Saturday, 25 August 2012

Season of the Pentecost - 14th Sunday

Dear parishioners and friends of St Charbel’s Parish,

On the 14th Sunday of Pentecost, the Maronite Church reflects on the story of Mary and Martha from the Gospel of St Luke (10:38-42). This Gospel tells us that Christian discipleship begins with listening. Martha is a symbol of action-oriented people, responsible people who serve and get the work done. We certainly need people like Martha in our families, in our Church and in our world.

However, the problem with Martha is that she was too busy working that she forgot to listen to Jesus. Whereas Mary knew that all begins with Jesus and that before anything else, a disciple needs to receive from Jesus. May we learn to listen to God in our lives when He speaks through the Bible, through others and through our own hearts.

Feast of Blessed Estephan Nehma
Thursday 30 August marks the Feast of Blessed Estephan Nehme.

Youssef Nehme was born in Lehfed on March 8, 1889 to Christian parents. He was the youngest son of six children. As a child, Joseph preferred solitude and prayer and, from a young age, he would meditate and pray in silence in the woods surrounding his home. At the age of 16, he became a novice monk at the Monastery of Saints Cyprian and Justine in Kfifane and chose the name 'Estephanos' after his father’s name and the name of his village’s patron saint. He took his vows on August 23, 1907. He then became an associate brother spending the rest of his life working in silence in the gardens and the fields of the monasteries in which he lived. Br Estephan suffered a severe fever that eventually lead to his death at the age of 49.

Br Estephan Nehme is well known for his life's prayers "God can see me" that he would repeat at all times. Br Estephan always believed that God was watching him like a foreman and would work and live at all times accordingly.

May we learn from Bl Estephan to work diligently and zealously and to serve our Lord in silence and with love.

For that occasion , St Charbel’s Parish is organising a tridium of prayers starting Monday the 27th of August and concluding on Thursday the 30th of August with a solemn mass at 6:00 PM

I invite you all to click on this link to view this weeks KADISHAT in PDF with Arabic translations
I wish you all a blessed week!

In God’s Love, Fr. Dr. Antoine Tarabay

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20th Year—Number 1023 Sunday 26/08/2012
Season of the Pentecost
14th Sunday
Sunday’s Readings: 1 Thessalonians 2: 1-13 & Luke 10: 38-42

Mary has chosen the better part

“ In the course of their journey he came to a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. She had a sister called Mary, who sat down at the Lord's feet and listened to him speaking.

Now Martha, who was distracted with all the serving, came to him and said, 'Lord, do you not care that my sister is leaving me to do the serving all by myself? Please tell her to help me.' But the Lord answered, 'Martha, Martha,' he said, 'you worry and fret about so many things, and yet few are needed, indeed only one. It is Mary who has chosen the better part, and it is not to be taken from her.'.” Luke 10: 38-42

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Reflection of the Week
 
At the feet of the Lord
The Gospel for today suggests that the first requirement for human love and Christian discipleship is listening. Human love begins with listening. Christian discipleship begins with listening. The primary foundation of human love is listening. Listening is the pipeline through which human love and divine love flows.

Martha has become a symbol of action-oriented people, responsible people, men and women who get the job done. And the world needs men and women and boys and girls who get the job done. This is certainly true in the church. It is also true in the house. We need responsible people to do the work of the house:
 
What is wrong with being a Martha? Martha’s fault is that she was … too busy to listen … too distracted to sit at his feet and absorb his presence … too busy living life to quietly hear what Jesus had to say … too involved with all her activities and actions that she didn’t find time to first listen to the voice of Christ.
 
And so Jesus taught in an unforgettable way that listening precedes action that we listen first and then do or act. It is always in that order. That is true in both human love and Christian discipleship. Listening and then doing.
 
Martha has become a symbol of the modern world. Martha has become a symbol of you and me who have become so active and busy with living life, we no longer have time to slowly quietly listen to God or even our spouse, kids or friends. In fact, it is a subtle trick that we become so active in doing good things, that our activities become a cover-up for our lack of listening and quiet caring. Martha has become a symbol of a person who is far too busy and has lost the art of listening.

Mary knew that all begins with Jesus and that before anything else, a disciple needs to receive from Jesus. Discipleship doesn’t start or depend on all the effort we make for God.
 
Discipleship means we have to find our ways of sitting at the feet of Jesus before we do anything else. Mary knew how to listen to the Word of God.
 
The Gospel today is primarily concerned about Christian discipleship and listening to the voice of God and Jesus. To focus, to centre, to concentrate, on Christ and the words and spirit of Christ. Listening is a gift of oneself to the other, a concentrating of oneself on the other, on Jesus Christ, and listening to his voice. Mary knew how to listen to Christ, and we are encouraged to do the same.
 
Ref: http://www.sermonsfromseattle.com/

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30 August—Feast day of
Blessed Estephan Nehme
Readings 2 Peter 1:3-11. & Luke 18:18-30

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Think About 

Listening is an art that is learned 
and slowly developed where you actually focus on that person before you. 
Listening focuses on that one person, not on the past, not on the future, 
not on all the stuff going on right now. 
Listening is a gift; it is an art; it is a learned behaviour. And listening is the first face of love. 
The more one listens, the more love grows. 
The less one listens, the less love there is. 
Listening is the conduit, the pipeline, through which love flows and grows.

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 Saints of the Week

30 August
Blessed Estephan Nehme,
Joseph Nehmé was born on 8 March 1889 in Lehfed, J'beil, Lebanon, the youngest of seven children of Estephanos Bou Haykal Nehmé and Christina Badawi Hanna Khaled. Baptized on 15 March 1889, at Our Lady Church of Lehfed, Nehmé studied under the Maronite Order at Our Lady of Grace School in Sakii Rishmaya. A story from his childhood reports that he once observed a badger enter an underground cave; Nehmé dug at that spot and unearthed a spring, which is known today as "Badger's Fountain".

In 1905, Nehmé entered the novitiate of the Order of Maronites at the Monastery of Ss. Cyprian and Justina in Kfifan. Nehmé made monastic vows on 23 August 1907, taking the name Stephen (variously transliterated as Estefan or Estephanos). He made solemn vows on 13 April 1924. At various monasteries, he did manual labor in the fields and gardens, as well as in carpentry and construction. Nehmé's contemporaries made special note of his constant repetition of the mantra, "God can see me".
Nehmé died of a severe fever that eventually led to apoplexy at 7 p.m. on 30 August 1938 at the monastery in Kfifan.

01 September
St Simon the Stylite
Simon is the most famous of the stylites or saints who spent their days seated on high platforms or pillars. The immense monastery which had been built around his pillar still exists in the environs of Alepo. The celebrated historian Theodoret who was a contemporary of Simon, had personally met him and wrote about his life. Simon was born near Antioch in the year 392. While still a young man, he gave himself over to the service of God in the desert. When he later sought solitude away from the crowds that pressed around him, he established himself on a pillar which grew higher and higher above the crowds. He thus lived between heaven and earth for about forty years, preaching and exhorting the crowds from high upon his pillar. Numerous individuals who came to him were converted by his preaching. He died in the year 459. Devotion to Saint Simon spread throughout Syria and Lebanon. The monastery named after him and the sight of his pillar were the objects of pilgrimages throughout the East.
 
August 29th.
Beheading of John the Baptist
The Church, having celebrated the earthly birthday of St. John the Baptist on June 24, today honors the anniversary of his mar-tyrdom. Besides our Lord and our Lady, St. John the Baptist is the only one whose birth and death are thus celebrated. John had the courage to blame Herod to his face for the scandal of his illegal union with his sister-in-law Herodias, whose husband was still alive. Herodias contrived to make Herod imprison him and took advantage of an unexpected opportunity to obtain through her daughter Salome the beheading of the saint.


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The Maronites and Lebanon (25)
The Ottomans era (4)
The first Maronite Order

 As we have seen before, ever since its birth, the Maronite Church has been closely bound up with the monastic life which grew up around Antioch. It was the only Church to have been actually nurtured in a climate of monastic life and it was to the activity of the monks of the Monastery of Saint Maroun that it owed its development and territorial extension.

The Lebanese Maronite Order, founded in 1695, was the result of a renewal of monastic life which was the work of three young Maronites, Jibrayel Hawwa, Abdallah Qaraali and Youssef Albeten, all from the city of Aleppo. Having felt a call to the monastic life, they discussed the matter among themselves and then they decided to go to Lebanon to fulfil their dream.

As soon as they reached the Monastery of Our Lady of Qannubin, the seat of the Maronite Patriarchate, they presented themselves to Patriarch Estefan Dweihy (1670-1704) and disclosed to him the secret of their religious call. He questioned them closely, insisting on the austerity of the monastic life followed in places that had little to offer in the way of resources or safety from danger, then he gave his blessing and encouragement to their initiative and, on August 1, 1695, even went so far as to offer them the Monastery of Saint Maura (Mart Moura), at Ehden. This marked the very beginning of the Order.

It was on November 10, 1695, that the three founders received the hooded monastic habit, blessed by Patriarch Estefan Dweihy himself, at the Monastery of Our Lady of Qannubin. Ever since, this date has been considered to mark the founding of the Order and it is on this basis that it holds it, General Chapters. The Mart Moura Monastery was chosen to be the Mother House. It was there that they were joined by Jibrayel Farhat at the end of the same year. The founders set about organising their way of life and began to receive new vocations. They elected Jibrayel Hawwa as Father General (1695-1699).


 
Ref: http://www.discoverlebanon.com
Next Sunday: The Ottomans era (5)- The move to Bkerky

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