Lesson Six: Be Who You Are!

This is the last lesson before our winter break.  No sloughing off!  It's an important lesson about our New Life in Christ.

Study Guide Lesson Six

This week we will also conclude the section of the Catechism about the Moral Life in Christ.  The chapter on the Tenth Commandment fits in well with our scripture passage in Lesson Six.

As I mention on the study guide, you're going to need your Bibles for this lesson.  If you're pressed for time, I know it's tempting to skip over those references, but the extra effort will definitely help you answer the questions in our study guide.

Don't forget, we're going to go out for lunch after our meeting.  Hope everyone can make it.  That reminds me--I have to call and make some reservations!

See you on December 5.

Lesson Five: Living in Christ

Another good lesson coming up.  I think we can have some good discussions with Lesson Five.  And the bonus is that our Catechism chapter fits in beautifully with our scripture study.

Study Guide Lesson Five: Living in Christ

If you're interested, here is the link for last week's notes.  I included the quote from Fr. Gaitley's book as well as the page number.  If you have the book, Consoling the Heart of Jesus, you may want to go back and review what he had to say about completing the work of Christ in the inevitable sufferings we experience in life.

Lesson Four Notes

See you  November 21.

Lesson Four:Hard Work for Christ and Lesson Three Update

First off, here is a link to my notes from Lesson Three.  Besides our lesson notes, it includes a summary of the major heresies that have attacked the Church throughout history.  I could see on your faces that it was a riveting topic.  Not.  But it is important for us to know and to remember the trials that people of good faith have endured  through the centuries to preserve the Truth of God's revelation for us.

Lesson Three Notes

Now for our new lesson.  We should have an interesting discussion about suffering joyfully!

Study Guide Lesson Four: Hard Work for Christ

This week's Catechism lesson, Chapter 32, Telling the Truth, fits in nicely with the message in our scripture passage.  The chapter begins with a small biography of Fr. John Francis Noll.  If the name doesn't sound familiar, his ministry should--he founded Our Sunday Visitor.  On our lesson guide, I promised a link to an extended preview of his book Father Smith Instructs Jack.  There are links on that page for Amazon and other booksellers that sell the Centennial Version of the book that was released earlier this year.  I have also ordered a copy for the bookstore.  (Always selling!)

I think that's it.  If I promised anything else and have neglected to include it on this post, leave a comment and let me know.

See you all on November 7!

Lesson Three: Hymn to Christ and Lesson Two Update

Before I move on to Lesson Three, I want to finish up with the promises I made after we talked about Lesson Two.

First of all, here is the link to the notes that I had made for that lesson:
Lesson Two Notes

Second, here is the link to the second interview that Pope Francis gave.  Remember, the caveat to reading this interview is that it was not recorded.  We are asked to trust the reporter in stating the Pope's responses.  However, Pope Francis has not refuted anything that appeared in this article, so I'm assuming it is mostly accurate.
Pope Francis Interview with Eugenio Scalfari

Now, on to Lesson Three.
Lesson Three Study Guide

Our next meeting is on October 24.  See you then!

Lesson Two: Thanks and Concerns

Sorry for getting this guide up late.  I could give you all my excuses, but I'll spare you the details.

Study Guide Lesson Two

Don't forget to print the guide from the print prompt on the Google task bar in order to print the guide with the same formatting that appears on your computer.

There are some reading recommendations on the guide.  The book that I recommend, Theology of the Body for Beginners by Christopher West, can be purchased at St. Patrick's Book & Gift.  Here are the links to the other documents:

Humanae Vitae

Pope Francis' Interview

Let me know if you have trouble with these links.

Again, I apologize for the late posting.  See you on Thursday.

Historical Background & Lesson One: Overview

It was great to see everyone who returned and to see our new members--all ready to start another year of Bible study.  If you were unable to attend, please ask me for a copy of our schedule.

After we finished all the business-side of our study of Colossians, we had a wonderful discussion of our summer book, The Fulfillment of All Desire.  It was frustrating to have such a short amount of time to talk about this deeply meaningful book.  As I mentioned at the end of our meeting, I would love to schedule another day to continue our discussion.  If there is enough interest, let's meet on Thursday, October 17 to do just that.  Let me know at our next meeting if you would like to attend.

I promised to post the file that has my own responses to the questions on our study guide.  If you're interested, feel free to print it out.  I'll warn you, it's about 18 pages long.

Study Guide for The Fulfillment of All Desire with Responses.

Our first lesson is mostly background information and a brief overview of this letter from Paul to the church in Colassae.  Please take the time to read the entire letter.  Don't get bogged down in details, just read it straight through and answer the questions in our LifeChange workbook.

For our new members, please print out the Study guide from the link below.
FYI: If you want to print out any of the documents that I put up on this site, use the print command on the Google page rather than the one on your browser.  Using the Google command maintains the formatting of the original document.  Please let me know if you need help or if the links do not work as they should, and I'll help if I can.

Study Guide: Historical Background & Lesson One

See you on October 10.

Oh, and by the way, you may remember that I mentioned that this is a good place to check after our meetings for links to extra information regarding our lesson or even things that may just have come up during our discussion time.  At our last meeting, a question came up about Angels.  Here's a link to some information about Angels: Angels 101

Looking Ahead: Colosians and Philemon

In 2013-2014, The Solid Grounds Bible Study will read St. Paul's Letter to the Colosians and Philemon. Meetings are scheduled on a (somewhat) bi-weekly basis on Thursday mornings from 9:00-11:00 at the Church of St. Patrick. Our first meeting will be held on September 12, 2013. This will mark the 13th year of our study, and while we still have a few charter members, we always welcome any new members who are interested in joining.

Prior to our September 12 meeting, please:
1. Register for the class.  To register, please call the church and leave your contact information. There are no fees for the study apart from the cost of materials.
2. It's become our tradition to read a book over the summer months and have a discussion about that book at our first meeting of the year. This summer we are reading The Fulfillment of All Desire by Ralph Martin. This is not required, although it is highly recommended.

Update 7/17/13: Study Guide for The Fulfillment of All Desire discussion.

3. Purchase the materials. On this website, just to the right of this copy, are links to Amazon for the materials that we use for our group. You are welcome to purchase them on your own, or we can special order them for you at St. Patrick's Book & Gift. In addition to the two books that we use for the Bible study, we also use the U.S. Catholic Catechism for Adults.

Any questions? Feel free to leave them in the comments section below, or contact the Church of St. Patrick.

Hope to see you in September!

Review

No study guide for the review.  We'll follow the questions in our workbook for our discussion.

Be sure to allow enough time to complete this lesson.  The final review, if done correctly, should take some effort.

See you on Thursday!

Lesson Ten: The Peace of God

Sorry I'm late getting this up this week.  Don't ask.

We're to the end of Paul's letter.  Not many verses, but once again, it is rich in meaning.

Study Guide Lesson Ten

We are also doing our last chapter for the year in our Catechism book, Chapter 29 on the fifth commandment.  And I will be taking orders for the book I have selected for our summer read and for the materials we will use for next year's study.  We'll have to start promptly at 9 to get everything done.

See you on Thursday!

Lesson Nine: Citizens of Heaven

We press on.  Paul wants to pass on the message of perseverance to the Philippians, and to us.  We know the goal.  Now we must, with the grace of God, do what needs to be done to get there.

I hope all of you are also persevering in your study.  We're nearing the end of this letter, so we need to keep our eyes on the goal of finishing out as strong as we started.  No spring fever or yearning for vacation yet! 

Study Guide: Lesson Nine

By the way, keep praying for our Church as the process of selecting our new pope begins. It's likely we'll spend some time talking about this at our next meeting.

See you March 7.

Lesson Eight: Profit and Loss

The rest is over.  This week's lesson dives back in to theology and many of the questions in our workbook are thought-provoking and sometimes hard to answer.  I think we will have a good discussion.

Don't forget to read the chapter in our US Catechism as well.  This time it's the Third Commandment to Keep Holy the Sabbath.  That might be a cause for self-reflection as well.  It was for me anyway.

Study Guide: Lesson Eight

We can also discuss how Lent is going as well.  As I write this, it's Ash Wednesday.  (Wasn't it just Christmas?)  Oh well, here we go!

See you all on February 21.

Lesson Seven: Co-workers

After two complex lessons, we get a break with Lesson Seven.  No deep theology.  Nice, straightforward advice for how to be good disciples.  Easy to understand; not always so easy to live out.  We try.

Study Guide Lesson Seven

I didn't get a chance prior to this to put up my notes from Lesson Six.
So...

Lesson Six Notes

Since this is an easier week for all of us, I will ask each of you to take on an extra assignment.  Believe it or not, Ash Wednesday is a mere six days after our next meeting!  Can we all try and bring some ideas on how we can make this a special Lent?  Lent during the Year of Faith should be a doozy!  I know I sure could use some inspiration.

See you on February 7.

Lesson Six: Working It Out

There are only two sentences for this week's study, but they are packed with good stuff.  I'm learning from Paul; this week's guide is only one page!

Lesson Six Study Guide

A few of you have expressed some problems with formatting and printing.  I think this is because you are sending the document to your printer from the commands in your browser (Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, etc.).  If you are having problems, try this: once you click on the link above, print the lesson by clicking on the Printer Icon, which is highlighted by an arrow in the example below, right on the Google page in your window displaying the document.  This should resolve the problem, but if not, let me know and...well, to be honest, I don't know what else to say except that I'll just print you a copy myself and bring it to our group with me.  I joke, sort of.

FYI: If you click on the arrow next to the Printer Icon, you can download the document to your computer.  Then you can do whatever you want with the file.

See you on January 24.

Lesson Five

Thanks for putting up with my nasal voice yesterday.  Hoping this stupid cold moves on soon.

I don't have much for notes, but will put up what I have.

Lesson Five Notes

See you in two weeks!

Lesson Five: The Attitude of Christ

Yea, I know.  I'm a little late again this week.  Sorry.  Better late than never though, right?  It was Christmas.  You've got to cut me some slack.

Don't let this week's lesson fool you.  It's short, but there's a lot of theology packed into those verses.  And this is a very familiar passage of scripture, so try to read it with fresh eyes and ears.  You may be surprised by what you learn.

Study Guide: Lesson Five

See you all on January 10.