Inspired by Truth, Enlightening Minds for the Church in Canada and Throughout the World
Inspired by Truth, Enlightening Minds for the Church in Canada and Throughout the World
Today’s optional memorial as we continue the Easter season (alleluia!) commemorates Saint John of Avila (1499 – 1569), a contemporary of his fellow Spaniards, saints and correspondents, Teresa of Avila, Ignatius of Loyola and John of God. Like them, he was one of the primary instruments in what is (somewhat inaccurately) termed the Catholic ‘counter-reformation’.[…]
Saint Damien de Veuster (+1889) is celebrated on this tenth of May, a missionary priest who gave everything, even laying down his life, for the leper outcasts suffering from the disease on the remote island of Molokai, Hawaii. Born and raised in Holland, the youngest of seven children, Damien followed his brother into the missionary[…]
Ignatius was speaking about being devoured by wild beasts in the arena – and so it happened – but his words apply more generally to an indispensable commitment for all those in the Church who exercise a ministry of authority. It is to move aside so that Christ may remain, to make oneself small so[…]
The new Holy Father offered his first homily this morning, to the College of Cardinals, and it’s very good – Christological, evangelical, with a strong message of where we stand as Catholics, against the secular mindset of the world. The Pope echoed something I have thought for a long time, that the central question, that[…]
The great desert Father, and founder of cenobitic monasticism, Saint Pachomius, died on this 9th day of May in 348 A.D., eight years before his fellow monk, Saint Anthony of Egypt, generally considered the founder of eremitic monasticism (even if his feast in many calendars is on May 15th). That is, Anthony was a hermit[…]
The final words of Jesus on the Cross at the last moments of his earthly life offer us demanding instructions for our prayers. Jesus, who asks the Father to forgive those who are crucifying him, invites us to take the difficult step of also praying for those who wrong us and have injured us. Jesus,[…]
I heard of the white smoke while walking with some students and alumni in Ottawa towards Canada’s annual March for Life. We had just attended a morning TLM together, and the election must have taken place at the 11:30 am vote (EST), just as the priest intoned the Regina Coeli at the end of Mass.[…]
Another March for Life here in Ottawa, Canada’s capital city, overshadowed this by the election of the new pope, Leo XIV. A bit more on that in an accompanying post. I’ve been attending the March for Life here in Ottawa, Canada since its inception in 1998, so this would make it the 28th. I’ve missed[…]
We don’t know much of what goes on in a conclave, but we do know the times of the voting, and it wouldn’t hurt to pray round about then, for the grace of the Holy Spirit to enlighten the electors: They are, all in EST, 4:30 am, 6 am, 11:30 am and 1 pm. Of[…]
We have celebrated a number of ‘Catherines’ of late in our liturgical calendar, two of them Canadian: Kateri Tekakwitha on April 17th, the native convert who adopted the name of Catherine of Siena, whose feast was on April 29th, the day Kateri was baptized. Now today we commemorate Blessed Catherine of Saint Augustine (+1688), one[…]
