Lectio Divina continually invites us beyond ourselves, teaching us to recognise others in the text and to allow the Word to speak, says Fr Barry White Christianity is not, as Pope Benedict XVI so often reminded us, an intellectual system, a packet of dogmas, or a moralism. Christianity is an encounter, a love story;…
Tracing Ireland’s forgotten desert saint The antiquity of the Irish church is a historic curiosity. We truly know very little about how and when Christianity arrived on the shores of Ireland. But arrive it did, and we are left with a few highly stylised legends about how this came to be. One of our…
The eighth book of Augustine’s Confessions describes the climactic moment of his conversion to Christianity after a prolonged spiritual struggle with his own divided will. This book recounts the final steps of his journey toward fully committing to God, culminating in the famous struggle in the garden and a decisive moment when he hears a…
Is 8:23-9:3 (9:1-4); Ps 27(26) 1 Corinthians 1:10-13, 17; Matthew 4:12-23 Jesus said: Follow me! Matt. 4:12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. Matt. 4:13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, Matt. 4:14…
St Anthony of Padua is one of the most beloved saints of the Church whose feast day is celebrated each year on June 13. He is often confused with his namesake, St Anthony of the Desert, whose feast day we celebrate this Saturday, January 17. This earlier Anthony is considered to be the father of…
We’ve come to canonise uncertainty and to be suspicious of certainty, says Fr Chris Hayden “We take every thought captive, and bring it to obedience to Christ.” So writes St Paul in his Second Letter to the Corinthians (10:5). What we think, the set of ideas we hold, is not a matter of indifference.…
* Isaiah 49:3,5-6 – *1 Corinthians 1:1-3 – * John 1:29-34 The Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, leads us along almost the same path as the previous Sunday. Once again, we return to the River Jordan and to the event of Jesus’ baptism. This time, however, we are no longer direct witnesses of the…
During his long stay in Milan, Augustine entered that phase in life when, in ancient Rome, men focused on their careers and other pursuits before starting a family. In Book VI, Augustine laments: “here I was in my thirtieth year sticking fast in the same muddy bog.” Books VII-IX recount the three years that followed.…
There’s been a lot written about falling birth rates in the United States. Less covered has been the simultaneous decline in grandparenthood. Grandparents, to hear friends tell it, are an endangered species. Virtually every child-bearing demographic group except women over 40 is having fewer, if any, children. And let’s be honest: Potential grandparents with children…
The Gospel – Here is the Lamb of God! John 1:29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! John 1:30 This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me…
Fr Barry White
Fr Dominik Domagala