Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity
Today is also the feast of Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity. These words of hers are not unlike those of her sister in Carmel, Thérèse...
Sancta Maria in Sabbato
Our Lady’s Day Every Saturday of the Blessed Virgin Mary brings with it a fresh infusion of grace. One cannot commemorate the Immaculate Mother of...
When Christ Dwelleth in Us
In this morning’s lesson at Matins (Votive Office of the Most Blessed Sacrament on Thursday), Saint Cyril of Alexandria addresses those who would stay away...
Pope Benedict XVI: Preacher of the Holy Mysteries
The Book I’ve Been Waiting For Heartfelt thanks to Sandro Magister and to translator Matthew Sherry for this brilliant presentation of Homilies. The Liturgical Year...
Parce, Domine
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A Drop of Water in the Wine
Twenty-Ninth Saturday II Mass de Beata in Sabbato Ephesians 4:7-16 Psalm 121: 1-2, 3-4ab, 4cd-5 Luke 13:1-9 In the Light of the Ascension Today’s Epistle...
This nation soaked in the blood of the innocent
There have been more than 40 million abortions in the United States since 1973. HEART OF JESUS, formed by the Holy Spirit in the womb...
The Knotty Entanglements of Sin
The two Collects given us by the liturgy this week — the first in the Extraordinary Form, and the second in the Ordinary Form —...
The Rosary: School of Contemplation and Silence
One of Barbara Pym’s characters — I don’t remember which one — sometimes exclaims, “Too much richness!” Exactly my sentiments concerning this past weekend! There...
Blessed Louis and Zélie Martin, pray for us!
Bienheureux Monsieur et Madame This morning, a married couple, the parents of a daughter who is a saint and a Doctor of the Church, were...
The Word Has A Face
Pope Benedict XVI preaches like a monk! By this I mean that his preaching, like that of Saint Gregory the Great and others of the...
Intent on what lies before me
I really do love praying Matins in the pre-dawn darkness while, in their own way, the crickets, and cicadas, and birds sing their Nocturns outside....
Compassionate Saint Callistus I, Pope
One of the things I most love about the prayers of the Roman Rite is their compassionate realism. Today’s succinct Collect (in the traditional liturgical...
O Hostie rayonnante!
On the feast of Corpus Christi, la Fête-Dieu, 1931, Mother Marie des Douleurs (1902-1983) wrote a meditation in the form of a dialogue with Jesus,...
Mary, the Virgin Who Leadeth the Lamb
Listening to Saint Bernard at Matins in the pre-dawn darkness, I was moved by his meditation on the obedience of the Son to the Virgin...
A Fruitful Love
Saint Daniel Comboni Today is the liturgical memorial of Saint Daniel Comboni, founder of two missionary institutes, tireless worker for the abolition of slavery, and...
Benedict XVI on Pius XII
I was in first grade when Pope Pius XII died. The news reached our parish school in the early afternoon. We were instructed to lower...
Saint Paul Advises Catholic Bloggers
Finally, bloggers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence,...
La fornace d’Amore
Dom Eugène Vandeur, O.S.B. gives this prose in his meditations entitled, Les voies à la fournaise d’amour, and attributes it to the seraphic Saint Francis....
Ut gaudium meum in vobis sit
At Today’s Second Nocturn This is what I read at the Second Nocturn of Matins this morning. It is a good example of what gives...