Padre’s corner

“These is so much bad in the best of us, And so much good in the worst of us, That it hardly behooves any of us To speak ill of the rest of us.”

This old saying contains a great deal of wholesome truth and advice. There is no greater and more general tendency on the part of human beings than to set oneself up as an infallible judge of other people. The criterion or standard measure by which we compare is our own little self. We do not seem to understand how unreliable and unfair this procedure is in judging our neighbour.

Everyone should realize, unless he is an unmitigated, conceited, and brainless snob, that he himself is not perfect, and that he has his own faults and failings. However, where the mistake is made by most of us in judging others is that we can explain, condone, and give extenuating circumstances for our own shortcomings, but, at the same time, we deny this prerogative to the ones who undergo our moral measuring.

It would very often happen, if time and trouble were taken for inquiry, that we would find out that, although appearances were against the one we feel like criticizing, his innermost motives were the best. We also might discover, and honestly confess it to our own shame, that his plight is such that, if we were in the same predicament we ourselves would not be half so courageous, so fine, and so good as he is at heart.

So many people get so totally discouraged and disgusted on account of heartless, unnecessary, and uncalled-for criticism on the part of holier-than-thou hypocrites. What a happier and better world this would be if everybody would be readier to accuse himself and excuse the other. No matter how bad a fellow is, there is always some good in him, and no matter how good we think we are, if we are honest, we will find work to be done at home— detecting and purging out our own personal defects.

Carney’s Amoral Majority

After five defections – euphemistically described as ‘crossing the floor’ – and three by-elections, Mark Carney and his Liberals how have their coveted majority. One wonders what bowls of pottage were offered in back-room deals. In the archaic monarchical system that is the Dominion of Canada, this majority allows the newly-minted Prime Minister to rule[…]Continue reading→

A Tale of Two Benedicts

A grace-filled Holy Week to all our readers! As we await and prepare for the Resurrection about to dawn upon us, we might keep in mind two Benedicts: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, requiescat in pace, elected on this day in 2005; and today’s commemoration of the mystic pilgrim, Benedict Joseph Labre, who died on this[…]Continue reading→

Saint Lydwina of Schiedam and Suffering Joyfully

Saint Lydwina of Schiedam (1380 – 1433) was one of the countless and glorious ‘victim souls’ in the history of the Church, those whose lives are filled with suffering, often of an unimaginable intensity, but who suffer joyfully. She was a fifteen-year old Dutch girl, out skating one day, when she fell and broke one[…]Continue reading→

The Glorious Martyrdoms of Martin and Maximus

As we enter into Eastertide, we recall on this 13th of April Pope Saint Martin I (+655), one of the noblest, if most tragic, of the successors of Saint Peter. Born in Umbria, Italy, he was of noble lineage, with great intelligence combined with charity and love of the poor and the Church. While still[…]Continue reading→

Saint Stanislaus of Szczepanów

We celebrate Saint Stanislaus today (+ April 11, 1079), in light of this Easter Octave, a bishop and martyr who accepted the episcopacy only at the direct order of Pope Alexander II. He proved a wise and courageous leader of his flock, put to death by his own king, Boleslaus, for rebuking the monarch’s ‘immoral[…]Continue reading→

Saint Gemma Galgani

On this April 11th, in 1903 – the same year that the Italian Guiseppe Sarto was elected Pope later that summer as Pius X – a lovely, young Italian woman died, by the name of Gemma Galgani. She lived a brief life of 24 years, as did a number of other young saints, including Pier[…]Continue reading→

An Ideological and Improper Translation

I noticed something odd with the psalm reading at Mass the other day. Our bishops’ conference here in Canada has decreed that the Mass in English – Novus Ordo – use the ‘NRSV’, the ‘New Revised Standard Version’, an ‘updated’ translation of the original RSV, first published in 1952. This ‘new translation’ has the tendency[…]Continue reading→

Saint Jean-Baptiste de la Salle: A Teacher for Teachers

Jean-Baptiste de la Salle (1651 – 1719), a French nobleman, ordained a priest, founded the first order in the Church’s history entirely without priests, and this came about almost by accident. I say ‘almost’, for, of course, there are no accidents with God. Destined for ordination from an early age, Jean-Baptiste never looked back, even[…]Continue reading→

Three Easter Musical Gems: Bach, Palestrina and Byrd

A very blessed and glorious Easter! Christus surrexit vere, alleluia! As we begin this Easter Octave with the great Solemnity of Easter, music to lift the soul would be one of Bach’s Easter cantatas, composed during his time at Leipzig in the early 1700’s, for the six Sundays of this festive season, leading up to[…]Continue reading→

Good Friday and Suffering

Evil and pain is always a mystery, that whole mysterium iniquitatis, of which Saint Paul writes (2 Thess 2:7). In 1984, Pope Saint John Paul II penned an Apostolic Letter on the nature and purpose of human suffering, Salvifici Doloris (curiously, now looking back, the same year he made his first apostolic journey to Canada).[…]Continue reading→