Ruminations of an Amateur Monastic
Saint Bonaventure (1221 – 1274) Saint Bonaventure, whose memorial is today in the Ordinary Form, received his (much delayed) doctorate in theology in Paris in 1257, in the same class as Saint Thomas Aquinas. Later that same year, he was elected Minister General of the Franciscan Order. Bonaventure spent much of his life as a theologian at the university, living […]
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I’m going to go out on a limb and say that vanishingly few American churches have an image of today’s saint. But ours does. Let me explain. It’s a pretty rare thing when Kings become saints, or at least become canonized saints. I can only think of a handful off the top of my head, though I’m sure there are […]
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Icon of Saint Benedict at Mount Athos For today’s Feast of Saint Benedict, I thought I’d share with you some of the short videos and documentaries I’ve found over the years that give an insight into the monastic life. Every monastery is different, of course, as you will see in these videos, but these monks have all responded to the […]
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Happy feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle! Today wasn’t always his feast. In fact in my Monastic Diurnal, today is the Memorial of Saints Processus and Martinian. I’m sure these holy martyrs will forgive me if I choose to celebrate the Apostle today as well, since he is my name saint. Grant, almighty God,that we may glory in the Feast […]
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Today the Church celebrates one of her most ancient feasts, commemorating the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul. I prayed at the tombs of these apostles during our pilgrimage to Rome in 2005. Icon of Saints Peter and Paul Peter With the body of Saint John Paul II mere feet from me, I knelt near Saint Peter’s tomb at the […]
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Painting of the young John the Baptist, by Alessandro Rosi (1627–1697) This year, we go right from yesterday’s Solemnity of Corpus Christi to the Solemnity of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. Historically, that’s a bit backwards, but every liturgical year is a new adventure in the meshing of the Temporal and Sanctoral cycles. So what’s the deal with […]
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Today is the anniversary of the death of the great G.K. Chesterton. You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it.(G.K. Chesterton) He’s not been recognized as a saint yet, of course, but there are those who think he should be. As I’ve said before, I have certainly had occasion to pray for his […]
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The Lord manifests Himself to those who stop for some time in peace and humility of heart. If you look in murky and turbulent waters, you cannot see the reflection of your face.If you want to see the face of Christ, stop and collect your thoughts in silence, and close the door of your soul to the noise of external […]
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Saint Boniface, whose feast is today, is widely known as the “apostle to the Germans”. An Englishman of Devonshire, he was part of a great Anglo-Saxon missionary effort in the Saxon marches of the Frankish Empire in the early eighth century. The Saint Boniface Window at Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Church, Tacoma Since my parish church of Holy […]
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Today in the calendar of the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite and (perhaps more importantly for me) on the Benedictine Calendar is the feast of this blog’s patron, Saint Bede the Venerable. For no reason that I understand, in 1970 his feast was moved to the day before yesterday. Saint Bede the Venerable translating the Gospel of John This […]
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After the suicide of Judas Iscariot, the remaining Apostles gathered to choose another to replace him. They had some criteria: Therefore, it is necessary that one of the menwho accompanied us the whole timethe Lord Jesus came and went among us,beginning from the baptism of Johnuntil the day on which he was taken up from us,become with us a witness […]
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Yesterday, following Vespers, I gave Father Wagner’s family the compostela from last year’s Camino. It seemed fitting, since I had walked for him. Indeed, the Pilgrim Office staff had written on it “Vicarie pro Rev. Michael Wagner”, indicating that I had walked as his substitute. Today I am reminded of something I wrote in my journal on this day back […]
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Today is the feast of four great Abbots of the Benedictine Order: Saints Odo, Majolus, Odilo, and Hugh. They were all good and holy men, and during the course of their reigns over the Abbey of Cluny and its associated priories, they reformed western monasticism – indeed, it could be fairly said that together they saved western monasticism. My Monastic […]
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Were today not Easter Thursday, it would be the Feast of Saint Mark the Evangelist. Even though Mark is eclipsed today by his Master, it’s worth spending a moment with him. John Mark was one of the original seventy disciples (Luke 10:1 ff). Tradition holds that he was one of those who left Christ when he preached on the Bread […]
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During Lent, I am often reminded of this, one of my favourite stories from the Desert Fathers: Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, “Abba, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my […]
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Happy Feast of Saint Benedict! Although it no longer appears on the Universal (Roman) calendar, today is one of two feasts of Saint Benedict of Norcia celebrated by Benedictines throughout the world. This feast is sometimes called the Transitus of Saint Benedict, for it is the day in the year 547 when this great saint died. Saint Benedict is generally […]
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Here’s an insight into how my mind works. As I was walking into work one morning a couple of years ago, commuter coffee mug firmly in hand, it suddenly struck me: the reason we call coffee “joe” is because it gets us through our morning, much as Saint Joseph got his foster-son Jesus through the “morning” of his life. I […]
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