The North American Martyrs were a group of French Jesuit missionaries and their lay associates working among the Native American peoples of Canada and upstate New York. They were killed between 1642 and 1649, and were canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1930. The Martyrs are St. Jean de Brébeuf (1649), St. Noël Chabanel (1649), St. Antoine Daniel (1648), St. Charles Garnier (1649), St. René Goupil (1642), St. Isaac Jogues (1646), St. Jean de Lalande (1646), and St. Gabriel Lalemant... Read more

Robert Hugh Benson was the youngest son of Edward White Benson, Archbishop of Canterbury. He was educated atEton College, and then studied at Cambridge. In 1895, he was ordained an Anglican priest by his father. His father died suddenly in 1896, and Benson was sent on a trip to the Middle East to recover his own health. While there, he began to question the status of the Church of England and to consider the claims of the Roman Catholic Church.... Read more

The world is full of mysteries; the soul is full of mysteries; heaven is all mystery to us earthly creatures. But whoever embraces the cross with open heart finds therein the explanation of a thousand mysteries.Archbishop William Ullathorne, Humility and Patience (19th century) Read more

SAINT THERESE OF LISIEUXBy Alfred Barrett, S.J.Not as a prima donna in a poseBefore the swaying curtain when the playsIs clamorously ended, her bouquetLoosed on the throng,— not even as a roseCan I conceive of you. Let others, thoseWhose lyric season is incessant May,Cull similes to strew your “little way,”With hothouse verse and honeysuckle prose. You are too real, too actual, Therese,To live in metaphor. The girl behindThe legend, could the legend fade, would beThe girl you were, sobbing upon... Read more

On this day in 1905, the Catholic Extension Society of America was founded in Chicago by Father Francis Clement Kelley. Its purpose was to help spread (i.e., extend) the faith in rural and isolated parts of the country. Among the means they used to do this were building chapels, rectories and schools in areas where Catholic had no parish facilities. Extension (as it was known for short) brought religious services to these places through the use of chapel cars on... Read more

Today marks the death of Michael O’Connor, the only American bishop who ever gave up his see to join a religious order. Born in Cork, Ireland, he studied in France and Rome and was ordained in 1833. He returned to Ireland as a seminary professor. In 1839, he went to America as a professor at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia and soon thereafter he was appointed President. Two years later he was transferred to Pittsburgh. He planned to join... Read more

In God there can be no selfishness, because the three selves of God are three subsistent relations of selflessness, overflowing and superabounding in joy in the perfection of their gift of their one life to one another.Thomas Merton, Seeds of Contemplation Read more

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Giovanni Bellini, St. Francis in the Desert, ca. 1480 Read more

Contardo Ferrini was the son of a teacher who went on to become a learned man himself, one acquainted with some dozen languages. Today he is known as the patron of universities. Born in Milan, he received a doctorate in law in Italy and then earned a scholarship that enabled him to study Roman-Byzantine law in Berlin. As a renowned legal expert, he taught in various schools of higher education until he joined the faculty of the University of Pavia,... Read more