Blogposts

Catholic Basics

03-27-2022Weekly Reflection

O Most Holy Trinity dwelling in my soul through Your grace, I adore You. O Most Holy Trinity dwelling through Your grace in my soul, grant that I may love You more and more. O Most Holy Trinity dwelling through Your grace in my soul more and more make me holy. Remain with me Lord. Be my true joy. Another Prayer All-powerful Father, help my weakness and snatch me from the depth of my distress. Wisdom of the Son, direct all my thoughts, words, and actions. Love of the Holy Spirit be the beginning of all the activity of my understanding and free will ever conformed to what pleases the Lord God.

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Primer on the Devil

03-20-2022Weekly Reflection

The Church teaches that the devil at first was a good angel created by God: the devil and the other demons were created naturally-good by God, but they became evil by their own doing. Catechism of the Catholic Church #392

The devil exists and acts in people and society. His activity is mysterious, but real and effective. Some people are inclined towards a superficial optimism and think evil is merely an incidental imperfection in a world which is continually evolving towards better days. Nevertheless the history of mankind has been adversely affected by the devil’s influence. We find in our day all the features of an intense evil which cannot be explained in terms of human behavior alone.

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Station Days/Station Churches

03-13-2022Weekly Reflection

Station days were days of fasting in the early Christian Church, associated with a procession to certain prescribed churches in Rome, where the Mass and Vespers would be celebrated to mark important days of the liturgical year. Although other cities also had similar practices, and the fasting is no longer prescribed, the Roman churches associated with the various station days are still the object of pilgrimage and ritual, especially in the season of Lent.

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The Church was already Catholic on the morning of Pentecost

03-06-2022Weekly Reflection

The Church which is “Jesus Christ spread abroad and communicated” completes—so far as it can be completed here below—the work of spiritual reunion which was made necessary by sin; that work which was begun at the Incarnation1 and was carried on up to Calvary. In one sense the Church is herself this reunion, for that is what is meant by the name of Catholic by which we find her called from the second century onward, and which in Latin and well as in Greek was for long bestowed upon her as a proper noun.

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Deliver Us From the Evil One: A Primer on the Enemy

02-27-2022Weekly Reflection

On Ash Wednesday the Opening Prayer of the Mass prays “we may begin with holy fasting this campaign of Christian service so that as we take up the battle against spiritual evils we may be armed with the weapons of self-restraint.” The Latin uses images from the Roman Army: praesidia and militia. The praesidium was a garrison of Roman soldiers.

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Pre–Lent

02-20-2022Weekly Reflection

Pre-Lent: Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sunday: 70, 60, 50 Days Before Easter: Feb 13, Feb 20, Feb 27

The Roman Rite

The Roman rite of the Catholic Church consists of two forms: the ordinary form and the extraordinary form. The ordinary form of the Roman rite exists from 1970 and was promulgated by Blessed Paul VI with a specific liturgical calendar. The extraordinary form of the Roman rite goes as far back as Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604 AD) although the present Missal was promulgated by Blessed John XXIII in 1962. It reflects primarily the Missal of Pope St. Pius V after the Council of Trent from the 16th century.

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Little Catechism On Marriage

02-13-2022Weekly Reflection

1. What is the importance of marriage today? Marriage is the fundamental building block for all other human relationships. If there is a single cause for most of today’s evils, both religious and secular, it is the weakening of marriages and family.

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Bernadette Soubirous: A Truly Great Saint

02-06-2022Weekly Reflection

All that we know of the Apparitions and the Message of Lourdes came to us from Bernadette. She alone saw the Lady and all depends on her testimony. Who is she, then? Three periods can be distinguished in her life: the obscurity of her childhood, a “public” life at the time of the Apparitions and of giving testimony; finally, a “hidden” life as religious at Nevers.

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Purgation as the Means to Charity

01-30-2022Weekly ReflectionVeronica Arntz

The Catechism of the Catholic Church gives the following definition of charity: “Charity is the theological virtue by which we love God above all things for his own sake, and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God” (1822). How do we grow in this virtue, which is clearly connected to our moral life in the Church and the world, because it informs how we relate with others (CCC 1828)?

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Church Unity Octave - January 18-25

01-23-2022Weekly Reflection

What is CUO? On October 3, 1899, the Rev. Lewis Thomas Wattson, an Episcopal clergyman later known as the Very Rev. Paul James Francis, S.A., arrived at Graymoor, N.Y. to establish a community of Episcopal Franciscans called the Friars of the Atonement. Father Paul grieved most because Christians seemed divided into warring sects and factions. He began to preach corporate reunion of the Episcopal Church with the Catholic Church. Because of this he was banned from the pulpits of the Episcopal churches. Father Paul went into the streets with his message. Father Paul was determined to carry on his work for the return of all separated Christians to communion with the Holy See.

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Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal

01-16-2022Weekly Reflection

I had been but a few moments in the church when I was suddenly seized with an unutterable agitation of mind. I raised my eyes, the building had disappeared from before me ; one single chapel had, so to speak, gathered and concentrated all the light ; and in the midst of this radiance I saw standing on the altar lofty, clothed with splendours, full of majesty and of sweetness, the Virgin Mary, just as she is represented on my medal. An irresistible force drew me towards her; the Virgin made me a sign with her hand that I should kneel down; and then she seemed to say, That will do! She spoke not a word, but I understood all.

— Marie-Alphonse Ratisbonne

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The Church was already Catholic on the morning of Pentecost

01-09-2022Weekly Reflection

Here is important commentary by the distinguished theologian Cardinal Henri De Lubac on why the Church is called Catholic:

The Church which is “Jesus Christ spread abroad and communicated” completes—so far as it can be completed here below—the work of spiritual reunion which was made necessary by sin; that work which was begun at the Incarnation and was carried on up to Calvary. (The Incarnation means God the Son became Man. His Name is Jesus Christ.)

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The Vaccines and Government Religious Bigotry

01-02-2022Weekly Reflection

Catholic journalist Philip Lawler has written an essay called Justice Gorsuch in dissent against religious bigotry. You can read it here: www.catholicculture.org/commentary/justice-gorsuch-in-dissent-against-religious-bigotry 

Some bullet points from the essay:

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