Catholic. Pastoral. Trusted.
As I was sitting in prayer one Tuesday morning after spending the previous evening in Urgent Care, I began to wonder what God was trying to tell me. Here I was at home when I should have been attending a three-day meeting with personnel from different retreat centers. It only took me a few seconds to hear God’s message. “Slow down!” God was shouting in that quiet voice only God can use.
The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure buried in a field.— Matthew 13:44 Three years ago I received Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Eat, Pray, Love for my birthday. I read it on a flight to India, where I spent a month praying with Indian Catholics, meditating in ashrams, taking yoga...
Inaccurate statement Steven Rolfes’ article on patron saints [“Saint-What’s-His-Name: Patron of Just-What-You-Need,” November 2010] mentions Saint Joseph and states, “He dealt with everything from a rather rushed marriage…,” which is an inaccurate statement. Mary and Joseph, both practicing Jews, followed the rules of their society, including the rites of the...
A colleague insists my glass is not half empty—she says it’s below sea level. So when January rolls around, I’m tempted to crawl under the covers and hide until the warm winds lure me into sunlight. During these bitter-cold months my mind fills with thoughts that take rather than give...
He came to Nazareth, where he had grown up, and went according to his custom into the synagogue on the sabbath day. He stood up to read and was handed a scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written: “The Spirit...
Preaching the Word of God has been an essential responsibility of the Church since the time of Saint Paul and the establishment of the first Christian communities. For Catholics today, the homily during Sunday liturgy remains a central moment of encounter with the Word of God. A good homily can be a source of insight and inspiration that can deepen the spiritual life of a congregation. Benedict XVI noted recently that good homilies help to “foster a deeper understanding of the word of God so that it can bear fruit in the lives of the faithful” (Sacramentum Caritatis).
Listen to your father who begot you, and despise not your mother when she is old.—PROVERBS 23:22 For the Christian, “To love or not to love?” is not the question (my apologies to Mr. Shakespeare). Our question is always, “How do I love?” How we love changes from person to...
Women’s Groups Fighting Poverty Thanks to the vision and commitment of two religious women in San Antonio, Texas, their “sisters” around the world are being empowered to support one another in learning, leadership, and raising their communities’ economic standards of living. In 2001, Sisters Dorothy Ettling and Naomi Hayes, both...
Oh, that today you would hear his voice: Harden not your hearts.—PSALM 95:7–8
Reading has clicked for my little granddaughter, and she is very proud of her new skill. She reads everything—cereal boxes, ads that come in the mail, road signs. This morning I was pondering this column as we drove through town, and as we approached the railroad tracks, she startled me by shouting, “STOP! LOOK! LISTEN!” I did. And then I explained to her the dangers of shouting at the driver.
It was a weekly occurrence in our family, and in most families in our parish. My mother would dress us up and take us to church for the weekly devotions to Our Mother of Perpetual Help. Our church of Holy Redeemer in Detroit, Michigan, is a large basilica-style church that seats a thousand people. The icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help is enshrined on the left side of the church, with its own marble altar surrounded by candles. After devotions, my mother would buy a candle and place it before the icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help, and we would kneel and spend additional moments in prayer. The beautiful gold, red, and blue colors of the icon sparkled in the flickering candlelight.
As regular readers know, my husband and I are guardians of our three grandchildren, ages seven, four, and two. They are fun, delightful, sweet kids, and we love them to pieces. They are also needy, demanding, outrageously self-centered, and drive us to distraction. In other words, they—and we—are normal.
Sometimes I can only laugh at their timing. Like when the seven-year-old insists that I show her “right now, Nana, please!” how to do something on the computer while I am up to my elbows in the poopy diaper of her squirming, equally impatient little brother. A gentle “Honey, what am I doing right now?” is the best I can manage. (Sometimes I’m not so gentle.)
May is the month for celebrating mothers, the women who teach us about love by communicating an acceptance and protection that tell us how important we are to them years before we understand their words. These same feelings of acceptance and security help us ratchet up our courage and take...
One reason for this choice is that Saint Clement, born on December 26, 1751, in central Europe, became a Redemptorist priest, just as I did, so we are “family.” Second, I am presently living in Saint Clement Health Care Center, and I will soon need a benevolent promoter “on the other side.”
So even though we cannot celebrate him liturgically, we can recall some facts of his life that have caused him to be recognized as the “second founder” of the Redemptorists and the patron saint of Vienna.
In the Gospel story of the widow’s mite, Jesus is unimpressed watching the rich put large offerings into the temple treasury. He praises instead the poor widow who put in only two copper coins. "I assure you," he said to his disciples, "this poor widow has put in more than all the rest."
Saint John Neumann reminds me of that poor widow. He was a short, shy, back-country immigrant priest. In the eyes of some he was an unimpressive, awkward little man; but in God’s eyes John was peerless, and his mite was a priceless gift. All that he had and was he willingly offered to God.
Saint Alphonsus’ famous Christmas carol Tu scendi dalle stelle O King of Heaven! from starry throne descending, Thou takest refuge in that wretched cave; O God of bliss! I see Thee cold and trembling, What pain it cost Thee fallen man to save! Thou, of a thousand worlds the great...
Gerard never set foot outside Italy, left no significant writings, and died at age twenty-nine after only six years of religious life. But even in his day, this humble Brother was considered a saint. He was friendly and generous by nature, and his confidence in God’s goodness seemed to give him supernatural influence. One biographer called him "the spoiled child of God" because whatever he asked for in prayer, he got.
For many people, religion has become like an old grandfather tucked away in a senior citizen’s home. People stop by to see him when they are in town, mostly on Christmas and Easter, and listen to him ramble on about the good old days, but most of what he says does not seem relevant to their modern lives. They kindly pat him on the head before leaving, then quickly forget what he said as they seek their way through this modern world that has passed him by. And if religion in general is out of date, for them, Catholicism is surely irrelevant. Although some religions change and adapt to the world, the Catholic Church with all its traditions is hopelessly stuck in the past.