Feast of Thomas More, Scholar & Martyr, & John Fisher, Bishop & Martyr, 1535 We sometimes come to read more

Feast of Thomas More, Scholar & Martyr, & John Fisher, Bishop & Martyr, 1535 We sometimes come to God, not because we love Him best, but because we love our possessions best; we ask Christ to "save Western civilization", without asking ourselves whether it is entirely a civilization that Christ could want to save. We pray, too often, not to do God's will, but to enlist God's assistance in maintaining our "continually increasing consumption". And yet, though Christ promised that God would feed us, he never promised that God would stuff us to bursting.

Continuing a short series on topics of Christian apologetics: A certain group of scholars, mostly German or influenced by read more

Continuing a short series on topics of Christian apologetics: A certain group of scholars, mostly German or influenced by German protestant theology, has rushed to abandon positions before they were attacked, and to demythologize the Gospel message when there was no clear evidence that intelligent minds outside the Church were any more frightened by her mystery than by her morals.

Commemoration of Allen Gardiner, founder of the South American Missionary Society, 1851 Commemoration of Albert Schweitzer, Teacher, Physician, Missionary, 1965 read more

Commemoration of Allen Gardiner, founder of the South American Missionary Society, 1851 Commemoration of Albert Schweitzer, Teacher, Physician, Missionary, 1965 But first I said, ... "Some people think it is not proper for a clergyman to dance. I mean to assert my freedom from any such law. If our Lord chose to represent, in His parable of the Prodigal Son, the joy in Heaven over a repentant sinner by the figure of "music and dancing', I will hearken to Him rather than to man, be they as good as they may." For I had long thought that the way to make indifferent things bad, was for good people not to do them.

Feast of Francis of Assisi, Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor, 1226 The great wonder is the living read more

Feast of Francis of Assisi, Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor, 1226 The great wonder is the living fountain of love and joy which Christ poured into and through this 'poor little man'. [Francis] always knew where the real miracle lay. It was not in things that happened to his body, though they were wonderful enough. It was not to be found in the fact that birds and beasts, even the wolf of Gubbio, felt the spell of his spirit. It was the radiance of light and love breaking across the darkness and hate of the world and his time. He loved lepers. He loved robbers and changed their lives. He loved beggars in their rags. He loved rich men, too, and members of the Church, who needed him as much as the robbers did. He brought Christianity out of forms and creeds and services into the open air, in action and into the movements of life. He changed the entire line of march of religion in the Western World. Brother Masseo, half jesting, asked him once why the whole world was running after him, not very comely, not very wise, not of noble birth. "Why after thee?" "God chose me," Francis answered, "because He could find no one more worthless, and He wished by me to confound the nobility and grandeur, the strength and beauty and learning of the world." But the real answer is that here at last in this wonderful man was an organ of that Spirit which was in Christ, and a marvelous transmitter of it to the world. The divine agape went out into men's lives through him. Here was a childlike lover of men, ready, if need be, to be crucified for love, but also ready in humble everyday tasks to reveal this love.

As, then, a consummate master teaches both by example and by precept, so Christ taught the obedience, which good men read more

As, then, a consummate master teaches both by example and by precept, so Christ taught the obedience, which good men are to render even at the cost of death, by Himself first dying in rendering it.

Feast of Matthias the Apostle In religion, we are not asked to make up our minds, we are asked read more

Feast of Matthias the Apostle In religion, we are not asked to make up our minds, we are asked to make up our lives... We may refuse to make up our minds, but our lives get made up, one way or the other... Whatever we believe with our minds, our lives are committed either to God's way or to the God-denying way, and what matters in religion is the act of commitment.

Feast of Thomas Aquinas, Priest, Teacher of the Faith, 1274 God usually answers our prayers so much more according read more

Feast of Thomas Aquinas, Priest, Teacher of the Faith, 1274 God usually answers our prayers so much more according to the measure of His own magnificence, than of our asking, that we do not recognize His benefits to be those for which we sought Him.

Trinity Sunday I vehemently dissent from those who would not have private persons read the Holy Scriptures, nor read more

Trinity Sunday I vehemently dissent from those who would not have private persons read the Holy Scriptures, nor have them translated into the vulgar tongues. I would wish that all women -- girls even -- would read the Gospels and the letters of Paul. I wish that they were translated into all languages of all people. To make them understood is surely the first step. It may be that they might be ridiculed by many, but some would take them to heart. I long that the husbandman should sing portions of them to himself as he follows the plough, that the weaver should hum them to the tune of his shuttle, that the traveller should beguile with their stories the tedium of his journey.

There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need read more

There is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance. But what is Repentance? Not the last and noblest and most refined achievement of the righteousness of men in the service of God, but the first elemental act of the righteousness of God in the service of men; the work that God has written in their hearts and which, because it is from God and not from men, occasions joy in heaven; that looking forward to God, and to Him only, which is recognized only by God and by God Himself.