Ubi Petrus

Today we pray for Rev. Daniel Szopa and Rev. Daniel St. Laurent.

Fr. Szopa was ordained in 1976 and appears to be retired (the Diocesan database is unclear here) having served, inter alia, for both St. Stanislaus’ Parish in Nasua and Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal’s Parish in Hampton.

Fr. St. Laurent was ordained in 1971 and is currently serving in the Diocese of Juticalpa in Olancho, Honduras.

Lord, may their years of service to you and your Church have born great fruit, and may they continue to bring new souls to the grace of your Sacraments.  May Mary, mother of the Church, watch over them and lead them to your Sacred Heart.

Now, soldiers of the Church Militant, it’s time to get on it.  Rosaries for Life is proposing a monumental effort – 68 million rosaries between today and Inauguration Day.  If you’re one of those Catholics who voted for Obama assuming his social and economic policies would reduce the overall number of abortions, this is your chance to put the full weight of your Catholicism behind it and pray that you were right.  If you voted against Obama because you feared what he promised would result in more abortions and not fewer, now is your chance to pray that you were wrong.  And if you didn’t vote or voted third-party, now is your chance to be involved in something we can all believe in – the power of prayer.

The first initiative of Rosaries for Life is going to be the Inauguration Day Rosary Novena. This Novena is going to last for 72 days – it consists of 4 sets of mysteries 9 times for the intentions, followed by 4 sets of mysteries 9 times in thanksgiving = 72 days of praying 5 decades). The novena will begin on November 10th, the feast of St. Leo the Great (as well as the first day of the USCCB meeting) and end on January 20th, Inauguration Day. If you missed the beginning of the novena, please join us anyway, and pledge either “a partial novena” until January 20th or a full 72-day novena to end sometime after Inauguration Day.

If you haven’t already, I’d highly recommend you head over to FightFOCA and sign their online petition.  For the unaware, FOCA stands for “Freedom of Choice Act” which promises to override every single legal restriction at any level on abortion.  Our new President has promised Planned Parenthood that he will make it one of the first acts of his administration to sign this act, consigning untold numbers of yet-to-be-born children to violent deaths.

Yes, I said I try to avoid politics on this blog; this transcends mere politics and jets straight to morality and the natural law.  If anyone of any party were to attempt passage of this act they would and should be properly pointed out because, quite simply, lives are at stake.  This must not be allowed to come to pass.  The time is now to act, and act powerfully.  Pray, always, but do not neglect the means God has given us in this country to affect real change.

Today we pray for Bishop John McCormack.

Bishop McCormack was ordained to the priesthood in 1960 and ordained to the episcopate in 1995.  He has been the Bishop of the Diocese of Manchester since 1998.

Lord watch over him and guide him, give him the strength and determination to fulfill the duties of his office in your Church with zeal and vigor, never to shy away from any need and always to properly balance that zeal with proper pastoral sensitivity.  Mother Mary, shelter him from the attacks of the Enemy and take him by the hand, leading him to your Son.

If you’re a Mac user and looking for a powerful Bible (and beyond) search and research tool, Logos is finally taking pre-orders for its software.  While the titles they have available are largely dominated by Protestant writers there is also a very large library of Catholic titles.  I often use the tool to prep for our RCIA classes and if I could invent more time in the day I’d be able to use it for many other purposes.  Some even use it to help them learn some of the ancient Biblical languages.

I’ve made a couple of tweaks to the site.  First, thanks to the tremendous pro-life strategy conference call (you can hear the audio or get the transcript here) this week I’ve added a links section for pro-life resources.  Now is the time to make sure we all know what to do and where to go and to get our facts sorted – I suspect after this election abortion is going to be an even more important topic than ever.  If you have other useful links, drop me a note in the combox and I’ll add them.

Second, I noticed that I had mistakenly set up the permalink format to include the day of the month which I hadn’t intended.  Hopefully tweaking that doesn’t break anything important.

Finally, I added the Sociable plugin which allows fast linking to social networks if you should be so inclined.  I would, again, suggest PickAFig as it’s intended to be a primarily Catholic resource.  Hopefully it works as intended – again, drop me a note if it doesn’t.  Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!

Today we pray for Rev. Steven Liscinsky LC and Rev. Arthur Pare SJ.

I am unable to find any information on Fr. Liscinsky – if you have any, please drop a note in the combox.

Fr. Pare was ordained in 1960 and is now Senior Priest at St. Joseph’s Parish in Salem.

May the Lord continue to mold and form them and draw them nearer to His Heart.  May Mary shelter them in her mantle and guide them by the hand to her Son.

Today we pray for Rev. Deacon Paul Boucher and Rev. Deacon David Shrader.

Deacon Paul Boucher was ordained in 2002 and serves St. Mary’s Parish in Claremont.

Deacon Shrader was ordained in 1988 and serves Holy Rosary Parish in Hooksett and St. John the Baptist’s Parish in Suncook.  He also serves as the Chaplain for the Hillsborough County House of Corrections.

May their work always be inspired by the example of St. Stephen, Deacon and Protomartyr.  May Mary our Mother draw them to her Immaculate Heart and show them the way to her Son’s Sacred Heart.

Today we pray for Rev. Donald Lafond and Rev. Eusebio Silva.

Fr. Lafond was ordained in 1962 and is now retired.  He is one of the priests who helps my parish, St. Catherine of Siena in Manchester, provide a full Mass schedule every Sunday.

Fr. Silva was ordained in 1966 and serves as associate pastor of Holy Trinity Parish in Plymouth.

May they put their many years of experience in serving the Christ and His Church to even better use each day and may they continually find themselves more conformed to His will.  May Mary watch over them and draw them to her Son.