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Greetings to each and everyone of you.


This section for English-speaking viewers –
and all those enjoying the culture –

has developed over the months and is now offering materials of all kinds:

texts, images, poems, videos, etc.

It will continue to provide you with rich contents week after week.

 

2nd Sunday of the Year, A

12 janvier 2017
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: 1 Cor.1:1-3, expérience, Is.49:3-6, Isaiah, Jn.1:29-34, John the Baptist, Paul the apostle, the Spirit, truth, witness

Being a witness can be a duty and it sometimes becomes an obligation that cannot be avoided.
It can be a pleasant task as it is to act as witnesses to the commitment of two people getting married.
It can be a painful experience to retell the details of an accident which one has witnessed.
And it can be very stressful to appear in court and, under oath, to say what one knows and sees as true.

In all these circumstances, a person is called to say clearly what he, or she, has seen, heard, and knows of a given situation.
In other words, the personal experience of the witness is what is required.

On this 2nd Sunday of the Year (A) the three scripture readings somehow refer to this aspect of human responsibility: witnessing.

Isaiah claims: “The Lord formed me in the womb to be his servant” (Is.49:3,5-6) and this service will be that of proclaiming God’s message to his people, speaking as a witness of what God has revealed to him.

In his turn, Paul affirms that he has been “appointed by God to be an apostle” (1 Cor.1:1-3), in other words he, too, will be asked to tell what he has experienced of the God of Jesus.

However, it is John the Baptist who speaks more clearly as he says of himself: “I have seen and I am the witness” (Jn.1:29-34).

Our times need witnesses no less than the past. It is easy to dismiss the fact that each Christian is called to be precisely that. Speaking for God, sharing Christ’s message, allowing the Spirit to lead me to speak when I should so that the truth may be known. The truth of who God is and what he calls us to be.

We need not be theologians, teachers, or specialists in explaining Bible texts. What is expected of us is simply letting our experience of God speak for itself… speak for Him!

Source: Images: wisconsinvows.com; 123RF.com;  www.diminishedvalue.com;  spiritualityhealth.com

 

World Day of War Orphans – 6 janvier

6 janvier 2017
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: abuse, child soldiers, discrimination, disease, landmines, malnutrition, orphans, poverty, war

Civilians bear the brunt of the suffering in war. Of the big number of war victims, the most often neglected are children.

Orphans throughout the world face many challenges: Malnutrition, starvation, disease, and decreased social attention. As the most vulnerable population on planet Earth, they have no one to protect them and are most likely to suffer from hunger, disease, and many other problems.

In recent decades, the proportion of civilian casualties in armed conflicts has increased dramatically and is now estimated at more than 90 per cent. About half of the victims are children.
An estimated 20 million children have been forced to flee their homes because of conflict and human rights violations and are living as refugees in neighbouring countries or are internally displaced within their own national borders.

More than 2 million children have died as a direct result of armed conflict over the last decade.
More than three times that number, at least 6 million children, have been permanently disabled or seriously injured.
More than 1 million have been orphaned or separated from their families.
Between 8,000 and 10,000 children are killed or maimed by landmines every year.

An estimated 300,000 child soldiers – boys and girls under the age of 18 – are involved in more than 30 conflicts worldwide. Child soldiers are used as combatants, messengers, porters, cooks and to provide sexual services. Some are forcibly recruited or abducted, others are driven to join by poverty, abuse and discrimination, or to seek revenge for violence enacted against themselves and their families.

Sadly, however, they rarely receive the time, attention, and love for optimal social and personal development. Research reveals that children growing up in an orphanage experience emotional, social, and physical handicaps. Without a doubt, the best place for a child to grow up is in a stable family with a loving father and mother.

Source: Text: Q9 Canada Data Center   Image: Earth Times

Feast of Epiphany, year A

5 janvier 2017
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: 'God-with-us', comfort, encouragement, Epiphany, foreighners, invitation, Is.60:1-6, light, Magi, outsiders, reproach, strangers

Day after day, week after week, the Bible texts call to us in different ways.
We believe that this is God’s message addressed to us.
We are convinced that the words we hear are not simply human words but God’s own words.

They may be words of invitation, or words of comfort;
words of reproach, or words of encouragement.

 God’s messengers speaking to us in his name sometimes ask us to do something.
In the first reading, this is what Isaiah does today (Is.60:1-6). He tells us:
“Lift up your eyes and look around.”
 
Did you notice how many people go about doing… exactly the opposite?!
Many walk around head bent down, with stooped shoulders…
Their steps are heavy… and, possibly, their hearts as well.
 
Through Isaiah, God invites us to lift up our eyes to see what?
He wants his people to realize:
“The nations come to your light… all are assembling.”
 
This is the meaning of today’s celebration on this feast of Epiphany.
It is a celebration for all nations, all peoples are called to recognize God in our midst, “God-with-us”.
The Magi – those Wise Men from the East –are the symbol of all the many we may see as strangers, foreigners, outsiders.
They are all called to be God’s people.
 
They, from afar, who come close to this new-born Child, represent already the Samaritan woman, the Roman soldier, the Syro-Phoenician woman, to whom He will make himself close to.
This will be… Epiphany continued!…
God’s revelation to each and everyone, notwithstanding their nation or language, their origin or belief.
 
God is the GOD OF ALL – by His own choice!

Source: Images: Daily Record; The Well Community Church

 
 

World Braille Day – 4 January

4 janvier 2017
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: blind people, braille, Charles Barbier, Louis Braille

The History of World Braille Day
Louis Braille, the inventor of braille, was born in France on January 4th, 1809. Blinded in both eyes in an accident as a child, Braille nevertheless managed to master his disability while still a child.

Despite not being able to see at all, he excelled in his education and received scholarship to France’s Royal Institute for Blind Youth. During his studies, inspired by the military cryptography of Charles Barbier of the French Army, he developed a system of tactile code that could allow the blind to read and write quickly and efficiently.

Braille presented the results of his hard work to his peers for the first time in 1824 when he was just fifteen years f age. In 1829, he published his first book about the system he had created, called “Method of Writing Words, Music, and Plain Songs by Means of Dots, for Use by the Blind and Arranged for Them”.

The braille system works by representing the alphabet letters (and numbers) in a series of 6 dots paired up in 3 rows. The simplicity of his idea allowed books to start being produced on a large scale in a format that thousands of blind people can read by running their fingertips over the dots. Thanks to this, blind students have the opportunity to be educated alongside their peers as well as read for pleasure just as easily as any seeing person can.

Source: Text & Image: DaysoftheYear

World Day of Peace – January 1st

1 janvier 2017
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: dignity, governments, international life, likeness of God, Message Pope Francis, nonviolence, peace, peacemaking, respect, values

Pope Francis has chosen “Nonviolence: A style of Politics for Peace” as the theme for the 50th World Day of Peace, commemorated each year on January 1st . This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Church’s World Day of Peace. Inspired by both St. Pope John XXIII’s encyclical Pacem in terris and his own encyclical Populorum progressio, Pope Paul VI introduced the commemoration of the World Day of Peace in 1967; it is now celebrated every year on the first day of January.

Source: Text & Image: Collaborative Center for Justice, USA

«Non-Violence: A Style of Politics for Peace». This is the title of the Message for the 50th World Day of Peace, the fourth of Pope Francis.

« I wish peace to every man, woman and child, and I pray that the image and likeness of God in each person will enable us to acknowledge one another as sacred gifts endowed with immense dignity. Especially in situations of conflict, let us respect this, our “deepest dignity”, and make active nonviolence our way of life.

This is the fiftieth Message for the World Day of Peace. (…) On this occasion, I would like to reflect on nonviolence as a style of politics for peace. I ask God to help all of us to cultivate nonviolence in our most personal thoughts and values. May charity and nonviolence govern how we treat each other as individuals, within society and in international life. When victims of violence are able to resist the temptation to retaliate, they become the most credible promoters of nonviolent peacemaking. In the most local and ordinary situations and in the international order, may nonviolence become the hallmark of our decisions, our relationships and our actions, and indeed of political life in all its forms. »

Source: Text: Vatican, Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Feast of Mary, Mother, Year A

29 décembre 2016
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: Christmas, Gal.4:4-7, getting used to, God's plan, God's Son, human being, Mary Mother of God, New Year, praise, wonder

There are attitudes which can be helpful and make life easier and more pleasant. Other ways are less conducive to growth and happiness. One of these is called: ‘Getting used to’… Of course, the repetition of certain tasks can make them easier to perform. Exercise and practice can make one more proficient. But this does not apply to understanding some realities.

You may wonder where this reflection is leading to. These thoughts came to me while reading the letter to the Galatians (2nd reading, Year A – Gal.4:4-7) where we are told that God’s Son was “born of a woman”. We repeat it every time we pray the Creed: “He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.”

Do we ever stop at this point unable to go on out of sheer amazement? Has it ever happened that other people around us went on reciting the text while we remained in total wonder at this extraordinary reality: GOD IS THE CHILD OF A HUMAN MOTHER. The fact is that we have got ‘used to it’… It somehow seems that the words flow of themselves as if things could not be otherwise – we have repeated them for so long!

Only God can make such plans: to involve a human being like us for his own Son to become precisely this: a human being like us. This is what we celebrate at Christmas, and this is what we celebrate today on this Feast of Mary, Mother of God.

In fact, what we celebrate is: God who needs – God wanting to be in need: is this not astonishing? –in need of a created being to carry out His design. Mary said ‘Yes’ not only to a baby of her own, but to… a son of God’s own, and yet… a son or her own!

Is this not enough to keep us in wonder and praise for the whole of this new year?!

Christmas, Year A

23 décembre 2016
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: 'God-with-us', birth of a child, event, glorifying God, helplessness, human history, Lk.2:15-20, Mt.1:23, power, proverbs, strength, weakness, wisdom

Proverbs often have much wisdom encapsulated in a few words. They convey the popular wisdom which has much to tell us about life and situations.

At one time or another, you may have heard this saying: “There is more to it than meets the eye.” Looking at a situation, observing the attitude of someone, a friend or neighbour may have whispered these words: “There is more to it than meets the eye.” The person would have acknowledged that what he saw, what she noticed, was “not the whole story”, as they say.

These words are truly appropriate for what we are celebrating at Christmas – what we see, or… think we see! – as we look at a Nativity scene. The scene itself may be very ordinary or quite elaborate, it may show only the new-born child with his mother and father, or display as well the humble visitors and the royal guests that are part of the longer narrative.

Yes…

  • We look at a baby – We are to see God himself;
  • We look at poverty – We are to see the riches of God;
  • We look at weakness – We are to see the strength of God;
  • We look at helplessness – We are to see the power of God;

Indeed, we look at a simple situation: the birth of a child – We are to see the most extraordinary event in human history: God who has become a human being like us.

He has chosen the name he was to be called: “God-with-us” (Mt.1:23) – this is what He is, what He wants to be for each one of us. There is no situation – except that of our refusal – which can render this obsolete.

The gospel text (Lk.2:15-20) tells us, that having seen the new-born child, the shepherds “went back glorifying and praising God.” What more could we do?

Source: Image: Answers in Genesis          

                                                                                                                                                     

International Human Solidarity Day – 20 December

20 décembre 2016
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: awareness, Development Goals, diseases, diversity, fear, forced migration, global cooperation, governments, hunger, international agreements, poverty eradication, protect the planet, UN

« Global problems require collective solutions. At a time of divisiveness on many key global issues, from armed conflict to forced migration, people need to turn toward each other in common cause, not away from each other in fear. » — UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon

This year’s celebration of Human Solidarity Day comes after leaders of the world adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which is a new, inclusive development agenda — succeeding the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) — to eradicate poverty, protect the planet and ensure dignity for all.

The new SDGs agenda is centred on people & planet, underpinned by human rights and supported by a global partnership determined to lift people out of poverty, hunger and disease. It will be thus be built on a foundation of global cooperation and solidarity.

International Human Solidarity Day is:
a day to celebrate our unity in diversity;
a day to remind governments to respect their commitments to international agreements;
a day to raise public awareness of the importance of solidarity;
a day to encourage debate on the ways to promote solidarity for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals including poverty eradication;
a day of action to encourage new initiatives for poverty eradication.

Source: Text & Image: UN

World Day of Migrants and Refugees – 18 December

18 décembre 2016
Nicole Gregoire
Aucun commentaire
Catégories: Anglophones et anglophiles
Mots-clés: Church, cooperation, equitable distribution, humanitarian crises, international interdependence, Mercy, migrants, Pope Francis, refugees, solidarity

The theme chosen by Pope Francis for 2016 is “Migrants and Refugees Challenge Us.  The Response of the Gospel of Mercy.”
“The tragic stories of millions of men and women daily confront the international community as a result of the outbreak of unacceptable humanitarian crises in different parts of the world,” writes Pope Francis.

“Indifference and silence lead to complicity whenever we stand by as people are dying of suffocation, starvation, violence and shipwreck,” he continues. “Whether large or small in scale, these are always tragedies, even when a single human life is lost.”

The Message also states:
“The Church stands at the side of all who work to defend each person’s right to live with dignity, first and foremost by exercising the right not to emigrate and to contribute to the development of one’s country of origin.  This process should include, from the outset, the need to assist the countries which migrants and refugees leave.  This will demonstrate that solidarity, cooperation, international interdependence and the equitable distribution of the earth’s goods are essential for more decisive efforts, especially in areas where migration movements begin, to eliminate those imbalances which lead people, individually or collectively, to abandon their own natural and cultural environment.”

Source: Text: Vatican Radio  Image: www.acmro.catholic.org.au/resources/migrant-refugee