Handmaids and Warriors Newsletter: May 2026

I have a new feature to present here on my blog.  This is a newsletter written by one of my fellow Lay Dominicans of my fraternity, Alice.  Alice writes a monthly newsletter for two groups, a male group dubbed the St. Michael Warriors and women’s group she calls the Handmaids of Mary.  The intent of the groups are to pray for the guidance and protection of the Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV.  The only requirements for her groups are, in addition to whatever prayers you normally pray daily, to pray three Hail Mary’s and one St. Michael the Archangel prayer for the Pope.  If you are interested in joining her group and receiving her newsletter, leave a comment and we’ll figure out how to get your email on her list. 

So I helped Alice edit her May newsletter, and I enjoyed it so much that I thought it might be a nice feature on my blog. I offered to post her newsletters and she agreed. I want to be clear, this is all Alice’s writing below.  I just tweaked the language a little bit.  This dovetails nicely with today’s Solemnity of the Ascension.

Before the newsletter, let us pray: For Pope Leo XIV

Hail Mary, full of grace…

Hail Mary, full of grace…

Hail Mary, full of grace…

St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle; be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil; may God rebuke him, we humbly pray, and do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all the evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.

 

Alice’s newsletter:

 

  St. Michael Warriors

                                                        Deus omnes amat et malum non praevalebit

                                                       “God loves everyone and evil will not prevail”

 

                                                                            He has Risen

                                                                       He has Risen Indeed!!!

 

As promised in March I write Mary’s answer to a Joseph when he asked Mary “how may I serve you” when they were betrothed.  Mary was 14 years of age, Joseph 33 a native of Nazareth and one of the descendants of the royal race of David. In her shyness Mary called on the angels to attend her when she spoke to Joseph. In the glorious company of angels Mary spoke to Joseph, “my lord and spouse, I acknowledge myself as more beholden than any other creature to God, so at a tender age I consecrated myself to God by a perpetual vow of chastity in body and soul;  I beseech thee my master, to help me in fulfilling this vow while in other things I will be thy servant, willing to work for the comfort of thy life as long as mine shall last.”

The most chase Joseph, full of interior joy at the words of his spouse, replied,  “My mistress, in making known to me thy chaste and welcome sentiments, I had not opened my thoughts to you before knowing your own; I desire thee to know at the age of twelve years I made a perpetual vow of chastity to the Most High.  On this account I will gladly ratify this vow in order not to impede thy own.  I promise to aid thee in serving and loving Him according to thy full desires.” 

By Divine operation the two most holy and chaste spouses felt an incomparable joy and consolation.  They immediately set out from the temple in Jerusalem and settled in Nazareth.

As in past letters I called to mind the apparitions of Mary who comes to earth to show us the way for our times.  Our Blessed Mother reminds us how peace will come to the earth if we follow her messages. Mary wants us to know, as in Our Lady of Guadalupe, that she loves us.  As in Our Lady of Fatima, she wants to show her wounded heart asking us for consolation.  As in Our Lady of La Sallette, she wants us to see her weeping over the abuse of Sundays.  Mary also brings gifts to help us to defeat Satan: the rosary, the scapular, the Miraculous Medal, the springs of holy water for healing the sick.  These are the treasures found only in the Catholic Church.

There are many Catholic treasures that help us in times of need. Such a as when  Pope Pious IX, who during the French Revolution, Rome was being ransacked, displayed in the Vatican the Veil of Veronica and the relic of the true cross.  The Veil of Veronica began to have a strange glow for everyone in the city to see,  the people prayed  to these relics and the French were driven out of Rome.

Another mighty prayer to drive Satan away also happened at the same time of the French Revolution, the prayer the Golden Arrow given to a Carmelite nun by Jesus who said, “this Golden Arrow prayer will wound my heart delightfully and heal the wounds inflicted by the blasphemy of using Gods name in vain.” 

GOLDEN ARROW PRAYER 

  Let us pray: May the most holy, most sacred, most adorable, most mysterious, and unutterable 

Name of God be always praised, blessed, loved, adored, and glorified in heaven and on earth and under the earth by all the creatures of God and by the Sacred Heart of our Lord Jesus Christ in the most Holy Sacrament of the altar.

 If we would say that prayer whenever we heard the name of God taken in vain it would console the Sacred Heart delightfully!

So now the Thursday of Holy Ascension is upon us …He goes before us to prepare a place for us, so that where I am you may be also…. In my father’s house there are many mansions.

 

Alice

Handmaid of the St. Michel Warriors

Sunday Meditation: The Spirit of Truth

The Sixth Sunday of Easter—the second to last Sunday of the season—continues with Jesus’s Last Discourse, and, if you notice, these discourses are focused on the coming of the Holy Spirit.  These Gospel readings, then, set the stage for Pentecost, the descent of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus tells the disciples that after He dies and rises and stays with them for a while (forty days) the Holy Spirit will come to them. 

I’ve been impressed with the Gospel reflections of Gina Hens-Piazza who provides reflections at America magazine.  She points out this week that Jesus in this passage is defining what love is.

 

Jesus, however, is suggesting a different relationship between love and obedience. He never threatens to withhold love, even when we turn away from the commandments. Instead, he makes obedience to the commandments the means by which we love one another. The concrete nature of love in human relationships becomes the means by which we love him. After all, whether they be mandates of commission or omission, commandments such as “Honor your father and mother” or “You shall not commit adultery” aim specifically at cultivating and preserving loving relationships among people. For Jesus, love is not contingent upon obedience but is the product of obedience. Divine commandments facilitate love of one another and result in love of Jesus.

Love in the Christian sense is certainly more complex than an emotional feeling.

Today’s Gospel:

 

 

Jesus said to his disciples:

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

And I will ask the Father,

and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always,

the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept,

because it neither sees nor knows him.

But you know him, because he remains with you,

and will be in you.

I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.

In a little while the world will no longer see me,

but you will see me, because I live and you will live.

On that day you will realize that I am in my Father

and you are in me and I in you.

Whoever has my commandments and observes them

is the one who loves me.

And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father,

and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”

~Jn:14: 15-21

 

 

Today’s reflection comes from Fr. Greg Heille O.P. from St. Louis.  He is one of the Dominican friars from the St. Albert the Great Province that provides these “Know Before You Go” homilies.  Fr. Greg rightly emphasizes the foretelling of the coming of the Holy Spirit in this passage.

 

Fr. Greg:

Our Jewish brothers and sisters celebrate a holiday that is called the Festival of Weeks which is held seven weeks and one day, or 50 days, after Passover…Well fifty days translates to Pentecost, and so we have in two weeks from now the solemn Feast of Pentecost, 50 days after our celebration of our Easter Sunday.  Early in our Easter season our celebration was all about “Alleluia, He is Risen, He is Risen Indeed!”  But now late in the Easter season our celebration has more of a spirit of “Veni Sancte Spiritus, Come Holy Spirit."

 

In a way the Gospel from John 14 looks ahead to the next four weeks of celebration in our liturgical cycle.  A week from now we will celebrate the Feast of the Ascension…Our Gospel today in a way gives a hint of ascension because as we think about Jesus ascending into heaven we can wonder where is He now.  And our Gospel today, John 14, says, “I will not leave you orphans.  I will come to you.”  “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always.”  The word advocate in Greek is paraclete, and its etymology is “one who is called aside to help.”  A helper.

 

So as we approach Pentecost we ae being promised by Jesus a paraclete, one who will walk along side of us to help.  We will not be left as orphans…Jesus was brought to life in the Spirit.  The Spirit walked with Jesus as His helper.  He was raised to life in the Spirit…And we begin to realize that what God has done for Jesus so too He does for us.  He raises us up in the Spirit.  He walks along side of us as a companion, an advocate, a helper.

 

That is the heart of our lives in the Spirit.  We have a “vital connection to Christ and the Father through the Holy Spirit.”  Be sure to listen to the end to where Fr. Greg explains that synodality is a walking of us all together on the Way.

For the pastoral homily, Cardinal Blasé Cupich of Archdiocese of Chicago combined this Gospel passage with a link to today’s Mother’s Day holiday.

 

Archbishop Cupich:

We've seen some remarkable transformations in this group of disciples that formed the early church.  We have Philillip who now very publicly addresses the people and speaks of Jesus.  Philip was the one who wanted death to know from Jesus the way that he was going.  And Jesus said to him, "How long have you been with me and yet you do not know me?" But all of a sudden with the gift of the spirit, something changes in him dramatically.  And it occurs to me as we celebrate Mother's Day that there are many qualities that are reflected in mothers that we find in this early church that's transformed by the spirit.

 

The first thing is the way the the disciples take initiative. Jesus is no longer with them. They're on their own.  And yet they go out and they make a difference.  How often mothers are the ones in the home who have to take initiative to get things going. Maybe those times in which there are birthdays or celebrations of holidays. They're the ones who take the initiative. They're the ones who kind of learn on the spur of the moment. I remember my own mother who was married when she was uh a young 22 years old and by the time she was 30, she had six children and she had to learn how to balance her life and balance being a mother to all those children. She took initiative much like we see in that early church.  But we also see these early disciples being willing to adapt and be flexible to the point that there were new members of the community who were different. We hear about of course the formation of the deacons. When the Greek Christians felt that they were being overlooked, the disciples were able to adapt and create a whole new order within the church that of deacons.  They paid attention to the specifics of the different groups that were there.  I think my mother reflected that as well. She always said that each child was different. The being a parent is not an exact science simply because there are so many variables in each child that comes along. She was once asked, "Do you love any of your children more than the others?" And her answer was swift and clear. No, she said, but only if they need it.  I think that that's the way each one of us have experienced our mothers as well.  That they know us and they look for ways in which they're going to meet the needs of each one of us in our particular circumstances, much like the early church was able to do.

 

Mothers as well were the point of unity within a family. So often the ones who brought people together for healing, telling and encouraging us to have forgiveness, but also the kind of unity that stays with us in our life even when our man mothers pass from this life. Much like the unity that we hear about in the gospel where Jesus says, "Even though I will be away from you, I will be in you as my father is in me and I am in you." How often we are able to carry within us the voice, the image, the words of our mothers within us. In a way showing us that the unity within a family is being able to have a sensitivity to the lives of others but also a fond remembrance of each other no matter what the circumstances are in life. Even if we are separated by distance or even by death.

 

God bless our mothers.  They are the image of Jesus in our lives.

 

Sunday Meditation: "On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you.”

 

How can we not listen to “Veni Creator Spiritus” after Christ’s foretelling of the Holy Spirit? 

 

Come, Holy Ghost, Creator, come

from thy bright heav'nly throne;

come, take possession of our souls,

and make them all thine own.

 

Thou who art called the Paraclete,

best gift of God above,

the living spring, the living fire,

sweet unction and true love. (...)

 

O guide our minds with thy blest light,

with love our hearts inflame;

and with thy strength, which ne'er decays,

confirm our mortal frame. (…)

 

Through thee may we the Father know,

through thee th'eternal Son,

and thee the Spirit of them both,

thrice-blessed three in One.

 

In Gregorian Chant!  Beautiful!

 

Sunday Meditation: Seeing the Father Through Jesus

The final three Sundays of the Easter season, leading to Pentecost Sunday, are devoted to highlighting Jesus’s Last Discourse sermon in John’s Gospel.  On the Fifth Sunday of Easter in Year A we get Jesus explaining He is “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”  Three years ago I embedded Dr. Brant Pitre’s exegesis of this phrase.  But when the apostle Phillip asks Jesus to reveal the Father, Jesus gives another important response about seeing the Father in seeing Jesus.  Jesus is the living face of the Father.  But it’s even deeper than that.  Jesus goes on to say that the Father is in Him and He in the Father.  Here is the perfect image of the Trinity.  While there are three persons in God, it is One God because there is a sharing of the Godhead. 

So what is the face of the Father that we see in Jesus?  Gina Hens-Piazza, reflecting on this passage for America Media, sums it up nicely:

 

Thus, the fullness of Jesus’ humanity reveals the very nature of God. In Jesus’ compassion for the widow whose son had died (Lk 7:12-15), in his forgiveness of a woman caught in adultery (Jn 8:1-11), in his healing a paralytic man (Mt 9:1-8), in his healing of a man with a withered hand in spite of strict religious obstacles (Mt 12:9-14, Mk 3:1-6, Lk 6:6-11), in his determination to eat with a man known to have questionable background as a tax collector (Mt 9:10-17, Mk 2:15-22, Lk 5:29-39), and in his encounter with a Samaritan woman, to whom he first revealed his divine identity (Jn 4:4-42), humanity sees the true character of God.

 

 

 

Today’s Gospel:

 

 

Jesus said to his disciples:

"Do not let your hearts be troubled.

You have faith in God; have faith also in me.

In my Father's house there are many dwelling places.

If there were not,

would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?

And if I go and prepare a place for you,

I will come back again and take you to myself,

so that where I am you also may be.

Where I am going you know the way."

Thomas said to him,

"Master, we do not know where you are going;

how can we know the way?"

Jesus said to him, I am the way and the truth and the life.

No one comes to the Father except through me.

If you know me, then you will also know my Father.

From now on you do know him and have seen him."

Philip said to him,

"Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us."

Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you for so long a time

and you still do not know me, Philip?

Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.

How can you say, 'Show us the Father'?

Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?

The words that I speak to you I do not speak on my own.

The Father who dwells in me is doing his works.

Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me,

or else, believe because of the works themselves.

Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do,

and will do greater ones than these,

because I am going to the Father."

~Jn:14: 1-12

 

 

I found Fr. Cajetan Cuddy’s homily fascinating.  Fr, Cajetan seems to delve into some of the more complex theology in his homilies but here he says Jesus is simple and direct.

 

Fr. Cajetan:

In the midst of this storm of information and of data and of pixels, we want clarity…This is supremely true in the case of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He responds concisely, pithily, truthfully, with concision and precision: “I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through Me.” 

 

Jesus identifies himself as the way, Himself as the truth, Himself as the life.  And yet there remain a plethora of ways, truths, and different lifestyles, claiming that there are other ways, other truths, other lifestyles that are consonant with what our Lord and who He was and indeed even who he is.  The evident problem with the responses of pluralism and diversity that diverge, not culturally different, personally different, but essentially different from what our Lord Himself revealed is that they don’t provide a cipher through which everyone can cut through all of the diverging claims about what it means to follow Jesus.  In other words, the fog of ideas and contradictory claims don’t bring precision. They don’t bring concision, and they don’t bring salvation, because salvation is precise, it is concise, it is simple, and it’s Jesus Himself. 

 

Jesus does not offer one path among many. He offers Himself. The confusion of the modern world cannot be resolved by more analysis or more perspectives, but only by returning to Christ.

 

How do we follow Jesus?  Turn to Him.  We are not saved by analysis or diverging viewpoints.  We are saved by Him.

For the pastoral homily, I will return to Archbishop Edward Weisenburger.  The Archbishop points out that in this scene Jesus is preparing the disciples for His departure.

 

 

Archbishop Weisenburger:

As the discussion continues, Thomas, it seems somewhat exasperated, blurts out, "Lord, just show us the way to the Father and that will be enough  for us." Jesus responds with those beautiful words, "How long have I been with you, Thomas, and still, you do not know me? Thomas, I am the way."  Okay, brothers and sisters, the meaning of that little phrase, "I am the way," holds a meaning that makes all the difference.  You see, in the first century of Judaism, the phrase "the way" was a metaphor for "life with God."  Today, we might call "the way" something more like "the spiritual journey" or "the life of faith." But the phrase was indeed a common one and very specific.  It seems Jesus is asserting that He alone the fullness of life with God. He alone has opened the door to heaven for all of humanity.

 

…I almost hear an echo of the anxious and frightened Thomas today.  His words, Thomas' 2,000 years ago, were, "Lord, we do not know where you are going.  How can we know the way?" Today, coming from our mouths, it might sound more like, "Lord, where in the world are we going, because it seems we have lost our way."  And for many in the fear, anxiety and struggles of today, what some have lost still goes back to that original meaning of "the way." It seems that some have lost the very relationship with God. And yet, if we listen attentively, does Jesus not respond to us today with   the same comforting words He first offered Thomas, and through Thomas, to all of us?  "Thomas, I am the way. I am the way."

 

Brothers and sisters, Jesus' words this weekend are powerful and critical.  We must not let any fears or anxieties of the day dampen our spirits or compromise our courage, our perseverance, and our determination. For while He has left us to take His place at the right hand of the Father, He is profoundly and wonderfully with us and remains with us forever.  And those who are on the way with Him can never be lost.

 

Again, Jesus is the way, and when you realize this, truly realize it, your heart will no longer be troubled.

 

 

Sunday Meditation: "Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?”

 

This is such beautiful hymn, “I Received the Living God,” performed by The Cathedral Singers.

 

The Lyrics:

Refrain:

I received the living God,

and my heart is full of joy.

I received the living God,

and my heart is full of joy.

 

Jesus said: "I am the Bread

Kneaded long to give you life;

You who will partake of me

Need not ever fear to die." [Refrain]

 

Jesus said: "I am the Way,

And my Father longs for you;

So I come to bring you home

To be one with him anew." [Refrain]

 

Jesus said: "I am the Truth;

If you follow close to me,

You will know me in your heart,

And my word shall make you free." [Refrain]

 

Jesus said: "I am the Life

Far from whom no thing can grow,

But receive this living bread,

And my Spirit you shall know." [Refrain]

Retreat With St. Catherine of Siena: Day 2, “Self-Knowledge”

Day 1 was actually a Lenten Retreat with St. Catherine, but since Lent is over and today is St. Catherine’s Feast Day (April 29^th), I am going to call these future posts as Retreats with St. Catherine.

 

What is self-knowledge?  From Marriam-Webster’s Dictionary:

“knowledge or understanding of one's own capabilities, character, feelings, or motivations : self-understanding”

To reach self-knowledge, one needs a fair amount of introspection. 

What exactly are you striving for spiritually when you are seeking self-knowledge?  Knowing one’s capability in shooting basketball foul shots will not exactly lead you to understand your relationship with God. 

Also, related to self-knowledge, but in an inverse way, is self-absorption.  When does meditating on one’s self-understanding cross over into self-absorption?

St. Catherine of Siena has a lot to say on these questions.  From Elizabeth A. Dreyer’s, Living the Truth in Love: A Retreat with Catherine of Siena.

 

From the Introduction:

[Catherine] was certainly no stranger to the lure of selfishness.  She cautions her readers over and over again that the great enemy of the spiritual life is self-preoccupation.  She writes, “Every scandal, hatred, cruelty, and everything unbecoming springs from the root of selfish love” (The Dialogue, Trans. Suzzane Noffke, New York: Paulist Press, p.35).  Terms like “selfish self-centeredness,” “selfish sensuality,” “self-complacency” and “self-opinionatedness” pepper her texts.  (p. 34)

On this second day of retreat, we reflect on the human condition as the great contrast with the reality of God.  We delve into a most basic truth about ourselves—that we are creatures, not the Creator; sinners, not the sinless One.   (p. 34)

Opening Prayer:

Ineffable Creator

…

You are proclaimed

The true font of light and wisdom

And the primal origin

Raised beyond all things.

Pour forth a ray of Your brightness

into the darkened places of my mind;

disperse from my soul

the twofold darkness

into which i was born:

sin and ignorance.

 [The Prayers of Catherine of Siena, Ed. Suzanne Noffke, New York: Pualist Press, 1983, p.82]

 

Spiritual Talk:

Three quotes out of the retreat talk.

Catherine’s works are full of references to self-knowledge and knowledge of God.  Often she places both phrases in the same sentence, since she sees them intimately related to each other.  Perhaps because she spent three years in solitary prayer in her room in her parent’s home, she often refers to the “cell” or the “house” of self-knowledge.  She may also have felt compelled to emphasize the “cell within” to counter her critics, who would have preferred to have her in her cell than traveling about Europe, conversing with popes and princes.  In a letter to her first spiritual director, Tommaso della Fonte, she describes the “cell of the soul” as a well in which there is both earth [our poverty] and living water [the very core of the knowledge of God’s will that we be made holy] (The Letters of St. Catherine of Siena.  Vol 1, Trans. Suzzane Noffke, p. 44).  One comes to know oneself by turning inward in quiet reflection.  She encourages us to enter into the depths of this well, into loving transformation.  (p. 36)

In order to force us to confront our sinfulness with honesty and courage, [Catherine] employs a rather dramatic metaphor.  She compares sin to leprosy (Dialogue, p.180).  Adam’s sin, she says, oozed with deadly pus, until the incarnation effected a cure, draining the pus out of Adam’s sin, leaving only its scar (Dialogue, p.52).  No doubt this imagery was impressed on Catherine’s mind as she went about nursing those who suffered from plague and other diseases.  (p.37)

Catherine’s insistence on self-knowledge bears the mark of her intense personality.  Nowhere is this more visible than in her awareness of her own sinfulness.  In her Prayers, she is constantly juxtaposing her sinfulness and the sinfulness of the world with God’s loving mercy.  The phrase, “I have sinned against the Lord; have mercy on me!” runs like a leitmotif throughout.  In a letter to two of her friends, Catherine writes, “I, Caterina, a useless servant, am in agony with desire as I searched the depths of my soul; I grieve and weep when I see and really understand our foolish apathy, our failure to give our love to God after God has given us such great graces with so much love” (The Letters of St. Catherine of Siena.  Vol 1, Trans. Suzzane Noffke, p. 80).  (p.40-1)

Catherine’s self-knowledge—her sinfulness, her smallness in the face of the Creator, and her sinfulness with respect to God’s purity—leads her to write from the mouth of God the eternal Father spoken to Catherine: "Do you know, daughter, who you are and who I am? If you know these two things you will have beatitude within your grasp.  You are she who is not, and I AM HE WHO IS." (Raymond of Capua, Life of Catherine of Siena, 92).  Knowledge of self for Catherine requires the awareness that one is not God and that God is many things she is not.

For Reflection:

Throughout her Prayers, Catherine repeats over and over again: “I have sinned against the Lord.  Have mercy on me!  Do not look at our sins, all-powerful, compassionate, merciful God.”

Closing Prayer:

“Cancel out our sin today, then,

O true God,

and wash our soul’s face

with your only begotten Son’s blood,

poured out for us,

so that dead to ourselves

and living for him

we may offer him a return for his suffering

with bright face and undivided soul.”

              (Prayers, p. 65)