Tuesday, October 17, 2006

More on St. Paul

As I prepare for my talk on St. Paul Living Today, I am getting to know more about Saint Paul, and others too. Sister Martha lent me a copy of a small book on the life of Sister Nazarena Mornado. She was the novice mistress of the Daughters of St. Paul in Rome for many years. Sister was also one of the first writers and editors among the Daughters of St. Paul. As you may or may not know, the Daughters of St. Paul were founded in 1915 to "Be St. Paul Living Today" by spreading the Gospel message with the media of today. The first modern media was the printing press. Johann Gutenburg never dreamed of the revolution he began back in the late 1400's with his moveable type printing press. In the early days of our founding, Italy was flooded with lots of newspapers and magazines that we would call today "The Yellow Press." (At least that's the name given to the phenomena by one of my history teachers.) The Founder Blessed James Alberione wanted to offset the harm done by sensationist and anti-clerical papers and magazines. He wanted people to have the best of news in front of them. His idea was not to picket and condemn media and journals, but to provide reading that would be wholesome and attractive.
Sister Nazarena grasped the idea of Alberione and ran with it. She also understood the spiritual foundation that sustained this work of "the Good Press" as it was called in the early days.
She said that the "Pauline Spirit" was really dedicating one's whole being to Jesus Christ, Way, Truth and Life. She said that we need to know, imitate and life the Divine Master Jesus Christ following the footsteps of St. Paul the Apostle and under the gaze of Mary, Queen of the Apostles.
On another topic, a priest friend showed me a nice, peaceful website which has meditation photos and musical accompaniment. Check it out (even though the words of in French it is still lovely): mariedenazareth.com

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