The Lord grants in a moment what we may have been unable to obtain in dozens of years. (Saint Philip Neri)
Year: 2020
The Similes of the Spirit
Suppose a blind man asked you, “What is a crimson like?” You might answer, “It’s like a blare of trumpets.” And the simile is reversible, for you could tell a deaf man that a blare of trumpets is like a crimson banner. It’s worth our while to consider this characteristic of metaphors and similes because[…]
Pentecost’s Fortitude
‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me so I send you’ (Jn. 20:21). ⧾ The text of the Gospel brings us back to Easter Sunday, evening of the day Jesus rose from the dead, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were[…]
Catholic Education, Whither Art Thou?
The Catholic School Board of Waterloo was going to fly a flag in solidarity – so to speak – with ‘Pride Month’. The emblem showed stick figures of different rainbow colours, in front of a stick figure Christ – blessing them all with open arms, with the Scriptural-esque verses ‘we are all wonderfully made’, and[…]
All battles are first won or lost, in the mind (Saint Joan of Arc, +1431)
Sanity in the Courtroom, and a Clarion Call
In a case recently decided in favour of a tanning salon – of all things – filed by owner James Mainer against the strictures of an ever-more Stalinesque state, in this case, Illinois, and Governor Stritzker’s lockdown, Mark Steyn points out the significance of the Judge Michael D. McHaney’s sane decision in an insane world.[…]
The Legacy of Paul VI
The controversial Pope Saint Paul VI is commemorated on May 29th, the day of his ordination to the priesthood in 1920 – this marking the hundredth anniversary. He was the second-last Italian Pope, a run of pontiffs from the nation that had last 455 years, which may seem odd for a Church that claims universality.[…]
Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses. (Pope Saint Paul VI, +1978)
Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are. (Saint Augustine of Canterbury, +604)
Augustine’s Monastic Mission
The first bishop of Canterbury, Augustine (+604), pronounced in England, ‘Austin’, was a Roman citizen, like the ‘other’ Augustine, of Hippo, who lived over two centuries before, in northern Africa. Neither would have considered himself ‘African’ or ‘Italian’, but Roman, for there was but one civilization. So too, there was one ‘Church’ to which they[…]