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Monday, September 30, 2013

A Man to be Emulated: St Peter Claver




St. Peter Claver: Patron Saint of Slaves

St. Peter Claver
St. Peter Claver
 
Saint Peter Claver, S.J., (Spanish: San Pedro Claver St. Peter Claver Corbò) (26 June 1581–8 September 1654) was a Spanish Jesuit priest and missionary born in Verdu (Catalonia) who, due to his life and work, became the patron saint of slaves, the Republic of Colombia and ministry to African Americans. During the 40 years of his ministry in Colombia it is estimated he personally baptized around 300,000 people.

Background

The 17th century was an era of expansion. New lands across the Atlantic Ocean had been discovered two hundred years previous. Spain took to the seas in pursuit of land, gold, silver, jewels, spices, sugar and tobacco. Settling the New World brought with it the need for cheap labor. The successors of the conquistadors looked to Africa. Blacks were captured, bartered, and purchased from territories of the west coast of Africa – what is today the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Ghana, Benin and other places deeper in the continent stretching as far as the Congo.

Early life

Claver was born in 1581 into a prosperous farming family in the Catalan village of Verdu, Urgell, located in the Province of Lleida, about 54 miles (87 km) from Barcelona. He was born 70 years after King Ferdinand of Spain set colonial slavery culture into motion by authorizing the purchase of 250 African slaves in Lisbon for his territories in New Spain, an event which was to shape Claver's life. His parents were devout Catholics.

Later, as a student at the University of Barcelona, Claver was noted for his intelligence and piety. After two years of study there, Claver wrote these words in the notebook he kept throughout his life: "I must dedicate myself to the service of God until death, on the understanding that I am like a slave."

In New Spain

After he had completed his studies, Claver entered the Society of Jesus in Tarragona at the age of 20. When he had completed the novitiate, he was sent to do his study of philosophy at Palma, Mallorca. While there, he came to know the porter of the college, St. Alphonsus Rodriguez, a laybrother known for his holiness and gift of prophecy. Rodriguez felt that he had been told by God that Claver was to spend his life in service in the colonies of New Spain, and he frequently urged the young student to accept that calling.





Claver volunteered for the Spanish colonies and was sent to the New Kingdom of Granada, where he arrived in the port city of Cartagena in 1610. Required to wait six years to be ordained as a priest while he did his theological studies, he lived in Jesuit houses at Tunja and Bogotá. During those preparatory years, he was deeply disturbed by the harsh treatment and living conditions of the black slaves who were brought from Africa.
By this time, the slave trade had been established in the Americas for about a century. Local natives were considered not physically fitted to work in the gold and silver mines and this created a demand for blacks from Angola and Congo. These were bought in West Africa for four crowns a head, or bartered for goods and sold in America for an average two hundred crowns apiece. Criminals, war captives, the mentally unstable, the sick and other social misfits were bartered to the white traders by African chiefs. Others were captured at random, especially able-bodied males and females deemed suitable for labor.


Cartagena was a slave-trading hub. 10,000 slaves poured into the port yearly, crossing the Atlantic from West Africa under conditions so foul that an estimated one-third died in transit. Although the slave trade was condemned by Pope Paul III and Urban VIII had issued a papal decree prohibiting slavery,(later called "supreme villainy" by Pope Pius IX), it was a lucrative business and continued to flourish.



Claver's predecessor in his eventual lifelong mission, Father Alonso de Sandoval, S.J., was his mentor and inspiration. Sandoval devoted himself to serving the slaves for 40 years before Claver arrived to continue his work. Sandoval attempted to learn about their customs and languages; he was so successful that, when he returned to Seville, he wrote a book in 1627 about the nature, customs, rites and beliefs of the Africans. Sandoval found Claver an apt pupil. When he was solemnly professed in 1622, Claver signed his final profession document in Latin as: Petrus Claver, aethiopum semper servus (Peter Claver, servant of the Ethiopians [i.e. Africans] forever).

Ministry to the slaves

Church of St. Peter Claver in Cartagena, Colombia, where Claver lived and ministered
 
Whereas Sandoval had visited the slaves where they worked, Claver preferred to head for the wharf as soon as a slave ship entered the port. Boarding the ship, he entered the filthy and diseased holds to treat and minister to their badly treated, terrified human cargo, who had survived a voyage of several months under horrible conditions. It was difficult to move around on the ships, because the slave traffickers filled them to capacity. The slaves were often told they were being taken to a land where they would be eaten. Claver wore a cloak, which he would lend to anyone in need. A legend arose that whoever wore the cloak received lifetime health and was cured of all disease. After the slaves were herded from the ship and penned in nearby yards to be scrutinized by crowds of buyers, Claver joined them with medicine, food, bread, brandy, lemons and tobacco. With the help of interpreters and pictures which he carried with him, he gave basic instructions.

Claver had conflicts with some of his Jesuit brothers, who accepted slavery. Claver saw the slaves as fellow Christians, encouraging others to do so as well. During his 40 years of ministry he personally catechized and baptized an estimated 300,000 slaves. He would then follow up on them to ensure that as Christians they received their Christian and civil rights. His mission extended beyond caring for slaves, however. He preached in the city square, to sailors and traders and conducted country missions, returning every spring to visit those he had baptized, ensuring that they were treated humanely. During these missions, whenever possible he avoided the hospitality of planters and overseers; instead, he would lodge in the slave quarters.
Claver's work on behalf of slaves did not prevent him from ministering to the souls of well-to-do members of society, traders and visitors to Cartagena (including Muslims and English Protestants) and condemned criminals, many of whom he prepared for death; he was also a frequent visitor at the city's hospitals. Through years of unremitting toil and the force of his own unique personality, the slaves' situation slowly improved. In time he became a moral force, the Apostle of Cartagena.


In 1610, he landed at Cartagena (modern Colombia), the principle slave market of the New World, where a thousand slaves were landed every month. After his ordination in 1616, he dedicated himself by special vow to the service of the Negro slaves-a work that was to last for thirty-three years. He labored unceasingly for the salvation of the African slaves and the abolition of the Negro slave trade, and the love he lavished on them was something that transcended the natural order. 

Boarding the slave ships as they entered the harbor, he would hurry to the revolting inferno of the hold, and offer whatever poor refreshments he could afford; he would care for the sick and dying, and instruct the slaves through Negro catechists before administering the Sacraments. Through his efforts three hundred thousand souls entered the Church. Furthermore, he did not lose sight of his converts when they left the ships, but followed them to the plantations to which they were sent, encouraged them to live as Christians, and prevailed on their masters to treat them humanely. 

Illness, and death

The bones of Claver under an altar at the Church of St. Peter Claver in Cartagena
 

In the last years of his life Peter was too ill to leave his room. He lingered for four years, largely forgotten and neglected, physically abused and starved by an ex-slave who had been hired by the Superior of the house to care for him. He never complained about his treatment, accepting it as a just punishment for his sins. He died on 8 September 1654.

When the people of the city heard of his death, they forced their way into his room, to see and pay their last respects. Such was the reputation of his holiness among the populace that they stripped away everything there to serve as a relic of a saint.



The city magistrates, who had previously considered him a nuisance for his persistent advocacy on behalf of the slaves, ordered a public funeral and he was buried with pomp and ceremony. The vast scope of Claver's ministry, which was prodigious even before considering the astronomical number of people he baptized, came to be realized only after his death.

He was canonized in 1888 by Pope Leo XIII, along with the holy Jesuit porter, Alphonsus Rodriguez. In 1896 Pope Leo also declared Claver the patron of missionary work among all African peoples. His body is preserved and venerated in the church of the former Jesuit residence, now renamed in his honor.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Judgement Cometh


WASHINGTON --  The Ten Commandments that sits on a street of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington has been toppled by vandals. The 3-foot-by-3-foot granite monument weighs 850 pounds and sits out front of the headquarters of Faith and Action, a Christian outreach ministry. The group installed the tablets in a garden outside its offices in 2006, and the group's president said the tablets were angled so that justices arriving at the high court would see them.

The Rev. Robert Schenck, who heads the organization, said the damage to the monument happened sometime between Friday night and Saturday night. A minister who works in the area alerted the group to the damage around 9 p.m. Saturday.

The monument had been pushed over so that the words of the Ten Commandments are now face down.



There could be no greater sign of this Nations abandonment of GOD'S Laws... 

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

The Coming Christian Holocaust

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is becoming highly adversarial against all Christians. The United States Army has begun a major effort to remove Christians's from its ranks.  Obama, a life long MUSLIM, has secretly warred against Christians his entire presidency.  As Supreme Commander of the United States armed forces, Obama has encouraged/permitted the United States military to participate in the persecution and removal of all active Christians from the military.  

A recent Army briefing, given by Lt. Col. Jack Rich, to a reserve unit in Pennsylvania, identified several organizations and movements as extremist groups.  First on the list of his slides presented in the briefing listed Evangelical Christians and the list also included Catholics, and way down at the bottom Hamas, al-Qaeda, Nation of Islam and the Ku Klux Klan. Isn’t it comforting to realize that your government sees Catholic and evangelical Christians in the same light as Hamas, al-Qaeda and the Klan?


Lt. Col. Rich warned his subordinates to not back down from “bad Christian behavior” for “when they see behaviors which are inconsistent with Army values, don’t just walk by. Do the right thing before it becomes a problem.” What exactly constitutes “bad Christian behavior?” Is praying a bad Christian behavior?
Further, the warning has been given to flag Christians and put them on no buy lists for guns. Rich’s briefing dovetails with the same kind of anti-Christian rhetoric recently presented to Colorado law enforcement officials in La Junta, Colorado in which Christians were prominently displayed in as domestic terrorists if they take the Bible too literally.

In Egypt, Libya and Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood was installed as the new leadership, or rebel leadership with the help of the Obama administration. These groups are also aligned with al-Qaeda. These groups are killing Christians by the thousands in all three countries. Presently, the Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaeda are persecuting Egyptian Coptic Christians in horrific ways and Obama “hears no evil, and sees no evil.” It is notable that the Coptic Christian presence in Egypt predates the Muslim. However, to the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Qaeda, the CIA and apparently President Obama, Christians are now persona non grata and it does not matter what country the Christians are from.

Coptic children are forcibly being taken from their families and forced to convert to Islam. Is this a foreshadowing of a future CPS field manual which will do the same here in America? Do you think this hyperbole? Then you must not be familiar with the new CPS manual which will be used to enforce “child welfare” under Obamacare. Under Obamacare, parents can lose custody of their children if their child gets a bad grade, is absent for more than 5 days in any 30 day period, if the parent has beer in the house or if the parent is a gun owner. Therefore, how far-fetched is it for American Christians to look at themselves as the next Coptic Christians and realize that the CPS could one day come for their children merely because they are Christians?

Make no mistake...  Unless you embrace Homosexuality, Pedophilia, bestiality, witchcraft, you will be branded as intolerant, homophobic, anti-gay, anti-choice, hateful and divisive.  After all, the TV says that Evangelical Christians, Catholics, and those Christians who take the BIBLE to seriously are archaic, judgmental,and living in the past.  Soon, every sick disgusting perversion will be on display 24hrs a day, 7days a week, 52 weeks a year.  Oh, wait a minute...it already is...





Thursday, September 12, 2013

Homosexuality is an Abomination before the Lord

“All passions are dishonorable, for the soul is even more prejudiced and degraded by sin than is the body by disease; but the worst of all passions is lust between men… The sins against nature are more difficult and less rewarding, since true pleasure is only the one according to nature. But when God abandons a man, everything is turned upside down! Therefore, not only are their passions [of the homosexuals] Satanic, but their lives are diabolical… So I say to you that these are even worse than murderers, and that it would be better to die than to live in such dishonor. A murderer only separates the soul from the body, whereas these destroy the soul inside the body… There is nothing, absolutely nothing more mad or damaging than this perversity. _ Saint John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople

Therefore, God handed them over to degrading passions. Their females exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the males likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity. (Romans 1:26-27)


The attraction is lust -- not love.
It is an evil spirit that causes one to feel lust for -- and become sexually aroused by -- another person of the same sex!

Homosexuality is sexual perversion;
it is human sexuality perverted by the devil!

It all begins with temptation. Many people are tempted with “same-sex” attraction. But temptation is to be resisted! So submit yourselves to God; resist the devil, and he will flee from you (James 4:7).
 
Evil increases insensibly, once it is given in to.

There is no question that sodomy (anal intercourse between two men) is “unnatural.” Sodomy is a perversion of human sexuality -- it is evil.

You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; such a thing is an abomination. If a man lies with a male as with a woman, they have committed an abomination… (Leviticus 18:22;20:13)

~ * * * ~

The “sin of the Sodomites” (homosexual sexual activity) is one of the sins that cry to heaven. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1867)

Then the LORD said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great and their sin (sodomy) so very grave, I will go down to see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry which has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”
Then the men (angels) said to Lot, “Have you any one else here? Sons-in-law, sons, daughters, or any one you have in the city, bring them out of the place; for we are about to destroy this place, because the outcry against its people has become great before the LORD, and the LORD has sent us to destroy it.” (Genesis 18:20-21;19:12-13)

~ * * * ~

“Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh?’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” (Matthew 19:4-6)

Monday, September 2, 2013

Rapture Dream Almost Completely Fulfilled


ALL PRAISE TO JESUS! THE KING IS COMING!

REVELATION 3:11

"BEHOLD, I AM COMING QUICKLY!"