All Things New and Better
Mary Coredemptrix I thrilled to the passage from Saint Bernard that I read this morning at Matins of the Saturday Office of the Blessed Virgin...
Turn On Us Thy Healing Face
Two strophes from this morning’s hymn at Lauds seemed to come to life as I sang them in the sunlight of this new Day of...
Nothing Else than the Grace of God
Reading Saint Paul This morning in my lectio continua of Saint Paul, I read Romans 7:14-25. I’m using the splendid translation of Monsignor Ronald A....
Nihil Amori Christi Praeponere
Saints Benedict and Paul This Solemnity of Our Father Saint Benedict, falling in the Pauline Year, invites us — I want to say, compels us...
For the Pauline Year
I celebrated the beautiful Votive Mass of Saint Paul this morning. One of my resolutions for the Pauline Year is to offer the Votive Mass...
Pope Benedict XVI to Priests
This particular teaching of the Holy Father went straight to my heart. It is, I think, a confirmation of the service I am called to...
Between My Bed and the Wall: Saint Paul
But do thou continue in the things that thou hast learned and that have been entrusted to thee, knowing of whom thou hast learned them....
Dominus meus et Deus meus
Where deep the spear had pierced, there Thomas searched thy side, Whence for the nations’ health, poured forth the healing tide; By this and each...
Feast of the Most Precious Blood
The first time I saw Bernini’s little known depiction of the Blood of Christ, I was completely smitten by it. The Eternal Father contemplates the...
After First Vespers of Midsummer Day
Oh, the joy of First Vespers of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist: a glorious set of antiphons and (in the monastic Office) an...
The Struggle of Prayer
Relinquishing Control What does it mean to pray for someone or something? If I pray to obtain control over someone or something, I am wasting...
Pro Affligentibus Nos
Commanded from the Heart “I say to you, Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you” (Mt 5:44). “Bless those who curse you,...
In the Light of Today’s Gospel
“But I tell you, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who persecute and insult you.” (Matthew 5:44) Prayer...
In plateas et vicos civitatis
When I came to the Magnificat Antiphon at Vespers this evening, I made the delightful discovery of the text (with a splendid First Mode melody)...
Saint Alice the Leper
Ablaze With the Love of Christ Today’s Saint Alice of Schaerbeek, a Cistercian-Benedictine nun, was one of a constellation of holy women who in the...
One-Hundred-Nine Years Ago Today
On June 9, 1899, Pope Leo XIII consecrated the entire world to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The eighty-nine year old Pontiff was prompted to...
Contra spem in spem credidit
Many years ago, as I was standing in the rain in front of the grotto at Lourdes on a cold February morning, a saintly old...
An Occasion of Grace for Priests
Called to a Vocation of Holiness “I would remind thee to fan the flame of that special grace which God kindled in thee when my...
Vultus Christi: The Face of God
That Mysterious Face This morning the Holy Father announced an exposition of the Sacred Shroud of Turn in the Spring of 2010. The Shroud will...
Saints Marcellinus and Peter
O God, Who by the glorious confession of the holy martyrs Marcellinus and Peter, dost surround and protect us, grant that we may go forward...