Saint John’s Eagle-Eyed View

Today is the feast of Saint John the Evangelist, also called the ‘Beloved’, as the one closest to the heart of Our Lord, likely the youngest Apostle, who lived to ripe old age, writing his Apocalypse (Revelation) towards the end of the first century.  He is the only Apostle not celebrated as a martyr, witnessing to his faith in other ways, by his life and writings, and in his exile by Emperor Domitian to the lonely, barren isle of Patmos in the Aegean Sea, where tradition has it that he composed his treatises.

His Gospel follows a different trajectory of Christ’s life from the other three ‘synoptic’ Gospels (literally, with the ‘same eye’), which all follow more or less the same events.  John sees things from a more theological perspective, eternal, heavenly – which is why his symbol is the eagle. His narrative places the greatest emphasis and clarity on Christ as the pre-existent Logos, always ‘with’ the Father.  But Saint John also portrayed Christ in His full humanity, the ‘Word made Flesh’, to deny which, as he declares in his first letter (4:3), is the very spirit of the Antichrist.

So let us pray to the Apostle today, that we may see things from just such a perspective, far above the passing travails of this world, as time and history move ever onward to the end of this 2022nd year Anno Domini, and, in a broader sense, to whatever personal or worldwide apocalypse – that is, what that same Lord of history wills to reveal to us – we all must face, one day.

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→

Saint Kateri , Canada’s Protectress

This was the title given to Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, by Pope Benedict XVI, when he canonized her on October 28th, 2012, along with six others, in Saint Peter’ Square (she had been beatified by Pope John Paul II back in 1980). With Saint Joseph as our protector, along with the Canadian martyrs, we seem to[…]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→

My Name is Bernadette

April 16th is a propitious day, for besides the anniversary of Father de Valk’s death, who founded Catholic Insight in its print form decades ago, and the commemoration of the ‘two Benedicts’, mentioned in accompanying posts, today we also recall Saint Bernadette Soubirous, the young visionary to whom the Virgin Mary appeared numerous times at[…]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→

Canonizing Sister Faustina and Divine Mercy

HOMILY OF THE HOLY FATHER  MASS IN ST PETER’S SQUARE FOR THE CANONIZATION OF SR MARY FAUSTINA KOWALSKA Sunday, 30 April 2000   1. “Confitemini Domino quoniam bonus, quoniam in saeculum misericordia eius”; “Give thanks to the Lord for he is good; his steadfast love endures for ever” (Ps 118: 1). So the Church sings on the Octave of[…]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→