May 29, 2014

I love the Easter liturgical season. For the obvious reasons. But I also love the white robes, signifying celebration. We have 40 days of rejoicing as well as the 40 days of preparation of Lent. And also the readings. John, linked with Acts. It’s not just chronological–the stuff in Acts happened right after the Resurrection–it is ontological. The Resurrection is and leads to the life of the Church. The Church happened, quite literally, because of the Resurrection. No Resurrection, no... Read more

May 29, 2014

A sequel to this. Think of St Maximilian Kolbe. In Auschwitz, he offered to take the place of a man who had been marked to death. Now, there are many ways he could have excused himself from making this decision. Even ways you can criticize his decision. Reasonable ones. After all, he was pastoring to people in the camp. Didn’t his people need him? Wasn’t there many more people who he could have helped if he’d tried to survive just... Read more

May 27, 2014

As y’all know, I care a lot about the liturgy and why we should care about the liturgy and how we should go about it and how we should think about it. An obvious first way to think about it is through the lens of yesterday’s post, Morality as Worship. Is “behaving right” is itself a form of worship and the reason why we should do it is that we are called to worship–that our very nature is to worship... Read more

May 26, 2014

  Why should Christians act morally? Because if they do they will go to Heaven and if they don’t they will go to Hell? Surely that can’t be the answer. For as the New Atheists rightly point out, a morality based on self-interest is no morality at all. It seems to me that the Biblical answer is that God demands worship and that acting morally is a form of worship. As Joseph Ratzinger points out in The Spirit of the Liturgy, in the Book... Read more

May 21, 2014

So here’s a thing we should do. Or not, because it might turn out horrible. But, basically, the idea is to have a movie (or, rather, a movie series) that teaches the faith to kids through Paul’s life. Series of flashbacks. Here’s the idea: we start with Saul on the Road to Damascus. Through flashbacks we understand he persecuted the Christian Church. Then Paul goes up to Jerusalem and meets with the Apostles. He’s completely discombobulated. He understands that Christ... Read more

May 21, 2014

There’s a Sorkinism that goes “It seems to me that more and more we’ve come to expect less and less of each other.” Jesus expects one very simple thing from us: “Be perfect as my Heavenly Father is perfect.” As Fr Robert Barron puts it, this is “the Catholic thing.” The Church’s rules are incredibly demanding. In practice we can never follow them. What is the answer? Mercy, and forgiveness–and the grace of the Holy Spirit, which equips us for... Read more

May 20, 2014

The #protfuture conversation continues. First Things editor R.R. Reno has a reflection on it, as a Catholic and also one of the sponsors of the #protfuture event. He notes that while intra-Protestant discussions of the future of Protestantism inevitable involve some discussion of Catholicism, he doesn’t see intra-Catholic discussion about the future of Catholicism involving discussion of Protestantism. To my dismay and sadness, a lot of Protestants on the internet see me as anti-Protestant, so I may surprise them by... Read more

May 20, 2014

There’s a vicious cycle about confession, isn’t there? The more you sin, the harder it is to go; the less you go to confession, the more you sin. It becomes harder and harder to go to confession. And the Devil is always there, whispering in your ear: you’re too far gone, you’re too sinful, you’re not worthy, confession is not for you. Maybe we disagree with this at a theoretical level, but can there be something like that going on... Read more

May 19, 2014

There’s a wonderful phrase I first encountered in Cardinal Müller’s address to the LCWR–this post is not at all about that–which is the “sentire cum Ecclesia“, the capacity for a religious congregation or other group to feel with the Church. Every word there is important. Isn’t that great? We feel with the Church–with–the Church. It’s not, or not primarily, about theology (rather, “theology”), or doctrine, about Magisterium, and all the rest. When we feel with the Church, those things come naturally. And I... Read more

May 16, 2014

Very busy today and not much inspiration so I’ll just give you this excellent video of an excellent talk by the excellent Scott Hahn on a very important theme we are only now rediscovering, at least popularly, which is the liturgical theme and character in the Bible. Almost everything in the Bible is about the Liturgy. Take it away, Scott: Read more


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