From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   The oil: Christ's gift   
      
   The oil of gladness with which Christ was anointed was a spiritual   
   oil; it was in fact the Holy Spirit himself, who is called the oil of   
   gladness because he is the source of spiritual joy. But you also have   
   been anointed with oil, and by this anointing you have entered into   
   fellowship with Christ and have received a share in his life. Beware   
   of thinking of this chrism as merely ordinary oil. As the Eucharistic   
   bread after the invocation of the Holy Spirit is no longer ordinary   
   bread but the body of Christ, so also the oil after the invocation is   
   no longer plain ordinary oil but Christ's gift which by the presence   
   of his divinity becomes the instrument through which you receive the   
   Holy Spirit. While symbolically, on your foreheads and organs of   
   sense, your bodies are anointed with this oil that we see, your souls   
   are sanctified by the holy and life-giving Spirit.   
   --St. Cyril of Jerusalem   
      
   <<>><<>><<>>   
   April 26th – St. Stephen of Perm, Bishop   
      
   Born at Ust Yug in 1345; died in Moscow in 1396. In the early days of   
   Christianity in the region, the Russian Church had sent out   
   missionaries to preach the Gospel to the Mongols and Finns. But it   
   wasn't until the 14th century that this zeal was revived. Saint   
   Stephen, one of the great Russian missionary bishops, had been born   
   among the Zyriane people (Permiaks or Komi), who lived southwest of   
   the Ural mountains but east of the Volga, and he longed to convert his   
   own folk to Christianity. After about 15 years in a monastery at   
   Rostov preparing himself for missionary work, he set out on a   
   preaching mission among them.   
      
   Soon Saint Stephen, a worthy successor to Saints Cyril and Methodius,   
   realized that he needed to make a translation of the Scriptures and   
   liturgy into their tongue. His biographer tells us that he believed   
   that every people should worship God in its own tongue, because   
   languages also are from God. Because the Zyrians at that time did not   
   possess even an alphabet, and Stephen was so convinced that every   
   people has its own peculiar contribution to make to God's service that   
   he would not give his converts even the Russian characters. Instead,   
   this Russian invented an alphabet for them using for letters parts of   
   the traditional elements of Zyrian carvings and embroidery. He set up   
   schools to teach this alphabet to his converts.   
      
   Like many other Russian missionaries, Stephen used the celebration of   
   public worship as an initial means of attracting the heathen by its   
   beauty and impressive solemnity. Having distinguished himself as a   
   missionary and as a champion of the downtrodden and oppressed as far   
   away as Novogorod and Moscow, he was recognized by being name the   
   first bishop of Perm (now Molotov) in 1383. As bishop, he had to   
   oppose the first Russian dissenters, known as Strigolniks, who had   
   much in common with the Lollards and Hussites (Attwater, Bentley,   
   Walsh).   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   "I fear the good opinion which my friends have formed of me: they will   
   believe me in Heaven and leave me to suffer."   
   --St. Francis de Sales   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us and   
   His love is perfected in us.  (1 John 4-12)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   The Resurrection   
      
   One thing is certain, if Jesus had not risen from the dead and   
   appeared to his disciples, we would never have heard of him. Nothing   
   else could have changed sad and despairing men and women into people   
   radiant with joy and courage. The reality of the resurrection is the   
   central fact of the Christian faith. Through the gift of the Holy   
   Spirit, the Lord gives us "eyes of faith" to know him and the power of   
   his resurrection. The greatest joy we can have is to encounter the   
   living Lord and to know him personally. Do you celebrate the feast of   
   Easter with joy and thanksgiving for the victory which Jesus has won   
   for you over sin and death?   
      
   <><><><>   
   Mary, Mother of the Unborn   
      
   Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I love you very much, I beg you to spare the life of   
   the unborn child that I have spiritually adopted who is in danger of abortion.   
   ( Fulton J. Sheen )   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)