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
For this Third Sunday in Lent, given the circumstances of the world, the suggestions of Pater Ignotus include this setting of the seven penitential psalms – 6, 31, 37, 50, 101, 129, 142, 148/150 – by the the late-sixteenth century composer Orlande de Lassus, some of whose hymns are still sung in our attenuated liturgy.[…]
O that today you would listen to his voice! Harden not your hearts (Ps. 95). The Responsorial Psalm of the Mass on this third Sunday of Lent is Psalm 95, known as the Invitatory Psalm, the psalm that is always first recited in the official prayer of the Church, the Divine Office: Today, listen to[…]
Physician-turned-author Walker Percy’s final novel, The Thanatos Syndrome, published in 1987, tells the odd tale of a town wherein the ‘elites’ are devolving – or is that de-evolving? – the minds of its citizens into ape-like status by adding ‘sodium ions’ to the water supply. As they act more like chimpanzees, the townspeople become ever-more[…]
One of the greatest lessons learned during my nursing career is the fragility of human life. Many times when a patient and their loved ones are given news of a life-altering diagnosis, they’ve told me: we didn’t expect this; but I’m not ready; I should have…; but I did everything right; we thought we had[…]
‘This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!’ When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear (Mt.17:6). ⧾ On the second Sunday in Lent we always read the Gospel of the Transfiguration of Our Lord. We do so in order that[…]
A few years ago, my husband and I looked around at our family and realized that our existing dining area was becoming too small to comfortably accommodate the growing number of young people who were showing up as guests at Sunday evening dinner. With practicality and common sense honed by the many challenges of raising[…]
The Transfiguration is celebrated twice in the Church’s liturgy: on the second Sunday of Lent but also on 6 August. The latter date is significant in that it’s the anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, an event that hastened the end of the Second World War. The difference between[…]
Perusing the website of Snowflakes, an American adoption agency, the viewer is presented with myriad photos of respectable, young-to-middle-aged couples radiantly embracing beautiful, healthy, beaming infants and young children. Beneath a prominent quote from Sacred Scripture,[1] the agency displays glowing reviews from its adoptive families, emphasizing the care taken to place children in families deemed[…]
David Bentley Hart has recently suggested that the Eastern Orthodox practice of divorce is more coherent and compassionate than the Catholic practice of annulment. The key premise of his argument is that divorce, though always sad, is sometimes the best option for couples; sometimes even for couples whose marriages the Catholic Church considers indissoluble. As[…]
In this account of Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich’s visions regarding the Last Supper, trial, scourging, carrying of the Cross, crucifixion, death and resurrection of Our Lord, we are given a compelling, often horrific description of the events of the Triduum. Included in her revelations are conversations, thoughts, emotions, motives and the demeanour of all the[…]
