The Deacon's Bench
St. Agnes via Wikipedia From the good people at Rome Reports, a short video showing the traditional blessing for the Feast of St. Agnes—and one attendee who had something to get off its chest. Pity he wasn’t blessing rabbits. Read more
St. Agnes via Wikipedia From the good people at Rome Reports, a short video showing the traditional blessing for the Feast of St. Agnes—and one attendee who had something to get off its chest. Pity he wasn’t blessing rabbits. Read more
From Wednesday’s General Audience, via Zenit: The meetings with families and young people at Manila, were salient moments of the visit to the Philippines. Healthy families are essential to the life of society. It gave us consolation and hope to see so many large families that welcome children as a true gift of God. They know that every child is a gift of God. I heard it said that families with many children and the birth of so many children are... Read more
From The BBC: Two Russian artists have been arrested after throwing holy water and shouting “rise up and leave” at the mausoleum containing Vladimir Lenin’s tomb. A video of Monday’s incident shows the men breaching a barrier to access the building in Moscow’s Red Square before dowsing one of its walls with water. Seconds later, police officers intervene and lead the two men to a nearby police vehicle. They could be held for up to 15 days for disorderly conduct, reports... Read more
I received the following e-mail this afternoon from Virginia Meagher, Director of the Office of Worship, Music and Christian Initiation for the Diocese of Stockton, California: As you often note the ordaining of new deacons, I thought I would share an unusual ordination with you from the Diocese of Stockton in California. Gregg Jacob has been preparing for the past five years to be ordained this coming September. This past fall, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and the disease has... Read more
The YouTube description from last year here notes: Muscovites braved minus 19 degree Celsius weather on Sunday (January 18) and plunged themselves into icy water to celebrate the Orthodox Epiphany. About a hundred people gathered on the frozen Moskva river in the west of Moscow for a prayer and a ritual dive. After a priest blessed the water, people formed a queue to the hole cut in the ice and started dipping in to the freezing water. “Now all water... Read more
Details from Conroe, Texas: Members of the community are grieving the loss of Mike Mims, a retired business man and beloved deacon at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church. Mims died Friday when the helicopter he was piloting crashed into a residential fence near The Woodlands. Michael Gene Mims, known as Mike, was 51 and a resident of Conroe. He hailed from California and was a graduate of the University of Southern California. Mims was a business man who wore... Read more
Photo: Aaron Almadro A Filipino who attended a papal Mass last weekend writes of how cynicism and doubt gave way to faith: I had only wanted to attend the mass. I admit, being through a lot of heartaches in 2013 and 2014 put a strain in my faith. The worst was when I lost my parents to Yolanda, my mother and father and our household help. Then just a few short months after the tragedy, after losing our home, I might... Read more
We just completed the annual novena at my parish in honor of St. Pio—more popularly known as Padre Pio. Our church includes a life-sized statue of the saint, which is an object of great devotion and affection. So as we prayed for Pio’s intervention over the last few days, I was reminded of this piece of news that has been sitting in my “to do” file for a few weeks. The St. Pio Foundation, which works to promote the charism... Read more
From The Anchoress: Fear is always what demands silence of others. In our neighborhood the carillons of Catholic parishes have been effectively “silenced” — their calls to prayer literally cannot be heard beyond the church grounds — because a neighbor found the lovely bells of the Angelus to be an “arrogant” intrusion upon his own awareness. He doesn’t worship anything, and doesn’t want to know from people who do, doesn’t want his conscious certitude to be intruded upon by any... Read more
View image | gettyimages.com From AP: Pope Francis denounced Monday what he calls the “ideological colonization” of families and the developing world, where he says progressive, Western ideas about birth control and gay rights are increasingly being imposed by groups, institutions or individual nations — often as a condition for development aid. Francis said Catholics don’t have to “be like rabbits” and have more children than is safe or responsible. He said there are plenty of church-approved ways to regulate... Read more
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