For 56 years, Fr Fred Power,S.J. promoted the Canadian Apostleship of Prayer Association and edited its Canadian Messenger magazine for 46 years. He is now Chaplain at the Canadian Jesuits Infirmary at Pickering, Ontario.
66 posts
The influence of Jeremiah was much greater after his death than when he was living. Israel in exile read and reflected on the writings of Jeremiah, listening to and heeding his words for the first time....
The Book of Isaiah is the first and the longest of the books of the Major Prophets. Isaiah's poetic grandeur and sublime expression of faith in God have resulted in the inclusion of many passages from the book in the liturgy of the Church....
The Book of Ecclesiasticus is a long one, containing fifty-one chapters. There are many beautiful passages in this book of wisdom poetry. May we point out in particular Chapter 43:13-20 on the glory of God as shown in the wonders of Nature to serve as a strong encouragement to become familiar with its treasures....
The Book of Wisdom, which does not appear in the Hebrew Bible, has the title The Wisdom of Solomon" in the Greek manuscripts. Experts put the date of composition towards the middle of the first century B.C., thus making it the last to be written of the books of the Old Testament."...
The Book of Ecclesiastes is known in Hebrew as the Book off the Preacher. This particular "preacher" is called "son of David and king of Jerusalem." We know him as Solomon.The Song of Songs is a series of love poems in which lover and loved are now united, now divided, now sought, now found – characteristic of lovers then and now....
Proverbs is part of what is known as wisdom literature, which flourished in the ancient East. The authors of this literature, known as sages, were teachers of the art of successful living, transmitting to successive generations the accumulated knowledge of the past. They were not concerned about religious thought as such but rather with human solutions to life's problems....
Psalms are of several types: hymns or public praise of God to be sung during religious ceremonies; laments, either public for use on fast days and during times of danger; thanksgiving, which proclaim God's goodness and glory but differ from hymns in that they narrate the sufferer's distress, his appeal for assistance, and God's answer; psalms of confidence; and "wisdom" psalms which treat the ethical themes of "wisdom" literature....
The Book of Job is a masterpiece written by a literary genius. We do not know the name of the author or any other explicit information about him. What we do know comes from what he wrote about Job. The information is a great deal for we see a man capable of the finest as well as the most upsetting emotions....
In all, there are four Books of the Maccabees. The Catholic Church places the first two books in her canon of the Scriptures. The tradition of using these books as inspired is an ancient one going back as far as St. Clement of Alexandria (215 A.D.)....
The three books, Tobit, Judith, and Esther, are religious stories that merely reflect an historical situation. They are inspiring stories which bolster our faith and trust in God's protective concern for our welfare....
