Welcome to the National Shrine of Saint Philomena

THE SAINT PHILOMENA MESSENGER
Issue Number 27 February, 2002, A.D.

My dear Friends of Saint Philomena,

May the Good Lord bless you all in this New Year Of Our Lord, 2002.

I am sure, many of you, like me, thought we would “see the Lord” rather than be here yet another year. God’s mercy is infinite, and Our Lady’s power with Her Son to stay His Hand despite our sins is far beyond our feeble understanding. It should hardly need to be said that the response of the faithful Catholic to having “death look us in the face”, is never one of worry or despair. No one is immortal. Very few of us will live to be 90 years old. We must ensure to be always in a state of grace and wearing the Brown Scapular, the “pledge of salvation”.

Secondly. Please note our “E. Mail” address has been changed. This is because “Gateway” was somehow absorbed by AOL (Don’t ask me how or why!). This has caused us great inconvenience, loss of donations, etc. Our new E. Mail address is : stphilomenamiami@aol.com.

Lent begins very early this year, the 13th. of February (Ash Wednesday). As ever, and now with more facility since we have the help of Fr. Enrique Rueda, the full Holy Week Ceremonies will be celebrated.
Can you imagine how few places in the world today are able to do this? It is a great cause for thanksgiving.

HOLY WEEK SCHEDULE, MIAMI, 2002 A.D.

24th. March: PALM SUNDAY
11.00 a.m. Blessing and distribution of Palms, Street Procession & High Mass
28th. March: HOLY THURSDAY
7.00 p.m. Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Footwashing, Street Procession of the Most Blessed Sacrament, Watch of the Passion until Midnight
29th. March: GOOD FRIDAY
3.00 p.m. Liturgy and Holy Communion
7.00 p.m. Living Way of the Cross on Eighth Street
30th. March: HOLY SATURDAY
11.00 p.m. Lighting of the New Fire, Easter Vigil & High Mass of The Lord’s Resurrection

ABORTION: AN “ABOMINABLE CRIME” (Pope John Paul II)

I have to share this with you all: Even before becoming a Catholic I knew abortion was terribly wrong. Incredibly, we are the only Catholic church in Miami (Except the Ukrainian) to allow the placing of a Pro-Life sign on our property (Our present one has a picture of a beautiful baby & the words in English and Spanish: “Each abortion kills a human life!”)

About a year ago two young men, not Catholics, contacted me. They were from Operation Rescue West in California. They had tried everywhere in Miami, seeking a place to park their vehicles and “crash” after a few days of pro-life witnessing. This consisted in driving their vehicles, which carried large photographs of the ghastly reality of abortion, in popular areas and around abortuaries during the daytime, in order to frighten people to acknowledge the hideous results of this barbaric murder. Astonishingly no church welcomed them. Some actually forbade their presence.I was only too glad to give them every assistance, inviting them to speak to my congregation to explain their wonderful work. Recently I read Troy Newman’s book “Their Blood Cries Out”. This is such an indictment of our comfortable, “politically correct”, “don’t want to lose our tax-exemption” Church, that on reading it one can only weep with shame and guilt, realising that the reason why more than four thousand babies are butchered to death in this country alone -every day!- is because apart from a number that can be counted on the fingers of one hand, the vast, vast majority of our bishops, priests and laity prefer to “change the subject” rather than risk the slightest inconvenience to save the lives of innocent victims, murdered by the thousand every day by their their own parents, our brothers and sisters “in Christ” who seek to get rid of the consequences of their sexual sins, or who seek to avoid the responsibilities of parenthood. Imagine if the Catholic Bishops, after “Roe v. Wade” had called for every Catholic to take to the streets in protest, we would not be where we are now, BY NO MEANS! Where were they over “partial birth abortion”? Stem cell research? Imagine the scene: the Cardinal Archbishop of X comes before the judgement seat of Christ: Jesus asks him: “My son, why did you not risk going to jail to protect the thousands of babies who were slain in your archdiocese during your time as shepherd? His Eminence replies, “But, Lord, we might have lost tax-exemption!” May God have mercy on us all!

‘Their Blood Cries Out”, by Troy Newman, is available from Operation Rescue West, P.O. Box 601150, Sacramento, CA 95860, (800) 705 1175, www.operationrescue.org. This book is so powerful it can change your life! It changed mine!

A SICK JOKE

Some years ago our “Pro-Life” sign read: “Abortion stops a beating heart”. One morning, three girls came into the church to ask me, “How much is it?” They knew abortion stopped a beating heart and they wanted that little heart stopped.

A RECENT TRAGEDY

On evening last summer, I was sitting in the church saying my breviary. A young man came in and indicated that he wanted to speak to me. I took him into the hall and we sat down. He was 17, Catholic, and of Nicaraguan descent. He told me he had got his girl-friend (16) pregnant, and he did not want her to abort the baby, he realised that abortion was murder. His girl-friend’s sister, 18, had already had two abortions, and was encouraging her sister to have her first. Could I help? I immediately called Miami Right to Life and set up a meeting the next morning for the youngsters and a counsellor, explaining to him that if she did not want to keep her baby there were thousands of couples desperate to have children, and that financial arrangements for his girl-friend would not be difficult.
Next morning the counsellor and I waited an hour in the church to no avail. Later I met the young man on the street and he told me the girl’s sister had taken her early that morning to the abortuary and the baby was dead. How could this young girl do such a thing? How could she strip, lay there and permit a demonically-possessed monster to insert a vacuum cleaner into her most sacred space to destroy her child? How is it that such a vast number of Hispanic women (I speak from my Miami experience - I’m sure the same thing applies to all racial groups) - have had NUMEROUS abortions? To be sure the fault lies at the doors of the bishops and the priests! When did you last hear a sermon explaining to such young Catholics the abominable crime of abortion? No wonder Dante saw Hell FULL of clergy!

WHAT DOES THE WORLD TRADE CENTER BOMBING HAVE TO DO WITH ABORTION? (The following article is much abbreviated from the latest newsletter of Operation Rescue West)

“Osama bin Laden is clearly the most hated man in the world right now.
But as bad as he is, Osama bin Laden has nothing on America’s abortionists
Nothing at all.
You see, while Osama bin Laden’s terrorists killed thousands of people in one day, America’s abortionists kill more than that - - every single Saturday.
Saturday is the “peak” business day in the U.S. abortion industry. That’s when the overwhelming majority of abortions are performed.
So every Saturday, American abortionists murder far more human beings than Osama bib Laden’s terrorists did on September 11th.
The entire world was shocked, horrified, outraged, and numbed by the terrorist massacre - - and rightly so.
But virtually the same people who reacted so strongly to the massacre - - the same newscasters… the same politicians… the same entertainers… and the same “man on the street” - - are also the same people who strongly support abortion.
They think it’s “nothing” to allow thousands upon thousands of helpless, innocent little babies in the womb to be massacred on a daily basis… over one million little people massacred by abortion every year in this country alone. (Worldwide the number is simply staggering.)
The difference is, of course, that abortion is a “legal” form of massacre.
It’s not considered “murder” or an “act of war”. No, it’s a “constitutional right”!!!
And that’s the hypocrisy of America today… a nation facing its judgement and its chastisement - - yet stubbornly refusing to confess its most grievous sins. Stubbornly refusing to confess those sins. And stubbornly refusing to repent of those sins.
I see a nation with its priorities completely out of whack.
A nation that thinks nothing of having murdered 42 million of its own children on the last 30 years…We are a nation blinded by greed, lust, pride, sloth, envy, gluttony, and anger - - the Seven Deadly Sins.
And yet, even with this horrible attack upon our soil, we still haven’t learned.”
Our challenge is to call people’s attention to the unrelenting Abortion Massacre that takes place here - on our soil - - every day of the week… 52 weeks of the year.
On any given day more innocent, defenceless humans are murdered in America’s abortion mills than were killed in the terrorist attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania - combined.
THAT MUST STOP before our nation can possibly be blessed, protected, and guided by God in President Bush’s new “war on terrorism” that is now underway.
Otherwise, God will surely treat us as the hypocrites and “whitened sepulchers” that we are - - and delilver us up to our most wicked enemies for our justly deserved punishment.” (Troy Newman, Operation Rescue West newsletter December, 20901, A.D.)

Abortion: May God have mercy upon us!

Let us offer up our Lenten sacrifices this year begging Our Lord to move the hearts of those in positions of power that they may realise the reality of abortion and act to put an end to this abomination once and for all! All must acknowledge the great intelligence and natural goodness of leaders such as Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice, yet they are blind to abortion murder, indeed support it, which, in the spirit of the demonically possessed founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, seeks to exterminate their race. (More on this see material produced by Human Life International, 4 Family Life Lane, Front Royal, VA 22630. E. Mail: hli@hli.org. Website: www.hli.org)

I know this is a most difficult time, but please be generous with your (tax-deductible) donations!

Yours most sincerely in Jesus, Mary and Saint Philomena,

Revd. Father Timothy A. Hopkins, Administrator.