Archive for November 2022
Advent Recollection: The Cave of Bethlehem
The Blessed Virgin was in the eastern part of this cave, exactly opposite the entrance, when she gave birth to the Light of the World. The crib in which the child Jesus was laid stood on the west side of the southern and more roomy part of the cave. This crib was a hollowed-out stone…
Read MorePerseverance in Prayer
If you want all your prayers to be answered without fail and oblige God to meet all your wishes, the first thing is never to stop praying. Those who get tired after praying for a time are lacking in either humility or confidence, and so do not deserve to be heard. You would think that…
Read MoreThe Beginning of Advent: Preparing for Christmas
The Catholic Church is the most interesting institution in the world. Like her Founder, she is both human and divine. She is human because her members are of human origin; she is divine because Christ, the Head of these members, is divine. The Catholic Church is the greatest storyteller in the world. She is the…
Read MoreFamiliar Friendship with Jesus
When Jesus is present all things go well, and nothing seems difficult; but when Jesus is absent everything is hard. When Jesus speaks not within, our comfort is worthless; but if Jesus speak but one word, we feel great consolation. Did not Mary Magdalen immediately arise from the place where she wept when Martha said…
Read MoreThanksgiving Meditation: Gratitude to Jesus Christ
“That they who live may not now live to themselves, but unto Him who died for them, and rose again.” -2 Corinthians 5:15 St. Augustine says that Jesus Christ, having first given His life for us, has bound us to give our life for Him, and further, that when we go to the Eucharistic table…
Read MoreInequality in Friendship
In a previous article, it was stated that just as there is an analogy between the natural life of man and the supernatural life of grace, there is an analogy between the development of human friendship and the friendship between the soul and God. However, in his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle, the Philosopher, notes that “if…
Read MoreConfession is the Sacrament of Mercy (PART II)
It is essential to be sorry for our sins—it is not essential to be troubled about them. Repentance is an effect of love of God, anxiety is an effect of self-love. In the midst of the keenest and most sincere repentance we can still thank God that He has not permitted us to become yet…
Read MoreReflection on the Feast of St. Cecilia
In the evening of her wedding day, with the music of the marriage hymn ringing in her ears, Cecilia, a rich, beautiful, and noble Roman maiden, renewed the vow by which she had consecrated her virginity to God. “Pure be my heart and undefiled my flesh; for I have a spouse you know not of—an…
Read MoreDiscourse on the Presentation of Mary
The offering that Mary made of herself to God was prompt without delay, and entire without reserve There never was, and never will be, an offering on the part of a pure creature greater or more perfect than that which Mary made to God when, at the age of three years, she presented herself in…
Read MoreConfession is the Sacrament of Mercy (PART I)
“I said: I will confess against myself my injustice to the Lord, and thou hast forgiven the wickedness of my sin.” -Ps. 31:5 The sacrament of penance is a sacrament of mercy. We should therefore approach it with confidence and in peace. Saint Francis de Sales assures us that for those who go to confession…
Read MoreVirtues of St. Gerard Majella
His Desire for the Highest Perfection After the death of Father Cafaro, his first director, Gerard placed himself under the direction of Father Juvenal, a religious of great virtue. To him we are indebted for precious documents on the holy brother’s inner life. He soon saw for himself that Gerard had received from God the…
Read MoreSpiritual Desolation
We ought to view in the light of God’s holy will, the loss of persons who are helpful to us in a spiritual or material way. Pious souls often fail in this respect by not being resigned to the dispositions of God’s holy will. Our sanctification comes fundamentally and essentially from God, not from spiritual…
Read MorePrayers Suitable to the Sick
The bed of the sick is an altar of sacrifice…Happy is the just man who disturbs not the sacrifice by his murmurs and his cries, who adores the beneficent hand that is hidden under the instruments which it vouchsafes to employ, who blesses the salutary strokes, who feels the honor of the distinction! How brilliant…
Read MoreIs the Brown Scapular “Biblical”?
On its face, the question sounds ridiculous. Anyone even vaguely familiar with the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel knows that the small, woolen sacramental goes back to Carmelite St. Simon Stock’s vision of 1251 A.D. The earliest account, in the Carmelite Sanctoral, recorded how the Blessed Mother showed St. Simon the Scapular…
Read MoreHow to Make Mary Live and Reign in Our Souls
Predestinate soul, have you understood, by the grace of the Holy Ghost, what I have tried to explain to you in the preceding pages? If so, be thankful to God, for it is a secret known and understood by only a few. If you have found the treasure hidden in the field of Mary, the…
Read MorePrayer Secures God’s Blessings on Our Labors
Without exaggeration we can say: Whatsoever is truly great in this world is a fruit of prayer. Every man who has achieved something extraordinary in the Church has been a man of prayer. For this reason the beneficent influence of the contemplative orders in the Church is incalculable. The unthinking world calls such religious idlers,…
Read MoreA Prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary for Her Help in the Hour of Death
O most loving Mother of God, Mary ever-virgin, you overflow with a miraculous sweetness, which the human mind is not able to comprehend or describe! I stand before you now as your lowly servant, humbly bowing before your most gracious throne, which is exalted far above all the choirs of angels in the heavenly kingdom.…
Read MoreEncouragement Under Trials
“Thy word enlivened me.” -Psalm 118:50 “God is faithful,” says the Apostle, “who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will make also with the temptation an issue, that you may be able to bear it.” (1 Cor. 10:13). This ought to be a great comfort to us…
Read MoreRemedies Against Sloth
Sloth is a reluctance to attend to duty, and, according to Cassian, it is especially a weariness or distaste for spiritual things. The peril to which this vice exposes us is clearly set forth in these words of Our Savior: “Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit shall be cut down and shall be…
Read MoreThe Rapidity of Time
These temporal years pass away; the months are reduced to weeks, the weeks to days, the days to hours, and the hours to moments, which are all that we possess, but which we possess only in proportion as they perish. The more perishable our existence, the more amiable ought it to be to us, since…
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