XPost: alt.religion.mormon, alt.religion, alt.atheism
XPost: alt.bible.prophecy

On Wed, 12 May 2010 13:50:16 -0300, John Manning
<[email protected]> wrote:

Watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNJ5nn2-2oo

Reflections on the Passion

13 - "You cannot better appreciate your worth than by looking into the
mirror of the Cross of Christ; there you will learn how you are to
deflate your pride, how you must mortify the desires of the flesh, how
you are to pray to your Father for those who persecute you, and to
commend your spirit into God's hands."
--(St. Anthony of Padua, Doctor of the Church)

14 - "We love a thing in proportion to what it has cost us. You may
judge by that of our Lord's love for our soul, which has cost him his
Blood." (St. John Vianney)

<<>><<>><<>>
23 June - Madonna del Sasso, Bibbiena, Arezzo, Toscana, Italy

(1347)
The little seer, Caterina, 7 years old, while her mother was washing
clothes in the Vessa stream, moved away a little, placing herself near
a stone. Here she saw a beautiful lady dressed all in white who,
having entered the nearby field of beans, collected several and placed
them in the bosom of the girl. Meanwhile, the mother was busy and the
little girl ran to tell her of the lady and showed her the beans she
had received but the mother paid no attention to her daughter�s
meeting.

Returning to the village, Caterina complained to her mother because
the beans had grown so much that their weight was difficult for her to
bear but her mother told her to be patient as they would soon be home.
In the evening, the mother wanted to cook some of those beans but she
noticed that they were full of blood. The whole country ran to see the
prodigy. The following morning, everyone went in procession to the
stone and here they decided to build a Chapel in honour of the
Madonna.

The apparition of the Madonna del Sasso was preceded and followed by
two further miraculous events.

Also in 1347, shortly before the vision, a white dove appeared on the
top of the stone and was approached only by children and an old
hermit, Beato Martino da Poppi, a Camaldolese Monk, who had his
hermitage nearby. When the children approached it, the dove pecked at
their fingers and hands but if adults approached, it flew away. In
1444, several people saw golden-blue light globes inside and outside
the Church; these appeared for about three months. The podest�,
together with some family and friends, returning from a hunting party,
about 300 meters away from the sacred stone, saw a crowd of
white-dressed young men heading in procession to the Church.

A small Chapel was immediately built next to the boulder, later
enlarged to include the entire boulder. It now hosts the beautiful
image of the Madonna del Sasso, painted by Bicci di Lorenzo in 1435.

This image miraculously remained intact in the fire that completely
destroyed the Church in 1486.

The Dominican Fathers were custodians of the Sanctuary since 1468.
They immediately worked on the construction of the current Sanctuary,
in pure Renaissance style, based on a design by Giuliano da Maiano. A
great amount of funds for the construction of the Sanctuary and
Convent, came from Savonarola in 1495, who solicited help from noble
families of Florence and from the Medici in particular.


�We give glory to You, Lord,
who raised up Your Cross to span the jaws of death
like a bridge by which souls might pass
from the region of the dead to the land of the living. ..
You are incontestably alive.
Your murderers sowed Your living body in the earth
as farmers sow grain but it sprang up
and yielded an abundant harvest of men
raised from the dead.�
St Ephrem (306-373)

�I am the vine, you are the branches.
Whoever remains in me and I in him
will bear much fruit
because without me,
you can do nothing.� John 15:5-6

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