John Janaro's Blog, page 149

Christina Grimmie: A Companionship that Never Ends

Remembering Christina Grimmie this month, with words from her most recent posthumously released song, "Hold Your Head Up." It's an upbeat song with a special kind of positive message, one that strikes me as founded on the hope for a companionship that never ends.

July 11: Saint Benedict's Universal Feast Day

Happy Feast of Saint Benedict to all Benedictines, oblates, and the whole Benedictine spiritual family throughout the world!

Today commemorates the translation of St. Benedict's tomb and relics to the Abbey of Fleury in France in the year 660 (to protect them from Lombard invasions of Italy). The Abbey of Fleury was an important pilgrimage site for over a thousand years. Its monastic community was dispersed by the French Revolution but the monastery remained in existence throughout the 19th c. period of French anticlericalism. The community of monks was restored in the 20th century. The current Roman calendar marks this day as Benedict's feast to insure that it can be celebrated by the whole Church. The date of his death (March 21) always falls during Lent; nevertheless it remains a Solemnity on the Benedictine calendar and is a III class feast on the 1962 calendar followed by the Extraordinary Form of the Roman rite. Don't be confused. Just have a blessed and happy day!

We are well instructed by these words preached 11 years ago on this day by then-Pope Benedict XVI. On this feast, we pray for an abundance of grace to vivify his current "monastic" life of contemplation and hidden service of love: 

"St. Benedict's life was steeped in an atmosphere of prayer, the foundation of his existence. Without prayer there is no experience of God. Yet Benedict's spirituality was not an interiority removed from reality. In the anxiety and confusion of his day, he lived under God's gaze and in this very way never lost sight of the duties of daily life and of man with his practical needs... In contrast with a facile and egocentric self-fulfilment, today often exalted, the first and indispensable commitment of a disciple of St Benedict is the sincere search for God on the path mapped out by the humble and obedient Christ, whose love he must put before all else, and in this way, in the service of the other, he becomes a man of service and peace" (Pope Benedict XVI, feast of St. Benedict, 2008).

"Sun Sky"

Here is "Sun Sky," - abstract piece in digital medium. By JJ.

Long Live the Queens! (U.S. Women Rule the World Cup)

They did it!

Dang, this team is a great team.

When it comes to the world stage, the United States Women's National Team is, arguably, the "team of the decade," not only in the beautiful game of soccer, not only out of all U.S.A. teams, but just THE Team of the Decade. Period.

It's just my opinion. It's a little bit of what fans do, in sports, when they humorously put on a just-for-fun show of "smack talk." (So take it easy, Italian friends; this is all in the spirit of nice American fun. Capito?

...in Distress

"I will be with him in distress," says the Lord.

United to Jesus

In difficult times, 
even more than in times of peace, 
the priority for believers 
is to be united 
to Jesus, our hope.

~Pope Francis

Happy Birthday USA

Happy Independence Day 2019

Facebook Causes Us to "Lose Face"!

Today, July 3, 2019, will be forever remembered as The Day Facebook Failed. I'm just kidding... the younger generation would say it "failed" sometime around the year 2013! They all use Instagram. But here's the thing: Instagram also failed today.

Millions of people spent hours deprived of the endless roll of digital images and videos. Oh the humanity...!

It looked like THIS:


Shocking! Just shocking! Where are my pictures? Where are any of the pictures?

We were still able to post words, however, on Facebook. Instagram was toast, but I don't think that was much of a problem for my kids or anyone else from the Smart(Phone)-Generation. They can survive, as long as they still have texting... rotfl ppl srsly.

Trust God in the Midst of Every Storm

In the Gospel reading for July 2, we hear the story of the storm that arose on the sea while Jesus was sleeping below the deck of the boat. His disciples "came and woke him, saying, 'Lord, save us! We are perishing!' He said to them, 'Why are you terrified, O you of little faith?' Then he got up, rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great calm. The men were amazed and said, 'What sort of man is this, whom even the winds and the sea obey?'" (Matthew 8:25-27).
One of the key themes of this text is that the Lord is trustworthy. If we could penetrate the fullness of the mystery of our lives, we would see that everything really is "grace," that God is indeed good, all the time.
Everything in our lives unfolds according to our Father's loving plan for each one of us. If God allows something bad to happen to us, He permits it because He wants to bring a greater good out of it; He wants to lead us through these struggles to a deeper and more mature life.
In affirming this, we don't want to trivialize the tremendous pain and apparently inexplicable sufferings that we face in different times and ways in our lives. Rather, we need to recognize that the purpose of our lives is hidden in the mystery of God's goodness.

And He is good. He loves us. When He permits us to suffer, He also gives us the strength to endure and grow through it. God doesn't always give us things that feel good, but He always gives us what we really need. That includes the grace that enables us to ask Him for help, to recognize that we need Him and are totally dependent on Him.

We don't ultimately know ourselves, or the mystery of the whole person God wills each of us to become. And when bad things happen, God doesn't usually show us (at least, not at the time) the purpose of these events in our journey to our destiny. We have to trust Him.

Trust is a decision; it is a position of the heart in the midst of the storm. It does not depend on how we feel, and it may not make us feel any better. It usually doesn't make the bad circumstance disappear. But trust makes our hearts grow. We must trust God and never give up, even if we feel like we can only do it through gritted teeth.

Years later, we can sometimes catch a reflection from the light of this mysterious growth. As we get older and look back on life, we can say, "I'm so grateful for that whole experience. I wouldn't be the person I am today if all of that had not happened."

Such memories encourage us to continue to trust. But even when we feel that our whole life has been nothing but a series of storms, we must hold onto Him. He will not leave us. He has come to stay with us.

Trust in Jesus, and never give up.

Lord Jesus, give me the grace to trust in You. Make this trust the foundation and the shape of my heart, the position of my heart in the midst of every storm.

Pete and Paul Go Way Waaay Back (Buona Festa!)

Saints Peter and Paul (on stone, detail from early fourth century Christian tomb). 


I thought this was pretty cool. Happy Summer Holidays!