Embers November 2024

October 31, 2024

We are coming to the end of another year and the FIRE committee hopes you have been applying the principles of the Catholic faith in your practice of medicine, even with your non-Catholic and non-Christian patients.

The image this month is the official icon of the CMA, Christ the Life Giver, painted by Dr. Lynne Bissonnette-Pitre and our theme for this month is Recognizing the Image of God in Our Separated Brethren.Today is a Holy Day of Obligation as we celebrate All Saints Day (Nov. 1).

In each EMBERS we focus on saints in the calendar that month who best exemplify the theme. Tomorrow is All Souls’ Day (Nov. 2) and we are reminded to pray each day for the souls in purgatory, many of whom have been forgotten by loved ones. We would suggest praying for your deceased patients and members of the CMA.

November is also National Black Catholic History Month. We would like to highlight Servant of God Sister Thea Bowman FSPA, a convert to the Catholic faith, who grew up amidst racial prejudice in Mississippi. Her words shortly before her death from cancer at age 52 were, “We unite ourselves with Christ’s redemptive work when we reconcile, when we make peace, when we share the Good News that God is in our lives, when we reflect to our brothers and sisters God’s healing, God’s forgiveness, God’s unconditional love.”

Read more about her remarkable life here.We suggest you pray the CMA Morning Offering with us each day. The family that prays together, stays together! The next ZOOM Prayer Group will be Sat. Nov. 9 at 2:00 PM EST. You can join the Zoom meeting here.

The Aquinas 101 short video from the Thomistic Institute is Fr. Dominic Legg, OP on Opinion, Doubt, Knowledge and Belief.St. Josaphat, Bishop and Martyr (Nov. 12) lived from 1580-1623 and as an Orthodox bishop born in Ukraine was martyred for promoting reunification with Rome. He was the first canonized saint from the Eastern Church.Since 1964, when Pope Paul VI embraced Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I, all the popes have worked to heal this division in Christendom. Most recently, Pope Francis greeted Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew on the occasion of the feast of Saint Andrew (Nov. 30), the patron of Constantinople. Read more here.

St. Margaret of Scotland (Nov. 16), an English princess who lived from 1045 to 1093, was shipwrecked on the shores of Scotland with her family, while sailing to Europe. She married King Malcolm III, had eight children and they were a devout Catholic family. St. Margaret aided the poor, worked to reform the Church in Scotland, and lived a life of extraordinary virtue.

Lastly, Our Lady of Kibeho (Nov. 28) is remembered on our Thanksgiving Day. It is the only Marian apparition on the African continent approved by the Vatican. Taking place in Rwanda from 1981 until 1989, Our Lady appeared to three young girls in Rwanda asking for repentance, the daily Rosary, and the Rosary of the Seven Sorrows on Tuesday and Friday. The consequence of not living Her messages was a bloodbath in 1994, with the death of 500,000 Tutsis at the hand of their neighbors, the Hutus. This apparition is for all of us today as you can read here.

The liturgical year ends with Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe (Nov. 24).Suggested reading this month includes Bishop Robert Barron’s An Introduction to Prayer; The Holy Hour: Meditations for Eucharistic Adoration (Matthew Becklo, ed.) and Pope St. John Paul II’s 1995 encyclical Ut Unum Sint.Happy Thanksgiving!

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FIRE COMMITTEE:

Chair: Kathleen M. Raviele, MDVice-Chair: Lynne Bissonnette-Pitre, MD, PhDChaplain: Fr. Christopher Kubat, MDDonna C. Dobrowolsky, MDRichard Florentine, MDJennifer Johnson, MDSister Edith Mary Hart, RSM, DO

Christina Chan, MDMarie-Alberte Boursiquot, MDChris Moon, MDDeacon Bruno Schettini, MDMaria Martinez Ramos, MDFélix Ángel Rodríguez, MD