Watching the movie The Rite last weekend made me realize that not thinking that the devil is real may be just as bad as not believing in God. The evil spirits are always at work wreaking havoc on our lives. And while it is okay to be fearful of them, it is very comforting to have Jesus Christ on our side. That is if you do have Him on your side and that requires some commitment on your part. Do you realize that Satan can only control you if you allow him to? The Bible says you can be bound by Satan. This can happen any number of ways but most likely through worship and allegiance to things rather than God. By not paying attention to your spiritual life, you can allow Satan to plunder away at you. The Bible shows us over and over again that the evil spirits are fearful of Jesus. In fact, in example after example, Jesus cast evil spirits out of people. He commanded that they leave and they listened. In The Rite, the exorcist explains that it is incumbent to learn the evil spirit's name so that you can command they to leave by the power of Jesus Christ. Mark 1:23-27 says, "In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit; he cried out, 'What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are--the Holy One of God!' Jesus rebuked him and said, 'Quiet! Come out of him!' The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him. All were amazed and asked one another, 'What is this? A new teaching with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him." Jesus has the power to destroy the unholy ones. When we do allow them to inhabit our lives, there is a way to drive them out again. Turning to Jesus Christ and asking for His help is the easiest way. Yet so many of us try to go it alone or ignore the situation, hoping it will get better on its own. Why would we ever do that? Mark 7:21-23 says, "From within people, from their hearts, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come from within and they defile." What is inside of you? Are you allowing the Holy Spirit to fill you from within or are you allowing the evil spirits to plunder away at your soul? The message of the Original Testament, the eternal message again is revealed--Trust God!

Exploring new ways to pray is a good way to reignite your prayer life. I know that I can get stuck in a rut and merely rely on the rote prayers that we learned as a child. Being in a relationship with God requires more than just sitting around waiting for an epiphany. Think about your life. Think about the things that make you happy and fulfilled and the things that make you sad or repel you. When you draw up the list of things that are valuable to you, where is God on that list? As a free person, are you making choices that bring value into your life? When you look at the man-made things around you, are you relying on those to make you happy? Are they bringing you closer to God? Money, power and influence just were not on Jesus' bucket list. Are they on yours? Why? God will attend to your every need. What are the things that turn you to God and make you more loving to Him? The What Would Jesus Do bracelets were a good thing. I wonder why they have gone away? It is a great reminder for how to live our lives. What would Jesus do about the abortion epidemic in our world? What would Jesus do for the poor in our community? What would Jesus do if He visited our church on Sunday? Would Jesus recognize me as a Christian? Do the things that I cherish make me more authentic? Am I making decisions based on the accumulation of more things instead of gaining eternal life? Allow God's power to work within you. Allow God's wisdom to collect inside you. Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, then you will also know my Father" (John 14:6-7).

An iPhone app aimed at helping Catholics through confession and encouraging lapsed followers back to the faith has been sanctioned by the Catholic Church in the United States according to a story on Reuters. Confession: A Roman Catholic app, thought to be the first to be approved by a church authority, walks Catholics through the sacrament and contains what the company behind the program describes as a “personalized examination of conscience for each user”. “Our desire is to invite Catholics to engage in their faith through digital technology,” said Patrick Leinen of the three-man company Little iApps, based in South Bend, Indiana. “Taking to heart Pope Benedict XVI’s message from last years’ World Communications Address, our goal with this project is to offer a digital application that is truly ‘new media at the service of the word.” The app is not designed to replace going to confession but to help Catholics through the act, which generally involves admitting sins to a priest in a confessional booth. Catholics still must go to a priest for absolution. Pope Benedict provided inspiring words during the installation of five new archbishops recently at the Vatican and called upon them to "throw out the nets of the Gospel into the stormy seas of our time" to draw men and women out of "the salty waters of death." The Pope told the five during his homily that "the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Although it may seem that a large part of the modern world, of the men and women of today, turn their backs on God and consider faith as a thing of the past, there is still a longing that justice, peace and love will finally be established, that poverty and suffering will be overcome, that mankind may find happiness," he said. As bishops, the Gospel passage on the harvest sheds light on two of their missions: to work to bring about God's will on earth and to cooperate with Christ along the way, said the Pope. The line from the Acts of the Apostles, "they devoted themselves to the Apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers," gives them guidelines for being pastors, he explained. Devotion and constancy are essential because "only where there is stability can there also be growth," he said. Communion with the Apostles and God is another task of a pastor, said the Pope. "May this chain of communion not be broken!" he exclaimed. "The essence of apostolic succession is to maintain our communion with the people who visibly and tangibly met with the Lord." Unity in the Church must be ensured, he said. For the "breaking of the bread," he told them that the "core" of the Church and of the Christian being is the Eucharist. "The Lord gives himself to us; the Risen One enters my intimate self and wishes to transform me, bringing me into profound communion with Him." Pope Benedict also spoke about prayer, telling the archbishops that it is personal, but "never an exclusively private affair. Only in community "can we be children of our Father, to whom the Lord taught us to pray." Benedict XVI concluded his homily with a call to action aimed at the new archbishops. He told them to "throw out the nets of the Gospel into the stormy seas of our time, to obtain the adherence of men and women to Christ, so as to draw them out ... from the salty waters of death and from the dark where the light of heaven does not reach. You must bring them onto the earth, to live in communion with Jesus Christ."