Catholic. Pastoral. Trusted.
Daffodils are emerging, blossoms are appearing on trees, and I’m due for my first bike ride of the year. It’s spring, a time of release—from the cold ground, from secret places in branches, from the dusty garage. It is also, of course, the season we celebrate Easter, when Jesus rose...
Christians keep vigils. They give us an important way to live our faith daily. They allows us to reshape time, put down the clock and encounter God. To keep vigil means that we have a purpose for watching and waiting. To be vigilant requires a level of endurance and patience. It invites us into...
Believe it or not, before Vatican II, it was generally believed that the Mother of God was not only exempt from original sin but also from the pangs of childbirth, fatigue, doubt, temptation, ignorance, and death. These human experiences, it was reasoned, were a consequence of sin, and Mary was...
Veneration of the icon means focusing our attention on a specific element, such as Mary’s face or her right hand, which points to the image of the Child—any aspect that communicates an exchange of energy, a divine presence. The icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help presents no written words...
I always enjoy reading Fr. Bruce Lewandowski’s “Plain Talk” column in Liguorian. His contribution in the December 2014 issue [on how Jesus teaches that we can be salvation for each other] was exceptionally thought-provoking. I am sharing it with my Bible study and St. Theresa Guild at church. Both groups...
The Cloud of Unknowing Fr. Dennis J. Billy, CSsR Liguori Publications $19.99 Few would dispute that our active lives can intrude upon our ability to focus when we pray. It seems twas ever thus. Seven hundred years ago, The Cloud of Unknowing was written in Middle English, a work of...
Lent appears to never end. But Easter seems gone in a snap. Some years I blink and wonder if I missed it. But in actuality, while the plastic bunnies and egg-laden trees disappear by Monday afternoon, to Christians, Easter is a fifty-day season! Think about it. On Good Friday we...
A story of how one couple follows the example of our risen Lord, even when their pain seems unimaginable. It was the phone call every parent dreads. In the early-evening hours on the last day of 2014, the police called a close friend of mine with tragic news. A driver...
Think About These… In the midst of darkness, Jesus is still the light. You don’t need collateral to borrow trouble. God gives us a face but we must choose the expression. Don’t worry about tomorrow. You did that yesterday.” Sign in a Pennsylvania cemetery: “Persons are prohibited from picking flowers except...
Lilies are the perfect flowers for Easter. Since the 1920s, when they were first introduced in the United States, they have become a symbol of Easter. For many, their strong fragrance and striking appearance are synonymous with the celebration of the resurrection of our Lord. But did you know that...
In my freshman year of high school, I attended a talk hosted by an evangelical youth group. The topic was about “almost-ers”—people who weren’t quite good enough to get into heaven and who would therefore burn in hell forever. I was fourteen! It terrified me! Who is ever good enough?...
Celebrations Worldwide Will Honor a Symbol That Once Was Lost On the Feast of Our Mother of Perpetual Help, June 27, 2015, the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (the Redemptorists) will begin a yearlong celebration to commemorate the restoration of the icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help to...
Back in the last century—in the days before mobile devices and the internet, before texting and webcams—my dorm room housed an instrument called a telephone. To keep long-distance calls as inexpensive as possible, my parents devised a signaling routine. I would call home in Springfield from my dorm room in...
The safety drill on airplanes is familiar. After you’re seated, the flight attendant explains that if oxygen masks drop from the overhead compartment, parents must put their masks on first and then assist their children. As I sit through those drills, I sometimes wonder if I would be able to...
Contemplation is one of the most profound, yet often misunderstood, types of prayer in the Christian tradition. Profound because it plumbs the depths of the human soul and exposes it in silence before the mystery of God. Misunderstood because many of us mistakenly believe it pertains to a select few, not ordinary people like us....
Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, the founder of the Redemptorists, was known to tell people: Pray always, and if you cannot pray, pray that you can pray. He understood that prayer is an essential part of Christian life. This ongoing communication with the Divine gives us the opportunity to express our needs, wants, desires,...
Earlier this year Pope Benedict XVI gave a series of weekly addresses on the Doctors of the Church. On March 30 he spoke about Saint Alphonsus, saying he “had a realistically optimistic vision of the resources of good that the Lord gives to every person.” A lot in that statement...
An old Chinese proverb says, “If your vision is for a year, plant wheat. If your vision is for ten years, plant trees. If your vision is for a lifetime, plant people.” To build a future, we must fill people with hope and equip them with the resources to get...
In 1990 South Africa, it was evident that political inequality had to change. Soon after President F. W. de Klerk made a speech to parliament in which he called for a nonracist South Africa, a joke started making the rounds: Two solutions were in front of the country, one practical and the...
I turned 50 in May. When my physician informed me that I should steel myself for a gauntlet of medical tests, I added my voice to the chorus of people in and out of the health care industry asking, when does the testing get to be too much? When a...