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Thursday, 11 March 2010
Contemplation and love Print
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By Hans Urs von Balthasar   
The long controversy as to whether eternal blessedness consists in contemplation or in love ends quite simply: it can only consist in a loving contemplation; for what else is there to contemplate in G...
 
Wednesday, 10 March 2010
The perpetually dying Church Print
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By St. Augustine   
Her enemies look upon her and say, "She is about to die". . . whilst they are thus speaking, I see these very men die themselves, day by day, but the Church lives on, and reaches the power...
 
Tuesday, 09 March 2010
Lucifer in Starlight Print
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By George Meredith   
On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose. Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiend Above the rolling ball in cloud part screened, Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose. Poor prey to his h...
 
Monday, 08 March 2010
The idol of truth Print
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By Blaise Pascal   
We make an idol of truth itself; for truth apart from charity is not God, but His image and idol, which we must neither love nor worship; and still less must we love or worship its opposite, namely, f...
 
Friday, 05 March 2010
Overcoming lust Print
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By St. Bernard of Clairvaux   
Absolutely every person, no matter how enmeshed in vice, ensnared by the allurements of pleasure, a captive in exile . . . fixed in mire . . . distracted by business, afflicted with sorrow . . . and c...
 
Thursday, 04 March 2010
Mankind and nature Print
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By Catechism of the Catholic Church   
339 Each creature possesses its own particular goodness and perfection. For each one of the works of the “six days” it is said: “And God saw that it was good.” “By the ve...
 
Wednesday, 03 March 2010
Who is the man? Print
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By Francois Mauriac   
Who is the thinking. loving creature who is on the point of landing on the stars and who will thus become a god in accordance with the promise made to Eve by the serpent? How close I feel to Nicodemus...
 
Tuesday, 02 March 2010
We hold these truths Print
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By John Courtney Murray, S.J.   
The first truth to which the American Proposition makes appeal is stated in…the Declaration of Independence. It is a truth that lies beyond politics; it imparts to politics a fundamental h...
 
Monday, 01 March 2010
At the movies Print
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By Pius XI   
[S]tories and actions are presented, through the cinema, by men and women whose natural gifts are increased by training and embellished by every known art, in a manner which may possibly become an add...
 
Friday, 26 February 2010
At first glance Print
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By St. Thomas Aquinas   
It sufficiently appears at the first glance, according to what precedes (1), that to create can be the action of God alone. For the more universal effects must be reduced to the more universal and pri...
 
Thursday, 25 February 2010
The science of religion Print
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By John Henry Newman   
All sciences, except the science of Religion, have their certainty in themselves; as far as they are sciences, they consist of necessary conclusions from undeniable premises, or of phenomena manipulat...
 
Wednesday, 24 February 2010
In defense of the Church Print
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By Albert Einstein   
Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the uni...
 
Tuesday, 23 February 2010
Reconciliation Print
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By St. Isidore of Seville   
Confession heals, confession justifies, confession grants pardon of sin. All hope consists in confession. In confession there is a chance for mercy. Believe it firmly. Do not doubt, do not hesitate, n...
 
Monday, 22 February 2010
Necessary limits Print
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By John Paul II   
If Pope Leo XIII calls upon the State to remedy the condition of the poor in accordance with justice, he does so because of his timely awareness that the State has the duty of watching over the c...
 
Friday, 19 February 2010
Prayer Print
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By Czeslaw Milosz   
You ask me how to pray to someone who is not. All I know is that prayer constructs a velvet bridge And walking it we are aloft, as on a springboard, Above landscapes the color of ripe gold Transf...
 
Thursday, 18 February 2010
This was a man Print
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By Shakespeare   
This was the noblest Roman of them all. All the conspirators, save only he, Did that they did in envy of great Caesar; He only, in a general honest thought And common good to all, made one of t...
 
Wednesday, 17 February 2010
Ash Wednesday Print
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By T. S. Eliot   
Because I do not hope to turn again Because I do not hope Because I do not hope to turn Desiring this man's gift and that man's scope I no longer strive to strive towards such things (Why should ...
 
Tuesday, 16 February 2010
More adulterer than thief Print
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By Thomas Aquinas   
Certain actions are called human, inasmuch as they are voluntary, as stated above (Question 1, Article 1). Now, in a voluntary action, there is a twofold action, viz. the interior action of the will, ...
 
Monday, 15 February 2010
True hope Print
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By Georges Bernanos   
Hope is a heroic virtue. People think it is easy to hope. But the only people who hope are those who have had the courage to despair of illusions and lies in which they had once found a security ...
 
Friday, 12 February 2010
A day in the life of a Dominican nun Print
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By Sisters of Mary   
5:00 Rise 5:30 Eucharistic Holy Hour Office of Readings Meditation Lauds Marian Consecration 6:30 Holy Sacrifice of the Mass 7:05 Breakfast Professed 7:30 - 4:00 Apostolate ...
 
Thursday, 11 February 2010
End-of-life issues Print
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By William Cardinal Levada   
First question: Is the administration of food and water (whether by natural or artificial means) to a patient in a "vegetative state" morally obligatory except when they cannot be assimilate...
 
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
Misunderstanding man Print
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By Georges Bernanos   
There is something more in man than those deceivers think who believe him inspired only by self-interest. There is in man a secret and incomprehensible hatred, not only of his fellow men but of himsel...
 
Tuesday, 09 February 2010
Fight courageously Print
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By Lorenzo Scupoli   
It does not matter how weak you are - how strong the enemy may seem, either in number or in power. Do not be discouraged. The help you have from heaven is more powerful than all that hell can send to ...
 
Monday, 08 February 2010
Stark staring mad Print
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By William Golding   
Utopias are presented for our inspection as a critique of the human state. If they are to be treated as anything but trivial exercises of the imagination. I suggest there is a simple test we can apply...
 
Friday, 05 February 2010
Prayer for the Saints (1968) Print
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By Philip M. Hannan, former archbishop of New Orleans   
God, we ask your blessing upon all who participate in this event, and all who have supported our Saints. Our heavenly father, who has instructed us that the “saints by faith conquered kingdoms.....
 
Thursday, 04 February 2010
Real growth Print
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By E. F. Schumacher   
Our ordinary mind always tries to persuade us that we are nothing but acorns and that our greatest happiness will be to become bigger, fatter, shinier acorns; but that is of interest only to pigs. Our...
 
Wednesday, 03 February 2010
Jerusalem Print
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By William Blake   
AND did those feet in ancient time Walk upon England's mountains green? And was the holy Lamb of God On England's pleasant pastures seen?   And did the Countenance Divine Shine forth...
 
Tuesday, 02 February 2010
"No longer mourn for me. . ." Print
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By Ralph McInerny   
No longer mourn for me when I am dead Nor dirges play nor toll the dismal bell, For when in earth I’m laid at last to bed My spirit will in a better country dwell, Where then what is will be...
 
Monday, 01 February 2010
Heaven Print
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By John Paul II   
In the context of Revelation, we know that the “heaven” or “happiness” in which we will find ourselves is neither an abstraction nor a physical place in the clouds, but a livin...
 
Friday, 29 January 2010
Bought with a Price Print
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By Bishop Paul S. Loverde   
Artists have often portrayed the human body, clothed and unclothed, in various depictions and poses. While the danger of immodesty exists even with regard to works of art, the evil of pornography is g...
 
Thursday, 28 January 2010
Priesthood Print
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By Father William Saunders   
The restriction of holy orders to men alone does not denigrate the role of women in the Church. Think of some of the great female saints like St. Clare, St. Teresa of Avila, and St. Catherine of Siena...
 
Wednesday, 27 January 2010
How John Paul II ended communism Print
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By Anne Applebaum   
Marxism, as it was practiced in Eastern Europe, was a cult of progress. We are destroying the past in order to build the future, the communist leaders explained: We are razing the buildings, eradicati...
 
Tuesday, 26 January 2010
The Lost Tools of Learning Print
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By Dorothy L. Sayers   
What use is it to pile task on task and prolong the days of labor, if at the close the chief object is left unattained? It is not the fault of the teachers—they work only too hard already. The c...
 
Monday, 25 January 2010
Affliction Print
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By C.S. Lewis   
Some people feel guilty about their anxieties and regard them as a defect of faith but they are afflictions, not sins. Like all afflictions, they are, if we can so take them, our share in the passion ...
 
Friday, 22 January 2010
Satan's winning ways Print
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By William F. Buckley Jr.   
There isn't any reason why President Bush has to renounce a friendship with Ted Kennedy, just so long as he makes it clear to the American public that Mr. Kennedy is an utter ass when prescribing poli...
 
Thursday, 21 January 2010
Yearning for salvation Print
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By Benedict XVI   
There is so much suffering in our world, and human selfishness continues in many ways to harm creation. For this reason, the yearning for salvation which affects all creation is that much more intense...
 
Wednesday, 20 January 2010
The paradox of Islam Print
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By G.K. Chesterton   
There is in Islam a paradox which is perhaps a permanent menace. The great creed born in the desert creates a kind of ecstasy out of the very emptiness of its own land, and even, one may say, out of t...
 
Tuesday, 19 January 2010
Memorial and Remonstrance Print
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By James Madison   
. . . [W]e hold it for a fundamental and undeniable truth, “that religion or the duty which we owe to our Creator and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction,...
 
Monday, 18 January 2010
Creative suffering Print
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By Leon Bloy   
Man has places in his heart which do not yet exist, and into them enters suffering, in order that they may have existence.
 
Friday, 15 January 2010
Torn out with irons Print
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By Georges Bernanos   
We are not those rosy-cheeked saints with golden beards whom pious folk behold in pictures, whose eloquence and perfect health even philosophers would envy. Our task is not as the world imagines it. C...
 
Thursday, 14 January 2010
Do we all know? Print
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By St. Thomas Aquinas   
A thing may be known in two ways: first, in itself; secondly, in its effect, wherein some likeness of that thing is found: thus someone not seeing the sun in its substance, may know it by its rays. So...
 
Wednesday, 13 January 2010
Lying logic Print
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By Dostoyevsky   
Man has such a predilection for systems and abstract deductions that he is ready to distort the truth intentionally, he is ready to deny the evidence of his senses only to justify his logic.
 
Tuesday, 12 January 2010
Time Print
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By Peter Kreeft   
Time is like the setting of a play. The setting is really part of the play, contained by the play, determined by the play. But we often think the opposite: we think the play is contained by the settin...
 
Monday, 11 January 2010
In no name Print
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By Isaiah 63: 17-20   
O Lord, why do you make us wander from your ways, and harden our heart, so that we fear you not? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your heritage. Your holy people held possession...
 
Friday, 08 January 2010
Duties never end Print
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By Simone Weil   
It makes nonsense to say that men have, on the one hand, rights, and on the other hand, obligations. Such words only express differences in point of view. The actual relationship between the two is as...
 
Thursday, 07 January 2010
Just war, in a nutshell Print
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By Thomas Aquinas   
In order for a war to be just, three things are necessary. First, the authority of the sovereign by whose command the war is to be waged. For it is not the business of a private individual to decl...
 
Wednesday, 06 January 2010
Beware! Print
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By John of Salisbury   
Interdum sibi laesit nasum vel eruit oculum, qui salutifer signo faciem munire disponit. (Sometimes a man who seeks to protect his face by making the sign of the cross injures his nose or puts out ...
 
Tuesday, 05 January 2010
The heavens hold no terrors Print
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By Paul Claudel   
  We have conquered the world and found that your creation is complete, And that the imperfect has no place among your perfected works, and that our imaginations cannot add A single term to t...
 
Monday, 04 January 2010
Poetic intuition Print
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By Jacques Maritain   
Poetic intuition makes things which it grasps diaphanous and alive, and populated with infinite horizons. As grasped by poetic knowledge, things abound in significance and swarm with meanings. T...
 
Friday, 01 January 2010
Something greater always lies ahead Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
If God exists, then there is no meaningless time, no time devoid of significance. Every moment has its value, even if all I can do is to endure my illness in silence. If God exists, then there is alwa...
 
Thursday, 31 December 2009
Christmas Silence Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
Christmas invites us into this silence of God, and his mystery remains hidden to so many people because they cannot find the silence in which God acts. How do we find it? Mere silence on its own doe...
 
Wednesday, 30 December 2009
The ox and the ass Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
The ox and the ass are not simply products of the pious imagination: the Church's faith in the unity of the Old and New Testaments has given them their role as an accompaniment of the Christmas event....
 
Tuesday, 29 December 2009
A Becket Letter Print
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By Thomas Becket   
There are a great many bishops in the Church, but would to God we were the zealous teachers and pastors that we promised to be at our consecration, and still make profession of being. The harvest is g...
 
Monday, 28 December 2009
Don't disappoint him Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
The tree of life is not far from us, somewhere in a world we have lost. It has been established in our midst, not only as an image and sign, but as a reality. Jesus, who is himself the fruit of the ...
 
Friday, 25 December 2009
Seeing in this world Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
Our Gospel [today] closes with the words: "We have beheld his glory. . ." (John 1.14) These could be the words of the shepherds as they return from the stable and sum up what they have exper...
 
Thursday, 24 December 2009
True Christian waiting Print
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By Benedict XVI   
When the time is not filled with a meaningful presence, waiting becomes unbearable. When the present moment remains completely empty—when all we can do is look for something to come, amd there i...
 
Wednesday, 23 December 2009
For Mary and Joseph Print
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By W. H. Auden   
Blessed Woman, Excellent Man, Redeem for the dull the Average Way, That common ungifted Natures may Believe that their normal Vision can Walk to perfection.
 
Tuesday, 22 December 2009
A Catholic faith Print
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By Avery Dulles, S.J.   
Faith is by its nature a commitment, and without firmness there is no commitment. The biblical idea of faith is clearly opposed to doubt, as appears from the story of Zachary (Luke 1: 18-20) and the w...
 
Monday, 21 December 2009
The Journey of the Magi Print
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By T.S. Eliot   
"A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The was deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter." And the camels galled,...
 
Friday, 18 December 2009
The burden of Christmas presents Print
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By P. G. Wodehouse   
The burden of Christmas-present giving has of late years been grievously increased by the growing sophistication of the modern child. In the good old days it was possible to give a child practically a...
 
Thursday, 17 December 2009
En garde Print
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By St. Francis de Sales   
We must be on guard against deception in friendships, especially when they are contracted between persons of different sexes, no matter what the pretext may be. Satan often tricks those (who) begin wi...
 
Wednesday, 16 December 2009
Hail Mary Print
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By Saint Bernard of Clairvaux   
In dangers, in doubts, in difficulties, think of Mary, call upon Mary. Let not her name depart from your lips, never suffer it to leave your heart. And that you may obtain the assistance of her prayer...
 
Tuesday, 15 December 2009
Thanks to the Word Print
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By John Paul II   
The fact that in the fullness of time the Eternal Word took on the condition of a creature gives a unique cosmic value to the event which took place in Bethlehem two thousand years ago. Thanks to th...
 
Monday, 14 December 2009
The Journey of the Magi Print
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By T.S Eliot   
Hear T.S. Eliot read his great poem.
 
Friday, 11 December 2009
The Christ child Print
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By Benedict XVI   
God’s sign is simplicity. God’s sign is the baby. God’s sign is that he makes himself small for us. This is how he reigns. He does not come with power and outward splendor. He comes ...
 
Thursday, 10 December 2009
On Galileo Print
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By John Paul II   
Thanks to his intuition as a brilliant physicist and by relying on different arguments, Galileo, who practically invented the experimental method, understood why only the sun could function as the cen...
 
Wednesday, 09 December 2009
Winning audience share Print
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By Fulton Sheen   
The only way to win audiences is to tell people about the life and death of Christ. Every other approach is a waste.
 
Tuesday, 08 December 2009
Conceived Without Sin Print
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By Blessed John Henry Newman   
A Protestant is apt to say: “Oh, I really never, never can accept such a doctrine from the hands of the Church, and I had a thousand thousand times rather determine that the Church spoke falsely...
 
Monday, 07 December 2009
Ecclesia docens Print
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By Cardinal Newman   
I think I am right in saying that the tradition of the Apostles, committed to the whole Church in its various constituents and functions per modum unius, manifests itself variously at various times: s...
 
Friday, 04 December 2009
From “The Road” Print
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By Cormac McCarthy   
The frailty of everything revealed at last. Old and troubling issues resolved into nothingness and night. The last instance of a thing takes the class with it. Turns out the light and is gone. Look ar...
 
Thursday, 03 December 2009
The yearning for completion Print
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By Allan Bloom   
Education in our times must try to find whatever there is in students that might yearn for completion, and to reconstruct the learning that would enable them autonomously to seek that completion....
 
Wednesday, 02 December 2009
For the Time Being Print
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By W. H. Auden   
Alone, alone, about a dreadful wood Of conscious evil runs a lost mankind, Dreading to find its Father lest it find The Goodness it has dreaded is not good: Alone, alone, about our dreadful wood....
 
Tuesday, 01 December 2009
The World's Desire Print
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By G. K. Chesterton   
The Christ-child lay on Mary's lap, His hair was like a light. (O weary, weary were the world, But here is all aright.) The Christ-child lay on Mary's breast, His hair was like a star. (...
 
Monday, 30 November 2009
The Spirit of the Liturgy Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
For fostering a true consciousness in liturgical matters, it is also important that the proscription against the form of liturgy in valid use up to 1970 should be lifted. Anyone who nowadays advocates...
 
Friday, 27 November 2009
By the Bivouac's Fitful Flame Print
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By Walt Whitman   
By the bivouac's fitful flame, A procession winding around me, solemn and sweet and slow—but first I note, The tents of the sleeping army, the fields' and woods' dim outline, The darkness ...
 
Thursday, 26 November 2009
Thanksgiving Proclamation Print
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By Ronald Reagan   
America has much for which to be thankful. The unequaled freedom enjoyed by our citizens has provided a harvest of plenty to this nation throughout its history. In keeping with America’s heritag...
 
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
A traitor to the ship Print
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By G. K. Chesterton   
I do not know whether an animal killed at Christmas has had a better or a worse time than it would have had if there had been no Christmas or no Christmas dinners. But I do know that the fighting and ...
 
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
The incomparable worth of the human person Print
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By John Paul II, Evangelium vitae   
In a special way, believers in Christ must defend and promote this right, aware as they are of the wonderful truth recalled by the Second Vatican Council: "By his incarnation the Son of ...
 
Monday, 23 November 2009
Faithful to previous councils Print
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By Second Vatican Council   
Christ is the Light of nations. Because this is so, this Sacred Synod gathered together in the Holy Spirit eagerly desires, by proclaiming the Gospel to every creature, to bring the light of Christ to...
 
Friday, 20 November 2009
Charity misconstrued Print
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By Benedict XVI   
I am aware of the ways in which charity has been and continues to be misconstrued and emptied of meaning, with the consequent risk of being misinterpreted, detached from ethical living and, in any eve...
 
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Comic Agape Print
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By W.H. Auden   
(P. G. Wodehouse's) Bertie Wooster. . .not only knows that he is a person of no account, but also never expects to become anything else; till his dying day he will remain, he knows, a footler who requ...
 
Wednesday, 18 November 2009
Insuffienctly progressive Print
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By Charles Peguy   
Some people want to insult and abuse the army, because it’s a good line these days. . . . In fact, at all political demonstrations it is a required theme. If you don’t take that line you d...
 
Tuesday, 17 November 2009
Enjoying Christmas Print
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By G.K. Chesterton   
People are losing the power to enjoy Christmas through identifying it with enjoyment. When once they lose sight of the old suggestion that it is all about something, they naturally fall into blank pau...
 
Monday, 16 November 2009
A perennial truth Print
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By Mark Twain   
If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.
 
Friday, 13 November 2009
Reeling but erect Print
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By G.K. Chesterton   
It is always easy to let the age have its head; the difficult thing is to keep one's own. It is always easy to be a modernist; as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those open traps...
 
Thursday, 12 November 2009
Mary and mystagogy Print
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By John Paul II, Rosarium Virginis Mariae   
The Rosary is one of the traditional paths of Christian prayer directed to the contemplation of Christ's face. Pope Paul VI described it in these words: “As a Gospel prayer, centred on the myste...
 
Wednesday, 11 November 2009
Benediction Print
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By Charles Baudelaire   
Blessèd be You, O God, who give us pain, As cure for our impurity and wrong — Essence that primes the stalwart to sustain Seraphic raptures that were else too strong. I know ...
 
Tuesday, 10 November 2009
To the reader Print
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By Charles Baudelaire   
Folly and error, sin and avarice, Labor our minds and bodies in their course, Blithely we nourish pleasurable remorse As beggars feed their parasitic lice. Our sins are stubborn, our repent...
 
Monday, 09 November 2009
The human ‘project’ Print
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By Joseph Ratzinger   
We cannot say: creation or evolution, inasmuch as these two things respond to two different realities. The story of the dust of the earth and the breath of God . . . does not in fact explain how human...
 
Friday, 06 November 2009
A dangerous aversion Print
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By Benedict XVI, The Regensburg Address   
I am reminded of something Socrates said to Phaedo. In their earlier conversations, many false philosophical opinions had been raised, and so Socrates says: “It would be easily understandable ...
 
Thursday, 05 November 2009
The one, true Church Print
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By Venerable John Henry Newman, A Grammar of Assent   
The “One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church” is an article of the Creed, and an article, which, inclusive of her infallibility, all men, high and low, can easily master and accept with a r...
 
Wednesday, 04 November 2009
The acceptable time Print
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By Thomas a Kempis, Imitation of Christ   
The present is very precious; these are the days of salvation; now is the acceptable time. How sad that you do not spend the time in which you might purchase everlasting life in a better way. The time...
 
Tuesday, 03 November 2009
Better indirectly Print
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By Benedict XVI   
I would go so far as to say that if there was no purgatory, then we would have to invent it, for who would dare say of himself that he was able to stand directly before God.
 
Monday, 02 November 2009
Real courage Print
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By Benedict XVI   
Speaking against the Magisterium of the Church is presented as courageous. In reality, however, it does not take courage for this, since you can always be sure of audience applause. . . .Rather it tak...
 
Friday, 30 October 2009
War and peace Print
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By Cardinal Francis George   
For eighty years we were a slave republic, and it took a terrible war to end that. And now for forty years we're in an abortion regime, and I'm not sure how that's going to end.
 
Thursday, 29 October 2009
Tell God all Print
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By Fenelon   
Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one's heart, it's pleasures, and it's pains, to a dear friend. Tell him your troubles, that he may comfort you; tell him your joys, that he may sober...
 
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
The other China Print
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By Confucius, Analects, 2:4   
At fifteen, I set my heart on learning. At thirty, I was firmly established. At forty, I had no more doubts. At fifty, I knew the will of heaven. At sixty, I was ready to listen to it. At seventy, I c...
 
Tuesday, 27 October 2009
Dear Member of Congress Print
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By Bishop William F. Murphy, Cardinal Justin Rigali, Bishop John Wester   
On behalf of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), we are writing to express our disappointment that progress has not been made on the three priority criteria for health care refor...
 
Monday, 26 October 2009
Better the angels Print
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By Anne Rice   
Vampires for me were always like feeling grief for my lost childhood faith, being cut off from that life. I reached the point where I didn’t have any more stories to tell from that point of view...
 
Friday, 23 October 2009
Either/or Print
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By Ronald Knox   
I can't feel that the Church of England is an ultimate solution: in fifty or a hundred years I believe we Romanizers will either have got the Church or been thrown out of it.
 
Thursday, 22 October 2009
On the road Print
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By Archbishop Timothy Dolan, installation homily   
[A]re we not at times perhaps like those two dejected disciples on the road to Emmaus? They were so absorbed in their own woes, so forlorn in their mistaken conclusion that the one in whom they had pl...
 
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
Trusting God Print
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By Benedict XVI   
The awareness of being saved by the love of Christ, which every Mass nourishes in the faithful and especially in priests, cannot but arouse within them a trusting self-abandonment to Christ who gave h...
 
Tuesday, 20 October 2009
Mostly rascals Print
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By Søren Kierkegaard   
Luther set up the highest spiritual principle: pure inwardness. It may become so dangerous that we can sink to the lowest of lowest paganism (however, the highet and the lowest are like one another) w...
 
Monday, 19 October 2009
Divining the gist Print
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By St. Thomas Aquinas   
Not merely learning about divine things but also experiencing them - that does not come from mere intellectual acquaintance with the terms of scientific theology, but from loving the things of God and...
 
Friday, 16 October 2009
Mad Science Print
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By G.K. Chesterton   
The obvious truth is that the moment any matter has passed through the human mind it is finally and for ever spoilt for all purposes of science. It has become a thing incurably mysterious and infinite...
 
Thursday, 15 October 2009
Real Presence Print
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By Paul VI   
While Eucharistic symbolism is well suited to helping us understand the effect that is proper to this Sacrament – the unity of the Mystical Body – still it does not indicate or explain wha...
 
Wednesday, 14 October 2009
The Maine answer Print
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By StandforMarriageMaine.com   
Yes on Question 1- the People’s Veto - does not discriminate against gays; it simply restores the meaning of marriage and protects it as an essential institution that has benefited mankind since...
 
Tuesday, 13 October 2009
All wolves Print
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By Thomas Jefferson   
We have the greatest opportunity the world has ever seen, as long as we remain honest—which will be as long as we can keep the attention of our people alive. If they once become inattentive to p...
 
Monday, 12 October 2009
The Gospel truth Print
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By Saint Augustine   
If you believe what you like in the Gospel, and reject what you don't like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself.
 
Friday, 09 October 2009
Gay marriage? Print
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By U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops   
What are called 'homosexual unions,' because they do not express full human complementarity and because they are inherently non-procreative, cannot be given the status of marriage.
 
Thursday, 08 October 2009
Tribulations Print
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By Saint Thomas More   
We may not look at our pleasures to go to heaven in featherbeds; it is not the way, for our Lord Himself went thither with great pain, and by many tribulations, which was the path wherein He walked th...
 
Wednesday, 07 October 2009
The civil authority Print
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By Pius XII, Summi Pontificatus   
Once the authority of God and the sway of His law are denied in this way, the civil authority as an inevitable result tends to attribute to itself that absolute autonomy which belongs exclusively to t...
 
Tuesday, 06 October 2009
A prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas Print
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By Thomas Dillon   
It is my practice to direct the graduating seniors each year to the prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas for after Holy Communion, since it contains great wisdom about the Christian life. St. Thomas prays, &l...
 
Monday, 05 October 2009
Liberty and Law Print
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By G. K. Chesterton   
I have been in many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having got beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to get beyond catchwords. But wherever the falsity ap...
 
Friday, 02 October 2009
The Book of nature Print
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By Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate   
In order to protect nature, it is not enough to intervene with economic incentives or deterrents; not even an apposite education is sufficient. These are important steps, but the decisive issue is the...
 
Thursday, 01 October 2009
Confirmation prayer Print
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By Catechism of the Catholic Church   
All-powerful God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, by water and the Holy Spirit you freed your sons and daughters from sin and gave them new life. Send your Holy Spirit upon them to be their ...
 
Wednesday, 30 September 2009
An apostolic institution Print
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By James Boswell   
BOSWELL: " So, Sir, you are no great enemy to the Roman Catholic religion." JOHNSON: "No more, Sir, than to the Presbyterian religion." BOSWELL: " You are joking."...
 
Tuesday, 29 September 2009
Radical secularism Print
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By Benedict XVI   
While the period of interference from political totalitarianism has passed, is it not the case that frequently, across the globe, the exercise of reason and academic research are – subtly and no...
 
Monday, 28 September 2009
Shameful lukewarmness Print
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By St. Bernard of Clairvaux   
When I reflect, as I often do, on the ardor with which the patriarchs longed for the incarnation of Christ, I am pierced with sorrow and shame. And now I can scarcely contain my tears, so ashamed am I...
 
Friday, 25 September 2009
Genesis not Leviticus Print
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By Maggie Gallagher   
Same-sex marriage is quite different from bans on interracial marriage in one powerful respect: It asks religious Americans to surrender a core belief – no, not Leviticus (disapproval of gay s...
 
Thursday, 24 September 2009
Learning in War-Time Print
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By C. S. Lewis   
War makes death real to us, and that would have been regarded as one of its blessings by most of the great Christians of the past. . . . All the animal life in us, all schemes of happiness that center...
 
Wednesday, 23 September 2009
Corruption limited Print
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By Joseph P. Kennedy   
Don't buy a single vote more than necessary. I'll be damned if I'm going to pay for a landslide.
 
Tuesday, 22 September 2009
The path to zero Print
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By Archbishop Edwin O'Brien   
Nuclear weapons can be dismantled, but both the human knowledge and the technical capability to build weapons cannot be undone. A world with zero nuclear weapons will need robust measures to monitor, ...
 
Monday, 21 September 2009
True generosity Print
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By Albert Camus   
Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.
 
Friday, 18 September 2009
Marry young Print
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By Frederica Mathewes-Green   
A pattern of late marriage may actually increase the rate of divorce. During that initial decade of physical adulthood, young people may not be getting married, but they’re still falling in love...
 
Thursday, 17 September 2009
Politics and religion Print
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By James Carroll of Carrollton   
Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime and pure (and) which insures to the good eternal happi...
 
Wednesday, 16 September 2009
On the New Knighthood Print
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By Bernard of Clairvaux   
When the battle is at hand, they arm themselves interiorly with faith and exteriorly with steel rather than decorate themselves with gold, since their business is to strike fear in the enemy rather th...
 
Tuesday, 15 September 2009
A valuable commodity Print
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By James Cardinal Gibbons   
Like all valuable commodities, truth is often counterfeited.
 
Monday, 14 September 2009
Declaration on Euthanasia Print
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By Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith   
It is necessary to state firmly once more that nothing and no one can in any way permit the killing of an innocent human being, whether a fetus or an embryo, an infant or an adult, an old person, or o...
 
Friday, 11 September 2009
The World State Print
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By G. K. Chesterton   
Oh, how I love Humanity,   With love so pure and pringlish, And how I hate the horrid French,   Who never will be English! The International Idea,   The largest and the clearest,...
 
Thursday, 10 September 2009
Late Ripeness Print
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By Czeslaw Milosz   
. . . .We forget - I kept saying - that we are all children of the King. For where we come from there is no division into Yes and No, into is, was, and will be. We were miserable, we used no mo...
 
Wednesday, 09 September 2009
Liberalism Print
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By John Henry Newman   
Ye cannot halve the Gospel of God's grace; Men of presumptuous heart! I know you well. Ye are of those who plan that we should dwell, Each in his tranquil home and holy place; Seeing the Word refi...
 
Tuesday, 08 September 2009
Pascal's Memorial Print
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By Blaise Pascal   
The year of grace 1654, Monday, 23 November, feast of St. Clement, pope and martyr, and others in the martyrology. Vigil of St. Chrysogonus, martyr, and others. From about half past ten at night u...
 
Monday, 07 September 2009
On Human Work Print
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By John Paul II, Laborem Exercens   
THROUGH WORK man must earn his daily bread and contribute to the continual advance of science and technology and, above all, to elevating unceasingly the cultural and moral level of the society w...
 
Friday, 04 September 2009
Avoid Grave Sin Print
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By The Didache   
And the second commandment of the Teaching; You shall not commit murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not commit pederasty, you shall not commit fornication, you shall not steal, you shall...
 
Thursday, 03 September 2009
The Idea of a University Print
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By Michael Novak   
A university is a blessed place, a sacred space in which persons converse in the pursuit of universal knowledge. In universities, mind speaks to mind, and (over time) heart speaks to heart. For what w...
 
Wednesday, 02 September 2009
Love's not time's fool Print
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By William Shakespeare   
      Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O no! it is an ever...
 
Tuesday, 01 September 2009
The Endurance of Saints Print
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By John Paul II   
73. Abortion and euthanasia are thus crimes which no human law can claim to legitimize. There is no obligation in conscience to obey such laws; instead there is a grave and clear obligation to oppose ...
 
Sunday, 30 August 2009
The Religion of Cain Print
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By John Henry Newman   
Brothers! Spare reasoning; - men have settled long That ye are out of date, and they are wise; Use their own weapons; let your words be strong, Your cry be loud, till each scared boaster flies. Th...
 
Friday, 28 August 2009
Moment of Truth Print
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By Archbishop Charles Chaput   
We're at a time for the Church in our country when some Catholics – too many – are discovering that they've gradually become non-Catholics who happen to go to Mass. That's sad and diff...
 
Thursday, 27 August 2009
Prayer for life Print
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By John A. Hardon, S.J.   
Lord Jesus Christ, you are the Author of human life. You, with our God the Father and the Holy Spirit alone have the right to determine who should be conceived and how. You are also the Destiny of ...
 
Wednesday, 26 August 2009
Infusion of faith Print
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By St. Thomas Aquinas   
Through baptism a person is reborn to a spiritual life, one proper to Christ’s faithful, as the Apostle says (Gal 2:20), “the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God...
 
Tuesday, 25 August 2009
Get it right