There is a movement that few people know of in Oregon: the Schoenstatt movement. It just celebrated its 100th Anniversary worldwide.
A mass lead by Monsignor Richard Hunegar was held on October 18th at St. Joseph Church, Salem, with a large crowd on this Saturday morning. There was a "Celebration of Love" for three "tween" girls as the focus. One of Oregon's best kept secrets time may have come and shines a light on this movement to celebrate the family. It has existed for years virtually unnoticed or recognized but no more.
Congratulations girls. Thank you for your witness of love for our Blessed Mother. God Bless you.
'What is being proposed is not marriage' – Pope calls for defense of family
Elise Harris
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| Pope Francis at an Oct. 25, 2014 audience with Schoenstatt movement. Credit: Photo Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA.Add caption |
Vatican City, Oct 26, 2014 / 12:52 pm (CNA/EWTN News).-
In an audience with members of an international Marian movement, Pope
Francis warned that the sacrament of marriage has been reduced to a mere
association, and urged participants to be witnesses in a secular world.
“The family is being hit, the family is being struck and the family is
being bastardized,” the Pope told those in attendance at the Oct. 25
audience.
He warned against the common view in society that “you can call everything family, right?”
“What is being proposed is not marriage, it's an association. But it's
not marriage! It's necessary to say these things very clearly and we
have to say it!” Pope Francis stressed.
He lamented that there are so many “new forms” of unions which are
“totally destructive and limiting the greatness of the love of
marriage.”
Noting that there are many who cohabitate, or are separated or
divorced, he explained that the “key” to helping is a pastoral care of
“close combat” that assists and patiently accompanies the couple.
Pope Francis offered his words in a question-and-answer format during
his audience with members of the Schoenstatt movement, held in
celebration of the 100th anniversary of its founding in Germany.
Roughly 7,500 members of the international Marian and apostolic
organization, both lay and clerics from dozens of nations around the
world, were present in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall for the audience.
In his answers to questions regarding marriage, Pope Francis explained
that contemporary society has “devalued” the sacrament by turning it
into a social rite, removing the most essential element, which is union
with God.
“So many families are divided, so many marriages broken, (there is)
such relativism in the concept of the Sacrament of Marriage,” he said,
noting that from a sociological and Christian point of view “there is a
crisis in the family because it's beat up from all sides and left very
wounded!”
In regard to Mary, the Roman Pontiff said that her visit to her cousin
Elizabeth is a strong symbol for the movement’s mission, and emphasized
how no Christians can call themselves orphans because they have a mother
who continues to give them life.
Pope Francis recalled this history of the movement’s foundation, noting
how it was started by Fr. Joseph Kentenich during the First World War.
It was after his time in a concentration camp during World War II, the
Pope noted, that the priest traveled to the peripheries of the world in
order to preach the Gospel.
Witness is key to spreading the Gospel, he said, explaining that true
witness means living “in such a way that the will to live as we live is
born in the heart of others…Living in a way (so that) others are
interested and ask: ‘why?’”
However, the Bishop of Rome emphasized that although we are called to
give this witness, “we are not the saviors of anyone,” but rather are
the transmitters of Jesus, who is the one that already saved us all.
True witness propels us out of ourselves and into the streets of the
world, the Pope continued, repeating his common declaration that a
Church, movement or community that doesn’t go out of itself “becomes
sick.”
“A movement, a Church or a community that doesn't go out, is mistaken,”
he said. “Don't be afraid! Go out in mission, go out on the road. We
are walkers.”
In answer to questions regarding how he can be defined as “reckless,”
the Roman Pontiff admitted that although he can be considered “a little
reckless,” he still surrenders himself to prayer, saying that it helps
him to place Jesus at the center, rather than himself.
“There is only one center: Jesus Christ – who rather looks at things
from the periphery, no? Where he sees things more clearly,” the Pope
observed, saying that when closed inside the small worlds of a parish, a
community and even the Roman Curia, “then you do not grasp the truth.”
He explained how reality is always seen better from the peripheries
rather than the center, and noted how he has seen some episcopal
conferences who charge for almost every small thing, where “nothing
escapes.”
“Everything is working well, everything is well organized,” the pontiff
observed, but they could do with less “functionalism and more apostolic
zeal, more interior freedom, more prayer, (and) this interior freedom
is the courage to go out.”
When asked about his process of reforming the Roman Curia, Pope Francis
explained that often renewal is understood as making small changes here
or there, or even making changes out of the necessity of adapting to
the times.
But this isn’t true renewal, he said, noting that while there are
people every day who say that he needs to renew the Vatican Bank or the
Curia, “It's strange (that) no one speaks of the reform of the heart.”
“They don't understand anything of what the renewal of the heart means:
which is holiness, renewing one's (own) heart,” the Pope observed,
saying that a renewed heart is able of going beyond disagreements such
as family conflicts, war and those that arise out of the “culture of the
provisional.”
He concluded by blessing the missionary crosses of those present, who
are called to missionaries in the five continents of the world, and
recalled how some time ago he was given an image of the Mother of
Schoenstatt, who prays and is always present.
The movement’s encounter with Pope Francis came on the second day of
their visit to Rome, which culminated with a Mass in St. Peter’s
Basilica presided over by Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz.
The
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation paid the National Catholic
Educational Association (NCEA) more than $100,000 to support teacher
training and materials on implementing the Common Core school standards,
The Cardinal Newman Society has discovered.
