Ruminations of an Amateur Monastic
Fifty years ago today, on July 20, 1969, human beings first set foot upon the Moon. My mother claims I watched the landing, at the tender age of two, hiding underneath the coffee table. If so, I don’t remember it. My lovely bride Francine, however, does. Her birthday is July 21, and she clearly remembers having a lunar module on […]
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Tradition holds that on July 16, 1251, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to Saint Simon Stock, prior general of the Carmelites. She offered him a message of hope for the Order, a message that they sorely needed. At this time, the Carmelite Order was in trouble. They had their origins as a community of hermits on the slopes of Mount […]
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I’m going to go out on a limb and say that vanishingly few American churches have an image of today’s saint. But ours does. Let me explain. It’s a pretty rare thing when Kings become saints, or at least become canonized saints. I can only think of a handful off the top of my head, though I’m sure there are […]
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IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of […]
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Sir Thomas More (by Hans Holbein the Younger) Today is the memorial of one of my favourite saints, Saint Thomas More, who died at the hands of King Henry VIII (that villain). That is, today is his memorial in the modern Roman calendar, which he shares with Saint John Fisher, also executed by the same king. In my Benedictine ordo, […]
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On this day in 1917, the Blessed Virgin began appearing to three shepherd children in Fátima, Portugal. She appeared on the thirteenth day of six consecutive months, culminating in the great Miracle of the Sun. Regardless of miracles, Catholics are not obliged to believe these “private revelations”. Indeed, the Church is very careful to investigate these sorts of claims with […]
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Today is the feast of four great Abbots of the Benedictine Order: Saints Odo, Majolus, Odilo, and Hugh. They were all good and holy men, and during the course of their reigns over the Abbey of Cluny and its associated priories, they reformed western monasticism – indeed, it could be fairly said that together they saved western monasticism. My Monastic […]
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Were today not Easter Thursday, it would be the Feast of Saint Mark the Evangelist. Even though Mark is eclipsed today by his Master, it’s worth spending a moment with him. John Mark was one of the original seventy disciples (Luke 10:1 ff). Tradition holds that he was one of those who left Christ when he preached on the Bread […]
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NOTE: Particularly if this article leaves a bitter taste in your mouth, you’ll want to read the follow-up. It is a sort of apologia. Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the promulgation of the Novus Ordo Missae by Pope Saint Paul VI in his Apostolic Constitution Missale Romanum. There is, so far as I can tell, no mention of this […]
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Most folks have seen some variation of this photo of Bernini‘s “Chair of Peter” in the Vatican. It’s a masterpiece of baroque art, found in every art textbook covering the period. The chair in question is carried aloft by four saints. The image of the dove in the Holy Spirit window has been duplicated and copied all over the world […]
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On a cold winter morning in the year of our Lord 1300, a terrible snowstorm descended upon the rural hill country in northwest Spain. A peasant named Juan Santín made his way in the midst of the driving snow to the church of Santa María in the village of O Cebreiro for Mass. The priest, who had long ago lost his […]
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Happy Saint Agnes Day! Saint Agnes was a young Roman lady of 13 or 14 who suffered martyrdom in the persecutions of Diocletian in about the year 304. She was one of the youngest of the early martyrs and one of the most moving and articulate. Agnes hastened to the place of torture as a bride to her wedding feast. […]
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Today is the feast of the man many consider to be the founder of Christian monasticism, Saint Anthony the Great of Egypt, the “Father of Monks”. He was born in the middle of the third century in decidedly Pagan Middle Egypt to a well-to-do, comfortable family. He spent much of his life avoiding the sorts of comforts available to him […]
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Happy Eleventh Day of Christmas! Today we honour a more modern saint than those of recent days. Elizabeth Ann Seton was the first native-born American citizen to be canonized. She was born in 1774 and grew up in a home in upperclass New York society. Her father was frequently absent in London for his business, and her stepmother spurned her […]
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On this day in 1892, J.R.R. Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa. The Professor is 127 today! All around the world, at 9pm local time, the Tolkien Society and the Professor’s many other devotees will celebrate his birthday with a toast to “the Professor”. I will join in, and I encourage you to do the same. The Professor’s writing, […]
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It is altogether right and proper that we should celebrate Christ as the bringer of light on this, the day of the winter solstice. This was an ancient holy day in many religions, as indeed it continues to be. On this, the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere, where people for eons have begged their divinity for […]
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If you think that the Spanish conquistadors are the ones who imposed Catholicism on the hapless Aztecs, well you’re wrong. Lord knows they tried. And tried. And failed. In the first decade of Spanish rule (1521 – 1531), only a handful of natives embraced Christianity. And then… well, here’s the story as found in the venerable Catholic Encyclopedia: To a […]
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