Letter from the Pastor
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August 4, 2024August is the month of the “dog days” a time when things get especially hot and quite sticky. Why “dog days?” The Dog Star, Sirius, in the constellation of Canis Major, translated as Big Dog is the brightest star in the northern sky! The star is pretty much in line with the sun during August.
The name August comes from the same place where we get July. The Roman senate renamed July for Julius Caesar, after his assassination in 44 B.C. After the death of Julius Caesar, the more idealistic of the assassins thought they were going to reinstitute a vigorously republican form of government. It never happened. After some years of political assassination, even open war, the man who emerged victorious was Caesar’s great-nephew and adopted son, Octavian. The Senate bestowed upon him the title Augustus, and that’s what historians have called him ever since. And they renamed the month coming after July, so we have uncle and nephew back to back. The title Augustus meant something like Your Highest Awesome! The Senators wanted to keep their jobs! Some things never change.
August is the last chance for summer vacation. It is also the month we say good-bye to our college students as some leave home for the first time. It is a month of preparation for the new school year and it is usually the hottest month as well.
August is also the month of our Blessed Mother. While we may know that May is the month of Our Lady, and October is dedicated to the Holy Rosary, fewer people realize that August is dedicated to her Immaculate Heart. We celebrate Mary on her feast days: The dedication of the oldest Church in her honor, the Basilica of Mary Major in Rome, the Assumption on the 15th, her Queenship on the 22nd and under her title, the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
During the second apparition at Fatima, (June 13, 1917), the Blessed Mother told Lucia that God wished to establish devotion to her Immaculate Heart. Our Lady also promised Lucia that her Immaculate Heart would be her refuge in all the trials and tribulations and we too can have a secure refuge in Mary’s Immaculate Heart.
Devotion to Mary’s Immaculate Heart is really concerned with the love that her heart has for her Divine Son and for God our Father, and her motherly love for us. The fact that her heart is immaculate (sinless), means that she is the only fully human person who is able to love God in the way that He should really be loved.
Honoring Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart is another way of honoring her as the person who was chosen to be the Mother of God, thus recognizing her extraordinary holiness and immense love she bestowed on Jesus as His mother.
So, we turn to Our Lady as a refuge and guide, her motherly love watches over us and protects us only as a mother can. So we place in her motherly and Immaculate Heart, all our children and young adults especially those going away for school.
