Ruminations of an Amateur Monastic
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) From the indefatigable Mark Shea, readings for the Feast of Gilbert Keith Chesterton: 1. JOB 19:23-27 Oh, that my words were now written! Oh, that they were printed in a book! […]
» Read moreWhile today is the feast of Saint Anthony of Padua, I really have little to add over what I wrote last year. Instead, I’d like to ruminate a bit about next year. Yesterday at Mass, I heard the word “pilgrim” an awful lot, including twice the phrase “pilgrim Church on earth” (cf. Third Eucharistic Prayer). Among other things, it got […]
» Read moreIn the Office of Readings for the last little bit, we’ve been reading the Book of Job. Everybody assures us that Job was a righteous man, but we know that we are all subject to sin. I begin to wonder if Job’s sin isn’t pride. There is some evidence in the text, but the proof, I think, is God’s rebuke […]
» Read moreAt a lecture many years ago, I heard Ray Bradbury say, “your job is to collect metaphors”. Apparently, nobody I was with there heard it. So I always assumed he was talking to me. Eternal rest, Mr Bradbury.
» Read moreLast weekend, we threw a surprise birthday party for Francine. She’s very clever, so we had to take some care in making sure she woudn’t find out. We figured the only way we could throw a surprise birthday party for Francine’s big 50 was to hold it seven weeks early and in another state. To get her to the appointed […]
» Read moreMary’s month of May draws to a close with the Feast of the Visitation. This feast celebrates the visit of Mary, pregnant with Jesus, to her cousin Elizabeth, pregnant with John the Baptist (Gospel of Saint Luke, Chapter 1 verses 39 – 56). Luke’s account culminates in one of the great New Testament songs, Mary’s Magnificat, which we recite at […]
» Read moreOn this day in 1431, Saint Joan of Arc was burned at the stake by the English at the age of 19. I’ve written about Saint Joan before, here and here, and I’m not going to go over old ground today. I‘m simply going to say that in this, the 600th year since her birth, we do well to remember […]
» Read more…we’re back in Ordinary Time. Which of course, is not so ordinary at all. Unless of course, you’re celebrating the Octave of Pentecost.
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When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together. And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them. And they […]
» Read moreToday is the feast of this blog’s patron, Saint Bede the Venerable. I took the name Bede when I made my final oblation as a Benedictine. Bede occupies an important niche in Church history by bridging the gap between patristic and early medieval times, the era when the Germanic nations had just been Christianized. Through him Christian tradition and Roman […]
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Saint Rita, whose feast is today, is sometimes known as the patron saint of lost and impossible causes. Married at a young age against her will to a terrible, abusive husband, by her prayers she gradually reformed him into a proper Christian husband. After his murder, she entered the convent. This wounded saint received the marks of Christ’s thorny wounds […]
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This past week, I had occasion to reflect on the liturgy at the parish we’ve been attending the past few months. I found myself startled to realize that in that entire time, I had not observed a single liturgical abuse. Not one. Not one deliberately changed word. No shenanigans. At all. There is nothing perfect this side of heaven. However, […]
» Read moreThe welling of blood from Christ’s wounds – from His million tiny shreds of scourged flesh, from the thousand thorn marks on His head, to the bruised tear on His shoulder where He carried His cross, to the five Great Wounds of nail and spear – all that blood, welling up, forming an enormous single drop of Divine blood at […]
» Read moreWhen they had gathered together they asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” He answered them, “It is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has established by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be […]
» Read moreThis year, I shall be praying the Novena to the Holy Spirit. This first and greatest of Novenas is based on the words of scripture, when the disciples, including the Twelve Apostles and the Blessed Virgin Mary, prayed in the Upper Room for nine days from the Ascension until the Holy Spirit descended on Pentecost (Acts 1:12 – 2:5). Won’t […]
» Read moreTomorrow is forty days since Easter, the Solemnity of the Ascension, when Christ ascended into heaven in what has to be one of the great comic scenes in the Bible: [A]s they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him from their sight. While they were looking intently at the sky as he was going, suddenly […]
» Read moreAfter 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 men who accompanied us the whole time the Lord Jesus came and went among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day on which he was taken up from us, […]
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