what it’s like to walk in some one elses shoes, who ends up alone because of a failed marriage, for whatever the reasons are.

What Jesus said seems plain and simple, but is it?

Do we really understand what he was saying on this issue?
 
some men and women have no choice - the example of the woman who did not ‘give her husband a divorce’ until their child turned 18 - think about it…she could not force her husband to be a man and live with her as a husband should.

And I have no doubt God understood…much better than any of us…what I don’t know is what His judgment will be of the people involved…that is His realm, and not mine.

I think you are being properly challenged by your RCIA class. I know that it is very difficult to live according to the faith and morals taught us by the Holy Mother Church, but I am eternally grateful for those parameters because they give me the guidelines I need to keep practicing practicing practicing.
 
10 October

I was able to contact the nearby Mary and Joseph Retreat Center about Spiritual Direction on a monthly basis. My first session will be this Thuesday

I have paid the deposit for the two week retreat in February:thumbsup:

I think I now have everything that Susan Tassone has put out concerning the Holy Souls of Purgatory. Four books and 1 CD. The CD has the Way of the Cross, and the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary. Every Tuesday and Friday I will play that CD when it is time for the Rosary. I hope she gets around to the other three sets of Mysteries soon.🙂

My daily catechismclass.com sessions continue to be a joy in my life. I am actually learning Good Stuff! We were informed that those who want to do more Bible Study can start here…

catholic-resources.org/Bible/index.html

I wonder where I could find the time.:rolleyes:

O yes, a 4th cat has arrived, and it may take some time to find out if he is compatable with the other three cats.
 
Harry, rather than starting these new threads, you might just consider some overall name like ‘Andruschak RCIA Journey’. It might make it easier both for you to look back upon as well as we, your readers, to follow.
 
Jeff_Hale said:
Harry, rather than starting these new threads, you might just consider some overall name like ‘Andruschak RCIA Journey’. It might make it easier both for you to look back upon as well as we, your readers, to follow.
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Excellent idea, and I will put it into practice
 
I think a good lasting marriage takes a lot of hard work, mutual understanding and 110% commitment by both sides.

There are many times when it would have been very easy to just say, this is just too terrible it is much less taxing to get a divorce.

Unfortunately it happens mostly in the first few years when couples are most vulnerable and more likely to split.

I know we are very lucky in the fact that neither of us are drinkers or physically abusive or are unfaithful. These things folks have to avoid like the plague because they are just that. I went into marriage firmly believing that failure was not an option.

If you know you will do eveything possible to make things work, you have a much firmer base to start with. Every marriage goes through tough times. It is very rare if not impossible to have everything go smoothly all the time or even most of the time. When you have 2 independant minds it is unlikely everything will mesh 100% of the time. Compromise, understanding and a lot of love and prayer goes a long way to making a lifelong marriage. But it can be done.

There are times, when the only thread holding a marriage together is simply because God says marriages are forever. IF you firmly believe that your vow of until death do you part is a real promise, you can and will make it work.
 
12 October: Had an hour of Spiritual Direction today, with a Nun who works at the local Mary and Joseph Retreat Center. We covered a lot of ground, starting with my desire to be confirmed long before the easter Vigil. I was told to keep on trying to get an interview with one of the 4 over-worked Priests at the Church. But I may have to wait until Easter anyhow to get certain things done.😦

One is that first confession, over 45 years worth. We have booked a ten day retreat in early February, and have asked for spiritual direction from a Priest on a daily basis. The Priest will walk me through the confession.

She approved my formal prayers (and agreed my prayers for The Church Suffering were having some effect) but wants me to write a very informal “Dear God” letter every Sunday, 2 hours worth. To be written from the heart, not the intellect.

I also have to start praying for my father, and especially for his soul in Purgatory, assuming he made it there. My father died in 1962, when I was age 19. I didn’t shed a single tear for him then, and haven’t done so since. :mad:

This MUST change. She wants me to continue that Novena to the Holy Spirit on a daily basis , no matter what.

But like we tell newcomers to AA, “It’s OK to ask for help”.👍
 
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