Ruminations of an Amateur Monastic
Do you pray to your Guardian Angel? Do you ask them for advice or help? Why not? The Church teaches that we all receive a guardian angel at birth, an angel assigned to guide and protect us, to watch over us. As it says in scripture: There shall no evil come to thee: nor shall the scourge come near thy […]
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Saint Jerome should be the patron saint of grumpy old men. Born in the Roman province of Dalmatia in modern Slovenia, he studied in Rome starting in about the year 360. During a journey to Syria in 373, he fell ill and had a vision that caused him to devote the rest of his long life to the service of […]
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Next year, I plan to walk a long Camino for Francine. Some background is probably in order. At the annual Gathering of Pilgrims back in 2022, Francine attended a talk on one of the four main Camino routes in France: the Voie de Vézelay, also known as the Via Lemovicensis. She was immediately smitten with this route. For one thing, […]
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Today is the “Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, Archangels” or, in the old calendar, the “Dedication of the Basilica of Saint Michael the Archangel”. Whatever you call it, the most common name is Michaelmas. It is one of several harvest festivals celebrated throughout Christian Europe. So happy Michaelmas! In England this is one of the “quarter days”, which […]
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Saint Hildegard of Bingen is one of those medieval figures who can cause a lot of confusion to people not paying close attention. She (or, rather, a version of her with her Christianity stripped out) has been adopted by some of the New Agers as one of their own. Of course, if you strip the Christianity out of the life […]
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Whither is thy Beloved gone, O thou most beautiful among women? Whither is thy Beloved turned aside, and we will seek Him with thee? We begin with the first antiphon of Lauds for today’s feast of The Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Monastic Diurnal. It has always affected me, but perhaps just now it’s affecting me […]
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Today marks five years since the final Mass of the parish of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary in Tacoma. These years have been filled with heartbreaking, almost unfathomable loss. This is an annual post, updated only slightly. Much of the language reflects my thoughts and feelings of the day, taken from my journaled notes. Over the past few years, […]
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Nine months after the solemnity of her Immaculate Conception, celebrated on 8 December, today we celebrate the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a feast so ancient that it is celebrated on the same day in both East and West. Scripture tells us very little about the early life of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Tradition tells us that she was […]
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“We make Idols of our concepts, but Wisdom is born of wonder.” (Pope St. Gregory the Great) Only a handful of Popes ever get named “Great”. Today in the Ordinary Roman calendar is the feast of one of them, Pope Saint Gregory the Great, confessor and doctor of the Church (540 – 604). His feast, originally celebrated on the day […]
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Today is one of the more interesting feasts on the liturgical calendar, for today is the feast of the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist. OK, nowadays they’ve slightly sanitized the name; it’s now officially called the “Memorial of the Passion of Saint John the Baptist”, but for the sheer Catholic joy of calling a spade a spade, I’m sticking […]
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In this very volatile moment in our history, both of the United States and of the world, where things seem to be unravelling and so much anger rises to the surface so quickly, it’s worth taking a moment to reflect on the meaning of our times. This anger and factionalism and the accompanying doom-saying are hardly unique to our age. […]
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Today is the memorial of Saint Monica, beleaguered mother of Saint Augustine, whose feast is tomorrow. I’ve had many occasions to pray for her intercession, but right now, this day hits a little different for me. In the modern Roman calendar, her memorial is listed simply as that of “Saint Monica”, but before the calendar reform of the 1970s, she […]
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Today, the Octave day of the Assumption, is the Memorial of Our Lady Queen of Heaven. May you have all the joy of the feast! On this day, Pope Leo XIV has requested that today be a day of prayer and fasting for peace. While our world continues to be wounded by wars in the Holy Land, in Ukraine and […]
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The Catholic Herald reports that for the first time in decades, the Catholic Church in America is growing. They go so far as to say, “If the projections for 2025 hold, this change could represent a significant turning point for American Catholicism.” I’m cautiously optimistic. The Church is a big ship, and she takes a good long while to turn […]
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Today is one of the great solemnities of the Church year: the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Last year on this date, my beautiful bride Francine and I celebrated our twentieth Catholic anniversary. For that anniversary, I wrote an article called “How the Assumption Saved my Life“, which delved into the history and meaning of this date for Francine […]
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Yesterday, on the Feast of the Transfiguration, I learned of the death of Bishop Peter Elliott. His Excellency was the author of any number of liturgical books. I consider myself privileged to have collaborated with him on his book, Ceremonies Explained for Servers. In addition, His Excellency wrote the foreword to my book on altar serving, The Altar Server Manual. […]
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Today is the Memorial of the dedication of one of my favourite church buildings in the world, the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, also known in English as Saint Mary Major. It is occasionally known by the title of Our Lady of the Snows. When Francine and I visited Rome in 2005, our apartment was just a few […]
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