May 20 the Church celebrates Saint Bernardine of Siena, a Franciscan theologian and preacher renowned for his great eloquence, who went to great lengths to revive and strengthen Italy’s faith during the 15th Century. Born in 1380 to a noble family, Bernardine Albizeschi, as with so many of the saints, and as with so many…
Lisa Hendey Lately I note a trend on social media, among my peers of a certain age. Amid the cute grandbaby pictures at Christmas there were pleas for intercessory prayer for their aging parents. Going home for the holidays can be a real wakeup call as we realise that – seemingly overnight – our…
It’s common in this day and age to hear the Old Testament decried as mad, bad and barbaric. Many atheists say that it’s an instruction manual for how to be a bad person, rather than how to be a good one. Others say that God seems to have undergone a major personality shift between the…
In much of the secularised world, we live in a climate that is somewhat anti-ecclesial and anti-clerical. It’s quite fashionable today to bash the Churches, be they Roman Catholic, Protestant, or Evangelical. This is often done in the name of being open-minded and enlightened, and it’s the one bias that’s intellectually sanctioned. Say something derogatory…
Jem Sullivan The Sunday Gospel May 21, 2023 The Ascension of the Lord Acts: 1:1-11 Ps 47:2-3,6-7, 8-9 Eph 1:17-23 Mt 28:16-20 The making of promises is part of special celebrations that mark the days and weeks of spring and the Easter season. As we celebrate graduations, ordinations, weddings, baptisms, and first Communions, we hear…
Pope Francis carries with him a particular fondness for a Marian devotion that he had encountered in Bavaria, writes Fr Hedwig Lewis SJ ‘Mary Untier of Knots, pray for us’ would be a strange-sounding invocation in the Litany to Our Lady to which we are so accustomed. In fact, devotion to the Blessed Virgin under this…
On the path of these catecheses on old age, today we meet a biblical figure — an old man — named Eleazar, who lived at the time of the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes. He is a wonderful character. His character gives us a testimony of the special relationship that exists between the fidelity of old…
Athanasius I of Alexandria (c. 296–298 – 2 May 373), also called Athanasius the Great, Athanasius the Confessor, or, among Coptic Christians, Athanasius the Apostolic, was a Church Father and the 20th Pope of Alexandria. His intermittent episcopacy spanned 45 years (c. June 8, 328– May 2, 373), of which over 17 encompassed five exiles, when…
On the night before he entered into his Passion and death, Jesus gave all of us a compelling model to follow. Serve as Christ serves; give as Christ gives, freely and fully. Jesus asks us – priests, deacons, religious, married, single – to follow in his footsteps. We know that Jesus’ footsteps led him to…
Jenna Marie Cooper Catholics don’t pray that souls in purgatory won’t wind up in hell, because hell is no longer a possibility for them. We do pray because we hope that, through our prayers and sacrifices, the sufferings of their purgation might be eased and their journey to heaven might be hastened. Let us recall…
Fr Ronald Rolheiser