The familiar modern image of the medieval knight—a creation of the Victorian romantic imagination, frequently appropriated by Hollywood—can be considered to be, at best, a distant and distorted shadow of its medieval literary ancestor, the knight of the chanson de geste. Knightly virtue, in the modern period, is believed to have consisted in raw physical … Read more
“The good God gave me a father and mother more worthy of Heaven than of earth.” So wrote St. Thérèse of Lisieux of her parents, Bl. Louis and Zélie Martin, who married at midnight on July 13, 1858 and whose feast is celebrated on July 12. In considering the parents, we tend to look first … Read more
A traveler in Wisconsin need not stray far from the Interstate before he gets a good sense of the wild and uncut territory that greeted the explorers, traders, and missionary priests who first brought European civilization and its Faith to the American Midwest. To the freshly ordained Samuel Mazzuchelli, O.P., the untamed Wisconsin Frontier of … Read more
Peter and Paul, the Fathers of great Rome, Now sitting in the Senate of the skies, One by the cross, the other by the sword, Sent to their thrones on high, to Life’s eternal prize. Elpis, the wife of Boethius, sings the praises of St. Peter and St. Paul in her Latin poem, Decora lux … Read more
When we consider the period in Western civilization known today as the Renaissance, we encounter a time of notable change in virtually every area of culture. Visual art was departing from the purely symbolic, representative forms of the Middle Ages and exhibiting a more earthly, mundane realism, and while it continued to concentrate on religious … Read more
Like flaming demons, Wallachians rushed out of the night and into the Turkish camp, striking terror in an army of terrorists. Leading the charge was a gore-spattered chieftain—hewing and hacking a path to the central tents where the Sultan huddled in fear. On he came, Vlad Dracul, raining down slaughter and raging for Mehmed’s blood. … Read more
Although it may not be so well-known, Brazil is the nation with the largest Catholic population in the world, about 123 million strong. Nevertheless, this nation had very humble beginnings. The Catholic foundations of this great nation were in large part laid by the sons of St. Ignatius. Of the many great Jesuits who worked … Read more
In June 1854 one of the fiercest outbursts of anti-Catholicism in American history began in Ellsworth, Maine. The victim was Father John Bapst, a Swiss Jesuit who nearly lost his life at the hands of a secret, anti-Catholic organization called the Know Nothings. Bapst had left his homeland in 1848 because of a religious civil … Read more
According to the new English edition of the Roman Missal, the priest, in the introductory rite, addresses the congregation as follows: “Brethren (Brothers and sisters), let us acknowledge our sins, and so prepare ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries.” The term, “sacred mysteries” in reference to the Mass is of ancient origin as is the … Read more
You could call the nineteenth century stupid, but hardly dull. At its birth, it was the stage for Napoleon’s antics and for the heroism of the captains of wooden ships; at its death, the old Europe itself was giving way before the hard, cold era of aluminum, centralized planning, and the IRS. Sure, it was … Read more
Near the close of the year 1925, Pope Pius XI issued his encyclical Quas Primas, introducing the Feast of Christ the King. By the celebration of this feast, it was thought that the teaching on Christ’s Social Kingship would more perfectly permeate the minds of men. Among other things, attacking the increasing secularism in social … Read more
In the year of Our Lord fourteen sixty-two, St. Peter’s chains’ day, I took the cloister’s bonds. In Gielniów, Peter begot me, but Peter, most kind, in the cloister enclosed me: smashed my chains. Thanking good God, with the Psalmist I sing: ‘You have broken my bonds, O merciful God, By a wretch be thanked, … Read more
In the nineteenth century, the West took great pride in its independence from the Church, an independence based on a new public authority rooted in the language of the natural sciences. Liberals and socialists disagreed on the nature of the economy, but both appealed to science to justify their positions. In France, this general faith … Read more
A little over a decade ago, a gathering of the who’s who of Catholic feminism issued the Madeleva Manifesto: A Message of Hope and Courage to Women in the Church. The signatories to the Manifesto included Charlie Curran’s defender Monika Hellwig and women’s ordination advocate, Joan Chittister. Not by accident, they issued their declaration on … Read more
When we study the history of the Church, we encounter what many have called the res Catholica, the “Catholic thing.” We use the non-descript Latin res quite deliberately in order to evoke within the reader a sense of enigma, of irreducible mystery. The saints of the Church are the strongest representatives of this res Catholica, … Read more
Although our minds are limited in their ability to attain God in this life, we are capable of “greater desire, and love, and pleasure in knowing divine matters” than we are able to find in “the perfect knowledge of the lowest things.” Thus far Aquinas, who taught as one who knew. Saint Nicholas of Flue … Read more
The resignation of Pope Benedict and the election of Pope Francis have set the eyes of the world on the papacy, and in the midst of the great joy of Catholics everywhere, there have been no lack of prognostications and concerns, often from those who know little of the spiritual dynamics of the Kingdom, about … Read more
O most charitable Jesus, you desired to enrich us, and so you first gave us your blood to wash us so that, having been purified, we might be able to receive the gifts you offer. O my dear Savior, you go out to the garden of Olives, to the house of Caiaphas, to the praetorium … Read more
As his time came near, Jesus came forth from his retreat at Ephraim and returned to Bethany, to the neighborhood of Jerusalem, just six days before the Passover. He came for a feast at the house of his friend Lazarus. Martha was serving, as was her habit, and Mary, in accord with hers, observed the … Read more
Humans are given to easy answers, especially when confronted with the dizzying intricacy of the world we inhabit. It is far simpler to attempt to account for complex causes with simple explanations, or to distill sophisticated historical and theological arguments into easily digested bits. Too often it seems that people think that St. Dominic swung … Read more