OPEN HOUSE ~ EVERYONE WELCOME

The Portiuncula Chapel is having an open house this coming Monday, August 11th (the Feast Day of St. Clare of Assisi) from 10:00 to 2:00 located next to the Immaculate Conception Cemetery in Ozark, Ohio

 

Pace e' Bene! (Peace and All Good)

 

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Sister Briege McKenna, OSC

Thank you, my dear Sister Briege! After nearly 20 years of yours and our prayers, our loving God has finally brought them to fruition with the building of the Portiuncula Chapel next to the Immaculate Conception Cemetery in Ozark, Ohio. Now please pray that the evil attacks by the devil against it be dealt with in Jesus' Holy Name. Amen 

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Altissimu, Omnipotente, Bon Signore

 

The Portiuncula is the womb of Saint Francis' charism and his Order, dedicated to Santa Maria degli Angeli (Our Lady, St. Mary of the Angels). Here Francis died on October 3, 1226.

It was at his Baptism, amidst all the splendor and wealth of the Cathedral of San Rufio, that Saint Francis received the Holy Ghost, but it was here in this poor, crumbling, forgotten ruin that he met God face to face.

We have built a replica of the Portiuncula at the Immaculate Conception Cemetery in Ozark, Ohio

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Footprints In The Water

 

To say that the road the soul travels to God is through the sea (the Prophet Baruch) and that His footsteps are in the many waters and so unknowable is to say that the way to God is as hidden to the inner senses as would be footprints on the water of the outer senses. The traces God leaves on the souls He wants to bring to Himself are unrecognizable. Secret.

St. John of the Cross
Dark Night of the Soul

 

Your Cell Will Teach You Everything

 In Scetis, a brother went to see Abba Moses and begged him for a word. The old man said, "Go and sit in your cell and your cell will teach you everything."

Saying From the Desert Fathers

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Portiuncula Chapel Prayer

 

Lord God, we have set aside the Portiuncula Chapel for an assembly of Your people. We ask Your blessings on this place that it might serve effectively as an area to promote unity, peace and the furthering of Your kingdom. We command in the name of Jesus that all spirits of discord or evil of any sort depart and we ask, O God, that You send Your angels to guard and protect the Portiuncula Chapel and all who participate in the events held here. We pray through the intercession of Holy Mother Mary and the Saints and in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen

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The Portiuncula Franciscan Hermitage and Retreat Center

P.O. Box 34

Jerusalem, Ohio 43747

The Portiuncula Chapel is located adjacent to the 

Immaculate Conception Catholic Cemetery 

on Ozark-Eddy Bridge Road in Ozark, Ohio 

Wear His Crown Of Thorns As A Crown Of Glory!

 

by
Fra Chris Dickson, F.L.A.
of the Portiuncula Hermitage

I was in an area of complete and utter darkness. Then a mist appeared, through which two hands appeared that were handing me a crown of thorns.

I took the crown of thorns from the outstretched hands and placed it upon my head. As the crown was being seated upon my head, I prematurely winced, fully expecting searing pain from those thorns to shoot through my head and throughout my entire body.

But instead of pain, a warm and wonderful feeling of joy and peace settled over me. I was being bathed in God’s love.

Simultaneously with the crown of thorns being placed upon my head, a vision appeared before me of a glass mirror “unfurling” like a window shade, even though it was glass.

Jesus then appeared in the glass before me.

I was immediately filled with shame because Jesus had caught me wearing his crown, and I immediately pulled it from my head.

As I did, Jesus disappeared.

I then placed the crown back onto my head.

As I did, the glass unfurled before me, and again Jesus was standing before me.

At that moment, the realization hit me that I was looking into a mirror and seeing my own reflection, and that reflection was my Savior and my Lord! And me! One and the same!

This vision greatly troubled me. After all, who did I think I was, anyway? Was I so vain as to think myself equal to Jesus? God forbid! The vision continued to frighten me long afterwards, fearing that my attitude was obviously not right with God…that is, until I heard these words:

“Do not be afraid to put on my crown of thorns.

It is My crown of glory!

Wear it as I did.

I will bear the pain so that you have none.

Then, and only then, will you see Me in glory.

Then we shall meet face to face.

You in me, and I in you.

People will see me in your image.

Give yourselves to Me fully,

And I will come to you in glory…”

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Prophesy Of Fr. Michael Scanlan, T.O.R. In 1980

 

Fr. Michael Scanlan, TOR, 1931-2017

Father Mike was a gentle giant in the Roman Catholic Faith, and a very dear friend. It seems like just yesterday that on a warm Summer day just the two of us walked and talked about Jesus around the hills on the campus of the Franciscan University of Steubenville. Then, a couple years after that, Fr. Mike was a guest on my radio talk show. That was nearly 20 years ago and I have nothing but fond memories of the greatest leader in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.

Fr. Michael Scanlan – Prophecy of 1980

Ralph Martin of Renewal Ministries posted another prophecy given to Fr. Michael Scanlan in 1980. For the first prophecy of Fr. Scanlan posted, click here:

 

The Lord God says, “Hear My Word: The time that has been marked by My blessings and gifts is being replaced now by the period to be marked by my judgment and purification. What I have not accomplished by blessings and gifts, I will accomplish by judgment and purification.

 

My people, My Church is desperately in need of this judgment. They have continued in an adulterous relationship with the spirit of the world. They are not only infected with sin, but they teach sin, embrace sin, dismiss sin. Their leadership has been unable to handle this. There is fragmentation, confusion, throughout the ranks. Satan goes where he will and infects whom he will. He has free access throughout my people—and I will not stand for this.

 

My people specially blessed in this renewal are more under the spirit of the world than they are under the Spirit of My baptism. They are more determined by fear of what others will think of them—fears of failure and rejection in the world, loss of respect of neighbors and superiors and those around them—than they are determined by fear of me and fear of infidelity to my word.

 

Therefore, your situation is very, very weak. Your power is so limited. You cannot be considered at this point in the center of the battle and the conflict that is going on.

 

So this time is now come upon all of you: a time of judgment and of purification. Sin will be called sin. Satan will be unmasked. Fidelity will be held up for what it is and should be. My faithful servants will be seen and will come together. They will not be many in number. It will be a difficult and a necessary time. There will be collapse, difficulties throughout the world.

 

But more to the issue, there will be purification and persecution among my people. You will have to stand for what you believe. You will have to choose between the world and me. You will have to choose what word you will follow and whom you will respect.

 

And in that choice, what has not been accomplished by the time of blessing and gifts will be accomplished. What has not been accomplished in the baptism and the flooding of gifts of my Spirit will be accomplished in a baptism of fire. The fire will move among you and it will burn out what is chaff. The fire will move among you individually, corporately, in groups, and around the world.

 

I will not tolerate the situation that is going on. I will not tolerate the mixture and the adulterous treating of gifts and graces and blessings with infidelity, sin, and prostitution. My time is now among you.

 

What you need to do is to come before Me in total submission to My Word, in total submission to My plan, in the total submission in this new hour. What you need to do is to drop the things that are your own, those things of the past. What you need to do is to see yourselves and those whom you have responsibility for in light of this hour of judgment and purification. You need to see them in that way and do for them what will best help them to stand strong and be among My faithful servants.

 

For there will be casualties. It will not be easy, but it is necessary. It is necessary that My people be, in fact, my people; that My Church be, in fact, My Church; and that My Spirit, in fact, bring forth the purity of life, the purity and fidelity to the Gospel.

 

Fr. Michael Scanlan TOR, sits in Christ the King Chapel at Franciscan University of Steubenville. Scanlan died at the age of 85 in 2017. 

 

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Woke Vatican

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The Transitus of St. Francis of Assisi

 

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The Transitus of St. Francis of Assisi

 

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Set Aside A Daily Period Of Time For Solitude And Silence

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Adoration Table set up at the Portiuncula Hermitage in Jerusalem, Ohio

Franciscan Lay Apostolates spend some daily time in solitude and silence within our own homes, out in nature, or in a sacred space. Our people are encouraged to spend twenty to thirty minutes in silence in a place set aside specifically for this purpose. It can be a prayer room or special corner set up in your home just for this purpose. It might be a stroll through the woods or dropping into the neighborhood church for a few moments. The important thing is that we experience some form of solitude and silence every single day.

Chris Dickson

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God Chose An Unborn Child To Announce The Coming Of His Son!

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As soon as Mary received the announcement from the angel, she went in haste to her cousin Elizabeth, who was with child. And the unborn child, John the Baptist, rejoiced in Elizabeth's womb. How wonderful it was...Almighty God chose an unborn child to announce the coming of His Son!

This was the first Eucharist: the gift of God's Son establishing Mary as the first altar, the first tabernacle. Mary is the only one able to confirm in complete sincerity, "This is my body!"

Merry Christmas from the Portiuncula Franciscan Hermitage!

Pace e Bene!

Chris

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The Very First Christmas Creche

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The Creche on the campus of the Franciscan University of Steubenville

adjacent to the Portiuncula Chapel

The good folk [of Greccio] came and were filled with joy as if for the first time over a whole new mystery. The woods rang with voices, the rocks echoed their festive chorus, the brothers sang their choice praises to the Lord, and the whole night seemed to leap rejoicing. The saint of God stood ecstatically before the manger, his spirit trembling with compassion and ineffable love. Then the priest celebrated the solemnity of the Eucharist over the manger and he too experienced a consolation he'd never tasted before.

Celano - First Life

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Franciscan University Of Steubenville Schola Cantorum For Advent

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"Why Everyone Should Be Baptized In The Holy Spirit" by Dr. Ralph Martin

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St. Francis of Assisi Built The Very First Nativity Scene

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What Francis did on the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ near the little town called Greccio in the third year before his glorious death should be especially noted and recalled with reverent memory. In that place there was a certain man named John, of good reputation and an even better life, whom blessed Francis loved with a special love, for in the place where he lived he held a noble and honorable position in as much as he had trampled upon the nobility of his birth and pursued nobility of soul. Blessed Francis sent for this man, as he often did, about fifteen days before the birth of the Lord, and he said to him: "If you want us to celebrate the present feast of our Lord at Greccio, go with haste and diligently prepare what I tell you. For I wish to do something that will recall to memory the little Child who was born in Bethlehem and set before our bodily eyes in some way the inconveniences of his infant needs, how he lay in a manger, how, with an ox and an ass standing by, he lay upon the hay where he had been placed." When the good and faithful man heard these things, he ran with haste and prepared in that place all the things the saint had told him.

...The manger was prepared, the hay had been brought, the ox and the ass were led in. There simplicity was honored, poverty was exalted, humility was commended, and Greccio was made, as it were, a new Bethlehem.

Saint Francis of Assisi
Celano, First Life
CHAPTER XXX

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Praise of Sister Death: Thirty Second Sunday Of Ordinary Time

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Blessed Francis, despite the overpowering burden of his sickness, praised the Lord in a great joyful outburst of body and soul, saying to his companion: "Since I must soon die, have Brother Angelo and Brother Leo come and praise our Sister Death for me." Both arrived, and, forcing back their tears, sang the Canticle of Brother Sun and of other creatures, which the saint had composed during his sickness for the glory of God and for the consolation of his soul and of that of the others. Before the last strophe, they added a few verses on our Sister Death to his canticle:

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Death,
From whose embrace no mortal can escape.
Woe to those who die in mortal sin!
Happy those She finds doing your will!
The second death can do no harm to them.
Saint Francis of Assisi
Legend of Perugia - 100

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Lay The Axe To The Root!

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"But let us lay the axe to the root, that, being purged from passions, we may possess a quiet mind."

THE IMITATION OF CHRIST

Thomas A' Kempis

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Do You Want Peace And Joy In Your Life?

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"For the Kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, which is not given to the wicked. "(Romans 14:17)

THE IMITATION OF CHRIST
Thomas A' Kempis

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