Saint Philomena the princess of paradise (poem)

Here is my latest poem.

Saint Philomena the princess of paradise (poem)

Saint Philomena’s life
was a shinning light
that shone through the darkness
strong and bright.

The world’s false promises
we will not swallow
Saint Philomena’s example
we shall follow.

Saint Philomena Virgin Martyr,
from your throne of grace
cast a look of pity
upon the human race.

Saint Philomena the Wonder Worker
please hear us when we pray
and guide us through the challenges
that come to us today.

Please hear our prayers
and calm our fears
and guide us through
this vale of tears.

Hear us when we cry out to you
in our time of need
and your heavenly assistance
to us please do concede.

Advertisement

Overcoming infertility through prayer to St Philomena the Wonder Worker

Baby Filomena Elizabeth

The following story comes from Australia. It is told here in the words of Filomena’s mother Elizabeth. Having been married on the feast of Mary the Mother of God on the 1st of January, 2000, Francis and I were trusting that God might bless us with a baby at some stage.  This was going to be a big challenge for me, as I had never considered myself to be very maternal because my reproductive cycle was always extremely “light on” or in other words “spaced out.”  Nevertheless my husband was always trusting in God’s providence and he never doubted that one day we would have a baby. I think that I “flunked” the Billings Ovulation method because in the end, our Billings practitioner was not convinced that I had been fertile during any of the months that we had consulted her, so Francis and I stopped the analysis and started praying.  Instead of consulting the medical fraternity we consulted Jesus in the tabernacle and prayed many Saint Philomena Chaplets before a statue of Saint Philomena at Saint Patrick’s in the city.   In April 2001 I discovered that I was pregnant. The great miracle had happened.  Saint Philomena made her presence felt very strongly during the labour and we subsequently named our gorgeous daughter Filomena.  There were some special pointers that Saint Philomena had indeed interceded for us in bringing about this great favour. One of these indicators was a small incident with an Italian friend of ours.  She came and visited our baby daughter when she had just been born.  She then put a question to her father when she got back home asking him to guess what we had named our daughter.  He paused for a couple of seconds and then said “Filomena.” Our friend could not believe it!  Incredible, how did he guess it? Our friend said that the name Philomena is an extremely old fashioned name in Italy and a name that probably only one’s grandmother or great grandmother might have. We thank Saint Philomena for her intercession and pray that we will able to have a brother or sister for our little Filomena.

The story above is one of the many accounts of answers to prayer from my book entitled:

Help from Heaven (Answers to Prayer), which can be read free on-line by clicking here. Please pay a visit.

A wonderful conversion through the intercession of St. Philomena the Wonder Worker

This story comes from Sydney, Australia.  It is related by the mother of the boy, who is the recipient of the favour.

When one of our teenage sons began drinking heavily, smoking pot and being involved with a heavy metal rock band, my husband and I decided to give him over to the care of Saint Philomena, who we had heard was a patron saint of youth and a wonder worker.  We had heard her story and had been impressed by the many miracles which had been attributed to her intercession.

We prayed a novena and went to our first Mass in her honour.  As the Saturday night binges progressed to the whole weekend and then to week nights we decided to pray the novena continuously, imploring Saint Philomena desperately as our son’s condition continued to worsen. By this stage he would come home from work and prowl around restlessly until the phone rang and then he was out again. His pores oozed the sweet/stale smell of beer continuously.

Usually he was very gentle – even when he was drunk, but he became more agitated, blaming us for filling him with all the “God stuff” as he was growing up.  This occurred on the Saturday night of the August Mass in honour of Saint Philomena. The week that followed was very distressing.  He went off to work on the Friday at 5am as usual and I was surprised when he came home at 1.15 p.m. – his usual home time on Fridays, but lately he had gone straight to the pub and we were lucky to see him all weekend.  My son came out of his room and put a broken CD into the bin. I was again surprised and so had a look at the title of the CD. He had dozens of heavy metal CDs. It was named “Diabolos Music.” I said, as I had often said, that means Devil’s music and that it was dangerous.  Usually he would laugh if off, but this time he said “I know mum.”

He brought out the printed lyrics of the song and said that the words to this song kept going through his mind and that he felt that he was going mad, but that he was at peace now. I was almost too scared to ask him why? how?  when? I just asked if he had called on God and he said “Yes.”  At work that morning he had experienced an overwhelming sense of peace and love. A feeling of great burden had lifted off him.  He felt the presence of a woman.  He looked around but there was no one there.

My son still had the music filling his head – so I gave him a much better tape to listen to. When his mate rang that night, before he left, he asked us to pray for him and said that he would not be

late. After a couple of Rosaries and Divine Mercy Chaplets, we were disappointed as the night wore on, because our son did not turn up.  Finally around 2 to 3am he came in.  My husband hurried out and I started another Rosary – hoping that my husband wouldn’t ruin the obvious start that my son had made.  When my husband finally came back to bed a few hours later, he said that they had been talking and praying the Rosary together.

My son had waited back to make sure that his friends got home safely. He wanted to go and tell them about his experience. They were not interested and as he listened to them, all he would hear was “hate” in their talk. That morning August the 15^th was the feast of the Assumption.  He went to the Sacrament of Confession and afterwards he shed many tears.  Our eyes were also filled with tears of joy. He went to three of the four Masses that weekend and did so for many months after.

He has never drunk alcohol, smoked pot, nor has he listened to heavy metal rock music since that time.  He threw out all his CDs and heavy metal T-shirts.  His conversion was sudden. We felt that it was miraculous. He now has a great love for Jesus and Mary, for Saint Philomena, the Pope and for the Catholic Church.

Looking back now we can see the strong spiritual battle that was going on for him in those last few weeks.  He even said a couple of times that he was tempted to go and kill someone.  We continue to pray the novena to Saint Philomena for our son for his continuing conversion and thanksgiving and “with joy in our hearts, we will bless God who is admirable in His Saints.” Our son attended the World Youth Day in Rome.  (M.W.)

Editor’s note: This conversion took place in the late nineties and is still going strong today.

This is one of the many story in my book entitled: Help from Heaven (Answers to Prayer), which can be read free on-line by clicking here.

Please pop over and have a look.  I promise that you will not be dissappointed.

Help the Holy Souls in Purgatory and read inspiring testimonies of their  powerful intercession for their benefactors

and then teach this devotion to others, so that they will pray for the Holy Souls in Purgatory as well.

The Sydney Opera House

Do lawmakers know that unborn babies are people?

Abortion is murder whether a politician believes it or not, just as my second name is Ann whether a person believes it or not. Being an abortionist is not a great doctoring job. Many abortionists are there because it is a good money making venture. Fortunately they are not beyond help. Father Pavone has helped many of them in their conversion process and the converted abortionists now help to fight against the ugly business that they were once involved in.

There was a case here in (Sydney) Australia, where a man kicked a pregnant woman in the stomach, causing her to lose the baby, (which is also his child). He went to jail for 10 years for killing the baby and I think that he is still there. This is a correct decision and I applaud it, but  it is in an Australian state where abortion is practiced, as it is practiced just about everywhere else. What a contradiction.  I am glad that I am not an unborn baby today. It is a dangerous time for them. Cases like that of the Sydney woman which highlight the contradictions in law regarding the unborn, at least give a faint glimmer of hope, that there will one day be some sanity and proper protection of the unborn. I have been told on another forum of similar contradictions in U.S. law. It also makes me wonder if some politicians actually know that the unborn are real people, but chose in the case of abortion to ignore what they clearly understood when it came to the case which is mentioned in this posting of the Sydney woman who was kicked in the stomach.  I also wonder what those who favour and push for abortion think about the Sydney woman’s case. It must be a thorn in their side.

Abortion is murder whether a politician believes it or not, just as my second name is Ann whether a person believes it or not. Being an abortionist is not a great doctoring job. Many abortionists are there because it is a good money making venture. Fortunately they are not beyond help. Father Pavone has helped many of them in their conversion process and the converted abortionists now help to fight against the ugly business that they were once involved in. There was a case here in (Sydney) Australia, where a man kicked a pregnant woman in the stomach, causing her to lose the baby, (which is also his child). He went to jail for 10 years for killing the baby and I think that he is still there. This is a correct decision and I applaud it, but  it is in an Australian state where abortion is practiced, as it is practiced just about everywhere else. What a contradiction.  I am glad that I am not an unborn baby today. It is a dangerous time for them. Cases like that of the Sydney woman which highlight the contradictions in law regarding the unborn, at least give a faint glimmer of hope, that there will one day be some sanity and proper protection of the unborn. I have been told on another forum of similar contradictions in U.S. law. It also makes me wonder if some politicians actually know that the unborn are real people, but chose in the case of abortion to ignore what they clearly understood when it came to the case which is mentioned in this posting of the Sydney woman who was kicked in the stomach.  I also wonder what those who favour and push for abortion think about the Sydney woman’s case. It must be a thorn in their side.

The breaking of the drought (poem)

It hadn’t rained for quiet a while

the ground was baked and dry.

Our prayers went up to heaven

and the clouds began to cry.

New life sprouted everywhere

The fields were lush and green,

With streams and rivers filling up

It all seemed like a dream.

Today is the 100th anniversary of the death of Blessed Mary MacKillop and also her feast day.

Today is the one hundredth anniversary of the death of Blessed Mary MacKillop of Australia and it is also her feast day.

She was a much misunderstood woman who suffered greatly at the hands of the clergy particularly the bishops.  Blessed Mary MacKillop was unjustly accused of so much, for example, each month she suffered great pain for a couple of days and had to stay in bed on these occasions.  There were no suitable pain killers in those days, so the doctor suggested that she take a tablespoon of brandy to dull the pain. Another nun even measured it out and administered it to her.  Despite this she was accused of being an alcoholic!  She was pronounced “excommunicated” by a bishop when she was just asking for a clarification of his words. This was actually an invalid action on the part of the bishop and was fixed up when he was dying. There is heaps to say about Blessed Mary MacKillop and I can also relate some great stories about her intercession. Do yourself a favour and read the story of her life.

Favours granted through the intercession of Saint Mary of the Cross (Mary MacKillop of Australia) Feast day August 8.

Prayers to find a good spouse

A lady in the USA asked for a petition to be placed at the shrine of Blessed Mary MacKillop in Australia.  One at the petitions was for her 28 year old daughter Lyn to find a good husband. A few days after the petition was placed at Blessed Mary Mackillop’s tomb, Lyn’s mother received a telephone call from a man that Lyn had dated eight years ago. Lyn and her former boyfriend went on a pilgrimage to Lourdes, in France to pray there to discern God’s will for their lives.  They have since married. Another of the mother’s petitions to Blessed Mary MacKillop was also answered.  Her son decided to give up living with his girlfriend.  They started to attend Mass regularly and also began making preparations to marry.

Blessed Mary MacKillop “fixes” a microwave oven

I had arranged to go on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Blessed Mary MacKillop at North Sydney.  On the morning that I was due to go I discovered that my microwave oven had stopped working. When I went to the shrine I prayed for many important petitions.  I also mentioned to Blessed Mary, the little matter of my microwave oven. When I arrived home I tried my microwave oven again.  It was still not working.  After this I slammed the oven door very hard and the microwave started working!  It seems that the only thing that was wrong was that there was a fault in the closing mechanism of the door. The microwave oven was not fully closing. It only appeared to be fully closed.

These stories are in my book Help from heaven (Answers to prayer) which can be read free-online by pressing here.

Would you like to join a Living Rosary? Information here.

Dear Friends,
Once again I am in the process of filling up a Living Rosary Circle (group). This is the way that it works: Each Living Rosary Circle consists of twenty people, because there are twenty decades in the Rosary.

Each person in the Circle says one decade of the Rosary each day. The twenty decades of the Rosary are divided up among them.

The most important thing to know: is that when each of the twenty people says their assigned decade each day, a Living Rosary is created: which means that the five Joyful, the five Sorrowful, the five Luminous, and the five Glorious Mysteries are said every day by the members of the circle.

Each of the twenty people although saying only one decade a day, gains the whole twenty decades of the Rosary each day to their spiritual credit. That is because they are united with the other people in the Living Rosary Circle. That is a good deal!

(I make up each person an individual chart so that they have a different decade to say each month. Each Living Rosary Circle runs for a period of twenty months).

If you would like to join, please email me your name and snail mail address, so that I can post you the card and other Catholic information that might be of interest to you.

If you live outside Australia, I can speed things up by emailing you your chart before the snail mail reaches you.

Greetings and prayers for all your intentions,
Mary Ann
(Sydney, Australia)
P.S. Each of the Living Rosary Circles is allocated a special name (the name of a saint).
Email me at:

catacomb@bigpond.com

Please put the words:  The Living Rosary in the subject line of the e-mail.

Unrelated but useful information.

The powerful intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory for their benefactors and ways to help them

The web page has accounts of the intercession of The Holy Souls in Purgatory, for their benefactors in cases of illness, addictions, cars that won’t start, infertility problems, protection in accidents, conversion, chronic insomnia, their help for people who are experiencing major trouble with city councils, success with projects, employment, real estate, finding lost property and trouble with relations, etc. and prayers and ideas on how to help The Holy Souls in Purgatory.

Read my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayer) free on-line

Please let others know about the book, so that they can benefit from it also.

Saving paper and money (commonsense)

When I was doing a secretarial course which included learning to type on a typewriter, I did one of the specified exercises, which involved formatting a long business letter. The teacher said that I had done it well, but that it should not have been continued on the back of the paper, but on a second sheet of paper.  I have always thought that was idiotic. What a waste of trees.  Blessed Mary MacKillop of Australia had an interesting approach.  She wrote her letter down the page (in the portrait position) and then turned the paper to a landscape position and wrote the rest of the letter across it!  This would have been a bit of a problem for the reader, but she was a very neat writer and it could be read.  Later on she also learnt to type on a typewriter. No doubt she did her double writing technique on the back of the paper also.

She was a greenie before greenies existed!  Now I hear that the USA wants to save money in order to pay for their immoral health scheme, (which has everything tied to abortion)  so one of the government departments there is saving money by using both sides of the paper!  It is amazing that it took them so long to think of something so simple!

A big compliment for the Sydney Opera House!

EWTN’s programe: Life on the Rock’s opening segment has music and images.  In this segment it has a picture of the Sydney Opera House with the word Heaven underneath it.  As an Australian and a Sydney resident, I accept the compliment although I know that heaven will be much better than the Sydney Opera House.

Have you received any favours through the Devotion to The Divine Mercy or from St Faustina ?

Have you received any favours through the Devotion to The Divine Mercy?  Please share them with us here.  Please tell if this was through the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy, the Three O’Clock prayer for the hour of great Mercy etc.  Also did you receive any favours through St Faustina the apostle of Divine Mercy.  I would like to hear about that also. Telling your story will encourage others to turn to the Divine Mercy.

Timely help (Our Lady of Mount Carmel)

Some years ago, there was a period when it rained almost continuously for ten weeks.  This made it difficult for people to get their washing dry. On one occasion because everything was still drying, I literally had no jumpers, left to put on my children. It was time for them to walk to school and all that I could do was say a prayer for some help in the matter. I prayed the prayer to Our Lady of Mount Carmel which is called the Flos Carmeli, (The Flower of Carmel). After saying the prayer, I opened the front door. There on the verandah was a cardboard box filled with clean ironed jumpers, slacks, jeans and blouses. I later learned that they had been put there by a lady who lived in the next street, who had received them from a cousin and had no need of them. This gift was the answer to my prayer.  Jumpers are known as sweaters in the USA.   (Mary Ann), Australia.
 
The feast day of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel is July 16.
 
This story is in my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayers). The book can be read free on-line at the link provided. I would appreciate any feedback that you would like to make on the book.

 

Masses for the Holy Souls in Purgatory through the organisation: Aid to the Church in Need

A good way to assist the Holy Souls in Purgatory is to have Masses offered for them through: Aid to the Church in Need. You can contact them at: 

http://www.churchinneed.org/site/PageServer?pagename=mainpage 

Having Masses offered through this organization is a good way of multi-tasking. You assist the Holy Souls in Purgatory, you support priests in poor areas of the world. The Mass offerings go much further than they would in a developed country. 

For instance the recommended minimum Mass offering in some areas of Australia is $10 (Australian currency).  In Australia this does not go very far, but in a third world country I have been told that it can buy a large sack of rice and feed many people for a week. The people in these third world areas are usually so poor that they can hardly support themselves, yet alone the local priest, going back to the theme of multi-tasking, you are supporting the building up of the Catholic Church in these areas and are in the process fulfilling one of your important obligations as a baptized Catholic. 

You are also building up these communities with their education, infrastructure, health and housing and protecting them from the threat of communism (which will promise them the world and will deliver them misery) and are ensuring that they stay Catholic and not join some other religious denomination. In South American countries, poor Catholics are being diverted in droves into other religious dominations that have lots of financial backing. 

You can also ask the Holy Souls for necessary favours as well, perhaps for conversions and for an end to the culture of death. This last petition is an ever increasing need.  On the TV news last night there was a very unwell man who is planning to go to Switzerland to end his life, because thankfully Euthanasia (murdering yourself) is illegal in Australia, although there are definite pushes to have it legalized. 

I muted the sound of this manipulative TV news item so that my children could not be affected by it and told them that this man probably has someone encouraging him to do this.  I had a particular Australian doctor in mind who we refer to here as “Dr Death”.  I don’t know why he is not put in jail.  Then the camera angle changed and sure enough there was the doctor that I had in mind.  He was behind this unwell man urging him to end his life, just as he had urged others to do so. Unfortunately some of them have listened to him and have ended their lives. Please pray for the conversion of this doctor.

A friendly duck at the park

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cute isn’t he?

The miraculous picture of Our Lady of Good Counsel at the monastery of New Norcia, Western Australia

There is a miraculous picture of Our Lady of Good Counsel at the monastery of New Norcia in Western Australia. This painting was given to the Benedictines in 1845 by Saint Vincent Pallotti, when they were leaving Rome to start missions in Western Australia. In December, 1847 a terrible bushfire was ranging and threatened to destroy the monastery.  The picture was placed against the standing corn in front of the fire. As soon as the sacred image of Mary was placed before the raging fire, the wind blew  in the opposite direction, carrying the flames away from the Mission where everything was already burned black. The fire soon died away. The native people who witnessed this were amazed. On another occasion the mourners in a funeral procession were in danger of perishing because bushfires had hemmed them in on all sides. Dom Salvado seeing this in the distance, got the picture from the church and ran with it toward the fire area and prayed to Our Lady to save the people.  The wind changed direction and the danger passed.

The Aussie Farmer (poem)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I bought a farm
Which was run down.
It was fifty miles
To the nearest town.

I ploughed the ground
And planted the seeds,
Watered the plants,
And tore out the weeds. 

With water levels low,
In the tank,
New artesian wells
Into the ground
I sank.

Some rain was needed
For the crop,
But there wasn’t even
One small drop.

I waited, waited,
For the rain,
And finally
One day it came.

It rained non-stop,
Every day,
Washing all
The crops away!

Then the bushfires started
And the barn burnt down.
I quit the farm
And headed for town.

A bakery shop in the town,
I now run,
And dough I am making
By the ton.

More of my poems

St Philomena’s help for an alcoholic

 
 
 
 

In the 1950’s a man left his wife and five children because of his alcoholism. His mother-in-law prayed to St Philomena to help him.  The Salvation Army found him in a very derelict state and took him in and rehabilitated him. In gratitude his mother-in-law whose name happens to be Philomena donated the statue of St Philomena pictured above to a parish in Sydney, Australia. St Philomena is powerful in her intercession for those who are addicted to alcohol, drugs and even cigarettes.  The account above was related to me by a friend, who personally knew the lady mentioned in the story above.

A rescue at sea that was bordering on the miraculous

Three sisters of the Sacred Heart Order in Papua New Guinea, were travelling to their outer mission post, with medical supplies in a canoe. They were accompanied by a native boy.

The river flowed into the sea. They were swept far out to sea. The canoe overturned and they were in the water.  Each of the sisters and the boy felt a dolphin underneath them, gently carrying them along.

The dolphins deposited them on an island. One of the sisters found a piece of glass on the island and a few days later the boy climbed a coconut tree and shined the piece of glass into the sun to create a light for ships at sea to notice. They were rescued by a passing ship. One of these nuns (an Australian) is the sister of one of our family friends.

Serenity

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nurragingy Reserve  Doonside, NSW Australia