The Boy who Saw the Mother of God
“How beautiful God is, how beautiful! But He is sad because of the sins of men. I want to console Him, I want to suffer...
To seek what is human, to give what is divine
The physician who does not suffer infirmities, knows not how to cure infirmities. This was the lesson before the Holy Gospel at Matins this morning....
Prayer of Saint Birgitta
I have long taken comfort in this prayer of Saint Birgitta of Sweden, whose feast we keep today. O Lord, make haste and illumine the...
Blessed Abbot Marmion on the Rosary
Blessed Abbot Marmion chose Rosary Sunday for his reception of the Abbatial Blessing in 1909, and commemorated this event each year with a procession in...
A prayer that revives the soul
Disarmingly Simple The Rosary is a disarmingly simple prayer. The power of the Rosary is completely disproportionate to the effort required to pray it well....
Healing the deepest wounds and traumas
Praying in the Balkans Last year, a dear friend of mine who is an Orthodox Christian — husband, father, and physician serving in the U.S....
Diabólica vitáre contágia
Da, quaesumus, Dómine, pópulo tuo diabólica vitáre contágia: et te solum Deum pura mente sectári. Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord, that Thy people may...
Dixit Dominus Domino meo
The Lord said to my Lord Psalm 109 figures prominently in today’s Holy Mass and Divine Office. At Mass, we receive Psalm 109 from the...
Father Benedict Joseph Groeschel, C.F.R.
The Franciscan Friars of the Renewal issued the following statement concerning the death of their beloved Father Benedict Joseph Groeschel on the eve of the...
Saint Francis and the Liturgy
Franciscans and the Liturgy: A Benedictine Point of View Here and there in the family of the Seraphic Saint Francis of Assisi one finds communities...
The Holy Face in Franciscan Spirituality
When it comes to Franciscan spirituality, I, being a son of Saint Benedict and an unworthy disciple of Blessed Abbot Marmion, lay claim to nothing...
Blessed Columba Marmion, O.S.B.
Would you have recognized him? This is none other than Blessed Abbot Columba Marmion, O.S.B. He was obliged to travel in disguise during World War...
Saint Jerome and Lectio Divina
Jerome and the Monastic Path Jerome, translator of the original Hebrew and Greek texts of the Bible into Latin, the tongue of the common folk,...
Patri munus et hostiam
The Office hymn given for Lauds and Vespers in the Liber Hymnarius and in the Liturgia Horarum for today’s feast of Saint Jerome, Doctor of...
Moneyless physicians labouring without pay
Saints of the Roman Canon From the end of the fourth century right up until 1970 the Mass of the Roman Rite was never celebrated...
Desire for God, unutterable love
Yesterday morning at Matins, we had this magnificent text of the Golden–Mouthed Doctor: From the Book on Prayer by St John Chrysostom, Bishop & Doctor...
When the world was growing cold
Vultus Christi Reader Richard Smith was kind enough to visit Saint Francis Church in New Haven, Connecticut, and photograph the window of the Stigmata of...
Fire for a World Grown Cold
Never underestimate the effect of an image on the memory and imagination of a little child. Long before a child learns to read, he begins...
How to Be Both Hot and Holy in Old Age
In his commentary on old King Solomon’s need to sleep with a maiden hot enough to keep him warm and holy enough not to arouse...
Envelop this island on all sides
We beseech and pray thee, holy Mary, to accept today the total and irrevocable consecration of Ireland to thy maternal and immaculate Heart. Let the...