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I am blessed with a wonderful Dad, who is also my most faithful and stalwart prayer partner! Wish him a Happy Father's Day!

Mamie Kirby Brennan and Children

Today is the 90th anniversary of the death of my great-aunt Mamie Kirby Brennan and of her two children, one year old Edward and four year old Edna. They died during the epidemic of the Spanish Influenza that swept through New Haven, Connecticut in January 1919. Here is the obituary notice that appeared in the local newspaper ninety years ago:

BRENNAN -- Sad indeed was the sudden death of Mrs. Mamie Kirby Brennan, which occurred on Saturday morning, January 4th, and scarcely had her spirit fled ere her little babe, Edward, one year old reach out his tiny hands and joined his mother in death. The little daughter, Edna, aged four years, soon followed and the triple funeral was held on Tuesday morning from their late home on Lamberton Street and later from St. Peter's Church.

As the two hearses passed side by side to their last resting place followed by the grief-stricken husband and relatives it caused many an eye to moisten with tears when the thought that this once happy little family had been parted in so short a space of time. One little baby of two years is all that is left to comfort the sorrowing husband and father.

Mrs. Brennnan was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Dennis Kirby, who died some years ago and left her a mere child. Her devoted aunt, Mrs. Mary Kirby Halligan, tenderly cared for her through her girlhood and watched her grow to womanhood endowed with all the graces of a Christian woman. She was married to Mr. Edward Brennan five years ago and three children were born to them. It seems sad to think that life held so much for the young wife and mother, but God doeth things for the best. God was merciful to also call the little babes that were laid in her arms that enfolded them in death even as she had done in life. Universal sympathy is extended to the sad hearts that will ever mourn the loved ones who have gone on before.

In a happy little homestead
Amid love and tender care
Dwelt this loving little family
With future hopes fond and fair,
But one day Death summoned
The gentle mother to her long rest
With one babe laid beside her
And the other clasped to her breast.

The days will be filled with sorrow,
The nights so sad and drear
For the grieving hearts so bereft
Who will shed many a silent tear:
But in God's holy Kingdom
Far above the starry sky
Dwells this saintly mother and her babes
In that beautiful land on high.
-- L.B.F.

The above verses are dedicated to this dear mother and to her babes, also to her sorrowing husband, and to her devouted aunt, Mrs. Mary Halligan.

(Mrs. Louise B. Flanigan)

Saint Thérèse and Her Father

Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus and of the Holy Face, reflecting on Isaiah's prophecy of the Servant, related it to the humiliation of her own father's suffering. When Thérèse was seven years old she had a vision of a man in the garden, dressed like her father, but going about with his head veiled. Only later did she realize that this was a mysterious prophecy of her father's mental illness. Profoundly affected by her father's suffering, Thérèse lived it as an opportunity to deepen her understanding of the humiliation of Christ in His Passion. Thérèse made some profound connections: she related her father in his sufferings to the humiliation of Christ in His Passion, and related the humiliation of Christ in His Passion to the Fatherhood of God.

The Holy Face

The violence against the Face of Christ in His Passion was, at the deepest level, an attempt by the Evil One to disfigure the Fatherhood of God. Our Lord says, "He who has seen me has seen the Father; how can you say, 'Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?" (Jn 14:9-10). From the beginning, the Evil One has sought to discredit the Fatherhood of God by sowing suspicion and doubt in the hearts of His children. The cruel disfiguration of the Face of Christ with blows, bruises, spittle, and thorns was the Evil One's mad attempt to vilify the Father.

War on the Family

The Evil One pursues the same agenda today. He seeks by every means to humiliate the father and to disfigure the face of fatherhood in society. John Saward, in his splendid book, The Way of the Lamb, The Spirit of Childhood and the End of the Age, writes: "The modern western world seems to have declared war on the family in all its members. It is destructive of the child, disparaging of the mother, and derisive of the father. Feminism, now complacently installed as the worldly wisdom of the West, tends to regard fathers as oppressive monsters . . . . All that is male, even the masculine pronoun, offends the feminist rulers of this age. Sometimes it seems as if the head of every father is veiled in shame, un père humilié."

The Father Under Attack

Every attack on the father is an attempt from below to undermine the headship of Christ, "the image of the invisible God" (Col 1:15) in Whom, "all things hold together" (Col 1:17). Just as Christ holds all things in the universe together, so too does the father hold all things together in the family. Abandoned by the father, the family disintegrates. Nothing so damages the wholeness of the family as the absence of the father.

Forty Years After Humanae Vitae

While pursuing the disgrace of the father, the Evil One continues to pursue the degradation of the mother. The widespread rejection in 1968 of Pope Paul VI's Encyclical Humanae Vitae drove a wedge between conjugal union and openness to the gift of life. As a result, the bride was no longer seen as a woman honouring within herself that most radiant of gifts: potential motherhood. The image of the mother was separated from that of the faithful spouse. By disfiguring the woman -- an image of the Church in her dignity of virgin, bride, spouse, and mother -- Satan seeks to discredit the Church, the Spouse of Christ and ever-fruitful Mother of the faithful.

Dissent from the teaching of Humanae Vitae paved the way for the widespread acceptance of artificial birth control, casual sexual relations, abortion, and the militant homosexual agenda that, seeking to parody marriage between one man and one woman, replaces conjugal fruitfulness with a self-indulgent sterility. The acceptance of abortion leads, inexorably, to the acceptance of parricide (the killing of parents) and infanticide. The society that kills its children becomes patricidal and matricidal. The society that discredits fatherhood and motherhood becomes sterile and dies.

The Consecrated Life

The poisonous trends of the culture of death have not spared the consecrated life itself. The crisis around Humanae Vitae corresponded exactly to the moment when religious began to speak naïvely of "openness to the world." The spirit of the world, the flesh, and the devil seeped through the cracks in the cloister and, in the most pernicious and subtle ways, infected religious and monastic life with the prejudices of the age against the father, the mother, and the child.

The Abdication of the Fathers

Rejection of the father began to manifest itself in the contestation of all paternal authority, focusing on that of the Pope. This was just another manifestation of what Von Balthasar so aptly calls Der Antirömische Affekt, "The Anti-Roman Complex." The very name of Father, in use from the Apostolic Age and honoured in the monastic deserts of Egypt and Palestine, fell into disaffection. Superiors felt the need to be "a brother among brothers," failing to see that by doing so they were abdicating the very grace of state constitutive of their spiritual authority.

The collapse of the religious or monastic family ensued, just as the collapse of the natural family would follow any father's abdication of his paternal authority. The most extreme manifestation of this disaffection for the Father is the kind of cultural patricide we see in society today. The same patricide holds sway in the religious community bent on eradicating every vestige of fatherhood in the name of liberty, fraternity, and equality.

The Mother Under Suspicion

Rejection of the mother was, if anything, even more vicious. The years immediately following the Second Vatican Council saw a widespread critique of the consecrated woman as sponsa Verbi -- bride of Christ -- and a decline in practices of devotion to the Virgin Mother of God. The anti-motherhood propaganda of radical feminism, based on the lie that motherhood limits a woman's freedom to be herself, combined with the rejection of Humanae Vitae to cast suspicion on every expression of maternal authority and spiritual motherhood.

Virtual Matricide

The failure of a few women religious to live the grace of spiritual motherhood wisely and tenderly became an excuse for the extermination of the mother, setting in motion a matricidal revolution. Immature religious women dealing with unresolved emotional conflicts within themselves found in this trend a justification for the expression of an anti-maternal animosity. Superiors were coerced into abdicating their maternal authority or, deceived by the lies of the age, did so willingly, contributing thereby to the disintegration of the spiritual families entrusted to them and to their inexorable descent into sterility.

The anti-maternal lies perpetrated by the culture of death were received uncritically by many religious. The name of Mother, like that of Father, had to be erased at all costs. Meanwhile, Satan laughed in scorn, knowing full well that the extinction of the mother leads to the extinction of life itself and not just to sterility, but ultimately to death.

The Wasteland of the Fatherless and Motherless

A Church without spiritual fathers and mothers will become like a society without fathers and mothers: a barren wasteland populated by an angry people, strewn with the aborted remains of lives that could have been, and defiled by every manner of abuse and by the triple sin of patricide, matricide, and infanticide.

Don't worry about tomorrow because the very same Heavenly Father who takes care of you today will have the same thought tomorrow and always. . . What does a child in the arms of such a Father have to fear? Be as children, who hardly ever think about their future as they have someone to think for them. (Saint Pio of Pietrelcina)

Heartfelt thanks to all of you who were so supportive and kind during Dad's recent hospitalization and surgery. I am happy to say that he is recovering well at home. Thank you for your prayers. Dad is especially grateful to Saint Padre Pio whom he invoked before his surgery.

Dad is recovering from his surgery slowly but surely. Remarkable for an 81 year old man! Yesterday, with help, he took a few steps around his unit. Although fatigued and needing sleep, he remains quick-witted and happy to see his visitors. I thank all of you who are praying for him and for my Mom. The two really are "one flesh" after 60 years of marriage.

My family and I are grateful to all who have offered prayers for my father. He is doing very well. Today we were able to spend time with him. He spoke a little, even if he is experiencing pain and, more than anything else, wants to sleep.

I anointed Dad last night. He had triple bypass surgery this morning. Being heavily sedated, he is not yet conscious (Thursday evening), but the surgery went very well. Deo gratias! And heartfelt thanks to all of you who are supporting us with your prayers.

My Dad was taken to hospital by ambulance this afternoon. He will have bypass surgery on his heart tomorrow morning. Please keep him and my Mom in your prayer.

On April 5, 2008 the Holy Father addressed the Pontifical Council of the Family on "Grandparents: Their Witness and Presence in the Family." I was blessed to know all four of my grandparents, the Irish set and the Italian set, as well as my maternal great-grandparents from Italy. My own experience taught me that grandparents have an integral role in family life. Many of the things I cherish most in life were transmitted to me by my grandparents.

The photo is of my Mom and Dad, loving grandparents of eleven grandchildren.

Grandparents in the Life of the Family

In the past, grandparents had an important role in the life and growth of the family. Even with their advancing age they continued to be present with their children, their grandchildren and even their great-grandchildren, giving a living witness of caring, sacrifice and a daily gift of themselves without reserve. They were witnesses of a personal and community history that continued to live on in their memories and in their wisdom. Today, the economic and social evolution has brought profound transformations to the life of families. The elderly, including many grandparents, find themselves in a sort of "parking area": some realize they are a burden to their family and prefer to live alone or in retirement homes with all the consequences that such decisions entail.

Reverence for Old Age

Unfortunately, it seems that the "culture of death" is advancing on many fronts and is also threatening the season of old-age. With growing insistence, people are even proposing euthanasia as a solution for resolving certain difficult situations. Old age, with its problems that are also linked to the new family and social contexts because of modern development, should be evaluated carefully and always in the light of the truth about man, the family and the community. It is always necessary to react strongly to what dehumanizes society. Parish and diocesan communities are forcefully challenged by these problems and are seeking today to meet the needs of the elderly. Ecclesial movements and associations exist which have embraced this important and urgent cause. It is necessary to join forces to defeat together all forms of marginalization, for it is not only they - grandfathers, grandmothers, senior citizens - who are being injured by the individualistic mindset, but everyone. If grandparents, as is said often and on many sides, are a precious resource, it is necessary to put into practice coherent choices that allow them to be better valued.

Spiritual and Moral Reference Points

May grandparents return to being a living presence in the family, in the Church and in society. With regard to the family, may grandparents continue to be witnesses of unity, of values founded on fidelity and of a unique love that gives rise to faith and the joy of living. The so-called new models of the family and a spreading relativism have weakened these fundamental values of the family nucleus. The evils of our society - as you justly observed during your work - are in need of urgent remedies. In the face of the crisis of the family, might it not be possible to set out anew precisely from the presence and witness of these people - grandparents - whose values and projects are more resilient? Indeed, it is impossible to plan the future without referring to a past full of significant experiences and spiritual and moral reference points. Thinking of grandparents, of their testimony of love and fidelity to life, reminds us of the Biblical figures of Abraham and Sarah, of Elizabeth and Zechariah, of Joachim and Anne, as well as of the elderly Simeon and Anna and even Nicodemus: they all remind us that at every age the Lord asks each one for the contribution of his or her own talents.

Yes, today was Mom's 80th birthday. The local contingent of the family gathered for dinner and then for birthday cake. Those of you who have met Emma Rose know what a wonderful woman she is, a real gift of God to my Dad, to her children, her grandchildren, and her friends.