Allow me to begin by making two confessions: I arrived at the Monastery of the Holy Name of Jesus in Denmark, Wisconsin, on Friday afternoon. I am an old friend of the nuns and try to visit them at least once a year. Two of the nuns, … [Read more...]
Articles
Inverting the Relevance of the Gospel
We hear much these days about relevance and the need to be relevant in all we do. The admonition applies to politicians, parents, teachers and especially pastors who are exhorted to make Scripture relevant to their congregations. What can … [Read more...]
God Isn’t Your College Professor
It’s the end of another semester. Final exams need to be marked and grades need to be assigned to a group of students anxious to learn “what they got” for the course. There’s so much in all of this that begs for the usual justification. T … [Read more...]
Parental and Spousal Alienation in Catholic Marriages
Marital separation and divorce in Catholic couples can result in intense levels of stress and sadness, particularly in the majority of spouses who report, while this is occurring, being happily married, committed to the marriage, and … [Read more...]
Circumcision and the Crucifixion
When God Almighty called to that man Abram, inviting him to live in a covenant with the Lord, He asked Abram to do a very curious thing to himself, to his people, and to his descendants as a sign of that covenant: to circumcise the flesh of … [Read more...]
Joseph and the Epic Battle of Humility over Pride in Spiritual Direction
From the lessons of the great protagonists of Judaism many valuable spiritual lessons are to be learned. What is at the core of the lives, and in particular the life of Joseph, is how the Lord’s plan is accomplished in cooperation with h … [Read more...]
Why You Should Have Hope for the Future of the Church
It’s officially the heart of ordination season, and our family is attending our usual round of ordination Masses. For the second year in a row, I am sewing a chasuble and stoles for some of my seminarian friends. If you have never sewn a … [Read more...]
Saint John Bosco
Spiritual Father and Friend of Penitents
In the two-thousand year history of the Catholic Church, there have been many priests who have distinguished themselves as renowned confessors. These priests are important models for confessors today to be effective ministers of mercy. This … [Read more...]
Is the Trinity a Mysterious Contradiction or a Rational Mystery?
Introduction Consider how central the Trinity is to our faith. We invoke the Trinity at the start and end of every Mass when we make the Sign of the Cross; those of us who pray the Rosary or the Divine Office will invoke the Trinity … [Read more...]
Mary and Prayer
Part III of a Marian Triptych
Mary is not a conceptual counterpoint to Christ, imagined and projected into the Gospels as a kind of semidivine goddess who was made manifest, as it were, in preparation for the coming of the Savior of mankind: a kind of “power of woman” to … [Read more...]
Analogy of Analogies
The Joyful Mysteries as Image of All Human History
A great tragedy occurred in salvation history in the so-called Enlightenment. An essential mammoth misfortune for this contrarily darkening age of the world, as well as, for that matter, the general period of thought and ideology between … [Read more...]
Evolution vs. Intelligent Design
Ever since, in late 2005, U.S. District Judge John E. Jones ruled that the school district of Dover, Pennsylvania, could not mandate material about intelligent design in its science curriculum on evolution (declaring it unconstitutional to … [Read more...]
The Color Pink and Abortion Glee
Toward Comprehending the Incomprehensible Events in New York on January 22, 2019
For many decades in most parts of the U.S., at least since the 1940s, the color pink was associated with girl babies and cute girly things. In 2017, feminists started wearing cat-eared pink hats as obscene symbols for women’s “rights.” With … [Read more...]
“Power Evangelization”
A Catholic and Carmelite Perspective
I. Introduction “Power evangelization” (hereafter, “PE”) is a rapidly growing trend in charismatic Catholic circles. It can be defined as “evangelizing through signs and wonders,” and promotes the practice of miracle-working by laity and re … [Read more...]
“This Is My Body”
Ronald Knox on the Real Presence and Transubstantiation
The Solemnity of Corpus Christi proclaims the truth that the Incarnate Son of God, having ascended to His Father’s right hand in heaven, remains present and active in His Church “until the end of the age” (Mt 28:20). The truth of Chris … [Read more...]
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