Sunday Sermon, May 15 -- Pentecost: The Gift of Tongues Means Speaking New Languages (Father Ryan Erlenbush, Corpus Christi Parish)

Pentecost Sunday - The Gift of Tongues Means Speaking New Languages

The gift of tongues is the wondrous miracle whereby the Apostles spoke many new languages on the feast of Pentecost. This miracles was prevalent in the early Church, but has since mostly disappeared. We consider that this gift was given for the spread of the Gospel in the earliest days of the faith, but is no longer needed since there are men and women of every language who speak the praises of God.

"Prayer of the Spirit" means prayer that is filled with love. Love of God and love of neighbor.

Sunday Sermon, May 5 -- The Dogma of the Ascension (Father Ryan Erlenbush, Corpus Christi Parish)

Sermon for the Solemnity of the Ascension (transferred from Thursday in Montana, USA) -- The Dogma of the Ascension of the Lord.

1. What the dogma of the Ascension entails: Jesus has not left his humanity, nor has he abandoned us; he has removed his visible, tangible presence (natural species) from us, even as he remains present in the Eucharist to the end of time.

2. What the Ascension means for us: Our Lord inspires our faith in what is not seen, lifts us our hope to the things of heaven, and makes our love to be truly spiritual and celestial.

Ascension Thursday Sermon, May 5 -- The Ascension helps the spread of the Gospel (Father Ryan Erlenbush, Corpus Christi Parish)

Ascension Thursday -- The Ascension helps the spread of the Gospel.

It is tempting to think that we would be better off if Jesus had remained upon the earth and not ascended to heaven -- he could solve all the disputes present in the Church and world today! However, the simply history proves that Jesus' ascension has been the greatest benefit to the growth of the Church and the spread of the Gospel.

Daily Sermons, May 3-7 (Father Ryan Erlenbush, Corpus Christi Parish)

Homilies from daily Masses at Corpus Christi, Great Falls, MT -- May 3 through 7.
Sts Philip and James, Pentecost Novena, St John at the Latin Gate, Mary the Mother of the Church.

Does it really matter whether Jesus ascended on a Thursday?

May 5^th, 2016 – Ascension Thursday

Although in many places throughout the United States and the world the Ascension is transferred from Thursday to Sunday, the Biblical evidence clearly indicates that our Lord did ascend to heaven on a Thursday, precisely forty days after his resurrection on Easter Sunday. The possibility of transferring Ascension Thursday to Sunday is yet another striking example of the “banality” of this “fabrication” which we call the Novus Ordo, to use the language of our dear “Father Benedict” (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI).

“One of the weaknesses of the postconciliar liturgical reform can doubtless be traced to the armchair strategy of academics, drawing up things on paper which, in fact, would presuppose years of organic growth. The most blatant example of this is the reform of the Calendar: those responsible simply did not realize how much the various annual feasts had influenced Christian people's relation to time […] they ignored a fundamental law of religious life.” Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, The Feast of Faith, 81-82 (published by Ignatius Press).

“The liturgical reform, in its concrete realization, has distanced itself even more from its origin. The result has not been a reanimation, but devastation. In place of the liturgy, fruit of a continual development, they have placed a fabricated liturgy. They have deserted a vital process of growth and becoming in order to substitute a fabrication. They did not want to continue the development, the organic maturing of something living through the centuries, and they replaced it, in the manner of technical production, by a fabrication, a banal product of the moment.” (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger in Revue Theologisches, Vol. 20, Feb. 1990, pgs. 103-104)

Why is it important to know that Jesus ascended into heaven on a Thursday? What is the significance of this fact?

The Church Can Allow Eating Strangled Animals, But She Can't Ever Allow "Pornea"

6th Sunday of Easter

Acts 15:1-2,22-29

That you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication: from which things keeping yourselves, you shall do well. (Acts 15:29)

In the first reading this past Sunday, we heard a list of things forbidden to the Christian, among which are blood, the meat of strangled animals, and “pornea” (translated as “fornication”). Did the Church really forbid eating these things? If that law could change, could the laws against fornication change? Could the Church sanction public adultery (under the form of divorce and remarriage)?

Sunday Sermon, May 1 -- Mary, True Spouse of the Holy Spirit (Father Ryan Erlenbush, Corpus Christi Parish)

Sermon of Father Ryan Erlenbush, given at Corpus Christi Catholic Parish in Great Falls, MT.

The Bible shows Mary to be the spouse of the Holy Spirit, through whom he desires to come into the world and produce Jesus Christ. Acts of the Apostles shows a Christian Church which is gathered around Mary through whose intercession the Spirit descends in power.

There is much fruit to be gained from meditating upon the intimate union of the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin Mary.