On observing the larger numbers for Easter one pastor wisecracked, “I have to apologize to all of you about all the lilies in Church. I wanted to get poinsettas, so it would look just like it did last time you were here…”

Amy Welborn covers Easter worldwide. She’s got moving photographs from Catholic celebrations of the Triduum from around the world. She’s also posted to Pope’s Easter message to the world as well as his homily at the Easter Vigil. Thanks, Amy for keeping at it while other bloggers were taking time off!

The Triduum at St Mary’s Greenville was splendid. I was priviledged to celebrate the Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Thursday. Fr Bart Leon celebrated conducted the Good Friday Liturgy and Fr Chris Smith presided at the Easter Vigil. The priests were supported by the whole team at St Mary’s–choir, our army of splendid altar [...]

I’m signing off for Holy Week, and will be back with the Alleluias.

A dear friend sent me this link to a story of a Jewish guy who converted to the Catholic faith. The story of his conversion is moving and real, then the story goes sour as he recounts his disappointing experience of Catholicism on the ground. He comes across New Agey kooks leading RCIA, ignorant Catholics, [...]

Daniel Herzog, The Episcopal Bishop of Albany has been received into full communion with the Catholic Church. Here’s the story. The detail that interests me is that (if I understand correctly) he somehow transferred his suffragan Bishop’s allegiance to an African bishop before resigning and handing over to his Episcopal successor. Can anyone illuminate us [...]

What is “Church unity”? Probably the most shallow concept of church unity is in the ecumenical movement as popularly understood. “Church Unity” in this context means Christians of different denominations should meet together, be more charitable toward one another, find ways to work out their differences, and where possible, work together for the common good. [...]

The discussions on Anglicans converting to Catholicism here and on Fr. Al Kimmel’s blog have been generating a lot of discussion across the blogosphere. Hits to this blog have gone through the roof. If you are reading this and are thinking through the claims of the Catholic faith there are plenty of good books to [...]

A.C.Grayling is one of London’s chattering class who espouse a shallow secularism and dress it up as philosophy. I commented on his most recent outing the other day. Carl Olson at Ignatius Insight has engaged with Grayling’s thought, and written an excellent counter argument. Take time to read this. Carl’s work is thorough, modest, incisive [...]

I love this quotation from Cardinal Newman’s Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine;If Christianity is both social and dogmatic, and intended for all ages, it must, humanly speaking, have an infallible expounder, else you will secure unity of form at the loss of unity of doctrine, or unity of doctrine at the loss of [...]

Check out this post to see how an American college student in the Bible Belt used Lady Day, angel cake and pink toenails as an opportunity to evangelize in her college dorm.

A reader has sent me this link about Elton John’s birthday party. The king of wigs, who recently bashed religion as ‘hateful’ and said organized religion should be banned, celebrated in the Episcopal cathedral of St John the Divine in New York. The cathedral was transformed into a huge party venue for all the bent [...]

The Telegraph of London gives space to secularist A.C.Grayling, who argues that religious believers are dangerous kooks. Grayling dishes out the weary old argument that all religion is dangerous because of the atrocities committed in it’s name. What I can never quite grasp is that these arguments come from guys who, on paper, seem to [...]

Over at Pontifications there is an interesting thread about Anglicans converting to Catholicism. It is easy to compare the two churches, thinking that they are pretty much the same, and forgetting that the Catholic Chuch is simply much, much larger than the Anglican Church. Fr. Newman chucks out this statistic: there are more Catholics at [...]

Last night in London, England the inner circle of UK Catholic bloggers met to plan their takeover of the world of Catholic blogging. In this rare photograph, the highly secretive cabal can be seen for the first time. Left to right are Fr.Nicholas of Roman Miscellany The mysterious conversant with cows, Dunadan, Fr Tim Finigan, [...]

It’s true my patient has agreed to go to a Healing Mass Hogwart, but you needn’t gloat quite so much. I’m not sure how you found out, but I expect you are already building up a network of sneaks and fiends who will sell their best friend for the assurance of promotion. Don’t worry; I [...]

There is a telling comment by Anglican theologian Ephraim Radner. He finally admits that those who wish to follow the historic Christian faith are not welcome in ECUSA. So that’s news? Anyway, Fr.Al Kimmel has a good post in reply with a good stream of comments about the future for orthodox Anglicans. I know many [...]

For those following the ATC (Anglican Train Crash) you won’t be surprised that the Communique which came out of the conference in Tanzania a few weeks ago has been kicked out by the Episcopalian Bishops. The communnique was a last attempt to bring the Episcopal Church to heel regarding homosexuality. In it the bishops of [...]

I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to post on St Joseph on Monday. Fr Christopher has a beautiful St Joseph story. He tells how St Joseph got him into the Catholic Church. Here’s one from our family: My younger brother, Daryl had become a Catholic. My older brother, Don (Yes, all five of us [...]

Check out Auntie Joanna if you would like to visit a typical British town on a Saturday night… … arrived in Manchester late on Saturday night, and the city centre was lively with shrieking, shouting young people, many drunk, a few vomiting or slumped in pub doorways. With intermittent blasts of driving rain, it was [...]

Go here if you would like to listen to the podcast of my sermon at St Mary’s for the fourth Sunday in Lent. The series is: ‘The War of the Worlds’. First Sunday is in text form. Second Sunday is a podcast: The Way of the World. Third Sunday is The Way of All Flesh. [...]

Hogwart, Slubgrip has ordered me to write to you about the sexual temptation of females. You should know that someone of my experience is far too busy to chat with juniors like yourself, but when Slubgrip exerts his considerable ‘charm’ how can one resist, or should I say, ‘How can one dare resist?’ I’ll be [...]