Saint Charles Parish, Imperial Beach, San Diego, California

FOR SPIRITUAL GROWTH

YOUR FAMILY CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

Catholic families can reclaim the culture by living the Gospel at home and in the community.

Eight Ideas to teach your children:

§ Remember that what you do is more important than what you say. The greatest gift a father can give his children is to love their mother. Of course, the same applies to wives loving their husbands. If you love each other, your children see and learn love. If you love God, they see and learn faith.

§ Teach your children to seek real freedom, not a counterfeit. A wider selection of sport utility vehicles is not freedom. A license to kill unborn children is not freedom. Truth is the inner structure of freedom. Truth and freedom can’t be separated. The more we debase words like “freedom” to sell cars and cell phones and abortion and assisted suicide, the more we debase ourselves.

§ Teach your children to seek wisdom, not just knowledge. Put wisdom first in the hearts of your children, so that knowledge serves humanity, and not the other way around.

§ Teach your children to see clearly and think critically. Help them to understand marketing, advertising, and propaganda for what they are --- not necessarily “bad” things, but very powerful influences on the way we think and act.

§ Help your children to remember their own history. The Catholic faith has a rich and marvelous history, and it’s always under attack from people who want to reinterpret it.

§ Teach your children to develop the virtues of the heart: fidelity, patience, simplicity, humility, courage, honesty, forgiveness, a hunger for justice.

§ Teach your children to revere the sanctity of life.

§ Teach your children to live 1 Corinthians 13: “Faith, hope and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (Excerpt from Columbia Magazine, 09/2001, Article of Archbishop Charles J.Chaput, OFM Cap

NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION, ANYONE?

Let’s take up the promise of Jesus and do our part. Let’s make it our goal this year, 2002, to draw closer to our Father and get to know Him better. Let’s tell Jesus that we want to love him more. Let’s tell him every day that we entrust our lives into his care.

Every new year is a perfect opportunity to reflect on how we’re living and on our relationship with God. It’s a perfect time to make some decisions about how we want to live the remaining years of our lives and to make whatever changes will help us experience more deeply the new way of relating that Jesus promised at the Last Supper.

We can experience the Holy Spirit in our hearts. We can change. We can grow closer to God and bear lasting fruit. We can deepen our friendship with God. Let’s make 2002 a special year for Jesus, and for us.

(From” the Word Among Us” ,01/02 Issue)

FOR SPIRITUAL GROWTH

The Eucharistic Community: “The office of pastor is not confined to the care of the faithful as individuals, but also in a true sense is extended to the formation of a genuine Christian community. Yet the spirit of the community should be so fostered as to embrace not only the local church, but also the universal Church. The local community should promote not only the care of its own faithful, but, filled with a missionary zeal, it should prepare also the way to Christ for all men (and women). In a special way, catechumens and the newly-baptized who must be educated gradually to know and to live the Christian life are entrusted to his care. No Christian community, however, is built up unless it has its basis and center in the celebration of the most Holy Eucharist; from this, therefore, all education to the spirit of community must take its origin. This celebration, if it is to be genuine and complete, should lead to various works of charity and mutual help, as well as to missionary activity and to different forms of Christian witness.”

From the Vatican II, Decree on the Ministry and Life of Priests, #6)